The Child From the Sea

by Elizabeth Goudge

  “They overtook me,” William was saying with incoherent delight. “I had not left Haverfordwest a couple of miles behind before they overtook me on the road. My sons.”

  “Has Cousin Llewellyn died?” Lucy heard herself asking.

  “Who? Llewellyn? Last night. Poor fellow. My two sons, Lucy! Overtook me on the road home. It was Richard who thought of coming to visit us. It was Richard thought of it.”

  Lucy realized that he was almost stupefied with joy. The son he had thought lost was home again. “For this my son was dead and is alive again, was lost and is found.” A sort of weeping started up inside her. Richard had brought this joy to their father but what was she going to bring him? Not shame, she had spared him that, but at the very first sight of his face as he rode down the hill she had known it would not be happiness. She had been drifting on a sea of joy and had let the tide carry her whither it would, but now the shore was rocky. She and Charles had seemed immune in bliss only a short while ago but it had been a false immunity, and now they were united once more with the sorrow of the world.

  Yet she played her part and in the cottage, as her brothers devoured the food she had prepared for Charles, her loving welcome was all that Justus had longed for and Richard had expected.

  “Justus had put his eyes out over his law books, and I found myself temporarily out of employment,” he said. “I have, as perhaps you know, been working as secretary to a certain noble lord, a member of the government, who has died, God rest his soul, and it seemed a good opportunity for us both to take a holiday and come and see you and my father. It has been a difficult journey but well worth every effort to see you both so blooming.”

  He paused, crossing one elegant leg over the other, and smiled at his sister, whose adult beauty he found both astonishing and gratifying; positively Bud had developed into a sister to be cultivated. She was equally astonished by the change in him. In the past he had not been much of a talker, preferring to listen cynically to other people making fools of themselves rather than risk anything of the sort himself, but now he talked easily and with charm. But not, she thought, out of genuine friendliness, for his fine eyes had still their old coldness. He was still Richard, not really the stuff of which prodigal sons are made. Why had he come, she wondered? Then she returned his smile with a rush of grateful affection, for he had made their father happy . . . And she must make him unhappy . . . Abruptly she turned her face towards the open door and the sea, afraid that Richard would read in it the mingled joy and dread that were tearing her apart.

  “Could we go now, sir?” It was Justus speaking to his father. His endearing homeliness was now intensified by the fact that his voice was breaking. Its alternate squeaks and organ notes were making William laugh, and as Justus never minded being laughed at he was laughing himself; and a further sign of his maturity was the deep warm chuckling laugh he was developing. Then he and his father suddenly sobered. “I have been thinking of it all the way home; next after you and Lucy and Dewi. Well, it is home, whatever has happened to it now.”

  “You will have a shock when you go inside,” his father warned him.

  “Let us go now!” Justus pleaded.

  “No!” Lucy cried in panic, swinging round to them. “No, sir. No, Justus. Not to the castle. Not yet. I must talk to my father first, and you and Richard shall know later. But my father first. Please, sir, I would talk to you alone.”

  They had finished their meal and Richard instantly got up, suave and a little mocking. “My very beautiful sister, I have been wondering for some while who gave you that handsome ring. Justus and I will go down to the beach. When you are ready to receive our congratulations, shout.”

  Justus, as unobservant as his father of such matters, had not noticed the ring. He gazed at it for a moment, astonished, and then as he followed Richard gripped Lucy’s hand without looking at her. It was no longer a little boy’s hand, slipping into hers for protection, but a man’s hand giving her reassurance. Yet it felt rough as always, for Justus never bothered to dry his hands properly. He had not changed. Because of him she could turn to face her father in control of herself, and not weep at sight of his suddenly old and stricken face. “I am married,” she whispered to him, her arms round his neck. “Do not you know that I would never disgrace you?”

  It was one of the worst half-hours of her life for she could not understand the depth of his anger and grief. That her deception and secrecy should distress him was not surprising, for there had never been anything but honesty between them, but even more it was the mere fact of what she had done that overwhelmed him with anger. And what had she done, she asked him at last? Married a good man in honest wedlock, and he was behaving as though she had become the mistress of a thief or mountebank. Did it make so much difference that he was a prince? Were they not fighting a vile civil war? Charles might be dead in a month. Her voice broke and William braced himself for the expected storm of tears, but it did not come, and by this he knew the depth of Bud’s hurt. She had never cried when he whipped her.

  There was a long silence while he struggled with himself and then he said gently, “Well, Bud, what’s done is done. I can only pray for your happiness. We are, as you say, at war, and can only live for the day. But Bud, Bud, I looked to see you the wife of some country gentleman of our own walk in life, secure and comfortable in a life you know.”

  He broke off, for she was in his arms, and beginning to cry a little. “You do not know Charles,” she said through her tears. “You do not know what he is. The dearest and the best. Will you come now and see him?”

  “No, Bud, no!” poor William said in horror. “He does not know I am here. You go now and tell him of my coming and then let me know his wishes. I am stunned, Bud. I cannot get my bearings at all.”

  “You will tell my brothers?” asked Lucy.

  “I will tell them.”

  She left him and climbed the hill to the castle. Why must her father spoil it all with his distress? Why could he not see that she and Charles hated the dishonesty and secrecy of what they had done as much as he did, but had not been able to help themselves? Why could he not rejoice with her in the glory of this happiness? Why must parents always be so difficult? At their ages, poor things, she thought, they lacked courage and hope in the future. They had lost the power to step out bravely. But they must know they were like this so why could they not put their trust in their children?

  In the garden she found Charles weeding, and Dewi with him. She had not realized that Dewi had left the family party, but she remembered now that he always absented himself at the first hint of family disagreement; especially if the food had already been finished. He disliked fracas unless he was himself the centre of it and had scampered off to his hero Charles.

  “Dear heart, Dewi has told me,” said Charles straightening himself. “I am very sorry.”

  “My father is very distressed. What shall we do?”

  “Is he very angry with me?”

  “No. I do not think so. But he would not come with me to see you. He asked me to discover your wishes first.”

  Charles had been trained from the cradle to the tactful smoothing out of difficulties and rubbing his earthy hands up and down his shabby breeches he considered this one. “We will ask your father and brothers to our wedding feast,” he said. “Dewi shall take the message now and you and I will go down to the mill and collect some food for it.”

  “Not you,” said Lucy.

  “Yes. The village know I am here now. You remember I stood out in the road this morning to watch you go down the hill? When I turned back again there were two men coming from the direction of the church. Good-looking men, not villagers, but evidently at home on their own ground. I saluted them and came back into the garden. They looked dumbfounded but they did not follow me; I think they had seen me waving to you.”

  “They were Howel and Owen Perrot,” said Lucy. “Owen is my fa
ther’s bailiff and they live at the mill.” She smiled. “Well, Tomos can now go free.”

  She was pleased, she found, and so was Charles, for they were relieved of some of the pretence. They went down the hill together with clasped hands swinging and Dewi strutting in front like a bantam cock. It was with tremendous pride that Lucy presented her husband Tomos Barlow to the family at the mill, but they were not so surprised as she had thought they would be. Damaris knew very well all that happened on the road beyond her home for she had a species of second sight that brought her to the window, or out into the garden, the moment there was anything to be observed. She had seen the notary and his clerk riding by and she had seen Old Parson leave the house and Lucy waiting for him. She had seen the notary and his clerk riding by again, and the return of Old Parson, and the reappearance of Old Parson’s fever had needed accounting for too. She knew there had been a wedding and when her husband and his brother had told her of the tall dark young man skulking in the castle garden she had merely remarked, “Fancy!” Confronted with Tomos she was at first a little stiff because she had not been told before, but she fell quickly under his spell, rolled up her sleeves and ransacked her larder.

  At the appointed hour the wind was rising, with the promise of rain in its chilliness, but the old kitchen looked capable of defying any kind of storm or sorrow. A log fire was blazing and the candles Damaris had given them were alight on the table and dresser. There was good food and two bottles of home-brewed wine, and Lucy had picked an armful of traveller’s joy and honeysuckle starred with red berries to soften the stony places with feathery snow and royal crimson. Dewi was sent running through the wind down to the cove to fetch the guests when all was ready, and Charles and Lucy were standing in the hall to welcome them when William and his sons came up the steps. For a moment Lucy was surprised to see that her father and Richard and Justus were wearing their swords, and then she remembered the old ceremony of loyalty that was to come and she smiled with a great breath of relief, realizing that her father had himself in hand and was ready to play his part. Without a glance at her he pulled off his cloak and stepped forward to kiss the prince’s hand. But Charles forestalled him. In a flash he was kneeling before his father-in-law to ask his blessing.

  It was a good beginning and a feeling of ease and timelessness fell upon them all as they sat together round the old table beside the well. Even William, though his nagging anxiety was very precariously battened down, relaxed and let a gentle glow of pride take slow possession of him. For Bud in her radiant happiness was looking more lovely than he had ever seen her, and was it a small thing that she had won the love of a prince? Had he not reason for pride as well as anxiety? And that her husband loved her he had no doubt. Charles was intent on bringing reassurance and happiness to his father and brothers-in-law but his dark eyes always came back to Lucy, and whenever he looked at her his face lit up in a way to which William’s heart responded with a lurch of sympathy. What else could any young man have done? Not to have followed Bud would have called for a resolution of which only maturity could have been capable. At his age I would have done the same, thought William, and under the influence of his son-in-law’s charm, and the warmth, and the wine brewed by Damaris from wild mountain raspberries, he began to melt into a state almost bordering on happiness.

  Justus took longer to melt. Knowing his brother he could not believe Richard had undertaken a dangerous journey out of family affection alone. Richard declared that he had no politics but his late employer had been a member of the Puritan government. What was Richard doing in Wales? Was he a danger to the prince? At the moment Justus thought he was not. Until the war was actually over, he had said upon the journey, one could not rule out a final swing of the pendulum. A Parliamentary victory now seemed certain but dying fires could spring into life again. One must remember that, he had said. He was remembering it, Justus thought and hoped, and regarding the heir to the throne as a secret investment that might yet prove useful. Justus too, like his father, began to feel happier. He lifted his dormouse head and said to William, “Sir, we never thought we should all dine together again under our own roof. And with the Prince as our guest.” He paused and smiled shyly at Charles. “It is a marvel.”

  The meal was finished and they rose to their feet. William filled the largest of the horn cups with the last of the wine and the men drew their swords. Dewi had no sword but he grabbed a knife instead. In a large assembly it was the custom as the cup was passed round the circle for two men at a time to stand while the health was drunk, so that each man as he lifted the heavy two-handled cup was defended by his neighbour, who stood beside him with raised sword. But with the Prince present, though the swords were raised turn by turn, they all stood. “I am sorry, sir,” said William, “that we must drink to His Majesty from a horn cup. It should have been my very best silver standing cup but my silver was taken from me.” Then he gave the toast, “The King.” They drank it in silence and Charles as he drank to his father was defended by William’s sword, and Lucy stood upon his other side.

  “The Prince,” said Richard, and they drank again. Charles glanced from one to the other and for a moment he saw these people as they might have been, standing on the dais of the great hall, their beautiful roof sound and strong over their heads, the long table gleaming with the silver cups and dishes. And now they stood in an old smoke-grimed kitchen, and above was the desolate hall, the roof open to the sky and the wind moaning through the empty windows and rustling the dead leaves on the floor. And they must drink to his father from a horn cup and receive into their family a prince who had nothing to bring them but added anxiety, more sorrow, increased poverty. That for a moment was how he saw it and he was speechless, unaware of the tears on his face until he felt Lucy’s hand in his and knew it was there for comfort’s sake. He looked round at the one girl of the party and saw her radiant, her blue eyes alight with encouragement and hope.

  “The bride and bridegroom,” said Justus, his voice beginning as a frog’s croak and ending in a falsetto squeak. The comedy of it broke the tension and they dissolved into laughter. When it was found that there was no more wine and they could not drink the toast the young ones were laughing too much to be disturbed. But William minded that there was no wine left in which to drink to Bud’s happiness.

  Afterwards Lucy fetched the flute and the guitar, all that was left now of the family treasure, and they sat before the fire and made music. Giving himself to the enchanting of his new relatives, and changing from the flute to the guitar that was his favourite musical instrument, Charles sang one of the songs that in happy days they had sung at Whitehall. His voice was not very sure of itself yet but it was a musicianly performance. Listening to him, trying to glean some knowledge of the boy who now had Bud’s happiness in the hollow of his hand, William remembered that evening in London when the guards had been out to protect the palace and he had worried about the safety of the royal children. The boy now singing was one of the children. How closely human lives were interwoven one with another, and also, it seemed to him at that moment, wonderfully. He was aware of wonder in the air and it comforted him. The wonder of first love, the wonder of music and the flames on the hearth. Wonder was a most comforting thing. It bore witness to realities beyond human understanding, even to the supreme reality that controlled the end.

  “Your turn, Father.” Too much ale had impaired the fine tenor voice William had once possessed, but he could still play the flute like a master and he played the airs of old Welsh dances until he had the feet of his children tapping on the floor.

  But it was Richard who brought the evening to a climax. He had inherited his father’s voice, though no one had known it until tonight. Nor had anyone known that he cared enough for the songs of Wales to have committed The Grove of Broom to memory. Yet he had, and with apologies to Charles because the girl’s hair was the wrong colour, he sang the golden song with a perfection to match its own. “I will remember him
like this always,” Lucy thought to herself. “Whatever happens afterwards I will remember him like this.”

  There for me and my sweetheart

  Is life, a fresh saffron field.

  I’ve a house, a good dwelling

  Made of Arabian gold.

  Tent of the firmament’s Lord,

  Cloth of gold, the roof’s speckled;

  A fair angel of heaven

  Embroidered it for May’s bed:

  Gold gossamer, wondrous bees,

  God’s glow-worms, gems of sunlight.

  What bliss, on the vine-clad hill

  To have the young twigs gilded,

  And the tips of bushes seen

  Like the stars, golden bullion.

  Thus have I, all one colour,

  Flowers of May like small birds.

  What a joyful thing it is,

  The grove veiled like an angel!

  I keep the grove and the glade,

  Fine custom, for my sweetheart.

  My bond’s good, I’ll not go from

  The grove with its gold-speckled veil

  Without, this summer, one tryst,

  Gold-haired girl in the greenwood.

  Let her come, where none part us,

  Fair slim girl, beneath fresh broom.

  Into the silence there came a rush of wind, the flames of the fire staggered and Dewi, who had been curled up on the hearth fast asleep for the last half-hour, woke up and with his fists stuck in his eyes began to whimper. He had been dreaming that something was after him and the rush of the wind had been like a pounce. They picked him up and comforted him, but their hour of harmony was over and William rose wearily to his feet and turned to Charles. “Son, you must be gone tomorrow. It is not safe for you to be here.” Charles had smiled in delight that he had been called “son,” but now panic wiped the smile from his face. Leave his fair slim girl after only two nights with her? No, begod! “No, sir! I cannot possibly go tomorrow.”