One Moonlit Night

by Caradog Prichard

  Dew, Mam thought the world of him as well. You should have seen her ironing his surplice and his stole on the table at home. She always left his surplice till last and did all the men’s and boys’ first. Then she’d clear the table and place his surplice on it very slowly and run her fingers along every pleat in it. And it was bigger than any of the others too cos Canon was over six feet tall. He was the biggest Parson I ever saw.

  Don’t ask silly questions, Mam said when I asked her where he’d caught smallpox.

  But why is there a scar by his mouth? I said.

  Get out of my sight, you little nuisance, said Mam. And I couldn’t understand why she was so cross.

  I was only asking, I said, watching the iron in her hand going backwards and forwards over the surplice, with her left hand holding the corner in case the iron went askew over the pleat.

  I was thinking about Griffith Evans Braich, Mam. Do you remember washing his surplice on the Tuesday before he was killed in the Quarry and he didn’t get to wear it the Sunday after? I was just thinking, I wonder if there’ll be a scar on Griffith Evans’ head in Heaven? And then I wondered if there’ll be a scar on Canon’s mouth when he’s gone to Heaven.

  And then Mam suddenly stopped ironing and started to cry.

  What’s up, Mam? Don’t cry, I said, but I wasn’t really worried, because Mam was always crying quietly about something and I was used to it. But she was looking at me so strangely that I was sorry that I’d said anything to her.

  No, there won’t be, chick, she said with tears rolling down her cheeks and her laughing at the same time. There won’t be a single scar on Griffith Evans Braich’s head in Heaven and there won’t be one on Canon’s face either after he’s gone there. And she stopped crying and went on with her ironing, singing.

  I remember the words she was singing too: See beyond the mi- ists of time, Ο my s-o-oul behold the view, Ο my s-o-oul beho-o-old the view.

  Dew, Mam had a good voice.

  There’s a light in the Vicarage study, too. Yes, I’m sure that’s the study window, where the little light is between those two trees. But it’s Azariah Jenkins who’s sitting in the chair in front of that fire now, I’m sure. Him and his wife, perhaps. It was him who came here after Hughes the Parson, who came here after Canon. He was a nice chap, old Hughes, too. But he had TB and he wasn’t a patch on Canon. He never gave me sixpence for not being able to read, anyway.

  Dew, I used to like going to the Vicarage after school to help Mam with the washing all those years ago. Nell, Little Will Policeman’s sister, and Gwen from Allt Bryn were the two maids there at that time. And even though Mam was much older than they were, they were great friends with her and still came to our house to see her after they got married. And it was a policeman that Nell married. Jones the New Policeman was her husband and I was never frightened of Jones the New Policeman cos Mam was such good friends with Nell, his wife. Gwen Allt Bryn was Frank Bee Hive’s wife after she left the Vicarage.

  Sit down there, love, said Nell when I went to the Vicarage for the first time after School to fetch Mam. I’ll cut you a piece of bread and butter in two minutes. Dew, the Vicarage kitchen was a big kitchen. It was twice as big as our kitchen and front room put together. And what a lovely smell! Dew, I used to love the smell, with me being starving hungry. And then I sat in the chair wolfing my bread and butter. And who came through the passage door but Gwen Allt Bryn with a big silver tray in her hand cos she’d just taken tea to Canon and the visitors who were there.

  Come to help your Mam? said Gwen. He’s a good boy, isn’t he, Nell? You’ll go to Heaven, you know, lad, for helping your Mam.

  Dew, Gwen had a pretty face. She had a prettier face than Nell, but Nell was the kinder of the two. She was always the first to give me a piece of bread and butter, every time I went there from School to help Mam with the clothes.

  Is it Price the School that’s there for tea? said Nell.

  Yes, said Gwen, putting the tray on the table. Have you had a hiding from Price yet? said Gwen.

  No, course not, I said, lying.

  Dew, you must be a right little angel then, said Gwen.

  I watched Nell filling a big paper bag with lots of crusts and spare bread and butter and leftover bones from the Vicarage dinner, with lots of meat still on them, until the bag was full to bursting. And Mam came in with her hair a bit ruffled and her arms full of washing from the line in the Vicarage Field, ready to take them home to iron after they’d been folded and wrapped in one of the woollen sheets. Then the three of them sat down and had a cup of tea and talked about lots of people and I was still sitting on the chair and counting the big, red, square tiles on the kitchen floor and thinking: Dew, this is a good place to play London with Huw and Moi, except we’d dirty the floor.

  You carry the paper bag, said Mam, I can carry these, meaning the washing, and remember to hold it underneath in case it tears.

  That was what I wanted her to say, of course, so I’d be able to put my hand into the paper bag on the way home when Mam wasn’t looking. But I never used to touch anything until after we’d gone down the lane to the Vicarage gate and out into Post Lane here in case Canon saw me through the study window. Dew, I’m sure he would have been cross with me too if he’d seen me, but he never once saw me doing anything. Dew, the bread from the paper bag tasted good on the way home. Sometimes I’d find a piece of meat without any bone. Mam never used to speak on the way home, she was too tired, or I’d have had to answer her and then she would have known by the way I spoke that I had my mouth full. The taste of the Vicarage’s dry bread was better than Gran’s bread and butter, even when that was thick with butter.

  I used to be frightened of going through those trees after I’d gone through the Vicarage gate when I went to fetch Mam after school in the winter and it was starting to go dark. They were like the trees in the Graveyard at that time. But I’d be okay once I was past the bend in the path and I could see the light in Canon’s study. I wasn’t frightened then.

  It was different in the summer. Dew, I remember once, there was no school one afternoon and I’d gone to the Vicarage and been allowed to go round the front and play with a little boy who had come there to stay. He called Canon uncle, and he spoke English. Dew, he was a nice little boy, with black hair, and it was shiny, and there was a nice quiff in it. And he had big black eyes, and his face was white, white as chalk, and he had little velvet trousers that showed half his legs, and white stockings, and slippers on his feet, not hobnailed boots like me.

  That’s why I was afraid of trampling the grass at the front outside the window when I was playing bat and ball with him, because I had hobnailed boots and the grass looked just as though Mam had been ironing it, not like the grass in Owen Gorlan’s field. Dew, I said to myself as I played with him, I’d like to have manners like him. But I must have been a good boy, because I was allowed to go inside with him through the glass door at the front and sit at the table with him to have tea after taking my cap off. Afterwards, the two of us went to the Vicarage Garden to scrump gooseberries.

  Ceri, Canon’s daughter, caught us scrumping the gooseberries. She suddenly walked out from the middle of the flowers in the greenhouse, without us seeing her until she was right beside us. And I blushed right up to my ears and didn’t say anything, in case I got told off, and then the little boy said something in English that made her burst out laughing. Oh, she had the nicest face I’d ever seen. I’ll never forget it as long as I live.

  How old is Ceri, Canon’s daughter, Mam? I said when I’d gone home.

  Oh, about eighteen, Mam said.

  And I went to the bedroom and lay on the bed and cried because she was so old.

  When I saw her that time, she didn’t have a hat on, and she had the fairest of fair hair, and the sun was shining upon it, and there was a flower from the greenhouse fixed on the side of her head, and two long plaits of hair, with pink ribbons in them going down her back. She had a pink frock with all sorts of co
lours in it, like there were in the window of the greenhouse with all the flowers. And when she bent down to speak to us, with her chest in full view, there was a smell of scent everywhere, and I started shaking like a leaf. I told myself I’d never scrump gooseberries again, or go scrumping apples with Huw and Moi, or swear or do any kind of mischief. Nothing except think about Ceri.

  Mam couldn’t understand why I was walking so fast with the paper bag on the way home that night. And I didn’t touch the meat or the crusts either. I just wanted to hurry home so I could go to bed and dream about Ceri. But I cried myself to sleep in the bedroom after Mam had said that Ceri was eighteen and too old for me to be her sweetheart.

  But I’ll pretend that she isn’t so old, I said to myself before I went to sleep. And she must like me because she didn’t tell Canon that me and the little boy had been scrumping gooseberries.

  Dew, I don’t know what Canon would have said either. He could be a wild one sometimes. I saw him in a rage once, but I don’t know what about, and I didn’t tell anyone because I was such good friends with him after he gave me that sixpence for not being able to read. But he wasn’t in the same kind of rage as Price the School used to get into. Dew, I got a shock, too. It was a moonlit night just like tonight, and I’d gone to the Vicarage late to fetch Mam. That’s how I saw him after going through the gate and up the path, they hadn’t pulled the blind down on the study window, and that’s where he was.

  I went up very quietly behind the tree to peep in through the window, shaking like a leaf in case I got caught. He was walking backwards and forwards. Backwards and forwards without a pause from one end of the study to the other and beating his head with his fists. And if you’d seen his face! His eyes were flashing like lightning and his white hair was all over the place, not combed like it usually was. And that scar by his mouth looked as though someone had just put a hot poker on it.

  He was on his own, but his lips were going as though he was having a hell of a row with someone. I nearly had a fit when he came up to the window and looked out, frightened that he had seen me. But his eyes didn’t look as though he was looking at anyone, only as though they were full of lightning flashing, although it was a fine moonlit night, except that the trees made it dark. His lips were still moving when he came to the window. But I couldn’t hear anything, I could only see him, as though he was saying: Strive ye for salvation through Godinjesuschrist. But maybe it was something else he was saying. The minute he turned his back to the window, I flew from behind the tree to the back door.

  What’s the matter with you, sweetheart? said Nell after she’d opened the door and given me a piece of bread and butter by the fire. You’re as white as chalk. Have you seen a bogeyman?

  No, course not, I said, wolfing down the bread. It’s old women like you that see bogeymen.

  But as I was sitting on the chair counting the tiles and thinking about Huw and Moi and me dirtying them by playing London on them, the three of them were sitting at the table talking very quietly about something.

  I didn’t say anything about it to Mam on the way home, and luckily I didn’t dip into the paper bag because Mam didn’t seem tired, like she usually did. And she was talking to me just as though I was a man and understood everything.

  Do you know what those old devils in the Village are saying now? she said as we reached the gate into Lôn Newydd.

  No, Mam, I said.

  They’re saying that God’s to blame for the War. And a lot of them Church people too. There was a terrible atmosphere in the Vicarage this afternoon. Some of them went to see Canon to tell him they weren’t going to go near the Church again until the War stops.

  They’re never saying that, Mam.

  Yes, really, and Nell was saying it’s that devil from The Blue Bell who’s behind them.

  Who, Johnny Beer Barrel’s Dad?

  Yes, the old good-for-nothing. Him and Johnny Williams the Barber. But they weren’t with the gang who went to the Vicarage. The two old scoundrels are leaving it to other people to do the talking. While they’re hiding behind a beer barrel, no doubt.

  I bet they are too, Mam.

  Yes, and they’ll both be at Communion on Sunday as bold as that bloomin’ Grace Ellen. But they really caught it from Canon in the Vicarage. Dew, he gave them a right telling off, Gwen said. Gwen had been listening to him lay into them when she took the tea in. Dew, you should have heard what Canon said to them.

  What did he say, Mam?

  Oh, nothing. Never mind what he said. Put the key in the lock. Dew, this washing’s heavy tonight. I’m nearly dropping.

  And she didn’t say anything else after we went into the house, just told me to hurry up and have supper and go to bed so she could get on with the ironing. And I went, still thinking about Canon reading the Riot Act to those people, and about him reading it to himself when I was peeping through the study window, and promising to half kill Johnny Beer Barrel in school the next day cos his Dad was telling the people in The Blue Bell that God was to blame for the War.

  Maybe that’s why Price the School never went to The Blue Bell at playtime again after that day when Canon came to School to say that Little Bob School had been killed in the War. Dew, I’ll never forget that day. It was after playtime and Price the School had been in The Blue Bell and his face was red but he was in a really good mood too, and he didn’t cane anyone.

  He was busy telling us about the Germans cutting off women’s breasts with swords and slicing little babies up the middle when Canon came past the Graveyard window and in through the door. And he went to sit quietly at the desk without Price hearing him come in and put his flat-brimmed hat down on the desk and sat in the chair and wiped the sweat from his forehead with a big, white handkerchief. Price didn’t know he was there, even though no one was paying attention to the lesson cos we were all looking at Canon. Price finally turned round when he heard him cough.

  Then he stopped talking about the Germans and walked very slowly to the chair where Canon was sitting. Canon was twice as tall as Price the School when he got up from the chair, and the two of them talked together for ages and ages, with Canon holding Price’s hand with his own right hand and with his left hand on Price’s shoulder. And we didn’t understand what the matter was until Canon sat down and wiped the sweat from his forehead again, and Price the School walked slowly back to us and said that Little Bob School had been killed by the Germans.

  But what frightened us was seeing him fall to his knees on the floor and put his hands together as though he was going to say his prayers. And his eyes were closed and tears were rolling down his cheeks. Dew, I’ll never forget what he said, either. I went straight home from school and I didn’t move from the house until I’d learnt every word, and Bob Milk Cart gave me sixpence the next Sunday at Sunday School for reciting them all the way through without a single mistake.

  God who is my refuge and my strength, said Price with his eyes closed and the tears pouring, a very present help in trouble. Therefore will we not fear, though the earth be removed; and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; though the waters thereof roar and be troubled; though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof. There is a river, the streams thereof shall make glad the city of God: the holy place of the tabernacles of the Most High. God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved: God shall help her and that right early. The heathens raged, the kingdoms were moved: he uttered his voice, the earth melted. The lord of hosts is with us: the God of Jacob is our Refuge. Come, behold the works of the Lord. What desolations he hath made in the earth. He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth; he breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; he burneth the chariot in the fire. Be still and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth. The Lord of hosts is with us. The God of Jacob is our Refuge.

  I was beginning to feel ill as I listened to him. Aw it’s a shame, isn’t it? I said very quietly to Huw, who was sitting beside me.
r />   Yes, Huw said, but how can he cry with his eyes shut?

  I don’t know, boy.

  Me neither.

  Little did we think, Huw and me, that that would be the last time we’d see Canon alive. He wasn’t in Church the next Sunday, nor the following Sunday, nor the Sunday after that. And on the Tuesday after that, we were looking at him in his coffin.

  The coffin was in the study over there, but it was daylight and the sun was shining when we walked with the Church Choir through the Graveyard to the Vicarage, and once round the coffin and then back from the Vicarage to the Church and the Graveyard along Post Lane here. His mouth was shut tight, just as it always was after he’d finished preaching hellfire in the pulpit, or at choir practice.

  Dew, I wish I could have come with you to the funeral, said Moi when we told him how he’d looked in his coffin.

  But Moi was at Chapel so he wasn’t allowed to come. Only the choirboys were allowed to go.

  Mam was right too when she said there’d be no scar on his mouth in Heaven. There was no sign of it on his mouth when I looked at his face as I passed by the coffin in the study.

  Did you see that scar that was usually by his mouth, Huw? I said.

  No, said Huw.

  Me neither.

  It died with him, I suppose, Huw said.

  But talking about Mam. Dew, I thought she was going to go out of her mind that day when Little Owen the Coal shouted through the door, as he passed, that Canon had died in the Vicarage. And somehow, she was never the same after that. She never went to the Vicarage again to wash for Hughes the Parson who came there after him.

  But the strange thing was, Canon never knew about John Elwyn, Ceri’s brother, dying, and John Elwyn never knew about Canon dying. It was on the Friday that Canon died and it was on the Friday that a telegram came to the Vicarage to say that John Elwyn had been killed by the Germans, just like Little Bob the School, and they were both the same age and just as good friends as Canon and Price the School were.