The Making of William Edwards Part 24

'The best way to do that would be to find the lease,' put in Davy. 'I wonder where grandfather did be hiding it?'

'I'll find it out, if I pull the old house down, stone by stone,' cried William pa.s.sionately; adding in another tone, 'Look you here, mother, crying will not be mending a broken egg. Let us show the old wretch a bold front, and who knows but G.o.d may help us to find the lease and keep the farm in spite of him. But, if not, in twelve months' time _I_ may be making a home for you, farm or no farm.'

Rhys alone had not spoken. Jonet had crept up to her mother, and, kneeling by her side, whispered comforting words, whilst tears ran down her own cheeks.

Rhys dashed the paper down on the floor and strode out, a suppressed cry of bitter anguish bursting from him. He could not ask Cate to marry now, with ruin hanging over them! He almost reeled against the doorway of the newly-erected addition, and groaned aloud. He felt as if the blow was directed against him--him above all.

'I did be so happy,' he murmured, 'and now--Oh, Cate, dear Cate, how can I be breaking the terrible news to you!'

Davy had followed Rhys.

"Deed, I will be for telling Cate, if it will be saving you pain,' he suggested quietly. 'Perhaps she may be taking it best from me.'

'Sure, Davy, you was always a good fellow,' was all the a.s.sent of Rhys.

But without turning round he stretched out his broad brown hand to meet the warm clasp of Davy, who, in another minute, was on his way steadily downhill.

Probably both brothers antic.i.p.ated hot-tempered tantrums from Cate Griffiths at the sudden change of her matrimonial prospects. But for once it was the mother, and not the girl, who flew into a rage at what she regarded as the final defeat of long-laid schemes.

For a moment Cate seemed dazed. 'Poor Rhys!' was all she said; 'he will need some one to comfort him, and your mother too.'

Ten minutes later Rhys, leaning stupidly against the door-frame where Davy had left him, felt a pair of warm arms steal round his neck, and a loving voice say, 'Poor Rhys! What do it matter? There do be other farms to be had. We shall not lose each other if we do be waiting. You have got a lease _somewhere_ that shall upset old Pryse. And look you, Rhys, neither Pryse nor his lords.h.i.+p have leases of their lives. He may not live to turn you out. Do not be disheartened. Trust G.o.d, do your duty, and leave the rest to Him!'

Poor Rhys! The very first words of sympathy had sunk into his soul. He had never known Cate so loving in all his life. She had been wayward, teasing, and tantalising, but never thus. His trial sank to nothing in the new discovery. He clasped her close, and took courage. Half his fear had been to lose her.

A loud summons from Ales recalled Rhys to neglected duties, and barefooted Cate sped homewards to have a sharp-tongued contest with her mother, who renewed an old cry that 'Cate needn't be spoiling her market for Rhys Edwards, whatever.'

The news spread rapidly that Mrs. Edwards had notice to quit the farm next Michaelmas, and commiseration was general.

But when Jane Edwards, supported by Rhys and Owen Griffith, walked into Mr. Pryse's apartment at the inn on the 9th of October, Caerphilly Fair Day, neither she nor Rhys made any allusion to the notice received or looked in any way daunted.

She put down her money, and asked for her receipt.

The agent eyed her curiously, but in the face of two witnesses he required to guard his words.

As Mrs. Edwards examined carefully the receipt he gave, he remarked, with his sinister smile--

'His lords.h.i.+p requires you to pay due regard to the ejectment notice served upon you. He cannot permit _tenants at will_ to build on his land without express permission.'

'_If_ his lords.h.i.+p do be knowing anything of that ejectment notice, he will know that it be just so much waste paper. Good-day, sir.'

He opened his eyes wide for once, and stared at her, but without another word Mrs. Edwards left the room, followed by Rhys and Griffith, who had previously paid his rent.

'You touched him there,' said they both in a breath, when clear of the inn.

They would have been sure of it had they seen him start from his seat and grasp the arms of his chair, exclaiming, as he sank back again--

'Confound the woman! What did she mean? Is the lease found? And what meant her innuendo anent his lords.h.i.+p's knowledge. They cannot have--but--no, no!' And there he sat biting his long nails in perplexity, oblivious of frequent knocks at the door, or tenants waiting in the pa.s.sage for their turn.

No, the lease had not been found, but something else had, from which Mrs. Edwards derived her courage.

In the first outpouring of her indignation she had forbidden William to proceed with his thatching. But he was equally persistent.

'What, mother!' he cried hotly, 'leave that bit of a place unroofed to be telling old Pryse that we be frightened by his dirty paper? Not I.

And it's my belief his lords.h.i.+p does not know one word about it, whatever.'

The words dropped from his lips like an inspiration. His mother caught at them.

William, taking the bit between his teeth, was up his ladder, with John Llwyd in attendance, before she had fully mastered the probabilities of the case.

It was not a long business, for considering the state of affairs he was not so foolhardy as to re-roof the whole farm. But to make a neat job of it he had to clear away the worn and jagged edges of the old thatch to make an even joining.

As he did so, and created a gap, something fell down inside the kitchen with a thud and a rattle.

'Name o' goodness, what's that?' cried Ales from the fireplace, almost losing her hold of the iron pot she was hanging on the hook. 'Do you be going to bring the house about our ears?'

Another moment she sent up a scream, 'It's found! It's found! Thank G.o.d!'

But before she could lay hands upon the prize William was in the house, and had picked up a small oak box covered with dust and mould.

The scream of Ales brought Mrs. Edwards in from the farmyard with an ap.r.o.n full of eggs that fell with a smash to the floor.

What mattered the eggs? The sight of that curious old box drove eggs out of mind!

'Oh, goodness, Willem! That was your grandfather's box! Many a hunt your poor dear father did have for that box. Open it, quick!'

'It's locked, mother. I cannot force the hasp, it do fit so tight.'

'Ah, yes, I do forget. I do have kept the key all these years. Here, here, do make haste!'

How her fingers trembled as she brought from her deep pocket the big key of the coffer, and the tiny one so well preserved for--this.

A folded paper, and a mult.i.tude of coins!

John Llwyd peeping in at the door, roughly driven off by Ales, like another winged-footed Mercury, flew over field and fallow, echoing her cry, 'It's found! It's found!'

Before the paper could be read, or the coins counted, there were other echoes besides William's to the mother's pious 'Thanks be to G.o.d!'

The paper was a _will_, duly signed and witnessed, by which William David Edwards bequeathed to his son William, and to his eldest son Rhys after him, the lease of the farm, and all property in the land held under that lease, with whatever stock and crops might be thereon at his decease. And further left whatever moneys might be found along with that will for the use of that son, William, should necessity arise, but laid a charge upon him not to diminish but to add to the store, to be divided between David and any future children born to the said William and Jane Edwards, in order to help them also to make a start in life.

What a shout went up when the '_lease_' was named! It became no longer a disputed fact. Here was legal proof that might serve them in good stead if the lease itself could not be found. No doubt the careful grandfather--who had died suddenly in a fit--had secreted that as well as the will just come to light. That might turn up any day.

Hope was in the ascendant. And now for the coins. Some--the five-pound and two-pound pieces of William and Mary--were unknown to the young men, though coined during the manhood of the h.o.a.rder; but the remainder, guineas and half-guineas from the mints alike of William and Queen Anne, had not yet dropped out of circulation, if seldom seen. Except four tarnished crown pieces, there was no silver.

It was a golden inheritance to feast their eyes upon. In all one hundred and forty-five pounds. Such a store had never met their sight before.

Yet, with the new possession came the dread of robbers. Ales counselled silence.

"Deed, and it's best the teeth guard the tongue. It be a fool's trick to show the old fox the hen's nest. Him as could steal my Evan might lay his claws on your gold.'