By Berwen Banks Part 23

And she laughed merrily at Cardo's clumsy efforts at clearing away. As she opened the door into the pa.s.sage a tremendous roaring and snorting filled the air.

"What on earth is that?" said Cardo.

"It is my uncle snoring, and if you dropped that tray (which I am afraid you will) the clatter wouldn't awake him."

"Good old man! let him rest, then. You are not going to wash up those things?"

"No, Mrs. Finch will do that in the morning. And now, Cardo, I must do what my uncle told me to do," she said, as they returned into the cosy parlour, glowing with the light of the blazing fire; and, holding up her dress with her two fingers, she made a prim little curtsey, and said:

"I hope your tea has been to your liking, sir? And now for the rest of my duty. Here is his jar of tobacco, and here is the kettle on the hob, and here is the bottle of whisky, and here are the slippers which I had prepared for you."

"Little did I think, Valmai, it was you who had made everything look so cosy and sweet for me--these flowers on the table and all those pretty fal-lals on my dressing-table. Little did I think it was my little wife who had prepared them all for me. But as I entered the front door a strange feeling of happiness and brightness came over me."

"And I knew the first tone of your voice, Cardo. Oh, I would know it anywhere--among a thousand."

There were innumerable questions for the one to ask and the other to answer as they sat in the glowing firelight. First, there was the description of the repairs required by Captain Owen's s.h.i.+p--"Blessed repairs, Valmai!"--and the extraordinary special Providence which had caused the ss. _Ariadne_ to collide at mids.h.i.+ps with the _Burrawalla_, and, moreover, so to damage her that Cardo's berth and those of the three other inmates of his cabin would alone be disturbed by the necessary repairs.

"Captain Owen thinks we shall be ready to sail in three days, so it is not worth while writing to my father," said Cardo. "The thick fog which looked so dismal as I drove into Caer Madoc with him--how little I guessed it would culminate in the darkness which brought about the collision, and so unite me with my beloved wife. Valmai, if Providence ever arranged a marriage, it was yours and mine, dearest."

"But, Cardo--"

"'But me no buts,' my lovely white sea-bird. Nothing can alter the fact that you are my own little wife."

"Yes, I know," said Valmai, "but if you love me as much as you say you do, grant me one request, Cardo."

"A hundred, dearest; what is it?"

"Well, we have had to be deceitful and secret--more so than I have ever been in my life. We could not help it; but now, here, let us be open.

Give me leave to tell my uncle the truth."

"Valmai! he will write at once to his brother, and the news will reach my father, and it will break his heart to find I have deceived him.

No, let me be the first to tell him. I shall have no hesitation in doing so when I return this time next year."

"But, Cardo, dear old Uncle John is quite a different sort of man to my Uncle Essec or to your father. I know he would never, never divulge our secret; he is kindness itself, and would, I know, feel for us. And it would be such a comfort to me to know that we had been open and above-board where it was possible to be so. Cardo, say yes."

"Yes, yes, yes, dearest, I know, I feel you are right, so tell him the whole truth. Oh, how proud I should be to tell the whole world were it possible, and how proud I _shall_ be when I return, to publish abroad my happiness. But until then, Valmai, you will keep to your promise of perfect secrecy? for I would not for all the world that my father should hear of my marriage from any lips but my own. You promise, dearest?"

"Cardo, I promise," and Valmai looked pensively into the fire. "A year is a long time," she said, "but it will come to an end some time."

"Don't call it a year. I don't see why I should not be back in eight or nine months."

The kettle sang and the bright fire gleamed, the old captain snored upstairs, and thus began for Valmai and Cardo that fortnight of blissful happiness, which bore for both of them afterwards such bitter fruits; for upon overhauling the _Burrawalla_ it was discovered that she had sustained more injury than was at first suspected, and the two or three days' delay predicted by Captain Owen were lengthened out to a full fortnight, much to the captain's chagrin and the unspeakable happiness of Cardo and Valmai.

Next day at eleven A.M. Captain Powell was lying in state, not with the trappings of mourning around him, but decked out in a brilliant scarlet dressing-gown, a yellow silk handkerchief bound round his head for a night-cap. Jim Harris had just shaved him, and as he left the room had said:

"There, capting, the Prince of Wales couldn't look no better."

Valmai flitted about, putting the finis.h.i.+ng touches to her uncle's gorgeous toilet.

"Do Ay look all raight, may dear?"

"Oh, splendid, uncle, only I would like you better in your plain white night s.h.i.+rt and my little gray shawl pinned over you."

"Oh, go 'long! with your shawls and your pins! You wait another month and Ay'll be kicking may heels about on the quay free from all these old women's shawls and dressing-gowns and things. Now, you go and call the young man up."

And Valmai went and soon returned, bringing Cardo with her.

"Well, Mr. Gwyn, and how are you? Very glad to see you, sir, under may roof. Hope you slept well, and that the lil gel has given you a good breakfast."

"Oh, first rate, sir," said Cardo, shaking hands and taking the chair which Valmai placed for him beside the bed.

"Well, now, here's a quandary, the _Burrawalla_ is in! but it's an ill wind that blows n.o.body any good, and since you must be delayed, Ay'm very glad it has landed you here."

"The delay is of no consequence to me; and it's a wind I shall bless all my life."

"Well, Ay don't know what Captain Owen would say to that nor the owners nayther. They wouldn't join in your blessings, I expect."

Cardo felt he had made a mistake, and looked at Valmai for inspiration.

"Mr. Wynne was rather hurried away, uncle, so he was not sorry to come back."

Cardo nodded his thanks to Valmai, and the captain and he were soon chatting unconstrainedly, and when at last Cardo accepted a cigar from a silver case which the captain drew from under his pillow, his conquest of the old man's heart was complete.

"If Ay _am_ cooped up here in bed," he said, "Ay'm not going to be denied may smoke, nor yet may gla.s.s of toddy, though the doctor trayed hard to stop it. 'Shall Ay mix it a little weaker, sir?' sez Jim Harris. None of your tarnished nonsense, Ay sez, you mix it as usual.

Ay've stuck to my toddy (just one gla.s.s or two at naight) for the last thirty years, and it's not going to turn round on me, and do me harm now. Eh, Mr. Gwyn?"

Cardo lighted his cigar with an apology to Valmai.

"Oh, she's used to it," said the captain, "and if she don't like it, she can go downstairs; you'll want to see about Mr. Gwyn's dinner, may dear."

"No, no, sir," said Cardo, "certainly not. I dine every day with all the other pa.s.sengers on board the _Burrawalla_. I shall come back to my tea, and I hope your niece will always sit down to her tea and breakfast with me."

"Oh, well, if you laike. She's quaite fit to sit down with any n.o.bleman in the land."

Later on in the day, Valmai, sitting on the window-seat reading out to her uncle from the daily paper, suddenly laid it aside.

"Rather a dull paper to-day, uncle!"

"Yes, rather, may dear; but you are not reading as well as usual;" and she wasn't, for in truth she was casting about in her mind for a good opening for her confession to her uncle. "Suppose you sing me a song, may dear!"

And she tried--

"By Berwen's banks my love hath strayed For many a day in sun and shade, And as she carolled loud and clear The little birds flew down to hear."

"That don't go as well as usual, too," said her uncle, unceremoniously cutting short the ballad. "Haven't you any more news to give me?"

"Shall I tell you a story, uncle?"