How they loved him, Vol. 1 (of 3)

I wonder if any one who reads these pages will recognise Ines-cedwyn—not under that name assuredly, nor perhaps in the same hemisphere, but as a place existing somewhere in this wide world, where men and women have met and loved and suffered. In the disguise under which it is here represented, it was a fishing hamlet only, the scanty population of which lived by the labour of their own hands. There was no almighty squire of Ines-cedwyn to rule the people by his frown, and hunt over the springing wheat to the ruin of the farmer; no noble landlord to keep a bullying agent to represent him, and force the tenants to make improvements they could not afford, at the risk of having their leases cancelled. Ines-cedwyn was too humble a place to enjoy such privileges, which some said was so much the better for Ines-cedwyn. Its land was too near the sea to be worthy the attention of any but the smallest farmers; and the majority of the cluster of humble dwellings that called themselves by its name were inhabited by fishermen.

Lynwern, which was three miles off, was becoming quite a fashionable watering-place; and occasionally its visitors found their way over to Ines-cedwyn, but they never stayed there. One person, indeed, a city merchant, had once thought he would like to build himself a retreat in Ines-cedwyn, where he might fly when sick of the world and its society, and enjoy the pleasures of solitude and meditation. So he purchased part of the rights of the beach, and erected a villa on the very sands, not a stone’s-throw from the water, and in memory of some old associations with a sojourn in the East, had named it ‘The Beach Bungalow.’

This had happened years and years before; the merchant had soon grown tired of his plaything, and the ‘bungalow’ was in ruins. Agents had tried to let it for him, but no one had been found willing to take it. For in the first place, those who desired to live comfortably in Ines-cedwyn were obliged to have all their provisions sent over from Lynwern; and in the second, the merchant had had the ‘bungalow’ built after his recollection of its Indian counterpart, which made it an inconvenient residence for the changeable climate of Wales. It consisted of three rooms only, all facing the sea; but with a wide bricked verandah, which was of the same length and breadth of the rest of the villa, shading them in front. A small kitchen and wash-house had been built out, at some little distance behind, but were now reduced to nothing better than sheds. Indeed, the whole of the ‘bungalow’ presented a most forlorn appearance. The windows were broken or gone, the doors were off their hinges, the roof leaked like a cullender, and the birds of the air made it their habitation. Added to all this, it had the reputation of being haunted, which was supposed to give it the only interest it possessed in the eyes of the visitors of Lynwern, who sometimes made picnic parties to Ines-cedwyn, in order to lunch on the floor of the ruined bungalow.

It stood all alone on a long strip of golden sand, which stretched on either side as far as eye could reach. This stretch of sand was the glory of Ines-cedwyn, and the villagers often grumbled at the superior popularity of Lynwern, and wondered how ladies and gentlemen could prefer a shingly beach that cut their shoes and boots to ribbons, to a place where they might walk for miles when the tide was out, with as much ease as in their own drawing-rooms. And when the tide came in, what a suave and gentlemanly tide it was. It never made much racket even in the wildest weather, for the waves soon found they had nothing to buffet against, and were compelled to run up the sands, a little more hastily than usual, perhaps, but still not in a manner to frighten the most timid looker on, though they had been known on one or two occasions to wash right through the ‘Beach Bungalow,’ and out on the other side.

But it was spring now, and a remarkably warm spring, and the Ines-cedwyn tide had never been seen to greater advantage. The waves were mere ripples on the water, and they broke like music and ran in upon the yellow sands like cream, leaving behind them upon every visit unbroken pink-lipped shells, and perfect branches of green and yellow sea-weed, which they had carried on their quiet breasts from foreign shores. The fishermen said there never had been finer weather nor calmer seas in the memory of all Ines-cedwyn, and day after day the fishing smacks put out from shore and returned laden with their shining spoils.

Benjamin Bennett, Eliza Bennett’s brother, took no part in such proceedings. He was a farmer on a very small scale, or at least they called him so in that part of the country. He was the owner of a small patch of arable land, from which he procured a tolerable crop of hay; and he had a large market garden, the produce of which he carried daily into Lynwern. In fact in England he would have been termed a market gardener. He had a horse and cart and a cow in the shed, which did duty for a stable; five or six pigs fatting in the stye; a considerable number of cocks and hens, and a pretty little flower garden. His cottage consisted of some half-dozen rooms, furnished poorly but decently, for his wife Martha was a notable woman, and they kept a girl to help in the house and farm work. They had no family, and so they had managed to save a small sum of money, and Mr and Mrs Bennett were considered to be amongst the most thriving and respectable inhabitants of Ines-cedwyn. Their cottage was situated about half-a-mile from the sea, in the centre of the village, and a broad piece of marshy land lay between it and the beach.

Here all was green and leafy enough, and one might have thought a hundred miles separated the flowery little hamlet from the briny ocean, though a suspicious smell of tar and rope pervaded most of the fishermen’s dwellings.

On the evening on which Eliza Bennett and Fenella travelled down from London to Lynwern, Martha and Benjamin, all unmindful of the proximity of their nearest relation, had retired to rest even earlier than usual, for their cow had presented them with a calf that morning, and they had sat up all night with her in anticipation of the event. But they would have sat up a second night with alacrity, had they imagined Eliza was so close at hand.

They were very proud of Eliza and her doings, and each time a letter reached them in her writing, they were not satisfied till they had read it out to all the village. She represented the ‘genteel’ portion of the family to their ignorant minds. They were never weary of hearing of the grand doings of her mistress (and none of Mrs Barrington’s doings suffered in importance by passing through Eliza’s hands), nor of the foreign places to which her maid accompanied her.

‘Think of our Eliza being at Paris, and seeing the Hemperor and Hempress!’ Martha would exclaim; ‘why, she’ll be too much of a lady to speak to us when she comes this way again;’ and Benjamin would answer,—

‘Nonsense! nothing of the sort, Marthy! ’Liza’s my sister, born and bred, and she’ll never forget it! Why, haven’t she been to Hitaly and the Pope o’ Rome, and up the mountains, and I don’t know where not, and writes just as haffable after it as if she’d never stirred from Ines-cedwyn!’

‘Well, let’s hope she’ll come back to the hold place some day,’ the hospitable wife replied, ‘and give us a treat of her face. Why, it must be a dozen years and more, Ben, since she and you met.’

‘That it is, wife, and she’s my only relation, as you may say, so it seems a bit hard; but never mind, it’s a long lane as has no turning, and ’Liza’ll be with us agen afore we goes ’ome. Mark my words.’

The good couple often talked after this fashion, and they had been speaking of her the very evening that she arrived there. Martha told Benjamin, as they were retiring to rest, that she had had a dream about his sister the night before. ‘And I’m sure we’re agoing to hear somethink of her, for our family is remarkable for dreams, and mine allers come true.’

‘What did ye dream then, Marthy?’

‘Why, Ben, it was just when our poor Cowslip seemed a bit easier, and I was so tired I nodded off—and what should I dream but that I was stumbling over that piece of waste land in the dark, and I knocked up against some one, and I calls out, “Who is it?” and, to my surprise, it was the voice of your sister ’Liza, and she says to me, “Take this,” she says, and puts something into my arms, and I could feel that it was a baby! And I should have dreamed a deal more,—only you shook me by the shoulder, and I woke up, and haven’t had time to think of it again till just now.’

Benjamin Bennett was much amused at his wife’s vision.

‘’Liza with a baby!’ he said; ‘that would be a rum start—I fancy she’s past that sort of thing, old woman! for she never did seem to take the men’s fancy for marriage, even when she was young.’

‘It shows your ignorance of dreams, if you think to take them just as they’re presented,’ retorted his wife somewhat offended. ‘I never supposed as Eliza would be married, but she’s comin’ to some misfortune nevertheless. A child is as bad a thing to dream of as you can well have.’

‘Well, I ’ope poor ’Liza ain’t in any fix,’ said Benjamin, as he settled himself in bed, ‘’cos she’s my only sister, and I couldn’t see ’er sufferin’ without sufferin’ myself.’

‘In course not,’ responded Martha, and in a few moments the worthy couple were fast asleep.

It was past midnight when they were roused by a violent knocking on the front door with a stick.

‘Benjamin Bennett,’ cried a voice several times in succession, ‘get up, will ye—there’s some one as wants your assistance.’

‘Hark to that, Ben!’ exclaimed Martha as she started up in bed. ‘What must be done now? Cowslip must have been taken bad again.’

‘Throw up the casement and ask ’im his business,’ said her husband.

The woman obeyed.

‘Who’s there? What is it ye want with Benjamin Bennett at this time o’ night? Why! Tom Asher, is it you?’

‘Yes, Mrs Bennett, it’s me, sure enough, and I’ve got bad news for you. There’s Bennett’s sister as was coming on here has fell down and hurt herself, and I want ’im to get out the horse and cart to fetch ’er home.’

‘What!’ screamed Martha. ‘Bennett’s sister? Are you mad, man? Why, Eliza’s in London with ’er mistress.’

‘Well! I don’t know her, not likely; but she says as ’ow she’s Bennett’s sister, and she asked me to fetch ’im to her: and she’s got a young lady there too, and they’re both in sad trouble to be sure.’

‘Where are they?’ cried Martha breathlessly.

‘In the Beach Bungalow. I passed ’em on the road, and carried ’er in there, for she can’t move another step, that’s certain. She’s broke her foot or summat, to my mind.’

By this time both husband and wife were fairly roused and hurrying on their clothes.

‘You get out the horse and cart, Ben,’ said Martha, ‘whilst I run down to the bungalow as hard as I can, and if you overtake me you can pick me up. But you can never drive fast over them ruts. Only to think of our ’Liza being in such a plight, and broke her foot too. Bless my heart! Now, didn’t I tell you as misfortune was comin’? But why has she got a young lady with her, and at this time o’ night? It’s all a muddle to me. However, I’m ready, and I shall go straight across the common as fast as my legs will carry me.’

Martha was as good as her word, and arrived breathless at the ruined bungalow before her husband’s horse and cart had traversed the uncertain road. Here she found Eliza Bennett stretched on the floor of the verandah in evident pain, whilst Fenella, white as a sheet with alarm, sat patiently beside her waiting for help.

‘Bless my soul! what’s this?’ cried Martha, as she bustled up to them. ‘Why, ’Liza, my dear, who’d ever have thought of seein’ you, and what have you done to yourself? Fell down and hurt your leg. Well, your brother’ll be along with the cart in no time to take you home, and right glad we are to see you, though you have given us such a start. And the young lady too—this isn’t the time of night for her to be sittin’ on these cold stones. However came you both to get in such a plight?’

‘Oh, Martha!’ said Bennett, between her groans; ‘I do feel putting upon you like this more than I can tell, but the mistress is going abroad, and wanted me and Miss Fenella here to spend the time with you and Ben, which I knew you’d be agreeable to; and I wrote you a letter this morning to say as we were coming on Friday. But my mistress altered her plans, and so we had to start sooner, and came off from London by the four o’clock train.’

‘Yes,’ continued Fenella in a sad voice, ‘and we didn’t reach Lynwern till ten, and I am afraid it is all my fault, for Bennett thought we had better sleep there; but it seemed such a beautiful night, and I said I should like a walk, so we left our boxes at Lynwern, and set out to walk to Ines-cedwyn. And just as we had got opposite here, Bennett’s foot slipped on a stone in the road, and she has hurt it so she can’t stand. But a man met us, and he carried her in here, and said he would go on and tell you about it.’

‘Ay! that was Tom Asher; and so he did, miss. Ben and I couldn’t think what had happened when we heard him a-knockin’ at the door. We had been asleep for a good three hours. And where is it you’ve hurt yourself, ’Liza—is it here?’

As Martha administered a kindly, but not over-gentle touch to the injured member, Bennett could hardly keep herself from screaming.

‘Oh! don’t handle it please, Martha! I’ve given it such a wrench I feel as if ’twas all alive. Just to think of my doing such a stupid thing, and the very minute I’ve come back to the old place too.’

‘But you couldn’t help it, Bennett,’ expostulated Fenella; ‘it was all my fault for teasing you to walk.’

‘’Twasn’t no fault of yours, Miss Fenella, my dear, so don’t think it. ’Twas just an accident, and the Lord’s doing, and such things is not to be prevented by any thought nor care.’

‘You’re right there, ’Liza, and I daresay it won’t turn out to be much. You’ve sprained your ankle—that’s what it is, and I don’t know anything as is more painful-like than a sprained ankle; but a day or two’s rest’ll put it all right again. And I hope you’ve come for a long spell, now you have come, my dear, and will give yourself time to get fat and ’earty in the mountain air.’

At this juncture Benjamin and Tom Asher arrived, and after the first greetings had passed between the brother and sister, they prepared to lift Bennett into the cart. Whether the injury she had sustained was dangerous or not, it was exceedingly painful, and she fainted as they carried her away. Martha took Fenella under her charge, and prepared to follow them as quickly as she could across the marshy common.

‘This is a sad beginning to a holiday for you, miss,’ she said, when she found that the girl walked by her side in utter silence; ‘but you mustn’t take it too much to heart. ’Liza must lay up for a day or two, and I daresay it won’t turn out as bad as it seems. I’ll put cold bandages round her foot as soon as she is comfortably settled. Them sprained ankles are nasty things to bear, but they always yield to rest and cold water.’

‘Do you think it is nothing worse than a sprained ankle?’ asked Fenella timidly. ‘As soon as it was done she fell right down, and couldn’t get up again.’

‘I daresay she did, miss. That’s generally the way with ’em, for the agony’s fearful. However, we shall be able to tell better when we’ve got ’Liza into bed.’

The carrying of poor Bennett up the narrow cottage stairs; and the undressing of her was a terrible business, and she fainted more than once during the proceeding, but when laid in Martha’s bed, and revived by a little brandy and water, she declared she was, comparatively speaking, comfortable, and became all anxiety for the welfare of her young mistress.

‘Do you go and lie down, dear Miss Fenella,’ she urged; ‘you look like a ghost, and I know you are as tired as you can be—and well you may, at past one o’clock in the morning. I shall have no rest till I know you are in bed.’

‘No, indeed, Bennett, you must let me watch by you to-night. What does it signify if I am tired when you are in such pain?’

‘Now, my dear young lady,’ interposed Martha, ‘Ben and me is used to this sort of thing, and you must let us do it. Why, only last night we was up for seven hours giving warm mashes to our red cow, Cowslip. And I couldn’t go to sleep again now, not if you was to pay me ever so—could I, Ben? He knows the wakeful habit I am, miss. And so now, if you please, you must let me take you to your bed, though it’s a poor sort of a room for a real lady like yourself to lie down in.’

Fenella followed her homely hostess to another room, on the same floor, where a small truckle bedstead and a painted chest of drawers formed all the furniture.

‘’Tisn’t fit for the likes of you,’ remarked Martha, as she ushered her into it; ‘but ’tis the best we have, miss, and the Queen couldn’t give you more.’

‘And I shall be much more comfortable in it than if I were with the Queen,’ replied Fenella, with the true courtesy that sets our inferiors at their ease, as she prepared to take possession of the humble-looking couch.

She slept on it nevertheless, for she had not yet reached the age when trouble keeps us waking; but with the earliest signs of dawn she was in Bennett’s room, to inquire how she had passed the night. She heard that she had been in great pain and very feverish, but both Martha and herself declared that the cold water bandages and rest would do all that was required for the injured limb.

‘I am so sorry I can’t get up and see after you to-day, Miss Fenella,’ said Bennett with anxious eyes; ‘but Benjamin is going to Lynwern with his vegetables, and has promised to call for our boxes and bring them back with him. So if you can amuse yourself on the beach, my dear, till they arrive, perhaps you will, and to-morrow, I hope to be able to hobble about a bit and see after you.’

‘Bennett, you mustn’t talk like that,’ said Fenella; ‘I shall do very well by myself, and you must lie still until you are quite recovered. But I wish I could get some paper and ink, that I might write and tell mamma about you.’

‘Miss Fenella! I couldn’t hear of such a thing. What! go to worry your dear mamma just as she’s setting off on her journey. What’s to-day? Thursday! Why, she couldn’t get your letter till she was on the very point of starting, and what good would it do, miss? It would only upset and fidget her. You wouldn’t expect her to come here and see after me—would you?’

‘I would, Bennett, if you had left me and met with such an accident.’

‘Ah! you, miss! well, you’re different from your mamma in many ways, and you’re but a child you see. No one would expect a lady to give up her plans for a servant. So I wouldn’t have her worried for the world, and ’tisn’t worth it either, for I shall be all right again in a few days.’

‘But you will send for a doctor, won’t you, Bennett?’ urged Fenella.

Both Bennett and her sister-in-law, sitting by the bed, began to laugh.

‘A doctor, miss! and for a sprained ankle! bless your heart—no,’ said Martha; ‘that’s not the way we manage in these parts; why, if we was to send off to Lynwern for the doctor everytime we felt a bit ill, there’d be no end to his coming and going. I can’t call to mind as there’s been a doctor in Ines-cedwyn since Mary Wills died of the typhus fever, and then her husband said as ’twas good money throw’d away, and he’d much better have kept it to help bury her. Oh no, miss, we don’t want no doctors here, and we’ll do well enough without him, never you fear!’

Fenella did not feel quite easy under this decision, but she was too young to oppose it. She spent the morning in wandering about the premises in a listless manner, making acquaintance with the poultry and the pigs and the new-born calf, but directing many an anxious glance, nevertheless, at the latticed window of the room where Eliza Bennett lay.

Martha, sitting behind the flapping blind, watched the girl’s proceedings, and remarked on them to her sister-in-law.

‘Lor’, what a pretty creature, and such a feelin’ ’art, too! I’m sure, if you was her equal, ’Liza, she couldn’t be more careful over you. How proud her ma must be of her. Ain’t she, now?’

‘Well, Martha,’ replied Bennett, whose loyalty was sorely tried in answering the question, ‘you see the mistress is very ’ansome herself—particular ’ansome; so p’raps she don’t think so much of beauty as we do. And Miss Fenella and she have been apart a good bit of late years. Young ladies must be educated, you see; and it can’t be done as well at home, so they don’t know so much of each other as they might.’

‘That seems strange; don’t it, now?’ returned Martha. ‘I never had a child, as you know; but if I had, I don’t think Ben nor me would have known how to make enough of it. We often says so ’mongst our two selves.’

‘But you mustn’t fancy but what the mistress thinks a deal of Miss Fenella,’ interposed Bennett eagerly. ‘That’s why she sent us down here, though it was a great inconvenience to herself, because my young lady looks so pale, and has grown so fast.’

‘She do look very peaky,’ said Martha sympathisingly; ‘my master was sayin’ so this morning.’

‘And her mamma wants her to be out in the sea air as much as possible, Martha—all day long if she can—so do show her the way to the beach after dinner, and let her go and sit on the sands.’

‘That I will, ’Liza; and I think it will be best for your sake to keep the house as quiet as possible, for you look a bit feverish to me. Close your eyes and try to sleep, my dear, and I’ll go and see after the young lady’s dinner, and send her out for a walk.’

Accordingly, when the early meal was concluded, Martha broached the subject to Fenella.

‘If you take my advice, miss,’ she said, ‘you’ll put on your hat and take a stroll down to the sea. It will be beautiful there this afternoon, for the tide’ll be up at five o’clock. And ’Liza she wants to go to sleep, so I wouldn’t disturb her if I was you, but just set off and enjoy yourself, and come back when you feel disposed for it.’

‘Oh, I should like to go if I may,’ replied Fenella, with a pink flush on her cheeks, ‘and if you are sure Bennett won’t want me; but which way is it, Martha?’

‘Why, straight across the common, miss, to where you see that streak of blue—that’s the water. And it’ll bring you out close to the place where poor ’Liza fell last night—“The Beach Bungalow.”’

‘The Beach Bungalow!’ repeated Fenella; ‘what a strange name! Why is it called so?’

‘I don’t know, I’m sure, miss, unless it is as the person who built it felt he had made a bungle; but any way that’s how it’s known amongst us. It’s an unlucky place, to my thinking, and I always fancy as every misfortune as ’appens to our folk, seems to have that bungalow mixed up with it—and, you see, ’Liza missed ’er footing just opposite. I often tells Ben as I wish somebody would take and pull it down. And they do say,’ continued Martha mysteriously, ‘as it’s haunted into the bargain. But p’raps that’s a matter I oughtn’t to speak to you on, or maybe you have no fear of ghosts.’

‘Oh no,’ replied the girl indifferently; ‘if there are such things, they wouldn’t hurt me—why should they?’

‘’Twould be a good job if every one had your sense, miss; but, you see, they haven’t, and so the place has got a reg’lar bad name in Ines-cedwyn, and none of our people would go past it after midnight unless they was obliged. But whether you believe in spirits or not, don’t you have too much to do with the Beach Bungalow, for it’ll bring you bad luck as sure as my name’s Martha Bennett.’

‘I will only go and sit in the verandah; that won’t hurt me,’ said Fenella, with a smile as she walked away.