"If you wish to do me a kindness, uncle, and you, too, dear aunt, you
will never mention the subject to me or to anyone else. It is a thing
of the past; let us bury it out of sight and hearing."
"We will do what you wish, my dear boy; but I am afraid, amongst these
gossiping villagers, you will often hear the subject alluded to in joke
or in earnest."
"Oh! I quite expect that," said Cardo, with an attempt at a laugh, but
it was a sorry attempt. "I am not going to play the rôle of a
love-sick swain, my grief will be buried too deep for a careless touch
to reach it, and I hope I shall not forget I am a man. I have also the
comfort of knowing that my sorrow is the consequence of my misfortunes
and not of my faults."
Soon things seemed to fall into the old groove at Brynderyn, as far as
Cardo and his father were concerned, except that that which had been
wanting before, namely, a warm and loving understanding between them,
now reigned in both their hearts, and sweetened their daily
intercourse. The west parlour and all the rooms on that side of the
house, which had been unused for so many years, were opened up again,
and delivered over to the care of Mr. and Mrs. Lewis Wynne, who kept
their own establishment there, thus avoiding the necessity of
interfering with Meurig Wynne's eccentric habits, and still enabling
them to meet round the cheerful hearth in the evening, or whenever they
chose.
As for Cardo, he threw all his energies into the busy work of the
farm--the earliest in the field in the morning, the latest to leave it
at night, nothing was too small for his supervision, no work was too
hard for him to undertake; and though he declared he was well, quite
well, still, it was evident to those around him that he was overtaxing
his strength. The flashing light had gone out of those black eyes, the
spring from his gait, the softness from his voice. He paid frequent
visits to Nance's cottage, always returning across the corner of the
churchyard. The stone-cutter had kept his promise, and had added the
surname of "Wynne" on the little cross, and Cardo read it over and over
again, with a sort of pleasurable sorrow. The banks of the Berwen he
avoided entirely, the thought of wandering there alone was intolerable
to him. Every bird which sang, every flower that nodded at him, the
whispering river, everything would ask him, "Where is Valmai?" And
what answer could he give to his own aching heart which echoed the
question, "Where is Valmai? Gone--worse than gone! changed, she whom I
thought was the counterpart of my own unchangeable nature. No, no,
anywhere but by the banks of the Berwen!" And he plodded on at his
work, doing his best to regain the placid calmness, though not the
bright joyousness of his life, before he met Valmai. But in vain; the
summer found him languid and depressed in spirits. It was Shoni who
first suggested to him the idea of a change of scene and companionship.
A strange friendship had grown up between these two men. Shoni had
been kind and tender to Valmai in her sorrow, and seemed to belong to
the bright, happy past which was gone for ever.