How Green Was My Valley (43 page)

“What is the use of a petition?” Owen asked, and a new note coming to his voice. “John
Burns has shown you what to do. Worry the Government. Make a nuisance of yourself.”

“And have six months of starvation for nothing but loss, and death to children,” my
father said. “Nonsense, boy. It do look very good in books, but hard on the mind and
belly. Leave it, now.”

“Will you starve for ever, one day, then, Dada?” Owen said, and stern in the eye.
“Markets are closing every day. Prices are rising. What will you do when they close
the pits?”

“I will tell you when there is danger of it,” my father said. “For the second time,
leave it, now. Let us sing. I want to hear if London have taken the bells from your
voices.”

So Wyn went to the harp, and Ceridwen to the piano, and my mother and father sat in
their chairs on each side of the fire, and we all had places about them.

And we sang.

Then the neighbours began to come in, front and back, and then Ivor and Bron came
in, with cheers from everybody, and Owen trying to squeeze the life from her, and
Gwilym looking in Ivor’s pockets for his baton, and shouting from all for him to conduct
us.

By that time we were so hot and so close together that there was no room for Wyn to
play, so outside we all went, into the street, with chairs and stools.

A fine night it was, with the moon pulling silver skirts behind her to brush the top
of the mountains, and the wind humble to have our voices and saying only a little
bit himself to show he had one still, and the Valley waiting quietly for us to fill
it with song.

Fill it we did, for hours, sitting in the street, with all the windows open and people
leaning out to sing, and Ivor conducting from the top of a chair in the middle of
the Hill. Sometimes you would see a few women go into the house, and a couple of minutes
later come out with big teapots, and home brew in jugs, and others again would come
out with bread and cheese and cake. But the singing never stopped, end one, start
the other, till Wyn was coming to have blisters on the fingers from pulling the strings,
and Davy took her from the stool and sat with his arm about her on our window sill,
with her head on his shoulder and his coat on her knees.

Beautiful is the voice rising to the quiet of night. Nobody, now, to cough, or rattle
paper, or come in late and make the noise of the devil with a chair or a dropped umbrella,
and put heavy feet on loose boards.

Quietness, and blueness, and faces in white light where the moon smiles upon them,
and darkness that moves where she does not. And in the quiet, O, hear the sweet, the
gentle voice, those pretty sounds of many tones that live in the shivering strings
of the harp. Wait now, for the slow pluck of deep chords, and feel them filling your
heart and bring yourself to be ready against the coming of the swift, strong mounting,
chanting melody that brings fire to the blood, and a command to raise up the voice
that shall not be denied, and sing, hearing about you the sharp edge of clean notes
struck in that moment when fingers touched the single string and the baton arm flew
down.

Hear you, then, the voice of your brothers and sisters, deep as the seas, as timeless,
as restless, and as fierce. Tenors spear the clouds with blades that had their keenness
from the silversmiths of heaven. Baritones pour gold, and royal contralto mounts to
reach the lowest note of garlanded soprano. And under all, basso profundo bends his
mighty back to carry all wherever melody shall take them. Sing then, Son of Man, and
know that in your voice Almighty God may find His dearest pleasure.

I felt Bronwen looking at me a couple of times outside there, but when I looked at
her, even though I looked quickly, she always looked away and never once did she smile.
But when I went in the house to help my mother with the teapots, I went to the cupboard
and took out her cup and saucer and filled it to take to her, first of all.

“Tea, Bron,” I said.

“O, Huw,” she said, but in the voice of a stranger, “there is a good boy you are.
Dying, I am, for this.”

“What is the matter, Bron?” I asked her, in a whisper, and thankful for the singing
all round us. “Did I say something or do anything to-night?”

She was in darkness, and the cup was big, covering her face, but I saw the moon put
her finger on a tear, then she turned away from me.

“To-morrow, Huw,” she said, in her own voice. “It was nothing.”

But again I felt the foolish newness busy within me and I went from there, and did
the work of two among the teapots, and helped with the little, pleasant kindnesses
that my mother was busy to do of cutting bread and butter and spreading milk cheese,
for old ladies with few teeth, and putting a hot poker with honey in home-brewed beer,
for Old Mr. Jones, who wanted to sing but felt the cold, yet could not be pushed to
go to his bed.

Most of the men on the Hill had a bit of sleep in chairs till early morning, but I
went up the mountain with Ianto for mushrooms, and took a basketful back, with flowers
for Ceridwen and Wyn, and some for my mother and Bron.

My father and Ivor, with Ianto and Davy, went down to the colliery to work the morning
shift. As soon as they were gone, the real business of the day began. The house was
cleaned from top to bottom, all the furniture was outside to be polished, clean curtains
were hung and the knives and forks and spoons were given a shine. Then all the cooking
started, with the neighbours helping, and I built fires in troughs outside to take
the pots and tins overflowing from the stoves and grates.

Then we peeled potatoes and sliced vegetables, stripped chicken and duck, cut steaks
and chops, sliced bacon and forked sausage until I was sick at the sight of food.
Then we laid all the tables, and some of us went down to the Chapel hall to lay up
down there for the Eisteddfod in the evening, and set chairs and hang curtains.

When the hooter went at noon we ran back up the Hill, and I put baths for my father
and brothers out in the back, and put the buckets of hot water near, then I had a
dip, and went upstairs to put on my long trews.

Well.

I wonder does anything feel better than to put on the first pair of long trews.

In this very room, here, where I am sitting, I took the paper from the suit, and pulled
little bits of cotton from it, and held it up to feast upon it. Off with my clothes
and into a clean shirt, with a stiff collar, and careful to tie my new white tie,
that Bron had given me, in a wide knot, and pin it with my father’s pin. On with the
socks, new too, that Ceridwen had made for me, and then to work with the comb and
water to have my hair with a parting, and flat.

Now for the suit. Pity that the coat and waistcoat cannot go on first, so that the
trews can be saved till last, as you will eat potatoes and meat first, and save the
new peas till the last. But there it is, trews first.

So, careful, not to spoil the crease, or get the ends on the floor, you balance to
have one leg in and draw it on, and then the other, and stand to button them to the
braces, and you feel the cloth covering your legs all round and down, and you look
and see the creases falling sharp to the top of your foot. On with the best boots,
polished to see your face, and careful in bending again to lace them. Then stand,
feeling the trews bearing down upon the braces, and put on the waistcoat, and feel
it snug about you, then on with the coat, nothing to fold over, no palmful of cuff,
tight, but not too tight under the arms, and flaps all flat, and the collar rolling
down to button over at the top.

Royal, royal is the feeling, to be standing in your good long trews, and well I understand
the feeling of gentlemen with sashes round their middles and feathers in their hats.
You are brave with glory, and with fear for none.

Up on the bed I got then, to try and see my trews in the little bit of glass. But
it was too small and this little room was too dark, and I could only see some shining
boot and a bit of turn-up. But I was feeling elegant, and that was enough for me.
Even old Napoleon never felt so good, and when I went downstairs, very careful again,
no Queen’s Ambassador to the Court of the Tsar had more straightness in his back,
or lift to his nose, or firmness to his feet, than I had.

I felt good inside and out, a feeling not to be had many times in your life, indeed.

Then my mother saw me.

She was just putting on her hat, with the pins ready to stick in.

Her eyes went big, and she opened her mouth to speak but no words came, and the pins
dropped from her hands and the hat hung upon her head, with the veil caught in a comb
at the back.

“Well,” she said, and put her hands together, and with a smile that was nearly crying,
“Huw, my little one. Who will tell you from a lord, then?”

“Is it fitting me, Mama?” I asked her, and going hot.

“Fit?” Mama said. “Like the green in trees. And I should think so, too. A sovereign
and a bit it cost us for Hwfa. Do you like my costume, then, Huw?”

So I knew my mother felt about her costume as I felt about my suit, and I looked at
it from the front and back to give it proper respect, though my mind was on what the
boys and girls outside would say about me.

“Beautiful, Mama,” I said, and she smiled again, very pretty.

In came Wyn and Ceridwen then, but not in their wedding dresses, and another turn
round and look, and hand claps and kisses, and trying to tickle the backs of my legs,
but I ran from them, and out in the back to meet my father.

“Well, well, Huw, my son,” he said, and looking me up and down, and turning me about,
and looking at the linings of the coat, and the buttonholing and the way the buttons
had been stitched on, “Hwfa have done a creditable job, indeed. No pig fits his skin
better.”

“How do I look, Dada?” I said, a bit disappointed he had gone to look at the work
instead of me.

“The same as yesterday, with long trews extra,” my father said, flat. “Take your brothers’
coats down to the field when you have had dinner, and remember the extra candles for
the hall.”

“Yes, Dada,” I said, very thin.

So into the house again, and smelling the richness of new baked cake and bread crusty
from the oven. But I was afraid to eat much in case to spill, so I was off down to
the field with the coats long before the match started, and everybody poking fun and
saying I was too proud to eat. And indeed, going down the Hill with the boys all staring
and taking off my cap to the women, that is what I was, proud as proud, and glad to
have something to do with my hands. But I could do nothing with my nose and mouth,
for they were all shapes and twitching like the tail of a cow, until, long before
I got to the field, I wished I was back in my old clothes with nothing to feel except
hot or cold.

I was glad to be by myself on the field for a little bit and I went to find a good
place to see the match, up on a mound half-way between the goal posts. There I put
the coats, and sat down, with care again, and there is good to sit down with long
trews and give the fronts a hitch so that the knees will be free of bag. It is almost
a sign that you are a boy no longer, and then it is that you will think of a pipe
and tobacco to round you off.

The other team came in a brake with four good horses and changed behind the hedge,
with a couple of boys to tell girls to keep clear. By that time our team were leaving
their houses and there is pretty to see their jerseys coming down the street, and
prettier still when the other team ran on to have some kicking practice. Now the field
was filling, with crowds of people coming down the Hill, and dogcarts and traps and
gigs coming along the mountain road every minute, until the square was full of wheels,
and the fields up the mountain full of grazing horses, with some of the men looking
after them to earn an extra pint.

Ivor went on to referee and spin the coin, and when we won the end with the wind a
big cheer went up, for the wind always dropped low toward sunset, so what there was
of it, we would have for the first half.

A healthy sound is the tamp of the leather ball on short green grass and pleasant,
indeed, to watch it rise, turning itself lazily, as though it were enjoying every
moment of the trip up there, against blue sky, and coming down against the green,
in a low curve right into the ready hands of a back.

A whistle from Ivor, and the captain on the other side takes his run and kicks, and
as you watch the ball climb you see the teams running into position to meet one another
underneath it.

A forward has it, but before he can so much as feel it properly, he is flat on his
back, and the two sides are packing over him. A whistle from Ivor, and the first scrum,
and shouts for Davy as he lifts his arms to bind his front men. In goes the ball,
and the tight, straining muscles are working, eight against eight, to hold one another
and then to push each other the length of the field. But the ball comes free behind
the pack, and their fly-half has it, so fast that nobody knows till he is on his way
toward our touch line with his three-quarters strung behind him and nothing but our
full-back in his way. Shout, crowd, shout, with one voice that is long-drawn, deep,
loud, and full of colour, rising now as the fly runs pell-mell and Cyfartha Lewis
dances to meet him, and up on a rising note, for inches are between them, louder with
the voice in an unwritten hymn to energy and bravery and strength among men.

But Cyfartha is like a fisherman’s net. The fly has been too clever. He should have
passed to his wing long ago, but he is greedy and wants the try himself, and on he
goes, tries to sell a dummy, and how the crowd is laughing, now, for to sell a dummy
to Cyfartha is to sell poison to a Borgia. The fly is down, and Cyfartha kicks the
ball half-way down the field to our forwards, and has time to offer his hand to poor
Mr. Fly, who is bringing himself to think what happened after the mountain fell on
him.