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Will was elated, and conscious of having stepped easily into his uncle's good graces, he walked up the street with the two clergymen, full of gratified pride. On their way, to his great annoyance, they met Gryff Jones of Pont-y-fro, a farmer's son holding the same position as his own.
In the course of the morning Morva entered the best kitchen, bearing a letter which Dyc "pigstye" had just brought from Pont-y-fro. "Tis from Will, 'n'wncwl Ebben," said the girl; "here are your glasses, or will I call Ann to read it to you?" "Let me see, is it English or Welsh?" said Ebben Owens, opening it with trembling fingers. "Oh! 'tis Welsh, so read thou to me.
Will wants it to be a secret." "Fear nothing," said Gethin, "I will never tell tales. Gethin Owens has not many good qualities, but he has one, and that is, he would never betray a trust, so be easy, Morva. I am going to Pont-y-fro. Good-night!"
"Yes yes, 'machgen i, I know I have thee still. Go, Morva, post my letter at Pont-y-fro, though 'tis Sunday night. Good-night, girl, thou hast an old man's blessing. For what it is worth," he added, under his breath, as the girl passed out of one door, while Gwilym and Ann entered at the other.
For Morva's love he would willingly have laid down his life; but now that that was denied him, nothing else was of any consequence; and in troubled thought he sauntered out to cross the farmyard on his way to Pont-y-fro.
"Yes, yes," shouted Gethin in return, and as he made his way through the grimy, unsavoury street, he chuckled as he pictured the impending scrimmage. Along the slope of a bare brown hill, which turned one scarped precipitous side to the sea, and the other, more smooth and undulating, towards a fair scene of inland beauty, straggled the little hamlet of Pont-y-fro.
But a little constraint fell upon them all, Gethin chafing at the girl's apparent nervousness, and his brother's silence; Morva fearful of offending Will, and disturbed at her own pleasure at meeting Gethin. When they reached the town she bade them good-bye. "Here's my corner," she said, "and when I have sold my brooms, I am going home in the cart from the mill at Pont-y-fro."
Early in the spring their wedding took place in London, and when one morning Morva brought from Pont-y-fro post office a packet for Ebben Owens containing a wedge of wedding cake and cards, he evinced some show of interest. On the box was written in Gwenda's pretty firm writing, "With love to Garthowen, from William and Gwenda Owen." Ebben rubbed his knees with satisfaction.
"Well!" he said to his fellow-deacons, as they followed the rough road to Pont-y-fro, "did you ever think we had such a fool for a deacon?" "'Ts 'ts! never indeed," said John Jones of the "Blue Bell." "Well, indeed," said old Thomas Morgan, the weaver, "I didn't know we had such a sinner amongst us; but fool! perhaps it would be better if we were all such fools."
There was bread of all sorts, from the brown barley loaf to the creamy, curled oatcake, flanked by piles of the delicious tea-cakes for which Pont-y-fro was noted. The men washed down their cakes with foaming "blues" from the beer barrel.
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