Part 23 (1/2)

Here Twm took his hand, and said, ”You look deeper into the hearts of men than I thought; but listen to a mystery and expound the dream that has so long haunted me.”

Here he related the particulars of the ”glorious vision” in the hay-loft of Morris Greeg, and of its repet.i.tion since he came to London; ”and strange to say,” added he, ”it was in widow's weeds the fair spirit each time appeared. What can be the meaning or end of such dreams?” ”I'll tell thee,” answered Rhys, leaning on his shoulder and looking in his face; ”Dreams long nursed, especially waking dreams, in time become realities-so will yours; you will marry this young widow, Twm!”

”Me! impossible!” cried Twm, blus.h.i.+ng from the chin to the forehead.

”Oh, very well, I'll court her myself, then!” cried Rhys; on which they both burst into a most hearty laugh.

Our hero was growing silent and meditative, when Rhys, striking him a hearty smack on the shoulder, asked, ”What would you say now, if the fair widow was herself in town at this moment?”

”What!” cried Twm, starting up, with an expression of interest that nothing could repress. Rhys in a most serious strain, a.s.sured him that her father, being chosen a knight of the s.h.i.+re for the ancient county of Brecon, was now in town with his widowed daughter. That he had ridden to town in their company, by which he had availed himself of a safe escort from the dangers of the road. Rhys added, that he had frequently conversed with the Lady Devereaux, both at home and on the journey, and that he, Master Thomas Jones, had always been the subject of her conversation and eulogy.

Very shortly after this conversation, in fact as shortly after as sufficed to take Twm and his friend Rhys to the town-house of Sir John Price, which was situated in Derby-street, Westminster, our hero was shaking hands and exchanging hearty good-wishes and congratulations with the ”lady of his dream.” His recollection of his dearly-cherished vision was now stronger than ever, in consequence of the widows' cap which she had lately a.s.sumed.

On the part of Sir John, our hero's reception was more ceremonious than friendly, but the feeling evinced in his daughter's eyes, and the speaking pressure of her hand, made ample amends for the baronet's stately coldness.

Having dined together, Sir John retired early on a more ceremonial visit, and the three friends were left together; for Lady Devereaux held Rhys in great esteem for his high professional character, and una.s.suming manners; and, in truth, we must add, more than all, for the friends.h.i.+p evinced by him for our hero, and the friendly way in which he spoke of him in his absence. It was with surprise and regret they heard the announcement of Rhys' intention (being now superceded in his curacy by the new inc.u.mbent,) of quitting his country and entering a foreign university, to seek in a far land that consideration and advancement not attainable in his own.

Lady Devereaux being only in the fifth month of her widowhood, the conversation, although kindly in the extreme, was of a melancholy cast.

Rhys having to embark in the morning, urged the necessity of retiring early, and took his final leave of the fair widow, who expressed the kindest wishes for his prosperity and success in all undertakings.

Accompanying his friend, Twm bade her adieu for the evening, and gained her leave to repeat his visit on the morrow. The permission to repeat his visits was eagerly seized by Twm, and not once a day only, but many times did he trouble Sir John's stately domestic to open the door to him.

That he was welcome by the fair enchantress, he could not doubt, and pleasant were the mid-day walks in the Park or Mall, their indoor conferences, and the evening parties at which they shone as twin-stars; but trebly pleasant to our hero was the hour in which he ventured to break to her his tender feelings and his darling hopes.

With the utmost candour, and without the least reservation, he told the humbleness of his origin, the blemish in his birth, his wretched bringing-up, and withal, the mysterious matter of his glorious vision.

The a.s.sertion that the moment he beheld her, on rescuing her from the robber, he identified her face and figure with the lady of his dream, called forth her deepest blushes, and she audibly whispered ”Incredible!”

His repeated a.s.sertions, pa.s.sionately urged, of the truth of his a.s.sertion, silenced and perhaps convinced her.

Certain it is that, like the gentle Desdemona, ”She gave him for his pains a world of sighs;” and time evinced to him that the lady had a tale to tell also, which proved that although highly born, and affluent as she was, her lot had not been entire suns.h.i.+ne.

”I am yet hardly twenty-one,” replied she, ”although I have been twice married. To neither of these husbands have I been able to give my entire heart. My first union was at my father's _command_, when solicitations proved useless, to his contemporary and old schoolfellow, who was old-fas.h.i.+oned enough to restore the long-exploded _abs_ in his name, vaunting himself as Thomas ab Rhys ab Thomas Gock, of Ystrad Feen; who could carry on the antique and rusty chain of _abs_, without a broken link, through several centuries up to the patriarch of his tribe, Elystan Glodrydd.

”Poor old gentleman! I fed him with a pap-spoon, in his large gothic arm-chair, when a stroke of paralysis had withered his right hand; but in six months after our marriage (marriage!) he fell a victim to his ruling pa.s.sion, which I will not name to his disparagement, and died of apoplexy. My year's mourning for him had barely expired, when my mother claimed her right of choosing my next husband; and, in the course of time, poor Sir George (peace to the memory of a harmless man!) became my second husband. Had I lived to these days unwedded,” said she, with a look and tone of resolute firmness, almost foreign to her usual gentleness, ”it is more than probable that I should not have become the victim of either of my parents' whims.”

”My poor mother has been long deceased; but well I know my father's future aim respecting me-to have me united to some other choice of his own; but no! the sapling may bend to the storm, but, springing up again, who shall re-bend the youthful oak that time matures? If my good father inclines to play the tyrant with me, he will find some difference between the woman and the child.” Applauding her resolution, Twm, kissed her hand with rapture; and, she added in a tone of gaiety, ”if ever I change my state, I shall become the votary of a different shrine to any that I have yet bowed to;”

”The little G.o.d shall shoot the porch, Ere faithful Hymen waves his torch.”

With that expressive couplet, she rose, and our hero, with enlarged hopes, took a tender, but restrained and respectful leave of her.

If Twm was heartily welcomed by Lady Devereaux, he was no less heartily disliked by her father. Sir John had learnt that he was a natural son of Sir John Wynn of Gwydir's, and no earthly merit could compensate, in his estimation, the bar of b.a.s.t.a.r.dy in his escutcheon. He sternly desired his daughter to break off all intercourse with our hero, as he had discovered, he said, the baseness of his origin. Although Twm appeared no more in his house, he had the mortification to learn that at the play, the ball, and in the Park and Mall, their meetings had been frequent. In a bitter spirit of resentment against his daughter, without the least previous warning, he one morning compelled her roughly to enter a coach at the door, which soon drove off, taking her she knew not whither.

Our hero's surmises became numerous and agonizing, when for three long weeks he had neither seen nor heard from his charmer, although he had not missed one opportunity of encountering her at any of their accustomed places of meeting, and his days became burdensome, and his nights sleepless. Just as he was sinking into a state of despondency, he one evening received a note in the hand of Lady Devereaux, informing him of her forcible conveyance to, and safe arrival at Ystrad Feen. His father having long since returned to North Wales, he took an affectionate but hasty leave of the hospitable family of the Martyns, and commenced his journey to his native princ.i.p.ality.

CHAPTER x.x.xII.

TWM in Wales again. His meeting with the ”lady of his dream.” ”The course of true love never did run smooth,” which Twm ruefully acknowledges.

The dangers of the road had been somewhat reduced by the vigorous prosecution of highwaymen and robbers, many of whom had been lately convicted and executed. Travellers could pursue their way in comparative security, so Twm encountered no ”hair-breadth escapes by flood or field”