The Making of William Edwards; or, The Story of the Bridge of Beauty

CHAPTER XV.
A STOP-GAP

As soon as Mr. Pryse was gone, Mrs. Edwards sank down on the oaken settle exhausted with the conflict of disturbing thoughts, and the harassing scene in which she had just borne a part. The old stocking-foot, which had been her only possible savings bank all the years of her thrifty widowhood, lay, with her limp hand, in her lap, in a corresponding state of collapse. Only three weeks before it had been plump and pleasant to contemplate, a testimony to industry, and a pledge of future prosperity. Now, within those three short weeks, the full half-year's rent had been a second time withdrawn, with exorbitant costs in addition, and the residue had ample space to chink.

There was a troubled aspect of careworn bewilderment on her countenance as she sat there, gazing abstractedly on her diminished store, endeavouring to reconcile the irreconcilable. And all the while Rhys was pacing the kitchen floor, with noisy tramp, in his wood-soled shoes, chafing and fuming over the cruel insolence of Mr. Pryse, as well as over their loss, yet wondering vaguely if there could be any truth in his allegations.

He did not altogether trust Mr. Pryse, but he had never had his mother's unbounded confidence in Evan, and, as Owen Griffith had suggested, so much money in his hands all at once might have proved too great a temptation, or he might have got drunk and lost it, and been ashamed to return. (But Evan did not drink.)

Now and then a sharp, jerky expletive gave expression to his crude doubts and suspicions, but he could not wring from his mother any word to strengthen his suspicions.

'I do not be knowing what to think, Rhys!' – ''Deed, Rhys, Evan has served us well, and Mr. Pryse is a bad man, your father said it.' – 'Yes, indeed, it is a serious loss, but Evan helped us to get the money.' – 'Yes, yes, Rhys, I do be aware you have worked hard too; but Evan, he did teach us new ways – and – after all,' she concluded, rising slowly to replace the depleted stocking in the coffer, 'we may thank God we had the money saved, or our farm would have gone from us, and we should have lost everything. Think of poor Ales, and don't be letting her hear you.'

Poor Ales! William had found her in the dairy, bent down over the tall churn, with her head on her bare brown arms, sobbing as if her heart would break, less for herself than the aspersion cast on her true and faithful Evan. She had shrunk away, not from Mr. Pryse's whip, but from an evil tongue and a threat that cut worse than a whip-lash.

Prisons were horrible dens before John Howard spent his life in dragging their iniquities to light, and purifying their foulness. 'Jail' was a word to daunt the strongest, for everywhere tales were rife how unscrupulous power thrust innocent men within their pestilential walls to perish, for no crime greater than debt or unguarded words.

William comforted in vain.

'Jail, Willem! He said he would send me to jail, only for standing up for honest people. But he is a rogue, Willem – a bad, wicked rogue, Willem.' She sobbed and shuddered as she gasped out the words. 'Yes, 'deed! it will be that cruel Mr. Pryse that do be robbing the widow of her money – and – and my poor Evan of his good name. Yes, sure, and me of my dear husband that would have been this day! Oh, Willem fach, my poor heart will be breaking.'

'Hush, Ales dear! don't say so,' implored the sympathetic boy, laying his hand tenderly upon her shoulder. 'Unkind words are hard to bear, I know' – and he sighed – 'but nobody here will think Evan took our money and yours, and ran away from you.' (He might have altered his opinion could he have heard through the stone wall what Rhys was saying.) 'Cheer up; it will all come right when Evan gets back; yes, sure.'

Ales startled William with the quick, energetic way she flung up her head and spoke —

'Come back? He will not come back unless I can seek out what that wicked wretch has done with him. Would he be so sure of it, or dare to come here to rob your mother – yes, to rob her – if he did not know what he had done to keep my Evan from me? He may have put him in jail to rot there. Oh!' (and she wrung her hands, brown and hard with honest toil) – 'oh! or he may have had him murdered. He is bad enough for that!'

'Hush, hush, Ales! Mr. Pryse would hardly do that; though he is a bad man, and looked, oh, so wickedly pleased when he knocked down the Tower of Babel I was building. I'm afraid, Ales dear, he would not stick at much,' William added, after a moment's cogitation.

'Name o' goodness, boy! He would stick at nothing whatever!' she cried, rising to her feet, and taking her cloak from a peg in the storeroom outside the dairy. 'But I am off to Cardiff to find Evan, or search out the truth; and do you pray for me, Willem, that I may succeed, and that no harm may come to me before I do.'

'Stay, stay, Ales,' exclaimed William, catching at her cloak in the doorway; 'you cannot go all that way on foot, and alone, or at this time o' day.'

Her voice was strangely quiet and determined as she answered —

'The sun has not set. I shall reach Caerphilly before night, and can stay and rest with mother until morning.'

''Deed, now, you had best be staying where you are till morning, and you shall have a horse to ride on. And if there is no one else to go with you, I will go myself, sure.'

After some persuasion, Ales consented to the first proposition, absolutely declining to accept his proffered escort, saying, 'Now Evan be gone you cannot be spared. And, now the money be gone, you must give up playing with stones, and work well to keep the farm from the sly old fox. Ah, sure, and the fox might be glad to catch the young goose near his hole. No, no, Willem, you must not run into danger. There be no need to break your mother's heart as well as mine. If God speed my errand I shall not be alone. Better God's arm than man's army.'

As her cloak went back to the peg, William slipped out through the farmyard, and was off down hill as fast as his legs would carry him. Davy and Jonet, returning from the potato-field where they had been industriously at work, undisturbed and unaware of the overwhelming trouble nearer home, called out to know where he was going; but if he heard he did not answer.

Supper – the old frugal meal of stiff leek porridge and milk – was on the table cooling when he returned out of breath, and whispered to Ales, as she carried out the porridge-pot, that their mutual friend, Robert Jones, had business of his own in Cardiff, and if she would join him at seven in the morning, where the roads met, she could ride all the way on one of his team. He did not tell her all he had said to enlist his old friend in her service, or how heartily the turf-cutter had responded, or that the man's errand was chiefly on her account.

Robert Jones knew more of 'old Pryse' than she did, and hated him as sincerely.

There had been some previous talk between Ales and her old mistress about the young woman's continuation on the farm unless Evan returned to claim her.

'I'd rather serve you for nothing than go away before Evan's good name was cleared, 'deed I would. And it will be cleared some day, I know it will, whatever some folk may think.'

She had said this with a full heart, meaning all she proposed, but Mrs. Edwards was too just to accept service on such terms from a tried and faithful maid in her hour of deep affliction. Besides, she had a feeling that whilst Ales was there, well-trained and active, Rhys would have less excuse to bring Cate on to the hearth. Motives are always more or less complex.

The objections of Mrs. Edwards to Cate Griffith certainly were so. She would have conceded that 'the girl was good-looking, quick of foot, and ready of hand,' but she would have added also, 'ready with her tongue, and not quite straightforward in her ways.' Then, if she must be deposed by her eldest son's wife, she would have been better pleased had he looked higher, and gone courting where there would be a little money to come home with the bride. Cate would have none to bring.

With such feelings uppermost, she did not contemplate the temporary absence of Ales with too much favour, anxious as she was for some news of Evan and of her missing money.

Mr. Pryse had disorganised the work in field and house for the one day utterly. All was now behind-hand. She was herself upset, and a woman far on the wrong side of fifty does not recover her balance too readily. The sudden departure of Ales at this inopportune juncture was another upset.

But she would not confess her weakness to Rhys, lest he should make it an excuse for bringing Cate to her assistance.

Yesterday – Tuesday – had been baking-day. In their trouble the oven had been allowed to grow cool, and the dislodged terrier, who had shown a set of angry teeth at Mr. Pryse, had gone back to his repose underneath it. The barley and oatmeal for the bread lay in the brown crock, as Ales had left it, with the bit of last week's dough in a bowl ready to leaven it. Mixing, kneading, and baking was not light work, yet it must be done. Thoughtful Davy had again driven away the dog from his hole in the ash-pit, and lit the oven fire in readiness.

Then it was Wednesday, the churning and butter-making day. How was she to bake and churn the same morning? for both required attention, and when once the long-handled dasher was set in motion, up and down it must go until the butter came, however long that might be, or all would be spoiled.

Jane Edwards, persistent as her children, was at her wits' end, but she could not call Jonet in from the field, for they were late in digging up the potatoes, and if the frost came before they were in the pits, the whole crop would be ruined.

Then dinner had to be thought of. It was a relief to her, whilst kneading the mass of dough, to hear Davy scrubbing away with a ling besom at the dinner potatoes in the stone hollow under the spring. But she heard the quick voice of Rhys recalling him to his field-work, and the passive 'I be coming,' which marked his subjection to his elder brother.

At noon, when her family came in to dine, expecting the Wednesday's meal of buttermilk and potatoes – still new enough to be something of a treat – though there was a pleasant odour of baking bread in the kitchen, and there were anticipations of a dough dumpling in the pot, there were unmistakable grumblings and sour looks because there was only fresh milk to go with the esculent root. (The difference is only to be estimated by a trial on a farm where the buttermilk is fresh.)

Jane Edwards was overtired, and lost her temper. 'You could not expect me to be baking and churning at the same time,' she jerked out angrily, feeling already warm with her morning's work.

Here was the opportunity Rhys had looked for.

'You had better have had Cate here this morning to churn. Then you would not have been so hurried, and our dinner would not have been spoiled.'

'Spoiled, indeed! I have seen the time you would all have been glad of hot potatoes and salt, without milk at all,' was retorted.

William and Davy rushed to the rescue, rightly interpreting the mother's frown. 'I'll stay and churn for you,' they cried in a breath.

'You'll do nothing of the kind. If those potatoes are not all in, and covered up, they will be ruined. There was a touch of frost this morning. And who's to do the milking?' said autocratic Rhys.

Jonet and William proffered their services, only to be rebuffed. This was followed by a sharp altercation between the two brothers, widening the existing breach, and – though William, out of consideration for his mother, who interposed, did not bounce off and absent himself as usual – it ended in the despatch of Lewis with a message to Cate, and the speedy arrival of the girl, as if she had expected the summons.

Mrs. Edwards was taking a loaf of bread out of the oven when Cate came in at the open door, and possibly set the harassed widow's red face down to the heat of the oven – not to her temper.

'Lewis do be saying you do be wanting me to churn. I shall be glad to help you any way, whatever,' Cate began demurely, just as if she had not exchanged a syllable first with Rhys over the wall by the gateway.

'Yes, yes, sure. Mr. Pryse stopped the baking yesterday, and Ales be gone to Cardiff, so we are late; and I must have the butter ready for to-morrow's market.'

Cate had her hat off with the first words of assent; her bare feet tripped lightly across the stone floor. She obtained from the pot on the fire a pitcher of warm water, to raise the temperature of the milk, as deftly as Ales could have done, and presently the dasher could be heard plashing in the churn with regular beat, as if lifted by strong, firm hands.

Mrs. Edwards, washing up the dinner things, sighed heavily, as if only half-satisfied, for a new perplexity had arisen in debating with herself who should go to Caerphilly market on the morrow. Whether she went or Rhys, she foresaw the necessity for Cate or some one to remain and take the place of Ales. She, however, did not care to leave the girl as her own deputy with Rhys at home to come and go at will.

The question was still unsettled when Cate called out that the butter had come.

At once Mrs. Edwards stepped into the dairy, and, as if ready for all contingencies, bare-legged Cate snatched up a milking-stool and pail, and was off, singing as she went; while the other collected the butter out of the churn, washed, salted, and moulded it into shape for market.

Back she came in due time, the full pail on her head, the stool tucked under one arm, her knitting-pins clicking as rapidly as if she was unencumbered.

Mrs. Edwards, moulding her butter at the dairy window, could but admit to herself, as she watched her cross the yard with light, firm feet, that Rhys might have chosen worse.

That night Cate remained on the farm. It was settled that Rhys was to attend Caerphilly market. He was to load the pony and sled with potatoes for sale – they were sure to fetch a good price, if only for seed, as other farmers were beginning to plant them. He himself was to go on foot bearing the egg-and-butter basket, since Breint, who would have carried all, was gone.

Cate was up before the lark. Milking was done, breakfast ready, and she, bright, brisk, and clean as a new pin by the time Rhys and the rest were ready for the morning meal.

She was certainly on her mettle, and Rhys could barely have reached the bottom of the hill before the relics of the meal were cleared away, fresh fire-balls added to the peat on the hearth, and she ready, as she told Mrs. Edwards, to take the place of Ales in the field.

William chuckled, and rubbed his hands together with glee, when he saw his mother so reinforced.

He whispered to Jonet, as she followed to pick up the roots he dug out, and remove the haulms, which really called for another hand.

Jonet nodded an affirmative.

'Mother,' he cried, 'if Cate will take the spade, you can sit still and remove the haulms as Jonet gathers them up. I've got some work to be doing that Rhys will not let me undertake. He says I don't know how, whatever.'

He had thrown down his spade, and was out of the potato-field, overleaping a wall, before his mother had time to question or remonstrate.

Evan had kept his eyes here, there, and everywhere. If the troublesome goats butted against a wall, and displaced a stone, he repaired the breach at once to prevent further damage. Rhys had been less wary, and, in his obstinacy, would not allow his youngest brother to see or know more than himself.

Consequently, an old greybeard Billy had been allowed to make a gap in the garden wall, and, though driven away with a stout broom-handle when Ales or her mistress might be there to see, had played havoc among the English herbs and flowering plants she was at such pains to rear. Then Mr. Billy and his friends had tried their horns on the empty sty, now the swine were turned to feed in the autumnal woods, and had done some fine damage there.

If Cate handled a spade with the skill and vigour of experience, William handled the unhewn stones with the inspiration of genius and long practice 'in play.' And he worked as if his life depended on his speed and skill.

Rhys made a good market, and came home with self-satisfied complacence at a late hour, to sup and turn over his gains to his mother, along with the news of the day. But he had no chance of a private word with Cate, who had gone home with her father before eight o'clock, well pleased to have earned the honest commendation of Mrs. Edwards, in addition to the customary 'payment in kind.'

Morning came, noon came, and afternoon was speeding before Rhys discovered that the broken-down wall and pig-stye were as whole and sound as when new.

He stood before the latter in blank surprise. He had given no orders for the repairs.

'Has Morgan the mason been here?' he bawled out after Jonet and William, who were off with milking-stools and pails.

'No,' came quickly back over Jonet's shoulder.

'Who has been at work here?'

No audible answer came back this time, but, with a wondrous twinkle in her expressive eyes, and an unmistakable grin on her face, Jonet pointed with outstretched arm, in silence, to the younger brother striding on well in advance.

It was a revelation to Rhys. His countenance fell. The wisdom of the world did not rest on his individual shoulders. He stood there amazed, hardly sure whether to be vexed or pleased, angry or grateful. Content he certainly was not. He had been slyly circumvented, and that was irritating, however necessary the repairs had been.

Into the house he strode in quest of his mother. He heard her at work outside. Here a fresh enlightenment awaited him. She was endeavouring to set her garden beds in order, behind a good firm wall. Her task was no longer hopeless; she could sing over her work.

There was little need for Rhys to ask over again 'Who hath done this?'

Still less need for frowns and sullen looks.

CHAPTER XVI.
DISCOVERIES

Robert Jones was a childless widower when he first picked up little William crying in the lane, and gave him a lift on his donkey. He was much older than Ales, but he was not too old to wish he had as smart and capable a helpmate on his own hearth, where was only his half-blind mother to keep all things fresh and clean. Many had been the sharp play of words between him and Ales during her progress from girl to woman, and, had not Evan come upon the scene when he did, Robert would certainly have made a bid for her favour.

He was one of the first to perceive that the younger man had quite spoiled his chances, and was generous enough to stand on one side, and keep his disappointment to himself.

So generous was he, that, instead of hailing Evan's mysterious disappearance with satisfaction, he stamped about and shook his fist at an imaginary 'old Pryse,' as he listened to William's recital, and proffered his services to 'poor Ales,' as if the recovery of her lost lover did not mean the extinction of the last spark of a chance for himself.

William could not have found for Ales a better safeguard on her way, or a more zealous and capable assistant in her anxious quest.

In fact, from the time they landed in Cardiff, and he found her a lodging with a dealer in peat, etc., who had her supplies from him, he took the business pretty well out of her hands, having, during their journey, made himself acquainted with Evan's errand and plans.

He argued with her that a strange young woman could not go about the streets of a seaport town – though, apart from castle and old monastery, Cardiff was but a very small place in 1733 – without exciting attention by her inquiries, and defeating her own purpose, whether Evan was keeping out of the way, or was kept out of the way by others, even if she escaped personal insult.

Whereas he, well known, and with his customary load of peat to dispose of, could go from place to place and pick up, in gossip, without exciting the suspicion of Mr. Pryse, or any one else, facts which might be withheld from direct inquiry.

And so well did he fulfil his mission that, when the last rays of the setting sun crimsoned the river and the fading woods of the Taff Valley on the Friday evening, Ales, weary and dispirited, but no longer ashamed, rode up the stony hillpath to the farm, on the back of good old Breint.

Robert Jones had turned off towards his own home, with his team and his return load, after a very curious disclaimer of thanks.

Part of that load consisted of a new turf-cutting spade and a small glazed window for his hut. His newly-discovered need for these took him among dealers in hardware and carpenters, until he found what else he went for. He drove hard bargains, and paid in part with winter store of peat; but he carried away more than the dealers supposed. In the one place he observed a full set of implements for husbandry put aside, and roughly labelled, 'Evan Evans, Castella, Paid,' and was told they had so lain, 'lumbering up the place,' for fully three weeks, the buyer not having turned up to claim them, although he had stated he intended to take them up the river by boat when the tide served.

A crusty carpenter, who had two glass windows exposed for sale, was glad to let one of them go as a bargain, seeing that the man for whom they were made in a hurry three weeks before had disappeared mysteriously, and not even gone back to his inn, on St. Mary's Quay, for his horse.

That bit of information about the inn had sent the turf-cutter tramping across the town with his beasts, sure, at least, of much-needed rest and provender, all houses of the kind, in those days of horseback travel and pack-horse conveyance, having ample stable accommodation.

A warm supper, more plentiful than dainty, had been supplied to him in the common room, odorous of tobacco-smoke, rum, cwrw, tar, and salt water.

Presently a voice he knew hailed him from out the smoke-reek.

'Do that be you, Robert Jones? 'Deed, you're the very man to tell the landlord here who owns an old horse left here three weeks ago by a farming-man, who called himself Evan Evans, of Eglwysilan, and went off without paying his score, look you!'

'Ah, how did he go off?'

'Queerly. He said as he was going to hire a boat to carry the horse and some goods of his, as he was be taking to Castella, across the river in the morning, but he never did come back here.'

'No,' chimed in the landlord, 'nor never did mean it, or he would not have been going off in the Osprey's boat, as he surely did.'

''Deed no! not if he did go of his own free will,' came from a feeble voice in a corner; 'but I've heard as' —

'Sure, and didn't Mr. Pryse be saying he was be running off with a lot of money?' again struck in the landlord, drowning the words of the previous speaker.

On this ensued a warm controversy, in which some dark hints were thrown out respecting the Osprey, and Mr. Pryse's connection therewith, all bearing on the strangeness of Evan's disappearance.

Listening Robert Jones had come to the conclusion that the landlord was under Mr. Pryse's finger and thumb, and cautiously made no comment. But he kept his eye on the owner of the feeble voice, and, when he went out, followed.

He had found the man shifty, timid, and unwilling to give an unspoken opinion to a stranger.

So, too, were the tarry loungers upon the quay the next morning.

'Evans might have been kidnapped and carried off against his will, the crew of the Osprey were a queer lot, look you; or he might be running away, as Mr. Pryse did say – they could not tell.'

Mr. Pryse might have frozen free speech, but Robert Jones had noted shrugs and nods more expressive than words. Then the application of two silver pennies to the palm of a timorous lad opened his lips to tell that he had seen a strange man, looking for a big boat, hustled into the boat of the Osprey, and held down whilst the crew rowed out to the schooner in the bay. And, when Ales herself discovered that Evan had bought both a wedding-ring and a brooch for her, the conclusion was obvious.

She had shed her tears in the three weeks gone. She returned to the farm in tearless, but gnawing, uncertainty as to her Evan's fate, yet proud of her ability to clear his honest name.

She was somewhat incoherent in her story, but Robert Jones an hour or so later backed it up with fuller details, and his own convictions.

'Yes, yes, indeed, Evan Evans did go about his business like an honest man. There be still the spades and things he paid for, and I have a glass window he left his God-penny¹² on. He would have kept all the money if he intended running away. No, no, he did be paying all the rent, Mrs. Edwards, whatever Mr. Pryse do say.'

''Deed, it do seem like it. But why should he be "pressed" on board?' she queried. 'There be no war now.'

'Why should any wicked deed be done?' put in Ales. 'A bad man do have his reasons ready.'

'Yes, yes, and one evil head moves many evil hands, Mrs. Edwards,' added Jones, 'if, as is hinted by them as daren't speak their minds, Mr. Pryse do have dealings with the gruff captain of the Osprey for something fiery besides his lordship's coal. Then, smuggling a stout-limbed fellow or two on board might be winked at, if it was no part of the bargain. And I do be telling Ales not to think they would kill Evan. They want living men for sailors, not dead ones.'

'Then God may bring him back to me some time, and I will pray day and night for him. Yes, yes, though the day be long it will have an evening. And let not Mr. Pryse be thinking to escape —

 
"The later that God's vengeance is,
The heavier far and sorer 'tis,"'
 

broke from Ales, her eyes and cheeks kindling as with a spirit of prophecy, as she hurried from the kitchen into the dark storeroom beyond to contend with her own agony in secret.

Then came a reckoning with Jones for Breint's keep at the inn (Ales had cleared Evan's score as a matter of honour), and whilst settling that with Mrs. Edwards, it occurred to him that her sons had pursued their occupations in uncommon silence during this statement of facts and fancies, especially Rhys, who seemed more interested in disentangling the locks of wool he was combing by the fireside (his comb-pot on the hearth) than on disentangling what seemed an unaccountable plot against his mother's tried and faithful servant.

William, knitting a long blue stocking in the opposite corner, had put in an occasional word, but even he did not appear at ease.

Davy's wooden soles had been heard clattering outside along with sounds indicative of more care for recovered Breint than the absent Evan.

He walked in from the farmyard just in time for the supper of hot leek-porridge Jonet poured scalding hot into their bowls, not forgetting one for the turf-cutter, who sat down without apology, for the odour was appetising.

Again he noticed that Rhys and William preserved a sullen silence towards each other, and wondered what fresh quarrel there had been.

When supper was over, and he rose to depart, William followed him.

No sooner were they out of earshot than the boy began to lay bare his grievance in tones of wounded self-esteem.

'Look you,' said he, 'since Evan went, Old Billy has been suffered to butt at the walls, and never a stone had been put back to keep him from the styes, till they did be like to tumble down. So yesterday, while Rhys was at market, I did work till the sweat poured off me, and mended them all, thinking I would let Rhys see what I could do. And since he found out this afternoon what I had been doing, he has never spoken one word to me, whatever. If I had knocked the walls down he could not have looked more surly. It's enough to make one run away, it is! And if it was not for mother and Jonet, I would be running away, 'deed I would.'

'Hush, Willem, don't be saying that; runaway sons make sorrowful mothers. Don't be thinking of doing anything rash, anything you cannot be asking the blessing of Almighty God upon. Perhaps you neglected something Rhys expected done, of more consequence than a dry wall.'

'Sure, Cate Griffith did be digging the potatoes. She could not build up walls. I do believe Rhys is vexed just because mother was so well pleased, and began to put her garden right that Billy and the pigs had spoiled. Rhys would have liked Evan better if mother had found fault with him.'

The boy's bitter attempt at self-justification was checked by his mature friend.

'Faults are thick where love is thin, Willem. You are only a boy and your brother is a man. It is not for you to go your own way and disobey wilfully. But I will look at your handiwork in the morning, when I bring the lime for the land; and, perhaps, be saying a word to bring Rhys to reason. Good-night, Willem. Go to bed peacefully. And don't be building up a wall of stony thoughts against your brother, don't.'

These were his parting words to the chafing lad, as they stood by the gateway, but, as he descended the hill in the full light of the moon, he said to himself, 'Better repair a breach between brothers than build up a wall to repel a fancied enemy.'

It was in this spirit the man addressed himself to Rhys the next morning, whilst helping Lewis to transfer the lime from the panniers to the freshly-dug potato ground, and the unturned stubble of oats and barley. He said he had observed signs of discontent between the brothers the previous night, and on other occasions, and expressed a desire to know if any real cause for discord existed. It was so very serious a thing for brothers in one house to bicker and quarrel; small differences were so liable to grow into great ones, even to enmity and hatred.

Rhys listened uneasily, fidgeted, puckered his brows, and at last jerked out, 'Look you, Robert Jones, that boy Willem is the plague of my life. He will not take orders from me. And who else should give orders if I am to manage the farm? Davy and Jonet obey. But he do think of nothing but picking up stones and building; and that will not make a good farmer or till the land, or pay the rent. He was mending walls on Thursday when he should have been digging potatoes. We may thank Cate Griffith they were all up and safe from last night's frost. She took up the spade he threw down.'