By Berwen Banks | Page 8

and out again on the breezy hillside before the blue smoke had begun to curl up from the thatched chimneys which marked the cluster of cottages called "Abersethin."
Down there, under the cliffs, the little village slumbered, the rising sun just beginning to touch its whitewashed walls with gold, while up above, on the high lands, the "Vicare du's" fields were already bathed in the morning sunlight.
As he crossed from ridge to ridge and from furrow to furrow Cardo's thoughts continually flew across the valley to the rugged hill on the other side, and to the old grey house on the cliff--the home of Essec Powell, the preacher. In vain he sought for any sign of the girl whose acquaintance he had made so unexpectedly, and he was almost tempted to believe that she was no other than a creature of his own imagination, born of the witching moonlight hour, and absorbed again into the passing shadows of night. But could he have seen through the walls of that old grey house, even now at that early hour, he would have understood what kept the preacher's niece so busily engaged that neither on the shore nor on the banks of the Berwen was there a sign of her.
In the cool dairy at Dinas, and in and out of the rambling old kitchen, she was busy with her preparations for the guests who would fill the house during the Sassiwn. She bustled about, with Marged Hughes in attendance, looking very different, but every bit as charming, in her neat farm dress as she had on her visit to Caer Madoc. The sleeves of her pink cotton jacket, pushed up above the elbows, showed her white, dimpled arms; while her blue skirt or petticoat was short enough to reveal the neatly-shod feet, with their bows of black ribbon on the instep.
Every house in the neighbourhood was busy with preparations of some sort. At the farmhouses the women had been engaged for days with their cooking. Huge joints of beef and ham, boiled or baked, stood ready in the cool pantries; and in the smallest cottages, where there was more than one bed, it had been prepared for some guest. "John, my cousin, is coming from 'the Works,'" [5] or "Mary, my sister, will be home with her baby."
Everywhere hearts and hands were full of warm hospitality. Clergymen of the Church of England, though generally looking askance at the chapels and their swarming congregations, now, carried away by the enthusiasm of the people, consented to attend the meetings, secretly looking forward, with the Welsh love of oratory, to the eloquent sermons generally to be heard on such occasions.
Cardo, ruthlessly striding through the dew-bespangled gossamer of the turnip field, heard with pleasure from Dye that the adjoining field, which sloped down to the valley, had been fixed upon for the holding of the Sassiwn. On the flat at the bottom the carpenters were already at work at a large platform, upon which the preachers and most honoured guests were to be seated; while the congregation would sit on the hillside, which reached up to the Vicar's land. At least three thousand, or even four, might be expected.
All day Cardo looked over the valley with intense interest, and when the day's work was over, unable to restrain his curiosity and impatience any longer, he determined to take a closer survey of the old house on the hill, which for so many years he had seen with his outward eyes, though his inner perception had never taken account of it. At last, crossing the beach, he took his way up the steep path that led to Dinas. As he rounded a little clump of stunted pine trees he came in sight of the house, grey, gaunt, and bare, not old enough to be picturesque, but too old to look neat and comfortable, on that wind-swept, storm-beaten cliff. Its grey walls, marked with patches of damp and lichen, looked like a tear-stained face, out of which the two upstairs windows stared like mournful eyes. Downstairs, in one room, there was a little sign of comfort and adornment; crimson curtains hung at the window, inside which a few flowers grew in pots. Keeping well under the hedge of elders which surrounded the cwrt or front garden, Cardo passed round to the side--the pine end, as it is called in Wales--and here a little lattice window stood open. It faced the south, and away from the sea a white rose tree had ventured to stretch out its straggling branches. They had evidently lately been drawn by some loving hand towards the little window. A muslin curtain fluttered in the evening breeze, on which came the sound of a voice. Cardo knew it at once. It was Valmai singing at her