“O, Jethro, I love you, love youl” she said.
I did not answer, having loved so long.
Two of us went home, and no Iestyn.
Should not tell of it really, too secret to tell; too hot the fire of that week when Tomos stayed at Cae White and kept Mam occupied. Night after night, come in from shift at Ponty, strip to the bare and wash the body clean, then down to the kitchen for the evening meal with secret glances over the table at Mari; the raised eyebrow of the evening question, the narrowed promise in her eyes for reply. Easy, too, with Morfydd out courting with Willie O’Hara; no prowling eyes, no listening ears.
“Think I’ll go out, Mam.”
Only too pleased to be rid of me, the pair of them, for it is only right that courting couples like Mam and Tomos wanted to be alone. And they made no complaints when Mari went for her summer night strolls, either … summer night strolls down to the estuary where I lay waiting.
“Jethro, you there?”
And the sound of her voice set my heart leaping.
Too secret to tell of the summer lovering; of the unbridled passion of our kisses, lying in sand. Rebecca and her burnings were forgotten in the newfound fire of possession. No blaze of ricks or tollgates invaded this mating, no eyes save the eyes of ghosts watched our kisses snatched in the roll of the breakers. As primaeval beings we were, diving together from rocks into the warm sea of moonlight, splashing demented in the surf, laughing, joyful, naked and unashamed, echoing the laughter of distant lovers on this same sand a thousand years before. Beautiful this new Mari in the shroud of her long, dark hair, resisting no more: and I would have the tongue of those who call it hateful, denouncing as obscene the purity of our love-making, making that which is noble into a thing satanic; twisting the beauty of God’s present to lovers by darkened minds and crippled words. Three days before Tomos was due to leave Cae White we lay together, Mari and me, in our haven of rocks.
“And Jonathon?” she said.
“Jonathon is mine,” I answered.
“You will love him, too, Jethro?”
“As my own son,” I said.
“Time was you were jealous, mind.”
I laughed, remembering. “That time has passed, Mari. The three of us it is from now on. Nothing will come between us now, nothing,” and even as I said it the face of Grandfer seemed to rise before me in some strange trick of moonlight. Clear as living that face, toothless, goat-bearded, grinning as he grinned on the night he told me of his Bronwen. I shut my eyes and lowered my head to the sand.
“Jethro,” Mari whispered, but I scarcely heard her.
‘With Cae White as your Eden and your brother’s wife for a lover, the fingers of Cain shall reach up from the dust, and seek you …’
Years, it seemed, since Grandfer died yet I heard his words again like yesterday; saw the face of my brother then, square and strong, unravaged by the blood and screams of the Westgate, yet Iestyn was smiling.
“Jethro, is it sad with you?” Mari now, turning on her elbow, brushing the water from her face, smoothing back her wet hair.
“No,” I said, and rose and left her, going to the outcrop of the haven where the sea was cresting silver to the breakers. Warm the night, but I was shivering.
‘For she bore my child and then she vanished, went down to the river for the shame of it, in the place where we loved. And they found her three weeks later on the reaches of Laugharne … with mud in her mouth and her eyes taken by gulls …’
Grandfer now, whispering again, words I had long forgotten; whispering in the rocks, but a trumpet of sound. I swung as Mari approached, fearing she would hear it.
“Jethro, for God’s sake, what is the matter?” she said, arms out.
Leaned against the rocks and looked. This, my brother’s wife, naked as me; beautiful this woman, the wife of Iestyn.
“Mari!” I took her against me, kissing her face, but she fought herself free and pushed me away, staring, eyes wild.
“Jethro, what is wrong?”
I could not face her.
“Iestyn, is it?” she said, cold.
I nodded.
Strange that the Father with His one great eye Who has in His face the weight of the moon can suffer His children to know contemplation; stopping the lover’s words in the mouth, turning joy to fear by the cold light of Reason.
“Sorry now, is it?” she whispered, frightened. I held her, but the night was between us.
“Mari, you will never leave me?”
She shook her head. “Jethro, listen. Iestyn is dead. You told me that but for years I have known it. I loved him as you, mind, do not forget it. Dead. And even if he is alive we cannot go back. …”
“Now I will say it, Mari. Listen, you will hear me. Iestyn is dead – there is only the two of us, you and me, Mari and Jethro.”
“And Jonathon,” she said.
“Aye, and Jonathon. Dress now, quick, or Mam will have babies.”
“Rather Mam than me,” she said.
CHAPTER 23
JUST THREE days more I had my mother before Tomos Traherne hooked her away.
Fully-fledged minister now, was Tomos, a man with his hand in God’s and in love with His people, preaching His goodness; a man with a chapel of his own and a little stone manse. Rising in the world, we Mortymers, and I was proud. So pretty Mam looked as Tomos led her out to the trap that Sunday; as a young girl going for marriage;
