Nobody had arrived before us; so we sat down on the cromlech, and began to sing what you may call a duet—that is, a stave for two voices.
But my heart was all with Rhoda Howell; and, as I sat singing alongside of that artful craft, Gwen Thomas, I thought of nothing but the good news I had to tell, and how it would joy the girl I loved so dearly.
It might have been ten minutes or more—at last, however, I spied the old miller, and behind him his pretty daughter, arm-in-arm with David Thomas.
Rhoda’s face was unusual white, and her eyes didn’t quite look straight ahead, but seemed to tack about, as if the wind had shifted to a stormy quarter.
Not much was said by any one, and that little not worth remembering. After a bit, Gwen pulls out her pitch-pixie, and starts off with “Hail, smiling morn!”—a very proper ditty; then “Hop-a-derry-dando,” “The Men of Harlech,” and a lot more—we men singing tenor and bass to the girls’ treble voices.
Ah, lads! I think I bear that harmony roll away with the waterfall. I’ve never forgotten it. The first storm in mid-ocean and the last song your love sings—these, my boys, are sounds which stick to your ears like barnacles to the bottom of a hulk, or limpets to the rocks on the shore.
In the middle of this sing-song, as you may call it, I spied Rhoda—who wouldn’t so much as look or smile at me—whisper to her father, the old miller; and presently they both left. I wish now that I’d given them a stern chase, and boarded, like a bold buccaneer. But, you see, I couldn’t rightly make out Rhoda’s looks. Something was amiss. That I guessed. And I thought that the sky being so ugly and overcast, I’d better wait for the chance of clear weather on the morrow.
As soon as the singing was over, I saw that lubber David—who I could have kicked all the way to Dolgelly with pleasure, indeed—I saw him catch Gwen by the buttonhole, and give her some sort of a tip. She looked earnestly at him, and smiled. Then she turned away, quite composed, indeed.
My lads, I can guess what it was that deceitful varmint said to his minx of a sister. They was laying a trap for me, the two of them. Ay! Yes, indeed! And they caught me, as clean as a shark a sailor’s leg!
“Rhoda’s got a bad headache,” says Gwen, sidling up to me.