Standing under the porch of the house was an old man with a long white beard like a Druid in spectacles shading his eyes and expectant...
A bicycle might prove an incumbrance in the ensuing interview, so David hastily propped his against a fuchsia hedge and hurried forward to meet the old man, who extended hands to envelop him, not trusting to his eyes. An old, rosy-cheeked woman in a sunbonnet came up behind the old man, shrieked out "Master David!" and only waited with twitching fingers for her own onslaught till the father had first embraced his prodigal son. This was done at least three times, accompanied with tears, blessings, prayers, the uplifting of poor filmy eyes to a cloudless Heaven—"Diolch i Dduw!"—ejaculations as to the wonder of it—"Rhyfeddol yw yn eiholl ffyrdd"—God's Providence—His ways are past finding out! "Ni ellir olrain ei Ragluniaeth!"—"My own dear boy! Fy machgen annwyli!"
Then the old woman took her turn: "Master David! Eh, but you're changed, mun!"—then a lot of Welsh exclamations, which until the Welsh can agree to spell their tongue phonetically I shall not insert—"Five years since you left us! Eh, and I never thought to see you no more. Some said you wass dead, others that you wass taken prisoner by the Wild Boars. But here you are, and welcome—indeed—" Then Master David between the embraces was scanned, a little more critically than by the purblind father, but with distinct approval.
At last David stood apart in the stone-flagged hall of the Vicarage. His abundant hair was rumpled, his face was stained by other people's tears, his collar, tie, dress disordered, and his heart touched. It was a rare experience in his twenty-four years of life—he guessed that should be his age—to find himself really taken on trust, really desired and loved. Honoria's friendship was a pure and precious thing, but in its very purity carefully restrained. Praddy's kindness, and the office boy's worship had both been gratifying to Vivie's self-esteem, but both had to be kept at bay. Somehow the love of a father and of an old nurse were of a different category to these other contacts.
All these thoughts passed through David's brain in thirty seconds. He shook himself, straightened himself, smiled adequately, and tried to live up to the situation.
"Dear father! And dear ... Nannie! (A bold but successful deduction). How sweet of you both—greeting me like this. I've come home a very different David to the one that left you—what was it? Five—six years ago?—to go to Mr. Praed's studio. I've learnt a lot in the interval. But I'm so sick of the past, I don't want to talk about it more than I can help, and I've been in very queer health since I got ill—and—wounded—in—South Africa. My memory has gone for many things—I'm afraid I've forgotten all my Welsh, Nannie, but it'll soon come back, that is, if I may stay here a bit." (Exclamations from father and nurse: "This is your home, Davy-bach!") "I'm not going to stay too long this time because I've got my living to earn in London....
"Did you never hear anything about me from ... South Africa ... or the War Office—or—your old college chum, Mr. Gardner?"
"I heard—my own dear boy—" said the Revd. Howel, again taking him in his arms in a renewed spasm of affection. "I heard you were wounded and very ill in the camp hospital at Colesberg. It was a nursing sister, I think, who sent me the information. I wrote several times to the War Office, my letters were acknowledged, that was all. Then Sam Gardner wrote to me from Margate and said his son had been in the same hospital with you. Later on I saw in a Bristol paper that this hospital—Colesberg—had fallen into the hands of the Boers and the Cape insurgents. Then I said to myself 'My poor boy's been taken prisoner' and as time went on, 'My poor boy's dead, or he would have written to me.'"
Here the Revd. Howel stopped to wipe his eyes and blow his nose. David touched through his armour of cynicism, said—Nannie retiring to prepare the evening meal—"Father dear, though I don't want to refer too often to the past, I behaved disgracefully some time ago and the Colonies seemed my only chance of setting myself right. I did manage to get away from the Boers, but I had not the courage to present myself before you till I had done something to regain your good opinion. I have got now good employment in London and I'm even reading up Law. We will talk of that by and bye but I tell you now—from my heart—I am a different David to the one you knew, and you shall never regret taking me back."
Both father and son were crying now, for emotion especially in Wales is catching. But the father laughed through his tears; and incoherently thanked God for the return of the prodigal—a fine upstanding lad—whole and sound. "No taint about you, Davy, I'll be bound. Why your voice alone shows you've been a clean liver. It's music in my ears, and if I could see as well as I can hear I'd wager you're a handsome lad and have lost much of your foolishness. Davy, lad" (lowering his voice) "you've no cause to be anxious about Jenny. She—she—had a boy, but we got her married to a miner—I made it right with him. She has another child now, but they're being brought up together. We won't refer to it again. She lives twenty miles from here, at Gower—and ... and ... there's an end of it....