Over our cigars, I told Sir Madoc all that had passed between Winifred and me, and begged his approbation; and I have no words to express how enthusiastic the large-hearted and jolly old man became; how rejoiced, and how often he shook my hand, assuring me that he had ever loved me quite as much as if I had been a son of his own; that his Winny was one of the best girls in all Wales--true as steel, and one who, when she loved, did so for ever.
"I thank Heaven," he added, "you didn't get that slippery eel, my Lady Aberconway!"
"So do I, now, Sir Madoc," was my earnest response.
But I had not yet seen quite the last of Estelle Cressingham.
Of her Winifred must, at times, have been keenly and bitterly jealous, yet she was too gentle, too ladylike and enduring, to permit such an emotion to be visible to others.
[CHAPTER LX.--A HONEYMOON.]
And so it came to pass, as perhaps Sir Madoc had foreseen, by the doctrine of chances, and without any romance or sensationalism, that in the bright season of summer, Winifred and I--after a short engagement, and many a delicious ramble by the Elwey and Llyn Aled, in the Martens' dingle and by the old rocking-stone--were married in Craigaderyn Church, by her secret admirer, the tall pale curate in the long, long coat, "assisted" by another (as if aid in such cases were necessary); and amid the summer sounds that came floating through the open porch and pointed windows, with the yellow flakes of hazy sunshine, when I heard the voice of the pastor uniting us, I remembered the Sunday we were all last in the same place, and the daydreams in which I had indulged during the prosy sermon, when I fancied the same solemn service being said, and when, by some magic, the image of Winifred would ever come in the place of another.
Sir Watkins Vaughan, a purpose-like and gentlemanly young fellow, a prime bat and bowler, a good shot and good horseman, a thorough Englishman and lover of all field sports, and who acted as my groomsman, was so intent on looking at Dora--radiant in white crape and tulle as one of her sister's bridesmaids--that he made, as he said, "a regular mull" of drawing off my glove, an office which I could not have done for myself.
At last the whole was over; the golden hoop had been slid on the slender figure of a tremulous little hand; we were made one "till death do us part;" and after the usual kisses and congratulations, came forth into the glorious sunshine, while overhead the marriage chimes rang merrily in the old square tower which Jorwerth ap Davydd Lloyd had founded in honour of St. David five hundred years ago. Then came the cheers in the churchyard--cheers that might wake the dead below the green turf; the guttural Celtic voices of the tenants and peasantry, the general jollity, with much twangle-dangling of harps borne by certain itinerant and tipsy bards, attracted thither by the coin and the well-known Cymric proclivities of Sir Madoc; and loud on all hands were praises of the beauty of the Briodasferch (Welsh euphony for bride), with prayers for her future happiness, as we drove away to luncheon.
All the household held high festival. Owen Gwyllim wept in his glee, and drank our healths in mulled port with Mrs. Davis (for whom he had a tenderness) in her room; and Bob Spurrit and Morgan Roots, and all the valets and gamekeepers, did ditto with mulled ale in the "servants' 'all," while we, leaving all to feast and speechify at Craigaderyn, were speeding, as fast as four horses could take us, to hide our blushes at Brighton. . . . After the stormy life I had led how sweet and blessed were home-rest with Winifred! No tempests of thought, of pique or jealousy, of disappointment or bitterness, agitated me now. It was all like first love, and calmly as the summer gloaming among the mountains, the joyous time glided away with us. I felt how truly she had clung to me, and loved me as only those who have long been loved in secret, and whose value, to the heart at least, has been ascertained, by having been to all appearance lost in life, and lost in death, too--for had I not been so to her?--and been mourned for as only the dead, who can return no more, are mourned. Yet I had survived all the perils of war, and her arms were round me now.