A Place of Meadows and Tall Trees

by Clare Dudman

  Her hair is loose around her face. The dense tight curls look a little like wool. She tips her head so her face is sheltered.

  ‘Miriam?’

  Her shoulders are shaking. He thinks she is laughing but she is not. He steps forward and parts her hair. It feels like a coarse version of Myfanwy’s. ‘What do you say?’

  Her long-fingered hands leap to her face. ‘It’s not how I thought.’

  ‘Miriam? Are you going to answer Silas?’

  She looks up. He has never seen her cry before. ‘What do you say, Mam? Yes?’

  ‘I think it would be a good choice.’

  ‘Well I don’t.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Isn’t it obvious?’

  ‘Am I too old, is that it?’ Silas shifts on his knees.

  ‘No.’ She has stopped crying now, but her eyes are still glinting. ‘There is something you’ve forgotten. Something everyone’s forgotten.’

  ‘What’s that, cariad?’

  ‘That! Love. Just some mention of it.’

  ‘Love you? Well of course I love you.’ His knees are aching. Something rasps inside one of them as he rises again, levering himself to standing with the help of the table.

  ‘And I love you, too,’ Myfanwy says. ‘Please say yes.’

  Miriam looks at her and gives her a small, tight grin. ‘Seems like I have no choice then.’

  Caradoc Llewellyn is not even pretending to be happy. He has arrived at Silas’ house without warning, striding through Silas’ open door and now pacing up and down the short length of the kitchen without taking off his hat. ‘It’s too early,’ he says. ‘Megan is barely cold in her grave.’

  Silas is sitting alone at the kitchen table; Myfanwy is with Mary Jones’ brood. ‘My child needs a mother, Caradoc, and I need a wife.’

  ‘Could she not just continue to help you for a while? Wouldn’t that be better?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Think of your reputation, man. Think of the reputation of the colony. How old are you now? Forty?’

  ‘Thirty-nine.’

  ‘More than twenty years older than her then. She is still a young girl. It is indecent...’

  ‘Indecent? All I am doing is trying to survive in this place, and help my child survive. Don’t you care about that?’

  ‘But it is wrong, Silas. If I could, I would forbid it. A mature man like you should not take such a young girl. Especially a man so recently widowed.’ Caradoc stops pacing and stands before him. ‘Cancel it, man, for the sake of all of us. Say you’ve been a little hasty. Everyone will understand.’

  ‘No.’

  Caradoc sighs. ‘I just want you to consider what you’re doing. You are ruining not just your life but hers too.’

  ‘Miriam knows her own mind. Surely you know that.’

  ‘Yes, I know she is a strong girl, in will as well as body. But I also know she must dream like all women of her age do – of flowers, of courtship...’ Caradoc raises his head and looks at him. ‘...of love.’

  ‘Love? Of course I love her. She is like a daughter to me.’

  ‘A daughter?’

  ‘Yes. And that, brawd, will have to do for now.’

  ‘This match is wrong. I shall pray for you to come to your senses.’ Then, without another word, he disappears out of the door into the early morning sun.

  Mary Jones arranges the wedding with her customary efficiency. For days Silas is tormented by smells of cakes baking and he gives her several bags of flour and sugar, and every egg his hens produce. Their diet, in consequence, consists mainly of meat but Myfanwy assures him that Miriam has told her it will be worth it in the end.

  Megan, of course, does not approve. In fact Silas thinks that she has disappeared in disgust. One night he comes home and finds that Miriam has rearranged the furniture and added small items of her own. It gives the place a warmer feel: several brightly coloured rag rugs on the floor, cushions tied onto some of the chairs, a few more books on the window sill, and a new cloth over the table. She stands at the bedroom door watching his face as he enters, smiling as his eyebrows rise and he looks around with his mouth slightly open.

  ‘What do you think, Dadda?’ says Myfanwy hopping up and down. ‘Miriam thinks it looks more homely, and so do I.’

  ‘Well,’ he says, seriously, then smiles, ‘yes, it is welcoming, quite a transformation.’

  After that she adds pictures to the walls, drawings by Myfanwy of animals they have seen, and replaces the plain brown curtains with a red print. She uses the same cloth to pad the chair that used to be Megan’s so that it becomes something entirely different, and covers the blankets in the bedroom with quilts of her own.

  They have built a chapel in Rawson now. It is made of bricks and has small windows made from rhea gut. Inside there are a series of crude benches, each one owned by a family, and a small platform and table at the front. It is well used: Sunday school, morning and evening services, prayer meetings, choir rehearsals, bible study as well the council and court and Jacob’s school – which Caradoc reluctantly attempts to continue.

  Although it is John who is officially on the council, it is invariably Mary who speaks – a situation which is acceptable to everyone, especially John.

  ‘This chapel needs more benches,’ she says. ‘If we hurry we can build them in time for Silas’ wedding.’

  Only Caradoc and the two Baptist members sitting next to him do not agree. Caradoc sits with his arms folded. ‘We don’t think it’s right,’ the man next to him says. ‘It’s unbecoming. Too hasty.’

  Silas opens his mouth, but Edwyn is there before him. ‘But it’s really not your business, though, is it?’

  ‘Well, Edwyn, I’m afraid it is,’ says Caradoc. ‘It’s the business of us all. She’s too young. It gives the whole colony a bad name. What will the people back home say when they hear? We’re allowing child brides?’

  ‘She’s hardly that.’

  ‘Well, we think it should not be allowed.’

  ‘And I don’t think we should condemn.’

  ‘He needs help,’ points out Mary, ‘he can’t look after a house and child on his own.’

  Silas is opening his mouth and closing it again like a goldfish. Every time he goes to speak someone butts in for him. He sits back.

  ‘Yes,’ says Edwyn. ‘His child needs a mother. We have to be practical, brodyr a chwiorydd, this is Patagonia, not Ceredigion. It is a harsh place, wild, and there are not many of us here. A man needs a woman.’ He sighs. ‘And a man with a child needs a woman more than most. Love, romance, courtship – all those – have to be forgotten, what we have to do now at the moment is survive.’

  There is silence. Silas is looking at Edwyn. He has forgotten entirely about closing his mouth.

  ‘Are you saying we should not love, brawd?’ Caradoc says.

  ‘Of course not. I am just saying we need to adapt to where we are and make sacrifices. After all that is what the Lord expects from us, is it not?’

  ‘Yes, brawd.’

  ‘So I think we should all offer our congratulations and look forward to the day. And Caradoc?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I expect it to be the shortest sermon you have ever written.’

  ‘But…’

  ‘And your most amusing.’

  ‘But I can’t…’

  Edwyn sits back and smiles. ‘I know. Just do your best.’

  The morning before their wedding Miriam opens the windows of Silas’ cottage wide. He has replaced the rhea gut now. It is crude stuff for windows, thick and in some places almost opaque, but at least it is sturdy, doesn’t rattle in the wind and, for the moment, has little smell.

  ‘There,’ she says, ‘the old replaced with the new.’ It is September and one of the last winds of winter blows in. It rushes around the room whistling to itself, displacing the heavy warm air that was there. Silas fancies he hears moans and faint cries, creaks and curses as if something is being shifted and doesn’t want to move. He lo
oks at Miriam to see if she feels it too, but if she does she makes no sign.

  When she closes the window again the house feels different. It is not just the smell of the fields outside but a different charge in the air. He sits in the chair that was Megan’s and for once feels relaxed and comfortable. Everything is well. He reaches out for Miriam’s hand. ‘Diolch.’

  Fifty-two

  In spite of everything he has slept. He wakes surprised, then becomes dimly conscious of a noise at the window.

  ‘Silas! Get up! Come on you old dog. Get up. Now. Hurry.’

  Joseph. My brother-in-law now, he thinks numbly, and then looks at his new wife. She has propped herself up on her arms and is swivelling her head to look, first at the window and then at Silas.

  He had just stripped off to his underwear to sleep. He leaps out of bed and immediately wants to cover himself. He sees her swiftly examine him; her eyes passing down his jerkin and then his long johns – neither item scrupulously white any more. He sees what she sees – his thin small shoulders, his small paunch stretching the fabric of his vest, and his legs, obviously thin even though they are covered. Caradoc’s words come back to him. Maybe she would have preferred someone her own age. Perhaps she is already a little disgusted. He remembers too well how the middle aged appeared to him in his youth. He has never had time to consider his age before. Middle aged. He gives an indiscernible shrug. At least he’s alive. At least he’s made it through this long. So many don’t. Megan. At the thought of her something vital seems to drop from him. That wedding night had been so different from this one. His shoulders slump. He knows she had been expecting something from him, more than a dry kiss on the cheeks and her own side of a cold home-made mattress.

  ‘Silas!’ The voice is in their kitchen now.

  He hurries into his trousers, pulls a shirt around him and yanking at his belt lurches into the living room and then the kitchen.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s Jacob. He’s back. Mam told me to come and tell you. She said you’d want to know, just in case.’ He stops. Miriam has come into the kitchen behind Silas. She stops at the doorway in her nightclothes, a blanket around her. Her face is flushed and the skin around her eyes swollen and not just because of sleep. ‘Are you all right, Mim?’ Joseph asks and steps towards her, but she hangs her head, steps back into the living room and then retreats to their bedroom again and closes the door. Joseph looks at Silas, as if he is waiting for him to say something. But Silas looks away. ‘Everything’s fine,’ he says, ‘or it will be. It’s all taking a bit of getting used to, that’s all.’

  Joseph nods curtly and goes to the door, then stops. ‘Mam said that if there’s any trouble to call on us. We’re your family too now. She told me to tell you.’ He seems to think for a while and then looks up again. ‘I think that’s all she said.’

  ‘How did you hear he was back?’

  ‘Ieuan said. He went into the village early and saw the ship there, and Jacob coming.’

  In the living room Miriam is sitting on Megan’s chair examining her hands. She looks up as he enters. ‘What have I done, Silas? Or is it something I haven’t done?’

  He sits down beside her and presses her head to his chest and strokes her hair. ‘It’s not your fault,’ he says gently. ‘I’ve been on my own too long. Even before Megan died I was on my own.’

  She forces her head away. ‘How?’

  ‘She didn’t speak. You must have seen it. She’d drawn away. She was too sad, too full of grief. She couldn’t bear it. Some people can’t. You must have noticed. They go inside themselves where nothing can hurt them.’

  She nods.

  ‘But...’

  He is interrupted by the thudding of horse’s hooves and then a neighing, loud and close. He stiffens. ‘Get into the bedroom. I’ll deal with this alone.’

  ‘But I want to be with you.’

  ‘Later. I promise. Now get yourself dressed.’

  Someone hammers on the back door. Whoever it is must know there is no need. He opens the door and the wind catches it and throws it wide. It is Jacob – holding on to his hat so it is low on his face, his great black coat loose and flapping like a cloak around him.

  ‘You!’ he says, prodding Silas in the chest. ‘What have you to say for yourself?’

  Silas steps back.

  ‘I’ve heard it all from Caradoc.’ He steps forward, releases his hat so it rises away from his head. His watery-blue eyes are rimmed with red and flooding.

  ‘I’m sorry, Jacob. It just happened. I did everything I could.’

  ‘You killed her.’ Jacob is breathing heavily, two dark red patches in the paleness of his cheeks. His years in Buenos Aires have made him look drawn and ill, and he has allowed his beard, now grey rather than gingery-brown, to grow in odd tufted clumps all over his cheeks.

  He prods Silas again, a finger hard in his stomach, and Silas grabs hold of his hand. Even though Silas is smaller he is stronger. Jacob tries to pull his hand back but Silas keeps hold, his hand tightening. ‘She did it to herself, Jacob. Are you listening? There was nothing anyone could do...’ A sob erupts from him. ‘I tried, Jacob. I tried everything. Listen to me. She was my wife, for God’s sake. My life. I loved her more than I could ever love anyone else.’

  Jacob opens his mouth to reply but then looks over Silas’ shoulder into the house and closes it again.

  Silas glances behind him. Miriam. How could he have forgotten? He can’t take the words back. They are true but it does her no good to know them. His hands have relaxed and Jacob snatches his own free.

  ‘Look at her. A child. How could you, Silas? What did you say to her? What lies? That you would look after her like you looked after Megan?’ He draws back his lips into the grimace of a smile. ‘God sees what you do. Taking a young girl like this. You disgust me.’

  ‘Go away Jacob, you’ve said enough.’

  ‘I’ve not started yet.’ His voice is close to a sneer, and his smile widens to a grin. It reminds Silas of another grin – the private one that used to belong to Edwyn.

  Jacob brings his face closer. ‘What are you going to do about it, eh?’

  Silas’ fist smacks forward. There is a crack and Jacob staggers back, his legs stiff like broom handles, holding his hand to his nose and then drawing his hand away again so he can inspect it. Blood is escaping freely from each nostril.

  ‘Your answer to everything, it seems,’ Jacob gasps. The rest of his face is drawn and white. He staggers back then forward again. ‘Is it guilt, I wonder,’ he says, panting, ‘which makes you answer everything I say with a fist?’

  ‘Leave me in peace,’ Silas hisses through his teeth.

  Jacob holds a handkerchief to his nose and steps closer again, his chin jutting upwards, his beard lifted from his chest.

  ‘He said he wants you to go,’ Miriam says loudly. She is beside them now, holding onto Silas’ arm. ‘He married me because he’s fond of me, Mr Griffiths. That’s the truth of it. He loved Megan, but now he’s fond of me as well. And I love him. And maybe he’ll never love anyone as much as he loved your sister, but I know he’ll try. He’s a good man, he just wants the best for everyone. You should leave us alone.’

  Jacob has started at her words, his mouth changing from grimace to open-mouthed astonishment.

  ‘Silas? Miriam? Is everything all right here?’ John has arrived with Joseph and Ieuan beside him, their faces set, as if ready for battle.

  ‘I think so.’

  Jacob slowly turns. ‘I was just giving Mr James my congratulations,’ he says, pointedly dabbing at his nose and wincing. ‘He’s a lucky man.’ Then, unwilling to turn his back on them, Jacob walks backwards to where his horse is tethered. ‘Shall I see you on Sunday?’ he says as if he has just come across them in the village, ‘I am looking forward to giving my first sermon in the new chapel.’

  ‘Perhaps, Mr Griffiths. We shall see.’

  They sleep side by side as if there is a cold barrier of bed they m
ustn’t cross. During the day she clutches him when anyone sees them, holds his hand or his arm, and leans her head on his shoulder, but never kisses him. And he is aware of her as he would be of an adoring child: another Myfanwy but older and bigger, her body heavy on his, but sometimes too close, sometimes pulling him and weighing him down.

  The summer is coming and the wheat is ripening. For an hour Silas and Miriam work side by side almost in silence, intent on their work even though it requires little concentration. Then, abruptly, she pauses and looks at him. ‘What must I do for you to love me, Silas?’

  ‘I do love you.’

  ‘Not as a friend. You know how I mean.’

  He doesn’t answer. His face is burning. He snatches at the weeds, counting them as he pulls them from the ground.

  ‘Look at me.’

  He stops. Stands upright.

  ‘What is wrong? My hair? My legs? My face? What is it that repulses you?’

  All of these things he thinks guiltily – and yet none of them. ‘You are perfect. The fault is mine.’

  She strides next to him. ‘Hold me.’ He touches her on the shoulders.

  ‘Properly.’

  ‘I can’t.’ He whips his hands away and she stares at him – eyes round and full of tears.

  ‘Is that what’s wrong? I want children of my own, Silas. Your children. Our children. How can I have them if you can’t even bear to touch me?’

  He looks away, kneels down again to dig at the weeds and her shadow stays there, across the ground in front of him unmoving.

  ‘Won’t you even talk to me?’

  ‘I can’t,’ he cries out. ‘I can’t tell you what I think. Everything is confused. You, me, Megan, Jacob, Edwyn... I’m sorry. I didn’t know it would be like this. I’m sorry.’

  ‘Why did you marry me, Silas?’

  He doesn’t answer. He is close to sobbing and breaking down. The smell of the earth, the sound of the river close by, even the tugging of the wind is reminding him of so many things he would rather forget.