, he was. And if it were finer to go
alone, it was: he did not want to go for all that.

They went over the field, where a thin, keen wind blew round
the ball of the hill, in the starlight. They came to the stile,
and to the side of Anna's house. The lights were out, only on
the blinds of the rooms downstairs, and of a bedroom upstairs,
firelight flickered.

"We'd better leave 'em alone," said Alfred Brangwen.

"Nay, nay," said Tom. "We'll carol 'em, for th' last
time."

And in a quarter of an hour's time, eleven silent, rather
tipsy men scrambled over the wall, and into the garden by the
yew trees, outside the windows where faint firelight glowered on
the blinds. There came a shrill sound, two violins and a piccolo
shrilling on the frosty air.

"In the fields with their flocks abiding." A commotion of
men's voices broke out singing in ragged unison.

Anna Brangwen had started up, listening, when the music
began. She was afraid.

"It's the wake," he whispered.

She remained tense, her heart beating heavily, possessed with
strange, strong fear. Then there came the burst of men's
singing, rather uneven. She strained still, listening.

"It's Dad," she said, in a low voice. They were silent,
listening.

"And my father," he said.

She listened still. But she was sure. She sank down again
into bed, into his arms. He held her very close, kissing her.
The hymn rambled on outside, all the men singing their best,
having forgotten everything else under the spell of the fiddles
and the tune. The firelight glowed against the darkness in the
room. Anna could hear her father singing with gusto.

"Aren't they silly," she whispered.

And they crept closer, closer together, hearts beating to one
another. And even as the hymn rolled on, they ceased to hear
it.

CHAPTER VI

ANNA VICTRIX

Will Brangwen had some weeks of holiday after his marriage,
so the two took their honeymoon in full hands, alone in their
cottage together.

And to him, as the days went by, it was as if the heavens had
fallen, and he were sitting with her among the ruins, in a new
world, everybody else buried, themselves two blissful survivors,
with everything to squander as they would. At first, he could
not get rid of a culpable sense of licence on his part. Wasn't
there some duty outside, calling him and he did not come?

It was all very well at night, when the doors were locked and
the darkness drawn round the two of them. Then they we