Sea Mistress Read Free

half inclined to beat the other men to the currying house and get the best place to sit and yet fascinated in spite of himself.
    â€˜Is it that Evan Roberts you’re talking about?’ he asked, his tone derogatory. ‘Preaching like a maniac, telling us all to get saved, trying to run the lives of Christian people he is, mind. Why doesn’t he go and convert the heathens, not tell respectable folk how to live?’
    Jubilee barely glanced at him. ‘Come from a place near Loughor, so it seems, got the hwyl all right, folks are going to the chapels in droves just to hear the word from him.’ He looked directly at Ellie, ‘Do you want to go and see him, merchi ?’
    Ellie considered her husband’s words. Jubilee must be interested in hearing this new preacher for usually he favoured the Church of England’s pomp and dignity. ‘Where’s he preaching next, then?’ She sat down at the table and pushed a mug towards Jubilee. Her back ached and she wanted to kick off her boots but there were still some hours of work to do yet. The prospect of a day off was appealing.
    â€˜I hear he’s going up to Tabernacle in Morriston, I could drive us there in the cart, be a good break for you, Ellie, looking a bit peaked you’ve been lately.’
    â€˜Perhaps she’s with child.’ Matthew’s voice was overtly innocent and Jubilee looked at him sharply.
    â€˜ Darro haven’t you got work to do? Perhaps there’s not enough jobs here to warrant the employment of three men and a boy, perhaps I’d best get rid of a full-time worker and employ another casual labourer.’
    Ellie wanted to reach out and cover Jubilee’s hand with her own; he was stung, his manhood imputed by Matthew’s jibe. She glared at the man in the doorway and he had the grace to look abashed.
    Boyo stood beside Ellie, he was puzzled by the charged atmosphere and a little dismayed, not understanding it. How could he know that Jubilee Hopkins was a man who could not father a child? An illness, the swelling of the glands in his neck when he was a young man had done the damage, at least that’s what the doctor had told Jubilee.
    â€˜Get out of here, leave me and my wife to eat in peace.’ Jubilee rarely lost his good humour but now, his mouth was drawn down, his eyebrows met across his brow and he suddenly looked like the old man he was.
    When they were alone, Ellie smiled reassuringly. ‘Don’t notice the men, especially Matthew, he’s all talk that one.’
    She stared into Jubilee’s eyes and saw a tear there. ‘Love, don’t be unhappy, we’ve got a good marriage, haven’t we?’
    â€˜But I wanted sons,’ he said flatly. Of course, it was the reason he had married her, taken her off the hands of her shamed family, made her respectable. He’d wanted the twins she was carrying.
    â€˜I’m sorry.’ Her voice was scarcely audible and he shook off his bad mood as though it was an unwanted garment. ‘No, it’s me that’s sorry, behaving like a big kid, I am. You suffered more than me when you lost the babbas and I should be the first one to recognize that. Wasn’t I there holding your hand, poor little girl?’
    A pain filled Ellie’s body and filtered into her mind. Her children, her sons. Born too soon as was the way of twins, they died without having lived. Jubilee saw her stricken look and rose, taking her into his arms, holding her against his barrel chest. ‘Damn Matthew Hewson,’ he said.
    She was comforted by his nearness, Jubilee was a good man and she loved him. It might not be the love of a wife for a husband but it was a strong love nevertheless. And Ellie was grateful to him, Jubilee had given her a life of respectability that she had no right to expect, only now and then when someone like Matthew stirred the muddy waters did she remember her past.
    On an impulse, she made up her mind.