Treasure of the Celtic Triangle Page 4

  Though today’s ride was prompted by Percy’s letter and her brother’s insufferable behavior, she found her thoughts turning toward dear Gwyneth Barrie, the mysterious nymph of Llanfryniog.

  Gwyneth’s diminutive stature, kind and soft-spoken nature, and unruly head of white hair would have been enough in themselves to invite taunts from other children. Along with these visible peculiarities, however, was the fact that she had no mother—at least no one knew who her mother was—and that her father, hard-working slate miner Codnor Barrie, was himself so short as to be considered by many a dwarf. To these was added the affiliation of father and daughter with Codnor Barrie’s great-aunt, christened Branwenn Myfanawy but simply known as “Grannie” to those few who claimed acquaintance with her. Though as kindhearted a woman as any in the region, she had been considered a witch by many in the village for what were considered her eccentric ways. There was not a grain of truth to the rumors. But that did not prevent them. The final and perhaps most serious charge against poor little Gwyneth was a serious impediment of speech. She stuttered, all the more so when nervous or agitated. It was all the excuse the cruel-minded children of the village had needed to torment her endlessly in her younger years. It was also the only justification the gossipmongers and old women needed to brand her a witch-child along with her great-great-aunt.

  But Gwyneth and Grannie had tried to return the evil of the community with good, often in the form of anonymous floral bouquets left on one door or another about town after an offense or rude word. The general antipathy toward Gwyneth and Grannie was all the more illogical in light of the general esteem in which Gwyneth’s cousin, Steven Muir, now factor at the manor, and his mother, Barrie’s sister, were held. But prejudice and suspicion are rarely guided by logic.

  Gwyneth’s fortunes had begun to change five years before. It was then that Florilyn’s Scottish cousin Percival Drummond, after a string of reckless incidents threatened to land him in a Glasgow jail, had been sent to Wales for the purpose of passing the summer with aunt and uncle and family.

  She and Percy had not hit it off at first, Florilyn remembered with a smile. But Percy made little Gwyneth’s acquaintance almost his first day in Wales. Knowing nothing of how she was viewed by others in the community, assuming her an odd but delightful child, and having no idea that a mere three years in age separated them, Percy was immediately enchanted. His friendship with the little blond nymph had changed Percy from a rebellious teen into a sensitive young man, newly awakened to God’s presence in the world and more importantly within himself. A new relationship with his father had followed subsequent to his return home to Glasgow at summer’s end.

  To her own great surprise, Florilyn reflected, the change in Percy had also wrought changes in her. She, too, had begun to look up and ask how God fit into her life … and how she fit into His. Indeed, little Gwyneth Barrie’s innocent, trusting, loving, forgiving outlook on life had influenced many—she and Percy perhaps most of all. Remarkably, Gwyneth’s stuttering had ceased abruptly after the accident at the end of that same summer.

  Percy, son of Florilyn’s mother’s brother Edward, a vicar of the Church of Scotland in Glasgow, and wife Mary, had eventually passed a good portion of three summers of his youth with them in Wales. Now he was in his fourth and final year at Aberdeen University, planning to continue his studies toward a future in law.

  When she first began to love Percy, Florilyn had asked herself many times. It had come upon her slowly. Had it begun as long ago as his first summer in Wales when he was sixteen and she fifteen?

  There was no doubt that she had missed him after he was gone and thought about him far more than she would have admitted either to herself or to him. By the time he returned for a second visit, she was eighteen and in grave danger of falling in love with the tall, dashing nineteen-year-old. The moment she saw him step off the coach, her heart had leaped within her. But his feelings remained a mystery. Even though nothing had been said, their friendship had deepened into what seemed like more. How much more she had been afraid to ask herself even then. She knew, too, that Percy remained captivated with Gwyneth, who was also growing rapidly into a young woman.

  By then she and Gwyneth had become the best of friends. Gwyneth was working at the manor as a lady’s maid to Florilyn and her mother. Nothing, not even a man, not even Percy, would come between them. But it was no secret that they both cherished more than a passing affection for the good-looking and chivalrous young Scot.

  Then suddenly without warning, about a year ago, the enigmatic little family of outcasts had disappeared from Llanfryniog without a trace—Codnor and Gwyneth Barrie and Grannie “Bryn” Myfanawy. Not a word had been heard from them since. No one knew a thing, not even Adela Muir, Codnor’s sister and Gwyneth’s aunt.

  Florilyn halfway expected her father to have more information concerning the mysterious affair than he let on. But he had revealed nothing, and now he was dead. Whatever secrets he may have possessed he had taken with him to his grave.

  Percy had returned to Wales last summer knowing nothing of the strange turn of events. The shock of finding Gwyneth gone had unsettled him more than anything Florilyn had ever seen. But out of the suddenly altered circumstances had come the decision that would change both their lives forever. She and Percy had been engaged since the final days of the previous June.

  There was still no word, no trace, no hint of Gwyneth Barrie’s whereabouts. Florilyn wondered if the mystery would ever be solved.

  EIGHT

  Schemes

  A week after their initial discussion about the Wales situation, as they were now calling it, Palmer Sutcliffe found his employer in his office. “I have learned a few details concerning the Westbrooke affair,” he said when he was seated. “I have a contact in Porthmadog who is acquainted with the solicitor for the late viscount’s estate. He was able to learn that Lord Snowdon established a trusteeship for the estate in which he named his wife trustee. That is where it stands at present. The solicitor is involved of course, but effectively the man’s widow is in complete control.”

  “And the son?” asked Lord Litchfield.

  “He will not inherit until he is twenty-five.”

  “How old is he now?”

  “Twenty-three.”

  “What do we know about the woman, Lady Snowdon?”

  “She is the daughter of a Scottish earl—of good family, well respected, quite wealthy. Though apparently the earl, her father, has very peculiar notions.”

  “What kind of notions?”

  “Religious. A fanatic, they say.”

  “Religious fanaticism is nothing unusual in Scotland. They breed preachers there like rabbits. What’s so unusual about this earl? Do I know him? Does he sit in the House?”

  “I don’t think he has ever occupied his seat. He is known to completely eschew politics.”

  “What does he do then?”

  “As I said, he is a man of substantial wealth. However, over the years he has given half his fortune away to various Christian mission organizations, particularly one in China. And then—get this—at sixty-four the man went off with his wife and joined the mission himself. They have been in China as some kind of missionaries ever since.”

  “That’s the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard,” laughed Litchfield. “What kind of missionaries could a doddering old earl and his wife make? What in the world are they doing, preaching to the natives, for God’s sake! The thing’s preposterous.”

  “I don’t know. But that is the way things apparently stand.”

  “They gave all their money to this missions outfit?”

  “About half as I understand it, to a number of missions and charities. They split what remained of their fortune between a son and the daughter in question. Lady Snowdon’s brother is a vicar in Glasgow. Both are apparently as fanatical about religion as their parents.”

  “A family of fools.”

  “Perhaps, but wealthy fools,” remarked Sutcliffe. “
Money apparently means nothing to them. Lord Snowdon, whatever our difficulties with him, seems to have been the only sane one in the entire brood.”

  “In other words, he didn’t marry the woman for her religion?”

  “Very unlikely, I would say. More likely for her money. He had been strapped for years.”

  “Then money will be no inducement to his widow.”

  “Again, most unlikely.”

  “How do we approach them then? How will we induce the woman to sell if she is independently wealthy?”

  “There may be no alternative but to await the son’s ascension to the title.”

  “How long will that be, did you say?”

  “A year and a half.”

  “We’ve already waited five years! Why not approach the son now?”

  “He would have no legal authority to sell any of the estate.”

  “What would we have to lose? It may be that he has influence with the mother.”

  “Or it could be that we might make the preliminary arrangements with letters of intent. It could take us eighteen months to be ready to begin blasting as it is—with all the legalities required to draw up the papers, getting the equipment there, and so on. It is not too soon to begin.”

  “You’re right. With an agreement in place, we could be ready to begin the day the sale is consummated.”

  “Let me see what more I can learn about the young man. If like his father he is financially straitened, we might attempt exactly the same line of approach with him. Youth is not always wise in the ways of the world. We may be able to use that to our advantage.”

  “Do you suppose he knows of our previous communications?”

  “There is no way to know. We must simply choose our words with care.”

  “Then find out what you can.”

  “Would you like me again to draft a preliminary letter?” asked Sutcliffe.

  Litchfield thought a moment. “Yes,” he nodded slowly. “But in my own name, I think. We don’t want to make the same mistake twice. We will have to hope the son is not so shrewd as his father. Word it to imply that Snowdon had already agreed and that all he must do to pocket a sizeable sum of cash is to agree to what his father had already set in motion.”

  NINE

  A Different View in the Hills

  It had rained incessantly for three days. Florilyn walked out the front door of Westbrooke Manor just after lunch. She was weary of the dreary atmosphere. She had had her nose buried in the MacDonald novel she was reading for as long she could tolerate for one morning. She had never been a great reader. Though she was enjoying it, she was still, and always would be, an outdoor person. When the rain finally began to let up about eleven o’clock, she determined that one way or another she would spend the afternoon outside.

  The clouds seemed at last to have emptied of their waterlogged floodgates and called a temporary halt to the deluge upon west Britain. The sun, however, gave no indication that it intended to battle the thick cloud cover for supremacy. A gray-white sky overspread the earth with a canopy of gloomy monotony. But it was relatively warm, pleasantly humid, refreshing in its own way with just enough bite in the moist air to keep it from being muggy. All in all it was a perfect autumn afternoon of late October.

  As Florilyn meandered away from the house, she breathed in deeply of the liquid fragrant air. Three days of rain had made everything clean. The ground was wet beneath her feet. Puddles were scattered everywhere about the entryway. Drops still fell from the eaves of the house, from every branch of every tree, from fading flowers and rosebushes and shrubs. Droplets clung to every blade of grass. Water was everywhere. But at least the rain had stopped.

  The air smelled good! It was the aroma of autumn, so different from that of its cousin spring. It was the smell of dirt, of peat, of wetness, of decay … of brown not green. Though it spoke of winter’s approach, it was yet sweet and pleasant.

  She had no plans in mind for the afternoon. It seemed too wet for a ride. She just wanted to be outside. Perhaps she would bundle up, bring out a warm cup of chocolate, and read in the summerhouse. Then let the rain come back and do its worst!

  She wandered toward the stables. It was dark inside as she entered. It took a good while for her eyes to accustom themselves to the dim light, for it was not bright enough outside to help much. She heard sounds and squinted. She had not seen Courtenay all day. Perhaps he, too, planned to take advantage of the lapse in the rain and was preparing for a ride. She soon realized, however, that the sounds were coming not from her brother but from Steven Muir at the far end of the great barn. He was occupied with one of the horses. “Steven, is that you?” she called into the semidarkness.

  “Miss Florilyn—yes,” came the familiar voice in reply. “I am checking on Grey Tide.”

  “How is she?” asked Florilyn, approaching slowly.

  “I would guess that she is perhaps two weeks away,” replied Steven. “I am not sure she will be ready for Mr. Percy to ride if he comes for Christmas.”

  “He has ridden Red Rhud many times,” said Florilyn. “I am not so worried about which horse he will ride as I am about snow and whether he and his parents will be able to get here at all.”

  “He will find a way. I am sure he is anxious to see you again.” Steven turned and walked toward the back of the barn.

  Florilyn followed him outside. There she saw Red Rhud saddled and apparently waiting for him. “Are you going out?” Florilyn asked.

  “I am. I’ve been waiting for the rain to break.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “Out to the Cnychwr croft. Their rent is due, but I haven’t had the chance to get out there. I haven’t seen them since Mr. Heygate left. Would you like to join me?”

  “Oh … yes—I think I would. This rain has been making me crazy. A ride would be nice, but I didn’t want to go out alone.”

  “Then I will saddle Black Flame. You may take your pick of mounts. But I should warn you,” added Steven, “it is six miles at least. We will not be back until late. The rain may resume.”

  “As long as you promise to take care of me, I won’t be worried.”

  Steven laughed. “You have my promise! It is not cold. Even if we should get wet, I don’t think it will do us any harm.”

  “I will go change into my riding clothes and get my raincoat while you saddle Black Flame.”

  Twenty minutes later, Florilyn Westbrooke set out through the eastern gate beside her mother’s young factor, who was only two years older than she. Accustomed to being in command and usually leading the way even when she rode with Percy, she found herself following, even occasionally along a few routes into the mountainous east she was not familiar with. Steven led the way almost due east toward the southern flank of Rhinog Fawr then veered south around the base of the mountain.

  At length they came around its far slope, where he again took a northerly bearing toward their destination, which sat nearly under the shadow of the peak to its northwest. It was a strange place for a croft. But the stone cottage had been there as long as anyone could remember. One family after another had somehow managed to scrape together an existence on the five acres that surrounded it, with cows and sheep and chickens and potatoes and what vegetables they were able to grow during the summer and autumn months.

  “Do you miss your father?” asked Florilyn as they rode.

  “Of course,” replied Steven. “But he was so unlike himself the last few years of his life, in another way it is a relief to have him released from all that. My mother misses him terribly. They spent their whole adult lives together. How about you?”

  “I do miss my father,” replied Florilyn. “He and I never really talked much together, though he was different the last few years. I suppose I miss his presence about the manor more than anything.”

  “In what way was he different?”

  “He seemed to pay more attention to little things. We began to talk more often.”

  “What about your mother?
”

  “She doesn’t talk about him. But I can tell she is sad. Did you and your father talk?” asked Florilyn.

  “My papa wasn’t a talkative man,” replied Steven. “I loved him dearly, and he was a good man to one and all. But no, we didn’t talk much. Sometimes we worked together for hours without saying a word. We simply enjoyed being together. But he was a quiet man.”

  “Percy says he and his father discuss whatever he is thinking about. He says he asks his father’s advice about everything. When I listen to him, I find myself wishing I had enjoyed something like that with my father, even wondering if I could have if I had been less self-absorbed.”

  “I don’t know whether that is true,” said Steven. “People are different. Not all men are capable of that kind of thing. Percy is fortunate, but he might not have been able to talk in the same way to your father either. We take the fathers we are given. We have to find God in them as it expresses itself in their own individual ways. I learned to see God’s fatherhood in my father, though I do not believe he once spoke a word about God to me in my life.”

  “It’s amazing to hear you say that,” rejoined Florilyn. “That’s exactly like something Percy would say.”

  Steven laughed. “I take that as a great compliment. But look, there is the Cnychwr cottage ahead. We seem to have made it without rain.”

  As they approached the stone house, Steven looked over the flock of sheep in the field next to it with a curious expression. They were full of wool and ragged looking. They should have been shorn long before now.

  Two dogs came bounding and barking out to greet them. Steven jumped down and let them get used to him before allowing Florilyn to dismount. “Wait for me just a minute,” said Steven. “I’ll go tell them we’re here. Then I’ll hold the dogs away for you.”