“Yes, and there are things I must talk over with him as well,” nodded Percy. “Where do you live?”
“Just down the slope, in one of the dells along the side of the mountain. My father raises sheep now. We have a fine house, and he has a large flock. I think he is happier now than when he worked in the slates. Come, Percy,” she said excitedly, taking his hand and beginning to run off down the mountain, “I will take you to him!”
“Wait, let me get my things!” laughed Percy. He quickly returned a few steps for the knapsack and staff then hurried after her.
60
Factor and Son
As Gwyneth skipped merrily down the slope with Percy chasing after her, back at Westbrooke Manor, Steven Muir had sent through one of the housemaids in his mother’s charge the request to Courtenay in his apartment, where he knew him to be at present, that he would be grateful to see him in his office at his earliest convenience.
Steven knew it would rankle Courtenay thus to be summoned as if he were the servant and Steven his master. In all likelihood it would ensure that the ensuing interview began in a combative tone. But he had done so intentionally. It was necessary to establish his authority, even if but briefly, to demand from Courtenay what the viscount’s son would never condescend to give him by simple request—a straight and honest answer to a direct question. In other words, the truth.
Courtenay walked through the open door of the factor’s office without benefit of knocking or announcing himself. He was breathing fire. “What is the meaning of this, Muir!” he demanded, striding angrily across the floor where he stood glaring down at Steven behind his desk. “Let us get one thing clear—you do not summon me! If you have business with me, then you come find me. I am not your lackey. I had been considering keeping you on after I am viscount. But if there are more incidents of this kind, I will turn you out on your ear without notice, and your mother with you. Do I make myself clear?”
Steven sat calmly staring into Courtenay’s eyes until he had finished his rant. Slowly he rose, walked from behind the desk and across the floor, closed the door of the office, then returned where he stopped and faced Courtenay. “Please sit down, Courtenay,” he said in a soft voice, gesturing toward one of two chairs.
“Did I not make myself understood?” rejoined Courtenay. “I will not have you telling me what to do!”
“Courtenay, please,” repeated Steven. “Just sit down. I would like to speak with you about a serious matter.”
“I have no intention of speaking to you about anything, Muir!” Courtenay shot back. “Now get out of my way before I dismiss you on the spot.”
He took two steps toward the door. But he did not take a third. With a swiftness and strength of which he scarcely guessed the other capable, he found his shoulders clasped helplessly between Steven’s two huge hands. As if he were a rag doll, he was unceremoniously thrown back and shoved down into the chair he had a moment earlier been invited to take under his own power.
Courtenay’s face glowed crimson. “How dare you lay a hand on me, Muir!” he cried, his eyes flashing fire as he leaped to his feet. “You will pay for that!”
Even as a clenched fist shot toward Steven’s face, his arm was arrested in mid-flight by the vice-grip of Steven’s right hand. Courtenay stood glowering, though obviously powerless. Steven squeezed his arm then slowly twisted it and pushed backward until, with a cry of pain, Courtenay fell back again into the chair.
“You could have broken my arm!”
“I would have been sorry had you forced matters that far,” said Steven. “I told you I wanted to talk to you. You and I will talk, with or without your cooperation. You took the whip to me once, and I did not defend myself. I had my reasons. But do not mistake me, Courtenay. I know something of your strength, for I have been watching you for years. I also know my own. I could put you on the ground without raising so much as a bead of sweat. You fancy yourself a powerful man, but I fear you no more than I would a ten-year-old. So I suggest we have our talk, that you answer my question, and that you go your way. It will be simpler for us both if you cooperate.”
“What do you want, Muir?” said Courtenay in sulking fury.
“I have a simple question to ask, and I want a simple answer. Are you the father of Rhawn Lorimer’s child?”
“Go to the devil, Muir.”
“I will have to ask you for directions. Now I put you the question again—are you the father?”
“And I give you the same answer I gave you before. I will tell you nothing.”
Standing before him, Steven drew in a breath then turned and paced about a few moments.
Courtenay’s eyes darted toward the door. For a brief instant he considered trying to end this humiliation by making a dash for it. But he did not relish the consequences if he failed. Nor was his pride fond of the notion of running away like a frightened child.
“You will be viscount in what, nine or ten days,” said Steven, turning again toward him. “Not that you may care about your reputation either in the community or the House of Lords, but there may come a time when what is said of you will be of some consequence. If you do not tell me, I will let it be known that you refused to answer me. You know what people will assume.”
“I will tell them that you are the father of the Lorimer brat.”
A smile spread across Steven’s face. “Do you seriously think anyone would believe that?” he said. “To make such a charge would only convince everyone all the more that you are the guilty party. On the other hand, if you deny it and I learn you are lying, and if that is the case I will find out … I promise you that it will go worse for you than had you confessed honorably to the truth from the beginning. You have only one choice, Courtenay. That is to tell me the truth. If you are the father, and you tell me plainly, I will respect your honesty and pursue the matter no further.”
Even in his fury at finding himself powerless before this clodhopping interloper of a factor, Courtenay was yet in sufficient awe of his calm demeanor and measured tone that he did not for a moment doubt that he would do exactly as he said. He knew something of the esteem in which Steven was held throughout the community. He was practical enough to realize the consequences of crossing him. “I am not the father,” he answered after a moment.
Steven nodded then walked back behind his desk and sat down.
“I presume that is all, Muir?”
“Yes. Thank you, Courtenay.”
Courtenay rose and stood a moment. “You may consider this your notice, Muir,” he said. “You are hereby terminated. I want you and your mother gone from the manor by six o’clock on the morning of the seventeenth, which is my birthday. Is that understood?”
“Very clearly.”
Steven watched Courtenay go, more sad than angry, then took out a sheet of writing paper, set it before him, and took pen in hand.
Dear Percy, he began,
We are only days from Courtenay’s birthday and his assumption of the viscountcy. However, that is not the reason I am writing, but rather about a crisis concerning Florilyn. I do not know if you have been apprised of recent events—her engagement to Colville Burrenchobay. My own concern for her well-being and future mounts daily. She is much changed—and I am heartbroken to have to say, not for the better. The spiritual being that had begun to blossom, under Burrenchobay’s influence, is fast becoming a withered flower and a mere memory of happier times. I am writing to implore you to return for the purpose of speaking to her and warning her of the danger of being joined for life with such a one.
We are two men who love her. We cannot allow this to happen without speaking forthrightly to her. I do not want to act without you, but I fear time is critical. Every day that passes she seems to slip deeper into what I am convinced is a deceptive attempt to woo her affections and distance her from her mother and the rest of us.
Please consider my request seriously. The matter is urgent. Please come.
Your friend and servant,
; Steven Muir
61
The Viscount, the Miner, and the Scot
As they approached down one of Lugnaquilla’s projecting ridges, Percy saw that the new Barrie home was indeed a fine one, easily twice the size of their former cottage in Wales. In the distance, the diminutive figure of Codnor Barrie was surrounded by several sheepdogs and a huge, moving mass of white.
They walked toward the shepherd and his flock. He saw them coming and turned to meet them.
“Look who I found on the mountain, Papa!” exclaimed Gwyneth, as they made their way into the midst of the flock.
Barrie’s face held its perplexed expression but a moment then brightened into a huge smile as recognition dawned.
“Mr. Drummond!” he cried. “How do you come to be here?”
“It’s a miracle, Papa,” said Gwyneth simply. “I think an angel led him to us.”
“Gwyneth may not be far wrong, Mr. Barrie,” said Percy as the two shook hands. “I would rather say that God led my steps, and I found an angel.”
Gwyneth glanced away shyly.
Barrie looked back and forth between the two and understood. “Do you and I need to have a talk, Mr. Drummond?” he said.
“We do indeed, sir,” replied Percy.
Beside herself with curiosity about what the two were saying, Gwyneth’s sense of the propriety of things kept her from intruding. She walked quietly toward the house, pausing once at the door to glance back.
The two men, the younger towering over the older, walked slowly away across the field, heads as close as their difference in height would allow. They were obviously engaged in earnest conversation.
Her heart full of many things she dared not think, she watched them a few moments more then went inside.
An hour later, from where she stood at the window, Gwyneth saw the two returning.
Her father’s face wore a serious expression. He nodded occasionally as Percy spoke.
She stepped back from the window.
As they came nearer the house, Percy noticed above the door a beam of oak into which were carved two words in Gaelic—the house name, he presumed. Though he could not read them, they seemed somehow familiar. He had no leisure to think about it, for a moment later Barrie led him through the door and into the spacious sitting room.
“Grannie!” Percy exclaimed as he saw the old woman sitting across the room in a positive fever of anticipation for whom Gwyneth had told her was coming.
She scarcely had time to pull herself up before finding her aging frame nearly crushed by Percy’s embrace. “Aye, laddie,” she said, “you’re as big and strong and handsome as I knew you must be!” she said. She pulled his head down toward her and kissed him on the cheek.
“And you, Grannie!” said Percy exuberantly. “You look well indeed.”
“For an old woman of eighty-eight years, I’m just grateful enough to the Lord for keeping me here long enough to feast my eyes on your face one more time.”
“Oh, but Grannie,” said Percy excitedly as he released her, “I just remembered. I have something of yours!” He reached into his pocket and pulled from it the gold coin she had been given on the sands of Llanfryniog more than eighty years before. He held it toward her.
“No, no, laddie!” she said. “That night when I told you how I came by it, and the evil that had stalked me because of it, I said I wanted it no more. I gave it to another to keep. But I’m thinking it wasn’t you.”
“You’re right,” smiled Percy. “Perhaps it is time I returned it to her.” He turned toward Gwyneth where she stood watching. “You gave me this for safekeeping,” said Percy. “I told you at the time that I would always consider it yours. I have carried it with me every day since. Not a day went by that I did not think of you. It remained with me as an unspoken pledge of our … of a friendship that I treasured. You are a grown woman now. It is time I returned it.” He held the coin to Gwyneth.
Her hand reached out, and he placed it in her palm. His fingers lingered briefly upon hers. She felt a sudden heat rising in her cheeks. She pulled her hand away as it closed over the coin and glanced away.
“But why have you come, laddie?” said Grannie as she eased back into her chair. “How did you find us?”
“It is a long and intricate story, Grannie,” replied Percy as he and Codnor also took seats.
Gwyneth moved toward the kitchen at the far end of the room and put a kettle on the stove for tea.
“It concerns my uncle, the viscount,” began Percy. “He had a riding accident a year ago, and his injuries were mortal. He died a week later.”
“God bless the man—I am sorry to hear it.”
“On his deathbed he asked me to do something,” Percy continued. “He asked me to find someone that no one else in his family, not even my Aunt Katherine or Florilyn or Courtenay, knew about. Then he told me a story he had told no other living person in more than thirty years.” Percy paused and drew in a breath.
By now Gwyneth was seated with the rest of them. She and Grannie listened intently as Percy told them what he had already told Gwyneth’s father—of his uncle’s sojourn in Ireland as a young man, of his marriage to Avonmara O’Sullivan, and of the tragic circumstances that had followed in which he lost track of the daughter that had been born to him. “It was this daughter, whom he had never seen again,” said Percy, “whom I thought he wanted me to find.”
“But if he was dying,” said Gwyneth, “why would it matter so much to him?”
“Because according to the terms of his viscountcy, she would be his legal heir, not Courtenay.”
“But she was a girl, laddie,” said Grannie. “How could that be?”
“Every peerage is unique,” explained Percy. “They are established according to terms that must be legally followed in perpetuity unless the peerage is abolished. The particular viscountcy my uncle inherited from his father must originally have been established by a progressive and far-seeing man who determined that a firstborn daughter, and her own children who followed, was equally deserving of the rights and privileges of the title as a son. I have been studying law, you see, Grannie, and I looked into it as much as I was able. It is extremely unusual, but those are the terms. No doubt it will ultimately have to be decided in court. But my uncle was certain enough of the legality of the terms to commission me, as I thought, to find his daughter. He knew she was the rightful heir by his first marriage.”
“Did you find her, laddie?”
“I am afraid not, Grannie,” replied Percy. He turned toward Codnor Barrie. “Perhaps you should explain the rest of it, Codnor,” he said.
Barrie nodded. The others waited as he collected his thoughts then turned toward Gwyneth. “I always told you, lassie,” he began, “that you were born across the water from where we lived—that you were born here in Ireland. But you never knew why I was here. There came a time, you see, when the mine in Wales had to close. Parliament was trying to improve on safety everywhere, and the labor movement was gaining strength. So they closed the mine to make changes and make working conditions safer than before. I was a young man at the time, not as adventurous as some but with my own share of the adventurous spirit. There was talk of work in the shipyards of Arklow on Ireland’s east coast. So I came here for the work. In the shipyards, I met an Irishman who had come south to the town for the same reason when his family fell on hard times in the years before the famine. He had brought his family with him, though that was years before I met him, which included his mother-in-law and her granddaughter. The girl was the man’s niece. She was a beauty, with bright red hair and white skin that looked like an angel’s face, tall and slender. She stood five inches above me, and I fell in love with her. She was your mother, lassie, and she was the best woman in the world. Her name was Morvern.” He paused and smiled sadly as he remembered. Slowly he sighed as he allowed his thoughts to linger fondly over the memory. Then he continued. “But Morvern’s grandmother didn’t like me,” he said. “She did not want us
to marry.”
“Why, Papa?” said Gwyneth with the simplicity of a devoted daughter. “Who would not like you?”
“It was because I was a Welshman,” Codnor replied. “Morvern’s father, you see, was also a Welshman, and he had deserted them after she was born. That’s why Morvern lived with her grandmother, because her own mother died when giving birth, and her father promised to come back to provide for her and take care of her but never did. Then they fell on desperate times, and she became yet more bitter at the father for leaving them in such straits.”
“What did you do, Papa, if Mama’s mother didn’t like you?”
“Morvern and I married in spite of her,” Barrie replied. “Maybe it was wrong. Perhaps we should have waited. I was young, and sometimes the young are not as wise as they think. But I determined to be the best husband and father a man could be and to win Morvern’s grandmother over. I would prove to her that I was a good man and wasn’t like the man who had married her daughter. I would provide for her granddaughter, and for her, too, if she would let me. A year later you were born, Gwyneth. But your white hair frightened people. They thought a curse was on you. It was only the curse of goodness, though that was the last thing they could understand. They began to say cruel things about you and about me. Even my friend, Morvern’s own uncle, said that I had brought evil to their family. I couldn’t let my wife and daughter be spoken of in that way. By then the mines were operating again in Wales. Morvern and I made plans to sail from Ireland and begin a new life in my own country where we would be free from people thinking evil of us. So you and I and your mother sailed for Wales. But a terrible storm came up in the Celtic triangle on the day of our sailing, and your mother was swept overboard—”
He drew in a shaky breath and looked away, wiping at his eyes. “I never forgave myself for sailing that night.” He struggled to go on. “I was only twenty-five at the time, heartbroken with grief and left alone with an infant daughter. When we arrived in Wales, there was nothing I could do but try to make the best of it for you. If I had gone back to your Irish kinfolk, they would have hated me all the more for bringing Morvern’s death upon her. The poor family—they lost two daughters who married Welshmen. What else could they do but hate the Welsh? So I stayed where we were. I tried to be a good father—”
The Treasure of the Celtic Triangle- Wales Page 28