Longbow Girl

by Linda Davies

  Parks reddened slightly and something in his eyes hardened a fraction, but then he recovered quickly, shaking James’s hand with what looked like an extra-firm grip.

  ‘And this is Dr Philipps,’ the earl went on.

  Merry shook hands, said hello. Dr Philipps had a thatch of unruly dark hair, extravagant eyebrows and smiling eyes. Donning a pair of white cotton gloves and squinting to keep a monocle in place, he bent over the book.

  He just stared at the cover for a while, saying nothing, not even seeming to breathe; then, very slowly, he opened the book and turned the pages.

  Finally he looked up. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘You know what you’ve got here then, do you?’

  ‘Not really,’ replied Merry, her heart beginning to beat faster. ‘I mean, I know it’s something special and very old, but that’s about it.’

  ‘I’d like to show my colleagues, I would, at the Museum of Wales. We’ll have to carry out carbon dating too, if you were to allow me, but my gut feeling,’ he rubbed his large stomach, ‘my gut feeling is that what we are looking at here might be, just might be, mind, one of the lost tales of the Mabinogion!’

  Merry heard Professor Parks swear and the earl took a step closer to the book, looked from it to Merry, eyes flickering.

  ‘The Mabinogion itself, as I’m sure you know,’ Dr Philipps was saying, ‘is a collection of eleven stories taken from medieval Welsh manuscripts from around 1060 to 1200. Some say it’s myth. Others truth. Some tales feature King Arthur.’

  Merry nodded. She’d been taught about it at the school in Brecon she’d attended before her accident, before she had begun to be homeschooled.

  ‘But there are suggestions, references in some manuscripts that other stories exist,’ Dr Philipps continued. ‘They are referred to as the lost tales. And this,’ he concluded, giving Merry a profoundly serious look, ‘is, I hazard, one of them.’

  ‘Goodness,’ Merry managed to say.

  ‘Bit of a miracle it survived in such pristine condition. Bit of a miracle you found it after all these years.’

  ‘Where did you find it?’ asked Professor Parks.

  ‘In a burial mound,’ replied Merry. ‘On my land.’

  ‘Whereabouts, exactly?’ asked the earl.

  ‘In the Black Wood.’

  ‘Ah, the forest that borders our land.’

  ‘This was some way from the border,’ replied Merry. She felt a sudden surge of panic. Hoped she was right. It was hard to tell in the forest, dense as it was, and she had taken a meandering path.

  ‘I am sure this is very precious to you,’ the earl went on smoothly, ‘and I can see you feel very protective of it, but may I just keep it for a few days? I could photocopy it, then have it translated for you.’

  ‘I could make a start on the translation,’ cut in Dr Philipps. ‘I’m familiar with Middle Welsh.’

  Merry hadn’t and wouldn’t forgive the earl for their stallion’s death and the strains it had put on her family. She didn’t want to hand over the book. But she did want it translated. Very much.

  ‘Forgive me being presumptuous here,’ interjected Professor Parks, ‘but I would counsel you most strongly to allow us to retain the book here at the castle for safe keeping. Rather valuable. Might attract unwanted attention.’

  ‘Oh, don’t worry,’ Merry replied airily. ‘This part of Wales is incredibly safe. No one even locks their doors around here.’

  ‘Maybe they should,’ Dr Philipps replied, looking concerned.

  Stung into decisiveness by the rebuke, and feeling trapped, Merry stared at him, then turned to the earl.

  ‘Actually, I’d prefer to keep the book with me. It is mine, after all,’ she added.

  She saw a mix of emotions race over the earl’s face: surprise, annoyance … He wasn’t used to being denied.

  ‘Of course,’ he replied with cool civility. ‘That is very much your prerogative.’

  ‘May I at least take some pictures with my phone?’ Dr Philipps asked.

  Merry nodded. ‘OK. That’s fine.’

  She watched him carefully turning the pages again. He paused at the same one that had caught her attention: a still, dark pool reflecting clouds scudding overhead; a ray of sunlight arrowing down through the water; a thicket of thorn bushes; a nightingale atop an oak, like a witness to some scene occurring off the page … it was beautiful and sinister.

  Yet it drew her in …

  ‘I’m dying to know what it says on this page,’ she found herself murmuring.

  Dr Philipps met her gaze, his own eyes glowing with a kind of sharp intelligence and fascination. ‘All right, young lady. Give me a little while.’

  Mrs Baskerville, the de Courcys’ housekeeper, arrived, struggling under a gigantic tray of teapot and cups. She glanced at Merry in amazement. She was well used to seeing Merry in the castle hanging out with James when the family was out, but not here mingling with the earl and his guests.

  When she left, Dr Philipps took a sip of tea, put down his cup, and said, slowly, his eyes on the page: ‘There is a cave where the green turns blue, where the earth beside does shimmer. A veil of water guards it well, of its secrets not a glimmer. There is a hole in the stone of sand at the back in the gushing flow; follow it through to another land and all treasures will you know. Twenty strokes have many tried, turning them to blue, of those venturers many have died, only the strong pass through …’

  His words echoed around the room. For a while, no one spoke. Merry felt almost dazed, as if she were under some kind of spell. Everyone in the library seemed to feel the same. They all had a distant look in their eyes.

  Merry jumped up. ‘Right!’ she said, her voice coming out unnaturally loud. ‘I need to get back.’ She picked up her book, re-swaddled it, and enclosed it safely in the chest, which she slid into the plastic bag.

  She seemed to have broken the spell, because everyone started moving and talking at once. James walked out with her and she felt the eyes on her back, and in the air the burn of covetousness.

  ‘That was intense,’ remarked James.

  Merry blew out a breath. ‘I still feel a bit dazed,’ she replied.

  ‘I’ll bet.’ They walked in silence until they emerged into the Great Hall. ‘Apart from everything else, you and my father actually speaking was remarkable.’

  ‘Call it the power of the book,’ said Merry.

  ‘There’s a lot of power in that thing. Wait here and I’ll run down and get your trainers and torch,’ he added. ‘No point in sneaking out in the tunnel now you’re in such favour.’

  While Merry was waiting for James, Professor Parks appeared, materializing on silent feet.

  ‘I was wondering if you’d be kind enough to show me where you found the book?’ He spoke crisply, in an emotionless, academic tone, but his eyes shone, betraying his interest.

  Merry wanted to say no but couldn’t think of a polite way to do so.

  ‘What, now?’ she asked.

  ‘That would be most convenient. Thank you so much,’ he added as if her question had been an offer.

  Merry scowled at the floor. She was going to have to learn to be a lot ruder and more forceful if she was going to deal successfully with the earl and his crew. It had been a lot easier treating him as an enemy than as a pseudo friend.

  James came back with Merry’s trainers and head torch.

  ‘Ah, Lord James, Miss Owen has most kindly offered to show me the burial mound.’

  ‘Has she?’ asked James, flicking Merry a look of surprise. ‘I’ll come along too,’ he added.

  ‘Oh dear,’ replied Parks. ‘I do think I heard your father saying he was most anxious that you join him. I got the impression it was somewhat urgent.’

  James, also trapped by manners, found himself nodding, then marching back to the muniments room.

  Merry, followed by Professor Parks, went out into the huge courtyard, surrounded by the high walls of the castle. She walked across the ancient cobbles, under the iron-toot
hed portcullis, across the drawbridge. She was used to it, but she could see Parks’s head swivelling, taking it all in with a hungry, avid gaze.

  ‘Living history,’ he enunciated. ‘A thousand years of it. What it must be like to own this place.’ He gave a half-laugh. ‘I’m a historian. Sometimes I love history too much.’

  ‘Give me the twenty-first century any day,’ replied Merry. ‘Antibiotics and equality.’

  ‘Hrmph,’ trumpeted Parks in disapproval. ‘That’s a somewhat narrow view, if I may say so. The past had many and subtle compensations.’

  ‘Well, we’ll never know, will we?’ countered Merry. ‘Look,’ she went on, ‘I really can’t show you the burial mound without my father’s permission.’ That was a lie, but one that she was happy to hide behind as she mounted her belated fight-back.

  Parks widened his eyes as if seeing straight through her. ‘Well, perhaps you could ask him?’ he replied smoothly. ‘You see, I’m more than just a historian. I’m an archaeologist. I could undertake an official dig.’

  ‘A dig?’ asked Merry.

  ‘Well, it would be the courteous thing to do. You see, with a find of this nature, the authorities could get a licence to dig on your land, a compulsory licence, that is. I just thought you’d like to do it in a rather less officious, let’s say rather friendlier way.’ He gave one of his tooth-baring smiles. ‘You see, I like to work alone. I’m sure you would prefer that to a large team traipsing across your land.’

  Merry said nothing as she tried to take in all he was saying and implying.

  ‘The other thing,’ continued Parks silkily, ‘is I know how to sift through the area very carefully, with infinite patience, taking care not to destroy anything. There could be other valuable items. I can ensure they are properly and safely excavated so you would get the maximum for them.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ asked Merry.

  ‘Well, according to the treasure laws, the landowner is entitled to share the proceeds of any finds, should you sell them, fifty-fifty with the finder. Could amount to a substantial sum of money, Miss Owen.’

  And money, Merry knew all too well, was in short supply at home. Parks had unwittingly hit on her weak point.

  ‘And lastly,’ he said with an almost conspiratorial smile, ‘in order to fully authenticate the book, we need to know much more about where it was found and attempt to find the other items that were almost undoubtedly buried with it. If we manage to authenticate the book, its value will be far higher.’

  ‘I thought that Dr Philipps would be working on authenticating it,’ argued Merry.

  Parks gave her a sharp look. ‘He will. Indeed. But he’s not an archaeologist. He doesn’t get his hands dirty,’ he added with relish. ‘He works with documents and archives. I work in the ground, with living history. History you can touch. We each have our own skills. We’re complementary. That’s why the earl employs us both.’

  That made up Merry’s mind. The earl would only employ the best people money could buy.

  ‘OK. You can discuss it with my father tomorrow,’ she said. ‘If you come at eleven, he’ll be taking a break from his farm work. He’ll be at the house then.’

  She hurried away across the parkland, keen to escape what she felt were becoming dangerous waters. Dealing with the book, with the attention it was already generating, with the earl and his experts skilfully manoeuvring her, was making her feel way out of her depth. But it was too late to go back now. She’d found the book, and now not just the earl but two different experts knew about it. She felt like fate had forced her hand. All she could try to do now was what was best for her family.

  Merry returned home to a strangely tense house. Her father sat at the small table in the hallway, bent over the farm accounts, his face taut. Her mother was closed away in the kitchen with Gawain for company. It sounded like she was cooking up a storm, banging pots and pans and muttering.

  Merry hurried up to her room, hid the chest back under her bed, then headed out to see to her chores – checking ponies and foals and troughs. She didn’t want to talk to anyone human for a while. The company of ponies was far less taxing. She took Jacintha out for a ride, deliberately avoiding the Black Wood and instead heading up to the Beacons, making the most of the late sunshine.

  Finally, as the sun was setting, she headed home and arrived back in time for a late dinner.

  Gawain was already in bed so it was just the three of them tucking into a roast leg of lamb, green beans and goose-fat-browned potatoes.

  They didn’t talk much. The food was good and they were all hungry but it was odd. They were usually a talkative household. When they’d finished, Merry’s father got up and poured himself a glass of whisky. He downed it in one gulp, then sat down again.

  ‘There’s no easy way to put this, so I’m going to cut to the chase. We’re in trouble. I kept it from you both while I tried to find a way out …’ He rubbed his hands over his face.

  Merry stared at her father: the farmer, the fighter, the longbowman, the soldier, decorated several times over for conspicuous bravery. Now he looked as if he faced an enemy he could not fight. The expression in his eyes made Merry feel a quiver of fear. She glanced at her mother. Elinor was twisting a strand of her long black hair around her finger. Her eyes were grave.

  ‘We owe the bank sixty thousand pounds,’ Caradoc went on. ‘I borrowed money to build the extension, to rebuild the barn. We’d have been fine if things had gone well.’ He gave a bitter laugh. ‘But things often don’t, do they, especially when you need them to. We simply haven’t made enough to meet the mortgage payments for the past six months. I was relying on the stallion’s stud fees to pay the mortgage.’ He paused, fisted his hands on the table. ‘He had eight bookings over the next six weeks.’

  ‘What about the insurance money?’ Elinor asked, voice high. ‘The company’ll have to pay out for his death … won’t they?’ she asked her husband. Her skin had turned ghostly white.

  Caradoc’s face became even more grim. He took in a deep breath. ‘I forgot to renew the insurance.’

  Merry looked at him in confusion. ‘No, you didn’t. I heard you on the phone about a month ago. You complained about the size of the premium to me. I remember.’

  Her father turned to her, shaking his head with a kind of horrible regret that made Merry feel sick to her stomach. ‘Trust you to remember, cariad.’

  ‘I did remember!’ she said hotly. ‘So why did you lie?’

  ‘All right, the truth of it is this,’ he replied, his voice heavier than Merry had ever heard. ‘Because you shot the horse yourself rather than letting him suffer in agony for the hour or so it would have taken the vet to get here and put him out of his misery, the insurance is invalid.’

  Elinor opened her mouth to say something, then closed it again.

  Merry covered her face with her hands, trembling in shock. She felt a huge hand, warm on her shoulder.

  ‘What you did was brave,’ her father said, urgently. ‘Humane. You must not blame yourself, cariad. You must not.’

  Merry uncovered her face, looked into his eyes, saw so many things there, most of all a horrible, unspoken pain.

  ‘So this is where we are,’ he said, going back to his seat. ‘Selling the mare only buys us time. The bank manager phoned this morning. He was short and not so sweet: pay off the arrears and meet the new payments or else he’ll have no choice but to foreclose. He’s given us six weeks.’

  Elinor gasped. ‘Six weeks? Six weeks? To come up with how much exactly?’

  ‘Six thousand pounds,’ Caradoc replied, voice hollow.

  Elinor reached across the table and grabbed her husband’s hand.

  ‘How on earth are we going to find that kind of money?’

  ‘Sell the mare. And the little silver we have. These old dining chairs must be antique. They’ll be worth something,’ he said, glancing around.

  ‘And if we don’t find the money,’ said Elinor slowly, each word like a hammer blow, ‘
we lose the farm? We just hand it over to the bank?’

  ‘Either that, or sell. Bits of it. Or all of it.’

  ‘And we all know who’d buy it, quicker than you can say knife,’ shouted Elinor in a rush of emotion. She pushed herself to her feet and strode to the window, gazing out towards the Black Castle. ‘Makes me wonder if the earl didn’t let out his hounds deliberately.’

  ‘We’ll never know, will we,’ Caradoc said, the muscles clenching in his cheek.

  ‘Merry and Gawain’s inheritance,’ said Elinor in a whisper. ‘And the longbow tradition …’

  She sat down heavily, propped her arms on the table, stared at the aged wood.

  ‘I know. Don’t you think I know?’ snapped her father.

  Merry felt dazed. She gazed from one parent to another, appalled by the news, distressed by their misery, horrified by the part she had played in adding to their trouble … but then an idea came together in her head. ‘There might be a way out,’ she said, fists clenched, digging her nails into her palms, hoping, praying …

  Her parents turned to her, faces edged with grief. They didn’t really think she had a solution. They didn’t know what she knew.

  ‘It seems the book I found might be quite valuable.’ She paused, sucked in a breath, let it out in one smooth go. Maybe fate was helping her family, just when they needed it most. ‘I showed it to an expert. He reckons it might, just might, be one of the lost tales of the Mabinogion.’

  Her parents looked stunned.

  ‘What on earth have you been up to, Merry Owen?’ Elinor asked, at last.

  So Merry told them about taking the book to show James, about the earl walking in on them, and everything that followed.

  Her parents sat leaning forward, eyes wide, listening in amazed silence.

  ‘So it comes down to this,’ Merry finished. ‘Dr Philipps will discuss the book with his colleagues and show them pictures he took with his phone. And Professor Parks, who is an archaeologist and a historian, says to help authenticate the book he needs to excavate the burial mound, get more information.’

  Her father stared into the distance for a while, processing it all; then he turned his gaze back to Merry. There was a new hope in his eyes and a kind of steely calculation.