Then he and Percy walked together toward the stables.
“Fine day indeed for a ride, Mr. Percy,” said Radnor as they went. “Going out alone, are you?”
“For now,” replied Percy. “Though I suppose you never know who might turn up, eh?”
“Which horse do you fancy, sir?”
“The gentle one you recommended before. Grey Tide, I believe she was called. I got on well enough that first day. I’m not keen on going out on Red Rhud again!”
“Yes, sir—I heard what happened. I would have prevented that unpleasantness if I had been able, Mr. Percy.”
“Well, no harm done. I survived it. Still, I think a gentler mount will suit me until I am a little steadier in the saddle.”
“Grey Tide is a wise choice, Mr. Percy. You will do fine on her back.”
Fifteen minutes later, after a detailed lesson in horse saddling, Percy rode off in the direction of town. The morning was still chilly. But Percy was full of the jubilation of life, added to by the exhilaration of sneaking away from the manor without Florilyn knowing it. Exuberantly he even encouraged Grey Tide into a trot two or three times on the way down to Llanfryniog. He was still timid about allowing the mare to cantor or gallop. Hopefully before long, with Gwyneth’s coaching, that would change.
He found Gwyneth walking along the shore south of the harbor waiting for him. He rode up beside her, reined in, and dismounted. “Good morning, Gwyneth,” he said. “It looks to be another fine day.”
“And the tide is low,” she said, turning toward him with a smile. “It is good for riding.”
“Do you ride here often?”
“We do not have a horse. I do not have many chances to ride.”
“But you know how to?”
“Horses are my friends. I have always known how to ride.”
“Well then, teacher,” said Percy with humor in his tone, though he meant the word with an endearing respect, “how do we begin?”
“You must show me how you ride first,” said Gwyneth. “I have seen you from far away. Now I want to see you close.”
“I shouldn’t have dismounted,” Percy said, laughing. “I still have a hard enough time getting in the saddle.” With some difficulty he climbed back up. “What do you want me to do?” he said.
“Can you gallop?” asked Gwyneth.
“I’ve never galloped on purpose,” answered Percy. “The only time I’ve ridden fast was on Red Rhud, and she threw me off!”
“Can you try?”
“I will try.”
Gwyneth stepped back.
Percy gave a few kicks into Grey Tide’s flanks and flipped at the reins. Grey Tide eased forward into a gentle cantor then gradually, as Percy kicked harder, into a halfhearted gallop, with Percy bouncing clumsily about in the saddle. He reined back after a short distance, turned the mare around, and returned to where Gwyneth stood. He stopped and looked down at her.
“To ride fast,” she said, “you need to lean forward. You sit up too straight. That’s why you bounce around. If you are bouncing up and down, the horse knows you aren’t secure. If it knows that, either it won’t do what you want or you will fall off.”
“I’m not secure!” Percy laughed.
“But you will be. When you are secure, the horse will know it. Then it will do what you tell it. So first you must lean forward. And sit higher in the saddle, with your knees bent. You must feel the horse with your knees, not your bottom.”
Percy tried to adjust himself.
Gwyneth continued to suggest this or that until she was satisfied with his seat for the present. “When you want her to go,” she went on, “press into her sides with your heels. Don’t kick—just press in with your heels and knees and lean forward. Then talk to her, tell her to run, and stroke her neck.”
“Why don’t you show me?” said Percy. He jumped down.
“You’ll have to help me get up,” said Gwyneth.
Percy took her foot in his hand. She reached up for the saddle with her hands as he lifted her. She was so unexpectedly light that he nearly flung her up and over the top. But Gwyneth recovered and landed gently in the saddle with the grace of a cat. Her feet did not reach Percy’s stirrups, but she hardly noticed.
She took told of the reins, then leaned forward, stroked the big mare’s neck, and spoke a few whispered words into her ear. “Now watch, Percy,” she said. “I will press in with my knees to keep me balanced. I am hardly touching the saddle, you see … and give her a little nudge in the sides with my heels, and lean forward … “She spoke again into the mare’s ear, “Dash on, Grey Tide … dash on!”
Though her command was soft, Grey Tide bounded with several steps into gentle motion. Quickly the pace increased. Within seconds she was at top speed and flying away from Percy down the wide sand glistening wet from the retreating tide. Huge clumps flew up behind her hooves as their echoes pounded through the morning air.
Percy gazed after her in astonishment that one so small could command such a powerful beast with so few words and movements. Until that moment, he had taken the proposed riding lessons more as a lark than that he really thought he could ever beat Florilyn in a race. Suddenly he realized, all things being equal, Florilyn would have no chance against Gwyneth. So why couldn’t he learn to ride as fast as she?
Had it not been for the rocks and boulders enclosing the harbor portion of the beach to the south, Grey Tide and her tiny white-haired rider would have quickly disappeared from sight. As it was, while he stared in wonder, Percy saw them make a wide semicircular arc on the sand that, because of the tide, was fifty or seventy-five yards wide. Gradually they came flying straight back toward him again.
Horse and rider were truly one. The motion of Gwyneth’s tiny frame flowed in a harmony of exquisite precision with Grey Tide’s movement. Elbows out, knees flexed, her frame parallel with the horse’s great neck, her body floated with fluid ease as if riding on a cushion of air. As they flew toward him, Gwyneth slowed the mare so gradually that Percy never once saw her use the reins.
A few seconds later, the huge horse stood panting beside him, great puffs of white pulsing from her nostrils in the chilly morning air. Gwyneth’s face was flushed with animation, her eyes wide with joy, a smile of ecstasy on her lips.
“Gwyneth,” exclaimed Percy, “that was marvelous! I had no idea you could ride so fast.”
“I told you I could ride fast.”
“Yes, but … that fast! I’ve never seen anything like it. How do you do it?”
“When you move up and down, holding by your knees instead of bouncing in the saddle, in exact rhythm with Grey Tide’s back, she will scarcely feel you. Then you will be able to ride as fast as me.”
“I can’t imagine that,” Percy laughed.
“Your motion must be smooth with hers,” said Gwyneth. “She will not feel you. She will be free. When Grey Tide is free, there is no horse at the manor faster. Now you try it again,” she added, swinging one leg up and around the mare’s back and slipping to the ground.
Again Percy mounted.
“Remember, feel Grey Tide’s motion,” said Gwyneth. “Move gently up and down. Do not let her feel you bounce in the saddle.”
For the next hour, Percy rode up and down the beach, sometimes fast, sometimes slow, trying to follow Gwyneth’s instructions. She watched and told him this or that to try next. By the end of his first lesson, he did not feel much improvement. Although he had begun to know what she meant when she spoke of moving in concert with the rhythm of the horse, to achieve his goal would take much practice.
They parted, and Percy rode back through town. By now the morning was well advanced. The sun was high and warming the earth, luring from the grass and trees and shrubs and dirt and water the fragrances of the wonderful time of late spring that was the month of June. For the first time in his life, Percy felt relaxed and confident enough on the back of a horse to enjoy himself. It was still early. He was not anxious to return to the manor. Instead h
e struck out inland over moor and field toward the hills east. He was curious whether he could find Gwyneth’s special high place with the spectacular view.
He rode slowly up the plateau. After a good deal of exploration along the ridge, he found the spot he had been looking for. He dismounted, tied the horse, and sat down looking out over the sloping plateau and coastline.
His mood grew thoughtful. His father came to his mind. With it floated into his consciousness an unexpected sense of fondness. Poignantly Percy realized that things were changing within him. Thoughts of his father were no longer irksome in his memory. Instead they drew him with emotions he had not felt in years. It reminded him of how much he had once loved his father and enjoyed nothing more than being with him.
Where had these new feelings come from? What could be the cause of these strange sensations? Were they really new … or was he just feeling again sensations he had lost from long before?
A hunger after something beyond him, something he could not have described, had come awake in his heart. When it had begun, he could not have said. Once he was aware of it, he realized it had been there from his first week here. It was, in fact, the beginning of the greatest transformation in all the universe, though Percy did not yet know it as such. He had heard his father preach about such things. He had never dreamed that the very movements of soul his father described would one day come upon him.
Was Wales the cause of it—the walk through the hills with Gwyneth … lying on the top of the ridge, at this very place, overlooking the moor and sea and sky … walking along the sand at the water’s edge … seeing the faces of humanity through newly loving eyes—or had it begun even before?
He came to feel a strange mystery in the world. It seemed full of meaning, yet a meaning he could not lay hold of. He perceived a whispering of unknown secrets in the wind that now came up the moor from the sea to greet him. He was stung with a consciousness of inexplicable rapture at the cry of a gull or the song of robin and sparrow. He took joy in every sunrise, felt a poignant sadness in the oranges and purples and reds of the sunset. He felt there must be something wonderful beyond and inside and above him. What could he do but ask, “What can it all mean?”
Wherever he turned, the bewitching loveliness in the face of the world met him. The scents the wind carried from field and forest and sea were sweeter than ever wind-borne scents from Glasgow’s streets and lanes and the deserted alleys he had roamed during the darkest days of his prodigality.
He sat on the high ridge for perhaps an hour. When he remounted Grey Tide and started back down the hill, he was still not ready to return to the manor. He was too full. The last thing he wanted now was to run into Florilyn or Courtenay or his uncle.
He descended the ridge and made his way across the plateau, then struck out along the promontory of Mochras Head. By now the tide was well on its way in, the beach below where he had walked with Gwyneth yesterday almost covered. The splashing and crashing of the waves against the rocks below echoed up and met him and filled his consciousness with the undefined pleasure of being.
As he went, the breeze coming off the water braced his face with a welcome chill, as if it had something to say. The sea glistened below as if it knew something it would be good for him to know. Its waves broke on the shore with words in a strange tongue he could not understand. Their watery echoes plunged into his heart and made him both happy and sad.
Creation reveals itself in secrets, but as secrets that are outer cloaks of truths waiting to be discovered. All around, in leaf and grass and cloud and rain and flower, the world whispered into his heart. It said that life could be a good thing, and that somehow God was in it all.
The world suddenly seemed so full of joy. But in truth the joy he felt was within him. Something was coming awake in the soul of Percival Drummond, something that had lain as an embryo of God’s creation, waiting to flex the seed-life of its being and break the sleepy shell of its chrysalis, that a new and higher form of being might emerge. What was it but life itself struggling to come awake within him.
He had begun to uncover the truths that lay beneath creation’s secrets.
TWENTY-SIX
Secrets of Man
While Percy was riding along the headland, Lord Snowdon sat in his study perusing the telegram that had finally arrived from London the previous afternoon. He had been stewing over it ever since.
Not only had Heygate learned that Palmer Sutcliffe was business manager for mining magnate Lord Coleraine Litchfield, but he was a forty-two-year-old business manager at that. He was a young man in the prime of his career. The fellow was a Londoner, born and bred, had probably never been to North Wales in his life … and was certainly not on the verge of retiring so that he could spend his leisure time in some cozy little cottage nestled in the Snowdonian mountains!
The letter from Sutcliffe had been a ruse, a fabrication of lies from beginning to end!
Litchfield’s interests, for such the fellow Sutcliffe was certainly representing, were in mining. Neither was Sutcliffe’s boss anticipating retirement anytime soon. Whatever he was up to had profit at the bottom of it, not nostalgia for the bygone happiness of childhood.
What did they take him for—a fool whom they could scam into selling off a piece of property for a few shillings? Whatever it was they thought lay beneath his property—and the logical assumption was coal—he wasn’t about to let some greedy Englishman waltz in and help himself!
It was time for a response. The viscount wrote:
Dear Mr. Sutcliffe,
It has come to my attention that you represent Lord Coleraine Litchfield in his business dealings and mining interests. I have only to assume, therefore, as you do not appear near retirement age yourself, that your recent letter expressing the desire to purchase a small portion of my land was sent on behalf of Lord Litchfield.
Is his motive personal, or do business pursuits make my land of interest to him?
I am,
Sincerely yours,
Viscount Roderick Westbrooke
A week later he received the following reply:
The Right Honorable, the Viscount Roderick Westbrooke,
Lord Snowdon.
My Lord,
Please forgive the subterfuge of our previous correspondence. I asked my manager and assistant Mr. Sutcliffe to draft the letter you received, expressing sentiments that are dear to my heart. Knowing the speculation my name invariably raises because of my extensive business interests throughout Britain, I told him to make the request in his own name. It was foolish of me. I see now that I was wrong not to be entirely candid with a man of your experience and good reputation. I apologize. Rest assured, however, that my motives are as stated, and my interest genuine.
Despite the fact that we have gotten off, as it were, on the wrong foot with one another, I hope you will consider this a new beginning and will consider my request to purchase a piece of your land as outlined in the previous letter with sincerity.
I am,
Humbly yours,
Lord Coleraine Litchfield
By now, however, having stewed on the matter for another week and having carried out further research, Westbrooke’s suspicions had nowise been alleviated. Indeed, they were greater than ever.
As a result, Litchfield received a second and more pointed communication from Lord Snowdon:
Lord Coleraine Litchfield,
My Lord,
I am deeply appreciative of the straightforward manner in which you have explained the letter from Mr. Sutcliffe. While I can assure you that I am not on principle opposed to selling a small portion of acreage from my estate and would happily entertain an offer, I would have to know more details regarding your purpose in such a proposed transaction. The image of a cozy retirement cottage nestled in the mountains is appealing. My instincts, however, tell me that there must be more to it than that and that the candor you spoke of has probably not yet been entirely forthcoming.
I remain,
&n
bsp; Sincerely yours,
Viscount Roderick Westbrooke
Litchfield swore lightly as he read; then his fist slammed down on his desk. This was not going to be as easy as he had hoped. He would have to consider his next move with care. To tell this provincial Westbrooke everything could spell doom to his whole scheme.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Shoes, Horses, and Friends
Codnor Barrie’s daughter usually kept to the side streets when walking through Llanfryniog. Thankfully Grannie’s cottage lay where she could easily reach it and keep mostly out of sight.
This girl of far-seeing eye but faltering tongue could welcome harshness from the elements of God’s world with glee. But meanness from those of her own kind was a harshness far different that she could not understand. She was child enough to be hurt by the lashes of unkind tongues. She thus kept to herself within the shadows of the village, although this habit contributed all the more to her reputation among the more low-minded of its inhabitants.
She climbed, on this summer’s day, from the grass and rocks down to the southern sandy tip of the Mochras Head beach, removing her shoes the moment she hit bare sand, and now wandered along it northward in the direction of the village. She climbed through the rocks halfway along more easily with bare feet than Percy had with his shoes. Before reaching the harbor in which the few boats were tied at the northeast end of the protected bay, she turned and scampered up the beach onto one of Llanfryniog’s outlying dirt streets, still carrying her shoes. From there she ran in the direction of Grannie’s cottage.
A few jeers and taunts came flying as she passed, mostly from school classmates, whose idleness led them to no good. But a friendly voice soon brought her swift barefoot steps to a stop.
“Hey there, young lady,” it said. “Where’ll you be bound in such a hurry?”
Gwyneth turned toward the wide doors of the blacksmith’s shop, which stood open to the day’s sunshine. “H–h–hello, Mr. Radnor,” she said as she caught her breath. “I’m on my way to Grannie’s.”
From Across the Ancient Waters Page 14