Before he lay down to sleep that night, Percy knew that fulfilling his uncle’s commission must next take him to Ireland. He must attempt to accomplish, even if it were thirty years later, what his uncle had not been able to with these letters.
If he failed, no one need ever know.
38
Departure
The next morning at breakfast, Percy broke the news to Florilyn and Katherine. “I am afraid I must take my departure sooner than I had planned,” he said.
Mother and daughter looked at him with surprise.
“Why … Are you going home so soon?” asked Florilyn.
“I’m not going home. There is something I have to do.”
“Where are you going, then?”
“I would rather not say.”
Florilyn’s face registered obvious disappointment. “But … you’ve only been here a few days,” she said.
“I know. I am sorry,” said Percy. “I can see that this has come out of the blue. I realize I haven’t spent as much time with you as I had hoped. I will make it up to you when I return—I promise. But there is something I have to do. I don’t think it can wait.”
“Does this have to do with what Roderick asked you to do for him?” asked Katherine.
“It may, Aunt Katherine,” replied Percy. “I can’t be certain.”
“Did you find something in his study?”
“I may have. Again, I cannot say for certain. I am sorry, but I just cannot say more. Actually, Uncle Roderick did not give me specifics. I am nearly as much in the dark as you. I hope you can trust me.”
Again his aunt and cousin stared back with expressions of bewilderment.
“Of course we can, Percy,” said Katherine after a moment. “When will you leave?”
“Tomorrow, I think.”
The rest of the breakfast passed somewhat somberly. Percy knew that Florilyn was not merely disappointed. He could tell that her feelings were hurt, as much that he did not feel himself able to confide in her as that he was leaving.
He spent the rest of the morning in his room, again perusing the letters he had found as well as completing David Elginbrod.
After lunch, he invited Florilyn for another ride, this time into the hills. Her mood was obviously subdued.
“I was embarrassed to tell you when I came,” he said after they were well away from the manor and climbing toward Rhinog Fawr, “but I hadn’t yet finished the MacDonald book. I knew it was important to you, but school was just too hectic. I finally did so last night and this morning. I think I see everything you were saying to me last Christmas.”
Florilyn nodded.
“It was hard to hear at the time,” Percy went on, “but the wisdom of it is growing on me.”
“Does your leaving have anything to do with Gwyneth?” asked Florilyn. “Mother said you went down to her cottage.”
“Not really,” answered Percy. “I just wanted to look around. There was nothing there.”
“So you’re not leaving because you have some new idea where she went to.”
“Nothing like that. It has nothing to do with her.”
“Does it have anything to do with me?”
“How do you mean?”
“Are you … disappointed with me?”
“No, not at all. Why would you think that?”
“I thought maybe that you … I don’t know … that you found it awkward or didn’t want to be with me anymore.”
“Oh, Florilyn—that’s not how I feel at all. I’m sorry if I—”
“It’s not you, Percy,” said Florilyn. “It’s only that I feel … It is just hard sometimes. I miss you, that’s all.”
“I know. The feeling is mutual. I’ve had bouts of sadness, even depression, these last six months … you know … wondering about it all.”
They rode on for several minutes in silence.
“What about the book?” asked Florilyn at length.
“I now understand about Hugh and Margaret,” replied Percy. “Whether their story has to do with me … with us … that I still do not know.” He paused a moment. “Are you …” he began hesitantly, “are you still at peace with what you did?”
Florilyn smiled wistfully. “I think so,” she replied slowly. “It makes me sad when I think about it. Doubts creep in. I wonder what it will be like if I one day have to watch you marry someone else.” Her voice quivered slightly. “Then I worry that I may never marry at all. Girls always worry about such things. The worse thing I worry about is that I do not want to be like Euphra—like she was before, you know. But if and when we do marry, or don’t … we will be stronger for having waited long enough to be sure. I know that in my head, but sometimes my heart forgets.”
“You would never be like Euphra. You are too wonderful for that. But you don’t know how much it relieves me to hear you say what you did,” said Percy. “I think you’ve pretty well summed up how I feel as well.”
Having cleared the air, the rest of the ride proved thoroughly enjoyable. They raced several times, explored a few new places, and spent the entire afternoon and most of the evening together.
The enjoyable day brought to Percy’s remembrance that he had actually made two promises to his uncle. One of them, after he left, he would not be in a position to keep. He had not thought of it in practical terms during his final year in Aberdeen. But with so many changes bound to come to Westbrooke Manor in the coming months, he must perhaps be more attentive to it than ever. Late in the day he found Steven Muir in his office.
“So you are leaving us, eh, Percy?” said Steven where he sat behind his desk. “We’ve hardly had the chance to exchange two words, and now you are off again!”
“I am sorry about that,” nodded Percy, easing himself into a chair opposite him. “It is actually quite unexpected but cannot be helped. I made a promise to my uncle that I have to attend to.” Percy paused then drew in a thoughtful breath. “There is something I need to ask you to do for me, Steven,” he said.
“Just name it.”
“Before my uncle died, he asked me to take care of my aunt and Florilyn. Of course at the time he thought that Florilyn and I would marry. With those plans now uncertain, the situation is obviously changed. Nevertheless, I told him I would do my best to protect them and see that no harm came to them.”
“He could not have left them in better hands,” said Steven.
“Perhaps,” rejoined Percy. “But now I am leaving. And with the strain caused by Courtenay’s position looming larger every day, I cannot help being concerned. I don’t know how long I will be away … and I would like to ask you to do your best for them in my absence and make sure no hurt of any kind comes to them.”
“I would do so even without your request,” said Steven solemnly. “I try to do so every day. But knowing I am standing in your stead, and indeed acting on behalf of the viscount himself, I will be especially diligent.”
“Thank you. That will make my leaving easier,” said Percy. “I know they are in good hands.”
Percy was up early, and his two bags packed the following morning. He had breakfasted an hour before the northbound coach was scheduled to pass through town.
Florilyn and Steven took him in the small carriage into the village.
One last item of business remained. “I need to say good-bye to Rhawn,” said Percy as Steven led the carriage into town. “Do you mind if we stop by her house?”
They drew up in front of the Lorimer home a minute or two later. Percy jumped down and went to the door. Two minutes later, Rhawn returned to the carriage with him.
“Room for one more?” said Percy. “I think we can all squeeze in. Rhawn’s going to the inn with us.” He climbed back up, gave Rhawn his hand, and helped her up beside him.
Ten minutes later, the northbound coach bounded along the street and pulled to a noisy stop in front of Mistress Chattan’s inn. Percy shook Steven’s hand, then embraced Florilyn and kissed her on the cheek. She did her best to smile but wa
s wiping at her eyes. Finally Percy turned to Rhawn. He opened his arms, and she walked into his embrace.
“Thank you for believing in me, Percy,” she whispered. “I am going to keep coming awake. I will become a growing meadow, Percy.”
“You already are, Rhawn. The flowers of spring are bursting out all over.”
She smiled. “You are too nice to me, Percy! No one has every treated me like you have. And I am going to be better. I am going to keep growing. I will make you proud of me one day.”
“I am already proud of you, Rhawn. Anyone who is growing is deserving of great respect.”
She was blinking hard.
“And I will ask for God’s help about what I should do,” she added in a quivering voice, “like you said I should.”
She stepped back and smiled again. In her moist eyes was the light of hope. She had begun to know that she was truly loved, both by God and by the faithful friends he had given her.
Part II
Ireland Summer-Fall 1873
39
Across the Ancient Waters
Twenty-two-year-old Percival Drummond, third in the generations of godly Drummond men and who now prepared to take his place in the man’s work of that lineage, stood at the prow of a passenger ferry plunging through the waters of the ancient Celtic Triangle. He was on a mission whose result he could not possibly foresee.
Not divulging to his aunt and cousin that his destination was Ireland, he had taken the coach north to Blaenau Ffestiniog then to Bangor and finally Holyhead on the island of Anglesey, where he had embarked the next day for Dublin. In the Irish capital, he had dispatched a telegram to his parents informing them briefly of his plans. From Dublin, led only by the newspaper clipping and letters he had found, he took a coach south along the Irish coast to the county seat of Wicklow.
A few days ago, the only possible clues he had to guide him in what his uncle had desired of him he had derived from the deathbed affidavit he had written out for him a year before. The entire thing had been mysterious, and many of his uncle’s words cryptic and puzzling. At the time, he had himself been filled with the youthful emotions of feeling partially responsible for his uncle’s mortal accident. He had been too overwhelmed to absorb what was happening and his role in it.
Now that a year had passed, he realized how ill prepared he was for the task his uncle had set before him. If only he had asked more questions, probed his uncle for more details. But the events of that fateful week had rushed by him like a blistering wind of uncertainty. The death and grief and funeral had consumed all else by their intensity. Now his uncle was gone. He had taken his secrets to the grave with him.
Suddenly, Percy had the newly discovered letters to accompany the affidavit. He still had no idea where they would lead. But at least he had something to shed additional light on his uncle’s dying disclosure—the name of the town that had apparently been his first wife’s home, or that of her relatives. It was a place to begin.
The day was fair, the ocean breezes light and fragrant with sea, salt, and sunshine. Percy turned from the bow of the vessel, walked to the passenger deck, and sat down in one of several vacant chairs. From inside his coat he pulled out the affidavit and again read, in his own hand, his uncle’s words.
To whom it may concern, especially to my dear wife Katherine, my family, and to Hamilton Murray, our faithful solicitor of many years:
I make this affidavit on the 27th day of June in the year 1872 in the presence of my nephew, Percival Drummond, son of Edward and Mary Drummond of Glasgow, whom, for reasons that will become clear, I have asked to set my final affairs in order. I am of sound mind, but failing body …
Even to read the words brought his uncle’s familiar voice back into Percy’s memory and tears rose in his eyes. Whatever his uncle had been, however he may have failed as a husband and father early in his life, Percy had grown to love him. The remembrance of their brief friendship would always be dear to him.
At sixteen years of age, Percy continued, as a spoiled son of what I thought was wealth, I left Wales on a youthful grand tour, as we called it in those days—to see the world and spend money and generally squander my youth on the altar of irresponsibility. It turned out that my father was not the wealthy man I took him for. Before my travels were over, I was nearly out of money. I found myself in Ireland chasing the fleeting dream of riches in the rivers of Wicklow, though what remained to be found was doubtful. There my heart was smitten with a young Irish lass of working, though not peasant stock. Her name was Avonmara O’Sullivan.
Several months later we were married in a small parish church in County Wicklow. We were both children, she a mere eighteen years of age and myself nineteen. Whether it was wise or ill fated from the beginning, who can say. But it was done, though our brief happiness would not last.
I can hardly recall what my plans were. The years have faded and my memory with them. I think I assumed that one day we would return to Wales as Lord and Lady Snowdon, after I inherited the title. But I was in no hurry to return after our marriage. The lure of the gold in eastern Ireland still possessed me, though most of the treasure had been unearthed decades earlier. Nor was I anxious to bring a new wife back to Llanfryniog where I would always be looked upon as a spendthrift son who had never amounted to much. Whatever I was, at least in Ireland I could be myself. People knew that I was of aristocratic stock, but they had no preconceptions formed against me. The thought even fleetingly occurred to me that I might find work—though I had never worked in my life—in the shipyards down the coast in Arklow. The husband of my sister-in-law had been involved in that trade before marrying my wife’s sister.
So we remained in Ireland and the following months were some of the happiest of my life. A daughter was born to us a year later, but my dear Avonmara died in childbirth. I was devastated. I could not even think clearly enough to give her a name. I did not return to the house for days. It was Avonmara’s mother who gave her the name Morvern and took charge of caring for her and saw that she was baptized in the Catholic church.
As I recovered from the shock of losing my young wife, I knew I was unfit to care for a child. I had married at nineteen and was now a mere twenty and without means. Without Avonmara, Ireland became suddenly desolate. The thought of remaining was odious to me. My life had been shattered. I decided to return at last to Wales, thinking, I suppose, to try to establish myself and prepare for my eventual role as viscount. My father was aging and not in the best of health by this time. Marriage and becoming a father had begun to sober me to my responsibilities but sadly had only begun to do so. I told Mrs. O’Sullivan that I would return for my daughter as soon as I was able and would provide a good life for her and, as my resources enabled me, to help all of the rest of them as well, for times then in Ireland were difficult not only for the poor but for everyone.
Alas, time went by more quickly than I anticipated. I became involved in two or three questionable business schemes—that was always my Achilles’ heel—and before I knew it, years had passed. I was still a foolish young man. Finally I made plans to go back to Ireland after my father’s death and my assumption to the title. Even then I was young, only twenty-eight, but I assumed on the strength of my new position that I would be capable of providing my daughter the life she deserved. I wrote to Mrs. O’Sullivan, telling her of my plans, but my letters were returned unopened. I wrote several times, then to her sister. But all the letters were returned. I assumed that Avonmara’s family was angry with me for, as they saw it, deserting my child. So I sailed for Ireland myself. But what should I find but that they were all gone from the town where we had lived. The entire family had disappeared.
It was not perhaps altogether to be wondered at. Those were desperate times in Ireland. The worst of the potato famine was still a year or two away, but it had begun by that time. People were starving and fleeing Ireland in droves. Entire villages were sometimes abandoned. The country was in chaos, and it would get worse. I went to the home w
here Avonmara and I had lived, where Mrs. O’Sullivan had lived, where her sister, Vanora Maloney, and her family had lived. Two were vacant, the third was occupied by a newcomer who had never heard of either the O’Sullivans or the Maloneys. It crossed my mind to wonder if they had left with the intent of keeping me from my daughter. They must have wondered what kind of father I would make after deserting her for so long. If that were true, I could hardly blame them.
I returned to Wales, disconsolate all over again. At last I wanted to be a father to my daughter, who would now have been eight. But I had no idea how to find her. I took to travel again, suffering great pangs of conscience and remorse. I met dear Katherine in Glasgow. At first I saw no reason to tell her of my past, but doing so became increasingly difficult with each passing year. We were married in 1847, and gradually my past faded away as a dream and I put the memory of that time behind me. Courtenay was born, then Florilyn, and I managed to convince myself, now that I was a father again, that my sin had not been so very great and tried to excuse it on the basis of youthful folly. For years, whenever I remembered, I was jealous of protecting the estate for Courtenay, my only son. But now I realize that right must be done … whatever it might mean. I must attempt to make my past right by my daughter Morvern. For if she can be found, she is my rightful firstborn and heir …
Percy set the paper down and sighed deeply. Thoughts of Courtenay made him realize again what was at stake. Even if he did find the viscount’s first daughter, Courtenay would surely challenge any threat to his position in the courts. In the hands of the right barrister, he would no doubt have a strong case. Percy knew well enough that a skilled barrister could twist the law into so many knots it could say anything. Sadly, there were many in the legal profession who were motivated by money more than truth or justice.
The Treasure of the Celtic Triangle- Wales Page 19
