• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 490 0

into my saddle-bag. One question I dared not ask, even when a girl who was not Keri brought wine for my refreshment. And finally, with my question unasked, I was ushered to the gate and out into the street. Here I thought for a moment that my luck had changed, for as I was untying my horse's bridle from the ring beside the gate I saw the old portress peering at me through the grille -- remembering, no doubt, the gold I had given her on my first visit. But when I produced money and beckoned her close to shout my question in her ear, and even, after three repetitions, got through to her, the only answer was a shrug and the one word, "Gone," which -- even if she had understood me -- was hardly helpful. In the end I gave it up. In any case, I told myself, this was something that had to be forgotten. So I rode out of town and back over the miles to my valley with the memory of her face burned into everything I saw, and the gold of her hair lying in every shaft of the slanting sunlight.

Cadal had rebuilt the pen which Galapas and I had made in the hawthorn brake. It had a good roof and a stout door, and could easily house a couple of big horses. One -- Cadal's own, I supposed -- was already there.

Cadal himself must have heard me riding up the valley, because, almost before I had dismounted, he came running down the path by the cliff, had the bridle out of my hand, and, lifting both my hands in his, kissed them.

"Why, what's this?" I asked, surprised. He need have had no fears for my safety; the messages I had sent him had been regular and reassuring. "Didn't you get the message I was coming?"

"Yes, I got it. It's been a long time. You're looking well."

"And you. Is all well here?"

"You'll find it so. If you must live in a place like this, there's ways and ways of making it fit. Now get away up, your supper's ready." He bent to unbuckle the horse's girths, leaving me to go up to the cave alone.

He had had a long time in which to do it, but even so it came with a shock like a miracle. It was as it had always been, a place of green grass and sunlight. Daisies and heartsease starred the turf between the green curls of young bracken, and young rabbits whisked out of sight under the flowering blackthorn. The spring ran crystal clear, and crystal clear through the water of the well could be seen the silver gravel at the bottom. Above it, in its ferny niche, stood the carved figure of the god; Cadal must have found it when he cleared the rubbish from the well. He had even found the cup of horn. It stood where it had always stood. I drank from it, sprinkled the drops for the god, and went into the cave.

My books had come from Less Britain; the great chest was backed against the wall of the cave, where Galapas' box had been. Where his table had stood there was another, which I recognized from my grandfather's house. The bronze mirror was back in place. The cave was clean, sweet-smelling and dry. Cadal had built a hearth of stone, and logs were laid ready across it to light. I half expected to see Galapas sitting beside the hearth, and, on the ledge near the entrance, the falcon which had perched there on the night a small boy left the cave in tears. Deep among the shadows above the ledge at the rear was the gash of deeper shadow which hid the crystal cave.

That night, lying on the bed of bracken with the rugs pulled round me, I lay listening, after the dying of the fire, to the rustle of leaves outside the cave, and, beyond that, the trickle of the spring. They were the only sounds in the world. I closed my eyes and slept as I had not slept since I was a child.

8

Like a drunkard who, as long as there is no wine to be had, thinks himself cured of his craving, I had thought myself cured of the thirst for silence and solitude. But from the first morning of waking on Bryn Myrddin, I knew that this was not merely a refuge, it was my place. April lengthened into May, and the cuckoos shouted from hill to hill, the bluebells unfurled in the young bracken, and evenings were full of the sound of lambs crying, and still I had never