From Across the Ancient Waters (44 page)

Percy slipped out of the manor shortly before six o’clock.

He was ready for the journey. His bag sat on the floor of his room.

Hoping to disturb no one, he left as he often did by the side entrance, walked around the house and down the drive through the main gate and to the moor. Twenty minutes later he was approaching the promontory of Mochras Head.

It was a cold morning. A thick fog had settled over all of Tremadog Bay during the night. The white mist seemed clinging to the promontory itself, rising two hundred feet in the air. But it had not drifted inland from the water.

As Percy approached, he entered a world of whiteness. He could scarcely see the edge of the promontory in front of him. When he reached Gwyneth’s special place, though there would be no sight of the ancient waters below on this day, he was surprised to find himself alone. There was no sign of she whom he had come to meet.

Percy sat down at the familiar place where he and Gwyneth had enjoyed the view so many times. The ground was wet. He would have to change into another pair of trousers before leaving for the coach. He heard the waves, muted by the thick fog, beating against the rocks far below.

He waited for twenty minutes, then forty. When an hour had passed, he began to grow concerned. He checked his watch and continued his wait. Why hadn’t she come?

Suddenly a horrible thought occurred to him. Was it possible that she had only just now heard of the rumor? Was she, like Florilyn, unable to face him?

Gwyneth had not actually expected Percy to be at the shore at such an early hour.

But she did not mind arriving first nor waiting for hours if she had to. She only did not want to miss him. So she would be at the beach early.

It was, in fact, a few minutes before five when she passed Grannie’s through a fog so thick she could scarcely see across the narrow lane. After the discovery that her home had been ransacked, Grannie was staying with her great-nephew. Nevertheless, Gwyneth said a brief prayer for her and continued on. It was the first time in memory she had not stopped in at the beloved cottage now sitting silent and cold and empty.

She walked down to the harbor in the white cloudy soup. She was all but certain Percy would come to the beach through town, not along the promontory path. The tide was coming in. To climb across the rocks by the cave, especially as he might be wearing his traveling clothes, would be all but impossible. He would have to come through town and pass close by her to reach the sandy beach that he called his
favorite place
.

She sat down on the concrete quay of the harbor and set the bouquet she had labored over with such care in her lap. It was tied with two pieces of the colored ribbon Percy had given her. This was no forgiveness bouquet but a gift from the depths of one human soul to another, speaking as flowers were created to speak, in the language of the heart.

There she waited. It was cold. But Gwyneth was warmly dressed, and the incoming and outgoing waves were of endless fascination.

An hour passed.

A few fishermen began to be about but paid her no heed.

Another slow hour went by. Still there was no sign of Percy.

By eight o’clock Percy could delay no longer. He looked at his watch one final time and let out a long sigh. They would be waiting for him at the manor to take him to the coach, no doubt wondering where he had disappeared to.

He stood, walked carefully to the edge, and gazed over the promontory. Still he could see nothing but white. “Gwyneth!” he yelled. His voice seemed lost in the fog.

The only reply was the sound of the tide far below.

“Gwyneth!” he cried a second time, louder than before. Sadly he turned, chilled to the bone, and ran across the moor in the direction of the manor.

By now he realized he had waited too long. He should have left the promontory sooner. Now he had no time to run by the cottage to see her. He pulled out his watch and glanced down as he ran, suddenly annoyed with himself. He should have left sooner!

He hurried up the hill and along the entryway, into the house, and to the breakfast room. He gulped down a hasty cup of tea and egg, then ran up to his room to fetch his bag and change his clothes, and returned along the corridor. He paused at Florilyn’s door. It was closed. He hesitated a moment but then continued to the stairway.

He found his aunt and uncle downstairs with a buggy waiting.

“Don’t want to be late, Percy, my boy,” said his uncle with watch in hand, twiddling the chain nervously. “It’s coming on to quarter till the hour.”

When Young Hearts Part

F
lorilyn Westbrooke had cried more in the last two days than she ever remembered crying in her life. Certainly she had never cried so much for being hurt by a boy. She had never cared enough for anyone to be this hurt.

A
boy!

What was she thinking? Percy was a
man …
and a wonderful young man. What had possessed her even to
think
he could be involved with Rhawn Lorimer? She knew it was another of Rhawn’s lies. Why Rhawn had blamed Percy for her troubles, Florilyn couldn’t imagine.

She had behaved like such an absolute fool. She didn’t deserve someone like Percy. She had been too embarrassed to face him. Like a baby she had kept to her room, unable to look him in the face. Yet with every day that passed, desperately longing to see him, the impossibility of looking into those honest, strong eyes mounted. Finally she had created for herself an imaginary barrier too great to overcome.

And now he was gone!

She stood at her window and watched the buggy leaving for town with her father and mother. They were taking Percy away. If she ever saw him again, it would be with a Scottish wife on his arm. He would never know what he had meant to her, never know how much she had loved him.

Tears filled her eyes at her childish foolishness. She would, as she had said to him, have to settle for second best and marry some boring, unmanly youth from North Wales.

Suddenly Florilyn’s eyes shot open.
Why
was it too late? Why could she not put an end to her idiocy … and right now?

The next moment she was bolting from her room and down the stairs. She flew outside and across the stones to the stables.

“Hollin … Hollin!” she cried. “Saddle Grey Tide. Saddle her faster than you have ever saddled a horse in your life!”

Gwyneth had no watch. But she could tell from the activity at the harbor and the sounds from the village that the day was coming to life. The fog was still thick, and she was chilled. Surely it was well past eight o’clock by now. Her father would already be at the mine wielding his hammer against the stones.

Where was Percy? Had she dozed without knowing it? Had she missed seeing him in the fog?
Why hadn’t he come?

Could the horrible rumor be true? Had he gone to spend his last hours with Rhawn Lorimer? She could hardly bear the thought.

What was she to do? It was too late to go looking for him at the manor.

In the distance, the vague sounds of galloping horses, with jingling and clanging and bouncing and an occasional yell of driver, intruded into her hearing. But she was too absorbed in her thoughts. The sounds did not register in her brain.

The coach bounded to a jostling stop in front of Mistress Chattan’s inn. Percy took his bag from his uncle’s buggy and walked across and set it on the ground beside it.

He returned to his aunt and uncle. “Well … thank you again,” he said. “For everything. This is truly a second home for me.”

“Percy …,” began Katherine, then for lack of words stepped forward and hugged her nephew with tender feeling.

Percy stepped back and smiled. The affection between them was mutual.

“Well, Percy, my boy,” said the viscount, never at his best at such moments, “looks like the coach is about ready for you. You’re welcome anytime, of course—goes without saying, what? Give your father my best.”

The two men shook hands. Percy turned and walked toward the coach.

Suddenly Gwyneth realized what she had heard. It was the northbound coach on its way into Llanfryniog!

Something must have detained Percy from coming to the beach. But she could at least say good-bye to him and give him her gift.

She leaped from the quay and dashed for Mistress Chattan’s inn.