The Pendragon Legend (8 page)

“Could you suggest a reason for it?”

“Of course. He is completely—as it used to be called—of a melancholic humour. At times he is immensely benign, the
kindest
man on earth. Then he draws back into his shell. There’ve been times when the three of us have been here and he hasn’t spoken to us once in six weeks, and he certainly wasn’t angry with us. He locks himself away in his rooms. We aren’t allowed in there. The whole of the second floor is his.”

“And what does he do up there, during those times?”

“I believe he works on his special animals. My uncle is a sort of amateur zoologist. But he never talks about it. He does sometimes go out for a stroll, but he never speaks to anyone; in fact I don’t think he even recognises people. And you’re not allowed to speak to him. On one occasion, you know, after the episode when he is said to have revived the Earl of Warwick, he chased a journalist up a tree because he asked for an interview. It seems yesterday was another of his bad days. But you mustn’t take it amiss. You must make yourself at home here, as much as you possibly can.”

“Thank you. But what would you say if a giant in fancy dress patrolled outside your bedroom door at night?”

Osborne roared with laughter.

“My dear man, you are far too sensitive. At night all Llanvygan servants are giants in fancy dress. An ancient ruling requires the Earl of Gwynedd to maintain thirty night-watchmen, complete with halberds, wherever he resides. Even their garments are prescribed. There’s nothing unusual in that. Britain is full of these old medieval statutes. Anyway, thirty men with halberds
are a great deal more practical than the knights in armour Lord Whatsisname has to keep permanently at the ready. Or the
trumpeter
who has to play non-stop whenever the king hunts in the vicinity of some peer or other. Not to mention the fistful of snow one Scottish lord has to supply to the court every year. Does that reassure you?”

“Not completely. But while we’re on the subject, I’ll tell you what else has been going on.”

“What, more horrors? I begin to envy you, Doctor. You
foreigners
have all the luck. I’ve lived here for three years and not one table has danced the tango in my honour.”

“Please, you must take me seriously. The cartridges were removed from my revolver. A packet Maloney entrusted to me has vanished from my suitcase. At night, a horseman stands
outside
the house with a flaming torch. Is that what usually happens here?”

Osborne was again deep in thought, and did not reply until urged to do so. Then, very quietly and with a look of self-
importance
on his face, he said:

“Tell me, Doctor, do they teach Geography in Hungary?”

“Of course they do,” I answered, somewhat irritably. “And much more thoroughly than in England.”

“Then you should have learnt that all Welshmen are mad. In England, every primary schoolchild knows this. I have no idea what has got into my uncle, nor do I bother my head about it. One fool can’t fathom the thoughts of another. Possibly he doesn’t even know about these things. The butler is just as crazy; none of the staff is completely sane. A certain mild abnormality is required of anyone who crosses the threshold of Llanvygan. It’s the tradition. It’s why I felt free to invite Maloney.”

“And the Earl me. Thanks very much.”

“If I were you, I wouldn’t concern myself with these trifles. You can be sure that by tonight your cartridges will all be back in place. The butler probably made a bet with the cook. It’s happened before. But the horseman you must have dreamed. I would have known about him too, don’t you think?

“Please believe me,” he went on. “For the last two hundred years nothing remarkable has happened to anyone living here. At
best, a few minor eccentricities, little incidents of no consequence, much to my regret.”

Slightly reassured, I went down to breakfast. I found Maloney already at the table. He made no comment on our nocturnal encounter.

Cynthia Pendragon, now dressed rather more casually, seemed to me altogether less formidable than she had the night before. This time I studied her rather more calmly. Even setting aside Pendragon, Llangyvan and several centuries of glorious English history, she was very attractive.

The loveliest of her features was her forehead. A high, clear brow dominated the face, lending it a certain piquancy. It was a broad, rational, honest face, with large blue eyes. The upper lip, with a touch of aristocratic grace, protruded slightly forward over the lower.

After the meal, Osborne and Maloney went off to play golf, and I prepared to head up to the library. The stony-faced butler, with his Franz Joseph whiskers, was already waiting for me.

To my great surprise Cynthia had not gone with the golfers, as I had expected in view of her background. Instead she fell in with me, announcing that she would show me round. I cannot say I was entirely delighted. The Mohammedans excluded women from Paradise, and I would exclude them from libraries, especially the pretty ones. Their mere presence obstructs my reading.

“Are you fond of books?” I asked, foolishly.

“Books are my hobby, indeed my obsession. And Welsh folklore. In fact, I’ve always wanted to be schoolteacher in a mountain village and spend my life doing ethnographical research. But my uncle thought it unsuitable. I mean the schoolteaching, not the research.”

This was not exactly the image I had formed of the Earl’s niece. Somehow I would have preferred her to have confessed to be unable to spell. But it seemed intelligence was yet another
sobering
Pendragon legacy.

We had reached the library.

It was an extremely long and narrow room, with countless books lining the walls, the majority in the uniform binding embossed with the Pendragon-Rosicrucian coat of arms.

I was filled with the tenderness I always feel—and which
nothing
can match—when I encounter so many books together. At moments like these I long to wallow, to bathe in them, to savour their wonderful, dusty, old-book odours, to inhale them through my very pores.

With genuine pride, Cynthia pointed me to the finest treasures of the library, the illuminated Welsh codices. She was proudest above all of those few written not in Latin but in the native
language
.

“You can see what a life’s work this could be for me,” she said, “to edit and publish these manuscripts—which exist nowhere else—with commentaries. It would be a major contribution to Welsh literature.”

“It certainly would. But can you imagine the work it would entail? It’s a job for elderly professors, not for young—and
beautiful
—patrician ladies.”

She blushed.

“You obviously take me for one of those English girls who answer ‘yes’ and ‘no’, and love dancing, and have winsome, empty smiles.”

“God forbid!” I said. “One has only to look at you to see how intelligent you are.”

But in truth, I lied. She was far too pretty for me to suppose any such thing. However, since it seemed her foible to be intelligent, I would have to woo her from that angle. For me, as it happened, this promised to be easier than if she had been interested only in sport.

Next she showed me the Persian codices, collected at the end of the last century by one of the Earls who had been in the tropics. I knew a little about them, having seen them at the great Persian Exhibition at Burlington House. There were some twenty of them and I stumbled from one ecstasy to the next. Little did I imagine what an active part they would play in my own personal history. In my excited bibliomania I forgot the first rule of English good manners, which strictly bars the didactic, and lectured my hostess on everything I knew about Persian books and illustrations—not that it was very much.

Cynthia listened with rapt attention. I don’t think she was
actually much interested in all the technical details I chattered on about, but she seemed to enjoy the performance.

It probably wasn’t often that anyone talked to her about these profound, and rather dull, things, and she was immensely
flattered
.

Cynthia was a fairy on a magical island, and our friendship was progressing with the sort of speed you’d expect at a well-attended party, after champagne, and after midnight.

But what is champagne beside a really old tome? In one hand I held an original Caxton, in the other two Wynkyn de Wordes—not to mention the Continental
incunabula
, and two Aldines enthroned on a separate shelf.

What a wonderful thing is a book! It simply sits there on the shelf, looking like nothing in any way special, and saying not a word. You open it, and you still know nothing about it, because
incunabula
have no title-pages. Then you glance at the back, at the colophon, and discover that you are holding a Caxton in your hands—an archduke, a Pope. Is there any human being who can carry self-effacement to that level of perfection?

I spent the morning familiarising myself with the more
noteworthy
volumes. Then the gong summoned us to lunch. In my overflowing happiness I sang Cynthia a Hungarian folksong about ripening ears of corn.

“You Continentals … you’re so … different,” she murmured dreamily.

“I’ve known English people who loved books.”

“That’s not what I mean. With you there’s still … passion.”

And she blushed scarlet.

Over lunch Maloney and Osborne talked golf, and we planned various excursions. The Earl did not appear.

We were sitting over our coffee and brandy when the local vicar, the Rev Dafyd Jones, was announced. He was extremely frail, and very nervous, with a hunted look in his eye.

“Excuse me for intruding. In point of fact I was hoping to speak with the Earl, but he won’t see anyone.”

“Not even you?” Cynthia asked with surprise.

“I don’t think he’s in,” said Osborne.

“He was seen this morning, walking in the direction of Pendragon,” said the vicar. “I thought he might be back for lunch. I’m very, very sorry. I shall be off now.”

And with a great sigh, he sat down.

“Is there something amiss in the village?” asked Cynthia.

“Amiss … well, no, strictly speaking, there isn’t. Only
superstition
, the ancient curse of our people. It seems nothing can drive it from these mountains,” he intoned.

Osborne pricked up his ears.

“Well, tell us about it! Do please join us in a drink, Vicar, and tell us the story. Is that table at your sister’s dancing about again?”

“That’s not superstition; that’s a serious scientific experiment. You may come and observe it any evening you like. No, it’s
something
else. The whole village has gone mad.”

“I’m delighted to hear it. Perhaps we might have some details?”

“You know old Pierce Gwyn Mawr?”

“The prophet Habakkuk? But of course I do. He belongs with my favourite childhood memories. I hadn’t heard of him lately: I assumed he was dead.”

“He isn’t dead. On the contrary, if you please. This morning he began to prophesy again.”

“Excellent. I’ll go and listen to him straight away. But what’s the problem?”

“The problem is, that the entire village has assembled, and they are completely beside themselves. All work has come to a
standstill
.”

“And what is Pierce telling them?”

“Mainly, that the end of the world is at hand, and they should repent.”

“And what is his source of information? Are there perhaps omens in the sun and the moon?”

“He says there are none yet, but there soon will be. Only, in the mean time … ”

“Well … ?”

“The four horsemen of the Apocalypse have appeared. He
watched them all night, circling around Llanvygan House, and then they rode off towards Pendragon.”

“I saw them myself,” said Maloney. “But how do you know they’re eucalyptic?”

“This is becoming interesting,” said Osborne, rising from his chair. “The doctor also saw them, and there isn’t the slightest tendency to the prophetic in him.”

The vicar’s already pale face showed increasing signs of unease:

“And my sister, too, heard the clatter of hooves … She had a terrible night, poor girl, as she always does when the wind is up. I thought she had just imagined it. What explanation can you offer for all this?”

“None at all, for the moment. But is it so surprising that
someone
should be riding around the house?”

“So in fact … in fact … ” stammered the vicar, firmly gripping his chair, “you too think there is something in what old Pierce is saying … ?”

“Of course,” replied Osborne. “But don’t you think, vicar, that it might be a little parochial to assume that the Horsemen of the Apocalypse might begin their European tour at Llanvygan? Wouldn’t they be rather more likely to open in London, or Paris, somewhere more central? Or in Rome, where the Antichrist
himself
sits on the papal throne?”

“That’s not the issue, sir … I’m thinking about something rather different … about something that might be quite specific to Llanvygan. But it’s rather difficult for me to mention.”

“Why?”

“In view of … with regard to … the family.”

“Which family?”

“The Pendragon family.”

“I cannot imagine what you are thinking,” said Osborne, after a protracted silence.

The vicar stood, wringing his hands. At last he began, in a mournful voice, like someone reciting a lesson.

“We are all aware of the family legends, and other local
traditions
and stories attaching to Asaph Christian, the sixth Earl of Gwynedd. These stories, moreover … ”

“The midnight rider!” exclaimed Cynthia, jumping up.

“Indeed,” said the vicar, with a bow. “Miss Pendragon and I have for some years been trying to collect all the folkloric data connected with him. According to the superstitious notions of simple people, the same deceased gentleman appears whenever some great
turning
point is about to occur, either in the country as a whole, or in the house of Pendragon. He was last seen in 1917, when the Germans began their submarine offensive against Great Britain.”