A SUMMONS
The days spent on the mountain had not been as cheerless as that first
night. The fire burned now continually on the hearth, the light peat
smoke was dissipated at once by the wind, which was never still at the
fall of the year at the altitude where was planted the hovel of the
hermit.
The supply of food was better than at first. One night Pabo had found a
she-goat attached to a bush near the stone of Cynwyl; and he had taken
her to his habitation, where she supplied him with milk. On another
night he had found on a rock a rolled-up blanket, and had experienced
the comfort at night of this additional covering.
But no tidings whatever had reached him of what went on in Caio. This
was satisfactory, and his anxiety for his flock abated. But he knew that
the enemy was quartered in the valley, because no call had come to him
to return to it. At nights he would steal along the mountain-top that he
might, from Bronffin, look down on the sleeping valley, with its
scattered farms and hamlets; and on Sunday morning he even ventured
within hearing of the church bell, that he might in spirit unite with
his flock in prayer. He concluded that one of the assistant priests from
a chapelry under the great Church was ministering there in his stead. He
knew that his people would be thinking of him, as he was of them.
During the day he made long excursions to the north, among the wild
wastes that stretched interminably away before his eyes, and offered him
a region where he might lie hid should his present hiding-place be
discovered.
None could approach the hut unobserved, a long stretch of moor was
commanded by it, and the rocks in the rear afforded means, should he
observe an enemy approach, of getting away beyond their reach into the
intricacies of the wilderness.
At first Pabo was oppressed by the sense of loneliness. No human face
was seen, no human voice heard. But this passed, and he became conscious
of a calm coming over his troubled heart, and with it a sense of
freedom from care and childlike happiness.
The elevation at which he lived, the elasticity of the air, the
brilliance of the light, unobstructed, as below, by mountains, tended
towards this. Moreover, he was alone with Nature, that has an
inspiriting effect on the heart, whilst at the same time tranquilizing
the nerves--tranquilizing all the cares and worries bred of life among
men. It was a delight to Pabo to wander through the heather to some brow
that overhung the Ystrad Towy or the valley of the Cothi, and look down
from his treeless altitude on the rolling masses of wood, now undergoing
glorious change of color under the touch of autumn. Or else to venture
into the higher, unoccupied mountain glens, where the rowan and the
rose-bramble were scarlet with their berries, and there he seemed to be
moving in the land of coral.
It was a delight to observe the last flowers of the year, the few stray
harebells that still hung and swayed in the air, the little ivy-leafed
campanula by the water, the sturdy red robin, the gorse persistent in
bloom. He gathered a few blossoms to adorn his wretched hovel, and in it
they were as a smile.
The birds were passing overhead, migrating south, yet the ring-ouzel was
still there; the eagle and hawk spired aloft on their lookout for prey;
the plover and curlew piped mournfully, and the owl hooted.
The insects were retiring underground for the winter. Pabo had not
hitherto noticed the phases of life around him, below that of man, now
it broke on him as a wonder, and filled him with interest, to see a
world on which hitherto he had not thought to direct his observation.
There is no season in the year in which the lights are more varied and
more beautiful than in autumn, the slant rays painting the rocks
vermilion, glorifying the dying foliage, enhancing the color of every
surviving flower.
But the fall of the year is one in which Nature weeps and sighs over the
prospect of death; and there came on Pabo days of blinding fog and
streaming rain. Then he was condemned to remain within, occasionally
looking forth into the whirls of drifting vapor, charged with a strange
dank scent, or at the lines of descending water. He milked his goat,
collected food for it, and heaped up his fire.
Then it was that sad thoughts came over him, forebodings of ill; and he
mused by his hearth, looking into the glow, listening to the moan of the
wind or the drizzle of the rain, and the eternal drip, drip from the
eaves.
He had thus sat for hours one day, interrupting his meditations only by
an occasional pace to the door to look out for a break in the weather,
when there came upon him with a shock of surprise the recollection that
there was more in the hermit's scroll than he had considered at first.
Not much. He unfurled it, and beside the bequest of the hut, only these
words were added: "For a commission look below my bed."
What was the meaning of this? It was strange that till now Pabo had
given no thought to these concluding words.
Now he thrust the fire together, cast on some dry bunches of gorse that
lit the interior with a golden light, and he drew the bed from the place
it had occupied in the corner of the chamber.
Beneath it was nothing but the beaten earth that had never been
disturbed.
The bed itself was but a plank resting on two short rollers, to sustain
it six inches above the soil. Nothing had been concealed beneath the
plank, between it and the ground--no box, no roll of parchment. Nothing
even was written in the dust.
Pabo took a flaming branch and examined the place minutely, but in vain.
Then he threw off the blanket and skins that covered the pallet. He
shook them, and naught dropped out. He took the pillow and explored it.
The contents were but moss; yet he picked the moss to small pieces,
searching for the commission and finding none. Then he drew away the
logs on which the plank had rested. They might be hollow and contain
something. Also in vain. Thoroughly perplexed to know what could have
been the hermit's meaning, Pabo now replaced the rollers in their former
position and raised the plank to lean it upon them once more.
At this something caught his eye--some scratches on the lower surface of
the board. He at once turned it over, and to his amazement saw that this
under side of the pallet was scored over with lines and with words,
drawn on the wood with a heated skewer, so that they were burnt in.
The fire had sunk to a glow--he threw on more gorse. As it blazed he saw
that the lines were continuous and had some meaning, though winding
about. Apparently a plan had been sketched on the board. Beneath were
these words, burnt in--
Thesaurus, a Romanis antiquis absconditus in antro Ogofau.
Then followed in Welsh some verses--
In the hour of Cambria's need,
When thou seest Dyfed bleed,
Raise the prize and break her chains;
Use it not for selfish gains.
The lines that twisted, then ran straight, then bent were, apparently, a
plan.
Pabo studied it. At one point, whence the line started, he read,
"_Ingressio_"; then a long stroke, and _Perge_; further a turn, and here
was written _vertitur in sinistram_. There was a fork there, in fact the
line forked in several places, and the plan seemed to be intricate. Then
a black spot was burnt deeply into the wood, and here was written:
_Cave, puteum profundum_. And just beyond this several dots with the
burning skewer, and the inscription, _Auri moles prægrandis_.
Pabo was hardly able at first to realize the revelation made. He knew
the Ogofau well. It was hard by Pumpsaint--a height, hardly a mountain,
that had been scooped out like a volcanic crater by the Romans during
their occupation of Britain. From the crater thus formed, they had
driven adits into the bowels of the mountain. Thence it was reported
they had extracted much gold. But the mine had been unworked since their
time. The Welsh had not sufficient energy or genius in mining to carry
on the search after the most precious of ores. And superstition had
invested the deserted works with terrors. Thither it was said that the
Five Saints, the sons of Cynyr of the family of Cunedda, had retired in
a thunder-storm for shelter. They had penetrated into the mine and had
lost their way, and taking a stone for a bolster, had laid their heads
on it and fallen asleep. And there they would remain in peaceful slumber
till the return of King Arthur, or till a truly apostolic prelate should
occupy the throne of St. David. An inquisitive woman, named Gwen, led by
the devil, sought to spy on the saintly brothers in their long sleep,
but was punished by also losing her way in the passages of the mine; and
there she also remained in an undying condition, but was suffered to
emerge in storm and rain, when her vaporous form--so it was
reported--might be seen sailing about the old gold-mine, and her sobs
and moans were borne far off on the wind.
In consequence, few dared in broad daylight to visit the Ogofau, none
ever ventured to penetrate the still open mouth of the mine.
Pabo was not devoid of superstition, yet not abjectly credulous. If what
he now saw was the result of research by the hermit, then it was clear
that where one man had gone another might also go, and with the
assistance of the plan discover the hidden treasure which the Romans had
stored, but never removed.
And yet, as Pabo gazed at the plan and writing, he asked, was it not
more likely that the old hermit had been a prey to hallucinations, and
that there was no substance behind this parade of a secret? Was it not
probable that in the thirty years' dreaming in this solitude his fancies
had become to him realities; that musing in the long winter nights on
the woes of his country he had come on the thought, what an assistance
it would be to it had the Romans not extricated all the ore from the
rich veins of the Ogofau. Then, going a little further, had imagined
that in their hasty withdrawal from Britain, they might not have removed
all the gold found. Advancing mentally, he might have supposed that the
store still remaining underground might be recovered, and then the
entire fabric of plan, with its directions, would have been the final
stage in this fantastic progress.
How could the recluse have penetrated the passages of the mine?
It was true enough that the Ogofau were accessible from Mallaen without
going near any habitation of man. It was conceivable that by night the
old man had prosecuted his researches, which had finally been crowned
with success.
Pabo felt a strong desire to consult Howel. He started up, and after
having replaced the plank and covered it with the bedding, left the hut
and made his way down into the valley of the Annell, to the Stone of
Cynwyl.
Notwithstanding the drizzle and the gathering night, he pushed on down
the steep declivity, and on reaching the brawling stream passed out of
the envelope of vapor.
The night was not pitch dark, there was a moon above the clouds, and a
wan, gray haze pervaded the valley.
As he reached the great erratic block he saw what at first he thought
was a dark bush, or perhaps a black sheep against it.
All at once, at the sound of his step on the rocks, the figure moved,
rose, and he saw before him a woman with extended arms.
"Pabo!" she said in thrilling tones. "Here they are--the two pebbles!"
"Morwen!"
He sprang towards her, with a rush of blood from his heart.
She made no movement to meet his embrace.
"Oh, Pabo! hear all first, and then decide if I am to lose you forever."
In tremulous tones, but with a firm heart, she narrated to him all that
had taken place. This was now Sunday. Two men had been hung. On the
morrow Howel would be suspended beside them. These executions would
continue till the place of retreat of the Archpriest was revealed, and
he had been taken.
She did not repeat to him the words of Angarad, Madoc's wife--now widow.
"Pabo!" she said, and tears were oozing between every word she uttered,
"It is I--I who bring you this tidings! I--I who offer you these two
pebbles! I--I who send you to your death!"
"Aye, my Morwen," he said, and clasped her to his heart, "it is because
you love me that you do this. It is right. I return to Caio with you."