01.05.08
Journey to the mine
Time to go, with talk down to hushed tones and last minute instructions and bags being hoisted with much looking around as though they never expected to see the place again. Out into the welcoming sunshine, greeting them like warriors off to war. Men were coming from all directions, filling the lane beside the house with a sudden swell of sound. The tramp of hobnails on the stony path assailed the still air with the authority of a marching army, whistles and catcalls going up for those late in joining the thong as it wound it’s way in the usual Monday morning exodus out of the village and over the hills to the quarry. There was almost a carnival atmosphere, something the women folk were quick to seize upon, for the men appeared to be actually looking forward to their five day exile away from the family hearth. Women probably said the same on the eve of Waterloo, such is the perversity of separation.
Ifor and Rhys went on ahead to join friends calling out to them and Geriant stood at the gate, looking down at his youngest. “Well Glyn, my spring lamb from the fold.” he said, placing a rough hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Afraid, lad?”
“A bit, Dada.”
“Nothing to be ashamed of. It is good to be afraid. I know I was.”
For Megan, this was one of a thousand farewells, different now from all the others in taking the last of her men, and she faced it with the outward acceptance of the hard way of life she always showed, but as they lingered at the gate, she found it difficult to control her feelings. The river of emotion within her, held in check by years of practice, was threatening to burst it’s banks and Geriant became aware of it in the twitching of her lips, the furrowing of her brow, the fluttering of her hands. Before he could try to assuage her fears, futile as it would be, she saw his concern and stood on her toes and brushed his cheek with a kiss, gripping his arm to speak volumes.
“Cold as it gets at night up there,” she said softly, a break in her voice. “An extra woolen in your bag.” “Stop fussing, woman.” Geriant forced a laugh. “Back there you were saying how hot it gets in Brynllech.”
She fixed him with the stare wives keep specially for their husbands. “You have heard me. Now go and take care of my little one. On your head it is.”
Her finger wagged to stress the point and then she turned to Glyn, embraced him in a hug that left him breathless, before turning on her heel and rushing away in a whiff of starch. Rownea had been watching in silence, her eyes misting. With sudden determination, she ran to her brother, threw her arms around him with a sob. “Friday night then.” she choked “Waiting I shall be.”
“What about your old Da then?” Geriant ventured hopefully, but the gate was swinging, the cottage door slamming behind her. He shook his head and tut-tutted, and hitched his pack into a more comfortable position on his shoulder, an action emulated by Glyn as though intent to start on the right side of his Dada. They turned away from the house and stepped off briskly, for the last quarryman was now out of sight and it would never do for the leader donkey, even if he was hand-holding on the way. 
Where the path left the last of the village behind, it ran alongside a gulley with a gentle stream, now a tide of rushing water swollen by the early spring rain, sweeping past in a hurry to reach the sea. Here a sign defied the years to welcome travelers to Diogel and leaning against it the scarecrow figure of Billy Peg, who was always there when the quarrymen went out, his patched eye and ornately carved stump for a leg a grim reminder, if any were needed, of the perils in the rock.
Billy received a nod of acknowledgment from Geriant with a raised stump and a rasping cackle, the derisive and sinister sound following them until it was mercifully swallowed by the roar of the water.
Geriant bit his lip, muttered, “Pay no heed, son. Rocks in the head that one.”
“Why was he laughing?” asked Glyn.
“Laughing? Fooled me he did.”
“What happened to Billy Peg…”
“…Will not happen to you. Watch and learn. Never underestimate the mountain.”
“Is that what Billy did?”
“Not looking when he should have been. And fatal that is. Robbing the mountain we are, see. Think about it now. For millions of years Mother Earth has been treasuring up what we take from her. Nestling it to her bosom. Family to her it is. Try to break up families, you know what happens. Sore heads and broken bones all round and no sympathy in sight.”
Trees now crowded about them, blanketing the end of the valley and the lower slopes. Sweet chestnut and oak, gnarled and ancient, weeping willow jostling with alder beside the water, Daphne in the depths, dog’s mercury and lesser celandine at their feet. This was the woodland of Nant Sarn, Glyn’s very own domain. His enchanted place, his own exclusive world, where he had walked hand in hand with nature for as long as he could remember. The children in the village called him “Mow”, which was short for Mogli from Mr. Kipling’s new jungle book recently introduced into the school with great popularity by Miss Tranter. There was nothing malicious in the nickname; it identified him with a favourite character also given to talking to animals as human beings and the community had come to accept him as strange and remote.
They walked on in silence, each with his own thoughts. Rabbits darted from thickets of buckler fern; a water vole washed it’s face, unconcerned, beside a pool of it’s own where a fallen tree had dammed the torrent; overhead, nesting birds cried out to foraging mates and impatient beaks were open in anticipation. Life was stirring and Glyn felt forlorn. He was leaving all this, walking away from it with legs already growing weak. He was deserting his childhood and all that mattered to him.
Geriant strode purposefully with head erect, but aware that his son’s step was faltering. To be expected, he thought, despite the hardness of him, feeling a pang of sympathy for the youngster. He also confessed to a touch of pride in Glyn’s knowledge of the wild. Right from his earliest years, he could identify birds, know their habits and become their friend, and he could pick out a yew, knowing instinctively that it would produce a bow more pliant than the others. When Mr and Mrs Corncrake were visiting in the summer, Glyn was the first to know, and he was the only one to make money out of crabby Win the Gin for gathering the most mature sloes, much to Mam’s disgust. And the time when chicken feathers were thick as snow on the ground, it was Glyn who tracked the polecat.
Glyn became interested in his new hobnails.
“New horizons.” his Father boomed. “New worlds. That’s what you are needing now.”
“Yes Dada.” said Glyn sadly, with eyes fit to strip paint.
“Thirteen you are now. A man you are getting, with a man’s responsibilities. Time to start making your own way in the world.”
“With the rock…that is the way?”
“For you it is something else then? Look about you, boy. See anything do you? All right is it for your old Dada and your two brothers? Break our backs and not another thought.”
Glyn shook his head and looked miserable.
“When I first took this road I was scarce twelve, and glad to be going. A good year on me you are.”
Glyn took a deep breath and seemed to stretch out of his corduroys, but before he could answer, his Father had strode as though he intended to go on alone and he had to scurry after him. They were now out of the trees and on the open hillside with a flood of gorse in full glory about them, and as they looked up at the track winding ahead, they could make out three figures on horseback against the sky at the top of the hill. Geriant spat viciously, his eyes narrowing. “Devil’s spawn!”
