I was astonished. “What should I be like, then?”
Grundo shrugged. “I can’t explain. More like—like a good sort of tree.”
“A tree!” I exclaimed.
“Something that grew naturally, I mean,” Grundo grunted. “A warm thing.” He moved his feet with such appalling sucking noises that I had to laugh.
“You’re the one who’s rooted to the spot!” I said, and we wandered on, making for a topple of rock in the distance. When we got there, we sat on the side that was in the sun and away from the wind. After a long time I said, “I didn’t mean that about not wanting to remember Sir James’s garden. It’s just I feel so helpless.”
Grundo said, “Me, too. I keep wondering if the old Merlin might have been killed so that the new one could take over in time to go to the garden.”
“That’s an awful thing to think!” I said. But now Grundo had said it, I found I was thinking it, too. “But the Merlin’s supposed to be incorruptible,” I said. “Grandad found him.”
“He could have been deceived,” Grundo said. “Your grandfather Hyde’s only human, even if he is a Magid. Why don’t you try telling this grandfather?”
“Grandfather Gwyn?” I said. “What could he do? Besides, he’s Welsh.”
“Well, he made a fair old fuss to the Chamberlain’s office just to get you here,” Grundo replied. “He knows how to raise a stink. Think about it.”
I did think about it as we wandered on, but not all that much because, after what seemed a very short while, we saw that the sun was going down and looked at our watches and realized it was after five o’clock. We turned back and got lost. The moor was surrounded by green knobs that were the tops of mountains, and they all looked the same. When we finally found the right knob and slid down the side of it to the manse, there was only just time to get cleaned up before tea was ready.
“I love this food!” Grundo grunted.
The table was crowded with four different kinds of bread, two cakes, six kinds of jam in matching dishes, cheese, butter, and cream. Olwen followed us into the dining room with a vast teapot, and as soon as my grandfather had thundered out his grace, she came back with plates of sausage and fried potatoes. Grundo beamed and prepared to be very greedy. I had to stop before the cakes, but Grundo kept right on packing food in for nearly an hour and drinking cup after cup of tea. While he ate, he talked cheerfully, just as if my grandfather was a normal person.
My grandfather watched Grundo eat with a slightly astonished look, but he did not seem to mind being talked to. He even answered Grundo with a few deep words every so often. I was fairly sure Grundo was being this chatty so that I could join in and tell Grandfather Gwyn what we had overheard in Sir James’s Inner Garden. But I couldn’t. I knew he would give me that look with his eyebrows up and not believe a word. I seemed to curl up inside just thinking of speaking.
I was wondering how often my mam had sat silent like this at meals when Grundo helped himself to a third slice of cake, seriously measuring off the exact amount. “I have room for twenty-five degrees more cake,” he explained, “and then I shall go back to soda bread and jam. Does Olwen do your cooking for you because you’re a widower?”
At this my grandfather turned to me. I could tell he was not pleased. It breathed off him like cold from a frozen pond. “Did Annie tell you I was a widower?”
he asked me.
“She said she had never known her mother,” I said.
“I am glad to hear her so truthful,” my grandfather replied. I thought that was all he was going to say, but he seemed to think again and make an extra effort. “There has been,” he said, and paused, and made another effort, “a separation.”
I could feel him hurting, making the effort to say this. I was suddenly furious. “Oh!” I cried out. “I hate all this divorcing and separating! My grandfather Hyde is separated from his wife, and I’ve never even seen her or the aunt who lives with her. And that aunt’s divorced, and so’s the aunt who lives with Grandad, which is awfully hard on my cousin Toby. Half the Court is divorced! The King is separated from the Queen most of the time! Why do people do it?”
Grandfather Gwyn was giving me an attentive look. It was the sort of look you can feel. I felt as if his deep dark eyes were opening me up, prizing apart pieces of my brain. He said thoughtfully, “Often the very nature of people, the matter that brought them together, causes the separation later.”
“Oh, probably,” I said angrily. “But it doesn’t stop them hurting. Ask Grundo. His parents are separated.”
“Divorced,” Grundo growled. “My father left.”
“Now that’s one person I don’t blame!” I said. “Leaving Sybil was probably the most sensible thing he ever did. But he ought to have taken you with him.”
“Well now,” said Grandfather Gwyn. He sounded nearly amused. “The ice of Arianrhod has melted at last, it seems.”
I could feel my face bursting into a red flush, right to the top of my hair and down my neck, because my grandfather had so obviously seen me the same way as Grundo did. So I was a puddle of ice, was I? I was so wrought up by then that I snapped at him, just as if he had been Alicia. “You can talk! If ever I saw a marble iceberg, it’s you!”
Now he looked really amused. His face relaxed, and he very nearly smiled.
“It’s not funny!” I snarled at him. “I can see you made my mother terrified of you by behaving like this! Most of the time you’d make her think she wasn’t worth noticing, and then you’d make fun of her!”
Then I gave a gasp and tried to hold my breath—but I couldn’t because I was panting with rage—knowing that a strict person like my grandfather was bound to jump to his feet and order me thunderously out of the room.
In fact, he just said musingly, “Something of that, but Annie brought her own difficulties to the situation, you know.” The mild way he said it surprised me. I was even more surprised when he said, “Come now, Arianrhod. Tell me what is really upsetting you so.”