Maids of Pen Neidr

“Tell the story Uncle Jack, go on.” My brother handed Jack a mug of tea.  We were spending the summer holiday on Uncle Jack’s farm in the Black Mountains, in Wales.  It was getting dark.  We’d had fish finger sandwiches for tea and run out of 50p coins to put in the telly.  Uncle Jack didn’t have kids himself so he always made a big fuss of us.

“You promise to do the washing-up then?” Uncle Jack winked and we nodded.  He straightened in his spindle-backed chair by the Rayburn.

“I was only a nipper.  But I’ll never forget them.  Two young girls, well, women, I suppose.  They called by the farm.  Dead funny they looked picking their way through the muck in their long skirts and boots with pointy toes.”

“Cowboy boots?” I asked.

“That’s right.  The girls were pretty, mind you.  I was only twelve but old enough to well, you know.” He blushed.  Kim and I giggled.

“It was a boiling hot day.  Dad gave ‘em some water.  Parched, they were.  Said they was going up Old Spirit.  Looking for wild ponies.  There was a piebald foal down by the brook and he was hurt.  He’d run off after the herd and galloped towards the mountain.  They were going up there to find him.  What you wanna do that for? Dad said.  His leg is all bleeding from the barbed wire.  They said.  Tough as old nails those wild ponies.  Even the little ‘uns.  They don’t want you mollycoddling them.  You got a car or what? Howdya get up ‘ere? Dad asked.  The blonde one was bolder.  She flicked her long hair back and said, We parked down by The Three Bells.  The one with short dark hair, bit like a pixie with saucer eyes, like that model, you know, the skinny one.”

“Twiggy?” I asked.

“That’s right, well she smiled at me.  Made a big fuss of Bess as well.  She bent down to stroke her and that’s when I noticed the necklace of daisies she was wearing.”

“Bess must be very old to have lived all that time.” My brother shifted on the sofa next to me, scraping my leg with the crepe sole of his brown Clarks sandals.  I smelled the pink of his Bazooka Joe gum as he chewed.

“Oh, hell no, Kim-boy.  That’s not the same Bess.  That’s her,” Uncle Jack counted on his huge fingers, “that’s her great-granddaughter.” He nodded towards the barn where Bess, the sheepdog, slept.  Anyrode, Dad went on, Don’t go up on Old Spirit.  Foal or no foal.  Not dressed like that.  It’s nice now but the weather can change up ‘ere like that.” Uncle Jack snapped his fingers.

“Blondie said, we won’t, Granddad, winking like he was just an old fuddy-duddy who didn’t know his ass from his elbow.” Kim and I loved it when our Uncle swore.

“Get off out of it then, if you won’t listen.  Daft wenches, he said.  Dad was like that see, had a temper on him.  And off they went, giggling.”

Uncle Jack stroked his black beard.

“Strange enough the weather did go bad.  He was funny like that my dad.  He was a seventh son.  Septimus they called him.  He always knew when the weather was on the turn.  Never had one day’s rain after he cut hay.  Never needed a weather forecast.  He could smell it in the air.

Hope them girls is alright, I said to him, when the storm broke.  They’ll be alright.  Daft buggers.  Shouldn’t we tell someone though, Dad, I asked?  Right vexed he was when he rang Watkins at the Rock.  You seen a couple of girls go by?  Watkins hadn’t seen ‘em.  They had to go by the Rock from our place up to Old Spirit.  They must have changed their minds and gone back to The Bells.  Dad put the phone down and that was that.  It didn’t feel right though.  I was worried about them.  My very first crush and she’d gone off and got herself lost on the mountain.  People got in trouble up there.  And not only in winter.  The weather was so bad by then we couldn’t do much work.  Just got the stock in and went in to have our supper as usual.  Just Dad and me, it was.  Mum was down at Auntie Phyllis’ in Aber.  Inside we had candles because the electric had gone off.  We was sitting at the table, nice as pie, and all of a sudden the whole room lit up.  Sheet lightning.  No thunder at all so you could hear a pin drop.  I’d never seen anything like it.  It was light as day for just a split second then it was me, Dad and the candles in the shadows again.  Spooky it was, supernatural.  It gets like that up here sometimes.  You’re so far away from everything, aren’t you?” Uncle Jack looked away for a minute; lost in his own thoughts.  The grandfather clock ticked.

“Then, there was a knock at the door and we both jumped.  It was Evans from the pub.  Said there was a Mini parked in the car park and it was way past closing by then.  Evans had had a suicide about a year back.  This bloke got pissed at the pub, left his car and went up the mountain.  Oh hell, Dad said, it’s those two girls, ain’t it? They must have gone up the mountain after all.  Daft little buggers.  He carried on cussing while he was putting on his coat and boots to go outside.  Of course he didn’t want me to come but I kept on at him, I did.  Wore him down like, and he said alright then and threw my coat at me.  Evans stayed waiting in the porch.  It looked like it was just us three, the rescue service was up on Y Das, with some walkers in trouble.  Bess was excited about all the palaver.  Dad loosed her and she took off up the lane towards The Rock.  We followed her.  Her white tail waved ahead of us in the pitch-dark.  Showing us the way like.”

Uncle Jack bent down and put a log on the Rayburn.  Then he leaned back in the chair and sighed.

“I wasn’t scared at all because we had torches and Dad and Evans knew the mountain well as anyone.  We went past The Rock.  Candles were lit in the bedroom window but we knew it was no good knocking at Watkins door.  Miserable old sod.  He was so mean he’d even charge you for a glass of water.  Not that we needed any.  It was coming down the mountain in buckets.  Past Watkins place is where the foothills start.  There’s not much of a rise there but the mud underfoot made it real bad going.  Bess went up ahead.  We thought she’d scented something – she had her nose down heading in the opposite direction.  Come by, Bess! Dad shouted.  But she didn’t listen.  She just carried on up towards the Bodnant.  The mountain suddenly turns steep there but Dad followed all the same.  She’d led him up there once and found a sheep in the brook, see.  It don’t make no sense.  The ponies would never come up here in a storm, I said.  I know, boy, but we’re gonna trust Bess, alright? I got a feeling about it.  We walked about half an hour up the hill.  Every so often we’d holler out hallo, or anybody there? Dad called Bess back ‘cos she was going too fast for us.  Evans was lagging behind by then.  He was carrying an extra pound or two.  Well, working in a pub’s not the healthiest of professions, is it? Me and Dad were fine.  The farm kept us fit, see.  Evans was starting to lose faith.  This is bloody hopeless, Sep.  We’ll never find ‘em in this.  He wiped his face clean of the rain.  There’s nothing to go on.  ‘Course we’ll find ‘em.  Don’t be defeatist.  They’ll be up here somewhere.  Gotta be.  Dad called back to Evans.  Just that minute I stubbed my toe against a rock and looked down to see a broken daisy chain lying next to the path.  Bedraggled by the rain, of course, but the flowers shone white in my torchlight, not wilted at all.  She made that! I shouted.  Looks like old Bess was right after all, Dad said, Come on, they can’t be far.  The old man had a good heart really.  He was gruff but I knew he really cared about them girls.  Evans looked rough by this time.  Dad was worried about him ‘cos he told him to sit on a rock for a bit, get his breath back.  We waited a while for Evans to recover.  Bess went on, following the narrow sheep track that winded up the side of the mountain.  The rain had eased off by then and it looked like the clouds were clearing a bit.  We saw some stars anyway.  Come on, Ev, Dad said and gave him a slap on the back.  Evans pulled out a whisky flask, took a quick nip and stood up.  We got to find them girls, he said, more to himself than anyone else.  We were almost at the top by then.  The last hundred yards or so we had to scramble up on our hands and knees practically the whole way.  I looked across at Bess but she scarpered up there like a mountain goat.  Dad was helping Evans, pushing him up every now and again, staying behind him in case he lost his footing.  Dad didn’t pay much attention to me.  He knew I had the mountain in my blood.  It wouldn’t kill one of its own.  Evans was winded by the time he reached the top.  Fighting for every breath.”

Uncle Jack got out of his chair to impersonate Evans.

“That effing pant, dog had better pant not brought us pant on some effing pant wild goose chase.”

We laughed at his impression.  Then he sat back down.

“The wind was real hard against us as we stood upright and started to cross the top of the mountain.  Just as we got there the clouds cleared and a half-moon appeared in the sky.  Up ahead there was an upright stone.  Funny shape, bit like a reptile’s head or a snake getting ready to strike.  It looked alive in the moonlight.  As if it might start moving.  Must have been from the old pagan religions.  Pen Neidr we called it.”

“What’s pag..?” I pinched my brother to be quiet.

“Bess ran towards it.  Then she sat down next to it and started whining, eerie-like.  Never heard her make a noise like that before or since.  What’s that Dad? I asked, as we neared the stone.  I could see something white sticking out behind it.  Then I saw what it was.  A leg.  I recognised the boots as well.  They was splattered with mud.  It’s them, I said and ran towards the stone.

Dad pulled me back.  Wait, son.  His face told me everything.  Then he nodded and I went and stood next to him.  At first I thought they were just asleep.  Then I reached out to touch and cold as glass they were.  They had their arms around each other, huddled up against the stone.  Their skin was creamy and see-through, bit like a waxwork.  They looked much younger, spooned together like that, their rain-soaked faces washed clean of make-up.  Dad and Evans carried them back down.  Hypothermia, it was.  Turned out they were part of some commune down in Hay.  Their lot came up a couple of weeks later.  Moving-on ritual.  They went past ours chanting and singing, carrying flowers and beating drums.  Rum old do.

We never worked out what happened that night.  Vexed my dad, it did.  The wild ponies never did go up to Pen Neidr.  Devil must have driven them girls up there, people said.  Superstitious lot, mountain folk.  If they’d found some shelter round the back of the mountain they might have stood a chance, see.  But it’s all exposed at the top, they was as good as meat.  Their spirits couldn’t rest though.  People wouldn’t let ‘em alone.  Brought a lot more visitors to the mountain which was good for some.  They all wanted to see where it happened.  The commune and their friends must have spread the word.  Mum wanted to open a little tea shop but dad was having none of it.  Good little earner it would have been.  Evans did alright out of it though.  His pub was on its last legs till those girls died.  He hung up two photos of them from the newspaper over the bar.  People would leave flowers and that.  A little shrine like, for the lazy ones that couldn’t be assed going up the mountain.  Dad thought it was morbid and stopped drinking in there.  On his deathbed do you know the last thing he said?”

Kim and I shook our heads.  Of course we did know because we had heard the story many times.

“I shoulda gone up after ‘em, boy, straightaway, I shoulda gone up after ‘em.”

Uncle Jack nodded towards the Welsh dresser.  Kim went over, squatted down, opened the cupboard and pulled out a dark red album.  He leafed through it to find the page and handed it to Uncle Jack, his head bowed as if carrying some ancient holy scripture.  The faint scent of a hayfield escaped from the pages.  The daisy petals had faded to sepia, their colour leached onto the thick paper. Only their yellow hearts echoed that summer full of promise when they were picked and woven by the lost girls.