The Gift by Peter Dickinson Page A

asked Mr. Lydyard, but he said it wasn’t in the syllabus.”
    â€œAch, it’s too little history I remember. Glyn Dwr was the last Prince of all Wales, wasn’t he? He beat the English many times, but they won in the end. He didn’t die, though. Vanished he did. And he is in one of Shakespeare’s plays— Henry the Fourth , isn’t it?”
    â€œI expect so,” said Davy, not yet used to Dadda’s habit of putting any statement he was quite sure of into the form of a question. He uncoupled the milk bucket, slapped Bella’s tough flank, and carried the bucket up to the milkshed. It wasn’t raining so he used the outside route, but when he got there, he found that Dadda had unlocked the top half of the connecting door and was leaning on the bottom half.
    â€œGlyn Dwr met a monk in the hills once,” he murmured. “The monk looked him in the eye and said, ‘Prince, you are born a hundred years before your hour.’ Then he walked on, saying no more.”
    That didn’t seem much help to anybody, Davy thought as he tilted Bella’s milk into the churn.
    â€œThe hills are full of stories,” said Dadda. “My Nain used to tell me them, about Arthur and Gawain and …”
    â€œBut they’re all earlier. A thousand years earlier, Dadda. Henry the Fourth is fourteen hundred and something.”
    Dadda stroked his neck and thought about it.
    â€œThe stories will be truer then, won’t they, bach?” he said. “You must ask Ian.”
    â€œIs he coming? I didn’t know.”
    â€œHe is a good boy,” said Dadda. “He rides up here most Saturdays to fill himself with Gwenny’s cooking, and sing in Chapel, and talk to his mad friends in Llangollen. Indeed he is late today.”
    â€œOh, good. I haven’t seen him for ages. Penny’ll be glad, too.”
    As he spoke, Rud dashed into the lane. His yelping drowned the deep burr of the bike as it took the steep inclines, and continued until Ian was actually standing there, straddled across the saddle, at the yard gate. The moment the engine cut Rud seemed to recognize who it was. Ian drew his left hand from his gauntlet and held it down for Rud to sniff; with his other hand he pushed his goggles back to show a savagely tired face.
    â€œHi, Davy,” he said, grinning. “Good to see you, Penny here?”
    He wheeled his bike into the yard and parked it under cover beside the old blue tractor just inside the gate.
    That grin turned out to have been an effort at goodwill. In fact, Ian was snarly with exhaustion, having broken down on the journey, and had to push his bike seven miles through Welsh hills till he’d come to a garage where he could repair his throttle link. He barely spoke to Penny and Davy while he ate a huge tea, and when that was over, he immediately put on his leathers again.
    â€œWhere are you off to, for heaven’s sake?” said Penny.
    â€œLlangollen, ducky. See you tomorrow.”
    â€œDo you know anything about Owain Glyn Dwr?” said Davy, knowing it was a rotten moment.
    â€œLook, I’m late, kid. And I’m not interested in historical nonsense. Look him up in the library.”
    â€œI’ve tried that. I can’t find anything useful in the one at Spenser Mills.”
    â€œTypical English chauvinism. Anyway, I don’t. Sorry. See you at breakfast.”
    â€œOkay. I hope the bike behaves.”
    â€œIt better had.”
    Penny and Davy waited despondently in the hallway until they heard the chuckle of the engine going easily down the hill.
    â€œHas he got a girl in Llangollen?” said Penny as they went back into the kitchen.
    â€œIan has a girl in Cardiff,” said Granny. “Black she is, but comely, like it says in the Bible. From Nigeria, too. He has showed me her photograph.”
    â€œWhat’s the hurry to get to Llangollen, then?” complained Penny.
    â€œHe is to