Peaks and Troughs

by Nick Perry

  In the Aga Ros roasted a goose, one of our own that Dewi had finally run over. After all the near misses, the front tyre of the post office van had flattened its neck. No one mourned its passing, in fact the opposite: one down, three to go. We reminisced, drinking Ros’s last bottle of pea-pod wine, remembering the most ridiculous incidents, the stupidity of imagining pigs would behave the way we wanted them to.

  Rob said he would never forget the time we held fifty-odd weaners in the barn while we put an electric fence across a patch of fallow land. The plan was to get them to plough up and manure it for us. Pigs are good at this, cheap and effective. What we hadn’t allowed for was what would happen when we let them out. The boisterous mob of young hooligans, pent up and frustrated, ran amok like lunatics escaping the asylum, taking the electric fence with them. Rob chased one through the larch trees, unaware that the slate that covered the cesspit had been partially removed. What happened next is beyond description.

  Jack recounted the time we put six pig arks in a field for the sows after they’d been served. ‘It was a simple mathematical equation: total number of pigs to be held in the area, thirty, six pig arks, five pigs per ark.’

  ‘Correct,’ we all said.

  However, the pigs didn’t follow Jack’s logic. They didn’t wish to sleep five to an ark. In fact, fifteen of them fancied sleeping in just the one. Result, the complete destruction of a wooden ark, split asunder in an incredible surge of exploding pig flesh, rolling over each other like a collapsing scrum. Then, finding themselves in a green field, they were off, galloping in the way only pigs can, slow and ungainly in a short-lived stampede. Luckily they soon ran out of puff. I remember Jack giving me that stony look when I told him, ‘I don’t think six into thirty goes, not in a pig’s world.’

  So we ate and drank and got stoned. It wasn’t often we were all together reliving our lives. What a strange fate had brought us all together, to live out a stretch of time that was now coming to an end.

  ‘So, how would you sum it all up, Rob?’ I asked.

  ‘Five went farming in the hills, because that’s what we’ve been doing,’ he said.

  ‘Sounds like an Enid Blyton book,’ said Jack.

  ‘Don’t mention Enid Blyton to me,’ I said. ‘Remember the WH Smith incident.’

  ‘To be fair to you, Rob man,’ said Harry, ‘when I first saw you that day it was nearly five minus one. You with that holy-man look.’

  ‘Couldn’t cope with that, could you, Harry?’

  ‘I’d heard of those Jesus freaks, never thought I’d come across one up here.’

  In the morning, still feeling the effects of the night before, we drove Rob to Bangor station and waved him goodbye on the train to Chorley. It was a sad day for all of us.

  With the weather having settled back into its seasonal pattern, late-September sales picked up again on the meat round. Harry now called me boss, tipping his cap when we met each morning. If I ever acted too much like an employer he would stand to attention saluting me, ‘Yes sir,’ then march off, goose-stepping, his arm at right angles, muttering ‘Heil Hitler’. But nothing had really changed with the new arrangement. As we worked, he talked about becoming a father and husband, paying off the mortgage, which was now through from the Woolwich.

  ‘Duw, man, I’ve never had to think about anybody else before, just myself.’

  I nearly said, but thought better of it, that he was losing his freedom. He was waking up to his responsibilities. I wondered what sort of man he would become, and hoped he wouldn’t lose his sense of humour. For that’s how Harry and I worked together, laughing a lot even when life was hard.

  Tom and Agnetta had bought a farm down on the flat lands of Pontllyfni, one hundred and fifty acres of rich arable soil and a six-bedroomed farmhouse, with barns and three cottages. They never mentioned the price; it was a private sale. It must have been well over a hundred grand. They still called in every week, always bringing news of the latest progress on forming the community. Ros, still keen, continued to show her commitment to the venture. Tom invited us down to walk around the farm with them.

  Jack was tight-lipped about Corinna. Whenever I asked him how things were going, ‘It’s OK’ was all I got from him. He’d spoken to our mother who had told him she was putting Hendy on the market. All news to me, but she rang that night to tell me she was staying in Westbourne with my sister, that there was no going back on her decision.

  Harry asked for the day off, saying he was marrying Bronwyn in the register office in Caernarfon. He hadn’t told anyone else. They had invited nobody, wanting to keep costs down. Not that his father would have struggled from the house, but he should have asked his mother. They were going to drag two witnesses off the street was how he put it.

  When I saw him the next day and asked him how it had gone he said, ‘Duw, man, it was great because it was so simple.’

  ‘How did you celebrate the evening?’

  ‘I took her to the cinema to see A Hundred and One Dalmatians. I sneaked in a couple of beers and we sat in the back row.’

  ‘Wow! That’s what I call going to town.’

  ‘Then we got fish and chips in Penygroes.’

  ‘Don’t tell me your mother served you?’

  ‘Yes, and she asked me why I was wearing a pink carnation. I said, “’Cause we just got married.”’

  ‘And what did she say?’

  ‘She didn’t. She said, “That’s sixty pence.”’

  Harry did manage to redeem himself. He took his mother to the Vic, plied her with gin and tonics and told her that if the baby was a girl it would be named after her. Then Bronwyn went back to her parents, and Harry helped his mother home.

  Recently I’d been having a recurring dream. I was walking through a dense wood, stepping over fallen trees, my clothes ripped, the path heavy with mud. I was not wearing the right footwear. Then at last, after stumbling along for hours, I came upon a clearing bathed in moonlight. Ahead of me was a bridge over a river, but every time I came to it I turned back, something stopping me from crossing over. I had dreamt this so many times, it was simple enough to interpret. The wood symbolised Dyffryn, the journey the relentless slog to reach a state free of financial anxiety, which was the clearing in the moonlight. Over the bridge was where Tom and Agnetta were waiting. And I couldn’t walk across. I wrestled with it, because Ros was still so keen, but in truth it wasn’t me. I knew it was all coming to a head.

  Just after we had finished supper, while Ros was upstairs with the children, Jack turned up. I knew as soon as I saw his face he had something to tell me.

  ‘Why don’t you roll one up?’ he said. Meg leapt on to the sofa to play with Moss.

  ‘Not bad news, is it? Tell me.’

  And he did, speaking seriously, as if a big decision had been reached. He was moving in with Corinna, going to rent a cottage somewhere nearby, probably in Penygroes. It was a big step for Jack, for he was used to his own company, and most of the conversation he’d had was with Meg. I thought it would be a good idea if they moved into Hendy until it was sold. It made sense, rather than leave it empty. It was only fifteen minutes from Glynllifon, so convenient for Corinna, and it would be easier for our mother to sell the place with someone living there.

  Ros came in. ‘Will you go and say goodnight to them?’

  ‘Jack’s got some news for you.’

  Getting the children off to sleep wasn’t the same any more. Sam and Lysta read their own books now and didn’t need their father to create fairy stories. Seth gurgled quite happily in his dream world, gazing at the mobiles that twirled above his cot. Sam and Lysta had become rational in the twinkling of an eye, seeking logical explanations to life’s mysteries. Such is the evolution of man’s consciousness; we all thought like children once. Sam wasn’t keen on being kissed by his father any more, offering me only his cheek, engrossed in his book. It’s a masculine thing: probably somebody at school had said ‘What! You still kiss your father!’ But Lysta was affe
ctionate, loving big hugs and kisses from her dad.

  When Gitto knocked on the door asking for forty quid, which I counted out in ten pound notes, he said, ‘I don’t know how much longer I can hold this price. Petrol’s gone up five pence a gallon. The cost of tyres, as well; all the basic things on the increase. There’s no money in being a haulier. The take-home pay in those new factories makes me think I’m working for a pittance.’

  ‘Lucky you’re not married with kids.’

  ‘You’re right. Look at the mess Harry’s got himself into. Can’t even come out and play darts on a Friday night any more.’

  To give Ros a break and Seth a change of scenery, Harry and I had him for the afternoon, taking him with us as we moved from job to job. Sitting happily in his buggy, watching us moving pigs from building to building, he played with whatever we gave him: a pigeon feather, a pine cone, stones from the stream. All held his attention as he examined them closely, with a look of heavy concentration. He got extremely excited when Moss appeared chasing a sow, snapping at its trotters, and expressed himself in a gobbledygook language, waving his arms frantically. We paid a visit to Dave, who stuck his head out through the bars, his tongue hanging from the side of his mouth. Moss was flat on her stomach, taking in every move Dave made. So much did Seth enjoy his afternoon, I told Ros we should do it more often. ‘He’s quite safe, as long as the brakes on his buggy work, and a pig doesn’t charge into him.’

  I hadn’t noticed Jobber walking along the boundary wall, now sound on four legs, leaping down and running across the field towards me. Moments later Hughie came into view, closing the gate, moving slowly. He held his arm at a strange angle, as if he was carrying an invisible basket. He seemed to be leaning slightly to the right. It was some minutes after Jobber arrived that he eventually joined me. His hand and wrist were bandaged, his fingers a deep purple and supported by a plastic splint that fitted over the dressing. You could see in his face he was suffering the pain of what looked like a nasty injury.

  ‘Duw, boy,’ he said, removing his cap and running his forearm across his brow. ‘I thought when I broke my leg lying under a drum of molasses was the worst I would ever feel, but this leaves that well behind.’

  ‘What happened, Hughie?’

  ‘Duw, boy, in all my years a freak accident, if there ever is such a thing. I hope you’ve got the stomach for it.’

  ‘Tell me,’ I said, motioning to him to sit down on the old wooden bench in front of the house.

  ‘Jobber, leave that bloody bitch alone,’ he shouted. ‘Well, I was fixing up to the PTO [power takeoff]. I had a length of cable in my left hand, which I know I shouldn’t have been holding, but I’ve done it for years, when I slipped and the thing got tangled up and tightened itself around my wrist, crushing my fingers. I screamed, boy, in agony. I thought I was going to watch my hand being torn from its wrist in front of my very eyes. I yelled until she came running, running she was in that bloody tight skirt of hers, my Myfanwy. It was she who turned it off and came with me in the ambulance to the hospital.’

  ‘God, Hughie, you were lucky not to lose your hand.’

  ‘Duw, you’re right there, and now six months as an invalid ahead of me. I’m finished, you know that.’

  ‘But surely Bryn can help when he comes home from the factory?’

  ‘Him,’ he said, raising his eyes to the heavens. ‘He won’t lift a finger. He would rather I sell the farm, be like the rest of them. Take a fancy bungalow on one of those estates.’

  ‘Can you not buy in some help?’

  ‘No, no,’ he said, with a heavy sigh of resignation, bowing his head, staring at the ground. ‘Do you know how old I am?’

  ‘Sixty-odd?’

  ‘Sixty-five, man. Not many years now before the grave opens up.’ Then he started to laugh. ‘You know, when she runs, it always reminds me of a fat goose running from the oven.’

  ‘Who does?’

  ‘No matter, boy, not your concern. Help me tomorrow, will you? I’ve two tons of hay to unload. There’s no one else to turn to.’

  ‘I’ll help, but Bryn needs to lend a hand.’

  When I got back after walking the farm that night and I’d finished milking Frieda, Ros was in the kitchen making supper. She didn’t look up from the vegetables she was chopping.

  ‘You’d better go up and say goodnight to the children.’

  Upstairs Lysta told me, ‘Mum isn’t in a good mood tonight.’

  There is nothing that festers like a cold silence. So during supper I said to Ros, ‘Can we get on with it, what you need to say, even if it leads to an argument? Let’s have it out and get on with our lives.’

  After she finished her mouthful she took a sip of water and said, staring straight into my face, ‘You are an inconsiderate selfish bastard.’

  I wasn’t ready for that, and had no immediate response. When somebody says something like that, you automatically wonder if it’s true.

  ‘Can I ask why?’

  ‘Your whole attitude to Tom and Agnetta’s plans. Not once have you supported the idea. You think only of yourself.’ Moss hid behind the sofa whining, as she always did whenever she heard raised voices. We argued as quietly as possible, using venomous language but under our breath.

  In the aftermath of emotional warfare, when the smoke clears, someone has to raise a white flag. It was me taking those delicate steps, needing to know how much damage I had done. That’s when the repair work begins, admitting you might well have been in the wrong, hoping to find some middle ground. Ros heard me out, but told me she could not let the opportunity pass her by. Even without my involvement she meant to press ahead. Though our marriage wasn’t over, we were going to go our separate ways. She would give up growing vegetables at Dyffryn; would no longer be a part of the farm. After the children had gone to school she would spend the day down with Tom and Agnetta, devoting herself to the community. She would have what she wanted and so would I. That was the decision we reached. It was two a.m. when I whispered to Moss, ‘It’s all right. You can come out now.’

  I turned on the record player. How appropriate. Bob Marley’s ‘No Woman No Cry’.

  14

  Whiteout

  We stood outside the Quarryman’s Arms; once again Harry had thrashed Jack and me at darts. Every defeat was not just a whitewash, but a humiliation. I told him there was no point to it, not any more. It was my final game. I have no hand-eye co-ordination. I am short of certain faculties that Harry takes for granted. I also have no natural rhythm, I can’t dance, and I can’t read maps. I could never finish on a bull’s eye, even if my life depended on it.

  It was a late-November night. Bronwyn was shivering, holding their new baby, Irving, under her coat. The first flakes of snow fell silently, as if someone had torn up a velvet curtain and was scattering it across the face of the earth, the pavements in the high street whitening as we made plans for tomorrow. Jack was coming early to move the ewes to Henbant, where we rented the land on a six-month agreement from Arfon’s cousin who now owned the place. He was no farmer, but worked in the power station over on Anglesey and would eventually sell the farm at public auction. We paid cash, which we sent to him in a registered envelope. As far as I knew the house had been condemned as unfit for human habitation. Since Arfon’s death I had driven into the yard to have another look. Mother Nature was claiming the house back slowly, strangling it under an advancing army of branches from the trees that leant over it, stretching through the windows, out of the chimney. It looked like some macabre work of art, or a set in a horror film. Hard to believe that three years ago a farmer and his wife had lived there.

  Harry would get to us at seven. With the run up to Christmas, prices were at their highest. We had another forty porkers ready to go to FMC. Gitto had promised he would arrive punctually at eight. No one held out any hope of that happening.

  Jack and Corinna were renting Hendy from my mother, so I was going to drop him in Penygroes, get some fish and chips and make
my way back to Dyffryn. That was the plan, but as the snow fell more heavily, with a northerly wind getting up, Jack and I had the same thought. If it was blowing this hard down here, it would be much stronger up in the hills.

  ‘I’m coming to Dyffryn,’ he said. We had thirty-odd ewes in the top fields.

  So after getting his coat and waterproofs from Hendy, eating fish and chips out of a newspaper we drove into a blizzard, what they call a whiteout. We were already in three or four inches of snow as we opened the gate into Dyffryn.

  Ros had left the kitchen light on. I changed and found a torch, one I’d bought recently that was as powerful as a car headlight, and the two of us, with Moss and Meg, went out to search for the ewes.

  They could be anywhere: all the gates were open as they had the run of the place at this time of year. But Jack narrowed down the possibilities, knowing how sheep protect themselves in extreme weather. Keeping out of the prevailing wind, they gathered beneath the stone walls. But now the wind was directionless, swirling chaotically, and seemed to surround us. Finding a flock of white-coated sheep in a blizzard is a daunting task. You act on instinct, trying to think as they would to find a safe corner that offered shelter.

  Jack shouted to me, ‘You look lower down. Just walk the walls; they’ll be together somewhere.’ After half an hour we still hadn’t found them. What made everything worse were the huge drifts banking up over the walls. There was no visibility; we couldn’t see our hands in front of our faces. Nothing was going to survive out here tonight. I grabbed Jack and we crouched down behind a wall to get out of the wind.