Excitement began to bubble deep in her throat and the evening was viewed with less and less apprehension as guest after guest arrived. Violet came with a stern-faced Edwin, a far larger Violet than she remembered, and she spared a thought for Barrass, wondering how he felt at seeing her married to another man while carrying his child.
The tables were barely sufficient to hold the twenty guests, each chair scraping against the one adjoining and knee pressed intimately against knee, a situation that some enjoyed thoroughly and unselfconsciously. It was difficult for Olwen to reach between the closely packed diners to pass food through.
Long before the meal was ended she was exhausted. Her legs felt encased in lead as she ran up and down the stairs bringing fresh courses and removing the remnants of others. She saw Barrass several times as he served the men in the bar-room, and once he defied Emma’s orders and carried a laden tray up the stairs for her.
‘You’ll drop the lot if I don’t. A titmouse given the load of an eagle, that’s what you are.’
He paused to peer through the edge of the door for a glimpse of Violet, and in her suddenly acquired maturity, Olwen allowed herself a moment’s sympathy for his lost love. Then she pushed him out of the way.
‘Want to get us both in trouble, do you?’ she hissed, then calmly went into the noisy overfilled room with the heavy tray.
There were several people she did not know, and guessed they were school friends of Pansy and Daisy. She looked at them curiously, and thought that apart from the strangely artificial voices, they were much the same as herself.
‘For you’d think from the way that Emma’s been carrying on these past days they were so special they wouldn’t look like the rest of us at all!’ she grumbled to Arthur as he pushed past to bring more wine.
‘It’s Emma who’s different from the rest!’ he whispered. ‘Cracked and heading for the Dark House, if you ask me,’ he said, referring to the place where those whose minds had become disordered were kept.
When the meal was finally over, the moment Emma had been dreaming of arrived. The ladies moved into the new and splendidly furnished drawing room. Emma’s face was redder than ever and her fat, beringed hands waved in apparent dismissal of the compliments she received. With a sigh of relief, Olwen carried down the last of the food, leaving the men to sit at their port and illegally imported cigars. She had already noted that Daniels had not been included in the gathering.
When the door closed behind her she sank onto a stool, hoping that she might go home without being expected to assist with the piles of dishes and pots. She had felt invisible during the hubbub of preparations, now she wished she were.
To her surprise, the men did not settle to enjoy their port as she had been led to expect. William, Kenneth and Pitcher crept downstairs to where several of the evening’s previous customers sat waiting for them. With Barrass and Arthur, who had been dismissed with a wave of William’s hand, Olwen watched them gather near the roaring fire and discuss something in low tones. The three watchers guessed they were planning the next landing of the boats.
Their business did not take long, and they went back up the stairs, trying to avoid the creaking of the wood and the squeaking of their leather boots. Their descent and ascent were hidden by the sound of music coming from the new parlour, where Dan and others were entertaining the ladies. As clapping announced the end of an item, the footsteps doubled their speed and they were back in the dining room before it had subsided.
In both rooms there were chamber pots hidden by a screen, so it was with surprise that Olwen saw Kenneth slip back down the stairs and out into the yard. She thought the pots must be over full, but did not mention it for fear that she would be given the unpleasant job of emptying them.
Exchanging glances of curiosity with Barrass and Arthur, she was even more surprised when the two young men followed him. She thought it politic to stay where she was, then curiosity overwhelmed the possible embarrassment of catching them urinating against a wall, and she set off after them. Anything was better than starting to sort out those endless dishes.
She had to run fast. Kenneth was already halfway up the steep wall of the quarry and Barrass and Arthur, carrying his dog to keep him quiet, were ready to climb the moment he disappeared at the top. She made an inspired guess at where Kenneth was going, skirted the quarry, ran up the road and crossed the fields to where the Keeper of the Peace lived.
She forced herself to run even after her legs began to tire and threaten to collapse under her, and she was in time to see the letter-carrier disappear inside Daniels’ house. As Barrass and Arthur arrived, she showed herself.
‘Go you,’ Barrass said, ‘back to the alehouse before you’re missed. Serve in the bar if needed, and tell anyone who asks we’ve gone for more ale.’
‘What will you do?’ she panted.
‘Arthur will go and tell William, I will go and warn Markus. Late as it is, he will want to know.’
‘I’ll come with you so he’ll believe you,’ Olwen insisted, and Barrass, seeing the sense of it, agreed.
‘Best you keep with me, mind, or I’ll leave you to find your own way.’
‘I’ve been watching Kenneth,’ he explained as they ran along. ‘I didn’t believe that Daniels would have risked implicating Florrie by asking her to spy for him. He cares for her, you can see that for sure.’
‘You don’t care for me, then! You don’t mind me coming on this errand with you!’ Olwen said.
There was silence between them for a while, apart from puffing breath. Olwen was glad of the darkness, afraid to see his face and the irritation it might show. Then to her relief he laughed.
‘When could I ever stop you doing what you have a mind to do, Olwen-the-Fish?’
* * *
‘So, Barrass, you are with us after all,’ Markus said when they had made their explanations.
‘I was never against you,’ Barrass replied, ‘I just refused to be a part of even this dishonesty.’ Wryly he added, ‘I thought that if I wanted to be a carrier of the King’s Mail, I needed to be above suspicion.’
‘You can work for me if you’ve a mind.’
‘Thank you, but no. I have my mind set on what I want to do and achieve,’ Barrass said firmly, ‘but if you would kindly make sure I don’t have my head pushed into any more rabbit holes it would be a kindness.’
Markus’s rare laughter followed them as they walked back home.
Walking with Barrass holding her hand to guide her, Olwen felt a resurgence of depression. He thought her still a child with no part in his future. He had dreams of being a fine wealthy man with a houseful of servants to wait upon him. He would marry someone like Violet who would fit into such dreams, while she would remain a little girl even when she was old and bent up and as bald as he had been for his first fifteen years!
He is a fool with as much common sense as a fly that buzzes until someone swats it, she thought irritably. She quickened her pace, pushing against him in the darkness, showing her impatience to be home.
He talked about the implications of the night’s events, and she only nodded invisibly in the darkness or replied with a grunt that could mean either yes or no, whatever he preferred. She wanted to hit him, hurt him so he at least noticed her.
As they approached the cottage, he pulled her to face him.
‘What is the matter with you, Olwen-the-Fish?’ he demanded.
Suddenly the scales tilted, the depression and anger slid away like water along the side of a speeding boat, and she was a child again. She pulled furiously on his long hair, then ran giggling at his shout of rage, as he chased her. Choking with the effort of trying to be quiet, she burst through the door, and stood behind it while he whispered insults through the crack. With a whispered ‘Goodnight’ she climbed the ladder to her bed.
Chapter Nineteen
Kenneth disappeared from the village and no one, not even his wife, knew where he had gone. For several days, Ceinwen wandered the streets and ho
uses wailing her misfortune at losing her husband and provider, leaving Enyd to deal with the post as best she could. Enyd at once sent for Barrass and asked if he would take over the collections and deliveries until she could decide on the best way of coping. Barrass accepted with unbounded excitement.
‘Olwen,’ he called as he ran up to the white cottage, ‘I am to be the temporary letter carrier!’
‘So? It will be just another excuse for you to chase girls. What is so wonderful about that? It’s not the position of letter-carrier you want, Barrass. It’s the position that gives girls your babies to carry!’
‘Olwen. Aren’t you pleased for me? It’s a step towards my dream,’ he said as he held her arm and walked with her towards the cliffs.
Olwen’s lovely face softened then, her blue eyes crinkling with generous delight. ‘Of course I’m pleased,’ she smiled. ‘Glad for you I am. But don’t spoil your chances by making it more a round for loving than for delivering the King’s Mail.’
‘You talk like an old woman, little Olwen.’ He showed strong white teeth in a laugh, his attractiveness hitting her like a sudden wild gust of wind.
‘Young I might be, but I am an old wise-woman compared to you when it comes to common sense!’ she snapped.
She stepped apart from him, pressing her shawl against her as the edges fluttered in the breeze. His hands, helping to fasten it around her slim body, disturbed her greatly and she turned away, afraid that her growing love for him would show. They stood together looking down over the still water in the fresh early morning.
‘Come with me tomorrow morning to collect the letters from Swansea,’ he suggested impulsively. ‘Ceinwen will have to pay for the hire of a horse or I’ll never finish. You can sit behind me and we can talk, and you can meet all the people at the inn I’ve told you about.’
Olwen was tempted, but she shook her head. How she would love to go with him, to enter this new life of his and meet his friends as if she were his partner. She ached for him, but afraid of spoiling their very precious friendship, she pretended to be the child that she looked, and said in a horrified voice,
‘No, I can’t! Florrie would kill me for sure if I was late for work. There’s a lot of cooking they do in that old Ddole House! You’d think there was an army to feed instead of only William Ddole and his friends.’
‘Do you hear news of Penelope?’ Barrass dared to ask. He was relieved when Olwen did not lose her temper at the reminder that he had been responsible for her going away.
‘No word reaches the kitchen of how she is coping with being so far from home, but I know there was a letter from her for her father, Kenneth told me that.’ She moved a little away from him, the memories of the coach house rendezvous painful for her. ‘I miss her, you know. She was kind and didn’t treat me like I was little better than the pigs and cattle, like some of the others do.’
‘I cared for her too,’ Barrass said. ‘Everyone I care for goes away,’ he added softly. Then he smiled. ‘Except you, Olwen.’
* * *
For a long time after he had left Olwen, Barrass’s thoughts were on her. She was so much a part of his life and he could not imagine ever living where she was not. He set off back to the alehouse and his day’s work with Pitcher, the wind blowing gently through his long, black hair and ruffling his shirt into ripples of bubbling warm air. Tomorrow he would go in the early morning to collect the letters, and for a while at least he could pretend he was stepping out following the footsteps of his unknown father. But even this gratifying turn of his fortunes was somehow subdued and without the intoxicating thrill he had so often imagined. Inexplicably, the fact that Olwen was not free to enjoy it with him had spoilt the excitement almost completely.
* * *
Emma Palmer was in a happy frame of mind. She had found a small jar of wild pansies in her daughter’s bedroom and guessed that Pansy had a secret admirer. She at once began to imagine the romance that surrounded the gift of flowers. Her plump face was rapt as she sighed and touched the small petals, each flowerhead so perfect, just like the girl she had named after them.
For several hours of each afternoon, when she had no visiting or shopping to attend to, Emma read romances. She was convinced that on one occasion they had saved her sanity, giving a false explanation for her daughter Violet’s inexplicable behaviour with Barrass. But today she could not settle to read, she was far too excited and needed to talk to someone. She stood up and rang the small hand-bell for the servant and asked for her outdoor clothes. There was, of course, only Ceinwen-the-Post, but she was better than no one and at least she listened without too many interruptions!
Ceinwen was sitting beside her fire, having walked around to every house she could think of where Kenneth could be hiding. She had even asked Betson-the-Flowers, going to the woman’s door with trepidation and asking if she had seen Kenneth. The woman had laughed and retorted that she saw everyone. A few more questions from Ceinwen elicited no further information and she walked down the green lane from the tumbledown house red with embarrassment and unreasonably angry with Kenneth for putting her in the position of having to go to that notorious place.
‘Not that I expected her to have seen him, mind,’ Ceinwen told Emma when they were settled near the fire with a cup of tea to hand. ‘Never one for the ladies, was Kenneth. Too fond of his home.’
‘For sure,’ Emma soothed, eyes glazed with determination not to tell. She sipped her tea and began to think it had been a mistake to come. She had expected that as usual Ceinwen would want to hear all her far more interesting news, but here she was, after almost half an hour, still listening to Ceinwen’s tale of woe. She shuffled purposefully in her chair, making preparations to rise. Ceinwen took the hint and said at once,
‘But here’s me going on and I’m much more interested to hear what has been happening to you, Emma. The girls, are they well?’
Emma launched into her news.
‘My dear, I do believe my Pansy has an admirer. I found a small posy half hidden behind a curtain in her bedroom and I am certain if they had been from someone – well ordinary, she would have shown them to me. Don’t you think it romantic that she keeps the gift a secret even from her own, loving mother?’
‘Very romantic,’ Ceinwen said obediently. ‘Have you a clue to who gave them to her?’
‘One or two, my dear Ceinwen, one or two.’ Emma shook her head mysteriously and placed a fat finger over her reddened lips. ‘But for the moment I will say nothing.’
‘I hope that the romance will go well, and that Pansy will have a better beginning to her marriage than Violet,’ Ceinwen could not resist remarking. She looked at Emma to see if there was any dismay, but Emma smiled at her and said,
‘That too was so romantic, wasn’t it? Just like in the book I read last week. The innocent and utterly beautiful girl falls for an undeserving man, and at the very last moment, she realizes that the other, wealthy and much more admirable gentleman is the one she truly loves. His love for her transcends all their problems and they live happily afterwards.’ She sighed her satisfaction at this slightly distorted summary of events, and held out her cup for more tea.
When she had discussed with Ceinwen all she had to say, Emma apologized for the briefness of her visit, explained how busy she was, and asked for her cloak. As she was being helped into it by her hostess, she heard raised voices and at once stopped her preparations to leave, curious to know the cause. The door leading to the room used as the sorting office burst open and Kenneth stumbled in, followed by Enyd, who hastily pushed the door shut and leaned against it in her determination to keep others out. ‘What’s ado?’ Emma demanded, moving into a safe corner.
‘It’s Dadda,’ Enyd said, panting with the effort of holding the door. ‘Help me, will you, or they’ll kill him before our eyes!’
Ceinwen and a reluctant Emma both leaned against the door and a frightened Kenneth joined them. After what seemed an age, those on the other side of the door stopped pushing a
nd Enyd cautiously opened it to see that the room was empty.
‘They’ve gone,’ she sighed. ‘But you can’t stay here,’ she added to her father. ‘Kill you for sure they will.’
‘I didn’t do it, I didn’t do it,’ wailed a white-faced Kenneth.
‘Oh, I’m so glad to hear you say that,’ Ceinwen sighed, but her relief was short-lived.
‘I didn’t get them imprisoned. Did that to themselves they did, caught stealing,’ Kenneth went on. ‘Doing my duty I was, for King and Country.’
Ceinwen reached for the girdle sitting on the hearth and hit him with it.
‘Fool that you are!’ she shouted. ‘We live here, don’t we? They’re our friends, aren’t they? You can’t hand over your friends like that.’ On the second smack, Kenneth sighed, smiled sweetly and sank to the floor.
‘Come with me, Enyd,’ Emma shrieked. ‘I can’t leave you here with these two maniacs!’ Grabbing the girl’s arm, persuading her to come for Emma’s own protection more than the girl’s, she pushed her way past the recumbent letter-carrier and his irate wife and out of the door.
They ran past the men and women who had been chasing Kenneth, now herded into a shouting, complaining group by Daniels, and into the alehouse. Puffing and gasping, Emma dragged Enyd up the stairs and into the sitting room where Pansy and Daisy were just being relieved of their outdoor clothes.
‘Kenneth is back from hiding and Ceinwen is on the edge of derangement!’ Emma announced. ‘Look after Enyd, my dears, it isn’t safe for her to return until everything has calmed down!’
* * *
Summer’s Last Retreat Page 35