They were silent for a while, each thinking about their own men and the importance of their letters. Then Hannah told Beth about her unfortunate misunderstanding when she more or less told Eirlys about Ken and Janet’s affair.
‘When she said Ken had told her everything I took her at her word and presumed she knew about Janet. How could I have been so stupid?’
‘Perhaps you weren’t. Perhaps it’s better to be honest and know what you’re dealing with than have something simmering under the surface and Eirlys not knowing what it is.’
‘Ken’s a fool!’
‘I agree with you there,’ Beth smiled. ‘It’s strange; I have never once thought about Peter finding someone else.’
‘Nor I with Johnny.’
‘We’re the lucky ones.’
Maldwyn came into the shop to buy a tea-cosy for Winifred. ‘I burnt hers by standing it too close to the fire to keep warm,’ he admitted.
‘How’s Vera? We don’t see her these days.’ Beth asked.
‘Oh, off with some boyfriend when she can. I hardly see her either, and I live in the same house!’
* * *
Vera refused to tell anyone about the boyfriend she occasionally met. Maldwyn and Delyth presumed it was the soldier she had met at the dance, but she received no letters and no one saw her writing any.
Maldwyn saw much less of her now she was working in the engine—parts factory. She had to contend with shift work, although she didn’t have to work nights: young girls were exempt from that. There were plenty of older women, and the few men who remained who were glad to earn the extra money it entailed.
The money was more than she had earned in Castle’s Café, and she occasionally treated herself to some new clothes when she had the coupons, and sometimes when she did not. Several of her new workmates were willing to sell their clothing coupons for ten shillings and although this was illegal she took advantage of their need for money and spent happy hours wandering around the shops before deciding on how to spend her wages.
When she met her boyfriend she dressed smartly, whatever the weather dictated. But they didn’t dance and they didn’t often go to the pictures. Instead they walked around the parks — now devoid of their gates and railings, which had been collected for scrap metal — and sat close, whispering about how much they loved each other and how, once the war was over, they would marry and build a home.
He didn’t want their love to be known until he was in London and settled in the job he said was waiting for him. ‘Dad isn’t too keen on my getting involved with anyone, says it isn’t fair, so best he doesn’t know. You can write to me, and we can tell everyone then,’ he promised. ‘I just want to wait until I’ve got a place for you.’
‘I don’t care what my father says. He’s a bully, always thinking the worst of me and my sisters,’ she said, and explained about his fears that she would end up ‘doing something silly‘.
‘Like this?’ he said, slowly lowering her to the ground and wrapping them both in his overcoat.
‘Just like this,’ she murmured against his lips.
* * *
Maldwyn persuaded Mrs Chapel to stay upstairs most of that Monday, and when she came down on Tuesday morning she looked refreshed and much brighter. While he went back to Mrs Denver’s at lunchtime, she closed the shop and went up to the flat and made herself some tomatoes on toast, wishing she had asked him to stay. He really was very kind and she was well aware how fortunate she had been the day she had offered him a job. When the phone rang downstairs in the shop she sighed and hurried to answer it. Lunchtime or not, she didn’t want to miss a sale.
She missed her footing on the bottom step and almost fell. By the time she had reached it, the phone had stopped ringing. She swore mildly and went back upstairs.
When it rang again an hour later, Maldwyn answered it.
‘It’s your sister, Mrs Chapel,’ he called. ‘She won’t be long,’ he said into the phone. ‘She’s out the back getting some foliage for a bouquet.’
‘In the garden you mean? But it’s raining. Why aren’t you doing that?’ the voice said angrily. ‘Sending her out in this weather! I thought you were paid to save her from that sort of thing?’
‘Mrs Chapel makes up her own mind, she won’t listen to me,’ he replied cheerfully, but he was puzzled by the sharpness of the woman’s tone. He handed the phone to Mrs Chapel with a shrug.
‘In the rain? What do you mean? There’s a shelter out there, and anyway, I can’t sit and watch Maldwyn do all the work when there’s a lot to do. We work together, and thank goodness I’ve got him.’ She looked at Maldwyn and mirrored his shrug. ‘What’s upset her?’ she said as she replaced the receiver. ‘She’s never criticised you before.’
‘I seem to be suspected by everyone lately,’ he sighed. Then he asked something that had puzzled him from time to time. ‘When your father died and you took over the business, was there any jealousy on your sister’s part? I mean, why you and not her?’
‘What business?’ She smiled ruefully. ‘He’d let it run down to almost nothing, and even the premises weren’t his. They were rented and the rent was in arrears. There was absolutely nothing for us to to inherit except memories of a once-successful flower shop. My sister wasn’t interested, so we shared the pieces of furniture, china, ornaments and things between us and that was about it. I applied for the tenancy, got it and started rebuilding the business. Dad had taught me a lot and I was a willing pupil. The rest I gradually picked up for myself, talking to other florists, listening to people in the wholesale market and reading books. You know, if you’re interested you learn by enjoyment. Better than school, believe me!’ she added with a smile.
‘So it’s all yours and there’s no reason for your sister to resent it?’
‘I bought the property. The mortgage was paid off a few years ago. Don’t worry about it, young Maldwyn. She isn’t afraid of you stealing the family funds, if that’s what you’re thinking. I once said I would leave the whole lot to her Gabriel, and offered to train him, but he hasn’t shown any interest. She’d probably had a bad day and was looking for someone to have a go at. She gets a lot of pain from her knees and can be a bit grumpy at times. But she’s not really unpleasant. You’d like her.’
‘I’m sure I would, Mrs Chapel.’ But he still wondered whether her sister had entered the shop while Mrs Chapel was at church and shown her resentment in destructive rage. Anger didn’t always need to be justified. She could get in — she had a spare key. But no, Mrs Chapel must have forgotten to lock the door, there was no other explanation.
The police returned a few days later but had nothing to report.
‘What’s puzzling us, Mr Perkins, is that no one heard anything. The work of throwing things around, and of pots and things being broken, couldn’t have been done in silence, so why didn’t anyone report a noise?’
‘Have you asked Arnold Elliot next door? He lives on the premises and was probably at home.’
‘We have interviewed Mr Elliot, and he told us there was so often noise from this place he wouldn’t have taken much notice. Banging and shifting things around late at night and once on a Sunday, he said.’
As they were leaving, Maldwyn’s mind returned to Arnold Elliot. He made no secret of the fact that he wanted the shop in order to extend his own. He was a person who would benefit by Maldwyn’s leaving the town. Without him to help her, Mrs Chapel might not be able to run the business for much longer. He saw the policemen out but said nothing of his suspicions. Best he bear them in mind and keep an extra eye on the man.
* * *
Young newly-wed Alice Castle enjoyed looking after the two rooms in which she and Eynon would start their married life. She didn’t feel lonely; she was saving and planning for when Eynon came home. He had gone back to his unit a few days after their wedding and was now in North Africa. She read the newspapers avidly and tried to follow the to-ing and fro-ing of Montgomery’s determined battle for El Alamein.
> When she read of casualties in the desert war, she had a way of dealing with it. She forced herself to visualise her husband running, fully equipped, approaching the victims, stopping to look down at them, then running on, unharmed. It was one of the many ways she had of coping with the dread of the telegram boy knocking at her door with the news of Eynon’s death.
She had been sent to work in Vera’s factory, and although the wages were better than she had earned in the sweets-and-seaside-rock shop on the promenade she still spent very little, putting money aside for when Eynon came home.
Putting aside the money she saved when she refused an invitation to the pictures, or managed without a fire for an hour or so longer, was another way of dealing with the minute-by-minute fears for his safety. She was one of the girls willing to sell her clothing coupons, buying second-hand garments and asking the patient Hannah to help her adjust them to fit. Everything was building towards Eynon’s return and she told him so in her letters.
It was five o’clock in the morning and almost time to leave for the six-till-two shift. She put the empty milkbottle on the doorstep. No milk today. With the ration cut to two and a half pints per week, the half-pint bottle arrived on five mornings only. She had used some of her precious food points to buy some condensed milk and although it was over-sweet she drank a cup of tea sweetened and whitened with that.
She hated the early-morning shift. There was always the chance of a letter from Eynon and she would have to wait until she finished at two o’clock to know whether he’d written. Like Hannah, she always took the letter to the family and read passages that would interest or amuse them. That way they all enjoyed them and it seemed to make their loved ones closer, more in touch, by having more than the occasional letter themselves.
She walked into the factory with Vera Matthews that morning, Vera running up and getting in just in time to clock on without losing a quarter of an hour’s pay by being there even seconds after six o’clock.
‘We’re going to see a fortune teller on Wednesday, want to come?’ she asked as they took off their coats and walked to the workbench.
‘Who’s “we”?’ Alice asked. She was reluctant to make a friend of Vera, who seemed so bold.
‘Me and Delyth and Madge. We’re going to see that Sarah — the gypsy who has the tent on the beach in the summer.’
‘I don’t know …’ Alice was thinking of the half-crown the woman was likely to charge them. ‘No, but thanks for asking.’
‘Please yourself.’ Vera flounced off, shaking back long hair that would soon be pushed up into a snood for safety; there was also a hat, something she hated and considered unnecessary.
Alice collected her first box of engine parts, took the seat of someone who had just finished the night shift and started work without delay. It was piecework, paid by the number of items she completed, and she needed every penny for when Eynon came home.
The postman was popular in the Castle family that day. Hannah heard from Johnny; Marged and Alice both heard from Eynon. Much of his news had been obliterated by the heavy blue pencil so loved by the censor. But they were assured that all was well. That evening, letters were read out in Marged and Huw’s living room and the contents, or those parts that were revealed, were discussed over cups of cocoa, made with condensed milk mixed with a spoonful of cocoa powder to which was added boiling water. For a while a sense of euphoria kept them happy. Their men had been well and safe when the letters were written; surely they must still be so? Illogical, but such a relief that for a few nights they were able to sleep.
Maldwyn was lucky too. He had a letter from Winifred telling him she hoped to see him home at Christmas. There was also one from Delyth, saying she and Madge were coming to St David’s Well the following Wednesday and asking would he like to meet them. He wrote straight back telling them he would be at the station.
He put aside Winifred’s letter. Christmas was a long way off, and who knew what would happen in two months? He half hoped to be invited to stay with Mrs Denver. He knew she hoped so too. She had been saving what special food she could buy, queuing for hours when a tin of salmon or fruit was on offer. Even with the points system these things were in short supply.
Perhaps Winifred could come to Mrs Denver’s? It would mean moving a lot of furniture around again, to make room for her, but he thought his amiable landlady wouldn’t mind — as long as his stepmother brought some rations!
Delyth hadn’t mentioned their intention to see the fortune teller to Maldwyn. She thought he would think them silly. Having no concerns at all about what Maldwyn thought of her, Vera did. ‘You coming with us then?’ she asked, and explained about going to visit the wise gypsy who could see into the future.
‘I think I’ll give that a miss,’ he said, and smiled as she teased him and accused him of being afraid.
Dressed in their smartest clothes, Delyth, Madge and Vera went to the dark, over-furnished house where Sarah lived. Maldwyn went with them but elected to stay outside. Life was full of mysteries and suspicions, and he didn’t think she would solve any; it was more likely she would add a few more. ‘Better to let tomorrow be a surprise,’ he insisted. ‘I don’t think I want to know what’s ahead. Knowing could make it harder to deal with.’
Calling him every kind of coward, laughing to conceal their own trepidation, the girls went in.
The woman, whose age they couldn’t guess, was dressed in dark clothes and swathed in scarves. Jewels twinkled in the light of the candles that surrounded her, and her dark eyes watched them with amusement as they stepped into her consulting room.
‘Together? Or separately?’ she asked and they chomsed. ‘Together,’ without the need to discuss it. There was such a weird atmosphere, the shadows dancing on the walls from the flickering candles so unnerving, that they sat as close together as the chairs allowed and leaned towards the table, glancing occasionally towards the door as though preparing for flight. Their hearts were beating faster than normal and in the semi-darkness even the faces of their friends looked strange and unrecognisable. Sarah knew how to set the scene and make a visit memorable.
Madge reached for Delyth’s hand. Vera, who had joined them after her shift ended at two, seemed the least affected by the atmosphere built up by the clever woman.
Sarah talked to them about their lives, saying nothing to alarm them, flattering them, promising them all they desired. Then, as she stood to dismiss them, she said to Vera, ‘Beauty isn’t enough.’ To Delyth she said, ‘Talent in your hands will grow.’ To a trembling Madge, she said softly, ‘And you, my gentle lady, you have to learn to let go. Don’t hold him, let him go free.’
Madge was sobbing when they were once more in the fresh air. Maldwyn came at once to comfort her, but she wasn’t sad, just emotional and, she insisted, very glad she had decided to visit the ‘All-seeing, All-knowing Sarah, the Gypsy King’s Daughter’.
Inside, the heavily clothed woman looked troubled. She made it a habit never to worry people by what she saw, unless it was something that could be prevented. Sometimes she saw a problem in isolation, and revealing it could worry customers unnecessarily when another piece of the puzzle, unknown to her, was ready to drop into place and solve it.
Around Delyth, the talented one, she had sensed danger, but it was too nebulous to be of any use. Occasionally, another visit helped, but at other times you had to let the fates do what they will. She went out on to the pavement and beckoned to Delyth. ‘Come and see me again — no fee — I might be able to help you further.’ She went back inside and stood for a long time looking thoughtfully at the uncooperative crystal ball. ‘If only my talents were greater,’ she sighed.
It was only two thirty and Vera was hungry, having had no food since a break at ten thirty, when Music While You Work came on the wireless and got them all singing. They wandered through the town, buying some pasties with mysterious contents and stopping in a café for a piece of flat, fatless sponge optimistically called chocolate cake, and a pot of
weak tea.
Eirlys was passing when they came out; she looked flushed and feverish.
‘Are you all right?’ Delyth asked. ‘Can we do something for you?’
‘I heard there were some broken biscuits for sale without needing to use food points and I wanted to get them for the boys,’ Eirlys said.
‘Go home and we’ll get some,’ Madge said. ‘Tell us where to find you and we’ll bring them, right?’
Eirlys thanked them and turned for home. She was feeling most odd and the pains that she’d felt for the last few days were becoming severe and beginning to worry her. It was too soon for it to be the baby and she was afraid something was wrong. She felt so weak she wondered whether she would get home without help. At a phone box she rang for a taxi and at the same time phoned her doctor. She would be all right, there was nothing wrong with the baby, she told herself, it was only reassurance she needed. How she wished her mother had lived. She wanted her so much it hurt. But greater than the need for her dead mother was a longing for Ken to appear, to tell her she would be all right, that he loved her and would always be there.
In the taxi she sat back and closed her eyes. She wanted Ken by her side, but was that love, or a need for the moment? She still doubted her ability to love, and Ken’s words during that row worried her more and more. All she knew for certain was that at this moment she didn’t want him to leave her. In a less emotional part of her mind she also knew that the way he dealt with the birth of their child, whether he was genuinely pleased and proud, or politely so, would decide their future. She didn’t want him to stay out of a sense of duty and all the time wish he were somewhere else. He deserved better than that, she thought sadly: as much, if not more, than she did.
The taxi took her home and she sank gratefully on to the couch. Where was Ken? If only she’d had his itinerary on her, she could have left a message for him too. She felt the emptiness of the house closing around her, isolating her from everyone, enclosing her with this pain and the accompanying fear.
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