Holidays at Home Omnibus

by Wait Till Summer; Swingboats On the Sand; Waiting for Yesterday; Day Trippers; Unwise Promises; Street Parties (retail) (epub)

  ‘I bought flowers to leave on the stairs for you,’ Keith said almost tearfully. ‘I called on Mrs Chapel at the flower shop and persuaded her to sell me a nice bunch of late chrysanths. I wanted it to be perfect. I wanted to please you, Audrey.’

  Downstairs a bewildered Huw and Bleddyn examined the damage, while Marged whispered to Hetty that Audrey must be out of her mind allowing such a maniac anywhere near her.

  Huw went upstairs to find notepaper, ruler and pencil, and he and Bleddyn measured up what was needed to repair the window. ‘I don’t know what we can do about the broken cabinet,’ Bleddyn said. ‘They’re hard to find.’

  ‘And costly. She’ll have to manage with one for now.’

  At the bottom of the stairs Marged was still whispering to Hetty, who tried to calm down her excessive outrage. ‘Come on, Marged, we don’t know what happened here and we have to get the facts before we can accuse Keith of wild behaviour. Let’s go and see what’s happening. But please, wait until we know the facts before sounding off.’

  ‘Who d’you think you’re talking to? Five minutes you’ve been a part of this family!’ Marged snapped.

  ‘Long enough to know you speak too quickly and say things you later regret!’ Hetty retorted. She led the way, making sure Marged was behind her and when she went into the living room, she quickly asked, ‘Can Marged and I make us all a cup of tea, Audrey?’

  ‘Thanks,’ Audrey said. ‘Keith has had a terrible shock and a cup of hot tea with plenty of sugar is what he needs.’

  ‘What about a brandy? I can slip home and get some,’ Bleddyn said, having followed them up.

  ‘No thanks,’ Keith replied. ‘I’m not much for drink and the thought of brandy makes me feel a bit sick. Tea’ll be fine.’

  ‘You’d better tell us what happened,’ Bleddyn demanded.

  Keith, with interruptions from an anxious Audrey, explained the sequence of events.

  ‘It’s this headache,’ Keith told them. ‘I thought it was passing but it came back worse than before. Migraine, it is. I should have told Audrey I couldn’t do it, but I wanted to please her and she rarely asks for help.’

  Bleddyn nodded. ‘I’ve heard about migraines. Bad they are, by all accounts.’

  There was no sleep that night. With the aid of candles and a low wattage bulb on the stairs they cleaned up the last of the damage and the coffee urn was restored, battered but still useable, into its place. By six o’clock the next morning, the place looked quite orderly and apart from the lack of glass in the front window, and the freezing temperature, it was ready for business as usual.

  Because of staying open so late in the evenings, Audrey didn’t start serving until ten o’clock in the morning and by that time, the glass had been replaced, and apart from some fingermarks from the putty, the café opened with few visible signs of the night’s disasters.

  Marged, busy making sandwiches while the girls made cakes, managed to keep her tongue still, but every time she looked at Keith, who was clearly unwell, she glared fiercely enough to melt him into oblivion. Keith avoided her as much as was possible, keeping busy, helping Bleddyn and Huw prepare the visible damage around the new glass.

  After Keith had drunk the cup of sweet tea the previous evening, Audrey had persuaded him to take a bath to warm himself and when he came out of the bathroom he had looked a different man. The headache had apparently cleared and he was cheerful and deeply apologetic. He set to and worked with the others to get everything straight, insisting on scrubbing the floor in case there were remnants of glass that might cut someone else. ‘If anyone is cut I deserve for it to be me.’ he said.

  ‘I’m going to make a few enquiries about Keith Kent.’ Marged muttered to Hetty when they walked home through the gloomy, frost bound morning.

  ‘Fine, but if you find out something unpleasant, don’t expect Audrey to be pleased.’ Hetty warned.

  Keith stayed all that day, and when the café closed at nine o’clock, Audrey persuaded him to spend the second night with them. ‘Maude can make you up a bed on the sofa. You’ll be comfortable there and we’ll keep the fire going so you won’t be cold. You’ve had a bad shock, and I’d feel happier if you didn’t go back to those lodgings.’

  ‘I’m sorry you saw where I live.’ he said. ‘It was only going to be temporary. I took it in a hurry after I was told to leave the room I had in Church Street. The woman’s son was coming home, invalided out of the army, poor lad, so she wanted the room back. I took the room in The Dingle just for a week or two, but I’ve been too busy to do anything about moving on.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it now, stay here for a few days until you feel stronger and we’ll all help you to find a better place.’

  ‘But I can’t! It’s Christmas, you have your family around you and I’d be intruding.‘

  ‘Nonsense. If you’d rather go back to your room we won’t stop you, but we’d like to have you here to share our Christmas, so it’s up to you.’

  ‘Thank you. I’d love to stay.’

  Maude smiled her approval but Myrtle frowned. Somehow it was a little too contrived. And as for the headache, that was convenient too. A cup of tea and a hot bath had been a miraculous cure for the migraine he complained of and she doubted whether such a headache could be so easily cleared. She said nothing. Auntie Audrey was no fool and she wouldn’t be taken in for long if the man was as dishonest as she was beginning to suspect.

  Audrey was tired, but inexplicably she was happy too. Having someone to look after was comforting. She’d always thrived on being needed by someone, in the past her mother and Marged, and then more recently dear Wilf. After Wilf had died, she had missed being important to someone. To the rest of the family she had never been anything more than good old Audrey, always willing to do what no one else wanted to do. Having Keith to fuss over had lightened her spirits as nothing else had done. She day-dreamed about him staying with her and the girls, looking after them all; life could be very good.

  That night, staying in Audrey’s living room, Keith couldn’t sleep. So, he slipped out of bed when he thought he wouldn’t be heard and went to his jacket hanging on the door. He knew he wouldn’t sleep unless he had some help. There was a small bottle of whisky in an inside pocket and he drank thirstily. He had refused the brandy when it had been offered because he didn’t want Audrey to think he was weak and needed support, as he’d made enough of a fool of himself, but after the bizarre events of the past twenty-four hours, he needed something to settle his nerves. The drink did the trick and he slept immediately.

  * * *

  The story of the series of disasters that had befallen Keith brought publicity and a flood of customers to the Corner Café in the two days before Christmas. He went back to The Dingle after breakfast on Christmas Eve, but at Audrey’s invitation, he stayed only to gather a few necessities, including his bicycle and trailer on which he travelled between home and his place of work, and came back to the flat.

  He insisted on helping, apologizing repeatedly for his unfortunate clumsiness until Audrey told him to stop. ‘You were ill, it was an accident. None of it was intended,’ she said. ‘If you want to do something to make up, just help us today and we’ll never mention it again, right?’

  Christmas Eve was the busiest day yet and the place was filled right up to closing, leaving them little time to sort out the cleaning between serving and preparing more food. Marged arrived, glared at Keith, smiled rather grimly towards her sister and began clearing the tables and stacking the dishes ready for washing.

  ‘What’s he still here for?’ she asked and Audrey replied that he was a guest and it was no business of hers.

  Without exchanging another word the two sisters worked in unison, sorting the chaos of a hectic day like the team they had always been.

  On that most unusual of Christmas Eves they finally climbed back up to the flat at ten thirty after cleaning up, leaving everything empty and clear for the few days they would be closed over Christmas.


  Marged saw that Keith had settled in, much to the family’s disapproval. Huw and Bleddyn considered him a scrounger and Marged was convinced there was something they hadn’t been told. She couldn’t resist voicing her doubts once again, and she and Audrey were again unable to be civil to each other. They spoke only when they had to and in a stiff and formal tone, disapproval hovering around every word.

  * * *

  Meanwhile, Andy was on the run again. The police had been quite relaxed by his apparent willingness to accept his fate. He told them he’d had his fun and now wanted to pay for it. ‘I dreaded serving in the army.’ he told them. ‘I’ve never resorted to violence and can’t imagine ever wanting to hurt another human being. Expecting me to kill someone because he’s on the other side is something I can’t do. Conscientious objectors are treated like criminals and I couldn’t cope with that either, so I thought I’d ride out the war by keeping a couple of steps ahead of blokes like you, but you were too quick for me this time, eh?’

  The two constables felt sympathy for him. After all, they had sons serving and would have helped them to avoid the call up if an opportunity had arisen, they admitted to each other. They were waiting for the custody sergeant to bring the relevant papers and when Andy offered them a cigarette and asked to go to the lavatory, they didn’t rush to accompany him, but pointed the way and waited for their cigarettes to draw before standing outside the door and waiting for him to reappear.

  Boldly, Andy walked calmly through the front door of the police station, he even paused for a moment, appearing completely confident, then walked to the nearest lane, cut across some gardens, through the park, and caught a bus.

  * * *

  Shirley Downs was looking forward to a few weeks rest. She had been busy both locally and on tours over the past months and with no concerts booked until the end of January, she settled down to enjoy an idle few weeks.

  Her leg ached still, but she was determined to stop using her stick before her next booking at the end of January at the town hall. Walking on level ground was the best way to strengthen the muscles and it was while walking along the windswept cold and abandoned promenade on the morning of Christmas Eve that she met Andy Probert.

  ‘I thought you’d been arrested!’ she gasped. ‘And before you say anything, it wasn’t me who called the police, right?’

  ‘Right. I never thought you did, not for a minute.’ He laughed and his eyes held such warmth, and such delight at seeing her, that she relaxed and took the arm he offered her.

  ‘Where are you living this time? Found another empty house so you can frighten some poor young couple again?’

  ‘I’ve got a room in the most awful place you could imagine,’ he told her. ‘It’s called The Dingle, which sounds quaint, but in fact it’s a rundown house in a rundown row, and if the landlady isn’t rundown, it’s because she’s always been a mess!’

  As they walked along the cliff path, Shirley pulling up a shawl to protect her head from the icy wind that worsened as they climbed up on to the headland, he told her about the room he had accepted. ‘It’s such a terrible place that no one would go there unless they had to. I’ll be as safe there as anywhere, at least through the Christmas weekend. As for what I’ll do then, I don’t know. I’m broke apart from the cost of the disgusting room and a few meals, and with having to lie low and it being Christmas and all, means I can’t earn.’

  ‘Give yourself up,’ Shirley said. ‘You can serve your time and come out with a clear conscience to start again when the war ends. It can’t go on much longer.’

  ‘Oh yeh? Go off to fight and have me head blown off? Sod that for a lark. I’m staying well clear.’

  ‘What will you do? You must have some plans?’

  ‘Right now, I plan to go on the bus to a pub I know where we might get a bit of steak and kidney pie, which to be truthful is more paste and mystery than steak and kidney, but the gravy’s good. Coming?’

  ‘I wouldn’t say no if you’re offering.‘

  ‘Good! I’m starving.’

  ‘Are you still having those bad dreams, Andy?’ she asked as they walked away from the seafront.

  ‘They’re what give me the speed I need when the police are about to grab my collar. They’re so real. Shirley. I can’t help thinking they’re a premonition.’

  ‘Don’t think like that. It’s probably only nerves. I’m sure I’d have worse dreams if I had to face the thought of going into battle.’

  ‘I’ve been lucky so far, the police have been very casual about my arrest. They’ve been more interested in nabbing me for a few robberies, rather than my invitation to serve in His Majesty’s army. But if I was caught by the military it would be a different story. Hard and cold they are, and I wouldn’t stand a chance of getting away from them once they had their great big mitts on me.’

  It was later that evening when she was helping Hetty to prepare a chicken and a piece of pork Bleddyn had managed to buy illegally, that Shirley heard her mother mention The Dingle.

  ‘That’s a coincidence.’ she said. ‘I was talking to someone today who has just taken a room in one of the houses there. It sounds a terrible place. Do you know it, Bleddyn?’ she asked.

  ‘Who do you know living in a place like that?’ Bleddyn asked. ‘It’s where that Keith Kent has been living. Him that’s always hanging around Audrey.’

  ‘Oh, someone who I’ve met a few times. He travels a lot and he’s got a room there at the moment.’

  ‘He can’t be up to much if he’s settled for a place like that!’

  ‘Will you take me there, Bleddyn?’ Shirley asked. ‘I’m curious to see it. I don’t want to talk to the person I met earlier, I just want to see if his description was an exaggeration.’

  ‘Go on,’ Hetty urged. ‘You know you want to find out something about this Keith Kent. Now’s your chance while he’s still at Audrey’s.’

  The place was approached by a narrow lane over which few vehicles passed. Grasses and wild flowers, now nothing more than dead stalks, grew out of the surface and the trees hadn’t been trimmed for several seasons, leaving the place almost cut off from view.

  While Shirley waited just out of sight of the row of houses, Bleddyn went boldly to the first door, and when a slovenly woman answered, he asked for Keith.

  ‘Gave notice he did,’ he was told. ‘Said he’d found somewhere better and cheaper. Well, you can tell him that if he wants to come back he’s too late, the room’s taken.’

  Bleddyn was quiet on the way home. It appeared that Keith was so sure of being offered a permanent home with Audrey and the girls, that he had left himself with nowhere else to go. His thoughts followed those of Myrtle: the migraine headache had been very convenient.

  Out of a growing concern for Audrey, Huw and Bleddyn made a few more enquiries. Apparently, Keith worked hard and there were only a few who complained about his occasional lapses when he went off for a few days and was slow finishing a job. Yet, he never seemed to have any money.

  ‘I spoke to Charlie Groves, the policeman, and he told me there’s an ex-wife and a couple of children somewhere,’ Bleddyn told his brother.

  Huw had heard the same and he added, ‘The two boys are working and it seems unlikely the wife demands much from him; she’s re-married and quite comfortable, I believe.’

  ‘We have to tread careful here. If we say too much, Audrey will stop talking to us and we need to be on hand, to keep an eye on him,’ Bleddyn said. He and Huw agreed to say nothing, but watch and wait.

  * * *

  Christmas exaggerated joy and sadness more during war time than at any other. Letters were unfolded, discussed and analysed, people trying to read more into the few facts they contained, inventing opinions and struggling to understand what their loved ones were going through. For Shirley, an unexpected delivery of letters that arrived from Freddy was a joy. The mail had obviously been delayed and having three within a couple of days and just before Christmas was the best gift she could hav
e received.

  She took them to her room and wallowed over his affectionate words, sharing only a little of what he had written with her mother and Bleddyn. His words were light-hearted but they warmed her more than any attempt at romantic flummery. ‘If only this war would end and he could come home,’ she said with a trembling sigh. Then a burst of frustrated anger overcame her. She needed him home. She wanted to know how they really felt about each other, not live this half-life, not knowing how their story would end. She was tired of trying to guess how he truly felt and even after his ten days leave she wasn’t sure of her own feelings. It was like standing on the edge of a precipice: would she fall this way or that? Would their love be stronger once they could spend time together and really talk? Or would the return of Freddy tilt her down into the abyss? The endless wondering was so cruel. To Hetty’s alarm, she burst into noisy tears.

  * * *

  Christmas Day was quiet for the Castles. Bleddyn took Hetty and his daughter-in-law, Hannah, with her girls, for a walk and called in to Huw and Marged’s after lunch. He knew the emptiness would be distressing for Marged, who had always shared the work with Audrey and provided for them all. Ronnie and Olive and little Rhiannon were there and Eynon’s wife Alice. Maude and Myrtle called later, leaving Audrey at the flat with Keith.

  Like Audrey, Marged’s daughter Lilly, her husband and baby Phyllis had declined the invitation to join them. Somehow the empty chairs lined along the walls were reminders of those other absentees: Bleddyn’s son Taff, who would never come home, and his other son Johnny who hadn’t been home for such an age, as well as Marged and Huw’s son Eynon, whose wife Alice was so determinedly confident and cheered them all. To compensate for the emptiness of the chairs, as in so many homes that Christmas, recent letters were read and discussed. Johnny and Eynon would celebrate another Christmas away from their family but they were here where they were loved, safe in everyone’s heart.