Shirley was laughing at the antics of the intruders when one of the clowns stopped in front of her. He wore a huge painted mouth with down-turned ends and sloping lines above each eye which gave him a sad expression. He stared for a moment then gave her a slow wink. The dark eyes, which on close examination were a surprising blue, stared at her before the man ran off to rejoin the fun. Andy! It was Andy!
In vain she tried to find him amid the identically dressed, tumbling clowns but with the make-up disguising their faces it was impossible. This time she was in no doubt. It was Andy she had seen. She pushed her way through the excited children and went to where Maude and Myrtle were standing with Audrey and Keith.
‘One of the clowns is Andy,’ she said emphatically.
‘Shirley, of course it isn’t Andy. He’s dead and he’ll never be back.’ Audrey spoke sympathetically as though to a simple child.
‘I saw him. He stopped right in front of me and he winked!’
The clowns had finished their nonsense and the children were being led away to where Huw and Marged had prepared cakes for them.
‘Reggie, over here,’ Maude called and one of the clowns ran towards them, pausing for Maude to quickly explain.
‘Did you enjoy it?’ the familiar voice asked and as Shirley looked into the eyes of the clown she saw, not Andy, but his brother Reggie.
‘It was you?’
‘That’s right, Shirley. I was forced to take part.’
‘You stopped in front of me and – poked your tongue out?’
For a moment he hesitated and even with the make-up distorting his appearance, hiding any expression he might otherwise have shown, that momentary doubt alone would have convinced Shirley he was lying when he said, ‘Yes. That was me.’ But she had lied too and she knew for certain the man had been not Reggie but his brother, Andy.
If their intention was to convince her that it had not been Andy she’d seen, it had failed. The eyes of Reggie were not exactly like his brother’s. They were similar, but Andy’s were so dark they looked brown at first, until you stared and then you realized they were blue. Andy had been here, telling her he was alive.
They thought she was losing her mind, pacifying her with kind words as they would a distressed child. Angrily she turned away from them.
Leaving the others, she pushed her way to the station and caught the train back to the other end of town. She was trembling. Why was he tormenting her? Why didn’t he talk to her? His quirky sense of humour was no longer a delight. She wanted to escape from the nightmare he was creating.
What should she do? What could she do? She wouldn’t be believed if she reported his survival to the authorities and anyway she didn’t want to do that. He had made his decisions and survived the war by running away from danger and the way he chose to spend the peace was up to him.
She couldn’t write to Freddy that evening. Her handwriting was shaky and she couldn’t think of a single thing to tell him. The fun of the afternoon had faded from her mind as soon as the clown that was Andy had stopped and winked at her.
* * *
Netta was utterly fed up with working in Castle’s café. She hadn’t been there long before the day of the Victory Parade gave them all so much extra work. Beside the usual customers coming in for trays to take down to the sand, and people demanding chips to be eaten in the café, the afternoon was made more chaotic serving the children wearing fancy dress, with cakes.
The children had been gathered in circles on the sand below the café and Netta had lost count of the number of times she had climbed down and up the metal steps to carry more cakes and drinks to the excited crowd. The offer of free cakes had been promised to those involved and wearing fancy dress, but it had been impossible to avoid sharing the treat with others who had simply followed the parade or run to the beach afterwards to join them.
‘I don’t blame them, do you?’ was Marged’s only comment when Netta complained about the interlopers holding out their grubby little hands.
Austerity meant the only way they could all be included was to make the cakes a fraction of the usual size and Netta had spent hours putting the small offerings in and then out of the oven. By six o’clock she was hot, tired and on the edge of telling Marged she wouldn’t be working there any more. Then Alice came in and her resolve strengthened. It would be worth it. Very soon she would tell them, and then she wouldn’t have to work any more. Like her friend Lilly, she would have an easy life just looking after Dolly and Walter, meeting friends and lazing the summer days away in the park and on the beach.
The hours she worked meant she had less time to meet Lilly but she made sure they met most days. Lilly was free and whatever time Netta suggested, Lilly was able to join her friend for an hour or so.
‘Any news of your brother and your cousin coming home?’ she asked Lilly one day when they met in the café after closing time. True to form, Lilly had made sure the cleaning up was finished before she arrived with Phyllis, asking if there were any left-over cakes to spare.
‘Eynon hopes to be home in August,’ Marged answered for her. ‘And no, our Lilly, I haven’t any food left. I’ve just given what I had to Netta. She works here, remember. She’s not idle like you.’
‘Shut-up nagging, our Mam,’ Lilly whispered for Netta to hear.
‘I heard that, Lilly, and I’ll have no more of your cheek! Why aren’t you home getting Sam’s tea for him?’ Marged shouted.
‘Because he doesn’t want me to. He’s a better cook than I am.’ She tilted her head towards the door, mocking her mother’s impatient tutting. ‘Coming, Netta?’
Netta thankfully collected her coat and the packet of leftover food, and the two girls walked down the steps and across the sand.
‘Tomorrow we’re moving into those awful rooms,’ Lilly told her friend. ‘I’ve had to brush walls down and wash floors and scrub the pantry shelves. I’m worn out.’
‘Poor you. Did you really have to scrub floors?’
‘Well, to be honest, I didn’t do much more than wet everything. I can’t cope with scrubbing and all that stuff. It looked clean enough when I’d done.’
The next day, the move was done efficiently, with Sam doing most of the work while Lilly sat and sobbed. By the evening, the rooms looked as comfortable as possible even though they were over full. The bedroom was less attractive than their old one with heavy, old-fashioned wallpaper and drab curtains. To Lilly it was a place where she no longer felt at home. They slept in the same bed but were as apart as it was possible to be. No hugs, she thought. Not any more. She didn’t even try, as Sam had made it clear she was no longer loved.
* * *
On her day off, Netta appeared at the café with her two children.
‘Hello, Netta, can’t you keep away?’ Huw joked, reaching for a Welsh-cake to give to the children.
‘Walter wanted to see where I work,’ Netta explained, and, seeing a queue forming, she sat Dolly on a chair, told Walter to look after her and slipped around the counter to serve. When the rush died away, Marged came to see the children.
Walter was rather surly, but Dolly was friendly and soon enjoying the attention of the two adults.
‘Walter’s very quiet,’ Huw commented. ‘Not unhappy, is he?’
Taking him aside, Netta explained. ‘Resentful he is, because he doesn’t have a daddy like his friends.’
‘What happened?’
‘He left us,’ Netta replied sadly. Alice overheard and said, ‘Left you? I thought you told me he’d been killed in the war?’
‘Walter’s father was killed, yes, but Dolly’s father left us.’
‘What happened?’ Huw asked, ignoring Alice’s comment.
‘He didn’t love us, I suppose.’
Alice tried to speak, but Huw hushed her with his hand, and she turned away, anger mounting.
‘Walter doesn’t get letters like other children. His father went away, something he wasn’t old enough to understand and all Walter was left with wa
s knowing that Dolly’s father didn’t love us and doesn’t want us. Poor love, he blames himself, thinks he’s unlovable.’
Exasperated by the way Huw and Marged were sympathetic to a girl she mistrusted, and not believing a word she was saying, Alice went out and began to wash the counters ready to make more sandwiches.
Why wouldn’t they listen to her? She had warned them about Netta; told them it had been Netta who had been following her, watching her house and walking behind her as she went to work. It must be the sympathy Netta was engendering for the children. Children in trouble was something neither Marged nor Huw could ignore.
The arrival of Netta and her two children had made Alice feel unwanted. First as Lilly’s friend and now a part of the business, Netta had wormed her way into the family and at the same time, because of Alice’s mistrust of the girl, Marged and Huw clearly considered her unkind. If only Eynon were home. His parents were supporting this newcomer and pushing her away. His return was going to be difficult enough without a family rift to contend with.
She glanced into the café where a family had just arrived and were finding themselves seats. Marged and Huw looked lost in Netta’s story. Trying to shed her continuing feelings of dread, Alice smiled and went forward to serve.
* * *
Eirlys was one of the few who had no one serving. Ken had been working throughout the war organizing concert parties and he had rarely been away for more than a couple of weeks at a time. Now the need for his work was slowly ending. Fundraising went on but the promise of an early end to the fighting in the Far East made him stop and consider his future.
‘I want to go to London,’ he surprised her by announcing one morning. She had ignored previous hints and the bald statement, so emphatic, came as a shock. She didn’t reply, just watched as he placed a page of notes and figures in front of her and began to explain. ‘I intend to start an agency finding work for actors and entertainers. Once I become well known for having top performers on my books, I know it will be a success.’
‘No, Ken,’ Eirlys replied succinctly.
‘But you haven’t heard my ideas yet! Look at this list. All these people are willing for me to represent them.’
‘Good. I’m really pleased for you. But you’ll have to work from home; we’re not moving to London. I have a job as well, remember, and it’s one I’m good at and enjoy.’
‘I need to be in London. That’s essential. You must realize that, Eirlys. It’s where I’ll make the best contacts and become known. I have to be accessible.’
‘And I need to be here, to look after Dadda and the boys, and, as you know, my work is here.’
Ken stared at her, the firmly closed lips, the steely eyes, the tight jaw. He grabbed the papers he intended to show her and pushed them untidily into his briefcase. ‘We’ll talk about it later.’
‘No, Ken. I don’t want to discuss it. St David’s Well isn’t the back of beyond. London is within reach. Five hours on the train and you’re there. Forget about us moving. My job, my family and my friends are here.’
‘And what about me? Aren’t I classed as family? Or friend? Or am I just someone you have to suffer the presence of?’
‘Don’t be melodramatic. Ken. You’re my husband and I love you. I just don’t want you to take us away from everything else I love.’
‘I should come first, above all the rest.’
‘Look, I have to go. There’s a meeting at ten and I need to get the papers set out and the coffee organized.’ She made her escape and ran anxiously towards the bus stop. She’d been half-expecting this. Ken’s conversations had been laced with the price of renting in London, and comments about the people whom he knew with places they were willing to share. The remarks were casually said, as though referring to other people, but she knew Ken’s dream about working and living in London was not a trivial idea that would fade. The dream was getting stronger and he now saw it as a reality.
That evening when she went into the house after collecting Anthony from Hannah, there was an unusual silence. No wireless playing, no boys arguing and, in the living room, no sign of Ken or her father.
She played with Anthony for a while before giving him his bath and a drink of milk and settling him into his cot. When she went back downstairs Ken was standing in front of the fire. He had a sheaf of papers in his hand.
‘Oh, Ken, not now,’ she pleaded.
‘Yes, now. I have an offer of a room in a suite of offices and it’s in a good position, a good address and I want to take it. I have contracts ready for signing, and I know I can make a success of this.’
Eirlys said nothing. She just stared at him.
‘If you won’t come, then I’ll go on my own, come home at weekends, holidays, that sort of thing. But I am going to do this, Eirlys.’ Still she didn’t speak and he went on, ‘It won’t be a profitable enterprise at first, ’specially if I have to help you here and live up there, but I’m prepared to give it a try. I think the income will be sufficient to keep me and hopefully send money home. Will you at least let me try this?’
She didn’t hear the rest of his explanations. Something inside her blocked off all sound and all she could think of was her job, the position she had held on to, even when she wanted to be at home with Anthony. Thank goodness she had that. She had always feared something like this. He might be talking about weekends and holidays, but she doubted whether that would last long. No, if he wanted to leave her, try his luck in London, he would quickly disappear from her life. As he almost had once before, when he had fallen in love with Janet Copp, who had danced and sang. Her instincts had been sound. Her marriage to Ken was not.
Ken followed her around, still trying to convince her what he was doing was for their future, while she made a few sandwiches. Her father and the boys had gone to the pictures and would be hungry when they came in. What would they say? Would she tell them from the angle of an unfairly treated wife, or as a young woman who wanted to follow her husband and support his dreams, but could not? Either way, it would be untrue. Ken was leaving her and unless she threw everything away and prepared to abandon Stanley, Harold and Percival at a time when they needed stability, she would lose him.
Sadness overwhelmed her. She had begun to feel safe, secure in her marriage, but now, her pure panic reaction to Ken’s proposal made her face the fact that the truth was Ken had lost her trust. She couldn’t leave everything here and go with him to start a new life among strangers. She didn’t have that much confidence in him.
He had failed her dreadfully when he’d had an affair and facing this situation made her realize it hadn’t fully mended. She was no longer sure of him or her own feeling for him and perhaps she never would be again. Going to London, depending on Ken for everything was frightening. It was something she just couldn’t do. Thank goodness I have a good job, she muttered silently. I can support myself and Anthony, thanks to my job.
* * *
Alice went to the beach less and less. Her in-laws had no real need of her, specially with Netta even spending the days when she wasn’t working there, with Walter and Dolly enjoying the attention of Marged and Huw. They were pleased to see her when she called, but made it clear she wasn’t needed.
She was lonely with only Eynon’s letters for company and the two rooms began to feel like a prison. It wasn’t easy to decide on a job she would enjoy, but she eventually settled for the office of a large grocery shop. It was hardly exciting and the wages were far less than the factory had paid.
She had been cautious with money and had saved quite a lot to add to the money her father had left her. She and Eynon would be able to buy the perfect house. All her thoughts were on Eynon, and his return was a regular dream both during the night and the day.
She hadn’t bothered to make friends, patiently waiting until the day Eynon came home. All the time she had worked in the factory she had ignored the friendly invitations from the other girls. Now when one of the office girls invited her to go to the cinema with so
me friends, she agreed. The evenings were long and she looked forward to the company and the entertainment of films at the cinema and concerts and even on occasions a visit to a public house.
Whereas before, she would make duty visits to Eynon’s parents she now filled her spare time with her new friends, enjoying the films they saw with the additional pleasure of being able to discuss them afterwards.
They were smartly dressed and all wore make-up and soon enticed her to wear foundation cream, a touch of lipstick and even some eyeshadow. She queued with the rest when supplies arrived in the local shops. Her hair, which had been tied up in a snood and covered with a scarf for safety for so long, when she had worked with machinery, was cut and styled and gradually life changed.
Marged and Huw both made artificially polite remarks; thinly veiled disapproval, which she ignored. She liked her new self and knew Eynon would too. Wouldn’t he?
Seven
Over the next few days, Eirlys avoided talking to Ken. Sadly, Morgan watched them both, knowing something was wrong, but he said nothing. When difficulties arose in a marriage the situation was more often worsened than helped by too many words being spoken.
On Sunday morning, Eirlys dressed Anthony, invited Harold and Percival to join her and went to the beach, where Stanley was working on the sands. She was utterly sad and even the lively activities of the children around her failed to pierce her gloom.
When they had found a place below the sea wall and unpacked their belongings, Harold undressed and helped Percival to do the same. Percival was almost twelve but still very slow and his brothers were used to helping him. As they ran down to the enticing waves Eirlys sat with Anthony, making a sandcastle and wondering how he would feel about her decision not to go with Ken to London.
He was too young to be included in the decision-making but, she wondered, was she being unfair to her son by depriving him of his father? Because that was what she might be doing. Would Ken settle for a family at weekends and holidays? Or would he find someone more willing to involve herself with his ambition?
Holidays at Home Omnibus Page 159