Cassie opened the door to an impatient knock. She had received a typed letter from a Mr Davy, asking if she had a vacancy for a lodger, and whether he might see the room. She had replied telling him the room was offered to women only, but their letters must have crossed as a second letter arrived telling her he would call on Sunday afternoon to view the room.
Standing on her doorstep was Joseph. Her heart leapt but she said, ‘Sorry, but you can’t come in, I’m expecting someone.’
‘A Mr Davy?’ he asked with a crooked grin. ‘Sorry for the deception but I thought it was the only way to be sure you’d open the door.’
‘What d’you want?’ she demanded.
‘Please, Cassie, I want to come home.’
‘No chance of that!’
‘You make the rules. Just as a lodger if that’s what you want, but please let me come home. I’ve been a fool and I don’t blame you for not trusting me, but I nearly got sent to prison and there’s nothing more sobering than that, believe me. That brings everything into clear focus. Please, Cassie. Let me at least come in and talk about it.’
With relief in her heart disguised by the stony expression on her face, she opened the door wide. He darted around the corner and came back with two suitcases and staggered in to drop them in the hall.
‘No further,’ she said. ‘And it’s only temporary, until you find something else, right?’
Joseph smiled abjectly, humility and shame showing in his eyes when she looked at him. A foot in the door, that was the hardest part; persuading her to take him back was going to be easy.
When Cassie told Alice later, Alice said, ‘This time, make sure he marries you!’
* * *
To Maude’s dismay, her marriage to Reggie had to be postponed. He was still in hospital on the day they were to have walked down the aisle, with a grieving Maude sitting at his bedside.
‘Everybody’s getting married except us,’ she said with a sigh. ‘First for fussy, last for lucky,’ he said. ‘Ours will be the best. You’ll be the most beautiful bride and me the luckiest man.’
‘You’re right. Being first isn’t important; it’s marrying the right one.’
When Shirley and Freddy told Hetty and Bleddyn they were going to marry, there seemed to be only one way to celebrate.
‘We’ll have a street party,’ Hetty said. ‘No more scrimpy meals and economy wedding cakes. The street will enjoy the third and last celebration.’
Rations had been cut again, the large loaf had been cut by four ounces and there was talk of bread being rationed later in the year. Most of the precious food luxuries women had kept for special occasions had been used up on V.E. and V.J. celebrations; there was little to create a party atmosphere, but they did it.
Out came the old piano and a wind-up gramophone with a pile of records. A bonfire was lit on the field opposite the house and potatoes were scrubbed ready for baked potatoes.
‘Although why we scrub them before putting them in the ashes, and then eat them, charcoal, soot an’ all, I’ll never know,’ Marged complained.
A happy Eirlys was there with Ken, and her father with the three boys. The newly wed Constable Charlie Groves and his wife, Madge, came, and Mrs Chapel from the flower shop, with Maldwyn and Delyth. Bernard came on the horse and cart with Peter, Beth and their son, plus old Sally Gough, who wore a frivolous hat that hadn’t seen daylight since 1903, and nearly caught fire when she went to retrieve a potato from the fire.
Shirley had received an anonymous gift of twelve cups and saucers. Each one different, every one beautiful. She knew they were from Andy but said nothing. Wherever he was, she hoped he was happy.
Unseen in the street filled with the Castle family and all their friends and a number of strangers attracted to the noise and made welcome, Andy stood in the shadows and watched the others having fun. The singing as always began with humorous songs from the music hall but as the evening ended they became more and more sentimental. Couples sat close together as they sang romantic melodies, the words having special meanings with the long separations still fresh in their minds: ‘Let Me Call You Sweetheart, I’m In Love With You’ and ‘You Made Me Love You’ being among the perennial favourites.
A cloud of melancholy settled over Andy as the mood of the evening changed. In the shadows was where he belonged and he couldn’t foresee that ever changing. That’s where he would spend his life; watching from dark corners. His uncontrollable need for excitement, for taking a risk, created a life that was impossible to share. He slipped away as the mood again changed and enthusiastic dancers began to dance to ‘Knees up, Mother Brown’ and ended with the now traditional conga.
Shirley smiled at Freddy and asked, ‘Remember you saying everyone had moved on and there was no place for you? Look around. This is your town. All these people are friends, tomorrow is going to be a wonderful day, for us both.’
Happily, Freddy agreed.
* * *
The season began just as it always had. Marged looked down at the families covering the sand, making the scene a colourful patchwork with discarded clothes and bright towels, and buckets and spades, and windmills and sunhats. The mothers trying to keep all their belongings within a small circle, fussing over the children, making a tiny part of the beach their own for the afternoon.
Children slipped into bathing costumes – still called ‘dippers’ by the locals – and shrieked as they danced down to where the waves touched their toes.
Many families were complete now, Marged noticed, with fathers and brothers as well as grandfathers sharing the pleasures of the sunny sandy bay, although, for some there would always be an empty place, like Bleddyn, who had lost his son, Taff.
Behind her Huw, Hetty and Myrtle, plus a newly reappointed Netta, were preparing for afternoon teas. Down below her on the sands, she saw a couple of young men setting out deckchairs for hire. Bleddyn had left them to get the chip shop ready for opening; Johnny and Eynon were brushing sand off the signs advertising rides. One day soon, Bleddyn would get out his boat and offer trips around the bay. In spite of the continuing shortages, things were getting back to normal.
On the glass door of the café, the faded verse which had been painted there so long ago by her grandparents, Joseph and Harriet Piper, had been rewritten by the sign-writer, Will Bowler. It told visitors all that St David’s Well Bay had to offer. Only the name had changed. The names and memories of Molly and Joseph Piper had faded and been replaced by the Castles.
Teas for trippers, donkeys and dippers
Sunhats, hoopla and tides
Castle’s kingdom, cloths of fresh gingham
Fortunes, windmills and rides.
First published in the United Kingdom in 2000–2003 by Severn House
This edition published in the United Kingdom in 2017 by
Canelo Digital Publishing Limited
57 Shepherds Lane
Beaconsfield, Bucks HP9 2DU
United Kingdom
Copyright © Grace Thompson, 2000–2003
The moral right of Grace Thompson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781911420934
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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s; Unwise Promises; Street Parties (retail) (epub), Holidays at Home Omnibus
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