by Jack Jones
‘Are you mad?’ she said to Saran. ‘Get up, indeed, and you like you are, hardly closed up after the baby. You’ll stay where you are, my gel. I’ve sent for Granny Rees, and after I’ve made your husband a bit of something to put in his belly, she and I will tend to your mother, God help her.’
So Saran had to stay where she was in bed, and soon her mother was brought upstairs and laid out tidy on the next bed, only a couple of inches away from Saran’s.
‘Well, well,’ said the most businesslike Granny Rees, ‘little did I think when I left you, Saran, that I’d be here again before the day was out…. But wasn’t I telling you? Didn’t I say that I wouldn’t be surprised to hear of her going off? And here she is…’
‘Don’t cover her face up, please,’ said Saran. ‘Leave her face uncovered so as I can look at her now and again.’
‘Certainly, my gel,’ said Granny Rees, turning back the sheet. ‘She looks peaceful enough, God help her. There, there, don’t cry and make yourself bad after your confinement,’ she said as the bitter tears began to run from Saran’s eyes. ‘That’s the way things are, my gel. One comes, another goes. Your boy’s come, your mother’s gone. And that’s how it’ll be with you – and me. Here, let me have that baby – give me the two of ’em, and I’ll wash and change ’em before I go, for I don’t expect I shall be with you very early in the morning after this jaunt.’
After she had washed and changed the two babies she placed them back in the bed with Saran. ‘There, they’re all right for the night now. I’ve told Marged to make you a drop of gruel, and after you take that you’ll be all right for the night, too. Now, is there anything else you want?’
‘Yes; I’d like if you’d ask Mrs Ward’s gel, Gwen, to go and ask Twm Steppwr to come up to see me tonight for certain. Gwen knows where he stays.’
‘Ay; and so do I, and a nice place it is, though it’s plenty good enough for the likes of him. Smith’s lodging house, down by the Iron Bridge, isn’t it?’
‘Yes; and tell the gel to mind to ask for the man as plays the concertina, for that’s how they know him best down that way.’
In less than an hour Steppwr, with his concertina under his arm as always, was standing at the side of Saran’s bed.
‘I want you to go down to the Rhondda to let Harry know about mother,’ she said. ‘But tell him he needn’t come up here and risk getting six months in jail, for we’ll see that she’s buried tidy. I don’t want him to come up here and be nabbed, yet I feel that he’d never forgive me if I didn’t let him know.’
Steppwr started off early the following morning on foot, and by nightfall he was in that part of the Rhondda Valley where Harry by this time had made a bad name for himself. He had met and defeated the ten best bare-knuckle bruisers in the valley, had run up a score behind the scoring-doors of all the pubs he had patronised, and he was a fancy lodger in the house of a childless couple, a house in which what the French are said to call a ménage à trois was the order of things.
But when he got to the place Steppwr didn’t go to the house for the reason that he was almost certain that Harry at that time in the evening was settling himself down in some pub or other. He first tried the Welsh Harp. Not there, but he found him in the Adam and Eve playing dominoes. As soon as Harry saw Steppwr with his concertina under his arm walking into the bar of the Adam and Eve he jumped up with his pint in his hand. ‘Here’s Steppwr,’ he cried joyfully, bounding towards him. ‘Here, drink that up whilst they’re filling you a pint,’ he said, holding out his pint to Steppwr.
‘But…’
‘Drink that up, I tell you.’
Steppwr drank it up.
‘Now sit there. Fill two pints, missus. When did you have grub last, Steppwr?’
‘I had a bit when resting on top of the Aberdare mountain about middle day.’
‘And some bread and cheese as well, missus,’ roared Harry as though he owned the place. ‘Damn, Steppwr, but you’re a sight for sore eyes…’
‘But, listen…’
‘Shut your mouth until you’ve been stuffed. Ah, here’s the two pints for a start. Drink up, I’ll go to the kitchen to hurry up that grub.’
The bar was full to overflowing in less than five minutes after the word had gone round that the little chap from Merthyr who played so well on the concertina was in the Adam and Eve. So ‘drink up’ it was. The landlord and his wife were very glad to see Steppwr any time, for he could draw the crowd with his playing, singing, and dancing, and that’s why the landlady hurried to execute the orders Harry gave to provide the wandering minstrel with all he required in the way of food and drink.
After Steppwr had drunk two and a half pints of beer and eaten some of the bread and cheese set before him, he was ready to commence his one-man show, which Harry produced with pride, but without trimmings.
‘Now, order, everybody. I’m not calling on Steppwr to oblige until I get the best of order; and once he starts playing there’s to be no drinks called for or served until he’s finished the item. I hope I’ve made myself quite clear, for if anybody makes a sound whilst he’s playing, then they’ll get this under the ear,’ he threatened, exhibiting his leg-of-mutton-like right fist. ‘It isn’t every day we get the chance of listening to him. Now, order.’ And there was order. ‘Right, Steppwr.’
Steppwr led off with ‘Alice, Where Art Thou?’ with variations, which brought the place down, and which he followed with a number of other items before he got too drunk to play, sing or dance. Then the landlord took up a collection for him, just before chucking-out time. When the money collected was handed to him Steppwr took it and in a lordly manner dropped it carelessly into his right-hand coat pocket without counting it.
‘Come on home wi’ me,’ said Harry, who had a quart bottle of beer in two of his coat pockets. ‘You’re sleeping wi’ me tonight.’
When the woman of the house called Harry to go to work in the pit at five o’clock next morning she was told by him to ‘go to hell out of here’, and she went out. Harry went back to sleep until nine o’clock, at which hour he sat up in bed and began to groan: ‘Oh, my bloody head.’ He looked sourly at Steppwr, who was snoring like anything. ‘Hoy, Steppwr. Come on, wake up, and let’s go out for a livener.’ He got out of bed and began to dress himself. ‘Oh, I’ve got a head like a bucket.’
‘What time is it?’ asked Steppwr, sitting up in the bed.
‘Time we had a livener. Here’s your trousers,’ he said, picking them up off the floor and tossing them on to the bed. ‘Your coat and waistcoat’s on the bed.’
‘Ay, and there’s some money on the bed as well,’ said Steppwr. ‘And silver as well as copper. Oh, damn, I remember now. The collection. Why, we’re in God’s pocket, Harry, we’re right for a spree today. But half a minute. Didn’t I tell you last night, Harry?’
‘Tell me what?’
‘About the old woman, your mother.’
‘Damned if I remember. What about her?’
‘Well, she’s – she’s – well, dead.’
Harry lowered himself on to the side of the bed. ‘Mam – dead?’
‘Ay, died day before… was it? Ay, day before yesterday. I expect they’ll bury her tomorrow. Saran it was that told me to tell you; but she said it was no good you getting yourself nabbed…’
‘And so mam is gone,’ Harry was murmuring as he looked straight at nothing at all. ‘She’s gone.’
‘Ay, she’s gone.’ Steppwr went on dressing himself, but he hadn’t finished when Harry rose from where he had been sitting on the edge of the bed and cried: ‘Come on, for God’s sake let’s get out somewhere,’ and downstairs and out of the house he rushed, but he didn’t make a beeline for a pub to get the livener he was saying he so badly wanted but a short while before. No, he passed pub after pub and, crossing the square, he started to climb to the top of Rhondda’s highest mountain. And there on top of the mountain Steppwr for the first time saw Harry shedding tears. He let him cry on whilst he had a smoke an
d watched trucks of coal being marshalled into trains near the pit-heads down in the valley below, trains which would soon be on their way to Cardiff Docks to make up cargoes of ‘Best Welsh’ for various parts of the world.
Harry had stopped crying. ‘When did you say they were buryin’?’ he asked.
‘Tomorrow, in the new Cefn cemetery.’
‘I’d give anything to be able to go to Merthyr to walk behind her for the last time, but I’d like to go tidy all the same. This thing’s the only suit to my name, and this….’ He shook his head.
Steppwr glanced at the suit, then he, too, shook his head. ‘No, you can’t walk behind her in that thing. It’s not black for a start, neither is it…’
‘You don’t need to tell me. So she’ll have to go on her last journey without a man b’longing to her follering.’
‘Glyn, Saran’s husband will be there.’
‘What was he to mother? Nothing; I’m thinking of the old man and we three boys. The old man gone, and our Ike went before him out in Zululand. Shoni – swine as he is – God knows where. He may be dead too. So there’s only me to follow her, and the only suit I’ve got in rags.’
‘P’raps it’s just as well you can’t go, for if you went and the police spotted you – and they’ll sure as hell spot you – it would mean at least six months, and maybe a hiding from them into the bargain.’
‘If I had a decent suit I’d go even if it meant six years and a dozen hidings.’
‘Well, if that’s how you feel, we’d better see what we can do. What about that man of the house where you lodge? Has he got a suit to lend you to go to the funeral?’
‘No, he’s worse off for clothes than I am.’
They sat there in silence looking down into the valley for some time.
‘Come on,’ commanded Steppwr, rising to his feet.
‘Where to?’
‘You’ll soon know.’
Steppwr led the way down the mountainside, and soon they were back down in the township and in the main street opposite the pub where Steppwr had entertained the patrons on the evening previous. As he was about to turn in Harry caught him by the arm, stopped him and said: ‘No, no drink for me this day, Steppwr.’
‘Who’s asking you to drink? I’ve a bit of business to talk over with the landlord, so come on in for a minute and wait.’
Harry followed him into the bar and seated himself in a corner as Steppwr went forward to where the landlord was smiling a welcome from behind the bar.
‘Two pints – or would you prefer a quart?’ he asked. ‘Have whichever you like, for you’re having this with me.’
‘Then two pints,’ said Steppwr, one of which he took across to where Harry was seated moping in the corner, and left the pint on the table for him to drink it or not, just as he liked, but Harry managed to drink it all right as soon as Steppwr went off and stood breasting the bar whilst he talked with the landlord, who started by saying: ‘Boy, we had a great time last night, and it’s a thousand pities you are not staying here in the Rhondda with us. But what’s the matter with Harry today? Looks like a summons.’
‘Ay, he’s had a knock-out blow; the old woman, his mother, is dead.’
‘Ah, pity, pity. Well, such is life. You’ll excuse me for…’
‘I was wanting to have a talk with you in private – important.’
‘Well, I’m sure I don’t know; the wife is busy in the kitchen…’
‘Come on, we’ll go into the kitchen to talk, and she can come and look after the bar. Won’t keep you a minute. But fill this pint and bring it to me in the kitchen.’
Steppwr walked out of the bar to the passage and along to the kitchen with the air of one about to confer a signal favour on somebody, and the way he carried it off so impressed the landlord that he took a pint into the kitchen and told his wife to go and look after the bar whilst he talked to Steppwr.
‘Your very good health,’ said Steppwr. ‘A drop of good beer, that. Now, I want you to do me a favour.’
‘Certainly, if it’s any way possible.’
‘It is, and I’ll do you one in return. Now, Harry wants to go to his old mother’s funeral.’
‘Naturally.’
‘As you say; but he hasn’t got a rag of clothes other than that old suit he’s now wearing; and I’m sure you wouldn’t like to be seen in your mother’s funeral in a suit like that, would you?’
‘Good God, no.’
‘No more would I. Yet poor old Harry’s breaking his heart to go, so if you’d only…’
‘Here, just a minute. If you’re going to ask me to lend him the money to get a suit, then you can save your breath. My oath you can. Why, do you know how much that chap owes me for beer?’
‘Beer. Now, who’s talking about beer? Or money? I’m not going to ask you to strap him beer or lend him money. But you’re about his size; and what I’m asking you to do is to lend him your suit of black just for one day to…’
‘What, my suit of black that cost me seven guineas money down to Evans the tailor for him to go and get drunk in? Why, I’d see him…’
‘Now, hold your horses; he’ll not get drunk in it, for there’ll be somebody in Merthyr as’ll stop him getting drunk in your clothes or in any other clothes. And won’t I be there? Now, if you’ll lend him the suit so as he can look a bit decent at the old woman’s funeral – and I’ll guarantee that it comes back as good as when he gets it – I’ll stay and entertain your customers tonight again, and I’ll do so for a couple of nights when we bring you the suit back, and without charge or asking for a collection.’
‘I tell you that I’m not lending my black suit that I paid seven…’
‘Oh, never mind the price. If you won’t, then you won’t, and that’s the end of it. Maybe the landlord of the Black Lion’ll oblige me, for he’s as near as damn it Harry’s size. Thank you for the couple of pints, and…’
‘Wait a minute,’ cried the landlord, who was as anxious as any man in the booze business to quickly gather a pile of money so as he and his wife could go and live retired on it at some nice seaside place where he and his wife could be respected members of a chapel again. And to attain that desirable end the help of men like Steppwr was not to be sneezed at, for as a pub entertainer Steppwr was undoubtedly the greatest draw in South Wales and Monmouthshire, and if he was in the Black Lion just across the road, then it would be there that the majority of the good spenders would be listening to him and drinking Black Lion beer, which he often heard from customers was nothing better than cats’ piss. But the chaps would put up with that stuff to have the pleasure of being entertained by Steppwr. ‘Now, if it was you wanted the suit…’
‘It is me that wants it – for Harry, but it’s me that’s willing to hold myself responsible for it. Well, what about it?’
After he had considered the matter for a while, the landlord said: ‘I must have a word with the wife… no, no, you stay where you are and finish your pint.’
‘I’ve finished it.’
‘Then I’ll bring you one back with me after I’ve talked this matter over with the wife. Smoke your pipe, here’s some ’bacco.’ In less than a minute the landlord was back in the kitchen. ‘Can I rely on you bringing my suit as I paid seven guineas for back to me as good as I give it you?’
‘As sure as my name’s Twm Steppwr.’
He looked rather doubtful when he said: ‘Very well, then.’
‘Good; we’ll have Harry in here to try it on, just the coat and waistcoat, that’s all.’
The landlord called his wife from the bar to get the clothes.
‘There’s nobody looking after the bar,’ she reminded him.
‘I’m going into the bar, and I’ll send Harry in here to you.’
The suit fitted Harry like a glove.
‘I thought it would,’ said Steppwr airily to the landlord.
‘Did you?’ said the landlord grudgingly.
‘Yes. Look, Harry’s brighter already; and you’ll be after
the business you’ll do tonight if only you’ll send the word round that I’m to be here at six o’clock sharp; and long before stop-tap you’ll be able to sell ’em the wife’s water – and your own – as Harrap’s XXX, for they won’t know the difference. We’re off up to Harry’s lodging to get some grub and a couple of hours’ doss, but we’ll be with you at six sharp.’
And they were. As they were on their way to the pub Steppwr said to the now much brighter Harry: ‘If we sweeten the old miser a bit, and business turns out to be as good as I expect, then p’raps I may be able to persuade him to lend you his ’lastic-sided boots and bowler hat to go with the suit. Then you’ll look grand, Harry.’
Harry’s face saddened again. ‘I haven’t got much stomach for sitting in a pub all night, and her in her coffin.’
‘Well, if she knew, I don’t think the old woman would mind us working in a pub to get the lend of a suit and things for you.’
‘Think she wouldn’t, Steppwr?’
‘No fear she wouldn’t. Here we are.’
The place was heaving with night workers who would soon be leaving for their work, but not before they were relieved by the day workers, who would hurry along in their pit clothes and with their breath in their fist when they saw the notice that the landlord had stuck up on a post near the point where the workers from four pits passed on their way home, just a simple notice which read: ‘Twm Steppwr will be obliging at the Adam and Eve from six to eleven tonight.’ That was quite enough. Steppwr worked through those five hours without the assistance of Harry as compere. He played and played again and again; he sang and sang again and again; danced and danced again; drank… and when eleven o’clock came his audience still called for more. But the landlord and his wife and helpers for the evening were all shouting in chorus that it was time, and they hurried the chaps out to face the night and their wives, for the landlord had had the wire that Sergeant Daniels was watching his place in the shadow of the Black Lion, which had been practically empty all the evening.