by Jack Jones
The driver looked up at her in a way that clearly revealed what he thought about her and her sort, whom he had seen hundreds of times on their way down from the coke ovens with the different chaps they had spent the nights with there. Still, in a case like this it was no use being finicky. ‘All right, you run and fetch the doctor, Jim,’ he said to his mate. ‘Dr Webster’s surgery’s nearest…. And tell him he’d better be quick. Never mind messing about with his head,’ he shouted at Nell as his mate ran off to fetch the doctor. ‘Let’s have that shawl of yours to tie tight this end of his leg, my scarf’ll be long enough to go round the lower end. Now, pull. What the hell’s the matter with you? Pull, can’t you?’
By the time they had done all they could for Harry the driver was a little less harsh in his manner and speech to Nell.
‘Who is he?’ he asked her.
‘Harry… I don’t know his other name.’
‘Where do he live?’
‘Where I stays, over Smith’s lodging house.’
‘Ay; but where’s his home?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Do you know if he’s got anybody b’longing to him?’
‘I’ve heard him talk about his sister…. But I know who can tell you. The little chap as plays the concertina, he stays over Smith’s lodging house, too.’
‘I wish that doctor was here,’ murmured the driver as Harry moaned. ‘Here, how long will you be, fetching that concertina chap?’
‘Not long,’ said Nell as she started off.
She was back with Steppwr before the doctor arrived on the scene, and Steppwr told the anxious driver who Harry was.
‘Here’s your mate coming with the doctor,’ cried Nell.
It wasn’t Dr Webster or his chief assistant, but the young assistant. Some swore that he was better with the knife than any of the other doctors in the district.
‘The sooner we get him to the hospital the better,’ he said after he had examined Harry and expertly stopped the bleeding. ‘I’m going back to the surgery to report to Dr Webster and to get some things. Let me see, now. How can we get him there?’
From where they stood grouped around the prostrate Harry, Steppwr saw Jack Gray’s pony and float being driven by Jack himself over the canal bridge towards the market for the day’s stock of fruit, fish and vegetables, which Jack hawked for a living. ‘There’s Jack Gray in his flat cart,’ cried Steppwr, pointing. ‘I think he’ll run him up, for Harry’s sister, Saran, is one of Jack’s best customers.’
‘After him, then,’ cried the doctor.
And off Steppwr raced. After a little grumbling about the likelihood of all the best stuff being sold by the wholesalers before he could get back to the market from the hospital, Jack Gray turned his pony round and drove to where Harry was waiting in an unconscious state to be picked up.
‘Lord, I’ll have to scrub my bloody float after I’ve unloaded him,’ cried Jack Gray.
‘Go on, take the bloody man to the hospital,’ said the engine-driver, who was anxious to get away for the coal they were waiting for at the steelworks.
Jack drove off with Harry on board, with Steppwr trotting alongside. Gypsy Nell accompanied them as far as the Patriot, where she turned in for the drink she felt so badly in need of, leaving her now blood-stained shawl under Harry’s head to keep it up off the wooden bottom of the float, which, driven along the main street by Jack with Steppwr trotting alongside, attracted considerable attention. But neither the pony, Jack nor Steppwr had time to answer any of the many inquiries which were shouted after them, such as: ‘What’s happened? Who is it?’ and so on.
Jack was driving past the Theatre Royal and Opera House when Harry came to himself and cried: ‘Where the hell am I?’ probably thinking he was in heaven when he opened his eyes to see the beautiful morning sky above him. Then he turned his head sideways to find Steppwr, now almost winded, for Jack trotted the pony most of the way, running alongside. ‘Steppwr; what’s up… oh, my bloody leg.’
‘Lie quiet, Harry.’
‘Where are they taking me to, Steppwr?’
‘Up to the hospital – very near there,’ gasped Steppwr.
‘Stop. Stop, I tell you,’ roared Harry, and Jack pulled up as passers-by left the pavements to step into the road to see who it was that was shouting.
‘Now, see here, I’ve got to get back to the market for my day’s stock,’ Jack explained. ‘And before doing that I shall have to scrub the bottom…’
‘Turn your horse round,’ said Harry, who by now was able to grasp the situation.
‘Yes, when I’ve dropped you at the hospital, and not…’
‘Do as I tell you before I throw myself out of this cart of yours. I tell you I’m not going to any hospital, so…’
‘But your leg’s damned near off, man,’ Jack told him. ‘And the doctor said…’
‘Never mind what he said; I’m going to no hospital.’
‘Talk sense, Harry. What the hell am I to do with you.’
There was a crowd around the cart by this time, and one of the crowd, who lost patience as Jack Gray had, cried out: ‘Take the bastard to Bolton’s, the horse-slaughterer, Jack.’
‘Jack, please, Jack,’ faintly and humbly now Harry cried. ‘Don’t take me to that hospital, please. Tell him not to take me to that place, Steppwr. Tell him to take me to our Saran’s, will you, Steppwr? She’ll look after me. Will you take me to my sister’s house, Jack, please? Oh, this leg.’
Touched more than he outwardly showed, Jack tried to hide his feeling by shouting to those around the float: ‘Get out of the bloody way so as a chap can turn round.’ The crowd made way and away Jack drove in the direction of Saran’s house. First to the left after passing the new Theatre Royal and Opera House, where The Grip of Iron was drawing crowded houses that week, then to the left again as soon as he had crossed the bridge over the stinking brook, then right up the hill, leaving the magnificent cathedral-like brewery building on the right.
‘Hullo, Steppwr,’ said Saran with a smile as soon as she opened the door and saw who was standing on her doorstep. Then looking past him to where the cart stood in the road before the house: ‘What in the name of God have you got there?’
‘It’s Harry, and…’
‘Drunk, is he?’
‘No, his leg’s damned near off, Saran. Knocked down by the engine, and the doctor said he was to be taken to the hospital, but Harry says he’ll go to hell first…’
‘Give me a hand to get him into the house and upstairs.’
‘I’ve had a bloody time of it with this brother of yours, Saran,’ said Jack Gray as she approached the cart to superintend the unloading of Harry.
‘You’ll lose nothing by it,’ she assured him. Neither did he.
When the old doctor, who was Saran’s family doctor, and a well-paid family doctor at that, for he drew twopence out of every pound of the earnings of all Saran’s pit-workers for as long as he lived… well, when he arrived with the young assistant carrying the tools in the bag, he shouted at Saran like anything.
‘What kind of a game do you call this, Saran?’ he wanted to know. ‘When I and my assistant got to the hospital…’
‘But I sent Steppwr over to the hospital to tell them there to let you know where he was, doctor.’
‘I know; and I’ve come here to tell you that he’s to go back there at once. We can’t do anything with him here.’
‘Then you’re not likely to do anything with him ever, for he won’t let you take him to the hospital – I wish he would, for I know he’d get better tendance there than I can give him here with all these children to look after. But he’s like my Glyn and a many more, doctor; swears he’ll die before he’ll go there.’
‘Of all the… do you think it’s any use me talking to him, Saran?’
‘Not a bit, doctor. He’d have been in the hospital ready for you if talking could have got him there. For you know I’m for the hospital, doctor.’
The old docto
r stood scratching his head. Then he sent his assistant over to the hospital to get a few things, and when the assistant came back to Saran’s house with the few things they worked on Harry with Saran as co-opted assistant and took his leg off just above the knee-joint. There wasn’t much the matter with his head, though he had to have a couple of stitches in his head, too. After the two doctors had gone off in the doctor’s high-wheeled trap Saran returned to where Steppwr was sitting in the kitchen and said: ‘You’d better go up and sit by his side ready to talk to him when he comes to hisself, for I can’t stay up there with him with the children coming home for their dinners, and things to get for Glyn’s and the boys’ suppers by the time they come home from the pit. I expect Glyn’ll be mad when he hears that Harry’s upstairs, for he and Harry was never the best of friends, but whatever Glyn says he’s staying until he’s able to get about again, and after that if only he’ll behave hisself. You’d better have a cup of tea and a bit to eat before you go up to sit with him; I don’t suppose he’ll want more than a cup of tea to drink when he comes to himself.’
That night, Glyn, who about that time was working in a wet place in the pit, a place where water dropped from the roof on to his back most of the time, hurried home to get his wet things off; he walked all the way home with Sam, the boy then working with him.
‘You’re early, ain’t you?’ said Saran as he entered.
Glyn looked up at the kitchen ceiling and listened for a few seconds before asking: ‘Who’s upstairs?’
‘Our Harry, and Steppwr, your brother-in-law,’ she replied.
‘Harry and… what the hell can you say they’re doing upstairs in my house, woman?’
She explained briefly.
‘But couldn’t they have taken him to the hospital?’
‘They could if he let ’em, which he wouldn’t, for he don’t like that hospital any better than you do. Take those wet clothes off; I’ve got the hot water ready for you to wash. Hurry up.’
‘Well, this is a damned fine lookout,’ grumbled Glyn as he began undressing. Then as he started to wash himself kneeling over the tub of hot water. ‘A nice feller he is to have in the house…. And he’ll be here for months,’ he cried out in alarm at the prospect.
‘P’raps you’d like me to send him to the workhouse?’ said Saran.
‘There’s better bloody men than him there.’
‘Then if that’s the case there’s the hell of a sight better bloody men than you there.’
‘Am I a scamp? A blackguard? A whore-master? And…’
Saran stopped his mouth with the washing flannel. ‘Now, simmer down, Glyn, my boy; for if he heard you talking as you are he’d get up and hop on one leg out of this house in the shape he is, and that would be the death of him. Don’t worry, you won’t have to go short of anything because he’s with us.’
‘Well, if Steppwr’s going to be here as his…’
‘You know damned well that Steppwr would rather starve than…’
‘I know damned well that you’ll talk white black…’
The rest was lost as he buried his coal-dusty head under the water in the tub. Saran went on laying supper, for by now the other two boys were home from the pit and shouting up to Sam to hurry out of the bathroom so as they could get there to bath. For the next hour Saran and her Jane were busy feeding and waiting on the pit-men, all of whom were in a hurry to get out to somewhere or other where the hard, wet and dangerous labour of the day could be forgotten for a short time. The boys had hurried out before their father, who complained that they got far more attention from Saran than ever he did.
‘Don’t tell your lies,’ Saran said as she handed him his bowler hat after brushing it. Then as he was about to walk out of the house: ‘You wouldn’t be mean enough to walk out without as much as going up to say how-do to him, would you?’ Oh, the way she said it.
‘Oh, I forgot,’ he said.
‘I thought so,’ she said as he went upstairs to where Harry lay. ‘Tell Steppwr to come back down with you, for I shall be going to sit with my brother for the rest of the time before bedtime.’
Having thrown Harry the bare bone of an invitation to stay until he was able to get about again, Glyn turned to Steppwr as he was going out of the room and said: ‘Saran wants you downstairs.’ And off down and out of the house he went, thinking: ‘I’m a workman, they’re a pair of rodneys as have always dodged work. So why should I be nice to them?’
‘Here,’ Saran was saying as she handed Steppwr a shilling. ‘Go on, take it. I want you to run up here most days now that Harry is with us, for it’s little time I’ll have to sit and talk to him, and both of us know how he gets when he’s got to lie by himself for any time. So you’ll be doing me a favour by coming up every day. Don’t take any notice of Glyn’s sour looks, and tell Harry not to, either. S’long, Steppwr.’
And that’s how it was for the best part of six months. Each day the concertina man would play a little and talk a lot to keep Harry from moping; and as soon as Glyn arrived home from the pit each night Steppwr would take his leave with the usual shilling from Saran to pay for his bed and a couple of pints and a bit of food. And during Harry’s convalescence Saran rigged Steppwr out in a barely worn suit that her Benny had left behind when he went and joined the Army, and also a good flannel shirt and a good pair of boots. But that was nothing to what she insisted on doing for Harry when he, as soon as he could bear the weight of his body on the stump of his leg when strapped to the wooden peg leg which was now his from the left knee down, said he wasn’t going to stay any longer where he wasn’t wanted.
‘Glyn don’t mind you staying, it’s only his old way, that’s all,’ said Saran.
‘It may be, but though I might take a drink with him some time again, I go to hell if I live under the same roof any longer. I know it’s his house, and… ah, well, we never have liked each other much.’
‘That’s not his fault.’
‘I’m not saying it is, Saran. I suppose that I’m one of these awkward buggers as don’t know how to…’ He bent down to adjust one of the straps fastened around the stump of his leg. ‘Bit tight for a start,’ he explained. Then he stumped experimentally to where Saran stood watching him. Steppwr watched from the foot of the stairs. ‘Not so bad for a start, Steppwr, is it? In about a week I’ll be able to hop about just as well as I used to.’ Then seriously, as he placed a big hand on Saran’s shoulder. ‘I’m off, then, Saran bach. You’ve been – well, what I knew you’d be to me. If I was any bloody good at all I’d know how to tell you… come on, Steppwr, let’s push off.’ And he stumped out of the house with his eyes full of tears; and Saran followed him to the doorstep, where she stood watching him gingerly stumping his way down the road leading into town. There were tears in her eyes, too, but before they came out she shook her head impatiently and went back into the house, where there was a bellyful of work awaiting her, for it was washing-day, and she was going to try and do the bedclothes of the bed on which Harry had been lying for nearly six months, for it was a lovely drying-day, and if she left them she might not get such another drying-day for a long time. So she started on her big wash about the time Harry and Steppwr were finishing their second pint in the Bird in Hand, where Harry was demonstrating the qualities of the peg leg. ‘Damn near as good as the other leg,’ he swore it was.
CHAPTER 10
BREAKAWAYS
Benny returned to civilian life to play his part in the breaking up of the family which his leaving for the Army had started. He returned to find that Hugh had had to get married in a hurry, and that he had gone to work and live at Senghenydd, his wife’s home town. ‘Time some of us got married or something,’ grumbled Benny after he had been back a week in the overcrowded home. True, they were one less than when he had left for the Army, but they had all grown so, he hardly knew his brothers when he returned home to them, and having grown so they took up more room. What with their bikes and clothes… And the rows. Boys three in a bed, for Jane by n
ow had to have a room of her own. And Benny wanted a room of his own, but his mother said: ‘Don’t be silly, boy; you’re not a young woman like Jane is. So tumble in with the rest.’
Big-sorted, that’s what Benny was, thought the other brothers as soon as the close contact with him had like a late frost killed the hero-worship that had developed during his absence abroad. And Benny shouted at the little boys, and was thrashing one for refusing to go and get him cigarettes, when Meurig rose from the table and said: ‘Let the kid alone, our Benny.’ Then there was a fight, and the next day Meurig went off to the Rhondda to work, said he’d had enough of Benny’s domineering ways.
‘I don’t know what’s coming over ’em,’ Saran would sigh.
‘They’re all getting too damned big for their boots, especially that chap back from India,’ said Glyn, one night after Meurig’s departure when they were alone in the house. ‘To hear him talk – “Told the gaffer the other day” – but there, they’re all alike. Now, Lewis, there’s a mouthy little swine if you like. Last night, puts his things on, and off away and up the pit, leaving me to finish off the tram myself, said he was off to see a fight between that Ike Bradley and somebody. If only we had as much sense as sparrows, and drove ’em out as soon as they’re able to take care of themselves. I shan’t be sorry when some of the others follow Meurig to the Rhondda, or Hugh to Senghen…’
‘Yes, no doubt you’d be glad to see ’em all go.’
‘I shouldn’t worry, for it’s work I’ll have to…’
‘Mam, mam,’ cried young Mervyn as he ran into the kitchen. ‘Uncle Steppwr wants that crutch Uncle Harry used before his peg leg was…’
‘Now, take a breath. Now, who wants the crutch?’
‘Uncle Harry, of course. He’s been fighting – I seen him fighting with his back ’gainst the wall and his peg drove into the ground. We boys were playing fire across the road when Uncle Harry rushed out of the Tanyard Inn, threw his coat in the air; and when he was fixing hisself against the wall Uncle Steppwr came out of the Tanyard Inn and said, “Don’t be a damned fool, Harry,” but Uncle Harry kept shouting for that Wat Morris to come out of the Tanyard Inn…’