‘You let Maisie go to the dance without a chaperon and not Liza?’
‘Maisie’s not going to the dance, not that it would make any difference if she were. She’s the same age as me and her free time is her own. Liza’s only sixteen and my responsibility.’
‘Can’t your aunt look after your children?’
‘Not on St Valentine’s Day. Dino’s taking her to the dance.’
‘So you’ll be alone on the most romantic night of the year?’
‘I have my memories, and,’ she smiled, ‘now that you Americans are here and optimism is in the air, the hope that this might be the last St Valentine’s I’ll be spending by myself.’
‘I think that might be a little too much optimism, Mrs John. Even for the Allies,’ he said grimly as he finished his tea and carried his cup to the sink.
The winding gear turned as the cage creaked, groaned and shuddered its heavily burdened way to the floor of the shaft. Mogg pushed the doors open and stood back, watching as the mass of men shouldered their tools and headed for the coal faces.
‘Got paper and pencil, Joe?’ Evan asked as they waited for everyone to leave.
Pulling a pencil from behind his ear, he nodded.
‘So have I. It might be an idea for both of us to keep a tally.’ Stepping carefully around a pile of horse manure Evan made for the twisted steel prop that had attracted Alexander’s attention the day before. ‘Shall we start?’
‘I didn’t expect to see you in today, Jane,’ Jenny commented as they fought their way through the crowds in the station, past the booking office and up the steps to the platform.
‘I didn’t fancy a fine.’
‘Management’s not that strict. Sally took five days off when her husband was given leave. They didn’t even know where she was until she came back after he’d gone, and no one seemed to care. Her pay just got docked for the days she didn’t work. She said it would have been worth it at twice the price. And like her, you can’t be that desperate for the money.’
‘No.’
‘Haydn told me yesterday he’s only got three days.’
‘He has.’
‘Then you shouldn’t have come in. I would have told them he was home.’
‘It’s all right. He’s tired and could do with the sleep anyway.’
Jenny eyed her sister-in-law, but the blackout shrouded her face. ‘It can’t be easy only seeing him now and again,’ she murmured as the train came in and they pushed into a carriage.
‘It’s the same for every forces wife.’
‘Jane, what are you doing here?’ Judy plonked herself into a narrow gap on the bench seat opposite her, wriggling until she’d forced the two girls on either side of her to make room. ‘I saw Haydn in the café last night.’
‘Don’t tell me he’s abandoned his chorus girls? What will the Pictorial do on Sunday?’
‘Not print a picture of you, Maggie, that’s for sure,’ Judy retorted tartly.
‘Ooh, nasty. What’s the matter? A Yank keep you up all night?’
‘Actually, sad thoughts of pathetic old maids like you.’
‘Ladies, it’s too early in the morning to quarrel,’ Jenny yawned. ‘Surely you’re only going in to ask for leave, Jane?’
‘I thought I’d ask for tomorrow and the day after off.’
‘What about today?’
‘Haydn’s tired.’
‘I bet he is.’ Having come off worse in her exchange with Judy, Maggie turned her attention to Jane. ‘All that prancing around with chorus girls must take it out of a man.’
‘If you must know, Maggie, it does,’ Jane bit back viciously.
‘Hey, I was only joking.’
‘Sometimes you push it too far, Maggie, and,’ Judy smiled maliciously as she flung the final insult, ‘what you should remember is that you haven’t even got a man for us to joke about.’
‘You’re not taking Anne out in this?’ Phyllis asked as Haydn lifted his daughter’s coat down from the hooks behind the front door and carried it into the back kitchen.
‘All kids like snow.’
‘Snow maybe, but not a blizzard.’
‘I thought I’d call in on Megan and see if Diana’s around, or telephone Bethan’s to find out if she’s home.’
‘And Anne’s dinner?’
‘We’ll go to the café. Want to come?’
‘It’s my baking day.’
‘Take a break for once?’
Phyllis looked out of the window at the snow that was still falling, thick and fast. She shook her head.
‘Coward.’
‘I always have been.’ For all the banter, she couldn’t help feeling that Haydn’s attention was elsewhere. ‘If you see Bethan, Megan and Diana, invite them and the children up for tea. It would be nice to have a family party to celebrate your homecoming.’
‘What about food?’
‘I can see you’re not used to living in the real world. They’ll bring a contribution.’
‘Here, snookems.’ Haydn put away the wooden jigsaw he had used to play with Anne all morning as part of his strategy to become reacquainted with his daughter, and held out her coat. ‘Want to come to town with Daddy?’
‘No.’ She stepped back, eyeing him warily from under her eyelashes.
‘Come on, I thought we were mates now. We could meet Mam from the train. She’s in about four, isn’t she?’ he asked Phyllis.
‘About then,’ Phyllis concurred, wondering why Jane hadn’t taken the day off. Reaching down she caught Anne who was trying to hide behind her skirt. ‘Daddy will take you to the café.’
‘See Auntie Tina?’
‘You bet. And I’ll buy you whatever they’re selling.’
‘Surprise pies?’
Haydn looked quizzically at Phyllis.
‘That’s all Tina says she can offer on the menu these days, because no one, least of all her, knows what’s in them.’
‘OK, sweetheart, I’ll buy you the biggest surprise pie Auntie Tina’s got.’
‘I’ll get the pram out of the front room,’ Phyllis offered as Anne ran to the washhouse to exchange her slippers for her boots.
‘No need. I’ll carry her.’
‘She’s heavy.’
‘Not to me.’
‘And if you slip?’
‘Good point, I’ll get it.’
‘Don’t forget the rubber sheet to put over the blankets or she’ll be soaked to the skin.’
Phyllis watched as Haydn, all fingers and thumbs, strapped Anne into the pushchair. When he’d finally succeeded in covering her to Phyllis’s satisfaction he wheeled the chair down the passage and out through the front door. Carrying it carefully, he negotiated the steps and set off down the road. He wasn’t even sure why he’d insisted on going out in a snowstorm. He only knew that he had to see Jane, and the sooner the better. He needed to assure her that their marriage was worth saving, and himself; that she would give him another chance.
A glimpse of the top of Anne’s fur-trimmed bonnet was enough to rouse his guilt. He’d been a fool, and a stupid one at that, but he was determined that it was for the first and last time, and if Jane would only let him, he would never do anything to hurt her or Anne, ever again.
Richard Reide surveyed the bank. It was solid, substantial, the walls panelled in dark wood, lending the atmosphere a sombre, hallowed air, almost like that of a church. Soberly suited men past military age sat at desks in a large well behind brass-trimmed mahogany counters, while women manned the cashiers’ points. He glanced along the row of clerks. Anthea was perched on a stool next to the wall that divided the public area from the private offices, her head bent over a ledger, a pile of notes in her hand.
He walked up and rapped the counter in front of her with his knuckles. ‘I’d like to complain about the service in this place.’
‘Richard.’ She flushed in surprise, conscious of the other girls listening in. ‘What are you doing here at this time of day?’
�
�Seeing my girl.’
‘It’s still on for tonight, isn’t it?’
‘Of course. I’ve just found myself free for an hour and I wondered if you’d like lunch. We could go to one of the cafés.’
She glanced at the clock. ‘I’m not due to take my break for another hour.’
‘I thought you had special pull with the boss?’
‘Daddy hates me asking for favours in work.’
‘Just this once? I have something to show you.’
‘What?’ she asked excitedly.
‘Come with me and find out.’
‘Richard, are you viewing the bank with a view to investing with us?’ Mr Llewellyn-Jones left the exclusive precincts of his private office and crossed the floor.
‘Not today, sir. Uncle Sam likes his troopers to put all the dollars they can spare into US of A stock. I was hoping to persuade my fiancée to lunch with me.’
‘Now?’
‘Afraid it’s now or never, sir. The army waits for no man.’
Ignoring the stares of the staff, Mr Llewellyn-Jones turned to Anthea. ‘You may take an early break, Miss Llewellyn-Jones.’
‘Thank you, sir.’ Knowing how her father hated any familiarity when he was working she’d been taken aback by his cordial attitude towards Richard, but she was still careful to observe the formality he insisted on in the office. ‘I won’t be a moment, Richard. I’ll just get my coat.’
‘You brought Anthea home late last night,’ Mr Llewellyn-Jones murmured as she left them.
‘I’m sorry, sir, it won’t happen again.’
‘I quite understand. I saw the ring.’
‘You approve, sir?’
‘I do. You are coming to dinner tonight?’
‘Wild horses wouldn’t keep me away, sir.’
‘Good.’ He nodded to his daughter as she lifted the flap in the counter. ‘Back in one hour, Miss Llewellyn-Jones.’
She nodded, beaming with pride as Richard offered her his arm, revelling in the envious glances of the other girls as they headed through the door.
‘Where are we eating?’
‘An exclusive little restaurant. I persuaded the cook to grill us a couple of steaks.’
‘Steaks … real beef steaks?’
‘Is there any other kind?’ He looked around to make sure no one was close enough to overhear their conversation as they crossed the road by the fountain. ‘I figure that it will take us ten minutes to eat them and five minutes to get you back on time, which leaves us forty-five minutes.’
‘For what?’
Opening the door at the side of Frank Clayton’s shop he pushed her into the passage. ‘I’ll give you one guess,’ he murmured, before kissing her.
‘Rick …’
‘Sorry, honey, but after last night I couldn’t wait another minute to be with you. Properly, that is.’
‘You said you wanted to show me something?’ she protested as he propelled her up the stairs.
‘And I do.’ Drawing a small box out of his pocket, he handed it to her. ‘Open it. I want to see you wearing them on Saturday.’
‘Oh, Rick!’
‘Like them?’
‘They’re beautiful.’ She fingered a pair of sapphire and gold drop earrings as she removed them from the box.
‘And you will wear them on Saturday?’
‘I can’t wait.’
‘And now?’
She rushed to the mirror. Unscrewing the gold studs her parents had given her on her eighteenth birthday, she replaced them with his present. ‘What do you think?’
‘I think I’d like to see you in those and nothing else.’
‘Rick, the curtains are open. Anyone can see in.’
‘Not in the bedroom, honey. Come on, I hate to rush you, but we’ve no time to waste.’
‘You’re the last person I expected to walk in here today.’ Ronnie lifted his stepson, Billy, on to the counter so he could see Anne.
‘And I thought you were working in munitions?’ Haydn shook the snow from his overcoat and hung it on the stand. Crouching down he removed the rubber cover from the pushchair, careful not to spill any of the snow on to Anne or the blankets.
‘Day off.’
‘And you spend it working here?’
‘Tina and Diana thought that as the weather was so foul it would keep all the other shoppers away so they’ve gone to Cardiff to look for girl things, though I doubt they’ll find anything other than empty shelves and snow. Hello, sunshine.’ He looked down at the pushchair, and winked at Anne who responded by giving him an enormous smile that made Haydn idiotically jealous.
‘She knows her uncle.’
‘I should hope so. After all, I am her uncle twice over. What can I get you intrepid explorers?’
‘I’ll have tea. What would you like, Anne?’
‘Cocoa,’ Ronnie pronounced decisively, ‘milky and sweet and the same for Billy,’ he decreed, smiling at the small boy still perched on the counter.
‘You’ve got a way with kids.’
‘You try growing up as the eldest of eleven. It’s easier to learn to control them than suffer their tantrums. Not that you ever do anything like that.’ He tickled Billy affectionately before handing him over to Haydn. ‘Set him down next to Anne, they can sit at the corner table. It’s the safest place for them while I heat up the milk. Household milk!’ He made a face as he mixed the powder with water. ‘So, how come you’re here instead of cuddled up in bed with your wife?’
‘My wife went to work.’
‘They probably need her in the factory.’
‘Probably,’ Haydn murmured noncommittally. ‘Hopefully she’ll get tomorrow and the day after off.’
‘And then you’re returning to the glamorous world of showbusiness?’
‘It never was very glamorous behind the spotlights, even before the war, and it’s got a sight worse since I’ve been touring in khaki. Sometimes it feels as though the whole bloody world has been dipped in camouflage. The trucks we use to tour the desert, the tents we sleep in, the clothes on our backs, even the canvas buckets we wash in.’
‘That bad?’
‘No,’ Haydn replied sheepishly. ‘Nowhere near as bad as what William and your brothers face every day, or what Eddie faced before he bought it at Dunkirk. Just tiring and tedious. Sorry. Forget I complained. I’ve no right to gripe at my lot when I see what everyone else is going through, and that includes you back home.’
‘As Churchill says, we’re all in this together.’
‘I suppose so.’ Haydn lowered the half-filled cups of cool cocoa to the table where Anne and Billy were sitting, perched on the edges of their chairs, their tiny legs drawn up beneath them as they drew indecipherable pictures with stubs of pencil on the backs of the old bills Ronnie had piled up for them.
‘Homecoming not what you expected?’ Ronnie asked astutely.
‘It’s not easy after being away for so long. Anne didn’t stop screaming at the sight of me until an hour ago.’
‘She’s with you now.’
‘And as soon as I get to know her I’ll have to leave again.’
‘There’s always next time.’
‘I suppose so.’ Haydn took a packet of cigarettes from his breast pocket and offered Ronnie one. He took it and pushed it behind his ear.
‘Is anything else bothering you? … Well, is it?’ Ronnie pressed when Haydn didn’t answer.
‘Nosy bugger, aren’t you?’
‘I hate to see people miserable.’
‘It’s Jane.’
‘Things are bound to be strange between you. You haven’t been home in months.’
‘Ten, and it was six before that.’
‘There you are then. Take a tip from Uncle Ronnie, leave Anne with Phyllis tonight and take Jane out. Go to the pictures, or the Town Hall and cuddle up in the back row. It’s amazing how quickly you can recapture that early courtship feeling in a darkened fleapit.’
‘I think we already have. When we
first met, Jane used to spit and claw like a cornered cat whenever I went near her, and she’s doing the same now.’
‘Then you’re really in trouble?’
Haydn nodded as he pulled a stool close to the counter. He lit his cigarette, holding the lighter out to Ronnie, watching as he lowered his face to the flame. He had known Ronnie all his life, but the Italian was a good eight years older than he. And although he’d married his sister, Maud, they had left for Italy straight after the wedding and there hadn’t been any time to get to know him, not then, nor since his return after Maud’s death. But he had to talk to someone. There was no way he could tell his father what he had done, and he sensed that Bethan, despite the very real affection between them, would quite rightly be furious with him for cheating on Jane. If Eddie had been alive, or his cousin William had been there or even, as an absolute last resort, Bethan’s husband, Andrew, he would have turned to them. But they weren’t and Ronnie was.
‘There was a girl …’ he hesitated, searching for the right words.
‘I take it Jane found out about her?’
‘I told her.’
‘You what!’ Ronnie almost dropped the cup he was holding.
‘She knew something was wrong. I couldn’t keep it from her.’
‘If you’d had any sense you would have lied through your teeth.’
‘You think it would have been better if I had?’
‘Frankly, yes. You’re a complete idiot, you do know that?’
‘Yes.’
‘Where is this girl now?’
‘It was a one-night thing. I couldn’t face her afterwards. As soon as the tour finished I had her taken out of the show.’
‘You must be feeling really proud of yourself.’
‘I saw that she was given another job. A good one. It wasn’t serious. It was just that …’ his voice trailed away lamely as he realised there was no way he could justify what he’d done.
‘You hadn’t been home, and she was there?’
‘So you do understand?’
‘I understand that this war is playing havoc with people’s lives.’
‘Can’t you see that I had to tell Jane the truth?’
‘No. Sometimes, just occasionally, it’s better to tell a lie. And I bet if you ask Jane tonight which she’d have preferred to hear she’d settle for a whopper over that kind of truth any time.’
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