‘Thanks for the advice, but it’s a bit late.’
‘Do you still love Jane?’
‘Of course.’
‘And you told her?’
‘She still wouldn’t come near me. She said she needed time to think. Which is presumably why she went to work.’
‘Put yourself in her place,’ Ronnie advised. ‘How would you feel if you’d come home and she’d told you she’d been having an affair?’
‘I’d want to kill him … and her,’ he added slowly.
‘So what makes you think she should feel any different?’
‘Because she’s a woman and a better person than me?’ Haydn said cuttingly.
‘You really have got yourself into a hole, haven’t you?’
‘And only two days left to dig myself out of it. Any suggestions would be gratefully received.’ He looked hopefully at Ronnie.
‘Other than crawl on your hands and knees and give her everything she wants and everything she didn’t know she wanted, I’m afraid I can’t be much help.’
‘I don’t suppose you’ve ever got yourself into a jam like this?’
‘Not when I was married to Maud, and when she died I lived like a monk until Diana came along.’
‘Then you must think I’m a right bastard?’
‘No more than any other man who succumbs to the mood and the moment, including me before I fell in love with your sister. Maud and I weren’t apart for more than an hour or two from the day we married until the day I buried her. So quite apart from the love aspect, there wasn’t any opportunity for either of us to indulge in any shenanigans. And now, I can’t imagine not waking up beside Diana in the morning. That’s not to say I wouldn’t be tempted if I ended up in your situation. But,’ he shrugged his shoulders, ‘I hope to God I’d have more sense. And if that’s too sanctimonious for you, I’m sorry. The one thing life’s taught me is that there’s nothing better than marriage to a good woman.’
Chapter Twelve
‘It was hardly fair. He got fined forty bob for having the cigarettes and fifty bob for the matches. Two weeks’ wages gone just like that and it wasn’t as if it was his fault. He forgot he had them in his pocket. They should have been picked up in the search at the top of the cage. Besides, there’s no bloody gas in this pit. Everyone worth their salt knows that.’
‘You playing devil’s advocate again, Viv?’ Alexander queried, as he helped his boy shovel coal into a truck.
‘And what’s that supposed to mean?’
‘You know as well as I do – one spark down here and we’d all be blown to kingdom come.’
‘Or hell,’ Luke murmured, the Quaker upbringing he’d almost, but not quite abandoned since he’d been sent to Pontypridd, surfacing.
‘You suggesting that I’m destined for hell, boy?’
‘No more than the rest of us, Mr Richards,’ Luke replied cheerfully as he sank his pick into the coal face again.
Hearing footsteps, Alexander pushed his shovel deep into his pile of coal. ‘Here comes management.’
‘The day I recognise that bloody turncoat, Mogg, or Joe Plummer as management is the day I give up on life.’
‘All talk and no work as usual, Richards?’ Mogg goaded as he passed by with Joe and Evan.
‘I make twenty replacements needed out of three hundred examined so far.’ Evan stopped to consult his list.
‘I make it the same,’ Joe agreed after totting up his figures. He shone his torch towards the junction of the face with the main tunnel. ‘Thirteen in this shaft, then I think we should check off the areas we’ve looked at on the plan, and decide where to go next.’
‘The north face?’ Evan examined the prop in front of him. ‘Look at this support. It was split before it was put up. The top and bottom don’t even meet. This is no crack, I doubt the two halves were ever married together …’ He faltered, sniffing the air. A distinctive smell permeated the close, fetid atmosphere. One he recognised, but couldn’t quite place. A familiar, sulphurous reek. Then he heard Alexander shout …
‘You bloody idiot, Viv.’
Fire flashed through the tunnel, blinding, searing in its intensity. It was as dazzling as it was fleeting. The tunnel exploded. Coal and rocks ricocheted off the roof, walls and floor. Thick, choking dust filled the air along with the desperate shouts and screams of men. When it settled there was only darkness, and silence.
Ronnie raised his eyebrows as they heard the wail of the siren in the café. ‘The Maritime?’
‘It’s close enough.’
‘Your father on day shift?’
‘Yes.’ Haydn’s voice sounded strange, even to his own ears, as foreboding numbed his senses.
‘You go up, I’ll look after the kids.’
Haydn reached for his coat.
‘There’s been a run of small accidents in all the pits lately,’ Ronnie did his best to sound nonchalant. ‘Men getting caught in winding gear and coal cutters. You know the sort of thing?’
‘I know the sort of thing,’ Haydn said grimly. ‘I grew up here, remember?’
‘Accident in the Maritime.’ Dr John dropped the telephone receiver back on to its cradle. ‘Want to come up, Bethan?’
She abandoned the list of patients she’d been compiling. ‘Is it bad?’
‘A flash fire, fall and explosion. You know as well as I do that could mean anything from one man injured to fifty trapped.’
‘I’ll get my bag.’
‘Good girl. Leave your car here, we’ll go in mine.’
Bethan started shaking when she heard the full blast of the siren as she stepped outside the door, and once she started, she couldn’t stop.
‘Your father will be fine,’ Dr John reassured her with more conviction than he felt. ‘He’s experienced, and from what I’ve seen, the older miners have a sixth sense about accidents. He’ll have reached safety before the first rock hit the tunnel floor.’
Bethan couldn’t answer. She only knew that if she opened her mouth her teeth would start chattering. She hadn’t felt quite so cold or panic-stricken since she had received the news that Andrew was missing.
‘Close relatives to the left. Come along now, there’s nothing to see. Relatives only, over here.’ Constable Huw Davies stood between the gates and the crowd of people massing in Albert Road.
‘Is there any news, Uncle Huw?’ Haydn demanded breathlessly, staring up at the wheels of the winding gear as he pushed his way to the front.
‘A hundred and fifty men are already up, safe and sound. We’ll know more when the cage comes up again.’
‘What happened?’
Huw beckoned him closer.
‘It’s all right for the relatives of the coppers then? They get to know what’s going on,’ a woman with a baby in a shawl screamed hysterically from the back of the crowd.
‘My orders are to lead anyone with first aid experience through to the shed, Daisy,’ Huw said quietly. ‘And any able-bodied men to the office. They may be needed.’
‘Seven hundred men down there and you’re … oh my God.’ The crowd fell silent as the implication of Huw’s words sank in. A sprinkling of fit, young men in uniform started forcing their way towards him. When the crowd saw what was happening they allowed them through.
‘In here, boys.’ Huw opened the gate a couple of feet.
‘I worked underground for ten years before I was conscripted,’ a short stocky man announced proudly. ‘What do you need us for?’
‘Hopefully nothing, lad.’ The police sergeant joined them as the cage doors opened. Two men on stretchers were handed out. As Haydn scanned their blackened faces and those of the men who filed out silently behind them he saw Dr John and his sister examining the injured. He’d been so preoccupied with his father he hadn’t even spared a thought for Bethan.
‘Your father wasn’t amongst the first lot either.’ Huw turned back to Haydn as soon as he’d made certain that Evan wasn’t with the survivors.
‘Where are they now?�
��
‘In the tool shed. As far as we can make out they were all working some distance from the site of the explosion. As soon as they heard the blast and felt the tremors they made a run for the cage. The manager’s sending a man down now to make a tally of those waiting at the bottom.’
‘Has anyone questioned the ones in the shed?’
‘Not properly.’
Haydn charged across the compound.
‘Hey you …’
‘His father was down there, sir,’ Huw explained to his superior.
‘That still doesn’t give him the right to barge in there.’
Siren wailing, an ambulance charged up to the gates.
‘Let it through.’ The manager nodded to the solitary figure waiting in the cage. ‘Send it down again,’ he ordered flatly.
Haydn leaned against the doorpost at the entrance to the packed tool shed and looked across the heads of the blackened miners. Dr John, white coat shining like a beacon through the gloom, was standing at the far end superintending the loading of the stretchers into the ambulance. Bethan was behind him, talking to one of the miners. Pushing his way forward, Haydn went to her.
‘Any news of Dad?’ he interrupted.
‘None.’ She clasped the grimy hand of the man she’d been talking to. ‘Thank you, Mr Davies.’
‘Don’t you worry about your father, Nurse John. He knows his way around down there better than any of us. He’ll be fine.’
She nodded before turning back to Haydn. ‘Some homecoming.’
‘Never mind me. Has anyone seen Dad?’
‘None of these men. They were in the shafts closest to the cage, but they all agree that the explosion seemed to come from the direction of the face Dad was working on. Only he wasn’t working on it today. He was checking props.’
‘Alexander, Luke?’
‘The cage is coming up again!’ The shout echoed through from outside.
‘I’ll go, sis.’ Heart thundering, Haydn broke out into a cold sweat as he went to the top door. The silence at the pit head was palpable as all attention focused on the winding gear, everyone trying to gauge the exact moment when the cage would reach the top.
Finally the doors opened and men flooded out. After checking to see if any of them were injured the manager ordered them into the shed to down tools for the day. Haydn peered into the grim, blackened faces as they passed. He would have recognised his father in a mudbath, but Evan wasn’t among them. He searched for other familiar faces – his next-door neighbour, Viv Richards, the lodger, Alexander, Luke – but to no avail. Huw came and stood next to him.
‘Most of the men are accounted for.’
‘Except Dad?’
‘It looks as though the explosion and fall affected just one small area.’
‘And he was there?’ Haydn’s blood ran cold as he looked to Huw.
‘There’s more men waiting to come up, but no one I’ve spoken to saw your father among them. That doesn’t mean that he was caught up in the fall, only that he was some distance from the cage when it happened.’
Haydn wanted to cling to the straw of hope Huw offered, but try as he might, he couldn’t. A horn blasted. An open truck packed with miners holding picks and shovels waited outside the gate. They all had blackened faces, which meant they’d been taken off shift in another colliery.
‘Rescue team from the Albion,’ Huw explained. ‘They’ll assist the team from here.’
‘Mr Powell.’ The manager walked over and offered Haydn his hand. ‘I recognised you from your photographs in the newspapers. Your father isn’t the only one who’s proud of the way you’ve put Pontypridd and Wales on the map.’
‘Is there any news of him?’
‘The under-manager’s been down to make a tally. There’s twelve men unaccounted for, your father among them. We think they could be caught behind a fall. But don’t worry, if they are, we’ll soon get them out.’
‘Is there a chance that any of them are still alive?’
‘There’s always a chance. Mr Powell. And those -’ he nodded to the miners climbing out of the truck ‘are good men. If anyone can get them out, they can. They’ll be going straight down. If you’ll excuse me,’ he held up a piece of paper, ‘I’ve a list to post, and I think your sergeant would like you to make some house calls, Constable Davies,’ he warned Huw.
‘Are you going to stay here?’ Huw asked Haydn.
‘I’ll talk to Bethan. If they let me, I’ll stay as long as she does, which will probably be until we know one way or the other.’
‘I’ll see you later.’
‘Oh God, there’s Phyllis …’
‘I’ll tell her, mate. You just see to Bethan.’
At first Bethan had no time to think. There were too many minor scrapes, contusions and bumps on heads that needed dressing to worry about her father. But when the final eardrum had been checked for perforation and blast damage, and the last cuts and bruises bathed, and most of the shift had left early for once, all she, Dr John and Haydn could do was sit in the office, smoke their way through their combined rations of cigarettes and wait … and wait … and wait …
At blackout time, boards were fixed over the window panes in the office. The night shift were turned back at the gates and still the clock on the office wall ticked inexorably on. Just before midnight the manager appeared, followed by a clerk with a tray of tea.
‘Anything from the rescuers?’ Bethan asked anxiously.
‘Nothing as yet. But we should hear something by morning. We’ve put six fresh men on to the fall as well as a new shift from the Albion.’
‘Only six!’ Haydn exclaimed in disgust.
‘The space is too confined for more, we’re changing them over every hour. Believe me, we’re doing all we can.’
‘Has there been any sound? Any signals?’ Haydn hesitated as the fixed expression on the manager’s face quashed his hopes.
Dr John glanced at his watch. ‘Why don’t you two go and get something to eat,’ he suggested.
‘Good idea,’ the manager concurred. ‘Nothing’s going to happen here for a couple of hours.’
‘I’m staying,’ Bethan said firmly.
‘You should look in on Rachel and Eddie,’ her father-in-law asserted quietly.
‘Phyllis might appreciate a visit,’ Haydn pointed out. ‘We could both go, have a meal, and be back in an hour.’
She looked to the manager.
‘I promise you, Nurse John, nothing much is going to happen before morning.’
‘They could get close enough to hear a sound, a cry …’
‘If that does happen, I’ll send someone up to you right away.’
‘My car’s still in town.’
‘Take mine.’ Dr John handed her the key. ‘The Infirmary’s only across the road. I’ll check on the men we sent there, and see what the sister has in her food cupboard. She always seems to find a sandwich or two.’
‘We could bring you something back.’ Reluctantly Bethan left her chair.
‘No need, but thank you for the thought.’ Her father-in-law hugged her as she walked to the door.
The kitchen in Graig Avenue was hot, steamy and crowded. Phyllis sat white-faced and dry-eyed, staring at the door, while Jane, Diana and Megan moved between dresser, stove and table, pouring out cups of tea and emptying ashtrays. To Haydn’s surprise, Jenny was sitting amongst the throng of neighbours, nursing a fretful Anne. Mrs Richards was hunched in the corner crying in inconsolable hysteria as Luke Grenville’s young wife, Gina, very obviously shell-shocked and traumatised, absently patted her hand. Lines from an old folk song sprang to his mind,
‘Married at sixteen, widowed at seventeen’ .
He only hoped they wouldn’t prove true in Gina’s case.
Phyllis jumped up as soon as they walked through the door. She looked mutely from Bethan to Haydn.
‘They’ve got two rescue teams trying to dig them out.’
‘Huw said they were trapped. Are any of the
m alive?’
‘They don’t know, Jenny,’ Bethan answered, wondering if her sister-in-law’s relationship with Alexander was more serious than she had thought.
‘You must be starved.’ Phyllis walked blindly towards the pantry door.
‘I don’t want anything, thank you, Phyllis.’ Bethan caught her by the shoulders and led her back to her chair. ‘I’m going to drive home, check everything’s all right up there and change.’ She looked across at her brother above Phyllis’s head. ‘I’ll be back in half an hour, but you don’t have to return with me.’
‘Yes I do,’ he said flatly, seeing her to the door.
‘I’ll get you something to eat, Haydn,’ Jane offered, refusing to meet his eye when he returned.
‘There’s a cheese and onion pie in the pantry that just needs heating up.’ Phyllis’s voice was husky with unshed tears.
‘I’ll get it.’ Jane went into the pantry while Haydn closed the door of the washhouse behind him.
Gripping the thick, cool, solid sides of the Belfast sink, he bent his head and closed his eyes. The door opened behind him.
‘I’m sorry, Haydn. I know how much your father means to you … to all of us,’ Jane said simply.
Tears fell from his eyes, splashing down into the basin as he leaned further forward. He felt Jane’s small hands on his shoulders. Turning, he caught hold of her, pulling her close.
‘Thank you for being here.’
‘I don’t have any other place to go.’
‘I’m sorry. I left Anne in the café. I wanted to meet you from work. I thought … I hoped …’
‘Ronnie managed to get us a lift up the hill in a bread van.’
‘I wanted to make it all right between us.’
‘Now isn’t the time, Haydn. We’ve other things to think about. You’ll want to wash. I’ll get you a clean towel from upstairs.’ Slipping from his arms she went to the door. ‘Your meal will be on the table when you’ve finished.’
The sound of Mrs Richards’s sobs wafted in as Jane opened the door. Jenny’s voice rose, sharp, impatient, and the noise subsided. Pushing the plug into the sink he filled it with cold water and plunged his head into it. Two days, barely two days since he had come home and he felt as though his whole world had caved in around him.
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