Heartbreak in the Valleys

by Francesca Capaldi

  Standing, she said, ‘I’ll take these plates now, sir. I need to get on.’

  ‘So soon?’

  ‘Miss Elizabeth asked me to call on Mr Lloyd with regards the vegetable patches and some seeds.’

  ‘Very well. Let me take the glasses.’ He picked them up, following her to the side of the house, to the doorway into the scullery.

  An idea occurred to her. ‘We can always do with extra help digging, hoeing, picking. If you’re ever at a loose end.’

  ‘Elizabeth has been on at me about this. I will give it serious thought. In the meantime, why don’t you come out to the cinema with me one evening?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know about—’

  ‘There are a few good films showing at the moment. Do you like watching films?’

  ‘Yes. I’ve been a few times, to the Cosy Cinema in Pontlottyn and the Imperial in Rhymney. Not for a while, though.’ Not since Idris had gone away. The pictures had been a favourite trip for them.

  ‘About time you went again then.’

  Should she? What was stopping her? Apart from the class difference, of course. ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘You decide when might be convenient for you, and I’ll have a look in the newspapers to see what’s on where.’

  ‘Hello Tom.’

  They both looked round. There, on the path outside the house, was Polly Coombes, bold as brass, her bright skirt and blouse topped with an open jacket. She gazed up from under her eyelashes and waggled her fingers in greeting.

  ‘Polly,’ Tom said, a smile on his face that did not convince Anwen, though Miss Coombes seemed satisfied.

  ‘See you around soon, I hope.’ Polly pouted in a most brazen manner.

  ‘Probably.’ He lifted his hand in a brief gesture.

  Soon she was strutting back down the path the way she’d come. Tom ushered Anwen through the open door, into the scullery.

  ‘My, you are certainly popular with the ladies of the village,’ Anwen joked.

  ‘Does that include you?’ He wasn’t teasing or smiling, but serious.

  She didn’t reply, saying instead, ‘Has she been pestering you?’

  His mood lightened. ‘No. She’s a funny little thing though, don’t you agree? Not bright like you.’

  Polly’s appearance felt like fate had intervened for Anwen. It reminded her that Idris wasn’t moping around after her. ‘I will have a think about a time for going to the pictures,’ she said.

  ‘Good.’

  ‘And you must think about helping with the vegetables.’

  He waited for her to put the crockery on the draining board. ‘You’re persistent, aren’t you?’

  ‘When something is important, yes. It’s getting so much lighter in the evenings now, so we could do with extra workers.’

  He handed her the glasses. ‘I can be persistent too, so don’t take too long deciding on a date. Thank you for your company at lunch. I’ll be out the rest of the afternoon. I’ve no doubt I’ll see you tomorrow.’

  He passed Rose in the doorway as she came into the scullery, hands firmly gripping her slight hips. She stared at Anwen for some seconds. ‘Nice lunch, was it, with Mr Tom?’

  ‘We were speaking about the vegetable-growing project.’

  ‘It’s alright for those what have time to dig vegetables. I’ve got my hands full cooking them.’ She sniffed.

  ‘But that’s the problem, Rose. If we don’t start growing our own there won’t be any to cook. Food’s getting short. And the government’s asked for families like the Merediths to give up their servants for war work.’

  ‘You can go do war work. I’m indinspendable.’ She gave one firm nod of her head.

  Anwen decided against correcting her last word. ‘No one is, Rose.’

  ‘As for a vegetable shortage, I don’t know what Miss Elizabeth is thinking with her crazy project. She’s not been subject to no vegetable shortage. Plenty of them here.’

  ‘Elizabeth’s aware that isn’t the case for most people.’ Yet it was a worrying aspect of this house that she tried to avoid thinking about too often. There was talk of profiteering. There were rumours of thefts in the area, from farms like Mr Lloyd’s, from shops. A delivery cart had been set upon by masked men a couple of weeks back. Food came to McKenzie House variously by motor van or via Rose who shopped in the village, returning with items not seen by the rest of the villagers.

  ‘It’s there for people what’s got the money,’ Rose concluded, stomping away back to her kitchen.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Anwen’s whole body had been abuzz with excitement for the last two hours. The Ebbw Vale Amateur Dramatic Society had portrayed some wonderful scenes from Shakespeare. Though the mood at the start of the evening had been sombre, with muted exchanges about the terrible events of Easter Monday in Ireland and martial law in Dublin, the audience were transported once the performance began.

  Scenes had been re-enacted from seven of Shakespeare’s plays, from the comedy of The Merry Wives of Windsor, through the whimsy of A Midsummer Night’s Dream to the darkness of Macbeth. Some scenes had elicited laughs, others gasps, but all had produced effusive clapping at their finales.

  The last scene to be played out was from Much Ado about Nothing. Anwen had read this play twice. How she now envied the love between Beatrice and Benedick.

  The last line of Much Ado was delivered. The actors formed a line, bowing to rapturous applause from the audience.

  Tom leaned towards her. ‘They were good for amateurs.’

  She inched a little closer. ‘Yes, I’ve seen them before, doing other plays.’

  ‘I’ve certainly seen worse, even in the West End.’

  Was she supposed to know what that was? It was tempting to nod and pretend she did, but she was curious to find out. ‘The west end of what? Cardiff?’

  He emitted a small titter. ‘No, Anwen, the West End. In London. Leicester Square, where the theatres are.’

  ‘Oh yes. I see.’ How stupid he must think her. She’d never been to London, knew little about it, except that the Houses of Parliament were there, and Buckingham Palace, where King George lived with Queen Mary.

  ‘One day you should go. It’s wonderful fun. You can get on a train from Newport straight into Paddington. Of course, I mostly went up from Reading with university friends.’

  Increasingly out of her depth, she was relieved when the applause faded and people began to rise. They were halted by the librarian, Mr Pritchard, rushing on to the stage, which the actors had recently vacated.

  ‘I’m sorry, but a moment more of your time, please,’ he boomed in his rich voice. He would have done well on the stage. ‘I have just been told some important news.’ His expression told them it wasn’t good.

  Anwen’s throat constricted; her breaths becoming laboured. Had the violence in Ireland escalated once more? Or had the Germans invaded, bringing ships from the Channel up the River Thames, or into Cardiff via the River Taff? The audience’s excited post-performance chatter ceased. On the stage, Mr Pritchard scanned the crowd, like a nervous performer on his first night.

  ‘I’ve been asked to convey to you all the sad news of the deaths of two of our finest, who enlisted into the Rhondda Pals Brigade last year.’

  Anwen stared at the ceiling, offering up a silent, selfish prayer. Not Charlie, please not Charlie. Or Henry.

  ‘Their families had word earlier of the deaths of Robert Harris and Percy Vaughan—’

  Whatever else he’d been about to say was drowned out by exclamations of shock and disbelief. Not sweet Percy – not dear Robert – Too young – Damned Hun! – all the Kaiser’s fault – Oh God, poor Florrie, poor Annie. Poor Jane. And those babbies without a da. The murmuring commentary continued.

  Elizabeth leant across Tom. ‘Did you know them, Anwen?’

  ‘I knew Robert a little, and Percy was friends with my brother Tomos.’ She gritted her teeth, trying to stave off the whining moan threatening to escape her throat.

 
‘How old were they?’

  ‘Robert was about thirty and Percy about twenty-five.’ A tear ran down one side of her face before she buried her face in her hands.

  ‘Oh dear, oh dear,’ said Tom, stroking Anwen’s arm gently. She was too upset to either appreciate or be embarrassed by it. ‘There there. It’s terrible. Simply appalling. Such a waste of young life. War always is.’ He was almost echoing what she’d said in the garden.

  Peeping up once more, trying to stem the flow of emotion, she saw that the audience was slow to move. There were women weeping. An old man held on to a seat for support, hanging his head low.

  At long last one man sprang up, rushing along the row of people between his seat and the aisle. Having escaped, he ran for the exit, disappearing after flinging open the door.

  ‘Good God, where’s he going in such a hurry?’ said Tom.

  It was Idris Hughes.

  * * *

  No, it couldn’t be. Not Percy and Robert. The room seemed devoid of air. He had to get out of here.

  Idris left his chair, struggling to get by the people in his row. His mother was calling, ‘Idris? Idris!’ He needed to be on his own, in his house, his safe place, away from the shocked chatter of the people, most of whom hadn’t known Percy and Robert as well as he had, hadn’t spent the best part of twenty-four hours a day training, eating and sleeping with them. In those seven months at camp, closeted together, he’d got to know his bunk mates better than almost anyone else in his life.

  Out of the door now he could breathe again. He had to get out of the building and down the street. He was glad of the cool air of the night, welcoming it as a friend to cool his emotion.

  Percy. A keen rugby player, ‘a fine figure of a man’, as he’d heard Gwen once describe him. Robert had been in the choir at chapel, the finest baritone voice he’d ever heard, frequently featured in the annual Baptist Gymanfa. It was lost to the world forever.

  He was finding it hard to make his breaths deep, catching as they did part way through, making him gulp in more air. He counted the front doors: thirty-one, thirty-two, thirty-three. Home. He almost fell into the hall, stumbling towards the open kitchen door, throwing his body into a dining chair. He should go to his room but he couldn’t face the stairs just yet. Bending over the table, he covered his neck with his hands, pulling his head down more as the sobs began.

  Percy and Robert. Percy and Robert. He was aware of the pulse in his ear, more than twice as fast as it should be. A vague nausea developed deep within his head. It was like the motion sickness he’d experienced once. His face and neck were sweating.

  How long he sat there, frozen in that pose, he wasn’t sure. He heard the front door close, tempting him to flee to the back garden. His limbs wouldn’t comply with the appeal, heavy like a chunk of newly hewn coal. There were subdued voices, then footsteps on the stairs. Good; they’d decided to go straight to bed.

  No such luck. The door opened and the light footsteps he recognised as his mother’s tramped across the floor.

  ‘Are you all right, bach?’

  If he didn’t reply she might go away, leave him to his sorrow. But of course, she wouldn’t. It wasn’t her way.

  ‘Come on, out with it. It doesn’t do no good keeping it in. This isn’t like you. You were always too fond of letting others know how you felt, once upon a time.’

  He lifted his head, regarding her with an expression that melted her indignation into sadness.

  ‘Oh Idris, bach, it’s a sorry picture you look.’

  ‘I should have been with them, Mam. Maybe I could have helped them.’

  ‘How? You don’t even know how they were killed.’

  The hard last word of her sentence shot through him. He hoped to God it had been over quickly, that they weren’t even aware of what happened. A quick round of bullets to the chest. Over. Blown up in a split second. Finished. He’d read of the poison gas the Hun used, burning skin into blisters, or clogging lungs, a slow, painful death. His hands trembled. He clenched them, tucking them into his armpits.

  ‘Look, Idris, I know it’s an awful thing. Tears the heart from me, it does. But I believe there’s a reason why things happen. You’re here, Idris, and it must be because you have a purpose to fulfil.’

  He wished he shared his mother’s certainty that there was some kind of logic to the world. As far as he could see, there was no rhyme nor reason to anything. What was the point of a fourteen-year-old boy dying in a pit accident, for instance?

  ‘Percy and Robert are not here to achieve anything anymore, but you are. What about the better conditions for miners you were so keen on before the war? What about raising a family – hope for the future when this war finishes?’

  That particular ambition was not going to be realised with anyone. A dizziness overtook him briefly.

  Meg pulled out a chair next to him, placing her hand on his shoulder. ‘Idris, you may not consider this the time to mention it, but you will have to snap out of this self-pitying mood.’

  ‘Self-pitying?’ He sat upright.

  ‘Yes, self-pitying.’

  ‘Mam, I—’ He was abruptly robbed of his ability to breathe, trying to catch his breath three times, before experiencing a coughing fit.

  ‘Idris, are you all right?’ She rubbed his back while touching his face with the back of her other hand.

  He shook her off. ‘I’m fine. Got that cold that’s going round.’ He didn’t believe it and he could see by her expression that she didn’t either.

  ‘The doctor at Winchester discharged you for a reason, Idris. Isn’t it about time we fetched Dr Roberts? You lost weight when you were away. I think you’ve lost more since you’ve been home.’

  He had lost a little, he couldn’t deny it, but he wouldn’t make anything of it, either. ‘I told you—’

  ‘Yes, you told me. But you’re not yourself, Idris Hughes, and I want to know why.’

  ‘Digging coal’s harder work than marching. I’m using more energy and food’s not as plentiful here.’

  ‘At least Anwyn and Miss Elizabeth are trying to do something about it. Why don’t you help out some evenings? Get some fresh air. It might stop this self-absorbed nonsense.’

  He glared at her. ‘There aren’t any men helping.’

  ‘So? Doesn’t mean there can’t be. Have a think about it.’ She went back to the hall, leaving him to his thoughts.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Having only just changed for her post-lunch duties, Anwen was already answering the door to the first of the callers who Mrs Meredith had invited to afternoon tea. Pulling the door open, ready with a greeting, she’d only got the word ‘Good—’ out when she realised she was facing two policemen, their metal jacket buttons gleaming.

  ‘Sergeant Harries,’ she finished instead.

  ‘Good afternoon, Miss.’ Harries lifted his helmet off and held it. ‘We’d like to speak with Mrs Meredith, if you please.’

  What was the etiquette for this? With delivery men, they were left waiting on the doorstep. The policemen might not appreciate that.

  ‘Please, come in and wait in the hall while I inform Mrs Meredith of your visit.’

  ‘Very well, Miss.’

  They entered. An older policeman, PC Probert, who’d come out of retirement to replace PC Davies when he’d been conscripted, removed his helmet too. Anwen remembered him being the local constable when she was a child.

  She went quickly to the drawing room, knocking but not entering until Mrs Meredith invited her to do so.

  ‘Madam, the police wish to speak with you.’

  ‘Goodness! Now, when my ladies are due? Very well, I will see them in the dining room. If any of the ladies arrive, please direct them here and inform them I have been slightly delayed and will be with them shortly.’

  ‘Very well, madam.’

  Anwen left, directing the policemen to the place specified. ‘Mrs Meredith will be along shortly.’

  She was about to leave when Margar
et Meredith appeared. She entered the dining room, giving Anwen no thanks for holding the door open for her. Frown lines marred her forehead.

  Anwen waited in the hall for the visitors to arrive. If Mrs Meredith was kept a while it might be an idea to bring them tea. She went to the large mirror, above the tall console table in the hall. After flicking imaginary dust from the bleached white apron, she straightened an already level cap. She hated being idle, wishing she’d secreted a small volume in her apron pocket, to read during such empty moments.

  It wasn’t long before Mrs Meredith appeared again, a tinge of red in her cheeks. ‘Anwen, I am going to be indisposed this afternoon. There are six ladies in all due to call.’ She named them. ‘Would you please let them know that I have a headache so will be unable to receive them.’

  ‘Of course, madam.’

  ‘After that, fetch my daughter. I believe she’s in the garden, digging.’ Her puckered lips made it clear she was put out by this. Elizabeth had persuaded her to swap some of her flower beds for vegetable plots. ‘And my son, who is… I’m not sure where he is.’

  ‘He went out earlier, madam.’

  ‘Of course he did.’ She raised her eyes. ‘I’d then like you to come down to the kitchen with Elizabeth.’

  ‘Very well.’

  Mrs Meredith’s callers came two by two. Various degrees of regret were expressed by them, each sending wishes for a speedy recovery.

  Anwen was about to close the door to the last pair of callers when Tom arrived back in the motorcar. A wind had recently whipped up, blowing his hair around his face. Anwen waited for him to come in, watching the last ladies return to their own motorcar. They greeted Tom as they reached the gate, holding onto their hats.

  As Tom entered, Anwen said, ‘The police have arrived, to talk to your mother.’

  ‘Really, what’s she been up to? Frightening Farmer Lloyd’s sheep?’ He laughed raucously, finding it much more amusing than Anwen did.

  ‘When she thought you were in, she asked me to fetch you, along with Miss Elizabeth.’

  ‘Good heavens, I can’t be bothered with whatever that is now. Tell her I’ve a headache and I’ve gone to my room.’ He took the stairs two at a time, not even removing his coat.