“Why? He gets all the support he needs from Nia and Viv.”
“Just a visit, Rhiannon. No one expects you to move in!”
* * *
Dora thought for weeks and weeks about searching for her lost child with a dreamy sort of hope. It seemed so huge a task she daren’t consider it really possible. Where would she start? Who would help? The hospital might have records but they wouldn’t divulge the identity of the adoptive parents. She didn’t remember any name being offered, just Lewis holding her while she cried, and telling her it was for the best.
Perhaps it was, but why had he made her give up her baby then have a child with Nia Martin? Nia had been allowed to keep Joseph while she was left to cry herself into exhausted sleep for week after week. Lewis had never loved her, she knew that now. She should have chosen the child and let him go!
What saddened her as much as anything else was not knowing whether her child had been a boy or a girl. She hadn’t even been able to give it an imaginary name. Clifford, he would have been if it was a boy, Rosie if it was a girl, she remembered.
She sat on her chair one evening in a semi-doze. The house was empty, Rhiannon and Viv were out, the fire had burned low and the rooms seemed filled with shadows. From the shadows she imagined a child calling. She knew he was hers and she had to find him. Yes, she decided in her sleepy state, it’s a boy and I’ll call him Clifford.
The pleasant dream became a frightening nightmare as she imagined that Lewis had already begun the search, helped by Nia. What if he found him first? Would he tell a completely false story and claim the boy as his and Nia’s and steal him from her a second time? Her heart raced painfully as she reacted in pain against this imagined threat.
Coming out of the nightmare but still half dreaming, Dora remembered a distant Auntie Dilys who was still alive, living in Cardiff. She might be able to help. Jerked out of troubled sleep by Viv and Rhiannon coming home, she woke with the intention firmly fixed. Tomorrow she would find the aunt and begin her search. She would see the boy before he could speak to Lewis, who would doubtless twist the story in his own favour. She’d explain how she had been forced to give him up by his father, who hadn’t wanted him. That way he would be hers, someone to take Lewis-boy’s place and someone Lewis wouldn’t take away from her.
* * *
Auntie Dilys was almost eighty but to Dora’s relief her mind appeared to be as sharp as many half her age. She remembered the family disgrace, as she called the birth of Dora’s illegitimate child, confirmed that it had been a son and clammed up after telling Dora to look through the births and death records.
Dora pleaded with her to explain, but she wouldn’t add another word. Births, yes. But why deaths? Believing the old lady to be confused after all, Dora left, surmising that the couple who had adopted Clifford, had died and he had been sent to a home. This was the fate of most children without a family to care for them. She got a list of children’s homes but her search was futile as every avenue was firmly closed with rules and regulations that forbade the passing of information.
It was in April 1953 that she finally went to London and looked up his birth. There was nothing to be found about an adoption as she didn’t know the couple’s name or address. Some melancholy settled on her and made her look up the deaths for that year. She found him there.
He was registered as Clifford Lewis and he had died two weeks after his birth.
Chapter Thirteen
Dora went home in a daze after learning of the death of her child. She desperately wanted to talk to Lewis, feel his supporting arms, hear him tell her gently all the details leading to that death. She presumed he knew. Someone would have had to be told. Her parents perhaps, but certainly Lewis, being the father. She felt the grief as if it were new and then a startling thought occurred. Perhaps Lewis didn’t know. It was possible that as she was so young only her parents had been told and they had kept the news from him as well? Then he too would have thought of the boy happily growing up in an adoptive family.
Had he imagined him at the various stages of his life: a helpless baby, then smiling, crawling, learning to walk, setting off for school, playing in his first football team, attracting girls, passing exams and being brilliant at everything? Being a dream child, he could be anything they wanted him to be.
She said nothing to Viv or Rhiannon but the following evening, she went to Lewis’s flat. Taking a chance on Nia being there she knocked and called, then pushed open the door and stepped in. Lewis was in the kitchen preparing a tray of sandwiches and tea.
“I went to London yesterday. To Somerset House,” she said staring at him, watching for his reaction.
“So you know about our Clifford then.”
“You did know! Why have you been keeping it from me all these years?”
“At the time we were both so distressed about having to give him up I thought it best you weren’t told how ill he was.”
“All this time I’ve imagined him growing up and he was in his little grave. You should have told me, Lewis,” Dora spoke softly, sadly.
“I couldn’t, love.” He added a second cup to the tray and led her into the small living-cum-bedroom which, apart from a shared bathroom, made up the rest of the flat.
“I expect the adoptive parents were upset too, they’d have prepared for him and bought all he’d need.”
Lewis poured the tea with a hand that shook, then he looked at her and said, softly, “The doctors knew there was something wrong before he was born. The heart wasn’t strong and, there was some deformities too. They told me there wasn’t a chance he’d survive. I kept on with the adoption story as I thought it was kinder.”
“You were wrong. I should have known.”
“Perhaps. But it wasn’t the easy way out. I had to keep my grief to myself, cope with knowing that a child we had made was less than perfect. Perhaps you’ll understand now why I was worried when we knew Lewis-boy was on the way.”
“No worries with her though. Her child was perfect, wasn’t he? There was nothing wrong with Joseph.”
Joseph is dead too, Lewis wanted to shout! But he ignored the gibe. Dora was entitled to be angry. He knew her anger was at a cruel fate and not really at him. He picked up a cup of tea but seeing her shoulders begin to shake he put it down and held her.
“Our precious love-child and I lost him twice.”
“I lost him too, Dora. Perhaps I should have told you. Losing him was something I carried alone, something we should have shared.”
“You never wanted him.”
“I’ve wanted all our children and I love them. Clifford came too early that’s all. He timed his entrance wrong.”
“But we’d have lost him anyway?”
“We’d have lost him anyway.”
She clung to him and as they sat wrapped in each other’s arms, Nia came in, saw Dora’s head buried against Lewis’s shoulder and with a brief nod to Lewis, slipped quietly out of the door.
As he hugged Dora, Lewis marvelled at the understanding and gentleness of Nia. She didn’t demand answers but simply guessed that this was a time for Dora, accepting it graciously.
Dora talked for several hours and Lewis patiently listened. She told him she no longer sold insurance, that Rhiannon was enjoying a livelier social life but refused to see her father, and that Viv was doing a remarkable job bringing Weston’s back to life. All of these things he knew from his regular meetings with Viv, but he allowed her to talk, making few comments, showing an interest.
It was after ten o’clock when he drove her home and she went straight to bed and slept. In the morning she was up early and had the fire lit and the breakfast cooking when Rhiannon and Viv came down. She told them where she had been and what she had learned. Viv felt sympathy for both his parents, and thanked his mother for trusting them with the story. But for Rhiannon the revelation only increased her disappointment with her father.
* * *
The christening of baby Joseph Martin took place
on a cold, gusty day in late April. Rhiannon arranged to go with Viv but at the last minute he told her he’d meet her there as he had an errand to run first. Dora refused to go, knowing Nia would be there and afraid that Lewis would be with her, playing the proud role of grandfather escorting the proud grandmother; congratulating Caroline, holding the child and being a part of that family instead of his own.
Rhiannon didn’t attend the church service. Later on, she walked across the fields to the overfilled house that stood with its doors and windows wide open, issuing forth laughter and high spirits, in defiance of the low temperature.
Jimmy had begged an invitation and he walked down the path to meet her, apologising for not calling for her.
“I thought you were coming with your mother and Viv,” he explained.
“Viv had to go somewhere first and Mam isn’t coming,” she replied.
“Looks as if she changed her mind,” he chuckled. He pointed to the corner of the lane where Dora was just appearing, wrapped in a coat which she held tightly around her against the chill wind. She looked so small and pale that Rhiannon was alarmed.
“She looks so unwell,” she whispered. “I didn’t realise how thin she’s become.”
Dora was confused, unsure where she was, and why. Something about a christening. But not her baby, someone else’s.
The small party from the church had already returned and the party mood that seemed to often fill the small house was well underway. The Weston girls were there as godmothers and their cousin Jack was proudly boasting of being Joseph’s godfather. Viv had called for the girls and walked with them from the church with the others.
Rhiannon noted with some surprise that he seemed relaxed with them, Megan was quietly absorbing the scene and Joan was complaining about everything. Instead of being angry with her, Viv seemed amused, even supportive. Surely working for their grandfather in the capacity of manager instead of clerk hadn’t made that much difference?
Barry had been outside the church taking photographs and appearing in some himself, and he followed the rest in, having snapped the party returning. He took photographs of the guests including Rhiannon and smiled when she looked up in some disapproval.
“People don’t just want formal, carefully composed pictures,” he said. “We’ve had the ceremony, now we have a party.”
“D’you want me to take a photograph of you and Caroline, the proud parents, and the baby?” she asked, but if he heard the sarcasm in her voice he chose to ignore it.
“Thanks Rhiannon, but Viv and Jack have taken a few. You aren’t that clever with a camera. Now Caroline seems a natural, in fact, she comes with me often and helps with the children, just like you used to do.”
Snubbed, she went to sit beside her mother and Eleri.
Viv was laughingly telling Barry about how Joan worked at Weston’s. “For a couple of weeks she was marvellous, but now she comes and goes when she likes and although she does work while she’s there, she spends more time making up her face and combing her hair than actually holding a pen,” he chuckled. “Still, old man Arfon pays her a little and she’s amusing to have around.”
Viv had been flattered when Joan and Megan asked him to escort them to the church for their part in the christening ceremony. Megan had walked ahead with their cousin Jack, and Joan had taken his arm as they walked into the church and he felt all eyes on him, pride making him feel twice his height. She had been so attentive of late, he had begun to hope that she felt more for him than she might have for just friend.
She had chosen to sit beside him throughout the first hour of the service, and he had wondered if he would be taking her home later.
“Oh, don’t worry,” she had said when he had voiced this hope. “We have a taxi coming for us at eleven. Jack insisted on arranging it.” Had there been disappointment in her voice? Had she too imagined a slow walk home through the fields and the quiet streets?
* * *
Caroline could see that Dora was unhappy. She remembered being so desperately low-spirited herself. She had tried to end her life and that of her child. Instinctively, she knew that Dora’s thoughts were heading the same way. Pushing her way through the lively crowd, who seemed unaware of Dora’s distress, she sat beside her and began to talk.
Dora seemed almost unaware of her presence for a while. And although she found it difficult, Caroline persisted.
“When your Lewis-boy and my Joseph died I didn’t think I had anything to live for,” she said, and this caught Dora’s attention.
“I know what you mean. The world isn’t such a wonderful place when you lose everything.”
“But I didn’t lose everything, and neither did you,” Caroline said. “I had a change of heart and look at me now. I have a wonderful life and a wonderful son. Everything changes. Everything comes to an end, good times and bad.”
“The sooner my life comes to an end the better,” Dora said. “I’ve lost my husband and my son.”
“Oh,” Caroline said sadly, “I thought you loved Rhiannon and Viv as well as Lewis-boy. Did you love him more because he was the first? Some mothers are like that.”
“I didn’t love him more!”
“But you’re thinking it would be best to leave them?”
“You don’t understand.”
“I do. I really do. I tried to walk into the sea. I haven’t told anyone outside the family, but that’s how much I understand. I tried to end my life without thought of the ones I was leaving behind. It was Barry who saved me and Barry who gave me a fresh start to a wonderful life.”
“You’ve got a small son depending on you, and a husband.”
“No, not a husband,” she smiled. “Barry only married me to give Joseph his father’s name. We’re divorcing as soon as we can and I’ll be on my own with Joseph. But I know I’ll never be so depressed that I won’t be able to cope, and neither will you. Not with Rhiannon and Viv, who’ll one day give you grandchildren to spoil.” She patted Dora’s arm and smiled into her eyes as if implanting that thought. “I have to go now, Barry’s mother is cutting the cake.”
Looking up, Dora saw that behind Nia, Lewis was looking across at her and smiling. She glared at him with some of her old fierceness and left.
With so many crowded into the rooms, the air was stifling even with the windows and doors open. A fire blazed up into the chimney and drinks seemed to make people hotter still. Viv suggested a walk to Joan, who agreed. He picked up a coat in case she needed it and they walked down the lane, leaving the chatter and music behind them. He put an arm around her to guide her and as they came close he kissed her.
“Joan, I’ve been wanting to do that for so long.”
“I hope you enjoyed it,” she said harshly. “It’s the last chance you get. Who d’you think you are? You work for my father. If I told him what you’ve just done he’d sack you.”
Viv blazed. “I don’t work for your father! He’s too weak to make a decision about which coat to wear! I work for your grandfather and he won’t sack me because he needs me. You all need me. The Westons were practically finished before I came in and rescued you and never forget it!” Leaving her to find her own way back, he leapt over a stile and ran through the dark fields back to Sophie Street, regretting that it was too late to go to The Railwayman’s and get drunk.
When Rhiannon realised that both Viv and her mother had gone she knew she had to leave too. Barry was waiting beside the van when she stepped out into the crispy cold night.
“I’m going now if you want a lift,” he said.
“I’d rather walk.”
“Rhiannon, we only live three doors from each other.” He opened the passenger door and, regretting her harshness, she got in.
He leaned over to make sure the door was fastened and almost before either realised what had happened, they kissed.
His arms held her in a long embrace, his hands did alarmingly pleasurable things to her body, his lips promised delights she had hardly imagined. It was somet
hing she had dreamed of for so long and refused to acknowledge, that she clung to him now as if she would never let him go.
It was several minutes before she came to her senses. Then she begged him to stop.
“Please, Barry, this is wrong.”
“Rhiannon, how can it be wrong? You know I love you. I’ve loved you for such a long, long time.”
“You’re married!”
“In name only and for a couple of years only. You can wait for me can’t you? Please, wait for me. Don’t say no. Not now, when you’ve shown me you still feel the same about me. It will be all right. We have to wait for a while, that’s all, my darling.”
“There’s been enough talk about my family. I don’t want people saying I’ve split you and Caroline. I couldn’t face it and neither could Mam.”
“But you know it was a marriage of convenience, don’t you? So her child could have the Martin name?” He kissed her again and then said, “You know there’s nothing between Caroline and me beside friendship, don’t you?”
“I do, but there are many who don’t. It’s no use, Barry. We have to stay away from each other until Caroline is safe from rumours and malicious gossip. For Caroline’s sake and for Mam’s.”
* * *
Rhiannon was worried about her mother. Dora was working hard and eating too little. Night after night, she crept down and sat in the kitchen with a pot of tea. She said nothing to Viv, but Eleri assured her it was nothing to worry about, that her unhappiness would ease.
“Once she’s over the new horror of learning that her child died so soon after he was born, and all these years she’d been unable to mourn him,” Eleri assured her, “She’ll cope.”
Because of her concern that news of her love for Barry might become public knowledge, and add further to her mother’s distress, Rhiannon was frequently less than civil with him. It wasn’t that difficult for her to show him her anger. In her mind the cause of the family’s current misery was the fault of his mother. She only had to think of her father to feel fury – and it was easy to blame Barry. If Nia had left them alone her parents would be together and the house wouldn’t be such an unhappy place.
Corner of a Small Town Page 21
