‘Her aunt’ he admitted.
‘I see.’
‘It’s not what you think …’
‘What we think is of little importance, Andrew,’ Dr John said firmly, breaking up the impending argument between mother and son. ‘It’s what the whole town thinks that concerns me. I’ve been a physician here all my working life. I have a certain standing in the county of Glamorgan. I – and my family – are expected to behave in the accepted manner. Like Caesar’s wife all of us have to be above reproach and suspicion. And if I, and you after me, are to continue to work and live here I don’t see how it can be otherwise.’
‘I’m sorry to have brought this whole mess to your door,’ Andrew apologised contritely.
‘Well, now you’ve brought it, the question is what do you intend to do about it?’ His mother left her seat and paced to the cold, empty fireplace, screened off by tapestry for the summer.
‘I don’t know.’ Andrew left the sofa, walked over to the bar and poured himself another whisky.
‘It’s plain enough to me.’ A note of hysteria crept into Isabel John’s voice. ‘You have to break off whatever’s going on between you two,’ she shouted. ‘Immediately …’
‘Didn’t you say earlier that you had something to check in the kitchen with Cook, dear?’ Dr John prompted gently.
‘No … I …’
‘You wanted to tell her which of the cold meats to cut,’ he prompted.
‘Yes, I did.’ She squared her shoulders and took a deep breath. ‘Thank you.’ She looked at her son as she left the room. ‘I’m only thinking of you, darling,’ she said softly.
Andrew took his glass and walked over to the open window. He preferred his mother’s hysteria to her understanding.
‘I think the best thing you can do, son, is go away for a while. You obviously need time to think things out for yourself. Why don’t you take Alec’s father up on his offer? Go up to London for a few months. Work on his surgical team. It will be good experience for you. Stand you in good stead, no matter whether you finally opt for general or hospital practice.’
‘I’ll think about it,’ Andrew said dully, promising nothing as he stared blindly at the garden.
‘A short spell in London will enable you to put things in perspective. I’ll be able to find a locum to take your place easily enough, and until I do, Trevor can double up. He’s only too keen to earn extra cash these days. You could go up tomorrow. Stay with Fiona and Alec. You know they’d love to have you.’
Andrew continued to gaze blankly at the magnificent display of summer roses that formed the centrepiece of his parents’ garden.
‘Just how much does this girl mean to you?’ his father asked bluntly.
‘I don’t know.’ He wasn’t lying. After the events of that morning he genuinely didn’t know what he felt for Bethan. His feelings were in turmoil. When he was with her all he wanted to do was undress her and himself and make love. But then again, the sensation wasn’t a new one. He’d experienced it before, with other girls. It was just that in London there’d been many other girls. Here in Pontypridd there was only one.
Elated at Andrew’s honest revelation, Dr John picked up the whisky bottle and joined his son in front of the window.
‘I got entangled with a working-class girl once,’ he confided as he refilled both their glasses. ‘Now your mother’s not around I don’t mind telling you she was magnificent. Especially between the sheets, if you get my meaning.’
‘I get your meaning.’ Andrew stared at his father in amazement. Having never considered his father’s youth, or the women he’d known before his mother, he was slightly shocked by the revelation.
‘You can want to make love to a woman without being in love,’ Dr John persisted. ‘All sorts of men have found that out. My father told me once that there were two kinds of women. The ones you dally with, and the ones you marry with.’
‘Isn’t that a little old-fashioned?’
‘The war changed many things. But it didn’t change people’s quality. Take your Bethan for instance. She’s certainly pretty enough,’ he conceded. ‘Curves in all the right places, nice smile, nice enough manners, but a bit quiet, wouldn’t you agree?’
‘She was when she was here,’ Andrew concurred ambiguously.
‘What I’m trying to say is that she’s probably been careful to show you only her best side. Think about it, Andrew. Can you honestly tell me that you really know her? Hasn’t the thought crossed your mind that she’s reticent when she’s here because she knows she doesn’t fit into our style of life?’
‘But she isn’t quiet when we’re alone together.’
‘How many deep, meaningful discussions have you had with her?’ Dr John pressed.
‘A few,’ Andrew retorted sullenly.
‘When you both had your clothes on?’
Andrew reddened.
‘I’m sorry, that was below the belt, but look at her family, son. What do you know about them? Her father’s a miner on short time work,’ he answered for him. ‘Her eldest brother earns a pittance in the Town Hall. The other one can’t even find a job.
And there’s a daughter still in school so she can’t contribute anything. I’ve seen enough families like that to know what the temptations are. They see people like us living well, in a reasonable house with a car, eating the right food, with enough money in our pockets to visit the right places, and they grow envious. They don’t see the work we do; only the rewards, and they go out to get what we have the only way they know how. They turn to crime.’
Andrew wanted to tell his father that he was wrong. Very, very wrong, but then he remembered Megan Powell. ‘Have they charged Bethan’s aunt?’ he asked, hoping against hope to find another way out.
‘Oh yes. Her and eighteen other women. And from what the superintendent said to me this morning, they’re the tip of the iceberg. There’s a lot more to come.’ He drank some of his whisky and rocked slightly on his heels. ‘Bethan’s aunt is as guilty as Cain,’ he affirmed strongly. ‘You know that, don’t you?’
Andrew recalled the clothes that Bethan and Charlie had carried through the kitchen and thrown into the wash boiler.
Bethan’s complicity was something he could hardly bring himself to think about, let alone divulge to his father. But much as he might want to, he couldn’t wipe his memory clean. Just how many Powells were as guilty as Cain? ‘What will they do to Mrs Powell?’ he asked.
‘They’ll go easier on her than on some of the others because she’s already decided to plead guilty. Saves the court a lot of bother, but then –’ his father topped up both their glasses – ‘unfortunately she’s refusing to talk. The sergeant said her sentence would be a lot lighter if she fully co-operated. Needless to say she won’t.’ He shook his head and shrugged his shoulders. ‘That’s these people all over for you. Misguided sense of loyalty. In the end she’ll probably get a heavy fine, an order to make some kind of restitution to the injured shopkeepers will be made, that’s if she has any assets to speak of. Plus a long sentence and hard labour of course to deter anyone from picking up where she left off.’
‘How long is long?’
‘Ten years. Possibly more. Andrew, do try to see this from your mother’s and my point of view. Superintendent Hunt warned us that this is just the beginning. There’s more to come. Now just suppose for a minute that Bethan’s involved …’
‘Dad …’
‘Hear me out, Andrew’ he barked. ‘What if she’s arrested for receiving? You can’t even begin to imagine what that would do to you. You’ve been seen with her around the town. You’ve taken her to decent places, introduced her to decent people. I’m not decrying your motives in doing that. You were going out with the girl and because you’re the kind of person your mother and I have brought you up to be … honest, uncomplicated and straightforward you went out with her openly. But everywhere you went together she was seen, smart, well-dressed and wearing the kind of clothes that a nurse couldn’t p
ossibly afford to buy on a hospital board’s wages. Particularly when she’s practically been supporting her entire family. Let’s look on the bright side. Even if she isn’t charged, she’ll be seen as a thief’s accomplice.’
‘But …’
‘And if you continue to see her –’ his father didn’t quite manage to conceal the edge of anger that was lying just beneath the surface of his outwardly reasonable attitude, ‘you’ll be tainted by the same gossip.’
Andrew sank on to the sofa, his head in his hands.
‘Look, I know your mother better than anyone. I know she frequently worries about things that never happen, but in this instance she’s right. Go to London, boy. Alec’s father will see that you’re worked hard but not so hard that you won’t have time for a social life. Meet a few other girls. A month from now you’ll be a different man. Take my word for it.’
Mair knocked on the door.
‘Dinner?’ Dr John asked sharply.
‘No, sir. It’s Dr Lewis. He says he has to see young Dr John urgently.’
‘Then show him in, Mair.’
Trevor walked in. ‘I’m sorry to intrude on you like this, sir,’ he apologised.
‘No intrusion.’ Dr John senior was glad of an excuse to break off his talk with Andrew. He had nothing constructive to add. The rest was up to Andrew and the common sense he fervently hoped would prevail. ‘If you haven’t a prior engagement stay to dinner,’ he offered hospitably.
‘I couldn’t possibly.’ The slum boy that was never far from the surface invariably made Trevor uneasy in the middle-class atmosphere of Dr John senior’s house.
‘Nonsense, if you’ve no other engagement we’d love to have you, wouldn’t we Andrew?’
‘What? Oh yes of course, do stay,’ Andrew reiterated unconvincingly.
‘I need to speak to you, Andrew.’
‘And I need to take a trip to the wine cellar. See what I can come up with that will go with cold meat and salad,’ said Dr John senior.
‘Is this about Bethan?’ Andrew asked.
‘Yes,’ Trevor answered with an embarrassed look at Andrew’s father, who was still hovering by the door.
‘You may as well say whatever you’ve got to say in front of my father,’ Andrew said with a touch of bitterness. ‘If he doesn’t already know about it, you can be sure that the superintendent will be on the phone to inform him in the next five minutes.’
‘That’s unfair, Andrew.’
‘At the moment I don’t feel very fair.’
‘I’ve just come from Bethan’s aunt’s house,’ Trevor burst out, trying to say what he’d come to say as quickly as possible so he could leave the heavy atmosphere and go to visit Laura. After the events of the day he needed to see her even more than usual.
‘Is one of them ill?’ Andrew asked anxiously.
‘She’s dead.’
‘Who’s dead?’ Dr John demanded.
‘Bethan’s aunt,’ Trevor repeated in exasperation.
‘But she’s in the police station,’ Andrew insisted.
‘Not Megan Powell, Hetty Bull.’
‘The minister’s wife!’ Andrew exclaimed.
‘Yes. She gassed herself. Her husband sent for Bethan as soon as he found her, but there was nothing either of us could do by the time we got there. I saw a note she’d written. Apparently she’d bought some clothes from Megan Powell. Said she couldn’t live with herself. I suppose it was impossible for someone as religious as her to come to terms with the idea that she’d worn stolen clothes,’ Trevor finished awkwardly.
‘The chickens are really coming home to roost on this one,’ Dr John murmured, unable to suppress a hint of, “I told you so”. This second blow, coming so soon after the first, devastated Andrew. He slumped forward on his seat, head in his hands again. The telephone rang and his father went to answer it.
‘Bethan looks dreadful,’ Trevor ventured. ‘She seems to be shouldering a lot of the burden. But she still insisted on going to work tonight.’
‘She would,’ Andrew said without emotion, inviting no further comment.
‘That was the superintendent on the telephone.’ Andrew’s father stood in the doorway. ‘They’ve arrested two girls, Maud and Diana Powell. Are they related to Bethan?’
‘Maud’s her younger sister. Diana’s her cousin. But they’re children. They’re only fourteen,’ Andrew protested.
‘Evidently they’re both old enough to steal,’ his father pronounced dismissively. ‘They wouldn’t have been arrested if the police had any doubts about their guilt. And you’d better brace yourself, boy. There’s worse.’ Dr John took a cigar from the silver box on the bar. A bad sign. Andrew had never seen him smoke before dinner until now.
‘Unfortunately for you, and for us as a family, the police suspect there’s a connection between you and the nurse they saw in the house this morning.’
‘Bethan?’ Trevor asked.
Andrew nodded miserably. ‘But they haven’t arrested her?’ It was more a plea than a request for information.
‘Not yet they haven’t. But in Superintendent Hunt’s opinion it’s only a matter of time,’ his father strayed beyond the narrow bounds of the information that Hunt had been prepared to impart. ‘Andrew, really, you have no choice. The sooner you’re in London the better for everyone concerned. If they arrest her, there’s no knowing what she’ll say once they get her to the police station. Knowing of our influence with people who matter, she may even send for you. Think of the disgrace.’
When Andrew remained silent he lost his temper. ‘Damn it all, boy, if you won’t think of yourself, think of me, of what I’ve worked for. Of your mother, and Fe. Don’t fool yourself, news of this mess will reach even London, and neither of them will be able to hold up their heads again. All because their son and brother got involved with a family of common thieves.
Trevor rose to his feet and walked towards the door. ‘I have to go on duty.’
‘You still have to eat, boy, and it’s ready. I’ll telephone the hospital and let them know where you are.’ Dr John rejected his excuse out of hand. ‘Andrew?’ He stood in the doorway, his hand poised on the door knob.
Defeated, Andrew looked up at his father. ‘You can send a telegram to Fe and Alec. Tell them I’ll be up on the morning train,’ he agreed wretchedly.
‘I’ll try telephoning them first.’ His father left them. A few minutes later they heard him speaking on the telephone in the hall.
Andrew sat on the sofa staring down into his empty glass. He wanted to speak to Trevor – to look at him – but he gagged on the unspoken words. Afraid to say anything in case he saw something akin to the contempt he felt for himself mirrored in Trevor’s eyes.
The quiet night Trevor had wished for Bethan hadn’t materialised. A mother went into labour. A ward maid, one of only two on duty, vomited and had to be sent home, making it impossible for the trainee and the other maid to cope with the normal workload, let alone the additional strain of looking after a patient in labour. By two o’clock Bethan felt tired enough to sit on the floor and cry. But she forced herself to go on. Checking feeding times, delivering the baby, cutting the cord, washing both mother and infant, writing reports – there wasn’t even time to take a break until four o’clock in the morning.
When she was finally free she went into the sister’s office and shut the door. The room held so many memories. She only had to close her eyes to see Andrew standing next to the fireplace, arms outstretched, ready to embrace her …
She opened them again.
There was no Andrew. Only two piles of paperwork. And the one that had been completed was by far and away the smaller. Sweeping them both aside she sat down and rested her arms on the desk. For the first time that day she indulged in the luxury of a waking moment to herself. She went over the events of the morning. Saw again the look of horror on Andrew’s face as the policemen clumped their way into Megan’s house. The shock registering in his eyes when he realised why she and Ch
arlie were running through the house with bundles of clothes in their arms.
Suddenly she remembered that he’d promised to call for her that afternoon. He’d wanted to take her to a garden party. Garden party! They’d discussed it only that morning. It felt like a lifetime ago. So much had happened in the space of a day. She consoled herself with the reflection that even if he’d driven to Graig Avenue she might not have been there. Hetty …
She was tormented by a ghastly, very real image of her aunt the way she’d found her. Lying on the floor of the washhouse, her feet curled round the boiler, dead …
Dead!
As a nurse she’d seen death many times, in many different guises, but apart from her grandmother who’d died peacefully in her sleep, it was the first time she’d witnessed the final tragedy in her own family.
Hot stinging tears of grief and remorse for missed opportunities burned at the corners of her eyes. She hadn’t known Aunt Hetty well enough to care about her. Not in the way she cared for Megan, but she’d pitied her. Hetty’d been so small, so fragile so totally subservient to her overbearing, self-righteous husband. She hadn’t had much of a married life – hadn’t had much of a life at all. If only she’d made the effort to get to know Hetty better. She might have been able to do something, at least given her a few happy times – hours they could have shared, the way she’d shared part of her life with Megan.
Overwhelmed by grief, misery and sheer loneliness she laid her head on her arms on the desk and allowed her tears to flow unchecked.
Andrew drove through the town at breakneck speed. On the seat of the car next to him was a letter he’d written to Bethan. He’d penned it after dinner in his father’s study while his father and a reluctant, press-ganged Trevor had lingered over coffee and brandy.
As soon as he’d finished it he’d returned to the dining room and asked Trevor to deliver it to Bethan after the London train had left. But Trevor had refused. And to his amazement his father had agreed with Trevor.
‘You’ll have to see her, Andrew,’ he declared as he passed the cigars and the brandy bottle around the table a second time. ‘Take my word for it. Letters are never final. Not like telling her to her face. A letter will only give her an excuse to see you again and drag the whole thing out. Write to her and you could be enmeshed in the trauma of this for months. Best to see her before you go, even if it means catching a later train. Tell her straight off that it’s over. A clean break’s what’s needed here.’
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