The Quality of Love

by Rosie Harris

  ‘If I’m late the first time I’m permitted to go to the pictures with a friend then I won’t be allowed to do it again.’

  ‘This is stupid,’ he argued. ‘You’re eighteen now and if you didn’t live so near to the university you would have left home ages ago and would be standing on your own two feet. They’d have no idea at all about how you spend your evenings.’

  ‘I know that just as well as you do,’ she retorted, her cheeks flaming. ‘I don’t like all these restrictions either but as long as I have to live at home then I have to do as they ask.’

  ‘I keep telling you, you must stand up for yourself. Tell them you need to have friends of your own and to go out with them occasionally. It’s not as though you are going to be out every night now, is it?’

  ‘When are we meeting again?’ she asked softly, trying to quell his anger.

  ‘If this is how things are going to be then there’s not much point in us doing so,’ he said churlishly.

  ‘Don’t be like that, Gwyn. Like I’ve already said, if I get home in good time tonight then they might relax. If I don’t, then they’ll think I’m not to be trusted.’

  ‘Well, you’re not, are you? If they knew about where you went and who you were with the other weekend they’d probably throw you out and tell you never to darken their door again. Perhaps I should tell them?’

  ‘You wouldn’t!’ She stared at him horrified. ‘Promise me you will never do anything like that?’

  ‘Why? Don’t you trust me?’ he questioned.

  Her heart was thumping because she wasn’t completely sure whether she did or not. Determined not to let their argument develop into a row she put her arms round his neck and pulled his face down so that she could kiss him.

  ‘When are we meeting again?’ she asked again. ‘Next time I’ll tell them in advance that I’ll be late home.’

  ‘Make that very late home and I might consider it,’ he murmured as he returned her kiss.

  ‘Very well, I’ll tell them I will be very late. So when is it to be?’

  ‘I’ll write to you. Look out for a letter from Gwyneth,’ he told her as they separated and she hurried down Cyfartha Street already later than she’d intended to be.

  Chapter Ten

  Although Lloyd Lewis looked very pointedly at the clock on the mantelpiece when Sarah arrived home he made no comment. She didn’t offer any excuse, although she had already planned what to say if he challenged her on how late she was.

  The evening hadn’t had the sparkle she’d expected so she said very little to her parents, refused her mother’s offer of some supper, and went off to bed right away.

  She was late waking next morning and had to rush so much that she had no time to sit down to have what her mother called ‘a proper breakfast’. Grabbing a piece of toast and gulping down a cup of tea she promised her mother she’d make up for it with a good meal in the canteen at midday.

  ‘Well, mind you do, cariad,’ her mother said worriedly.

  About twenty minutes later she was feeling quite sick and wondered whether it was because she’d missed out on breakfast or because of the ice-cream she’d eaten in the pictures the night before when she’d been with Gwyn. As she reached the university building she felt so dizzy that she thought she was going to faint.

  The feeling wore off during the morning and she certainly felt better after she’d eaten at lunchtime. The next morning, however, she felt queasy again and this time her mother overheard her being sick and asked her what was the matter.

  Although she dismissed it as merely something she’d eaten her mother didn’t seem completely satisfied. ‘I think you’d better go and see the doctor. I’ve noticed you’ve not been looking well for a couple of weeks,’ she said worriedly. ‘Perhaps the doctor can give you a tonic or something.’

  ‘You’re making a fuss about nothing,’ Sarah told her. ‘I’ll be fine in an hour or so, I usually am.’

  ‘Do you mean that you’ve been sick before and said nothing about it?’ Her mother frowned.

  ‘A couple of times. It’s nothing. Like you keep saying, I have been working very hard.’

  Lorna refused to let the matter drop. That night, when Sarah was going upstairs to bed, her mother followed her saying she wanted a quiet word with her.

  ‘I’m going to make an appointment for you to see the doctor. Now don’t worry, I’ll come with you,’ she added quickly when she saw the look on Sarah’s face.

  ‘I can’t do that because it means I’ll miss out on an important lecture. I tell you what I’ll do,’ she went on quickly before her mother could start to argue about it, ‘I’ll report to the sick room and see the matron at the university.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘I’ll do it today, I promise.’

  ‘Well, mind you do and when you come home I’ll want to know what she said.’

  ‘Probably exactly the same as you; that I’ve been working too hard.’ Sarah smiled as she kissed her mother goodnight.

  It was mid-afternoon before Sarah remembered her promise to her mother and dashed along to the sick room. She hoped there would be no one else there and that she could get away again in a matter of minutes so that she wouldn’t be late for her next lecture.

  Matron was a plump middle-aged woman with grey hair pulled back into a fat bun. She was neatly dressed in a dark blue dress and a white starched apron, and she had a fob watch to which she referred every few minutes as if timing how long her patient had been there.

  She took a minute or so to find the card with Sarah’s details on it, then she listened in silence as Sarah explained that she didn’t really feel ill and that it was only because her mother had insisted she had professional advice that she had come to see her at all.

  ‘She made an appointment for me to see our doctor but it would have meant taking the morning off and I didn’t want to do that,’ Sarah finished.

  Matron nodded understandingly. ‘I’ll know better if it is anything to worry about after you’ve told me your symptoms,’ she said in a kindly voice.

  ‘I feel sick first thing in the morning. That’s all, really.’ Sarah smiled. ‘It always wears off by mid-morning, though, and then for the rest of the day I feel fine.’

  ‘I see!’ Matron picked up her pencil, asked a few pertinent questions, then made some notes on the card in front of her. When she looked up the smile was gone from her face.

  ‘I think that perhaps you will have to go and see your own doctor, my dear,’ she said gravely.

  ‘Why?’ Sarah looked alarmed. ‘Do you really think I’ve got something wrong with me, then?’

  For a moment Matron didn’t answer. She looked down at the notes she’d made, tapping her pencil thoughtfully. ‘I think you may be pregnant,’ she said in an expressionless voice.

  ‘Pregnant?’

  Matron was quick to notice the dismay in Sarah’s voice and she gave her a piercing look. ‘Is there any reason for you to believe that you might be?’ she asked in a rather severe voice.

  Shaking her head and trying to hold back her tears, Sarah stood up and made for the door, ignoring the order to come back and discuss the matter further.

  Once out in the corridor she headed for the cloakroom. All she wanted was to be on her own so that she could think through what she’d been told.

  She splashed cold water on her burning face and tried to collect her thoughts. She’d never even thought about such a thing happening. Her parents would be mortified when she told them and what was Gwyn going to say?

  Not for the first time she wished there was some way she could get in touch with him. For one wild moment she thought of going to the Western Mail offices and asking if she could speak to him, but she didn’t think he would like that. Yet it was an emergency, she told herself; she needed him to advise her; to help her sort out the trouble she found herself in.

  She walked home in a daze but by the time she reached Cyfartha Street she’d still not decided what to do. As she let herself i
nto the house she resolved she’d wait until she had told Gwyn before she said anything to her mam and dad.

  She wondered how he would react. Would he be pleased at the thought of becoming a father or would he be horrified? Perhaps, like her, he’d feel scared by the enormity of what had happened.

  ‘So, what did the matron say, then?’ her mother asked almost the minute she walked through the door.

  ‘Not very much, can we talk about it later on, Mam?’ Sarah prevaricated.

  ‘Come on, tell me before your dad gets in,’ Lorna persisted. ‘Is it bad news?’

  ‘I told her you thought I’d been working too hard.’

  ‘Fair-do’s, and what did she say to that?’

  ‘Well, what do you think she said?’ Sarah smiled.

  ‘She probably agreed with me, if I know anything about it.’

  To Sarah’s relief there was the sound of the front door opening so she pressed a finger to her lips.

  ‘Yes, all right, then, we’ll have a talk about it later on,’ her mother whispered.

  ‘There’s really not much else to say,’ Sarah said hurriedly, hoping that would be the end of the matter.

  She knew she was playing for time and the thought that her mother might start questioning her again the moment they were on their own worried her almost as much as the news itself. The last thing that went through her mind as she went to sleep was the hope that there would be a letter from Gwyn on Monday morning.

  There wasn’t, and, knowing not only how ill she would feel afterwards, but also what the real cause of it was, it took her all her time to sit down and eat the breakfast her mother insisted on her having.

  It was Thursday before she received a letter. This time, although she had been determined to be near the hallway when the postman called, it was her mother who picked it up from behind the front door and handed it to her.

  ‘If that’s another letter from that friend of yours asking you to go to the pictures again, then you’d better say no. Late nights are the last thing you need at the moment, Sarah, because you are still looking rather washed out.’

  ‘Perhaps it is exactly what I do need,’ Sarah argued. ‘If I have a night out now and again instead of studying every evening then I’ll feel more relaxed, won’t I?’

  ‘Having an early night would do you far more good,’ her mother told her.

  ‘If I go to bed too early then I wake up in the middle of the night and I can’t get back to sleep again.’

  ‘These days you’ve got an answer for everything, haven’t you?’ Lorna said rather sharply. ‘I’m not sure if all this education is doing you any good. It’s certainly making you very difficult to live with, I can tell you that.’

  Sarah knew that she ought to apologise to her mother but she couldn’t bring herself to do so. She had so many other things to worry about. Even if her parents said she couldn’t go out she knew she would have to go and meet Gwyn at all costs so that she could tell him that she was pregnant.

  ‘Well, go on, then, open the damn letter,’ her mother said crossly. ‘At least let me know what’s going on. Why on earth does she have to write to you?’ She frowned. ‘Why can’t she ask you when you meet up at one of the lectures?’

  ‘Gwyneth’s no longer at university. She left last July and now she’s working,’ Sarah muttered tersely.

  ‘Oh! Funny you never mentioned that before. So you went on holiday before she started work, did you?’

  ‘That’s right. She started work the following week. I thought I had mentioned it.’

  ‘No, not a word, but then you didn’t tell us all that much about your holiday either. Well, go on, then, open that letter and see what it is she has to say.’

  Reluctantly Sarah slit open the envelope and pulled out the sheet of writing paper. She’d wanted to be on her own when she read it. The words became blurred in front of her eyes the moment she saw the signature ‘Gwyneth’.

  ‘Yes. She does want me to go out again,’ she said defiantly. ‘Tonight, as a matter of fact, so don’t expect me home until about ten o’clock.’

  ‘Ten! Why that late?’ her mother queried. ‘Surely you’ll be going to the first showing so you’ll be out by nine and it doesn’t take you an hour to walk home.’

  ‘We . . . we might go to a milk bar,’ Sarah said shrugging her shoulders nonchalantly.

  ‘Whatever for? Why waste your money like that when there’ll be supper waiting here for you when you get in?’

  ‘So that we can have a chat and catch up with what’s happening,’ Sarah said abruptly.

  ‘The last time you went out together you said you were going to a milk bar before you went to the pictures, so if you do that you’ll have plenty of time to talk then.’

  ‘Half past nine, ten o’clock, what does it matter? Why are you making such a fuss, Mam?’

  ‘I’m thinking of you, cariad. I don’t want you getting ill.’

  ‘One night out in the week isn’t going to do that,’ Sarah argued. ‘And you keep saying I work too hard. Look, I must go or I’m going to be late.’ She grabbed her coat, picked up her bag of books, and headed for the door.

  ‘Hold on, cariad, you haven’t had any breakfast again,’ her mother remonstrated.

  ‘I know, but because of all this arguing I haven’t time now,’ Sarah retorted as she banged the front door behind her and hurried down the street ignoring the fact that her mother had come out on to the step and was calling after her.

  The day seemed endless and Sarah alternatively longed to see Gwyn and tell him what Matron had said and dreaded the thought of doing so because she wasn’t sure what his reaction would be.

  He was waiting outside the milk bar as he’d said he would be and as she walked down the street towards him her heart raced. Every time she saw him he seemed to be more handsome than ever.

  Since he’d started work he’d become so forceful and even more confident about everything that she sometimes wondered if he still loved her as much as she loved him.

  She waited until they were sitting down and she’d listened to all the new developments in his job and how exciting he was finding it before she attempted to tell him her news.

  He frowned almost as if he couldn’t comprehend what she was telling him.

  ‘So what are we going to do, Gwyn?’ she asked meekly.

  He sat toying with his knife and avoiding her eyes for several seconds. When he looked up she realised that the news had astounded him and that he was as taken aback as she’d been when Matron had told her.

  ‘You haven’t had it confirmed by a doctor yet so you are not a hundred per cent sure,’ he pointed out. ‘It may not be that at all; it might be something you’ve been eating that disagrees with you,’ he reasoned hopefully. ‘Why not leave things as they are for the present?’

  ‘No, I can’t. My mother wanted me to go to the doctor but I said I would see Matron instead rather than take a morning off, but she’s still insisting that I must do so and I haven’t told her yet that Matron believes I am pregnant. If I am, then it will start to show soon and then everyone will know.’

  ‘It’s time enough for us to worry when that happens,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Surely you can tell your mother you’re feeling all right again now.’

  ‘You don’t understand. Although I am feeling better my mam knows about me being sick and she’s bound to notice that I am beginning to find it difficult to fasten my skirt.’

  ‘You’re imagining it, cariad, because of what you’ve been told. Mind you, it could be all the cream cakes and milk shakes you’ve been having when we go out,’ he joked.

  Sarah bit her lip and said nothing. She didn’t think it was anything to joke about. She’d expected Gwyn to be very surprised, shocked even, but she had been hoping he would understand the predicament she was in and come up with some sort of solution to the problem.

  She didn’t really want to go to the pictures but she hoped that perhaps it would give Gwyn time to absorb what she had told him
and then they could talk about it again afterwards.

  She felt upset and worried by his response. Remembering the time when he’d said they should elope she’d thought that he would suggest that it was what they ought to do now. Or, better still, insist that they must get married before her parents discovered her predicament.

  Chapter Eleven

  It was the last week in February and three weeks since she’d heard from Gwyn when Sarah arrived home to find her mother looking very upset. Even before her mother said a word she knew instantly that she was going to have to tell her the truth.

  In one way she felt it would be a great relief. Once her mother knew the truth then they would be able to talk openly about it and she would be able to ask her mother’s advice about what she ought to do for the best.

  ‘Don’t try giving me any excuses,’ Lorna greeted her angrily. ‘I know perfectly well what is wrong with you and why you’ve been sick in the mornings . . .’

  ‘Well, I’m not any more,’ Sarah interrupted her quickly. ‘That was a long while ago. I’m fine now. It must have been something I ate that disagreed with me. It was probably something I bought from the canteen.’

  ‘Duw anwyl! Stop talking such twaddle, Sarah. I clean your room and I do all your washing, remember, so I know quite well that there is something wrong and has been for some weeks now. What’s more, look at the way you’re putting on weight. None of your clothes fit you properly any more. You’re pregnant, aren’t you! Come on now, cariad, admit it!’

  They stared at each other in awkward silence. Then Sarah sighed resignedly. ‘Since you already seem to have guessed then I suppose there’s no point in denying it,’ she said reluctantly. ‘Yes, Mam, you’re quite right, I am pregnant.’

  ‘You’re what?’ The astonished voice of Lloyd broke into their discussion. They’d been so intent on what they were talking about that they hadn’t heard him come into the house. Now he stood there in the doorway of the kitchen, his face puce, and his eyes glittering with anger as he stared accusingly at Sarah.