Ignoring the other diners in the City Restaurant, Joey pushed his dessert bowl aside, leaned across the table towards Rhian, and continued relating his life history.
‘… So, when the colliery management refused to give my father, Lloyd, Victor and me our jobs back after the strike because Dad and Lloyd were strike leaders and union officials, we thought we’d have to leave the valleys. None of us had ever considered working anywhere other than the pit. Even now, Lloyd considers himself lucky because he succeeded in finding a management job with another mining company.’
‘But you are happy working in Gwilym James?’ she asked.
‘Only since they made me manager of the Tonypandy store,’ he replied half-seriously. ‘But when Sali first suggested I apply for a trainee manager’s position I thought she was mad.’ He leaned back from the table as the waitress arrived to clear their plates. Both he and Rhian had opted for the three-course, ninepenny lunchtime special: brown soup followed by pork chops, swede, mashed potatoes, apple sauce, and gravy; and for dessert, jam roly-poly and vanilla custard. The portions were liberal enough to satisfy the hungriest navvy, and he had only managed to eat a quarter of his jam roly-poly. But Rhian had given up halfway through her dinner and barely touched her dessert.
‘Anything wrong with this, miss?’ The waitress poked at Rhian’s roly-poly with her spoon.
‘Nothing, thank you. I’m just not used to eating like this in the middle of the day,’ Rhian apologized.
‘Tea or coffee? Both are served as part of the special.’
‘Tea, please,’ Rhian answered.
‘Me too, please.’ Joey leaned towards Rhian again as soon as the waitress left. ‘In answer to your question, yes, I am happy working in Gwilym James. Very happy. I never saw myself wearing a suit to work every day, or managing a store, but I have always liked people.’
Trying not to sound as if she were carping, she murmured, ‘Especially women people.’
Trusting that honesty would prove the best policy, Joey confessed, ‘I took Sara to the Empire Theatre once. When I invited her to come out with me again, she refused. I never asked her again.’
‘The show was that bad?’
‘The show was fine.’ He had the grace to look ashamed. ‘In fact it was so good I took her best friend to see it later in the same week. Both of them were furious when they found out.’
‘They had every right to be angry.’
‘I was only seventeen. I’ve done a lot of growing up during the last five years.’
‘And now you only go out with one girl at a time?’ she smiled.
‘I’ve spent so much time building up trade in the store during the last two years I’ve hardly gone out with any girls.’ He fell serious. ‘I really am looking for someone special. Someone I can spend the rest of my life with.’ He reached out, intending to cover her hand with his, but she pushed her chair back from the table and moved her hands out of his reach, just as she’d done in the teashop in Tonypandy.
‘How many girls have you said that to?’ She was growing warier of him by the minute. Already, she was beginning to understand why so many women liked him. He was easy company, and he was confiding his thoughts as if she were the only person in the world he could talk to.
‘None,’ he answered, ‘and not just lately – ever.’
‘Do you expect me to believe you?’
‘It’s the truth, but knowing what the gossips say about me, no. And before you tell me again that this is an outing based on friendship, let me explain. I love my family to bits, but there have been times when I’ve hated being the youngest. Lloyd is nine years older than me; Victor, six. They were allowed to do everything that mattered years before me. Go to school, leave school, wear long trousers, stay up late, work, take out girls – and that’s without bringing drinking and pubs into the equation. But I’ve never been as jealous of either of them as I have been since they married. Victor and Megan are so wrapped in one another and their farm I sometimes wonder if the rest of the world exists for them. And I only have to see the way Sali looks at Lloyd to turn green with envy. Not that I want Sali to look at me in that way,’ he clarified hastily. ‘But I do hope that one day I can be part of a marriage as strong as theirs.’
‘They are happy together.’ Rhian didn’t dare tell him that she too envied Sali and Lloyd’s close relationship. Or how much she dreamed of being a part of a family like theirs.
‘Have you ever noticed the way Lloyd and Sali finish one another’s sentences, or exchange glances as if they know exactly what the other is thinking? Or listened while they talk to their children?’ Joey watched the waitress set their tea, sugar and milk on the table.
Rhian was amazed to think that a man could feel the same way as her about marriage. But her past was very different to Joey’s and she’d never entirely put it behind her. Orphaned at eight, her early memories of her father’s drunken rages and the beatings he’d given her mother still had the power to bring tears to her eyes. ‘There’s nothing worse than a bad marriage,’ she pronounced bitterly.
‘And nothing better than a good one.’ Joey handed her the sugar bowl. ‘I’m not just talking about my brothers and their wives. My parents were very happy together until my mother died a few years ago. In some ways I don’t think my father ever recovered from losing her.’
‘You’ve been lucky in your family.’ She could only imagine what it would have been like to grow up in a houseful of people who cared about one another. She hadn’t even known what it was like to have a friend until she had met Sali.
‘But as I said, Lloyd and Victor have been luckier still and, like school, long trousers and being allowed into pubs, I hope my turn will come.’ He gazed intently into her eyes. ‘I know what people think of me, I know how they talk and I know I’ve been no angel in the past. But can’t you see this could be different? That’s why I’m trying to tell you that I want more than simply a good time with you, Rhian.’
Her heart turned somersaults. Joey was offering to make all her dreams of a husband and a family of her own come true. But she also felt that it was ridiculous of him to talk like this on their first outing. It was one thing to be envious of his brothers’ domestic bliss, quite another to insist that his intentions towards her were serious when he only really knew her as an acquaintance. It was as though he was prepared to consider any eligible, presentable woman as a possible wife. And flattering though it was to be considered presentable by Joey Evans, she was too cautious to entrust her feelings and happiness to what would probably turn out to be another of his passing fancies.
‘And if all I want at the moment is a good time?’ She deliberately kept her voice light.
‘So long as the good times are with me, fine.’ He pulled his wallet from his inside pocket and winked at the waitress to gain her attention. Flustered, the girl dropped her notepad and pencil.
Rhian smiled and shook her head. ‘You’re incorrigible.’
‘In what way?’ he asked in surprise.
‘One minute you sit there and tell me that you want one special person in your life, the next you flirt with the waitress.’
‘I wasn’t flirting with her.’
She counted out tenpence from her purse. ‘You winked at her and in a woman’s eyes that’s flirting, especially when the wink is accompanied by the smile you just gave her. When she brings the bill she’ll be expecting an invitation out.’
‘Don’t be silly, I’m with you.’
The waitress set the bill beside Joey’s empty cup. ‘Can I get you anything else, sir?’ she purred seductively.
‘No, thank you. My brother and I have finished,’ Rhian answered before Joey had a chance to speak.
Joey took Rhian’s tenpence and handed the girl two shillings. She covered his fingers with hers and he was forced to tug his hand away to free them.
‘I’ll bring your change in a moment, sir.’
‘See what I mean?’ Rhian lifted her eyebrows. ‘Another wink and she’ll
do a lot more than hold your hand.’
‘It’s just banter. It goes on all the time between men and women.’
‘In my experience, only when you’re involved.’
‘All right, I solemnly promise that I’ll never wink or flirt with a woman from this moment on.’
She burst out laughing.
‘Now what’s funny?’ he demanded touchily.
‘You. I doubt that you could stop making eyes at women, even if you tried. Every time I’ve been in your company you’ve flirted with someone. It makes no difference whether they’re young or old, married or single, and you’re not even aware that you’re doing it.’
‘It means nothing, surely you can see that.’ He sat back with his arms folded, forcing the waitress to drop his sixpence change on to the tablecloth. He took it after she left and pushed her tuppence tip under his cup.
‘You might think it means nothing, but what about your legions of ex-girlfriends?’ Rhian tugged on her gloves.
‘Legions! I admit I’ve sown a few wild oats –’
‘And none wilder than today. You’re lucky you were talking to me. Another girl might have dragged you halfway to the altar by now. You can’t just wake up one morning, decide to marry and look around for a wife. Haven’t you heard the expression “marry in haste, repent at leisure”?’
‘I didn’t have to look around for a wife, as you put it. I made up my mind months ago that you were the girl for me. It’s taken me this long to get you to agree to come out with me.’
‘What time does the Park Hall open?’ She left her chair.
‘Three o’clock.’
She glanced at the clock on the wall. ‘It’s not even one yet, and we’ve already walked twice around the town.’
‘We could go to Ynysangharad House. Sali will be home. She’s not returning to work until the end of Harry’s holidays and he has to go back to boarding school.’ His eyes were dark, probing, and she sensed him daring her to take up his invitation and announce to his family that they were going out together.
‘Fine, we’ll visit Sali and the children – as friends.’
He offered her his arm. ‘Let’s go.’
‘Pow!’ Harry stuffed a matchstick into a toy cannon and fired it. The missile hit a lead soldier in the middle of the row Joey had set up in front of the small fort Victor had made. The figure wavered, hitting the ones either side. When it finally toppled, the entire row followed suit. ‘All your officers are killed, Uncle Joey.’ Harry triumphantly scooped up Joey’s ‘dead’ men and piled them behind him. ‘Now your troops have no one to order them about you’ll lose the war.’
‘No, I won’t, because my sergeants will take over, and everyone knows it’s the sergeants who are really in charge of every army.’ Joey moved two battered figures forward to replace his officers. One was missing an arm, the other a leg, and it took a little care to balance them.
The door opened and Sali’s housekeeper, Mari Williams, wheeled a loaded trolley alongside the sofa where Sali was sitting with Rhian and her three-year-old daughter, Bella.
‘Thank you, Mari. Go to Auntie Rhian until I’ve poured the tea, poppet.’ Sali handed Bella her picture book and the little girl climbed on to Rhian’s lap, settling down contentedly.
‘Is there chocolate cake, Mari?’ Harry pushed another matchstick into his cannon.
‘Only for polite boys, who look at Mari when they speak to her and say please and thank you,’ Sali reprimanded.
‘If I look up, Uncle Joey will kill all my men.’
‘I call a truce until after tea.’ Joey rose from the hearthrug in time to see Mari nod from him to Rhian and give Sali a questioning look. ‘Yes, Mari, Rhian and I arrived together.’
‘Does my sister know that you are spending your day off with this one, Rhian?’ Mari pointed at Joey.
‘I have no doubt that Llan House’s Mrs Williams will have heard that we left Tonypandy on the same train this morning by now.’ Joey perched on the arm of the sofa next to Rhian and Bella.
‘We’re not spending the day together, Mari,’ Rhian explained. ‘We’re spending it here. I happened to mention that I was going to visit Sali and Joey decided to tag along.’
‘Just so long as that is all it is,’ Mari pronounced disapprovingly. ‘Given his reputation, you shouldn’t need telling what he’s like.’
‘I am here and I’m not deaf, Mari.’ Before Joey could say another word in his defence the front door closed.
Harry leapt to his feet and ran out into the hall. ‘It’s Daddy, Bella,’ he shouted back excitedly. ‘Daddy, you’ll never guess who’s here.’
‘Auntie Rhian.’ Lloyd carried Harry back into the drawing room on his shoulders.
‘And Uncle Joey.’
‘So I see.’ Lloyd swung Harry down. ‘Hello, sweetheart.’ He kissed Sali’s lips and Rhian’s cheek. ‘Joey,’ he acknowledged his brother. ‘I didn’t think you could take a Thursday afternoon off.’
‘I can now I have the store running like clockwork. Four sugars in my tea, please, Sali. And I’d love one of the scones with raspberry jam and clotted cream, Mari.’
‘You’re worse than Master Harry and he has the excuse of being eight years old,’ she grumbled. ‘As I keep telling him, no cakes, jam or cream until he’s eaten at least two sandwiches and as you’re twice his size, in your case that’ll be four. Ham, chicken or tongue?’
‘Chicken, please, Mari. They look delicious.’
‘And you can stop flattering me. Cook made them and I’m too long in the tooth to be taken in like one of your Tonypandy floozies.’
‘What’s a Tonypandy floozy when it’s at home?’ Joey laughed.
‘A kind of cake,’ Lloyd broke in, with a significant look at Harry and Bella who were apt to pick up every word.
Sali busied herself with pouring the tea. Fond as she was of Joey, she couldn’t help feeling that a courtship between him and Rhian might prove disastrous. The only question was, for which one of them?
‘You’re not returning to the store again today, Joey?’ Lloyd sat in an armchair next to the hearth.
‘Even clockwork needs checking every couple of hours. I told Sam and the ubiquitous Miss Robertson that I’d be back at seven o’clock before the rush. Thank you, Mari.’ He took the plate of sandwiches she gave him.
‘Why is Miss Robertson ubiquitous?’ Harry set his plate down next to his soldiers.
‘Because it’s impossible to run away from her,’ Joey answered.
‘Why do you want to run away from her when she works in your shop, Uncle Joey?’
‘It’s not my shop, Harry, I only manage it.’
‘And your Uncle Joey was joking, Harry. How about I drive you and Rhian back to Tonypandy?’ Lloyd avoided Sali’s eye because he knew she’d guess he’d only made the offer out of concern for Rhian.
‘I’m sorry, Mr Lloyd.’ It had taken two years of living in the same house for Mari to stop addressing Lloyd as ‘Mr Evans’. Although he’d asked her to call him Lloyd, ‘Mr Lloyd’ was as familiar as the housekeeper was prepared to get. ‘Robert told me to tell you that the car is out of service again. The mechanic at the garage has promised to call round first thing in the morning to look at it.’
‘That car spends more time out of commission than working,’ Lloyd complained.
‘We could ask Robert to harness the carriage.’ Sali placed four of Lloyd’s favourite ham and cress sandwiches on to a plate and handed them to him.
‘Please, Mam, can I go too?’ Harry begged. He loved riding in the car but he loved the horses more.
‘Me too,’ Bella lisped.
‘Why not?’ Sali agreed. ‘It may take us longer to get there but there’ll still be time to call on Granddad after we’ve left Joey at the store. And Rhian can visit him with us.’
‘That’s a good idea.’ Curious to see how Joey would react to his and Sali’s manoeuvring, Lloyd glanced at his brother.
‘But Uncle Joey and I have to finish our ga
me first.’ Harry wiped his fingers on his napkin and dived behind his men.
‘That must be some game you two are playing if it’s made you forget chocolate cake, Harry.’ Lloyd helped Bella climb on to his lap.
‘What time do you have to be in tonight, Rhian?’ Sali asked.
‘Ten o’clock as usual.’
‘I wish I could go home with you.’ Joey took the matchstick Harry handed him and loaded it into his own miniature cannon.
‘Even the store manager is entitled to a half-day off a week besides Sunday.’ Sali leaned forward and wiped crumbs from Bella’s mouth with her own napkin.
‘I couldn’t take Pandy Parade night off, especially at sale time; it’s the busiest of the week. Do me a favour, Rhian?’ Joey fired the cannon and knocked over two of Harry’s cavalry. ‘Put another two of those chicken sandwiches on to my plate for me. War is a hungry business.’
‘What do you think you’re doing?’ Lloyd asked his brother after Mari had cleared away the tea things and Rhian and Sali had taken the children upstairs.
‘Clearing up Harry’s toys.’ Joey lifted the forts and boxes of soldiers on to a side table, ready to be carried to the nursery.
‘Don’t be clever with me. You know what I’m talking about.’
‘Rhian?’ Joey sat in the chair opposite Lloyd’s.
‘She’s a nice girl.’
‘I wouldn’t have asked her out for the afternoon if she wasn’t.’
‘You know what you’re like,’ Lloyd said impatiently.
‘I know what I was like. I’ve changed. I want to settle down.’
Before Lloyd had time to digest what Joey had said, Sali joined them. She picked up her handbag from the sofa. ‘I needed my hairbrush but even if I hadn’t, I would have found an excuse to come back. In case you don’t know, Joey, Rhian had nothing but grief, misery and tragedy in her life before she went to Llan House. From what I’ve been told, her father was a violent bully, her mother incapable of protecting her, and I know her brother treated her worse than an unpaid slave and skivvy after they died when she was eight. He was kinder to his dogs than to her and when he wasn’t beating them, he kept them chained up on minimum rations in his yard. She didn’t so much as hear a kind word until she met me. So, I’m warning you now, you hurt her and I’ll never speak to you again.’ Without waiting for Joey to reply, she left, closing the door behind her.
Sinners and Shadows Page 4
