Past Remembering

by Catrin Collier

  ‘You going up to Graig Avenue?’

  ‘Yes,’ he answered reluctantly, unable to think of anywhere else he could call in on a Sunday night in Pontypridd.

  ‘I’m meeting someone,’ she answered, regretting the arrangement she had made to have supper with Dai Richards in Ronconi’s café. Alexander Forbes was not only crache, but good-looking. She’d heard the rumour that he was supposed to be carrying on with Jenny Powell, but if Jenny was stupid enough to keep him a secret from her friends, she couldn’t blame those same friends for treating him as fair game. ‘But I’m free tomorrow night. I always go for a drink in the White Hart after work, why don’t you join me?’

  ‘I won’t finish my shift until six.’

  ‘We’ll say seven, then?’

  ‘They don’t allow miners in working clothes in any of the pubs.’

  ‘In that case we’ll make it eight. That gives you plenty of time to go home and wash and change.’ She caught hold of his buttonhole, and gave him a sloppy wet kiss. ‘I believe in us war workers having fun. Don’t you?’

  Despite her resolve to cool the situation between herself and Alexander, Jenny had sliced the cold chicken and made sandwiches. The trifle still stood untouched and tempting on the marble shelf in the pantry. She looked up at the clock. Apart from her brief outing earlier that morning to pick primroses for the table, she had been inside all day. Waiting. First for Ronnie, and now – hopefully – for Alexander.

  She wasn’t at all sure that he’d try the stockroom door tonight, a whole week later than she’d suggested. He usually made a point of going out on his day off, and he had told Freda that he was going to be free today. Suspicious, or just tittle-tattling, Freda had passed the message on. The question was, would he bother to call in on her, even if he walked up the hill after blackout? After the way she had treated him the last time she’d seen him, she oscillated between doubt and certainty. She’d unlocked the door to the stockroom and sat at the window all afternoon, scanning old magazines, hoping to see him every time she looked up from a page.

  Dusk was falling. Soon it would be time to close the blackout and then she’d have no way of knowing if Alexander had passed the shop without calling in, and with Mrs Evans across the road watching her every move she could hardly go out and accost him in the street.

  She crossed her fingers, and tried to concentrate on a beauty problem page specifically aimed at munitions workers. There was nothing in it about hair. All week she had struggled to keep every single strand under the unbecoming dust cap. She pulled a lock forward and examined it closely. Was it her imagination, or was it already turning green? What if it did? Not even Alexander would want her then. Perhaps after the way she’d treated him, he wouldn’t want her at all. And then how would she feel? With hardly any men in town, it would be too bad to be rejected by the two most eligible bachelors on the Graig.

  People came and went. Chapelgoers on their way to Temple, churchgoers on their way to evensong in St John’s, a few salvationists to the citadel. Dai Richards swaggered past in his conscripted brother’s best suit and a red and green striped tie, most unsuitable for chapel. She wouldn’t even have noticed Dai before the war. He was only seventeen. Four years younger than her, practically a baby. But with most of the young men gone, there were plenty of women who would settle for an evening with him. Had she stooped that low?

  When she could no longer see the pavement, she drew the blackout and switched on the radio. There was a concert from the troops. The first song was ‘Somewhere in France with you’. Tears began to fall from her eyes again. Tears for Eddie, for the miserable mess they had made of their marriage, a mess she entirely blamed on herself. More tears at the injustice of being widowed at twenty-one … of self-pity … of loneliness …

  She heard a step on the stair. She turned to the door just as Alexander opened it. He leaned against the post. ‘I was passing so I tried the stockroom door. It was open. I hoped you’d left it open for me.’

  ‘I did.’ Heart thumping, she left the sofa and went to him.

  He put his arms around her. ‘I’ve been wanting to do that for two weeks. God how I’ve missed you!’ Tossing his hat on to a chair he swung her off her feet, running his hand up her skirt.

  ‘You’ve only just walked in.’ She laughed out of sheer joy and the relief of knowing she was still wanted.

  ‘It’s all right, I locked the door behind me. No one can get in to disturb us.’ Picking her up, he carried her into the bedroom, threw her down on to the mattress and sat beside her, setting to work on the row of pearls on the front of her dress.

  ‘You saw your parents?’ she asked incongruously as he eased her dress back from her shoulders.

  ‘I’ll tell you about them later. You wore these, just on the off chance I’d call in?’ He fingered her silk underwear and gartered stockings.

  ‘Of course,’ she lied.

  ‘After the way you tried to shut me out I wasn’t sure you wanted to see me again.’

  ‘Of course I want to see you,’ she breathed headily, as he slid his hands beneath the legs of the knickers. ‘But please be careful, this is my last pair of stockings.’

  ‘Not any more.’

  ‘You brought me stockings?’

  ‘And a few other things.’ He sat up and took off his jacket. ‘I didn’t know if I was going to see you, so I left them in Graig Avenue.’

  ‘I’ve a few surprises for you too,’ she murmured, as he bent over her again.

  ‘Like?’

  ‘A special meal.’

  ‘Jenny …’

  ‘Later, Alex … later.’

  ‘This is brilliant.’ Alexander scooped the last spoonful of trifle into his mouth, settled back on the pillows and beamed at her.

  ‘You’ve no idea of the trouble I went to make it.’

  ‘I can guess. How about giving me the key back?’

  ‘I can’t, I had to give it to Freda.’ It was tucked away in the top drawer of the sideboard. Incensed by Ronnie’s rejection, she still wasn’t sure what she wanted, but she knew what she didn’t; and that was a return to the straitjacket of marriage she had found herself trapped in with Eddie.

  ‘You’ll get another one cut?’

  ‘When I get the chance.’

  ‘If you’re busy I can do it.’

  ‘I’ll get around to it.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Please, Alex, don’t push me.’

  ‘I need to know where I am with you. I did some thinking when I was away. I’m not getting any younger. It’s time I settled down.’

  ‘How can we in wartime?’

  ‘It’s quite simple. In view of my atheism, and your widowhood, we go to a registry office, take out a marriage licence, sign it in the presence of witnesses and set up home together.’

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘I’m beginning to feel like something you keep on the side to amuse yourself with. Like a man with a mistress, only you’re the man and I’m the mistress. We don’t share anything except sex.’

  ‘And that is wonderful.’ She crept closer to him and took the bowl from his fingers. ‘Or don’t you think so?’

  ‘Yes I think so, but there has to be more to life. A home, children …’

  ‘Children! How can anyone even think of bringing a child into a world at war?’

  ‘People are doing it all the time.’

  ‘Not me. It’s downright irresponsible. Besides, I have a job, an important job.’

  ‘How is it going in the factory?’

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘Really?’ He raised his eyebrows, debating whether to let her know he’d met Judy on the train. And even without Judy’s testimony, he’d heard enough stories about the munitions factories to know that the working conditions in them were only marginally better than underground.

  ‘Yes, really,’ she asserted defiantly, ignoring his scepticism.

  ‘That offer of a ring still stands.’

  ‘An engagement ring?’<
br />
  ‘Only if you set the date for the wedding when I slip it on to your finger.’

  ‘How can I? You’re forgetting I haven’t been widowed a year. I need time, Alexander, please?’ She widened her eyes, giving him her most appealing look.

  ‘A week?’

  ‘Longer.’

  ‘How much longer?’

  ‘Must we talk about this now?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘At least six months.’

  ‘Fine, six months it is. Then I take you out, and I mean out, and tell Evan Powell and the world that we’re getting married.’

  ‘Alex …’

  ‘I’m serious, Jenny, you put me off again, and I’ll start looking elsewhere. I’ve had enough of being kept dangling on a string.’

  Chapter Sixteen

  ‘This won’t do at all. I warned you, Ronnie.’

  ‘It was almost healed, Bethan,’ he protested as she examined his leg. ‘It’s just that I banged it yesterday, knocked off the scab …’

  ‘And set yourself right back where you were when you came home.’

  ‘I’m not going into hospital,’ he insisted.

  ‘No?’ She stood back, hands on hips and stared at him.

  ‘No,’ he repeated firmly.

  ‘All right.’ She threw the old bandages into a box and wrung out a pad of cotton wool in antiseptic. ‘Last chance. You stay in bed and rest. If it heals over in the next couple of days I won’t call the doctor in.’

  ‘I can’t do that. I promised to help Tina with the café.’

  ‘Then I’ll telephone Dr John right now.’

  ‘There’s no one to look after me. The girls are busy with the business.’

  ‘Move in with Luke and Gina. There’s an evacuee family there with a young mother who stays home: she can take care of you.’

  ‘There isn’t a spare bed, much less a spare room in Danycoedcae Road.’

  ‘Compromise. I take you up to my house, and Maisie and I will see to you.’

  ‘You’ve got enough to do without taking in patients.’

  ‘My house or a hospital? What’s it to be?’

  ‘Your house is full of kids and noise. I’d never have a moment’s peace. Suppose I stay here and take it easy, very easy,’ he emphasised, ‘for a few days. Then, if it doesn’t improve, you can cart me off.’

  ‘I know your idea of taking it easy.’

  ‘I swear, I won’t put my leg down except to go to the ty bach or cook.’

  ‘Cooking’s out, it involves standing. I’ll get the girls to send food up.’

  ‘Then I can stay here?’

  She hesitated for a moment. ‘Only if I have your solemn promise not to put a foot to the floor more than twice a day for the next four days.’

  ‘You have it.’

  ‘I should never have allowed you to work in the café,’ she declared as she laid fresh dressings over the reopened wound.

  ‘There wasn’t anyone else to do it.’

  ‘Tina would have had to manage if you hadn’t been home.’ She cleared up the mess of dirty bandages and bowls and took them out to the washhouse.

  ‘Tea?’

  ‘I’ll make it. And after you’ve drunk it, I’m putting you to bed.’

  ‘No one’s done that since I was a baby.’

  ‘You’re behaving like one.’

  ‘You heard from Andrew lately?’ he asked in an attempt to coax her out of her starched-nurse mood.

  ‘Not since last week, and then the letter was months old. There must be an enormous mountain of undelivered Red Cross mail stacked somewhere between here and Germany.’

  ‘It must be hard on him, sitting around in a POW camp with nothing to do except worry about you.’

  ‘And get angry with me for not telling him things that I know will trouble him.’

  ‘Surely not angry, Beth?’

  ‘Yes, angry. Why are men so stupid, and why am I pouring out my problems to a patient?’

  ‘Try brother-in-law.’

  ‘You’ve enough troubles of your own.’

  ‘Seems to me problems are the only things people have too much of these days. Perhaps an effort should be made to share them around on a more equitable basis. Like rationing. Can’t you just see it? New Ministry of War directive, “No one is allowed to have more than one worry at a time. All problems must be part-exchanged for another. Hoarders will be prosecuted.”’

  ‘Nice idea.’ She picked up the kettle. ‘Pity it wouldn’t work. Take no notice of me, it’s just a bad day. Andrew’s birthday.’

  ‘At least he’ll be back, Beth.’

  ‘I wonder if I’ll know him when he walks through the door. A lot can happen in a year. I’ve changed, and from his letters I suspect he has.’

  ‘But not in ways that matter, surely?’

  ‘I wish I could agree with you. Alma said Charlie seemed like a stranger when he came home, but at least they were able to spend a few days with one another. Heaven only knows when, if ever, I’ll see Andrew again.’ Lifting down the teapot she set about making the tea.

  ‘You still love him, don’t you?’

  ‘All I have are memories and photographs. To be honest, when I compare them to his letters, I’m not sure any more.’

  ‘Have you tried writing to tell him how you feel?’

  ‘So I can depress him even more than he is already?’

  ‘Hasn’t it occurred to you that he might be feeling the same way, which is why his letters seem angry?’

  She looked at him and smiled. ‘Perhaps you should write a column in the Observer. “Problem page from the male point of view, from one of the few members of the species left in the town”.’

  ‘At least it would keep me off my feet and occupied. I’m not sure I know how to rest.’

  ‘I’ll get Diana to bring you up some books from the library.’

  ‘There’s no need to trouble her.’

  ‘She comes this way every day to check on the High Street shop, it wouldn’t be taking her out of her way.’

  He fell silent, wary of protesting too much.

  ‘You two haven’t had a quarrel after that nonsense about Tony, have you?’

  ‘No, of course not. Look, if you really think she wouldn’t mind, ask her to look out for a couple of Agatha Christies, will you, please? I read one in the RAF camp and liked it.’

  Bethan found Diana in the kitchen of Alma’s shop. She and Alma were sitting at one end of the enormous preparation table, drinking tea and eating tongue rolls.

  ‘Elevenses, because there’s never any time for dinner,’ Alma explained. ‘Want one?’ She pushed the bag of rolls across the table, and reached for the teapot.

  ‘Just a peaceful sit down would be bliss.’ Bethan took the vacant chair next to Alma’s.

  ‘Busy morning?’ Diana glanced at her cousin over the top of her cup.

  ‘The usual. I’m looking for help. Ronnie’s hit his leg and opened his wound.’

  ‘How did he manage that?’ Alma asked.

  ‘He didn’t say.’

  ‘He could have done it in Shoni’s yesterday, I met him there.’

  ‘Then he’s an even bigger idiot than I thought he was. What was he doing walking through the woods? I warned him if he didn’t rest, he’d end up in hospital.’

  ‘You know Ronnie: telling him to take it easy is like ordering a mongrel to stay away from a butcher’s stall. He probably saw it as an invitation to go on a route march.’ Alma picked up another roll and reached for the butter.

  ‘Well, he’ll have to stay put now: I’ve put him on bed rest for a week and I tucked him up myself.’

  ‘You’re not naive enough to think he’ll stay there, are you?’

  ‘No, which is why I was hoping you’d help.’ Bethan looked to Diana. ‘He needs something to do and he said he might read if you got him some Agatha Christie books.’

  ‘I’ll call in the library.’

  ‘That’s what I was hoping. You wouldn’t mind dr
opping them off as well, would you?’

  ‘I’ve got a better idea than books,’ Alma broke in before Diana could answer. ‘I saw the manager of the slaughterhouse this morning. I’ve got some definite figures on what we can have in the way of unrationed offal and meat. Perhaps Ronnie could work out the overheads and production figures on the basis of us taking over the kitchen of his High Street café.’

  ‘I don’t care what he does, as long as he keeps off that leg,’ Bethan said decisively. ‘If he doesn’t, he’ll end up in hospital, and then he can forget all about going into munitions for months.’

  Diana walked into Laura’s house loaded down with three bags. One of library books, one of food, and one with paper, pencils and lists of costings that Alma had sent up. She called through, ‘It’s only me’ before heading down the passage and into the kitchen. She found Ronnie on his feet in the washhouse, filling the kettle.

  ‘I heard you coming in and thought you’d like tea.’

  ‘Bethan would kill you if she knew you were up.’

  ‘I’ve just been to the ty bach.’

  ‘Liar. It’s no joke, Ronnie, Bethan told me how bad it is.’

  ‘I’ll rest now.’ He carried the kettle into the kitchen and set it on the hob before lowering himself into an easy chair. She saw him grimace as he lifted his leg to prop his foot on a stool.

  ‘According to Bethan you should be in bed.’

  ‘Then I’d have to walk up and down stairs every time I wanted to go out the back.’

  ‘There is such a thing as a chamber pot.’

  ‘Which I haven’t used since I was three, and before you say another word, I’ve no intention of starting again now.’

  ‘I could get Wyn and Uncle Huw to come round and carry a bed down into the parlour.’

  ‘You’ll do no such thing. I promise to be a good boy, Miss.’ She glared at him and he dissolved into laughter. ‘Was that supposed to make me afraid?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Don’t be cross. What have you brought me?’

  ‘Tongue rolls for your dinner, all the Agatha Christie books they had in the library, and some accounts that Alma thought might keep you busy. She talked the slaughterhouse into giving her extra supplies, and wants to go ahead with the expansion.’