Riding the Storm

by Susan Holliday

  ‘How did you know?’

  ‘There’s always been something special about that piece of furniture,’ she said, looking at the cupboard. ‘They say it came originally from an old haunted house in the Black Mountain. It was Sara’s grandmother who gave it to the hospital, a long time ago now.’

  Alun nodded. ‘It’s daft, isn’t it? I never believed in ghosts before but I have seen him –’ he thought of Rhiwallon’s tense, searching eyes – ‘but not today. Today it was me looking like Dad. Do you believe in ghosts?’

  The nurse sat beside his bed and whispered, ‘Yes and no. After all, when we get old our heads are full of ghosts.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘The ghosts of our childhood I suppose. And it is true to say that some people are more sensitive to the paranormal than others, especially when they are in trouble,

  like everyone here.’

  ‘Morgan doesn’t believe in them.’

  The nurse nodded. ‘Ghosts are not for everybody, you know. The truth is, Wales is haunted by its past. All the old burial grounds, the old stones, the old stories and legends. Think of Merlin up the road. In Wales if someone sees a ghost with their own eyes it is not all that surprising.’

  ‘I know it’s daft,’ said Alun, ‘but I think Rhiwallon cares for us.’

  ‘Some say he still wanders about here trying to help people,’ whispered the nurse.

  ‘Who says that?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know.’

  ‘What about if you’ve done something really bad?’

  The nurse looked at him intently. ‘Sleep,’ she whispered, as if she could read his thoughts, ‘sleep. It will do you a power of good. I’ll get something to help you.’

  In the low night light Alun thought he saw Rhiwallon smiling at him, holding out his hands. He leant up and took Myddfai from his locker. Maybe Rhiwallon had sent him the little black calf to keep him company when he went to prison.

  Chapter Five

  BREAKING THE SILENCE

  By late afternoon the next day, a thin frost lay on the grass and rooftops. Alun watched a car draw up, white powder clinging to the edges of its windscreen. The outside door opened and shut in a blast of cold air. Sara swirled her chair round and wheeled down the ward towards her mother. Sara was wearing a woolly white jumper and a long flowery skirt. Her fine gold hair was brushed up and there was a touch of lipstick on her lips.

  ‘She doesn’t know she’s in another sort of prison,’ thought Alun as Sara whizzed back and struggled to put on her overcoat. ‘Work hard,’ she said to the others when she was buttoned up. ‘I’ll think about you all.’

  ‘Bet you won’t,’ said Bryn, trying to spike up his orange hair with a handful of gel. ‘Bet we won’t cross your mind.’

  ‘Don’t forget to ask about Rhiwallon,’ said Huw.

  ‘You must be out of your mind,’ said Morgan putting on his glasses to read a computer magazine. ‘There’s nothing to know.’

  ‘You like to make out you’re so clever,’ said Olwen, ‘but it’s all memory and no imagination.’ She turned to Sara. ‘There should be lots of contacts in Myddfai. How many are going to the Ruby Wedding?’

  ‘Everybody in the family and old friends, aren’t they, Mam?’

  Her mother nodded. ‘Time to go,’ she said, smiling round. ‘The forecast is not too good and we don’t want to get caught. The main road to Llandeilo isn’t so bad but I heard there was an accident on the road to Bethlehem.’

  Alun shut his eyes. Of course he knew about Bethlehem. Dad had once taken him there to get his cards stamped at Christmas. But in his head, time skewed and he was watching the great star in the east crash down into the hilltops, making a bonfire of the whole Christmas story. The stable was burning and his beautiful clay model of Mary cracked in two as she reached out in a vain attempt to rescue the baby from the cradle. He opened his eyes. He must be off his head or something, but he couldn’t help it and he was still on the edge of that great accident as he watched Sara swing round her wheelchair.

  ‘I’ll tell you all about it when I come back,’ she was saying cheerfully.

  ‘You will find out more, won’t you?’ begged Huw, as she passed by. ‘We need to know if anyone else has seen – we need to know more about Rhiwallon.’

  ‘Do we now!’ said Morgan flatly.

  ‘Make a few notes for the project,’ said Mrs Parry in her practical voice as she waved goodbye. She turned back to Alun and looked startled when he spoke in a disconnected way, as if he could only follow his own thoughts: ‘Can anyone bring dead people back to life?’

  He couldn’t help the nightmare in his head. He sat there, unable to move, looking at the shape of a small dead body, heavy and still like a stone. Then he looked round. He knew by the silence that he shouldn’t have said anything. The silence felt threatening.

  In the end it was Mrs Parry who broke it. ‘You all know the story of Jesus bringing Lazarus back from the dead,’ she said, and he knew by her tone that she was afraid for him. She would be more afraid if she really knew, he thought.

  Suddenly everyone came to life again. ‘Good luck,’ they shouted as Sara and her mother disappeared through the door.

  ‘Time to clear up,’ said Mrs Parry, gathering up the books that Sara had left on the table.

  ‘Will Sara ever get better?’ asked Huw.

  Mrs Parry paused and looked at him shrewdly. ‘It all depends what you mean, Huw.’ She put the books on to the shelf.

  ‘Getting better is sometimes getting

  strength to cope.’

  ‘That’s not getting better,’ said Morgan.

  ‘No. But it’s getting better inside and perhaps that’s the most important thing.’

  ‘Some people can’t get better inside,’ said Alun.

  ‘If you really want to you can,’ said Mrs Parry, ‘though wanting to can be difficult.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘It sometimes means you have to take a leap in the dark. Not once but time and time again.’

  She didn’t say more and by the time she had finished tidying up, the tea trolley had arrived and there was Ffion, running ahead of her family, fair plaits bobbing and her small face alight. She rushed up to Alun’s bed and rode Myddfai up and down the blankets. He watched her from his chair.

  ‘Will you be out soon?’ she asked.

  ‘After Christmas,’ he said shortly, following the china calf’s journey across the bed.

  ‘You could put Myddfai into your Nativity scene,’ said Ffion. ‘Huw said you’re doing the people in real clay. You’re lucky. At our school we only have Plasticine.’

  She wrinkled her nose and looked up as her mother came in, large and smiling and surrounded by other children.

  ‘As if she’s at a party,’ thought Alun.

  Under her flowing coat Mrs Gwynne wore a purple dress. She was holding a tin in her ample hands.

  ‘A little present for being up,’ she said to Alun. ‘You look different up. Taller somehow.’ She sat herself down in the chair and talked and laughed as if she had all the time in the world. Then she stood up for Tony who was coming towards them in his leather jacket and expensive trainers. He sat down and looked hard at Alun.

  ‘You talking today?’

  Alun nodded.

  ‘You read that note I gave you?’

  ‘Lost it.’

  ‘That’s what you think of your Mam, then?’

  He couldn’t answer.

  ‘Looks like it to me,’ said Tony helping himself to an apple Alun had saved from lunch. He chewed loudly and showed his big white teeth.

  ‘I know why she doesn’t come,’ said Alun but he couldn’t bring himself to say any more.

  Tony laughed coarsely. ‘You keep everything to yourself like a rat in a trap that can’t squeak. Talk about a one-way conversation. Take after your father if you ask me.’

  ‘Don’t you bring my Dad into it.’

  Tony looked at him seriously. ‘It’s not r
eally funny, you know. You’ve hardly said a civil word to me since I’ve been visiting you. I don’t know why I bother, specially when you think of all that slaving away I’ve done. I’ve made your room really nice. Well, I had to for the baby . . . didn’t I? I was getting no sleep at all when she was in with us.’

  He took another bite at the apple and turned to Huw’s Mam. ‘Bright yellow it is now. Nice and cheerful. Not like him. There’s a limit, isn’t there?’

  Huw’s mother looked as if she was about to reply but Tony had already turned back to Alun.

  ‘As for your Mam, it’s between you and her. If you won’t read her note there’s nothing I can do.’

  He stood up and threw the apple core into the bin. ‘At any rate, I’ll tell her you’re on the mend.’

  ‘Where have you put my posters?’ asked Alun.

  His room was his refuge, the only place in the house where he could be himself. It was at the top of the steep stairs and opposite the other bedroom. He could do what he liked up there. He often used to open the window on Priory Street and make sure his bike was still padlocked to the hook. His room was so private it might have been hidden away at the end of a long corridor in a great castle or palace. He couldn’t bear the thought of anyone interfering with it. Least of all Tony. How dare he muck around with his room? How dare he! As for the baby . . . He turned his face to the wall then turned back and watched Tony press his hands into his thighs as he sat down again.

  ‘Posters,’ he was saying, ‘That’s a funny thing to bring up. As it happens, I thought you’d be pleased to have some new ones. Your Mam told me you used to walk to the museum with your father so I got them there on the way back from a removal at Llandeilo. Thoughtful, eh? Specially as I’d never been in there before. Your old ones weren’t half tatty, specially that bike one. And that pin-up! Looked as though you’d been kissing her all night.’ He laughed coarsely. ‘Well, there you go. Spent a bit of money, I did. Surprise, see? Well, what do you say?’

  Alun shrugged his shoulders and the silence came down again until Mrs Gwynne told him to open the tin and it was biscuits all round.

  ‘I hear Sara’s gone home for the Ruby Wedding,’ she said warmly. ‘Huw says she’s sure to find out more about the legend up there, being in the very place.’

  ‘You don’t know,’ said Alun flatly. ‘There might be nothing to know.’

  ‘He’s either silent or a right little arguer,’ said Tony confidentially to Mrs Gwynne. ‘Never mind, the biscuits are good,’ and he opened the tin and helped himself to another one.

  ‘Welsh legends are never quite reliable,’ said Mrs Gwynne, smiling inoffensively. You’re quite right there, Alun. Not like the Christmas story. That always brings a true understanding of peace and hope.’

  ‘Could do with more of that,’ said Tony, wiping his mouth with a bright red handkerchief. After a few more cheerful comments, Mrs Gwynne left them and Alun fell silent again.

  Tony stood up. ‘Well, out into the gathering dusk. It’s blowing a gale and it’s really cold. They reckon we’ll have snow soon. Local to North and Mid Wales. Think of that – Bath in bright sunshine and us snowed in!’

  Alun still didn’t respond. ‘At this rate it might be worth my while to get back where I came from!’ Tony looked angrily at Alun and strode down the ward, doing up his jacket and humming tunelessly to himself.

  The next day was colder; low grey snow clouds drifted across the sky.

  ‘We haven’t had snow for ages,’ said Olwen, ‘I do hope Sara is all right.’

  ‘She will be thoroughly enjoying herself,’ said Mrs Williams, throwing another lump of clay on Alun’s small wooden board. ‘We need good work from you, young man, what with Bryn having X-rays and Morgan at physio – you’ll have to be the leading light for a while.’

  ‘And Huw?’ asked Alun.

  ‘He won’t be long. I think you know there’s some sort of infection in his leg and they’re taking tests. So would you make the baby? He has to be quite small to go in the little manger. You would do it well.’

  She smiled so he couldn’t say no.

  ‘What about me?’ said Olwen.

  ‘One of the Wise Men?’

  Olwen nodded. ‘The one who carries gold.’

  She was wearing a fluffy pink jumper. She looks younger today, thought Alun, and for some reason the thought comforted him.

  ‘These will have to go on,’ said Mrs Williams and gave out blue plastic aprons.

  ‘I wouldn’t be seen dead –’ began Alun, then shrugged. It made them both the same, he thought, Olwen and me in our silly blue plastic aprons!

  They worked in a companionable silence until Olwen told him her aunt Angharad was expecting a baby. Her first, after ages.

  ‘My Mam had one,’ said Alun.

  Olwen looked up quickly. ‘Well, there you are. You do know about babies.’

  They worked in silence again.

  ‘I’ve never seen your Mam,’ said Olwen suddenly.

  ‘She’s gone away,’ said Alun quickly. ‘That creep Tony comes instead.’

  He tore the clay apart and wiped his hands free of it.

  ‘I thought he was your dad?’

  ‘He’s nothing like my dad. He’s like –’ but he couldn’t think of the words and simply added, ‘My dad’s gone away too.’

  Olwen looked surprised.

  ‘But at least Tony comes.’

  ‘He’s the last person!’ said Alun. ‘I wish he’d never come near me again.’

  ‘Why ever not?’

  ‘I’ll tell you what he’s done –’ said Alun, putting down his clay. ‘He’s taken over my bedroom; he’s taken down all my posters; he’s painted the walls bright yellow; he’s gone into the museum where I used to go with Dad’ – he couldn’t bring himself to say more.

  Olwen shrugged her shoulders. ‘Sounds as if he’s trying to do his best.’

  ‘Best?’ said Alun, ‘If you knew what else he’s done you couldn’t say that.’

  ‘What else has he done?’ she asked, looking at him with her straight brown eyes.

  Alun spoke in a low, venomous voice. ‘Got rid of my dad, that’s what he’s done.’

  He squeezed the clay tight so it oozed up between his knuckles, but he didn’t dare say more in case everything came out.

  Olwen laughed uneasily and held up the piece of clay she had been trying to mould.

  ‘Yours is like a tube of toothpaste and mine is – let’s face it – another – what’s he called – Quasimodo . . .’

  Quasimodo, thought Alun, greasy Quasimodo in his black leather jacket. But Olwen’s anxious laughter steadied him and when she said, ‘Come on, we haven’t long,’ he began to mould the clay again and found that his fingers were even more supple. He stroked the clay, pushed it about, threw it down on the board, sloshed it with water and fingered it again until the shape began to show and he forgot his anger. When Olwen smiled at him her smile went into the clay and he wanted to make the baby smile like that. Come to think of it, he knew quite a lot about babies. He knew their heads were large in comparison with their bodies, and he knew they learnt to smile within a few weeks even though Tony said it was only wind.

  He shaped the small limbs and made the feet look as if they were kicking. He rolled out a thin flat band of clay for the swaddling clothes that he wound round the body but not tightly, more like a shawl, so the little feet still stuck out and the hands stretched towards him. He left the face to last and stared for a long time at the blank round clay. He took a thin pointed stick and shaped the eye sockets and in between drew up the clay into a tiny turned up nose. Then he drew a smile with the stick and delicately pushed up the clay for the lips. He left the eyes to last because he wanted to make them special.

  ‘Can you stay still for a minute,’ he asked Olwen, and without stopping to think he stared into her brown flecked eyes, almondshaped, crinkling up because she was laughing.

  ‘Oh, all right then. But be quick. Here are the othe
rs and they’ll think I’m funny.’

  He looked back at the baby and increased the length of the eyes. Then he made the pupils and added a little incision to hold the light. It was then – and he didn’t know how– the baby opened his eyes and looked up, smiling, alive, waiting for him to pick him up.

  ‘It’s wonderful,’ said Mrs Williams. ‘I knew you had it in you.’

  ‘Mine still looks like the hunchback,’ laughed Olwen, showing him to Huw.

  ‘Can I keep him?’ asked Alun.

  ‘After the carol concert,’ said Mrs Williams. ‘You’ll have to paint him next week. He’s delicate so I’ll put him on the shelf.’

  She turned to Olwen and picked up the Wise Man.

  ‘Is he bending over or something?’

  Olwen laughed and Mrs Williams said he would look more regal when he was painted. Then she had an idea. ‘That lump on his back could turn into a lamb and he could be a shepherd.’

  ‘We could have other lambs behind him,’ said Alun comfortingly as he watched Olwen’s face drop.

  ‘We could have a hillside,’ said Mrs Williams, stroking the air to conjure up a hill. ‘Your shepherd is rescuing one of the lambs and Myddfai could be with his mother and the other cows. They are moving down the hillside towards the stable or maybe we could have Myddfai looking into the crib at the baby.’

  Alun shoved his hand roughly over his eyes. Something was rising in him and he didn’t know what it was.

  ‘You could make another Wise Man next week,’ Mrs Williams was saying faintly to Olwen. ‘Something to look forward to after your op. Sara will be back with us then. Now come on, Bryn, you must help me –’

  But the voice in Alun’s head was louder than Mrs Williams’s ‘I didn’t mean it,’ the voice was saying, ‘Honestly, Rhiwallon, I didn’t mean to kill the baby . . . The wind was in my head and I’d had enough. I didn’t really want to throw her down. I didn’t want her to lie so still I had to run away. I’m getting better now and they’ll come for me. I need you, Rhiwallon, I need you to help me. Huw says you’ll help me –’