Amanda asked polite questions about his plans, hoping to hide her disappointment, but a glance at the penetrating blue eyes of her companion convinced her she could hide nothing.
Asthey prepared coffee, there were seven loud bangs on the wall: bom diddy bom bom, bom bom. Mrs Falconbridge added another cup and saucer to their tray. Amanda looked at her companion curiously but nothing was said. A moment later there was a knock at the door and a man’s voice called, ‘Catrin? Can I come in?’ He entered and Amanda was introduced to Philip Morgan, who lived in the adjoining cottage. They shook hands formally and she found herself looking into a pair of friendly, dark blue eyes in a sun-wrinkled face
‘We have this code,’ Philip explained. ‘The “lucky seven” knock means I’m coming in and two knocks means I need help, come at once.’
‘What a sensible idea!’ Amanda warmed to the man at once. He was obviously taking care of his neighbour as it seemed unlikely he would be the one in need of help.
He was in his late thirties, she guessed, with a figure that could only be described as burly. There was an air of restlessness about him. He was tanned and his piratical eyes shone with lively intelligence. He was, Amanda decided, a free spirit, a man who chose his own way and enjoyed life to the full.
She was enormously disappointed to be told he drove a bus!
‘But how can you not be a sailor?’ she said with a look of surprise.
‘Because I’d be sick before we left the dockside,’ he replied, with a loud energetic laugh in which they all joined.
‘So you aren’t a pirate!’
When the teasing had died down, Philip said, ‘So, you’re the new landlady.’ He looked her over in an embarrassing way, his eyes clearly liking what they saw.
Throughout the evening Amanda tried several times to bring up the subject of Roy. Mrs Falconbridge had been so kind to her she felt she owed her complete honesty, but each time something stopped her. She admitted that the strongest motive for silence was fear of Rhys being discouraged from becoming a friend. They knew she had a brother, but the impression she gave was that Roy was working a long way away in a job in retail marketing. As soon as she had invented the lie she had regretted it and now it was impossible to put it right. The evening ended with her still holding back the embarrassing detail of his prison sentences.
Roy’s recent letter had assured her that with Gillian to help him he was making a determined effort to leave his past behind. He had been so understanding about their Aunt Flora’s refusal to allow him to share the cottage, he must have changed. If he succeeded in keeping out of trouble there might not be any need to explain, until the prison sentences were behind him and it could all be put down to juvenile wildness. She drove part of the way home with her fingers superstitiously and childishly crossed.
3
The letter from Edmond telling her he was engaged to someone they had both considered a friend was a relief tinged with sadness. They had drifted away from their once close relationship and although she knew that much of the blame was upon her brother’s head, she also knew that theirs would never have been a really successful marriage. The parting was too easily done.
She wondered idly whether she had a decent photograph of Edmond and, also, whether she would keep it if she did. That reminded her of the photographs she had taken of Rhys on the day she had suspected him of being a burglar. Perhaps she would take them to be developed. She imagined how Catrin would laugh when she related the story once again, with illustrations.
Now Edmond was out of her life she felt free to start planning her future without anything dragging her back to the past. Unfinished business no more. If only Roy’s future could be sorted so easily.
* * *
Apart from moments of weakness, Roy was able to enjoy the feeling of being free from worry over the police investigating his activities. Running bets for bookies from the market stall-holders and those he began to know in the local pubs was against the law and, as he was still on probation, a risk, but he needed some excitement in his life and running to and fro with the written bets and the cash in his pocket and waving to the local policeman on his beat was better than nothing.
He explained this to Gillian, who understood his need for some spice to compensate for his lack of night-time activities and she giggled with him as he told her of some narrow escapes.
‘Roy, you’ll never change,’ she chuckled when he had explained how he had chatted to the policeman for ten minutes while watching the clock, afraid he would be too late to place the bets.
‘Casual beyond, I was, love. You’d think I was an actor the way I leaned on the wall as if I had all day to waste. And there I was, watching the minutes tick away, closer to the time when I’d have to stand the bets myself.’
‘What would have happened?’ she asked.
‘Well, if the horses had lost, I’d have kept the money, seven pound I had, mind! But if they’d won I would have had to pay out. I’ve done it before,’ he told her with a grin. ‘Made a few shillings that way I have.’
‘It’s risky though.’
‘That’s part of the fun.’
* * *
He was whistling cheerfully, brushing away the debris of a day’s trading when a shadow crossed the floor in front of him and a voice said, ‘So, Roy Clifford, I’ve found you at last. Hiding from your old pal, were you?’
‘Dave!’ Roy felt his legs shake as he looked into the angry eyes of his one-time partner. ‘I didn’t think you’d be out just yet, boy. How’s tricks?’
‘Tricks? That’s more your line. Why haven’t you been in touch? Where’s my money?’
‘Money? What money?’
‘Oh, I see, we’re playing that game are we?’
‘Never ’ad a penny piece, Dave, I swear!’
‘I know different.’
‘Oh come on, boy, let me buy you a drink, is it?’
‘I want more than a drink from you, Roy Clifford.’ The last of the stalls were closed for the night and Roy looked around as if wondering if he could make a run for it as Gillian appeared and waved. Dave gripped his arm tightly before waving to Gillian and moving away. ‘Don’t think you can get away with it. I served time for both of us, remember? I want my money, here, tomorrow, right?’
‘Wasn’t that Dave?’ Gillian asked. ‘Why didn’t he stop and say hello?’
Roy put on his little boy look and lowered his head. ‘Come to ask for money he has, love. Says I owe him fifty-seven pounds.’
‘What?’
‘Well, we didn’t get clean away on that last job. We had to leave the money behind and he thinks I still have it. Depending on it he said, to pay some debts. I don’t know what I’m going to do. I haven’t got fifty-seven pounds, just the fifteen I’ve saved to buy your ring and he won’t get that.’
‘Ask your sister! She owes you something for leaving you like she did and owning a cottage and only paying rent for a tiny room. She must be able to give you enough to pay him off. Forget the ring, love, it’s more important we settle this. We don’t want anything of your past dragging us down, do we?’
‘I’ll try,’ he said. ‘There’s lucky I am, to have you.’
Roy had no intention of trying to borrow from his sister. She could be saved for when he needed more generous help. She was bound to be feeling guilty about the cottage. No, Amanda could be put on ice for later.
After stalling Dave for a few days, and being threatened with violence, Roy took out the list of houses taken from the files in Gillian’s office and began to plan a new spate of robberies. He was drenched with sweat at the prospect of another session of break-ins and the sweat was from the thrill and not from fear.
He would have to leave of course. Once the police realised the houses were all registered with the firm for which his girlfriend worked they wouldn’t take long to get to him. Lucky he hadn’t told Dave about Amanda’s cottage. That might be a useful bolthole if he couldn’t get the money in time. Damn it all, he muttered w
ith insincere anger. Why did I spend it! Just when I was beginning to feel settled. But there was a lilt to his step and his smile was wider than it had been for weeks.
* * *
It was Philip Morgan, Mrs Falconbridge’s neighbour who accompanied Amanda and Mrs Falconbridge on their first foray into Amanda’s past. They had decided to begin at the church but to their disappointment, when they reached it, it was locked.
‘Tombstones it is, then,’ Philip said cheerfully. ‘Where do we start?’ He looked thoughtfully around then said, ‘Your Aunt Flora was married so we need to know her maiden name. Any ideas?’
‘Beynon according to the solicitor.’
By kneeling down and scraping away at the lichen and mosses that concealed the writing on the neglected stones, they were able to decipher several Beynons, which Amanda carefully noted in her book together with dates. Most were too long ago but some were possibilities.
‘These two could have been the couple who lived in the cottage before Flora,’ Philip said, pointing. ‘Would they have been your great-grandparents, d’you think? The dates look about right.’ They all compared notes and discussed their oddments of information.
Amanda looked at the sad rows of graves with their occasional bunch of wind-blown flowers and thought it all too long ago to hope for success. The trail was cold and tenuous and she might as well forget any idea of discovering a warm and welcoming family. If there were any they would be far from this place, where memory had dimmed every trace of their existence.
Amanda saw that Catrin was chilled and at once abandoned further searching. ‘Come on, it’s time for a cup of tea I think. A café, or the cottage?’
They went back to the cottage where the fire burned cheerfully and after preparing a tray of tea, Amanda said the two possible names aloud hoping foolishly they would mean something to her. ‘William and Sheila Beynon.’ Could she be their great-granddaughter? A stirring of hope grew within her.
‘Flora couldn’t have been your mother,’ Philip said as the discussion continued. ‘She was too old.’
‘I understand she died without children and so did her brother, Tom,’ Mrs Falconbridge told them. ‘At least, Tom didn’t marry. The only hope seems to be their sister who went to live in America.’
‘If the American sister married and had a daughter, could that daughter be my mother?’ Amanda sighed then. ‘Oh, it’s all hopeless. How can I trace the existence of someone who lived in America – if she existed at all! There are too many gaps and guesses. Her name wouldn’t even be Beynon so where would I begin?’
‘You aren’t giving up after one afternoon, are you?’ Philip teased. ‘I thought you were made of sterner stuff!’
‘Of course not,’ Mrs Falconbridge said, ‘she’s just stopped for tea!’
Driving home, Amanda felt the wriggling impatience of dissatisfaction. She had been disappointed in the day and as the journey ended she admitted that Rhys’s absence had been the main reason. Philip was excellent company but it was Rhys with whom she wanted to share her search.
Unable to calm her restless thoughts, she took out her notebook and read the names again. Sheila and William Beynon. Were they her great-grandparents? She stared at the names, willing them to reveal something. If only she had a photograph, that would at least give a focus for her tumbling thoughts and endless questions. Tired at last, she slept, to dream, not about Sheila and William Beynon, but of Rhys, magically finding a huge loving family for her, arranging them, presenting them like a bouquet.
* * *
When Amanda visited her brother, they met not at the flat which he had now vacated, being unable to pay the rent for an extended period, but in a café in the same area. As she listened to Roy’s plans for the future, she felt her spirits rise. He really did seem genuine in his resolve to start afresh and forget the troubles of the past.
‘See, Mand,’ he explained, ‘I’d fallen into the trap of always looking back. That way you never stand a chance of changing. I’m so much in the habit of blaming everything on what’s long gone, I haven’t allowed myself to get away from it. I’ve “shackled myself willingly to a heavy load that’s holding me back”, that’s how Gillian’s dad put it, and it made sense.’
‘You know I’ll help you in any way I can,’ Amanda said. In spite of many previous dashed hopes, there was something about her brother that made her believe that this time it would be all right. She went home bursting with the sensation that everything in her life was beginning to sort itself out beautifully.
Gillian had never been to the cottage now owned by Amanda, but, knowing she still lived in the bedsit, she wrote to her there. In the letter she explained that Roy had some debts which she feared might lead him back into crime and asked if Amanda, bearing in mind her own good fortune, would be willing to help.
Angry at the inference that she was selfishly enjoying her good fortune and forgetting her brother, Amanda called to see Roy at the market where he still did odd jobs and earned the occasional tip.
‘If you want money, I’d prefer you asked me yourself,’ she said angrily when she found him helping to pack away the remains of a shoe-repair stall.
‘What you talking about, Mand? I haven’t asked for money. I’m doing all right here with this and that.’
She took out the letter and waited while he read it. Anger suffused his face as he handed it back.
‘I didn’t know Gillian had written, honest, Mand. I don’t know why she did. I don’t owe anyone anything, although Dave came round begging for a few pounds last week. Forget it, off her head with worry about me she is. Afraid I’m going bad again if I’m a few minutes late home.’
Amanda watched him. He was trying to laugh but he couldn’t hide his anger. Something was up, she knew him well enough to know that.
‘Look, I can help a little, perhaps a couple of pounds each week? It isn’t much but it will buy a few meals, or help toward the rent of a room. I can’t do more, not until the ownership of the cottage is settled.’ She was receiving rent for Firethorn Cottage and besides, she still felt guilty about the condition that she was not to allow him to stay.
‘I don’t want it, Mand,’ he said with that forced smile that didn’t reach his eyes.
‘Please, Roy, I’d be happier if you’d take it.’
He shrugged agreement and kissed her. ‘Right then, that’s agreed and thanks. I’m lucky to have a sister like you, Mand, don’t think I don’t know it.’
* * *
During the weekends, Amanda worked at preparations for Christmas, searching out a play for the children to perform, gathering ideas for cards and small gifts for them to make, displays to cover the walls. One Friday, needing a break, she telephoned Mrs Falconbridge and suggested going to Red Cliffs Bay for lunch on the following day.
‘I’d love to and please, dear, call me Catrin.’
Stopping the car by the now familiar hedge, Amanda looked expectantly at the front door but no Catrin appeared. She walked around to the back but there was no answer to her knock. Opening the door, she called.
‘I’m here, in the kitchen, Amanda dear,’ Catrin answered.
Amanda saw at once that Catrin was unwell. She was sitting in her favourite chair covered with a crocheted blanket.
‘What’s the matter! Why didn’t you tell me you weren’t well?’ Amanda cried in alarm.
‘I thought I’d be all right by the time you got here. I do so hate worrying people.’
‘What about your famous two knocks on the wall?’ Amanda demanded. ‘I think Philip will be disappointed that you didn’t call him.’
‘It’s only a heavy cold, but perhaps I oughtn’t to go out for lunch.’
‘I should think not! I’ll get something from the chemists to make you feel better, but first…’ She picked up the small hearth brush and gave two loud knocks on the wall.
Philip came within seconds and was surprised to see Catrin wrapped up and obviously ill.
‘What is it? Your cold gettin
g worse?’ He turned to Amanda. ‘She was out in the garden an hour ago!’
Amanda drove to the small row of shops that served the village and in the chemist bought Beechams powders. Next door at the greengrocer’s she bought some fresh farm eggs and a couple of lemons. Unseen for the years of the war, lemons still seemed a bit of a luxury, she thought, smelling their fresh scent as she hurried back to the cottage. At the grocer’s where she bought a fresh loaf, she was given some off-ration butter after explaining about Catrin being unwell. ‘If anyone asks, tell them it’s only the scrapings of the wrapping paper,’ the grocer told her with a wink.
They were coaxing her to eat a lightly poached egg and thin bread and butter when Rhys walked in.
‘What’s going on here?’ he asked, taking in the friendly scene.
‘It’s Catrin, she isn’t well,’ Amanda began. ‘Philip and I are getting her some lunch.’
Without needing to say another word, Rhys showed his disapproval. Amanda felt antipathy like an electric current passing between the two men. ‘Philip has been very helpful…’ she began in an attempt to ease the tension.
‘And Philip is just going!’ Philip put down the tray he was about to hand to Catrin and with a wave went to the door. ‘Philip has to get HMS Land-Lubber out of the dock at two-thirty.’
Amanda smiled at his reference to her conviction he was a sea captain and not the driver of a bus and was about to explain the joke to Rhys. A glance at his angry face stopped her.
As the door closed behind Philip, Rhys said softly, ‘Why did you send for Philip and not me?’
‘I presumed you were still in London,’ she said. ‘Besides, it was quicker. He comes in answer to two knocks on the wall.’
Tight-lipped, he went to his aunt. ‘I think you should be in bed,’ he said, and without waiting for a reply he picked her up and carried her to her bedroom. Amanda followed with the tray. Catrin said nothing, she just smiled at them with a quizzical look in her bright eyes.
The Tangled Web Page 5
