The Earth Hums in B Flat

by Mari Strachan

Because I stole her dead fox?

  ‘Because of Elin?’ says Nain and then answers herself. ‘Of course, Mrs Llywelyn Pugh knew her parents, didn’t she? I didn’t realise they were close though . . .’

  Nellie Davies nods, still holding Nain’s hand. ‘They were close,’ she says. ‘She’s been good to Elin. And she’s been so good to me because of Bob being shot when he was trying to save her son. And both buried next to one another and so far away. And your Idwal. So far away, Gwen.’ Nellie Davies sobs. ‘What use was a medal when I had mouths to feed? I don’t know what I’d have done without Ceridwen.’

  The kettle belches steam and I pour water from it into the teapot and stir it. Three times each way.

  ‘Oh, Gwen, I heard the birds knocking. I knew they were coming for someone. Knocking and knocking. And last night, did you hear that corpse bird in Bron-y-graig? I put my head under the pillow but that didn’t stop death from coming, did it? Poor, dear Ceridwen.’ Nellie Davies takes her handkerchief from her apron pocket and wipes her face.

  ‘And poor Hywel Pugh,’ says Nain. ‘He won’t know what to do without her, either. Was it her heart, Nellie?’

  ‘He’s beside himself,’ says Nellie Davies. ‘He found her this morning. Too late to do anything. He ran through the street to the Police House, covered in her blood.’

  ‘Her blood?’ says Nain. She turns to me. ‘Go home to see how your father’s getting on, Gwenni. Leave the tea.’ I go through into the scullery and open the back door slowly, slowly.

  ‘She cut her wrists, Gwen,’ says Nellie Davies. ‘Her blood had run like a river under the bathroom door.’

  And as I pull hard on the back door to shut it I hear Nellie Davies wail again and again.

  PART THREE

  35

  The cold heightens the scent of the beeswax polish on the pews. Mrs Davies Chapel House never fires the boiler in summer no matter how cold the weather. Through the narrow windows, light spills into the chill dimness of the Chapel. Here, under the gallery, I sit squashed between Alwenna and Meinir and watch the dust motes move up and down the beams of light. When I was little I thought they were angels dancing down from Heaven but Mam said: Don’t be silly, Gwenni.

  Alwenna pokes her elbow in my side. ‘Your mam not here today, then?’ she says. ‘Or your Bethan?’

  ‘No,’ I say. Mam is still in bed and Tada still distempering between trips upstairs to see if Mam needs him. But she doesn’t. She lies there staring at the wall and won’t speak to him. He said he won’t tell her about Mrs Llywelyn Pugh until she feels better. And Bethan didn’t come home for lunch, which is lucky since there wasn’t any. My stomach rumbles. It’s hours since I had toast at Nain’s.

  Alwenna elbows me again. ‘Why not?’ she says.

  ‘Mam’s ill,’ I say.

  Alwenna smirks. She thinks she knows everything. But to know isn’t to understand, is it?

  On the other side of me Meinir is speaking to Eirlys and except for shuffling to make room on the seat and squeezing us all tighter together they both ignore Deilwen when she slips through the pew door. No one likes to sit too near her since she was sick on my socks. She bends her head to say a prayer after she sits down. Geraint turns around and nods at her from the pew in front but Aneurin and Edwin are too busy bobbing their quiffs at one another to notice her.

  Young Mr Ellis strides up the aisle and into the pew in front of the boys and turns himself around on his seat to face us. Aneurin and Edwin groan and mutter but Young Mr Ellis ignores them.

  ‘I’m having no nonsense today,’ he says. ‘No chattering. No speaking unless you’re answering a question.’ He pushes his spectacles up his nose. His little fingernail is still black. ‘No—’ Alwenna interrupts him. ‘What if we want to ask a question, Mr Ellis?’

  ‘If you want to ask a question, you put your hand up,’ he says.

  ‘Like at school?’ says Geraint without putting his hand up. Young Mr Ellis stares at him.

  ‘Sorry,’ says Geraint.

  Aneurin and Edwin both put their hands up. Young Mr Ellis sighs and says, ‘Yes, Edwin?’

  ‘Can we ask anyone a question? Or just you?’ Edwin’s quiff almost collapses over his nose, but not quite. The movement wafts the scent of Brylcreem towards me. I try to not to breathe.

  ‘Just me,’ says Young Mr Ellis. ‘Yes, Aneurin?’

  ‘Is it true that when Mrs Llywelyn Pugh cut her wrists all the blood ran out of her?’ says Aneurin.

  Meinir squeals and hides her face in her hands.

  ‘Not that sort of question, Aneurin,’ says Young Mr Ellis. He slides along his seat away from Edwin and Aneurin and nearer to his pew door.

  Edwin has his hand up again.

  ‘What now?’ says Young Mr Ellis to him.

  ‘Did you know that the human body has got eight pints of blood in it?’ says Edwin. ‘I read it in my comic. So it would be like eight bottles of milk poured all round her. Only it would be red not white—’

  ‘What did I just say, Edwin?’ says Young Mr Ellis. He tugs at his tie as if he’s trying to loosen it. ‘No more questions. I’ll talk, you listen.’

  Alwenna raises her hand but Young Mr Ellis ignores her and takes a notebook from his pocket and flips the pages.

  ‘That’s not fair,’ says Alwenna. ‘You let Aneurin and Edwin ask silly questions and now you won’t let me ask a religious question.’

  Young Mr Ellis shuts his notebook. ‘What do you want to know, Alwenna?’ he says.

  ‘I want to know if it’s wrong to kill yourself,’ says Alwenna.

  ‘Of course it is,’ says Young Mr Ellis.

  ‘Why?’ says Alwenna.

  Young Mr Ellis chews his thumbnail. It’s as rimmed with black as his other fingernails. ‘Can one of you answer that?’ he says to us. ‘Sensibly.’

  ‘Because,’ says Deilwen, ‘life is sacred.’

  ‘We kill animals,’ says Geraint.

  ‘It’s human life that’s sacred,’ says Deilwen. Her nose points up in the air as if our human life is too smelly for her.

  ‘But if it’s your life, can’t you do what you like with it?’ I ask.

  ‘Do we have to talk about this, Mr Ellis?’ says Meinir. ‘It’s making me feel sick.’

  I try to move away from her, nearer to Alwenna. Mam would be beyond cross if she had to buy me another pair of socks. Alwenna shoves me back.

  ‘Don’t be a baby,’ she says to Meinir.

  ‘Your life doesn’t belong to you. It belongs to God,’ says Deilwen. ‘It says so in the Bible.’

  I haven’t read as far as that bit yet. ‘What if you don’t believe in God?’ I say. Like Richard’s father. ‘Then can you do what you like with your life?’

  ‘It belongs to God even if you don’t believe in Him,’ says Deilwen.

  ‘Quite right, Deilwen,’ says Young Mr Ellis. ‘See, everyone, killing yourself is a crime against God.’

  ‘You go to prison if you’re a criminal,’ says Aneurin. ‘But no one can put Mrs Llywelyn Pugh in prison, can they? Not if she’s dead.’

  ‘Not like Mrs Evans,’ says Edwin.

  Young Mr Ellis turns scarlet, first his neck, then his nose and cheeks and then his forehead. He tugs at his tie again and takes out a bunched-up handkerchief from inside his jacket and mops his face with it. I don’t look at his handkerchief. ‘Did I ask you to speak?’ he says to Aneurin and Edwin. ‘Now keep quiet, the pair of you, unless you can say something sensible.’

  Aneurin and Edwin writhe with silent laughter and punch one another on the shoulder.

  ‘My mam says we should feel sad for Mrs Llywelyn Pugh,’ says Eirlys. ‘My mam says you have to be in a very bad way to do something like that to yourself.’

  ‘We do it all the time to animals,’ says Geraint. ‘We cut their throats and spill their blood.’ He turns round to look at me. ‘Did the Bible prove they’ve got spirits, Gwenni?’

  ‘Not yet,’ I say. ‘But I haven’t read anything that proves they don’
t have spirits. I think they do.’

  ‘Me too,’ says Geraint. ‘I’ve stopped eating meat. I’m never eating meat again.’ He nods at me and his spectacles catch the light and flare with fervour.

  ‘We’re allowed to kill animals,’ says Deilwen. ‘And eat them. It says so in the Bible.’

  ‘Human beings are animals, too,’ says Geraint. ‘What’s the difference between us and any other animal?’

  ‘Doesn’t that mean it’s all right to kill people, Mr Ellis?’ says Aneurin.

  ‘And eat them,’ says Edwin.

  Meinir squeals again. ‘I feel really sick now,’ she says. She closes her eyes and holds her stomach and I shuffle my feet right back under the seat.

  ‘Certainly not. Certainly not,’ says Young Mr Ellis. ‘You’re twisting things, the pair of you. And you, too, Geraint. Now, try to be sensible.’ He tugs his tie. ‘Tell them, Deilwen, what it says in the Bible about killing.’

  ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ Deilwen puts her hands together under her chin as if she’s praying. ‘That’s in the Old Testament. It’s one of the ten commandments.’

  ‘That means you’re not supposed to kill anything,’ says Geraint.

  ‘Mr Ellis, Mr Ellis,’ says Aneurin flapping his hand in the air. ‘I don’t understand all the commandments. What does Thou shalt not commit adultery mean?’

  Alwenna snorts. Young Mr Ellis looks at her and she smiles at him.

  Meinir sighs and lets go of her stomach and scrabbles in her cardigan pocket. She pulls out a bag of sweets and takes a pineapple chunk from it. ‘This’ll stop me feeling sick,’ she says. She holds the bag out to me. ‘You can have one, Gwenni. And Eirlys.’

  I take two pineapple chunks from the bag because they’ve stuck together and pop them into my mouth. Young Mr Ellis is looking up at the Chapel ceiling as if he’s expecting some help to arrive from Heaven. An angel, maybe. Or even God himself. The crystals of sugar on the sweets are rough on my tongue. Pineapple isn’t my favourite flavour, but if the sweets stop Meinir feeling sick, maybe they’ll stop my stomach rumbling.

  ‘You’re getting off the point, again, Aneurin,’ says Young Mr Ellis. At least he doesn’t look as if he’s going to cry the way little Miss Griffiths does at school when Aneurin and Edwin ask those sorts of questions in the Scripture lessons.

  ‘But I thought you didn’t want us to talk about Mrs Llywelyn Pugh cutting her wrists and Mrs Evans going to prison,’ says Aneurin.

  ‘I don’t want to talk about it, either,’ says Meinir. She crunches her pineapple chunk. ‘It’s horrible.’

  ‘We’re talking about the sanctity of life,’ says Deilwen.

  ‘Saint Deilwen,’ says Aneurin just loud enough for her to hear. But she looks pleased, not insulted, and Aneurin frowns.

  ‘Not the sanctity of all life, though, is it?’ says Geraint to no one in particular.

  ‘Is it really just as bad to kill yourself as it is to kill someone else, then, Mr Ellis?’ says Alwenna.

  ‘Yes, it is,’ says Deilwen.

  ‘I wasn’t asking you, Saint Deilwen,’ says Alwenna.

  ‘Oh, dear,’ says Mr Ellis and he starts to worry his thumbnail.

  ‘It’s not so wrong, is it, Mr Ellis?’ says Eirlys.

  ‘Yes, it is,’ says Deilwen. ‘Mrs Llywelyn Pugh will go straight to Hell.’

  Hell? We all look at her. Meinir stops crunching her sweet and Young Mr Ellis lets his mouth hang open with his thumb halfway to it.

  ‘And so will Mrs Evans when they hang her,’ says Deilwen.

  ‘They won’t do that,’ I say. ‘She didn’t do it. You’ll see. And anyway they don’t hang women any more, do they, Mr Ellis?’

  ‘That would mean someone would have to kill her,’ says Aneurin. ‘And Saint Deilwen said the Bible says you shouldn’t kill people, didn’t she, Mr Ellis?’

  Young Mr Ellis closes his mouth with a snap and jumps.

  Perhaps he’s bitten his tongue. ‘Well, uumm . . .’ he says.

  ‘The Bible says an eye for an eye,’ says Deilwen. ‘If Mrs Evans is a killer, someone should kill her.’

  ‘But the killing would never stop, then,’ I say. ‘Someone would have to kill the person who killed Mrs Evans and—’ ‘Then someone would have to kill the person who killed the person who killed Mrs Evans,’ says Aneurin. ‘Gwenni’s right.’ He bobs his quiff at me.

  What did he say? I rub both my ears. But I can hear everyone else clearly. I look at Aneurin and he winks at me. I look away. I don’t want Aneurin to wink at me.

  ‘You don’t understand anything,’ says Deilwen. ‘Mami says she’s never seen a place so full of stupid and wicked people.’

  We all gasp. I’m sure even Mr Ellis gasps.

  ‘You’re so wicked, we’re moving away to live,’ says Deilwen.

  ‘Good riddance,’ says Alwenna.

  ‘God and His angels,’ says Deilwen, ‘won’t have people like you in Heaven. So you’ll all go to Hell. Mami said so.’

  Young Mr Ellis coughs, ‘Well, now, Deilwen,’ he says. ‘I’m sure your mam didn’t—’ ‘It’s all in the Bible,’ says Deilwen.

  ‘Have you read it?’ I say.

  ‘Mami’s read it,’ she says. ‘Three times.’

  Three times? How long did that take?

  ‘God isn’t very kind, is he?’ says Eirlys.

  Aneurin and Edwin stand in their pew pretending to be God and his angel sending people to Hell. They send Deilwen first, and we all laugh except for Deilwen and Young Mr Ellis who flaps his hands at them as if he thinks the draught will blow them away.

  Geraint polishes his spectacles on his shirt. He puts them back on and he says to Deilwen, ‘I don’t think you should say things like that about us. That we’re wicked and we’ll go to Hell. You don’t know anything about this place and you don’t know anything about Mrs Evans or Mrs Llywelyn Pugh.’

  ‘That’s right,’ says Meinir. ‘It’s you and your mam that are wicked for saying things like that.’

  Deilwen begins to cry. Eirlys, who is squashed tight to her side, pats her hand. ‘Shall I take her to find her mam, Mr Ellis?’ she says.

  ‘She’s in the vestry with Mr Roberts’s class,’ says Young Mr Ellis. ‘I’ll take you, Deilwen.’ He holds out his hand but Deilwen rushes out of the pew and runs along the aisle towards the vestry door sobbing and screaming for her mother. Young Mr Ellis runs after her.

  People in the other classes in the Chapel stand up or turn around in their seats to watch. I see Bethan glance from Deilwen racing up the aisle to me in my seat. She looks just like Mam. On the lightbeams the angels dance in the wake of the agitation beneath them.

  The vestry door closes on Deilwen’s noise. We lean back in our seats. Alwenna hooks her arm through mine without saying anything and Meinir fishes out the crumpled bag of pineapple chunks from her cardigan pocket. She pokes her finger into it and counts the sweets. ‘Just enough for two each,’ she says. She takes two and gives the bag to me. ‘Pass it round.’

  36

  I don’t know where I’m walking to. There’s nowhere to go up this way any more. When Tada and Bethan and I had a late dinner with Nain and Aunty Lol after Sunday School, instead of tea with tinned fruit and bread and butter, Nain tried to persuade Tada to send for Dr Edwards to come to Mam. Nain said: She must be bad if she won’t get out of her bed. Richard says his father saw dozens of doctors about his depression but not one of them could help him. They were special doctors, doctors of the mind. I think Dr Edwards is an everything doctor. He told Aunty Lol she’d sleep better if she put a cover over Lloyd George’s cage to stop him calling her in the night. He was right. She tells everyone what a good doctor he is. But his tablets don’t always help Mam. Maybe she needs a special kind of doctor, too.

  The rain has stopped but the clouds hang so low I almost feel their weight on my shoulders. I’ve walked as far as the Baptism Pool but the road that winds up past the gates to Brwyn Coch and the Wern is as empty as those two abandoned h
omes. I won’t go further today. But I don’t want to go home yet. I lean over the Pool railings. The stream that feeds the Pool slithers down the wall and barely stirs the green and stagnant water at the bottom. The stench from the Pool is worse than the smell in Nain’s house when a mouse died under the floorboards in her bedroom and started to rot. How could something so small make such a big smell? If I were a detective, I would probably have that old family stomach if I had to examine decaying corpses. And if I were a detective like Mr Campion or Gari Tryfan I would have found clues by now to help Mrs Evans. I take out the blotter she gave me from my dress pocket and smooth and smooth the tiny violet on the knob with my thumb.

  Listen, there’s a sheep somewhere calling for her lamb. Calling and calling. But perhaps the lamb has already been taken to market, and she’ll never find it.

  Now I’ve got bits of rust all over my Sunday dress from leaning on the railings. I always forget about the rust. It shows plainly on the grey checked cotton and won’t brush off. Mam will be cross when I get home. Unless she’s still in bed staring at the wallpaper.

  I lean on the stone wall just beyond the Pool and slide down to sit on a big stone that sticks out at the base like a skirt with a frill around it of cornflowers with furry grey stems and thin grey leaves. The flowers are blue as the sky in the morning when I fly back to my bed. In a minute I’ll see if I can fly from the Pool railings. I have to keep practising. If only I could remember exactly what I did that time I flew when I was little. I close my eyes and concentrate.

  What’s that? A noise I recognise but can’t place. I must have fallen asleep. It’s become colder and the clouds are darker. And there’s that noise again. It’s the squeak of Sergeant Jones’s bicycle. I put the blotter back in my pocket, and stay where I am. Perhaps he won’t see me in my grey dress against the grey granite.

  ‘Did I frighten you, Gwenni?’ he says. He’s in his gardening clothes with his trousers held up by a piece of string. He doesn’t look like a policeman who can catch murderers.

  ‘I heard your bike,’ I say. ‘Where are you going? There’s nothing up this way any more.’