Longing

by Mary Balogh

  “There are always other people willing to work for less,” Sir John Fowler said. “The Irish would be only too glad to take these jobs.”

  “If the companies collapse because too much has been paid out in wages,” Barnes added, “then there will be no work for anyone.”

  Mr. Humphrey provided the winning argument. “Perhaps you can afford to operate at a loss, Craille,” he said. “We all know that you draw enormous incomes from your estates in England. The rest of us are not so fortunate. This is our livelihood.”

  It was a losing battle he fought, Alex knew even as he argued and tried to devise other ways of protecting profits besides reducing wages. But it seemed that there was only one other way—laying off some of the workers. That was even less acceptable to him as a solution. He had to admit to himself finally that there was nothing he could do to prevent the further drop in wages. And he could not act unilaterally. He reluctantly agreed with the idea that solidarity among the owners was necessary.

  But it was a nightmare situation, one in which his head and his heart were at war and could come to no agreement with each other. He was going to have to study the books with great care over the coming days, he thought, instead of concentrating on the human aspect of the business as he had done so far. He needed fully to understand the concepts of profit and loss as they applied to this industry. He needed to know quite clearly exactly how profitable or unprofitable the Cwmbran works were.

  If he then disagreed with the other owners, he would call them back and throw at them a whole new arsenal of arguments. And if that failed, then he might consider breaking the solidarity after all in order to deal justly with his own people. But it was not a decision he felt informed enough to make now. Perhaps after all they were right and as much the victim of circumstances as their workers were.

  “I will have to authorize you to reduce wages next week, then, Barnes,” he said. “But I do so with a heavy heart.”

  The other owners appeared to breathe a collective sigh of relief. They seemed unconcerned with the state of his heart, Alex thought. They probably wished him in Hades. Doubtless everything had run far more smoothly when Barnes had had the sole responsibility for running the Cwmbran works.

  “And now the other matters I wished to discuss,” he said, and saw wariness and some irritability return to the faces of most of his guests.

  No one else seemed to feel any concern about child labor or the employment of pregnant women for heavy labor or the lack of compensation for workers injured on the job or the fact that workers were regularly paid their wages in a public house—that complaint even won for itself a hearty laugh—or the absence of waterworks or sewers in the towns. The list went on and on.

  The only answer he received from the other owners was the one that had been made before—they were not running a charity, but a business. But this time he was even more reluctant to give in to the need for joint action—or joint inaction.

  “I cannot see,” he said to Sir Henry’s angry objection, “that my putting in waterworks at Cwmbran will cause the collapse of the works at Penybont or elsewhere. But I do know that it will make life here cleaner and healthier and will perhaps save a few babies from dying.”

  “You have no imagination, Craille,” Mr. Humphrey said irritably. “Dangle a piece of cake before one hungry person, and a hundred others will want it too.”

  “Perhaps if they are hungry,” Alex said, “they have a right to want cake—or at least bread.”

  But his answer, he saw, only angered them further. He had no friends, no allies in this group. In the end he compromised. He promised to do nothing in haste but to see how the markets progressed over the next month or so. Perhaps the demand for iron would return to its former level and wages could be raised again and there would be profits left over to make some of the improvements he suggested.

  He would give himself that month, he thought as he saw his visitors to their carriages, to educate himself thoroughly, to see to it that he knew as much about Cwmbran as Barnes knew. Then he could make some informed decisions without having to feel that he was trotting along in the wake of men he could not quite bring himself to like.

  He dreaded the thought of having to meet anyone’s eyes next week after wages had been reduced again. How would he be able to do it without squirming with shame?

  He thought back to the day of the eisteddfod, less than a week ago, when he had felt accepted by most of the people of Cwmbran. They had tolerated and teased him and even talked and laughed with him. They had allowed Verity to mingle with their children.

  How would he be able to face these people now?

  How would he be able to face Siân? Although he had been careful not to be in company with her since the night of the eisteddfod, he had come to feel that they were in some way friends. He had felt on that night that they had grown comfortable with each other, that perhaps they had come to like each other.

  Would she like him next week?

  He was going to work night and day, he thought, to understand this coal and iron industry from the inside out. He was going to prove that there was a way people—his workers and he both—could control industry instead of being controlled by it.

  14

  JOSIAH Barnes was breathless and exhausted. He crushed Angharad’s unprotesting body beneath his weight for a few minutes before rolling off to one side of her.

  “There is wonderful it is with you, Mr. Barnes,” she said, turning her head to look at him and smile. “Are you pleased with the news I brought you, then?”

  He grunted and lay quiet for a while. “But you don’t know exactly when,” he said. “The information is not much use to me unless I know the exact night of the meeting.”

  “The men I overheard at the eisteddfod said it would be soon,” she said. “It will not be hard for me to find out exactly when. I will let you know as soon as I hear.”

  “Yes, you will,” he said, reaching for one of her breasts, “if you want me to continue to be pleased with you, Angharad. John Frost, you say? Coming here to persuade the men to riot?”

  “I don’t think they will, Mr. Barnes,” she said, “especially if you let it be known you have found out about the meeting and put a stop to it. That would be best for everyone.”

  “Why would I do that?” he asked.

  She looked at him appealingly. “I don’t want to get anyone in trouble,” she said. “Promise no one will be in trouble, Mr. Barnes.”

  He squeezed her nipple between thumb and forefinger until she squealed and then set his mouth over hers, thrusting his tongue deep inside.

  “Just find out the exact night for me,” he said. “And I will find a way of thanking you, Angharad.”

  “But you are pleased with me anyway?” she asked, putting her arms about his neck. “I try to please you, Mr. Barnes. I would do anything for you. I wish I could be here for you every night for the rest of my life.”

  He grunted and lifted himself over her and between her thighs again.

  * * *

  Siân was enjoying a quiet evening at home with her grandmother. Emrys and her grandfather were always late home on pay night. Siân was preparing lessons for Verity while also participating in a sporadic conversation about her wedding.

  “I am happier for you this time, fach,” her grandmother said. “Not that I would wish to say any ill of the dead and I was very fond of poor Gwyn. But such a little house he took you to and so crowded it was. This time you will have a house all of your own with Owen. There is grand you will be—the queen of Cwmbran.”

  Siân laughed. “I don’t want to be the queen, Gran,” she said, “just a very ordinary person. And that is what I will be.”

  “I don’t know that you will ever be that, Siân,” her grandmother said fondly. “And Owen is no ordinary person, either, is he? I just hope he does not get into any trouble with all this nonsense of meeting
s. Mr. Frost is to come up from Newport next week, is it?”

  “Yes, Gran.” Siân’s spirits dropped at the thought. It was to be a secret night meeting on the mountain again. Owen and Emrys were all fired up about it. Mr. Frost apparently had ideas of uniting all the men of all the valleys for one great demonstration against the government rejection of their Charter. But Siân did not trust the word demonstration. What exactly did it mean?

  “There will be divisions among the men again,” her grandmother said. “There is foolish men are, Siân. It is women who should rule the world. Then we would see some good sense. The eisteddfod brought all of us together in a lovely spirit of togetherness, and now this old meeting will split us up again.”

  And there will be Scotch Cattle again, Siân thought, but she did not speak aloud. She looked down at her book and pretended to be concentrating on it so that they lapsed into silence again. Would Iestyn be willing to participate in a demonstration? Would those who organized it be willing for some men to stay at home? But her thoughts sickened her. She tried to bring her mind to the words on the page.

  And then there was a knock on the door and it opened to admit Owen. Siân closed her book with a snap and jumped to her feet, smiling. She had not been expecting him.

  “Owen,” she said, “how lovely.” But even as she spoke she looked into his face and saw his expression. “What is it?”

  “Wages down another ten percent next week,” he said curtly. “That is what.”

  Siân sank back into her chair and closed her eyes.

  “Oh, Duw, Duw!” her grandmother said.

  “One thing about it,” Owen said, “it will open up the eyes of those who have been wavering about coming up to the meeting next week. It is not needed, some have been saying. Our owner has come, they say, and he seems a decent sort. He has talked to us and visited us. He has rescued Blodwyn Williams from the mines and paid her man for his injuries. He came to the eisteddfod with us and took off his coat to help Ifor Richards with Glenys’s harp. He will put our wages back up again and all will be well with the world. This will open up their eyes wide.”

  The door opened again and Emrys and Siân’s grandfather came inside.

  “You have heard the news, then,” Emrys said, slapping his pay pack down on the table. “Here, Mam. There will not be so much next week.”

  Hywel Rhys sat down heavily in his chair by the fire. “It is the Lord testing us,” he said, “as he did with Job.”

  “I would like to give the Lord two black eyes,” Emrys said, “and kick his backside up the mountain and down the other side.”

  Hywel was on his feet again. “Right-o, Emrys,” he roared, “out the back, is it? It is not enough that you show disrespect to your mam, but you must blaspheme against the Lord too. I will show you what for now without further ado.”

  “I bloody well will not take all this lying down, Dada,” Emrys said, eyes blazing. “If John Frost will not organize a protest against the government, then I will. And I am sorry, Mam and Siân. I do mean no disrespect, but my blood is on the boil. Glad I am that I have no wife and little ones. But plenty of men do.”

  “John Frost will have a plan,” Owen said quietly. “Sit down, Hywel. This is no time to be turning against one another when we should be uniting against the true enemy. A mass protest it will be, and a strike too, like as not. I will speak out for a strike.”

  “A strike? Oh, no, Owen Parry,” Gwynneth Rhys said, her palms to her cheeks. “The little ones will starve and there will be no winning anything.”

  “The little ones will starve on eighty percent wages, Mrs. Rhys,” Owen said. “And who knows that there will not be another cut in a few weeks’ time? Are we to stand by and let the owners treat us as if we are just cogs in their machines, not flesh-and-blood human beings?”

  Siân had not said a word. She had sat with her eyes tightly closed, trying to will it all to be a bad dream. He had betrayed her. Utterly betrayed her. She had begun to believe in him despite all Owen had said to the contrary. She had begun to believe that he was a kind man, that he cared for the people of Cwmbran, that he was going to change everything for the better. She had grown to like him. She had fallen in love with him.

  He had betrayed her.

  “Siân,” Owen said, “you will leave your employment at the castle without even giving any notice. You will not go to work tomorrow.”

  She opened her eyes at last and looked at him. “Why?” she asked.

  “I will not have you working directly for that bast—for Craille any longer,” he said. “You will stay home here. If your grandfather cannot support you for the next few weeks, then I will contribute to your keep. My wages will be enough to support you after we are married even with the reduction. Tomorrow you will stay home here.”

  “Yes, you must, Siân,” Emrys said. “And we do not need your money, Owen. We will look after our own women, and Siân is ours until she weds you.”

  “It will be for the best, fach,” Gwynneth said. “I have never liked the thought of your going up there to that house.”

  Had no one said anything, Siân thought later, perhaps she would have decided for herself that she could not possibly go back to Glanrhyd Castle. Certainly the thought of ever seeing him again sickened her. But there was the fact that she hated to be told what to do. She always had. It was one of the weaknesses of her character. Her mother had always said she got it from Sir John Fowler.

  “I am working with Verity,” she said. “I am teaching her. She is a six-year-old child and in no way involved in any of this. I cannot just abandon her.”

  “But the point is,” Owen said, “that you are working for him, Siân, that you are going up to the castle each day, and that you wear the clothes he provided for you.”

  “We are all working for him,” she said.

  “There is a difference.” He pulled out a kitchen chair from beneath the table and straddled it back to front. “It does not look good, you going there to work. There will be those who will say now that you are turning against your own people and making sure you do not have to suffer with them.”

  It was something she feared more than anything. “They would be wrong,” she said. “I will give my pay to Gran, and if she gives any back to me, I will give it to Mari to feed the children or to any other woman who has hungry little ones.”

  “Huw would see his babies dead first,” Emrys said, “and you too, Siân.”

  “There will be talk if you do not give up your job,” Owen said.

  “About what?” Siân jumped to her feet. “About what, Owen? It always returns to this, doesn’t it, and yet you were the one who wanted me to take the job in the first place.”

  The chair scraped across the floor as Owen got up too. “I will not have my woman in the same house with Craille day in and day out,” he said, “and people wondering what goes on between the two of you there.”

  “Oh, Duw,” Gwynneth said. “There is wicked people are if they are wondering any such thing, Owen.”

  Emrys was rolling up his shirtsleeves. “I think it is time you came out the back with me, Owen,” he said. “Siân is not your wife yet and even if she were, I would not have you talk to her like that in this house.”

  “Tempers are short,” Hywel said. “It is part of the test. We all turn on one another and prove that we do not have what it takes to be ennobled by suffering. Emrys, it is bedtime. Owen, we will say good night to you. Siân, you must make up your own mind about what you will do and then live with your conscience. But just remember that no woman in this family is compelled to work outside the home.”

  Emrys stamped his way upstairs without another word.

  Owen and Siân stared at each other while anger waned.

  “Come out to the gate with me,” he said, “and say good night. Good night, Mrs. Rhys, Hywel.”

  Siân preceded him silentl
y to the back gate and hugged her arms with her hands. It was chilly and damp and she had not brought her shawl.

  “Cariad,” Owen said, framing her face with his hands, “I love you. But you have a stubborn streak that is going to give me the devil of a bit of trouble. When we marry, you will be promising before the Reverend Llewellyn and as many of the people of Cwmbran as can squeeze inside the chapel that you will obey me. It is a promise that I will make sure you keep. Even though I love you.”

  She had made the same promise to Gwyn. But it had never been an issue between them. It would between her and Owen. It would always be an issue. They were two strong-minded individuals who did not always see eye to eye.

  “I will obey you, Owen, once we are married,” she said, not at all sure that she would be able to keep either this promise or the far more solemn vow she would make at their wedding.

  “But not before?” His voice was soft.

  “I realize now,” she said, “that you will not allow me to continue to teach Verity once we are married. Let me have these last few weeks with her, then, while her father finds someone else. She is a dear child and is a joy to teach. And she is very lonely.”

  “You are making a mistake, Siân,” he said. “The mood of the men is about to turn ugly. There will be us on the one side and the Marquess of Craille and Barnes on the other. And you in the middle. You will not be looked upon kindly. I will not look kindly upon you myself.”

  She swallowed painfully. “Perhaps,” she whispered, “you want to change your mind about marrying me.”

  He searched her eyes. “Do you?” he asked.

  There was panic in the thought. She shook her head.

  “I love you,” he said. “But don’t expect a complacent husband, like Gwyn was. If you must be stubborn, get it out of your system within the next few weeks, Siân, or it will go hard with you.”