‘Being so near to Christmas we must make preparations now. And make sure that I can fit it in with my other commitments.’
‘It would have been Tom’s birthday. I just wanted it to be a special memory for him.’
‘I understand perfectly, Mary. Your brother was a staunch member of this church, and, speaking personally, a good friend. I am more than happy to marry the two of you on that date. It is a fitting tribute to a man of exceptional qualities, a man whose tolerance and understanding spread in so many different ways.’
His words brought hot tears; she struggled to hold them back. ‘Thank you.’
‘I’ll contact the Registrar, make sure the date is in his diary. We’ll need him to be there to legalise the proceeding,’ he explained, answering her look of enquiry. ‘We’re a Nonconformist church, we’re not yet solemnised for marriages.’ He leaned back in the pew. ‘Nice chap – new to the area. Now, if we could go over a few details?’
An hour later Mary knelt in between the two graves, sharing chrysanthemums between each of the metal vases inserted in front of the identical headstones. The curled petals of the bronzed flowers tightly overlapped, trapping, here and there, drops of water that held tiny light reflections.
‘There,’ she said again, tracing the words chiselled on both graves with her fingers. ‘Hedd perffaith hedd.’ Mary read it out as Gwyneth had taught her. She looked up at Peter. ‘It means “peace perfect peace”,’ she said. ‘Gwyneth wanted it on Iori’s headstone and she asked if I minded having it on Tom’s grave.’ She gave him a small smile. ‘I didn’t, don’t. It makes me feel they’re together in their faith.’
Peter held out his hand and helped her to her feet. ‘Walk?’
‘Yes, please.’ Mary patted the headstones, feeling for the first time a form of peace, of acceptance of Tom’s death. ‘You don’t mind waiting until December to be married?’
‘No, I think it is right for us. I believe Tom would like for us to be married on that day. He would have been my best man. And to have the Brautlied sung by Ellen will be wonderful.’
‘It’s a lovely suggestion, Peter.’
At the lychgate they turned to look back at the church. The diamonds of stained glass in the two large windows on either side of the arched door gleamed in a kaleidoscope of colours in the evening light. The yew trees at the corners of the small churchyard cast their long branched shadows across the paths and the irregular rows of headstones, some upright, some tilting.
‘It is good, peaceful here,’ Peter said.
‘Yes.’ Mary clasped his hand. It felt symbolic to be standing under the engraved wooden porch, as though they were being blessed. ‘Let’s walk back along the beach.’
They waited to let a couple pass by outside the entrance to the churchyard.
‘Good afternoon.’ Mary smiled at them.
‘Guten Tag,’ Peter said automatically. He dipped his head in greeting.
The woman glanced at them, looked away and then back at Mary. ‘Dirty bitch!’ she said, over her shoulder. ‘Aren’t our boys good enough for you?’ The man tugged at her, urging her forward. She reluctantly yielded, still glaring at them. ‘Bloody Nazi.’
Taken by surprise and angered, Mary stared after them. With a shock she saw the empty sleeve pinned to the side of the man’s jacket. Oh God. In a way she understood the woman’s viciousness, but she couldn’t allow it to affect her and Peter.
‘Come on,’ she said, ‘let’s get home.’
His eyes were blank when he looked at her.
‘It’s fine,’ she said, ‘I don’t care what anyone thinks about us, Peter. As long as we’re together, I don’t care.’
That night they sat on the low wall that separated the road from the beach. The sun was dropping behind the horizon, leaving behind streaks of pink and red. They watched in silence until there was only a domed sliver of gold resting on the dark skyline.
Peter lifted her hand to his mouth, a gesture he often did just to show he was thinking of her. ‘It will be good,’ he said.
‘It will be wonderful,’ Mary said.
Everything will work out. I’ll be fine Mam, she thought.
Chapter 35
‘Do you remember when you first came here to live?’ Gwyneth held out her hand.
‘I do.’ Mary took hold of her fingers, noticing the freckled brown blotches on the skin, the flesh of an old woman, and the raised thin bones on the back of her hand. ‘Coming here meant everything to us.’
She’d always known that Gwyneth’s offer to rent the cottage wasn’t only altruism. She also needed someone nearby who she could talk to about her son without worrying he’d be judged; who knew him as well, or better, than she did. That had been Tom. It hadn’t made any difference to Mary. She was still grateful. Iori was buried in the graveyard in Llamroth so Tom had felt close to him. In an odd way it had saved her brother’s sanity.
And Mam’s. From the moment they arrived in Wales she stopped drinking, even at that first Christmas, even on the anniversary of her husband’s death.
‘And me, it meant everything to me.’ There was a small smile on Gwyneth’s lips. ‘Ever since last week, after you told me you and Peter were getting married, I’ve had this thought in my head.’ She crossed to the Welsh dresser and tugged at the copper handles of one of the drawers. ‘And yesterday I decided to do something about it.’
The black metal box she pulled out looked heavy and Mary half-rose to take it from her. ‘Here, let me.’
‘No, I can manage.’ Gwyneth carried the box the table and unlocked it. ‘Put the lamp on, will you, cariad, I can’t see what I’m doing in this light.’
‘I’ll pull the curtains back a bit as well.’ Mary dragged the heavy blue velvet drapes as far as she could.
‘I want to talk to you about the cottage.’ Gwyneth rifled through some papers, peering myopically at first one and then another. Eventually she gave a small cry of triumph, flapping a sheath of yellowed pages in the air. ‘These are the deeds to your cottage. I’ve seen my solicitor and I have to take these to him.’ She smiled broadly, showing the gap in her upper gum where two teeth had fallen out. ‘And I want you to come with me.’ She sat in her chair, the documents held loosely in her hands. ‘Because I want to give you the cottage. It will be my wedding present to you.’
Mary watched the second finger on the face of the Welsh slate mantle clock turn a full circle before finally answering. She spoke steadily. ‘You’ve always been so kind to Tom and me but this…’ She held out her hands, palms upwards. ‘This is too much.’
‘I thought Iori would live there one day. During the war when he and Tom were in prison I hoped that they would come to live there.’ Gwyneth glanced around, her gaze finally settling back on Mary. ‘Tom and you coming to live in the cottage was the next best thing. The last few years have been better than I ever thought they could be after I lost Iori. I’m not getting any younger and I want you to have next door. It was cartref mam a ’nhad – my mother and father’s place, and I want to know it’ll be looked after when I’m gone.’
‘I don’t know what to say.’
‘Then say yes, cariad.’
‘If you’re sure?’
Gwyneth waited, watching Mary steadily. ‘I’m sure.’
‘I still think it’s too much.’ Mary hugged her. ‘But yes, Gwyneth, thank you, yes.’
Chapter 36
‘Always thought she’d be famous, did that one.’ Hannah Booth tipped her head towards Ellen, who was sitting at the kitchen table determinedly reading an article on Tyrone Power playing the leading role in Mister Roberts at the London Coliseum.
Hannah picked at her cuticles. After trying and failing to make eye contact with her daughter-in-law, she continued, ‘Just because she’s had a few jobs singing in the likes of back-street clubs she says she could have made a career of it. Caterwauling more like.’
Ellen mouthed the words along with Hannah. It was a comment she’d heard many times, one
that used to hurt but not anymore. Now it made her want to scream. She forced herself to read against the background of Ted’s mother’s droning voice.
The District Nurse acted as though nobody had spoken. She’d learned months ago that this was the only thing to do. Keeping her head down, she concentrated on unwrapping the bandages from Hannah’s leg and studying the varicose ulcer on her shin.
The stench was instantly noticeable and Ellen wrinkled her nose in disgust. God, she hated the sound, sight and smell of the fat cow.
Hannah poked the nurse on the shoulder. ‘You’d think she’d know better, a wife and mother, wanting to gad about all the time.’ She flicked away a small piece of cuticle with the pad of her thumb. ‘Makes you think, huh?’
Ellen slapped her magazine on the table. ‘Enough! I’ve heard it all before, Hannah, and I don’t think Nurse Hampson wants to hear your vicious carping.’
The nurse bowed her head even lower over the wound.
Hannah smiled in satisfaction. ‘Truth hurts, doesn’t it?’
‘Oh, just shut up!’ Ellen stared at the pages of Theatre World Magazine. The words merged together. Outside, the tin bath scraped against the wall in the wind, rain rattled on the metal. She could hear Doreen in her kitchen next door, whistling to some tune on the radio. What was it their mam used say? A whistling woman and a crowing hen brings the devil out of his den. Yeah, that was it. She and Ted were living with the devil, that was for sure. Ellen scowled.
The nurse swabbed the ulcer with Red Lotion, but the sweet aroma of lavender and zinc did little to block out the reek of the slowly granulating flesh around the wound.
Ellen saw Hannah wince and for a brief moment felt some sympathy, recalling the very early days when they’d lived together in harmony and she’d helped her future mother-in-law to bandage the damaged varicose veins. It was impossible to believe they’d ever got on; now she sometimes wished Hannah dead.
‘That’s me done, Mrs Booth, I’ll see you next week.’ The nurse patted Hannah’s arm. Packing her bag and closing it with one hand, she stood and fastened the buttons of her coat with the other.
‘She’ll see you out.’ Hannah carefully took her leg off the small stool and lowered it to the floor, adjusted her long black dress over her knees.
Ellen led the way along the hall and opened the front door. She watched the nurse cycle, head bent against the rain, down the street, the black nurses’ bag bouncing around in the wicker basket behind her. As she turned onto Shaw Street, Ellen saw Nurse Hampson wobble and grab hold of her hat with a shrill shriek, in danger of losing it in a sudden gust of wind. A man, hurrying down the street on the opposite side, swopped glances with Ellen and laughed before continuing on his way, taking long strides to avoid the streams of cream and yellow donkey-stone that was being washed off the door steps by the rain.
The smile faded when she closed the door and went back into the kitchen. Ted had told her he’d had a word with his mother about her constant picking. It hadn’t made much difference.
‘I’m at the end of my tether with you,’ she said, sitting back at the table. ‘This is my house and you’d better remember that before you start again with your nasty remarks in front of anybody else.’
‘Aye and it’s my money that paid for the shop that pays for the upkeep of your house.’ Hannah’s jowls shook with the force of her words. She wiped at the sweat on her forehead with a large white handkerchief. ‘I speak as I find, my lady, and you’ve never been good enough for my Ted.’
‘You didn’t say that when you were so bloody lonely stuck up in that house of yours that you begged me to come and live with you.’
‘You asked.’
‘I didn’t.’
‘You did.’
Ellen rose and walked to stand over Hannah. ‘You. Bloody. Asked,’ she repeated. ‘And, like I’ve said a thousand times, if I knew then what a selfish old cow you were I’d have run a mile.’
Even though she shrank slightly back in her chair the old woman raised a large pudgy fist and shook it at Ellen. ‘If I’d known what kind of woman you were I wouldn’t have let you within a hundred miles of my lad.’ She sucked her lips into her toothless mouth and dabbed at her chin where she’d dribbled. ‘You kept very quiet about her upstairs –’ she paused to catch her breath in one loud intake, ‘until it was too late for Ted to change his mind.’ She pushed the handkerchief into her ample cleavage and wrapped her black cardigan tighter around her.
‘Don’t you ever again…’ Ellen raised her hand and gritted her teeth. ‘I’ve told you – and I know Ted’s told you – leave Linda out of this. I’m warning you, Hannah, one word from me to Ted and you’ll be gone, faster than a rat up a drainpipe. We’ll both make sure of that.’ She shoved her clenched hands into the pocket of her apron. She spun around and picking up the magazine, left the kitchen.
Upstairs, the two children were still napping. She checked the clock. She’d leave them for another half an hour.
In her room she flopped down on the bed and shuffled back against the headboard, pulling the eiderdown over her legs. The room was gloomy. Rain slapped on the window. She reached up and yanked on the lamp cord, intending to read in the pool of light. Instead she wrapped her arms around her waist and hugged herself, going over and over again what Hannah had said. She was trembling and a tight pain in her chest only allowed her to take shallow breaths. She’d had it a few days now and today it was worse. She couldn’t take much more and she didn’t know what to do. It was obvious Ted’s talk to his mother had no effect, her nastiness had only increased. But up to today, she’d stopped the spiteful talk about Linda and directed all her venom at Ellen. Now she’d started again.
Gazing at the window against the dark sky all she could see was a reflection of the room. Except for Ted’s bits and bobs strewn around, it hadn’t changed much since she’d shared it with Mary, but that seemed ages ago. Sometimes she thought about how they used to snuggle up together, laughing and whispering until their father banged on the wall, yelling at them to shut up.
She began to cry. Once she started she couldn’t stop. She tried but nothing halted the flood of tears, not even when Linda came into the room. Not even when she crawled onto the bed with Ellen and wrapped her thin arms around her.
Chapter 37
Princess Anne to Balmoral
Crowds gathered outside Clarence House as the young Princess Anne travelled with her mother and brother from their home to make their way north to Balmoral. Only the second outing since she was born.
Mary read the article with little interest and flicked through the pages. The resident columnist’s by-line on page five jumped out at her.
Matron of the Pont y Haven hospital to marry German ex-POW Peter Schormann…
‘Oh no!’ Mary skimmed through the item:
… love thine (one-time) enemy … my source at the hospital … Mary Howarth, Matron at Pont y Haven will be one of the first in Wales to marry a German ex POW … Peter Schormann, a former doctor and POW at a camp in the north of England … now an odd job man in the village of Llamroth where they live … fell in love at a time when it was totally forbidden … ‘We are very happy,’ says Miss Howarth, ‘and don’t see why others shouldn’t be happy for us as well.’ …will marry at Llamroth Church on Saturday 23rd December at 2 o’clock …
‘Damn and blast.’ Mary crumpled up the paper and threw it in the waste paper basket under her desk. Who would have talked to the Clarion? The answer was staring her in the face. She looked beyond the open door of her office and along the corridor filled with staff going about their business. Or my business, she thought, bitterly. ‘Damn and blast “my source at the hospital”,’ she said, crossing the room and slamming the door.
Too angry to stay still she paced her office. She had a good mind to telephone the bloody newspaper, demand to know who they’d talked to, insist on speaking to whoever wrote the article. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been so furious.
/> An ambulance darkened the window as it passed, its bell shrill, insistent. At the same time the telephone rang. ‘The Chairman would like to see you in the Conference Room, Matron.’ The cool voice of his secretary held no hint of friendship.
Mary stood motionless, her hand still on the receiver, steadying her breathing. Pulling her shoulders back, she smoothed her hair away from her forehead, adjusted her cap and scrutinised herself in the mirror. Her blue eyes were resolute. ‘All right,’ she muttered, ‘here we go.’
The corridor to the Conference Room had never seemed so long. Or so quiet. Mary was aware of the soft squeak of her heels on the tiles, the muffled sounds behind the closed doors of the wards, even the kitchens were quiet at this time, between breakfast and lunchtime. She had time to think as she strode, eyes fixed to the front. She needed to be ready to answer any questions if the hospital board members had seen the Clarion. She slowed to a halt. Or did she? Did she really have to defend herself? Was it any of their business? She kept this in mind as she settled in the chair opposite the six men and four women of the Board.
‘We were aware of the rumours around the hospital about your – your domestic arrangements. And then, this morning, the Clarion…’ Ivor Thomas almost spat out the words as though the name had left a bad taste in his mouth. ‘Now I realise it is neither the business of the Board or of me as Chairman to make summary judgement without hearing your side of the situation—’
‘No, it’s not, Mr Thomas. And if you don’t mind I will not be discussing my, as you call it, domestic situation,’ Mary interrupted.
‘Miss Howarth!’ The remonstration came from Mrs Warburton-Thorpe, a tall, gaunt, very upright woman of about sixty with grey hair tightly scraped back from her face. She peered over her spectacles at Mary, clearly astounded. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever heard you be so rude.’
‘Probably not, Mrs Warburton-Thorpe, but there again I have never been treated in such a fashion as I have lately. I realise you may have some concerns—’
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