A Family Christmas

by Katie Flynn

  Miss Trent shrugged. ‘I’ve no idea. But since we have no other clues, and you intend to leave Liverpool anyhow, we might as well run to Wales as anywhere else. Since your dad was probably already in the merchant navy and based in Liverpool when he met your mum, her family’s farm might not be all that far away.’

  When Frank returned from work Jimmy put him in possession of all that he had missed, and then the four of them settled once more around the kitchen table and began to plan.

  ‘We’ll be travelling by train, so we don’t want to burden ourselves with unnecessary luggage,’ Miss Trent said. ‘Oh, and by the way, please call me Auntie Glenys, because I think that if anyone asks I should say you’re my nephew and niece, and we’re trying to get in touch with our Griffiths relatives because, although it’s probably just talk, they do say there’s a war coming.’

  ‘Huh!’ Jimmy said. ‘Wharrabout peace for our time an’ old Chamberlain telling everyone there wouldn’t be no fightin’? If you ask me we’ve enough to worry about on our own account, without someone startin’ a war—’

  Glenys cut in. ‘We’re supposed to be deciding where and when we take off for pastures new. Anyone got any suggestions?’

  ‘Pastures new,’ Mo said longingly. She grabbed Jimmy’s arm. ‘Don’t that sound nice, our Jimmy? It’s like that song they sings in church sometimes: “Sheep may safely graze”. Sheep and lambs graze on pastures, ain’t that so? Will there be sheep where we’re goin’?’

  ‘Maureen Trewin, if you don’t stop chattering you can jolly well go to bed and leave us grown-ups to discuss what’s best to do,’ Jimmy said severely. ‘Just button your lip, understand?’

  Maureen, far from being cast down, grinned cheekily at her brother. ‘Shan’t say another word,’ she promised. She got up from the table and went over to the curtained window, making herself a little spy-hole so that she could look out at the passers-by, for it was another mild night and though the pavement was by no means crowded there were a few people still about. ‘I say, Frank, when you came home . . . Oh, oh, oh . . .’ She dropped the thick curtain back into place and turned a white and frightened face towards the rest of the company. ‘Jimmy, it’s him! Perishin’ Cyril Huxtable! He’s comin’ along the pavement headin’ straight for this house!’

  ‘Then gerraway from the perishin’ window,’ Jimmy hissed. But Frank took his dark greatcoat and peaked cap off the hook and put a finger to his lips.

  ‘It’s probably just a coincidence, someone what looks like Cyril,’ he whispered. He jerked a thumb at Mo. ‘But the littl’un won’t sleep until she knows for sure that Huxtable ain’t found you. Shan’t be long.’

  He disappeared from the room, shrugging into his coat as he went, and they heard him unlocking the front door and issuing forth into the moonlight. Jimmy moved over to the window and bent his head, listening. Presently he beckoned to Glenys, who joined him at once. ‘D’you think Frank might not be as nice as he seems?’ he murmured. ‘If so, we’re dead ducks.’

  Glenys shook her head. ‘I’m a fair judge of character and I’d say Frank is very much on our side and just what he seems – an honest man,’ she whispered. ‘But Liverpool is full of hefty seamen with black beards. I don’t think we need worry, but it’s best to make sure.’

  And presently Frank re-joined them, ruffling Mo’s pale curls as he re-entered the room and divesting himself of his outdoor clothing. ‘False alarm,’ he said cheerfully. ‘So back to business.’

  Mo took Frank’s hand and rubbed it worshipfully against her cheek. ‘Thanks, Frank,’ she said, beaming up at him. ‘Sorry I false alarmed, but until we’re away from Liverpool I reckon I’ll still be scared of anyone who looks even the tiniest bit like Cyril!’

  ‘Right you are, chuck,’ Glenys said, standing up. ‘And if we plan to leave within the next few days, we all need our beauty sleep. So I’ll come and tuck you up and shan’t be long following you.’

  When she returned to the kitchen, however, she glanced enquiringly at Frank, who smiled ruefully. ‘There’s no sense in worrying Mo, but it was him all right,’ he said. ‘He stopped me, said he’d mislaid the number of the house his young cousins were staying in, but knew it was somewhere along this road and could I tell him if I’d seen any youngsters about. He described Jimmy and Mo to a T. I told him there were no children living here as far as I knew, but he said he’d keep looking because he’s sure they’re here somewhere. So the sooner you leave the better.’

  Glenys packed up some food, checked that the fire was almost out and tiptoed into her bedroom. She began to lay out Mo’s clothes, whereupon the child woke and sat up, eyes wide and black in the candlelight. ‘It wasn’t true, what Frank said about the feller I thought were Cyril, was it?’ she asked. ‘He didn’t want to scare me but I were right, weren’t I? It were Cyril?’ A hand flew to her heart. ‘Is he still out there? Is he like a cat waiting at a mousehole, ready to pounce the moment one of us goes out the door?’

  Glenys shook her head. ‘Of course not,’ she said reassuringly. ‘Though you, were right about Cyril. Frank didn’t want to worry you, but we’ve decided we must leave now, whilst it’s still dark. He’s given me a telephone number where I ought to be able to reach him between shifts, so we can keep in touch. I’ve laid out your clothes, dear, so just you get dressed and go down to the kitchen. We’ll go out the back way across the yard and into the jigger. I’ve already made some sandwiches, so we shan’t starve. Frank will see us off on the milk train before going to work.’

  Mo, who was struggling into her clothes, nodded. ‘I’m glad we’re off,’ she admitted. ‘Only suppose Cyril’s still lurking about somewhere and sees us leave?’

  Glenys picked up her carpetbag and shook her head. ‘Not even Cyril can be in two places at once, and his pals – if he’s got any – have more sense than to hang around the streets all night. Now stop imagining horrid things, pull the covers straight on the bed, and we’ll be off.’

  Chapter 7

  AN HOUR LATER the three of them were on the train and waving to Frank. It was still dark, and Mo was discomposed when, as the train drew out, a man in seaman’s clothing waved to them. Jimmy assured his sister that the man had merely been waving at someone further up the carriage, but it had made Mo uneasy and she did not begin to relax until they had picked up speed. The train was practically empty and Mo enjoyed herself hugely, as indeed did Jimmy, for neither of them had ever travelled by rail before. Jimmy remembered his mother telling him a story in which she had imitated the sound of the train wheels clattering along the lines and crossing the points. ‘Ticketyboosh, ticketyboosh, ticketyboosh’ their mother had told them the engines said, and scarcely had the train pulled out of the station before both children, noses pressed to the window, were imitating the sound. They marvelled at fields, woods and copses, dimly seen in the dawn light, watched cows being driven to the milking sheds, and saw early risers going off to work. The train was not a fast one and it stopped at every station, but nothing spoiled their enjoyment of this, their first train ride. Indeed everything pleased them, even the fact that the rolling stock was old and it was a no-corridor train. ‘It means we can’t go along to the privy, or to a refreshment car if there is one,’ Glenys said rather regretfully, but Jimmy assured her that this made him feel safer than ever.

  ‘Even if Cyril had seen us get aboard the train, and followed, he’d be stuck in his own compartment until the train stops,’ he said gleefully. ‘I say, Miss – I mean Auntie Glenys, ain’t this just prime? I’d like to travel by train for days and days.’

  It was late afternoon by the time they reached the border town from which Glenys thought their search should start, and by then she was heartily sick of cardboard cups of railway tea and the continual stopping of the little train. She checked the compartment to make sure they had left nothing behind and smiled her thanks at a fat red-faced farmer who was helping Mo to descend from the carriage. They had travelled for the last fifteen minutes or so of their ride with
the farmer and his wife, and as Glenys adjusted the straps of the small haversack on Mo’s shoulders the farmer remarked that it was a strange time of year to start a walking holiday.

  ‘It’s not exactly a holiday,’ Glenys began, but the farmer and his wife were already moving away, and Glenys suddenly felt very alone and almost crushed beneath the weight of responsibility for the two children. She led them across the platform and on to a paved road, where several other passengers from their train were already heading away from the station.

  ‘No point in asking directions into town; we’ll just follow everyone else,’ she said, falsely cheerful. ‘We’ll have to find somewhere to spend the night, and then tomorrow we can start asking questions. I’m sure the local people will know everybody who lives in the area, and I don’t imagine Griffiths is a common name.’

  Mo said nothing, and even in the dusk which was beginning to fall Glenys could see that the child looked tired and worried. And why not, Glenys asked herself as they crossed the road over the railway line. They seemed a long way from home, and suddenly she began to wonder whether this whole expedition was not just a huge waste of time. After all, there had been a family rift; Grace and her new husband had gone their own way and lost touch with her parents completely, it seemed. Even if they managed to find the Griffiths – and it was a big if – then they might be told that it was the duty of the children’s father, not their mother’s family, to take care of them. Of course they could explain that the children were in fear of Cyril Huxtable and tell the whole frightening story, but that did not mean they would be believed. In fact, weighed down with both responsibility and her haversack, she began to wish she had never agreed to try to help Mo and Jimmy.

  What was more, she acknowledged now, the reason she had thrown herself into the children’s search was that ever since discovering that she herself was Welsh she had longed to find her own family. But without any sort of clue as to her mother’s identity, apart from a first name which for all Glenys knew could be shared by half the young women in Wales, how could she possibly hope to trace the poor girl who, twenty-six years previously, had been forced to abandon her baby on someone else’s doorstep? Yet she had heard of others, abandoned at birth, who had managed to trace their parents; why should she not be equally fortunate? Indeed, in her heart she had hoped that when they discovered the children’s relatives, the Griffiths might, in gratitude, agree to try to help in her own search. So I’m not just doing this for the sake of Jimmy and Mo, if I’m honest, but for my own sake too.

  Nevertheless, Glenys told herself, as a gentle rain began to fall, I’ve been a complete fool. I have little money and I’ve saddled myself with two children who have no money at all. Perhaps I should have encouraged them to go to the police after all, but oh no, I couldn’t just do that. I had to say I’d look after them, see that Cyril Huxtable didn’t touch them. Whatever was I thinking of? He’s a big hefty man with three times my strength, and I dare say if he got really nasty he’d be prepared to attack all three of us. And what do I do to protect them? I bring them to a foreign country and intend to set them down amongst people who may prove to speak scarcely a word of English. We should have started our search in Liverpool – there are heaps of Welsh people there. Why didn’t I think of that? But I’m Miss Awfully Clever Glenys Trent, who never takes advice or asks for suggestions, but goes her own way. And now I’m stranded in a town of which I know nothing with two frightened children who turn white at the mere mention of the name Huxtable. And what I aim to do with them in a strange town as it grows darker and darker and the street lamps wink on, I have no idea whatsoever.

  It was at this moment that Glenys spotted something ahead of them, and realised it was the swinging sign of an inn. She gave Mo’s small hand a squeeze and spoke in her most schoolmistressy voice. ‘There now, aren’t we in luck? A nice little inn, not too big and expensive, which I do hope can give us a couple of rooms for the night. Once we’ve settled in, I’ll order us a meal and we can start asking questions. Wouldn’t it be marvellous if we found your family on the very first day of our quest?’

  By this time they had reached the inn, which was called the Glas Fryn. As they neared the door it opened and the smell of hot food and beer came wafting towards them. The man who came out started to close the door behind him, then noticed them, grinned, and held it open. He said something in Welsh and then called out to someone behind him. Before Glenys could open her mouth Jimmy said, ‘We’re lookin’ for somewhere to spend the night. Does this place have rooms to let?’ The man ushered them inside and then called out once more to the man behind the bar, and Glenys realised that this was the first time in her life she had been on licensed premises, unlike Jimmy who, she knew, was in the habit of earning a few pence by scrubbing down pub floors or washing up large quantities of dirty glasses.

  Telling herself that what she had imagined as a den of vice was clearly no such thing, she chided herself. You have got to start living in the real world, Miss Holier-than-Thou Trent.

  The man behind the bar raised his eyebrows at her and smiled pleasantly. ‘Can I help you?’ he asked. He looked at Glenys’s coat, furred with a mixture of rain and snowflakes. ‘Come off the train, did you?’ He jerked his thumb at the man still hovering by the door. ‘Dick there seems to think you’re after finding if the Glas Fryn lets rooms. Well it do, but not at this time of year – no call for it, see, ’cos folk don’t walk the hills in the winter. But you might try Mrs Hughes, three or four doors on. She’s a keen one on earnin’ a few extra bob, though I can’t promise . . .’ He stopped speaking, dismayed. Miss Holier-than-Thou Trent had burst into tears.

  Afterwards, she wondered whether it was the best thing or the worst that she could have done. The man behind the bar shouted: ‘Cath, Cath, come you through here. There’s folk wanting lodgings,’ and whilst Glenys was blowing her nose and wiping the tear tracks from her cheeks a round and motherly woman appeared from the back premises. She wore a large white apron over a black wool dress and was drying her hands on a striped tea towel. She smiled across at Glenys.

  ‘How can I help you, dear?’ she asked, and her fat and comfortable voice held a trace of the Liverpool accent with which Miss Trent had grown familiar during her one term in the city. ‘Wanting a room, was you? Well, as I expect Mr Jones told you, we don’t do rooms at this time of year, but Mrs Hughes, four doors down the road, might be willing.’ She cocked her head on one side and shrewd little eyes scanned the bedraggled trio. ‘And if you’re the new schoolteacher, come to instruct the kids whilst Miss Jones is ill with the measles, I know for a fact she’s expecting you.’ She tutted. ‘Miss Jones’s mam should have seen that she took the measles when she were a kid, then we shouldn’t be in such a pickle now.’

  Glenys was shaking her head when Jimmy spoke up. ‘That’s right; my auntie is a schoolteacher,’ he said firmly. ‘Can you show us which is Mrs Hughes’s house, please? I don’t suppose she’s expecting my little sister and me, but – but . . .’

  ‘But we’s had the measles and our mam died a while back, so Auntie Glenys said we could come with her so long as we promised to behave,’ Mo put in.

  The fat woman chuckled richly. ‘You’d best be good if you’re goin’ to live with Mrs Hughes, else she’ll turn you out,’ she said. She came out from behind the counter, crossed the bar and held the door open, then pointed. ‘See the house with the blue curtains and a light showin’ through? That’s Mrs Hughes’s place. Knock good and loud and then wait, because she lives in the back.’ She turned to go back into the pub, but Glenys put a hand on her arm to detain her.

  ‘Oh, excuse me, but what do we do if Mrs Hughes won’t take us in? She won’t be expecting a couple of children . . .’

  ‘I wouldn’t worry about that, my dear,’ the fat woman said. ‘If there’s money in it Mrs Hughes will be first in line.’

  She turned away and this time Glenys did not attempt to stop her, but picked up her carpetbag, seized Mo’s small hand, waited
for a moment whilst Jimmy picked up his own bag and then set off at a fast walk towards the blue curtains.

  They reached the house and Jimmy knocked loudly on the door, and then the three of them waited in the drizzling rain. Mo, who had been unusually silent, suddenly piped up. ‘I’m cold and wet and I want to go home to where there’s street lights,’ she said miserably. ‘Why couldn’t we stay in that nice cheerful pub? I liked it in there; it was warm and cosy and it smelled of food, and I’s hungry.’

  Glenys was about to remind her of the no children on licensed premises rule when they heard shuffling footsteps approaching the front door, and it was pulled open by a tiny woman who Glenys thought could have been any age between forty and seventy. Glenys opened her mouth to explain, but before she managed to get a word out Mrs Hughes said, ‘A message I had to say you wasn’t comin’, ’cos you’ve got the measles yourself,’ she said crossly. ‘Or are you the replacement for the replacement?’ She gave a little snort which might have been amusement or disapproval. ‘But you’d best come in, else you’ll catch your death and I can’t and won’t nurse sick persons, whether it’s measles or pneumonia.’ She did not wait for a reply, but turned away, opening the door on her right, and gesturing her unexpected guests to enter the small and stuffy parlour thus revealed.

  Glad to be indoors, but somewhat nonplussed by their reception, Glenys herded the children into the parlour, then went and shut the front door. In the murky grey of the evening it had been difficult to get even an impression of Mrs Hughes, but the parlour was lamplit, though icy cold, and at last she was able to take stock of the landlady. She was very small, perhaps only a few inches over four foot tall, and though Glenys had thought her fat she now realised that scarves, shawls and cardigans had been piled on haphazardly, one on top of the other, until she was as round as a ball. She gestured Glenys to sit down and took a chair herself, whilst Mo perched on a pouffe and Jimmy leaned against the empty sofa.