by Rhys Bowen
“But, Mr. Evans,” the minister went on, “think of Christian charity. Love thy neighbor—that’s what we are instructed to do. If this is so abhorrent to our neighbors, have we a right to proceed with it?”
“They can go to hell as far as I’m concerned,” Evans-the-Meat retorted. “Let them go ahead and be damned.”
“There will be no damning while I’m in the room,” Mr. Parry Davies said firmly. “I strongly advise that we break up this meeting until tempers have cooled and we have had time to examine the ramifications.”
A thin figure in black rose to his feet. “I completely concur with my learned colleague,” Reverend Powell-Jones said, turning to address the audience.
“That makes a first,” a voice commented in a loud stage whisper. “They never agree on anything.”
“So shall we close up the meeting for tonight then?” Rev. Parry Davies asked the assembly.
“Hold on a moment. I’ve got something to say.” Ted Morgan stepped up onto the platform. In contrast to the previous speakers, he wasn’t wearing a jacket, but a light blue golf shirt over well cut slacks. The hall was instantly quiet. “Before everyone leaves, I have an announcement to make. Most of you already know who I am.” Ted looked around the audience with a self-satisfied smile on his face. “For those of you who haven’t been in the Dragon and had a chance to meet me yet, I’m old Taff Morgan’s son. I’ve been living in London for most of my adult life and I’ve done pretty well at it too. Now I’ve decided to give it a try back where I started. Some of you have probably heard—most of you, if I know the village grapevine—that I’ve bought the old slate quarry.” There was a stir of excitement in the audience. “It’s quite true. I bought it a few months ago and now I’m at liberty to tell you what I plan to do with it.” He reached into his pants pocket and produced an envelope. “This came today to say that planning permission has been granted.”
“Planning permission for what?” a voice demanded.
Ted stepped closer to his audience. “Those of you who worked in the old mine will remember that it is a dramatic and beautiful place—vast slate caverns, an underground lake. What a shame to keep it all shut away. It’s the sort of place that’s crying out to be revived. That’s why I decided to set my adventure park there. I’m going to create a theme park called The Haunted Mine. Doesn’t it just lend itself to that kind of thing? Picture a ghost train ride going through the little tunnels with spooks jumping out around every corner, a roller coaster in the main cavern, a waterslide coming into the lake. Pretty powerful stuff, eh? And the whole thing will be linked by monorail to a big new hotel I’m going to build on the old farm.”
Evans-the-Meat leaped at him. “Are you out of your mind, man?” he screamed. “The Haunted Mine? A monorail? A big hotel? The place crawling with tourists? Over my dead body!”
“Easy now, Gareth boy,” Ted Morgan said with a laugh. “It will be good for Llanfair. Think of the jobs. Think of all that cash waiting to be spent here. You want this place put on the map? I’ll put in on for you.”
“Not with your damned sleazy commercial ideas, you won’t,” Evans-the-Meat yelled. “You never did appreciate what we’ve got here and now you’re going to wreck it for us.”
“You can’t stop me.” Ted Morgan chuckled. “I told you. I’ve already got the go-ahead from the Gwyneth County Council and the Welsh tourism board. They’re even thinking of giving me a grant to get it started. They said it was badly needed in a depressed area like Llanfair.”
“Depressed area?” Evans-the-Meat shouted.
“Full of backward-thinking half wits like you, boy,” Ted Morgan jeered.
Evans-the-Meat uttered an enraged roar and flung himself at Ted. Evan had been standing alert and poised at the back of the hall. He ran forward to prise Evans-the-Meat’s hands from Ted’s throat. Barrry-the-Bucket and several of his friends rushed to join Evan in pulling apart the two men.
“Easy now, man, unless you want to spend the night in jail,” Evan said softly. Evans-the-Meat still struggled. “Let me get at him. I’ll kill him first,” he yelled as he was half carried, half dragged down the center aisle. “I’ll kill him, I swear it. We all said good riddance when he went away and nobody wants him back again now.”
Evan noticed that the butcher smelled strongly of beer. So he had been getting up his courage before the meeting started. They dragged him into the cool night air.
“What shall we do with him?” Barry’s friend asked Evan.
“Let go of me. I’ll teach that slimy little snake Morgan a lesson he won’t forget,” Evans-the-Meat threatened.
“Do you want to spend a night in a cell?” Evan demanded. “I don’t want to call for a squad car, but I will unless you calm down and stop talking so daft.”
Evans-the-Meat gradually stopped struggling. “You don’t know him,” he growled. “He’s no good for this place. Never was, never will be. Nothing but trouble.”
“It seems like you’re the one who’s causing all the trouble right now,” Evan said. “We’re going to walk you home and I suggest that you go straight to bed.”
It had started to rain, a sudden, stinging shower that seemed to sober up Evans-the-Meat by the time they reached his front door. His living quarters were in a flat over the butcher shop.
“Is your wife home?” Evan asked as he fumbled with his key.
“Visiting her mother in Dolgellau again,” Evans-the-Meat said. “She’s always visiting her mother in Dolgellau.”
“I can trust you to stay home and go to bed, can’t I?” Evan demanded. “I don’t want to find you’ve gone to the pub and caused more trouble.”
“I won’t go to the pub,” Evans-the-Meat said with a little sigh. “I’ll be a good boy, officer. I’ve got a lot of thinking to do.”
“Alright then,” Evan said, hesitating as Evans-the-Meat began to close the door. He stood in the street outside.
“We’ll be off then, if you don’t need us any more.” Barry-the-Bucket put his hand on Evan’s shoulder.
“Oh, right. Thanks for your help,” Evan said, shaking hands with him. “I think everything will be alright now.”
The sound of voices echoed down the street. It was apparent that the meeting had already broken up and groups of people were coming toward them, oblivious of the rain, chatting excitedly about the events that had just taken place. Mrs. Williams saw Evan and came scurrying over to join him, her face alight and eyes shining.
“Who would have thought it, Mr. Evans? We haven’t seen this much excitement here since that German bomber lost its way and crashed on Mount Snowdon during the war. A proper old ruckus, wasn’t it? All that shoutin’ and carryin’ on.” She glanced around conspiratorially. “Did you manage to get Evans-the-Meat calmed down then?”
“Eventually,” Evan said. “He’s a strong bloke. It took four of us.”
Mrs. Williams shook her head, making little clucking noises. “He always did have a terrible temper, that one.” She looked up and down the street. “Are you coming home now then?”
“I’d better stay out here for a while,” Evan said, “just to make sure there’s no more upsets tonight. But you should go home. The rain’s coming down harder now.”
“You’ll get soaked to your skin. Shall I pop home and get you your raincoat?”
“I’ll be fine, thanks. I’ll see you in a little while.” Evan had to smile. Sometimes Mrs. Williams made him feel that he was five years old again and just setting off for primary school. He watched her hurry on down the street and disappear into the darkness beyond the street lamp. Then he turned up his collar against the driving rain and walked slowly back up the length of the village. The village hall was also in darkness now and he met Mr. Parry Davies coming down the path toward him.
“I sent them all home, constable,” he said. “I thought there was no point in prolonging things at this point.”
“Quite right, reverend. I’m glad you did,” Evan said. “We’ve had enough hot temper for
one night.”
He looked up as he heard a car start and drive away with tires squealing.
“I’ll be off home then,” the reverend Parry Davies said. “I’m glad you were there, Constable Evans. A tricky situation, wasn’t it just?”
“I’ve seen worse,” Evan said. “But it was too much excitement in one night.”
The reverend chuckled as he opened his gate. Evan patrolled slowly back down the street. It was now deserted, and strips of light were all that showed between tightly drawn curtains as the inhabitants of Llanfair were safely back in their living rooms with the telly on. He paused again outside the butcher shop and looked up at the lighted window upstairs. There was nothing more he could do. He hoped that Evans-the-Meat would have the sense to have cooled off by morning.
Mrs. Williams must have been watching and waiting for him to come home because the front door opened before he could put his key in the lock.
“Any more signs of trouble?” she asked, half expectantly.
Evan shook head. “Everyone’s gone home.”
She helped him off with his wet jacket. “Look at you, soaked to the skin just. Come and sit in the kitchen and I’ll make you a nice hot cocoa.”
“I’m fine, Mrs. Williams,” Evan protested. “A spot of rain won’t hurt me.” He glanced at his reflection the hall mirror. “Quite a night, wasn’t it? I always knew that Evans-the-Meat got upset easily, but I wasn’t prepared for that.”
Mrs. Williams shook her head. “Shocking,” she said. “Of course, there’s always been bad blood between those two.”
“Evans-the-Meat and Ted Morgan, you mean?” Evan asked with interest.
Mrs. Williams nodded furiously. “Oh yes, ’deed to goodness. They never could abide each other, even back in primary school here. The number of canings they got for fighting—I should think their backsides were black and blue all over! Ted Morgan always seemed to know how to get Evans-the-Meat riled up and make him lose his temper. Always teasing him, he was, and that boy had a terrible temper, even back in those days.” She leaned closer to Evan, as if she was afraid someone might overhear them. “He went for a boy called Tommy Hughes for laughing at him once and landed him in the hospital with a broken jaw.”
“Then Ted Morgan should be grateful that I stepped in just in time,” Evan commented.
He followed Mrs. Williams into the kitchen and watched as she put a kettle on the stove. “There were some pretty hot tempers in that room. That man from Beddgelert was as bad as Evans-the-Meat. I thought he was going to break a blood vessel the way he was yelling.”
“That’s Mr. Dawson who runs the Royal Stag Hotel,” Mrs. Williams confided. “You know, that big fancy hotel just across the bridge with the ivy on it?”
Evan nodded. “No wonder he was so upset at the thought of tourism being taken away from Beddgelert.”
“He never used to be like that,” Mrs. Williams said as she got two cups down from the dresser. “I suppose you can understand how he got that way, after the tragedy he’s known, poor man.”
“What happened?”
Mrs. Williams shook her head sadly, making more clucking noises. “His daughter killed herself,” she whispered, although they were quite alone. “They only had the one child and he idolized her. She was a pretty little thing too. Well, maybe he tried to protect her a little too much, maybe he was just too strict with her, because she ran away and got in with a bad crowd. They say she got involved in drugs and ended up taking her own life.” She started ladling cocoa into the cups. “He took it very hard. And then his wife couldn’t stand it any longer and she up and left him. Afterward he was a changed man—always picking fights with people and yelling.”
Evan pulled out a chair. “Evans-the-Meat’s always picking fights and he doesn’t even have an excuse,” he commented. “I just hope he simmers down, although I can’t see that he’ll ever go along with this new idea of Ted Morgan’s.”
“What do you think of it then, Mr. Evans?”
“It doesn’t sound like a bad idea to me,” Evan said cautiously. “It would mean lots of jobs, wouldn’t it, and it would make use of something that’s lying idle right now. I’m not sure that I’d like a big hotel and a monorail right here in the village, but I suppose these things can be done tastefully.”
“I don’t know that I’d like all that traffic and people peering in my windows,” Mrs. Williams said, “but you can’t stop progress, can you. Are you hungry now, Mr. Evans?” She looked around the kitchen for inspiration. “Can I make you a nice cheese sandwich? Or how about cold bacon pie and pickles? Or some of my eccles cakes?”
Evan was spared from answering these questions by the phone ringing in the front hall.
“Now who could that be at this time of night?” Mrs. Williams demanded as she always did when the phone rang. Evan wasn’t sure how she expected him to be clairvoyant and know.
He went to pick it up. “Hello? Williams residence. Constable Evans speaking.”
“Mr. Evans? This is Annie. Annie Pigeon,” a voice whispered. “I think someone’s trying to break into my house.”
Chapter 10
The rain had stopped as Evan hurried out of the house. The street was deserted and the faint sound of dramatic music punctuated with explosions came from TV sets behind heavy curtains. The pavement glistened in the street light but there was a large patch of shadow before the next light up by the school. Wisps of cloud hung like ghostly shadows on the slopes above. Evan’s feet echoed from the stone walls as he broke into a run.
Annie must have been watching for him because she opened the front door before he reached her cottage. She wasn’t wearing makeup this time, and her face looked deathly white against her red hair. She was dressed in old dark sweats and Evan wondered if she had already undressed for bed. Her eyes darted nervously around as she let him into the narrow hallway.
“What happened then?” he asked.
Annie glanced toward the back door and then up the stairs. “I think he might still be there,” she whispered. “I didn’t dare go into the kitchen, because I thought I could see the glow of a cigarette.”
“Stay there,” Evan said. He went down the hall and into the tiny kitchen without turning on the kitchen light. The back door was shut. So was the kitchen window. Without hesitating he crossed to the back door and wrenched it open.
“Alright, what’s going on out here?” he demanded.
Silence. His flashlight strafed the little back garden and the bushes beyond. He waited, holding his breath but there was no sound, only the sigh of the wind. A concrete path led to the back fence with flower beds on either side of it. He walked down the path, examining the beds for footprints. Of course an intruder need never have stepped off the path to reach her kitchen. There was a rickety back gate that wasn’t properly latched. Someone might have gone out that way. He opened it and shone his flashlight along the footpath in both directions but there was no sign of movement except for branches swaying in the wind.
“Did you see him?” Annie’s anxious voice asked as he headed back into the house.
Evan shook his head. He shone the light over the window and door frame. The paint was peeling on both but there was no sign of recent interference.
“Tell me what happened,” he said as he went inside and shut the door behind him.
“I was upstairs, putting my Jenny to bed,” Annie said, still talking in whispers. “I heard people go past talking and then it got quiet. I went into the back bedroom where I sleep to get something and I just happened to glance out of the window and I thought I saw a shadow streak across my back garden toward the house. And then I heard this scratching sound, like someone trying to get in. I tiptoed downstairs and I could see his cigarette. He was standing there in the dark.”
“Any idea who it was?” Evan peered out of the window again.
She shook her head.
Evan went over to the window, then he turned back to her with a grin. “Are you sure you didn’t mistake th
is for a cigarette?” he asked, pointing to the little red light that glowed on the electric stove. It was reflected in the window glass.
Annie bit her lip. “Oh, I see,” she said. “Yeah, I might have done. I was that scared.”
“The wind does strange things up here,” Evan said kindly. “You might have heard a branch scraping on something and the trees moving in the street light can throw strange shadows.”
She nodded, still wide-eyed. “You may be right,” she said. “Perhaps my imagination is getting the better of me, except…”
“Except what?”
She looked away. “It almost sounds daft to say it now, but I suspected someone had been here yesterday. You know when we were out up on the hill? When I got back the kitchen window was open and I’d swear I closed it before we left. I looked around and it didn’t seem as if anything had been taken, but I just got the feeling that someone had been snooping around and hadn’t put things back how I left them.”
She led him out of the darkened kitchen into a sparsely furnished living room. There was a green vinyl armchair, a bean bag, and a clothes basket full of toys. A small TV sat on top of a bookcase that held a few children’s books.
“It wasn’t robbery, was it?” he said. “Or they would have taken the TV. You’ve no idea why anybody would want to get into your house?”
She shook her head. “No idea at all.”
Evan looked directly at her. “You don’t think someone might have found out where you were living? Someone who might have been looking for you and followed you here?”
He thought she hesitated before she said, “Nobody at all. Jenny and me have no one. We’re all alone.”
“I see,” he said, but he didn’t see. He found himself wondering if this was a ruse to get him round to her house for an evening visit. That’s what Mrs. Williams would have suspected. Bronwen too. But Annie was clearly upset. Her eyes darted around nervously and she was playing with the ring she wore on her right hand.
