Swansea Girls

by Catrin Collier

  ‘She did. And if you know anything about Angie, that should tell you how desperately fond of you she is. She’s never run after a boy before in her life. And speak of the devil.’

  ‘You didn’t say she was in the house,’ Joe reproached as voices drifted in from the hall.

  ‘You didn’t ask. She’s been plotting some girl thing or other in the drawing room,’ he shouted for the benefit of whoever was in the hall.

  ‘Charity concert for the benefit of the Children’s Fresh-Air Fund, not girl thing,’ Angie corrected, opening the door and looking at them. Joe glanced into the hall, it was packed with what seemed like a horde of chattering girls in pastel frocks, bright-red lipstick and high-heeled stilettos that were making machine-gun noises on the tiled floor.

  ‘Hello, boys.’ Half a dozen of them crowded in behind Angie.

  ‘Goodbye, girls.’ Robin moved to the door.

  ‘Say goodbye nicely, Robin,’ Angela chided.

  ‘Goodbye nicely.’

  ‘Isn’t he a scream?’ Emily shrieked at no one in particular.

  ‘A hoot.’ Angie smiled at Joe and arched her eyebrows. ‘If you’re staying for supper, Joe, I’ll warn Mrs John.’

  ‘He’ll be staying for breakfast if you don’t leave us in peace to finish this game,’ Robin interrupted.

  ‘See you later, Robin,’ Emily cooed, backing into the hall.

  ‘Joe?’ Angie waited, hand on doorknob.

  ‘I’ll be out after the game.’

  ‘Then I’ll tell Mrs John to set an extra place.’

  He faltered as he looked into her eyes. ‘Please, Angie,’ he capitulated, ‘if it’s not too much trouble.’

  ‘No trouble, Joe, no trouble at all.’

  ‘What the hell ...’ Martin was jerked out of sleep by a banging on the front door that resounded down to the end room that he and Jack had organised as their bedroom.

  ‘Need you ask?’

  Martin opened his eyes to see his brother balancing on one leg while he thrust his other into his jeans.

  ‘What time is it?’ he barked above the pounding on the door.

  ‘After twelve. The old man can’t be working tonight and by the racket he’s making I’d say he’s pissed.’

  Martin leapt out of bed. ‘You’re not going to the door.’

  ‘You want him to wake the entire street?’

  Grabbing his dressing gown, Martin pushed ahead of Jack, but Brian reached the kitchen before either of them. Opening the front door, Brian stepped forward. Red-eyed, swaying on his feet, Ernie would have fallen flat on his face if Brian hadn’t held him stiffly at arm’s length.

  ‘Who the hell are you?’ Ernie’s eyes rolled alarmingly in his head as he tried – and failed – to focus.

  ‘I think you’re the one who should be introducing himself,’ Brian replied in his detached police officer’s voice.

  ‘You’re not my bloody son.’

  ‘I’m glad to say.’

  ‘Bastard!’

  ‘I have to caution you ...’

  ‘Jack, where’s bloody Jack ...’ Gripping the doorposts, Ernie swayed precariously forward. ‘There you are, you stupid moron. I’ve come for my money.’

  ‘What money?’ Tying his dressing-gown belt, Martin stepped in front of his father, preventing him from advancing any further into the room.

  ‘Rent money. The stupid cow next door ...’

  ‘As neither of us are living next door, we’re not paying the rent.’

  ‘You’d see your mother put out on the streets?’

  ‘She’s not moving back in with you.’

  ‘You ...’ Ernie swung a punch. Brian parried it before Martin had a chance. Lifting Ernie’s arm high behind his back, he held him firm as he slumped forward.

  ‘Want me to arrest him?’ Brian looked from Martin to Jack. ‘We’ve enough for breach of the peace and drunk and disorderly.’

  ‘Which will get him what?’ Martin asked.

  ‘A cell until he sobers up, a fine if he goes to court.’

  ‘Which he won’t pay and my mother will starve herself to find money for.’ Jack took his father from Brian and slung him over his shoulder. ‘What’s the bloody point?’

  ‘The point is we can’t have him coming round here and making that racket at this time of night.’

  ‘Because he scares you?’ Jack taunted.

  ‘Because he’ll terrify your sister even more than she is now, and possibly Lily and Mrs Evans, although in a fair contest I’d back Mrs Evans against your father any day.’

  ‘I’ll give you a hand to get him home.’ Martin rummaged in Ernie’s pockets for his keys. Flicking through the ring, he extracted the one he wanted and walked through the door.

  ‘You’re not going to dress?’ Jack asked.

  ‘Who’ll be around at this time of night to see me?’

  Brian had made a pot of cocoa and cut half a dozen sandwiches, by the time Jack and Martin returned.

  ‘You were gone a long time,’ Brian commented as Martin slung his dressing gown and pyjama jacket in a bucket ready for washing, filled the sink with water and plunged his head and hands in it.

  ‘The place was like a pigsty.’

  ‘If it had been up to me I would have thrown him in his own filth, but this one’ – Jack indicated Martin – ‘insisted on changing the bed.’

  ‘I don’t like him any more than you ...’

  ‘Then why clean up after him?’

  ‘Mam’s sake, I suppose.’

  ‘Do you have any idea when she’s coming out of hospital?’ Brian poured cocoa into three cups.

  ‘No.’

  ‘I’ll move out any time you want me to.’

  ‘There’s no need. Mam won’t move in with us even when she does come out.’

  ‘You don’t know that, Jack.’

  ‘Yes, I do.’ Slamming the door behind him, Jack stormed off down the passage.

  ‘I’m sorry about Jack.’ Drying himself off, Martin sat at the table in his pyjama trousers and sipped his cocoa.

  ‘In his position I’d be climbing the wall.’

  ‘Then you do understand.’

  ‘I try. Look, it’s none of my business ...’

  ‘It is when the old man comes thumping on our door at this time of night.’

  ‘He must have been pretty desperate to ask you for his rent money.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Have you thought he could be about to get evicted?’

  ‘In which case he’ll have to leave the street ... and Mam won’t have anywhere other than here to come back to.’ Martin’s face cracked into the first real smile Brian had seen on it since he’d come to Swansea.

  ‘Powell, you’re a bloody genius.’

  ‘It’s only a theory.’

  ‘I can check the details with Mrs Lannon tomorrow. She’s told me dozens of times that if it was only my father in her basement, she’d have had him put out on the street years ago.’

  ‘Might he leave Swansea?’

  Martin shook his head. ‘That would be too much to hope for. Apart from his job, everyone he knows is here. Aside from a stint in the army he’s never left the place.’

  Brian would have offered to keep a discreet eye on Ernie Clay but he sensed it would be superfluous. He was surprised Ernie had got away with knocking on their door tonight, but then Roy was on night shift and things could get busy after the pubs closed. He suddenly understood why the rotas had been changed in the station so he and Roy were never on together.

  ‘Thanks for the cocoa.’ Martin picked up Jack’s cup. ‘I’ll take this down for him. And thanks for persuading us to let you move in.’

  ‘Changed your mind about coppers?’

  ‘Keep at it and I might.’

  ‘Thank you for the supper, Dr Watkin Morgan, Mrs Watkin Morgan.’ Joe nodded to them as he left the table.

  ‘It’s a pleasure to have you here, Joseph. Any time,’ Mrs Watkin Morgan gushed.

  ‘See you
tomorrow,’ Robin murmured absently, gazing intently at Emily.

  ‘I’ll see Joseph out.’ Angela accompanied him into the hall. ‘Don’t forget your coat.’

  ‘I won’t.’

  ‘There’s a party tomorrow ...’ Angie began.

  ‘I’m busy.’

  ‘Your sister again.’ She smiled brightly. ‘Don’t answer that.’

  ‘How about Saturday?’

  ‘Last pool party of the season here. You’ll come?’

  He remembered Lily was going to the youth club dance. ‘I’ll come.’

  Standing on tiptoe, she kissed his cheek. ‘I’ll see you then.’

  Chapter Fifteen

  John scanned the letter Rosie had put on his desk before scribbling his signature at the foot of the page. ‘That’s it for the day?’

  ‘Yes, Mr Griffiths.’

  ‘You can leave now.’

  ‘It’s only five o’clock.’

  ‘Have an hour on me. How are the wedding preparations going?’

  ‘Fine, I think, Mr Griffiths.’

  ‘You think,’ he reiterated, looking quizzically at her.

  ‘My mother’s taken it upon herself to see to every detail.’

  ‘Then all you have to worry about is looking beautiful on the day.’

  ‘That’s one way of looking at it, Mr Griffiths.’ She picked up the letters. ‘I’ll get Katie to put these in the post.’

  ‘How are you getting on with her?’

  ‘She’s keen, conscientious, works well; in fact, she typed this and, as you see, without a single mistake, unlike most of my letters.’

  John set his pen on his desk, crossed his arms and looked up at his secretary. ‘I know you, Rosie, there’s a “but” coming.’

  ‘From a work point of view I can’t fault her, Mr Griffiths, but she is dreadfully nervous and absolutely petrified of making a mistake. She also tries to clear all the outstanding business at the end of every day, which you well know is impossible. I reassure her every chance I get, but at the rate she’s going she’ll be a worn-out wreck before her probationary period is up. She wouldn’t take a tea break at four o’clock because of the typing, and when I suggested she take one now she insisted she’d prefer to study our accounting systems.’

  ‘But all in all you think she’s up to the job.’

  ‘More than up to it, Mr Griffiths. You picked well.’

  ‘That’s what I’ve been waiting to hear.’ John glanced into the outer office as Rosie opened the door. Katie was sitting at Rosie’s desk, head bent over the invoice book. She did look tired and drawn but was it down to the stress of the job, as Rosie had suggested, or was it her father? Along with half the street he had heard Ernie banging on her brothers’ door in a drunken stupor late last night and when he had seen Roy coming home after night shift, Roy had let slip that Annie Clay wasn’t doing so well.

  Making a mental note to offer Katie a lift home to see if he could help her in any way, he picked up the furniture catalogue he had been studying and flicked through the dining room suites. None looked as though they would last more than a couple of months of normal family wear and tear, unlike his grandmother’s suite, which he had packed away in the basement – but if customers wanted contemporary style before durability and craftsmanship, that’s what he would stock.

  The telephone rang in the outer office. Hearing Katie answer it in a tone virtually indistinguishable from Rosie’s, he left his chair and moved restlessly to the window. Now that he’d begun to consider a life without Esme all he wanted from her was his freedom, but would she give him a divorce if he pressed her? And would Joe and Helen want to live with him or their mother? The only thing he could be certain of was that if Esme did agree to a divorce she would not want to stay in Carlton Terrace, considering the number of times she had tried to get him to move out of the street.

  Already Joe spent more time outside the house than in, although if he had been in Joe’s position he wouldn’t want to spend time at home after witnessing the ultimatum he’d given Esme. But then Joe was no longer a child. After university he would make an independent life for himself and move on to wherever his work was. And Helen? She had seemed strange the last week. Detached, secretive, cleaning out the basement instead of fighting with Esme and demanding she be allowed out as he’d expected her to. Helen was growing up and not very well if last Saturday night was anything to go by.

  Helen’s problems seemed insurmountable; it pained him even to think of them. He loved her and wanted to help her, only he wasn’t sure how. But if Esme left, could he cope with Helen alone?

  Just thinking about it led to a vision of life without Esme. Of living alone – or possibly just with the children – of restoring the house to the comfortable, homely place it had been in his grandparents’ day. Listening to the music he liked on the radio and the record player on Sunday mornings. Asking the daily to prepare the kind of food he preferred and hadn’t eaten at home since his marriage. Traditional cooked dinners, with meat and three vegetables thick, savoury gravy, roast potatoes and stuffing. And afterwards substantial suet puddings filled with apple and rhubarb, and smothered in creamy custard as opposed to the endless cold salads and fruit jellies Esme ordered. The more he considered how his life would be without his wife, the more it appealed. He would be alone but not lonely. And best of all, he wouldn’t have to think about Esme any longer. Where she was. What she was doing, or who she was doing it with. He wouldn’t have to concern himself whether she approved of anything he or the children did. Freedom ...

  ‘Mr Griffiths.’ He turned to see Katie standing in the doorway. ‘Mrs Evans is on the telephone; she would like to speak to you.’

  ‘To me?’ He looked at Katie’s white face and realised what the call might mean. ‘Do you know how to put a call through to my telephone?’

  ‘Yes, Rosie showed me.’ She returned to her desk. He closed the door behind her and waited for the ring.

  ‘We won’t be getting many more evenings like this before the year’s end.’ Joe breathed in deeply as he stood on the foreshore of Swansea Bay and gazed out towards Mumbles Head. The sun, an enormous golden ball, hovered above the sea, floating on filaments of saffron and crimson clouds, lending the entire scene a surreal tinge, blending sand, cliffs and sky in a single-textured mass of artist’s palette tints from yellow through ochre and orange to scarlet.

  ‘No, but I like the beach in winter. When I was younger Uncle Roy used to take me on long walks, especially after a storm. You’d be amazed at the things we found washed up – tables, chairs, shoes, bricks – and when it began to get dark we’d go home, and Auntie Norah would be waiting with the fire stoked high and home-made cake and bread ready for toasting in front of the parlour fire ...’

  ‘Is that a hint that if I bring you down here in winter I’ll have to arrange the welcome-back fire and food first?’

  ‘No.’ She coloured in embarrassment. ‘I was just trying to say ...’

  ‘That you like walking in winter.’ He caught her hand, holding it as they turned towards Mumbles. ‘Do you want to do anything when we get there? Have an ice cream, coffee, window-shop?’

  ‘Window-shopping sounds fun.’

  ‘Really? Most ...’

  ‘Girls you know.’

  ‘I left myself wide open for that one.’

  ‘Alternatively we could just walk to Mumbles, sit on the beach until the sun sets and get the train back.’

  ‘Whatever you like.’

  ‘Is Helen still angry with us?’

  ‘Why should she be angry with us?’

  ‘I mean, Katie, Judy and me. She was furious because we didn’t call for her when we went to Mumbles on Sunday.’

  ‘She couldn’t have gone anywhere on Sunday. My mother threatened to send her to my aunt’s farmhouse in Carmarthen if she as much as tried to set foot over the front doorstep.’

  ‘I know, but when Katie and I tried to explain why we hadn’t called she refused to listen.’
>
  ‘Helen can be stupid as well as stubborn and Sunday wasn’t her best day. She’s calmed down since then. She’s spent most of her time cleaning out the basement and all that dusting, polishing and beating of carpets has taken the edge off her aggression. I went down there yesterday. She’s organised a sitting room for when you girls come round again.’

  ‘I’ll work on Auntie Norah. Perhaps she’ll allow Katie and me to call on her tomorrow.’

  ‘I’d wait until my mother was out if I were you.’

  ‘How would we know whether she’s in or out?’

  ‘I’ll come round and tell you. I’ll even sit in the basement with you.’

  Not quite knowing how to respond to his offer, she looked away. There was hardly anyone else on the beach. Way in the distance at the dock end of the bay a man was exercising two spaniels. Close to Mumbles she could just about make out a solitary woman with what looked like a terrier on a lead.

  ‘We could watch the sunset from that dune.’

  ‘We could.’ Her heart began to beat faster.

  Leading her towards the edge of the beach where the sand was broken by great clumps of coarse grass, he took off his mac and spread it on the ground.

  ‘You’ll get cold,’ she warned.

  ‘Not if you snuggle up close and keep me warm.’ As they sat next to one another he wrapped his arm round her shoulders. ‘Put your hands under my pullover.’

  ‘They’re freezing.’

  Taking them, he tucked them beneath his Aran sweater against his chest. Conscious just how cold they were, she tightened her fists as small as she could.

  ‘Keep them still.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘And stop apologising, that’s definitely your worst fault, being sorry for everything even when it’s not your fault.’ He blew on the tip of her nose. ‘You’re turning blue. I wish it were the beginning of summer, not the end. But there’s always next summer.’

  ‘Will you be here?’

  ‘On the beach?’

  ‘I meant Swansea.’

  ‘Not too far away,’ he murmured seriously. ‘I have a lot to stay here for.’

  ‘You’ll be qualified.’

  ‘And working, heading for the grown-up world.’ As he gazed into her eyes he couldn’t understand Robin and Emily wanting to prolong their courtship. He could think of nothing he wanted more than marriage to Lily. He’d even begun to plan out his life with her. As soon as he turned twenty-one he’d raid his trust fund to buy a small, cosy house with an enormous garden somewhere in the country close to the BBC in Llandaff. When he came home at night he’d close the curtains and shut out the world; they’d sit in front of the fire and watch the flames while they ate and afterwards make slow, languorous love on the hearthrug ...