Victor and Joey insisted on looking after Harry while she went to the Pandy Parade, although she and Megan always made a point of returning by eight o’clock so they could go out for a drink with Lloyd. As winter set in, Sunday dinners became a tradition in the house and even Mr Evans stopped lecturing her about taking her one day off a week. Sunday afternoons she reserved for reading to Harry, who soon began to repeat word for word the stories in the children’s books Joey, Victor and Lloyd ‘lent’ him. When he turned the pages in the correct place, even she began to wonder how much he remembered and how much he could actually read.
Her life was very different from what she had once planned, but apart from concern for her brothers and sister, and her Aunt Edyth, she was content. She and Harry had a comfortable home with good people. She could keep both of them in necessities, and although she insisted that Mr Evans drop her wages to ten shillings a week to pay for Harry’s food, she calculated that by Christmas she would have earned enough to redeem Mansel’s ring.
She had truly believed herself in love with Mansel, and felt as though she had lost him twice. On what should have been their wedding day and a second time when she had listened to the revelations of Harry’s foster mother in the filthy kitchen in Clydach Vale. But Harry was bright and she had aspirations for him beyond their present life. The ring was valuable and if sold in the right place, it might pay for him to go to university some day.
He was her greatest joy. He grew stronger and healthier every day and learned to laugh and play for the first time in his life with Sam and his newfound friends. Using kindness and a patience she hadn’t suspected them of possessing, Joey, Victor, Lloyd and Mr Evans taught him that not all men were to be feared. And the very first time Harry left the house without her, he went to play football on the mountain with Joey and Victor.
There were times when she might have believed herself almost happy if it hadn’t been for the nights when both she and Harry woke from the nightmare world of Mill Street crying and screaming. And then the spectre of Owen Bull and the pain and misery he had inflicted on them rose and returned in full force, and she wondered if they would ever feel truly safe.
‘What a cake! I’ve never seen anything like it in my life,’ Joey gushed as he walked into the kitchen the Monday evening before Christmas, to find Sali standing at the table, struggling to mix icing in a bowl.
‘You, Joey Evans, are a flatterer and a liar,’ Sali countered irritably. ‘And get your hands off that marzipan,’ she ordered, as he broke a piece from the side of the cake. ‘It took me over an hour to cover that cake and there’s a hole there now.’
‘I’ll smooth it over.’ He pinched the pieces either side until they met and popped the piece he’d stolen into his mouth.
‘Well?’ She watched him anxiously.
He frowned. ‘I’m not quite sure. I think I should try a piece with cake.’
‘Oh no, you don’t.’ She picked up a wooden spoon and knocked his hand away. ‘If you want to taste the cake, I made a small one. It’s in the blue tin in the pantry. I was going to put slices in your snap tins tomorrow.’
Joey went to the pantry and opened the tin. ‘There’s no marzipan on it,’ he complained mournfully.
‘And there won’t be, given the price of ground almonds.’
He sniffed the tin theatrically. ‘It smells all right. Have you been feeding it with whisky?’
‘Brandy. Should I have used whisky?’ she asked anxiously.
‘Brandy’s better. It’s what my mother used.’
‘I know. I followed a recipe I found in her notebook, but don’t expect too much. This is the first Christmas cake I’ve ever made.’
‘How long ago did you make it?’ He opened the drawer and took out a knife.
‘In October along with the puddings. Connie sent up the ingredients with a note telling me it was time to make them. She also warned me that if I didn’t hide them from you and Victor I’d have only crumbs left by Christmas Day, and looking at the size of the slice you’ve just cut from that taster cake, you greedy boy, she was right.’
‘This is for Victor and me.’ Stung by her criticism, he halved the slice. ‘So where did you hide the cakes?’ he enquired innocently.
‘If I told you, I wouldn’t be able to use the same place again. Oh ... sugar!’ she cried in exasperation as the icing she had been trying to beat stuck in an unwieldy lumpy mass around the spoon.
Joey took a teaspoon from the drawer, scooped up a blob of icing and dropped it on to his slice of cake. ‘I take it you’ve never made icing before either?’
‘Does it taste that bad?’ she asked apprehensively.
He made a face. ‘It’s not mixed properly. I just tasted something sour and it’s dry and powdery.’
‘The ingredients cost the earth. There’s fresh lemon juice and egg whites in that bowl as well as sugar.’
‘Have you been sitting here filling your face instead of going to the meeting?’ Lloyd demanded of Joey as he walked in from the passage.
‘I’ve only just got in,’ Joey protested.
‘From where?’ Victor closed the door, rubbed his hands together and held them out to the stove.
‘The Bridgend. I called in for a quick drink.’
‘You promised you’d go to the meeting. Management are trying to cut our wages by seven and half per cent.’
‘And they’ll do it with or without our agreement,’ Joey interrupted testily, raising his voice to the level of Lloyd’s.
‘If we don’t show a united front –’
‘I am united. Right behind the rest of you,’ Joey retorted.
‘Wrapped around the new barmaid in the Bridgend?’ Lloyd enquired caustically.
‘She’s right behind us as well.’
‘This isn’t one of your crazy jokes, Joey. The way management are eating away at our wages, we won’t be able to afford bread and scrape soon, let alone beer, meat and cake. And we’re better-off than most families. When you go down in that cage tomorrow, take a long, hard look at the men who are trying to keep a wife and children on less than you earn.’
‘You know you can count on me.’
‘No, I don’t,’ Lloyd snapped. ‘And neither do the other men. All you ever think about is chasing skirt and boozing down the pub.’
‘I do more than my fair share when I’m in work.’
‘Only because there’s no beer or women underground.’ Lloyd glowered at Joey, who retreated into sullen silence.
Sali still found the arguments between the brothers disquieting, but she had come to realise that they never bore a grudge. Summoning her courage, she broke the silence. ‘Would anyone like tea and cake?’
‘Tea would be great,’ Victor said, as Joey handed him half of the slice of cake he’d cut.
‘Please,’ Lloyd relented.
Joey winked at Sali and muttered, ‘Thank you,’ behind Lloyd’s back. Pretending she hadn’t seen him, she cut another slice of the ‘taster’ cake and handed it to Lloyd before setting the kettle on the hob.
‘Was anything decided at the meeting?’ Joey ventured.
‘The union is going to offer the Coal Owners’ Association a five per cent cut in wages. We have to be realistic,’ Lloyd protested defensively, in reply to the angry look on Joey’s face. ‘And frankly, I think we’ll be lucky to get away with five per cent. The owners were complaining about the soaring costs of production before the new Coal Mine Regulations were introduced this year to improve safety.’
‘Why the hell should we pay to improve safety?’
‘Language! There’s a lady present,’ Victor reprimanded through a mouthful of cake.
‘You want a repeat of what happened four years ago?’ Lloyd enquired tartly.
Sali recalled her father’s devastation in March 1905 when thirty-three miners had been killed in an explosion in the Cambrian Colliery in Clydach Vale. And the death of another 119 men in a similar explosion in the National Colliery in Wattstown four months lat
er had driven him to install every safety measure designed to improve conditions in the pits in the Watkin Jones Colliery.
Silence again fell over the kitchen. She poured out four cups of tea and handed them around. While Lloyd was sugaring his, he peered into the bowl in which she had been trying to mix the icing.
‘You trying to put this on the cake?’ He lifted his eyebrows.
‘Sali was thinking of serving it separately as a sauce,’ Joey joked.
‘Do that, and we’ll be chipping it out of the bowl with pickaxes on Christmas Day. Royal icing sets as solid as cement. It is Royal Icing?’ Lloyd said.
‘I tried to follow the recipe in your mother’s book, but I made a real mess of it,’ she confessed. ‘It’s such a waste of expensive ingredients.’
Lloyd poked at the icing with the end of his teaspoon. ‘It’s not past salvaging. If you boil some water, I’ll see what I can do.’
‘You can ice a cake?’ she asked in astonishment.
‘Lloyd is a man of many talents. You should see his knitting and embroidery.’
‘Keep it up, Joey, and I’ll be knitting socks from your intestines,’ Lloyd threatened.
‘That’s Dad coming in, I’m off to bed.’ Joey rushed up the stairs as Billy Evans opened the door from the basement.
‘Joey?’ Mr Evans asked, hearing a door slam upstairs.
‘Just gone to bed.’ Victor finished his tea and stretched his arms above his head. ‘That meeting went on for ever. I think I’ll go on up, too.’
‘I’ll be right behind you.’ His father looked at Lloyd and gave the first smile Sali had seen on his face. ‘You’re icing a cake?’
‘An engineer can do many things,’ Lloyd informed him gravely, pounding a wooden spoon in the bowl.
‘I’ll take your word for it. I’m surprised to see you still up, Sali.’
‘I wouldn’t be if the cake had gone right, Mr Evans. Would you like a piece of the “taster” I made?’
‘Keep it for my snap tin tomorrow. I wasn’t expecting a Christmas cake this year,’ he said. ‘But seeing as how you’ve gone to the trouble of making one, you may as well have the crib. You know where it is, Lloyd. See you in the morning.’
‘Why should I need a crib for the cake?’ Sali whispered, as Mr Evans climbed the stairs.
‘It’s a china one. My mother always put in the middle of the cake. Do me a favour,’ Lloyd lifted an enamel jug from the cupboard, ‘fill this to the top with boiling water and make sure that it is boiling.’
Sali sat at the table, watching while Lloyd softened the icing with drops of boiling water and beat it to a fine paste. When he was finally happy with the mix and consistency, he dipped the longest, thickest carving knife he could find into the jug of hot water and after leaving it for a full minute, used it to spread the icing in a deep, smooth layer over the cake.
‘You make it look easy.’
‘It is easier and less messy than greasing some of the machinery we have underground.’ He slipped the knife back into the jug. ‘You looking forward to Christmas Day?’
‘Apart from making the puddings and cakes, I haven’t thought about it.’
‘Your father organised some memorable parties for the workers of the Watkin Jones Colliery in the Horse and Groom on the Graig Hill.’ He mentioned her past life for the first time.
‘My father loved Christmas. We used to have wonderful parties at home when I was growing up.’ She brushed aside a mist that clouded her eyes.
‘You’re talking like a woman of ninety and you can’t be much over twenty-five.’
‘Twenty-four,’ she amended, ‘and sometimes I feel like a woman of ninety.’
‘I take it your husband didn’t celebrate Christmas.’
‘Not outside the chapel,’ she concurred abruptly, hoping to dissuade him from further probing.
‘You didn’t enjoy the services?’ he pressed.
‘As a fallen woman I wasn’t allowed to attend services and as a bastard, Harry wasn’t either.’
‘Then we’ll have to make it up to both of you this year.’
‘Do atheists celebrate Christmas?’ she questioned suspiciously.
‘No.’ He stepped back and studied the cake as he put the finishing touches to the icing on the sides. ‘But as the Christians purloined the ancient heathen festival of Winter Solstice, which atheists are allowed to celebrate, I feel perfectly justified in enjoying Christmas Day. Have you bought Harry a present?’
‘Every time I take him into Pandy Square, he drags me over to the fancy goods shop to look at a toy horse and cart, so I bought one for him last week. I’ve also had our photograph taken and ordered enough copies to send to my brothers, sister and friends. Mrs Williams said she’d put them into her Christmas parcel to Mari, but I’m afraid they’ll get bent.’
‘I’ll take them to Pontypridd for you,’ he offered.
‘I couldn’t put you to any trouble.’
‘You wouldn’t be. I’ve arranged to meet Mr Richards in his office on Wednesday afternoon to discuss the shares your father left me. And, as I have to go anyway, I thought I might as well make the trip on market day. You could come with me and pick up any last-minute bits and pieces we need for Christmas.’
She shook her head as she cleared away the bowl she’d used to mix the icing in.
‘You don’t want to see your family?’
‘I’d give a great deal to see my brothers, sister and mother, but my uncle wouldn’t allow me in the house, or them to talk to me. And much as I love and miss my Aunt Edyth, I’m too afraid of what my husband might do to her if he sees me in Pontypridd.’ She filled the bowl with cold water and set it beside the sink ready for washing with the breakfast things in the morning.
‘You’re living in a house full of men who can protect you, Sali.’
‘Not against my husband.’ She shuddered involuntarily.
‘He can’t make you go back to him.’
‘You have no idea what he’s capable of.’
Whether or not she had reason to be terrified, he sensed that she was, and didn’t repeat his offer to take her to Pontypridd. ‘Do you want me to take your letters and presents and give them to Mr Richards to pass on to your sister and brothers?’
‘And my Aunt Edyth and Mari,’ she added. ‘Yes please, Lloyd. But could you just leave them in his office and not tell him where they came from. And there is something else.’ She pulled her purse from her skirt pocket. ‘If I give you the money, would you redeem something from Mr Goodman the pawnbroker for me?’ She handed him the pawn ticket and twelve pounds.
‘You have twelve pounds when we’re paying you ten shillings a week?’
‘Mr Goodman advanced me ten pounds when I pledged the engagement ring Mansel gave me. I thought I’d need that much to buy essentials and keep Harry and myself until I found a job, but as I was lucky enough to start working here the day I left the infirmary, I soon saved enough to replace what I spent.’
Lloyd recalled what Victor and Joey had said about the woman who had looked after Harry and her claim that Harry wasn’t the only bastard fathered by Mansel James. ‘You want the ring back.’
‘Mr Goodman told me it was worth a great deal more than he advanced me.’
‘Then why not sell it?’
‘Mr Goodman said there is no call for expensive rings in Pontypridd and he couldn’t make me a realistic offer. I know it probably sounds ridiculous but I have ambitions, not for me, but for Harry. And I hope that if I take the ring somewhere like Cardiff or even London, I might be able to raise enough to send him to a good school and possibly university when he is older.’
‘Harry’s a bright boy and your ambitions for him aren’t ridiculous, but aren’t you afraid Mr Goodman will tell people that you have redeemed the ring.’
‘No. He was a friend of my father and he promised he wouldn’t tell anyone he’d seen me. He even gave me my coat and valise, which my husband had pawned, and wouldn’t take any money for them. H
e said he had made enough profit from my husband selling my things as it was. Will you get the ring for me?’
‘Yes.’ He pocketed the notes. ‘We’d better find that crib before the icing sets rock hard on the cake.’
Chapter Seventeen
‘Are you absolutely certain that you want me to liquidise your shares in the Collieries Company, Mr Evans?’ Mr Richards enquired tactfully. ‘The shares have accrued in value and are likely to go on doing so. A young man in your position –’
‘A young man in my position, Mr Richards, cannot continue to take dividends from a Collieries Company that is hell-bent on forcing men to work in filthy and dangerous conditions for less wages than they earned a year ago.’
Mr Richards coughed discreetly. ‘Mr Watkin Jones told me more than once that your political beliefs will be the death of you.’
‘If they are, Mr Richards, at least I’ll die with my integrity intact.’
‘If you intend to invest the money elsewhere, I may be able to help you.’
‘It’s already earmarked, Mr Richards.’
‘In that case, I will forward you a cheque as soon as I have sold your shares.’
‘No hurry, Mr Richards, sell any time you see fit, so long as it is within the next couple of months.’ Lloyd left his chair. ‘If you’ll excuse me, I have errands to run.’
‘Christmas shopping, Mr Evans?’ Mr Richards walked out from behind his desk and shook Lloyd’s hand. ‘May I extend the compliments of the season to you and your family.’
‘And I to you, Mr Richards,’ Lloyd replied, aware that the solicitor was a bachelor with no living relatives.
‘Mr Evans?’ Mr Richards’s clerk called him back into the outer office, as Lloyd was leaving the building. ‘You have left a parcel.’
‘It isn’t mine.’ Lloyd shrugged on his overcoat and placed his hat on his head.
Beggars and Choosers Page 29
