Winners and Losers

by Catrin Collier

  ‘Those women ought to be shot. All three of them,’ Mark Hardy growled from the doorway of his hut where he wasted most of his days, sitting staring into space. ‘Standing there fat, healthy and dressed to the nines, flaunting themselves while others starve.’

  ‘I’m the last person to put in a good word for Megan Williams or Betty Morgan. Any woman who earns her bread by working for the enemy gets nothing but contempt from me.’ Alun spat on the pavement to emphasize his disgust. ‘But whatever else you want to say about Sali Evans, the Evanses are living off strike pay, same as the rest of us.’

  ‘Not the same as the rest of us at all,’ Mark Hardy snarled viciously. ‘They get four lots of pay and they’ve a garden big enough to keep chickens and grow vegetables in. They’re not much worse off than when they were in work.’

  ‘Fair’s fair. Victor Evans gives away what he can to the soup kitchen. And before he was dragged into court and the police started watching him too closely for him to risk working in the drifts, he often used to slip the missus the odd bucket of coal.’ Alun spoke up in Victor’s defence.

  ‘Maybe a couple of buckets of nicked coal and a handful of vegetables to the soup kitchen makes him all right in your book but not mine.’ Mark scowled. ‘Just look at those three.’ He focused on Sali, Megan and Betty again. ‘They may as well stand there and shout, “We’re all right and to hell with the rest of the world.”’

  ‘Like us, Mark, they’re just trying to survive,’ one of the other miners pointed out mildly.

  ‘Survive! Victor Evans’ girl has a job where she can eat herself silly skivvying for bloody coppers and it shows. Tell me truthfully, have you seen any other women in this town lately with curves like her and Lloyd Evans’ wife? And Betty Morgan’s been looking healthier since she started working in Palmer’s lodging house. Bloody Ned Morgan ...’

  ‘No speaking ill of the dead,’ Alun warned. He looked closely at Mark. If he hadn’t known any better he would have said he was drunk. But Mark only got a couple of shillings a week from the distress fund and the half a jug of soup and few slices of bread a day that Father Kelly sent over from the soup kitchen because Mark was too proud to eat in the hall.

  ‘Ned, Billy and Lloyd Evans started this strike -’

  ‘With our backing,’ Luke reminded. ‘We had a free and democratic vote, remember?’

  ‘No, I bloody well don’t.’

  ‘You were told about it. Everyone in the pit was.’ Arguments had become Luke’s lifeblood since the strike had started, the one occupation open to him that actually taxed his brain.

  ‘I never voted to strike.’

  ‘That’s democracy for you, Mark,’ Alun said calmly. ‘The majority not the minority get their way.’

  ‘And did the men who voted for the strike know that it was going to mean women and children starving to death?’ Mark trembled with suppressed emotion.

  One or two of the men exchanged embarrassed glances and drifted away from the group. Everyone felt intensely sorry for Mark and what had happened to his wife and children, but that hadn’t stopped them from apportioning some of the blame for their deaths on his pride and stubborn refusal to ask for help before it was too late.

  ‘Deserve to be shot, the bloody lot of them,’ Mark muttered. ‘All the Evanses, and their women and Betty Morgan, deserve to be shot and if there was a God that’s what he’d do, shoot the lot of them. But then perhaps shooting’s too quick ...’

  ‘Mark, man, you’re upset, you don’t know what you’re saying.’ Luke walked towards him.

  ‘You stay away from me, Luke Thomas. You’re as bad as the rest of them. Deserve to be shot ...’ Mark went into his hut and banged the door so hard the remaining men standing around Alun’s house thought it would fall off its hinges.

  ‘Silly sod’s gone off his rocker,’ Luke declared.

  ‘Can you blame him?’ Alun asked. ‘Wife and two kids dead from starvation, all his other kids in the workhouse and, as he hasn’t the means to keep them, there’s no prospect of him getting them out. When he went up there yesterday to try to see them he discovered the oldest girl had been sent into service. They wouldn’t even tell him where. Said she had a better chance of a new life if she made a clean break from her old one.’

  ‘That’s hard,’ Luke commiserated.

  ‘It is. She’s only eleven.’ Alun glanced at Megan again. She lifted her skirt as she stepped around a steaming pile of horse manure behind the brewery cart. Her shapely ankle and slim leg brought his wife’s sagging body and thinning hair to mind.

  ‘You looking at what I’m looking at?’ Luke asked.

  ‘Just can’t take your eyes off them, can you?’ Alun said.

  ‘Some men are born lucky, and I’d say none are luckier than Lloyd and Victor Evans. Just the sight of those two women is enough to make me want to follow them home and forget my missus.’

  ‘Careful I don’t tell her that,’ Alun laughed.

  ‘Tell who what?’ Beryl demanded, leaving the house.

  ‘Just men’s talk, my darling,’ Alun answered flippantly.

  ‘You can go in there,’ Beryl pointed into the house, ‘and look after the twins while I go down to Rodney’s to see how much food ten bob can buy this week.’

  Sali and Megan picked up Harry from school, and walked towards the town centre and Mrs Palmer’s lodging house. After leaving Megan at the back door, Sali carried on to the soup kitchen where Father Kelly was telling bad jokes and being more determinedly cheerful than usual, in an ineffectual attempt to make everyone forget what was going on outside the Ely Colliery in Penygraig. She was glad when their first customers came in and she, Father Kelly and their helpers were kept too busy serving food to make any extraneous conversation.

  After Father Kelly saw the last people out of the hall at seven o’clock, he closed the doors, drew Sali aside and handed her the keys.

  ‘You want me to lock up for you?’

  ‘If you’d be so kind.’ He picked up his hat.

  ‘You’re going to Penygraig?’

  ‘Someone has to mediate between the hotheads. From what I’ve seen, there are men on both sides determined to get stupider and more pig-headed with every passing day. Now don’t you go trying to clear everything up here, in your condition, it can wait until morning.’

  ‘Looks like Mrs Gallivan and Mrs O’Casey have everything in hand.’ Sali drew his attention to their two hardest working volunteers.

  ‘They’re both fine charitable women and God loves them for it. I’ll see you here tomorrow afternoon, Sali, but only if it’s convenient for you.’

  Sali blanched at his inference that it might not be convenient. Every time there was fighting at a pithead, Lloyd, or one of his family, seemed to get injured. She looked at a picture of the Virgin Mary in the corner of the hall and uttered a wish, which became a prayer, that this time, all four men would escape without a scratch.

  She and Harry returned to an empty house at half past seven. Hoping that at least one of the men would return home in time to eat supper, she put a match to the fire, set the vegetable stew she had prepared earlier on to boil, and heated water to wash Harry. At half past eight Harry fell asleep on her lap, unable to stay awake even to hear her read him his favourite chapter of Treasure Island. She carried him up to bed, slipped him between the sheets, drew the curtains in his tiny bedroom, returned downstairs –and waited.

  She banked up the fire with small coal that smouldered more than burned, but it was enough to keep the stew warm. Setting Treasure Island aside, she went into the parlour and looked along the bookshelves for something to read. Knowing she would find it almost impossible to concentrate, she picked out one of her favourites, Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities. Curling up on an easy chair, she opened it at the first page, but it was hopeless.

  She sat staring at the clock, watching the hands crawl round from nine to ten to eleven o’clock. Unable to sit still a moment longer, she went to the front door and opened it. Betty Mor
gan was sitting on a kitchen chair she’d set in her open doorway. She was knitting but Sali noticed that her attention was focused on the street, not the fine white wool in her hands.

  ‘You worried?’ Betty asked.

  ‘Have you heard anything?’

  ‘Not since I met you on my way home from the lodging house this afternoon. But as I said to you then, they were sending as many police as they could to Penygraig. I tried telling the sergeants that a glimpse of a uniform is all that’s needed to drive a collier crazy these days, but neither of them would listen to me, no more than either side is prepared to listen to common sense. If you ask me, I think the whole world has gone mad.’

  Not wanting to think about what might be happening on the picket lines, Sali asked, ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’

  ‘I wouldn’t mind.’ Betty knew she was more likely to hear any news if she remained in her doorway, but she sensed that Sali was in need of company. Sticking her needles into the ball of wool, she left her chair, picked it up and carried it back down her passage. Closing her front door, she walked across the road into Sali’s kitchen.

  ‘The kettle will take another five minutes or so to boil, Betty,’ Sali apologized, ‘we haven’t the coal for a big fire.’

  ‘Daft, isn’t it?’ the older woman said. ‘Here we are, sitting on one of the biggest coalfields in the world and hardly anyone can afford to keep a fire in for more than an hour or two a day. And, when the men dig the outcrops on the mountains that are there for the taking, they get fines they can’t pay and are put into prison where they are given three meals a day while their families carry on starving and freezing.’

  ‘When you put it like that, I have to agree with you. The world is mad.’

  Betty saw the frown on Sali’s face. ‘Worrying about them isn’t going to do that baby you’re carrying any good. I’ve known Billy Evans for close on thirty years and those three boys of his since they had the first nappies put on them. They know how to watch out for themselves and each other.’

  ‘They haven’t been doing so well lately. Mr Evans hasn’t recovered from the train crash. Victor has a couple of cracked ribs from boxing, the last time the police arrested Lloyd they beat him, and Joey’s temper flares ...’

  ‘Lloyd and Victor will keep him out of trouble. Who’s there at this hour?’ Betty shouted at a knock on the front door.

  Quicker on her feet than Betty, Sali ran and opened it. ‘Constable Davies, is Lloyd or -’

  ‘No one is hurt, Mrs Evans.’ He removed his helmet and his ginger curls shone in the fading light. ‘Can I come in?’

  Sali opened the kitchen door wide, but although Huw Davies closed the front door behind him, he remained in the passage.

  ‘I can’t stay. The sergeant doesn’t know I’m here, and things still might turn ugly in town. There was trouble down the Ely colliery this afternoon. I’m sorry to have to tell you that your husband, father-in-law and brother-in-law have been arrested. The union solicitor has seen them and is doing all he can for them, but they’ll be kept in the cells in the station overnight. They should make bail after their cases have had a preliminary hearing in Porth magistrates’ court in the morning.’

  ‘This is becoming a regular occurrence,’ Sali said bitterly. ‘What’s the charge this time?’

  ‘Your husband and father-in-law have been charged with riotous assembling to disturb the public peace, your brother-in-law with assaulting a police officer,’ Huw divulged uneasily.

  ‘Which brother-in-law?’

  ‘Victor. Joey followed us to the station with a crowd of strikers after the arrests and he’s been there ever since so I guessed he hadn’t been home to tell you what’s been going on.’

  ‘It was good of you to call,’ Sali said contritely, realizing that Huw had risked a reprimand or worse from his sergeant to give her the news.

  ‘There’s over a hundred angry men outside the police station. I only hope we succeed in calming them down and moving them on before we have to arrest anyone else. The men on the picket line in Penygraig threw stones and injured a couple of constables from the Worcester force. There’s a lot of anger on both sides. I’d better be getting back before I’m missed.’ He opened the door.

  ‘Thank you, Constable Davies.’ Sali offered him her hand and he shook it.

  ‘I wish I’d brought better news, Mrs Evans.’

  ‘It was good of you to come.’

  Huw put on his helmet, straightened it and ran off down the street.

  Betty Morgan joined Sali on the doorstep. ‘Have you noticed the Welsh coppers are the only ones in Pandy who dare walk alone around the town. The English coppers don’t even go round in pairs any more, it’s threes and fours.’

  ‘I haven’t noticed, Betty, but now I come to think of it, you’re right.’ Sali looked at the old woman. ‘The kettle should have boiled. Do you still want that tea.’

  ‘Please.’ Betty laid her gnarled, calloused hand over Sali’s. ‘I can stay the night if you want me to.’

  ‘I won’t sleep,’ Sali warned.

  ‘My Ned might have gone but that doesn’t mean I’ve stopped caring about the strike and the men. We’ll sit up together.’

  ‘As it looks like we won’t be seeing our beds until morning, it’s good to have a warm night for it.’ Luke threw his head back and stared up at the night sky. A full moon and a million pinpricks of starlight shone down on him. The vastness made his head swim and he reached out and grabbed the nearest shoulder.

  ‘Watch who you’re mauling, Thomas.’ Joey brushed Luke’s arm aside.

  ‘Touchy tonight, aren’t we?’ Luke jibed.

  ‘Layoff him, Luke.’ Alun Richards leaned against the wall behind him. The lower end of Dunraven Street was outlined in ghostly blue-black shadows and the men around him, standing strained and silent, seemed to merge into the scene, casting a peculiar and dreamlike atmosphere.

  ‘It feels like we’ve been waiting here for bloody years not hours. Anyone got the time?’ Luke looked around. ‘Sorry, dull question. The only honest men in Pandy who can answer that are the pawnbrokers, seeing as they’ve got all our watches.’

  ‘It was gone midnight when I called in my house and that was hours ago,’ a muffled voice answered.

  Joey paced impatiently to the edge of the pavement. ‘If they’ve beaten my father or brothers the way they beat Lloyd last time ...’

  The door of the police station across the road opened. Bright yellow lamplight flooded out and a dozen constables marched out of the building. They stood on the steps for a moment before two figures broke away and crossed the road. Ignoring the officers walking towards them, Joey continued to watch the constables standing outside the station. They were holding batons and he suspected there were others inside preparing for a charge.

  ‘Get ready, boys,’ he muttered out of the side of his mouth.

  Sergeant Lamb was the last to leave the station. He stood, hands behind his back in the doorway, staring directly at Joey who remained in the front line of the colliers.

  ‘Joey?’ Gwyn Jenkins approached him, Huw Davies walking closely behind. ‘I’m sorry, son-’

  ‘I’m not your son,’ Joey snapped belligerently. He squared up to Gwyn.

  ‘I’ve just spoken to your father and brother -’

  ‘You beaten them up yet?’ Joey’s question prompted an angry murmur from the men behind him.

  ‘No one is going to touch a hair on their heads.’

  ‘It’s not their hair I’m worried about.’

  ‘They won’t be harmed,’ Gwyn assured him. ‘The local sergeant is on duty tonight and he’s looking after them. Look,’ Gwyn parried the angry glares of the men standing around Joey, ‘the last thing, Billy, Lloyd, Victor or any of us want is more trouble, or for any more colliers to get arrested.’

  ‘You can’t arrest the whole bloody lot of us.’

  ‘Isn’t one fine enough for you, Luke?’ Gwyn asked. ‘If any officer other than Huw or me hears you us
ing language like that, you’ll find yourself back in court for swearing.’

  ‘Please, have a bit of common sense,’ Huw pleaded, when he saw a collier pull a stick from his sleeve. ‘One glimpse of a weapon and the sergeant will roust a couple of hundred officers from their beds and order a baton charge.’

  ‘You have my word that Billy, Lloyd and Victor Evans are being well looked after,’ Gwyn reiterated. When the men facing him remained hostile and silent, he added, ‘You saw Geoffrey Francis leave the building. Didn’t he tell you they were fine?’

  ‘That was hours ago,’ Luke shouted. ‘Anything could have happened to them since then.’

  ‘The only thing that’s happened to them is they’ve been given a fish and chip supper,’ Gwyn retorted.

  ‘After you charged them and put them in a cell,’ Joey reminded.

  Gwyn and Huw waited for the chorus of catcalls, derogatory whistles and groans to subside.

  ‘What I’d like to know is why you’re not charging the whole damned lot of us,’ Alun Richards demanded.

  ‘We’d clog up the courts if we did that,’ Gwyn said patiently.

  ‘So, it’s easier to pick on our leaders than all of us?’ Luke taunted.

  ‘Victor isn’t a strike leader,’ Joey argued.

  ‘Victor has admitted that he tried to prevent a police officer from arresting your father, Joey,’ Gwyn said.

  ‘My father’s just come out of hospital, he’s a sick man -’

  The sergeant barked an order and the constables standing on the steps marched forward. Another dozen moved out of the station behind them, and another dozen and another dozen after that.