Valley in Bloom

by Valley in Bloom (retail) (epub)

  ‘Well, I’d better get off back ’ome to see to George’s casserole. I likes to ’ave ’is dinner ready for ’im this cold weather.’

  Amy watched Nelly wander across the road and through the main road towards the lane, coat reaching her ankles, the large long-legged dogs at the full extent of their leads so it looked as if they were towing her. ‘There are times when I envy you, Nelly Luke – I mean Masters,’ Amy whispered. Nelly had been Nelly Luke for so long everyone forgot that since she had married George, who had once travelled the roads as a tramp, she was now Mrs Masters. Nelly had seemed not to mind about people using the wrong name, but lately she had taken to reminding everyone of her proper title. Proud, she is, to be George’s wife. And why not? Amy thought. Everyone needs to be important to someone, even the independent Nelly.

  * * *

  Opposite the school in a building similar to Amy’s shop-cum-post-office was the village fish and chip shop. It was run by Bethan Toogood. Bethan was the shy unmarried daughter of Milly and Tommy Toogood who lived in the flat above the shop with Bethan’s son, Arthur Toogood. Bethan was a very retiring young woman who seemed to have little or no social life, hardly ever leaving the shop and the bed-sit behind it, apart from necessary shopping trips into Llan Gwyn, the nearest town. She had a habit of walking with her eyes studying the ground when she did venture outside her home and rarely, if ever, instigated a conversation, restricting her speech to the briefest of replies to any remarks she received.

  On the morning following Nelly’s discussion with Mrs Norwood Bennet-Hughes, Bethan was in the fish and chip shop washing down the surfaces and polishing the chrome covers of the fish fryer. Behind the shop she could hear water running and the occasional clanking of buckets. Hilda Evans was preparing the potatoes ready for the lunchtime trade. Bethan hadn’t greeted Hilda when she arrived for work, but that was not unusual. Hilda Evans, who lived a few doors away, came in through the back gate and began her chores without the need for any instruction. Hilda had been doing the job for years, unaware that while she stood in running water and handled the cold potatoes and heaved about the heavy sacks, Bethan was entertaining Griff, her wayward husband.

  Now Griff was in prison Bethan felt uneasy, unable to face Griff’s wife, afraid that the secret that had been kept from Hilda for years, would somehow be broken now the man was in the hands of the police. He’s confessed, people were saying in hushed tones, and Bethan feared that the revelation that she and Griff were lovers was certain to be announced with the rest. What would she say once Hilda knew? How would the woman react? Bethan rubbed with extra energy on the chrome and saw her frightened face in the curved mirror-like surface and shivered. She wanted to run away and hide.

  Outside the icy conditions seemed to worry Hilda less than usual. Her movements were more hurried and although her hands were blue with the cold, and the back of her legs above the turned down wellingtons were marked with chilblains, there was a glow to her face that revealed an inner fire. Her dark eyes sparked with anger, her dark hair, recently released from metal ‘Dinkie’ curlers danced about her scowling face like puppets in the hands of a drunken puppet-master. The peeled potatoes were picked up and thrust into the chipping machine, the handle pulled in a rhythmical one-two-one-two movement and Hilda’s lips chanted with it all the insults she could remember and invent. In his prison cell Griff’s ears should have been burning to cinders.

  ‘Cheating, lying, underhand, pig-face; cheating, lying, underhand, pig-face; cheating…’ At last she stopped. She pushed the white enamel bucket, now full of chipped potatoes, to one side with her Wellington and pulled another one into place below the chipping machine. She looked around her and her face relaxed from anger into sorrow. All the money Griff had cheated and stolen, yet this was what she would have to do until she was too old to lift the sacks, or too stiff to manage the cold water. If he’d only shared some of his thieving with her she might have felt at least some sympathy for him. But to allow her to work like this while all the time he was filling his pockets, it was too much for her to forgive that painfully cold morning. ‘Cheating, lying, underhand pig-face. PIG FACE!’ she shouted. And bending down she pulled off a Wellington and sent it winging down the yard and over the wall into the lane. It was closely followed by the other and, wearing only socks on her feet, she stomped towards the gate.

  ‘’Ere, what’s going on, flyin’ boots and at this time of a morning?’ Nelly demanded as first one then the other sailed over the wall to land near her. Hands on hips, she waited as the gate opened and a scowling Hilda stormed out.

  ‘I’m going to see that pig-face of a husband. I’ll give him “Forgive me, pet and we’ll make a fresh start when I come out”! I’ll never forgive him. Never.’

  ‘Come on, Hilda, you’ll get over it. It’s only yer pride what’s hurt, and now you know, you can face it and start over again. I don’t say you shouldn’t make ’im suffer a bit first, mind. But you’ll get over it.’

  It was several weeks since the police had called to talk to Griff, and Hilda had appeared to carry on in the same way as always. So Nelly guessed, wrongly, from the sudden outrage that Hilda had finally been told about Griff and Bethan.

  ‘Forgive him? He’s cheated on me all this time, he’s cheated on me,’ Hilda said, referring to the money Griff had made and not shared.

  ‘A bit on the side ain’t that unusual, Hilda, and your Griff’s still an attractive bloke even if ’is ’air is a bit on the greasy side and his moustache is sometimes a bit uneven because of the drink makin’ ’is ’and shake!’

  ‘A bit on the side?’ Hilda stopped and glared at Nelly.

  ‘Well, whatever you wants to call it. ’E’s never left you, ’as ’e, and with your Pete sixteen and working he could ’ave. He loves yer really, don’t doubt it.’

  ‘You think so?’ Hilda continued to stare at Nelly, who failed to see the warning signs. ‘And what about her…?’

  ‘Bethan ain’t no catch, got no go in her. Griff ain’t daft, Hilda, he knows you’re the one ’e needs.’

  ‘Bethan? Bethan Toogood?’ Hilda’s jaw dropped and her ill-fitting teeth fell with it.

  ‘Oh Gawd.’ Too late Nelly realised her surmising had been wrong. Hilda hadn’t known about Griff and his lady love at all. She stared at the shocked expression on Hilda’s unattractive face and wished the words could be brought back and swallowed. She didn’t know what to say yet she couldn’t stand there in the freezing cold of the early morning and not at least try to offer some comfort. ‘Get yerself ’ome and find some slippers fer yer poor frozen feet, come on, we’ll come with yer, me an’ the dogs. Make us a cup of tea why don’t yer?’ Slowly, still dazed, Hilda allowed herself to be led home and pushed into an armchair.

  ‘How long, Nelly?’ Hilda asked at last. ‘How long have they been carrying on?’

  ‘Couldn’t say, and anyway, who’s to say they were… ‘carrying on’? Gossip that’s what it is and no evidence of anything other than a bit of kindly ’elp from a neighbour. Just helping Bethan, that’s probably what your Griff was doin’, her not ’avin’ a man to ’elp except her dad and ’im about as much use as a swarm of wasps on a summer picnic!’

  Nelly poured tea and gave Hilda a cup. Hilda sipped it, saying little as Nelly chattered on, first about Griff and his innocent kindnesses to Bethan, then about anything else that came into her mind. When Hilda spoke, Nelly thought she had heard none of it.

  ‘I’m going to see Griff, Nelly. But I don’t want him to know that I’ve been told about him and Bethan.’

  ‘Him and Bethan!’ Nelly said derisively. ‘I’ve probably got it all wrong.’ Again, Hilda wasn’t listening.

  ‘I don’t want him to know. Promise you won’t let on you’ve told me?’

  ‘There’s probably nothing to be told, nothing more than malicious rumours.’

  ‘Promise?’

  Nelly knew when she was beaten. She nodded and poured them another cup of tea.

  After Ne
lly had gone Hilda sat for the rest of the day thinking of what she should do and the best way of setting about it. There were several knocks on her door but she didn’t answer them, she hardly reacted to the sometimes loud and impatient demands, she just sat and slowly incubated her plan.

  When her son, Pete, came home for his tea she was still sitting there, but the scowl and the shock had lifted. She was smiling and in a good humour. Later she went up the dark slippery lane to see Nelly. She found her sitting in the armchair listening to the radio, with George opposite her on the couch, and the sight made her feel deprived, lonely and even more determined.

  ‘I’m going in to see Griff, will you come with me, not to visit, just for company on the ride? It’s Swansea, and we could perhaps go to the pictures after? Doris Day’s at the Albert Hall. Lucky Me, with Phil Silvers – he’s a laugh.’

  Nelly would have preferred to go with George or Amy, but she agreed, still feeling ashamed of the way she had let out the long-standing secret.

  ‘Yes, why not. Perhaps we can look in the market for some Christmas presents, eh? And,’ she said excitedly, ‘p’raps, while I’m waitin’ for yer, I’ll ’ave a ride on the Mumbles train. Perishin’ cold it’ll be, that close to the sea, but fun all the same, eh?’

  ‘Everything is fun where you’re involved, Nelly Luke,’ Hilda sighed. ‘Got a gift for it you have and no mistake.’

  ‘Masters, me name is Masters,’ Nelly corrected, but she sighed as once again Hilda wasn’t listening.

  Chapter Two

  The term approaching Christmas was always a busy one for Delina Honeyman. Besides the normal school work that had to go on whatever the extra calls on her time, there were the decorations and cards the children made, and the carol concert for which she was responsible.

  On Monday mornings of late she was disorientated after a weekend in which she had taken on her other role; that of temporary mother to her younger brothers, Daniel, eighteen, and David, thirteen, and housekeeper for her father, Victor. Since her mother’s sudden and unexpected death, her life had become filled with confusing and unwanted demands and she was beginning to feel resentment.

  She was normally a calm, capable twenty-two-year-old woman, but having to deal with the grief and the day-to-day needs of a family had jerked her out of her regulated life in a way she disliked. Her father and her brothers were already beginning to accept her as a substitute for her mother. It wouldn’t do. It really wouldn’t do.

  She walked down Hywel Rise, a smartly dressed young woman, blonde hair in a page-boy style with not a hair out of place, neat shoes and a slim-fitting suit over which hung a mauve plastic mac in case the cold mist precipitated into rain. She glanced up and saw Dawn Simmons waiting for her. Dawn had also lost her mother and was being cared for by her father who, Delina thought with an uneasy feeling of shared guilt, also found it hard to cope – not with resentment but with an inability to understand and deal with a rather wayward ten year old.

  Tad Simmons, she had to admit, showed no sign of resentment towards his small daughter while in her heart she, Delina Honeyman, wanted to refuse the position of loco parentis. Why, she sighed, did it spring automatically to people’s minds that the daughter should accept responsibility when the mother was lost? For Tad, she thought, defiance showing in her remarkably blue eyes, it was different. It was a wife he had lost and a daughter he was caring for. But still the guilt remained. She ought not to mind, but she did.

  ‘Mor-ning-Miss-Hon-ey-man,’ Dawn chanted in the way all her pupils said her name, whether in chorus or alone.

  Delina was so prickly she almost chanted back, but didn’t, ‘Good morning, Dawn. Have you got your homework?’ she asked briskly, increasing her pace and making the girl hurry. She was leaving behind Delina Honeyman, aggrieved daughter of Victor and older sister of David and Daniel, and becoming Miss Honeyman, teacher of small children.

  During the previous summer Dawn Simmons had become a problem to the neighbourhood by stealing small items, mostly to throw away, and it was thanks to the kindly villagers that she had not ended up in the hands of the police or been taken into care. Delina had offered to take responsibility for the child and watch her after school hours so Tad could recommence the studies he had been forced to abandon during the war. He was an engineer and because of the death of his wife he had found part-time work in a factory, sweeping up, so he could look after Dawn. His efforts had not been a great success and although he was a prickly and ill-tempered man, Delina had persuaded him to allow her to help.

  At the bottom of Sheepy Lane they waited on the main road for the bus, Dawn holding Delina’s hand and chatting cheerfully about the doll her father was going to buy her for Christmas. Delina remained silent, still wondering how she could either cope with the situation that had befallen her or escape from it without burdening herself with equally destructive guilt.

  Almost opposite the bus stop was Amy’s shop. Delina looked across and saw the curtains in the flat above move. Idly she wondered if it was Mavis Powell preparing to leave the flat and go down to help Amy in the shop. She saw a hand wave, but she didn’t respond. The Powells weren’t her favourite people, particularly their daughter, Sheila.

  * * *

  After the day’s activities had ended, Delina returned home, but Dawn didn’t go to the house on Hywel Rise where she lived with her father, but continued on to Delina’s home. Tad wouldn’t be home until after nine o’clock when his evening class finished, and until then Dawn was the responsibility of Delina. As she opened the front door Delina gave a sigh. There were football boots still caked with mud on the stairs and an equally dirty shirt hung carelessly over the banisters where it had been thrown by David. With an even louder sigh, Delina put down her brief-case overflowing with books for marking, and picked up the abandoned clothing.

  ‘David,’ she called softly, her voice revealing none of her irritation. ‘I’d like you to take these outside and scrape off the worst of the mud, then wash them. You can deal with the dubbing tomorrow.’

  ‘I’m tired, Del. I’ll do it in the morning.’

  ‘Now, David. Or, if you prefer, I’ll do them while you see to the vegetables and start cooking the meal.’

  David came out of the living room, a dark and sombre room where heavy maroon curtains were drawn against the chill of the evening and only a small lamp glowed. He looked sulky and he didn’t speak to Dawn as he slouched past them heading for the kitchen.

  ‘David,’ Delina said again, softly and without anger. She handed him the boots which he took from her with a scowl.

  ‘Hello, David,’ Dawn said. ‘Shall I help?’

  ‘No, I’ll do it or Del will find me something else to do.’

  Delina watched as David’s fair head bent about his task just outside the back door in the light from the porch. He had always been so polite, mannerly and pleasant, but now he seemed to be in a constant bad mood. The inhibiting guilt again swept over her as she realised that for him more than herself the loss of a mother was devastating. She turned away and determinedly smiled at her young charge.

  ‘Now, Dawn, would you like to help me? What about setting the table. You know where everything is.’

  ‘Am I having tea with you tonight?’ Dawn asked.

  ‘Of course. It’s one of the nights for your father’s class. I’ll take you home about eight and wait ’til he comes in, as always.’

  ‘Thank you, Miss.’

  Something will have to be done Delina thought sadly. As things were at present no one in the house was happy. If her father were to marry Amy at least there would be some improvement although, she decided, looking at the defiance in the tilt of David’s chin, Amy wouldn’t have it easy!

  At seven-thirty, having washed up after a silent meal and helped Dawn with her homework, she walked the little girl home. Even Dawn had become subdued by the atmosphere in the house she realised, remembering the lively, naughty and difficult child she had promised to help control. Perhaps it comes fr
om me she thought with a stab of alarm. Perhaps my discontent is reflecting on everyone else. In a vain attempt to change things she took hold of Dawn’s hand and ran with her the last few yards to arrive breathless at her front door.

  ‘In you go, Dawn, you have your key,’ she said, then followed her into the plain hallway and towards the kitchen, where she prepared a tray of tea and a slice of cake ready for Tad’s return.

  ‘Shall we listen to the radio, Miss?’ Dawn asked.

  ‘If you wish, just for a little while, but I’ll have to get on with this.’ Delina patted the bag of books she had brought to mark. Dawn turned on the radio and sat silently listening to the last few minutes of Wilfred Pickles’ programme Have A Go. But she wasn’t concentrating, she was watching Delina and shifting and squirming in her chair.

  Though her attention was on the book she was marking Delina sensed Dawn’s need to speak to her and, putting the book aside, she looked at the girl and smiled encouragingly. ‘What is it?’ she asked in her gentle way.

  ‘How did you know there was something?’ Dawn demanded. ‘How do you know what’s happening without looking up?’

  Delina laughed and shook her head, her hair swaying then falling back into its neat style.

  ‘It’s about Christmas, Miss,’ Dawn said when it was clear Delina wasn’t going to explain. ‘What will we do? I mean, will Dad cook our dinner? And can I have a tree? And will you help me put up some chains to decorate the room?’

  ‘If I can answer the last first,’ Delina said, smiling wider at the anxiety shown in the rapidly fired questions. ‘Yes, I think I would enjoy helping you make some paper chains and perhaps we’ll come home early one day in a few weeks and make a start so they’re ready to hang a week or so before Christmas.’

  ‘Thank you Miss.’

  ‘As for what will be happening at Christmas, well, that isn’t up to me. Your father will decide what you and he will be doing. But I’m sure he’ll make Christmas Day very special.’