Tiger Bay Blues

by Catrin Collier

‘Because Mother is looking forward to seeing all her old things again. This vicarage is similar to the one I grew up in. With Mrs Mack’s help, I managed to place her furniture and ornaments more or less just as they were in Mumbles.’

  ‘But this isn’t the vicarage in Mumbles, Peter.’ Edyth felt as though she and Peter were speaking different languages. ‘This is our home, Peter. Yours and mine. People have been kind enough to give us beautiful wedding presents –’

  ‘They have,’ he interposed sharply. ‘Mother gave us every single possession she owns. The entire contents of her house.’

  ‘Exactly, Peter – her house. This is ours.’

  ‘Hotpot.’ Mrs Mack barged in without knocking. There was a jubilant look on her face, and Edyth knew she had been listening at the keyhole again.

  ‘Would it hurt you so much to leave the silver on display and the china and cutlery in the sideboard until Mother arrives? That way the two of you can discuss where you want everything to go. After all, this is now home to you both.’ Peter’s suggestion sounded so rational that Edyth felt as though she was being unreasonable.

  Deciding to employ the same tactics on him that he used on her, Edyth didn’t answer him. She took the tray that held the tureen from Mrs Mack, set it on the table and handed the housekeeper the barely touched soup bowls in return.

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Mack, I’ll serve.’ She spooned out a portion and handed it to Peter. The hotpot looked even worse than the leek and potato soup, but she persevered, filling her own plate as well as Peter’s, the whole time conscious of Mrs Mack standing, bowls in hand, behind her chair, watching every move she made. ‘That will be all, Mrs Mack, you may return to the kitchen.’

  Mrs Mack left and closed the door. Edyth replaced the serving spoon in the tureen, glanced at Peter, then, without warning, whirled around and opened the door. Mrs Mack was standing in the hall, staring intently at a cobweb on the ceiling.

  ‘That ceiling could do with a brush-down,’ she slurred.

  ‘The entire hall could with a damned good scrub,’ Edyth said angrily.

  ‘Edyth!’ Peter reprimanded.

  ‘I am sorry I swore, Peter. Mrs Mack, please don’t ever let me catch you listening outside a door in this house again. If you should –’

  ‘You’ll what?’ Mrs Mack stared coolly back at her.

  ‘I’ll reconsider your position in this house.’ Edyth looked pointedly at Mrs Mack’s apron. The outline of the bottle could be clearly seen in the pocket.

  Mrs Mack leaned forward and looked around the corner at Peter. ‘I’d like to hear what the Reverend Slater has to say about that.’

  ‘You’re slurring, Mrs Mack,’ Edyth said.

  ‘Am I, Mrs Slater?’ Mrs Mack waited a full insolent minute before walking off down the passage. Edyth didn’t return to her seat until she had seen the housekeeper close the kitchen door.

  ‘Did you hear what she said to me, Peter?’

  ‘You knew she was listening at the door?’ The colour had drained from Peter’s face.

  ‘Yes,’ she returned to her chair. ‘Micah Holsten and I caught her doing the exact same thing when he called this afternoon. She even had the gall to open the door and interrupt us. Now will you allow me to sack her?’

  ‘Let’s eat. I have an extremely busy day tomorrow – as do you.’

  Edyth clenched her fists. She had to find a way to break through Peter’s maddening silences and point-blank refusal to discuss anything important – or intimate. She suspected that if she didn’t succeed, their marriage was doomed to failure.

  She picked up her knife and fork and poked at the hotpot. ‘This is even worse than the soup. I doubt there was any meat on these mutton bones when Mrs Mack bought them. They’re not fit for dogs, let alone humans.’ She speared an oyster with her fork and lifted it to her nose. ‘The oysters are off, the mushrooms shrivelled … don’t touch it, Peter.’ She left her chair and piled her plate and Peter’s on the tray that held the tureen.

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  If she hadn’t known better, she would have said that he looked afraid. ‘There has to be a fish and chip shop around here somewhere and, as it’s a Saturday night, it’s bound to be open until late. I’ll send Judy to get some.’

  ‘For all of us?’ Peter asked.

  ‘No, not for all of us,’ Edyth opened the door and picked up the tray ready to carry it out. ‘Just for Judy, you and myself. Mrs Mack can eat her hotpot.’

  Judy returned to the kitchen after taking Peter’s fish and chips to him in his study and saw that Edyth had laid two place settings of cork mats, knives and forks on the table.

  ‘Sit down, Judy, I have plates warming on the rack on the range. We can eat right away.’

  ‘I can’t eat with you, Mrs Slater. Not even in the kitchen, it’s not right.’

  ‘Rubbish, Judy, the old mistress and maid relationship went out with Noah’s Ark.’ Edyth unwrapped the two remaining newspaper-wrapped parcels of the three Judy had brought from the fish shop and set them on the plates.

  Edyth had elected to eat with Judy in the kitchen because Peter had insisted on being served his fish and chips in his study. He had told her that he liked to go to bed early on Saturdays and still needed to revise his sermon for the morning, something he had intended to do after dinner – if she hadn’t refused to allow him to eat it – which suggested that he blamed her for their spoiled meal, not Mrs Mack. But she suspected that his main reason for retreating to his study was to avoid listening to her criticism of their housekeeper.

  Fortunately for her and Judy, Mrs Mack had also refused to listen to complaints about the hotpot and, after announcing that she had worked quite enough hours for one day, swept up the stairs.

  ‘These fish and chips look really excellent, Judy.’ Edyth set the cruet and vinegar bottle on the table and sat down to eat.

  ‘Best on the Bay, from the Sophia Street shop,’ Judy said with a rare smile. She moved her place setting to a chair lower down the table, further away from Edyth’s.

  ‘We may as well sit opposite one another so we can talk.’ Edyth put the teapot on the table, filled two glasses with water from the jug and set them next to the cups and saucers she had laid while Judy was out.

  ‘What would you like me to do tomorrow, Mrs Slater?’ Judy asked shyly.

  ‘Apart from the essentials that have to be done every day – cleaning out the fire grates and laying the fires, dusting the hearths and mantelpieces, filling the coal and stick scuttles, cleaning the bathroom and kitchen, and laying the table – nothing.’

  ‘Nothing?’ Judy repeated in astonishment.

  ‘Well, not exactly nothing, because I would like fires laid and lit in every single room, including all the attics. This house feels so cold and damp I think it must be months, if not years, since it had a good airing. But just to warn you for the future, Reverend Slater doesn’t believe in anyone working on a Sunday. So, from now on, all the cooking and baking for Sunday will have to be done on a Saturday and our food heated up on the day. But we have to eat something tomorrow. I don’t know what. I checked the pantry again while you were out and found virtually nothing edible in it.’

  ‘Lunch won’t be a problem, that is, if you’re prepared to pay for it,’ Judy said cheerfully, finally cutting into her fish after Edyth had started eating hers. ‘I’ll take one of your saucepans down to Mrs Josefina’s in George Street. She makes the most delicious Spanish salt fish stew you’ve ever tasted and fills a pot for two shillings.’

  ‘She cooks for her neighbours?’ Edyth asked in surprise. To her knowledge no one did anything like that in Pontypridd.

  ‘She’s turned her house into a sort of café. The sailors know that whatever the time of day they can always get a meal in her back kitchen. And Mr Goldman, the Jewish baker, will be baking fresh bread and bagels in the morning. His Sunday is Saturday, if you know what I mean. If there’s a tin of salmon in the larder I can make bagels for breakfast. And I’ll buy a
loaf for you to eat with the stew.’

  ‘I didn’t see any salmon.’ Edyth wasn’t quite sure what bagels were, and the idea of eating them with tinned salmon for breakfast sounded positively exotic after the usual breakfast fare Mari served.

  ‘Then I’ll call in the corner shop run by Mr Mohammed when I go to the baker’s first thing and get one. That only leaves tea and supper.’

  ‘Judy, you’re a miracle-worker. Reverend Slater and I have been invited out to tea tomorrow but if the baker has something you fancy you can buy it for yourself, and for supper –’

  ‘I’ll find something in the Arab shop or the baker’s. Will a simple meal like cheese on toast or potted beef rolls do?’

  ‘Very nicely, I should think,’ Edyth said in relief. ‘First thing on Monday morning I’ll go shopping and you must come with me.’ She cut into the remaining half of her fish. The crisp golden batter concealed perfectly cooked, flaking white flesh. She’d had no idea how hungry she was until she’d started eating, but then, she’d spent more time talking than eating at her and Peter’s farewell lunch in her parents’ house.

  ‘What about the housework, Mrs Slater?’ Judy asked. ‘I won’t be able to do any if I go shopping with you on Monday.’

  ‘I haven’t even had time to start making the list of things that need doing in the house, Judy. But before I do anything else, I need to sort out a good grocer, greengrocer, butcher and baker, and as you’ve lived on the Bay, you’re the best person to advise me on that. It appears we already have a regular milkman, although I’d like the churn in the pantry to have a good scouring before it’s filled with fresh on Monday.’

  ‘I’ll do it tomorrow evening,’ Judy offered.

  ‘Don’t let Reverend Slater catch you.’ Edyth was ashamed of herself when she realised she was already planning to keep secrets from Peter.

  ‘I’ll go to early mass in the morning. That will leave me free to do some housework tomorrow evening when Reverend Slater is at Evensong.’

  ‘I remember your Uncle Jed saying at Bella’s wedding that your family are Catholic.’

  ‘That won’t be a problem, will it, Mrs Slater?’ Judy asked anxiously.

  ‘Not at all,’ Edyth reassured. ‘If I manage to organise regular deliveries of food, we can order in our goods every week and that will save time on shopping. When we come back on Monday, we’ll make a simple lunch and start on the hall. It’s the first place people see when they call here and I’m ashamed of the state of it.’

  ‘It is grubby,’ Judy agreed.

  ‘I’ll put an ironmonger on the list of places to visit. I’d better check the cleaning materials so I’ll know what to buy before we go.’ Edyth felt as though she were being crushed beneath the weight of tasks waiting to be done. But as there was nothing she could do about the house or the shopping until Monday morning, she cleared her mind of all practical considerations and thought of Judy.

  She was finding the vicarage strange and uncomfortable after life at home and her brief holiday in the hotel. Judy must be finding it doubly so, especially in the light of Mrs Mack’s hostility towards her.

  ‘Micah – Mr Holsten – tells me you have an audition lined up, Judy?’

  ‘I do.’ Judy sprinkled more vinegar on her chips. ‘For a part in the chorus of a touring musical, The Lady Does, at the beginning of next month. But Mr Holsten, Uncle Jed, and the rest of the band have more faith in my talent than I do. I don’t for one minute expect to get it.’

  ‘You sing beautifully, and I wouldn’t tell you did if you didn’t.’

  ‘So do a hundred other girls.’

  Edyth sensed that Judy meant ‘white girls’. ‘Mr Holsten told me you’d been turned down for a few jobs and why.’

  Judy shrugged. ‘The first dozen rejections were the worst. I’m used to it now.’

  ‘You shouldn’t have to get used to it,’ Edyth protested.

  Judy forked the last chip from her plate into her mouth. ‘Even if I wanted to, there’s nothing I can do about it, Mrs Slater. If make a fuss, I’ll never be given another audition, much less a job.’

  ‘You’re probably right, Judy, but injustice always makes me angry.’

  ‘So this is where you are hiding?’ Peter carried in his tray and looked disapprovingly from Edyth to Judy. ‘You didn’t eat in the dining room, Edyth?’

  She knew it was a reprimand not a question. ‘I cleared the table when Judy went to fetch the fish and chips. It didn’t seem worth laying it again just for myself.’ She took his tray from him.

  ‘I’m going to bed. You haven’t forgotten that you’re running the Sunday school tomorrow, Edyth?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I will look in on you about halfway through to check everything is all right. I won’t be able to stay, though. I promised to help the choirmaster audition new members in the vestry. He has a full programme scheduled for this winter. As well as the Christmas carol concerts, there’s the twelfth anniversary of Armistice Day. And there’s the inter-faith concerts you’ll be helping Micah organise.’ He went to the door. ‘You haven’t forgotten we’ve been invited to tea by the chairman of the church council and his wife?’

  ‘Mr Maldwyn and Mrs Eirlys Williams.’ Edyth had made a point of memorising the name of every member of the church council. ‘Should we take anything?’

  ‘A bunch of flowers, perhaps?’

  ‘We have no garden. Is there somewhere where I can buy flowers on a Sunday?’ she asked Judy.

  ‘One of the greengrocers usually has a few bunches.’

  Peter unbent enough to say, ‘Goodnight, Judy. Goodnight, Edyth.’ He didn’t add, ‘see you in the morning’, but Edyth felt that he was about to.

  Edyth stacked the dishes on the table. ‘You can go on up, too, Judy. You’re sleeping on your feet.’

  ‘I haven’t had a full night’s sleep since I moved in with Uncle Jed. His youngest two wake every hour on the hour.’

  ‘I had a baby brother who did that for six months. I used to threaten to put his cot on the roof. Go on,’ she said kindly to Judy, ‘go on up. I hope you’ll be warm enough in that attic.’

  ‘I will be. I’ve never had a fire in my bedroom before. It will be a real luxury.’

  ‘If Mrs Mack gives you any trouble, my bedroom door is directly opposite the bottom of the upper staircase.’

  ‘She hasn’t said a word to me since I arrived, just sniffed a lot whenever I’m around.’ Judy left her chair. ‘Are you sure about this, Mrs Slater? I could wash the dishes. It won’t take me a minute.’

  ‘Or me, Judy, Goodnight.’

  Judy went to the door, but she hesitated and turned back. ‘Thank you again for giving me this job, Mrs Slater. If you hadn’t, I would have had to leave the Bay. That’s if I’d found anything at all.’

  ‘I’ve a feeling it’s me who’s got the best end of the bargain, Judy. If I only had Mrs Mack to help me, I suspect that Reverend Slater and I would live in freezing cold squalor all winter. Sleep tight, see you in the morning.’

  After Judy went to bed, Edyth squeezed a last cup of tea out of the pot, sat and looked at the dishes. She had two pounds and some coins in her purse and nothing else besides, except her savings. Her father might be an MP, but unlike most Members of Parliament he had no private means. His expenses were met from the funds of the mining unions and, knowing how little most of the members had to live on, he never spent a penny more than he absolutely had to. Most of the cost of her family’s day-to-day living was met by the salary her mother was paid for working in Gwilym James.

  Lloyd Evans had been a miner himself before management had singled him out and sent him to study engineering in one of the ‘mining schools’ that had been set up in the South Wales Valleys; in his case, Treforest. His father had been a miner in the days when the work had still been well-paid and Billy Evans had invested every spare penny of his own and his sons’ money in houses that they had rented out. They had used the rents to buy even more houses and, when Bill
y died, the houses had been divided between Lloyd and his brothers. Victor’s share had bought him his farm, Joey still had some of his properties, although he had sold a few when he had purchased the house he lived in with his family in Pontypridd, and Lloyd had sold all of his and used the proceeds to buy the family home.

  Harry might have inherited wealth – or rather would in five years when he reached his thirtieth birthday and his trust was dissolved – but her parents had been careful not to touch it. And her own savings were an accumulation of all her birthday and Christmas money, the percentage her parents had insisted she set aside from her weekly pocket money, and the money she had earned in the school holidays by cleaning the stockrooms and working in the staff canteen of Gwilym James.

  All her parents had promised her and her sisters was an education that would enable them to earn a living that would hopefully keep them in the style in which they had been brought up. If she and Peter really were desperately short of money, and she couldn’t see how they could be because she was sure that Peter would be paid at least as much as the Reverend Price – and the Prices could afford to employ a tweenie – then she would have no choice other than to dip into her savings.

  She had enough money to pay Judy’s wages for a couple of years, but there was still Mrs Mack. The woman was not only unfit for her job, she was ill-mannered and rude. Why wouldn’t Peter get rid of her?

  With thoughts whirling senselessly and fruitlessly around her head, she finished her tea, left the table, ran a sink of hot water, washed their plates, knives and forks, and wiped down the work surfaces. Her temper flared again when she saw the dirt trapped in practically every dark corner. It was a disgrace, especially when she considered how short a time had elapsed since the renovations, and she wondered if Mrs Mack did anything besides sit next to the warm range, nursing her ‘medicine bottle’.

  She was exhausted when she finished. She left the kitchen and checked that all the fires had been banked down for the night, and the fireguards hooked in front of the grates in the downstairs rooms before going upstairs.

  The door to Peter’s single front bedroom was closed. She went to the bathroom, washed, dressed in her negligée set and walked along the landing. She tapped Peter’s door softly. When there was no reply she turned the handle. Then she knew for certain that he’d locked himself in – and her out.