Paint on the Smiles
Read Paint on the Smiles Online
Authors: Grace Thompson
Grace Thompson
S
UMMER VISITORS WERE
beginning to come to the town, its beaches and shops and fairground a draw for families inland. The children gripping new, shiny tin buckets and spades heading for the beach seen only once a year, the youngest not quite sure what to expect, being given confusing descriptions by parents that made eyes shine with excitement.
Parents were already looking weary as they carried heavy cases and baskets, looking up addresses on pieces of paper as they searched for their rooms. Some had dogs on leads and a few carried birds in cages as well as the luggage.
Cecily and Ada had already been stopped twice by anxious fathers flagging down the car and asking for directions.
‘We’ll never get to the beach at this rate,’ Ada chuckled, driving around the corner and on to the road leading to the Pleasure Beach.
Cecily and Ada ran a shop selling green groceries and fresh fish and in recent summers had increased their business by serving the shops and tea stalls on the popular holiday destination. It was Wednesday and a half day. When the shop closed at one o’clock, they headed for the beach to visit customers, some of whom had become friends.
They parked the car then headed to find the green-painted stall to find Peter Marshall. He had seen them approaching and was pouring teas for them as they arrived. The sun had brought the crowds, locals as well as visitors, and Peter and his young assistant were kept busy. The sisters didn’t stay long. Promising to see him soon, they left to wander around to talk to other stall holders, take a few orders and leave lists of all they could supply.
As they were leaving, Ada saw a dark, angry-looking man watching them and guided her sister in a different direction. Danny Preston was the last person Cecily needed to see.
‘Cecily!’ Danny shouted. His voice was powerful but the noise of children laughing, people on the fairground rides screaming and the loudspeaker warning people to behave drowned his voice. Ada hurried Cecily away. Danny had caused enough trouble with his jealous, possessive, tainted love for Cecily.
Since their father had died and they had been able to run the shop as they chose, they had been helped by two friends. Waldo Watkins ran a large and successful grocery store on the main road; Bertie Richards was a successful businessman buying properties, some of which he rented, some he resold. Bertie and Beryl and Waldo and Melanie came every week to examine the accounts and order books to make sure everything was running smoothly.
The following evening the four of them were due to visit once the shops closed and Cecily’s daughter Myfanwy waited impatiently for them to arrive. She watched as her mother and aunt dragged the boxes of meal and seed in from the porch, squeezing past them and looking up the hill for the first glimpse of Edwin.
‘Uncle Bertie and Auntie Beryl will bring Edwin, won’t they?’ she asked.
‘Of course they will. They wouldn’t miss a chance of you two spending an hour together.’
‘Can we go into the stables and play on the swing?’
‘No, dear. It’s better that you stay away until the building work is finished.’
‘That means forever! Why don’t you ask Willie to get on with it?’
‘There are other things to spend our money on. It’s sound enough for the shop van and the car to be garaged there, so there’s no hurry.’ The stable had suffered a fire, which although not serious had left the walls soot covered and made it an unsuitable place to use.
When the five visitors had arrived and settled in the small room behind the shop, Myfanwy asked again, ‘Uncle Bertie, when will Mam repair the stable?’
‘No hurry, lovely girl. It isn’t needed now there are no more horses.’
‘But it’s a mess and I like to go there and play with the empty boxes, like I used to do when Grampa was here.’
‘Van,’ Ada said with a laugh, ‘that’s silly. It’s 1938 and you are fourteen years old! Grampa left us a long time ago.’
‘You do silly things sometimes. And I still miss Grampa, even if you don’t!’
Cecily glanced at her daughter’s expression and could see that another argument was brewing.
Ada gave a sigh. Everybody leaves us, she thought as Van left the room, banging the door behind her, Edwin following. ‘I don’t think our Van will stay once she’s old enough to move away.’
‘Of course she won’t leave. She’s difficult, I know, but she’ll grow out of it.’
Ada ignored the interruption. ‘Our Mam running away with the coal man, Dadda dying in an accident, Gareth frightened away from marrying you by his mam, and my Phil in prison for burglaries….’
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, cheer up,’ Cecily said with a laugh. ‘We’ve still got Van and lots of good friends, especially dear Waldo and Melanie and Bertie and Beryl.’
The men examined the accounts and the order book and nodded approval. ‘You are increasing your stock well,’ Bertie said, ‘but a lot of the things you hold are slow sellers. Are you sure you want to continue to sell these odd spices and things used only by one or two local cafes and boarding houses?’
Ada nodded. ‘We believe that if they ask and we can’t help them, they’ll go somewhere else and probably buy other things there too. So we try not to say no.’
Cecily added, ‘If it’s something we don’t have, we promise it for later that day and Willie, our wonderful stable boy, goes to get some. The time he spends isn’t wasted if it keeps a customer we might otherwise lose.’
The two men nodded approval.
‘About the stable,’ Bertie said as they were collecting their coats. ‘It might be a good idea to get the place repaired properly and perhaps use it for storage. The fire didn’t cause great damage – the shelves are gone and the floor between the stable and the loft above is gone but the rest is no worse than smoke-blackened wood.’
‘But we don’t need more storage. We have the back room next to the kitchen and that’s plenty.’
‘For the moment,’ Waldo added, looking seriously at Bertie.
‘We’re thinking that if there’s a war, you might be glad of extra space – perhaps bulk buying so you have a start if things get scarce.’
‘But there’s a risk of mice and rats if we store food, and also burglaries, if food gets scarce.’
Ada’s face stiffened with distress. ‘It’s all right, my Phil is in prison – he won’t be a danger.’
‘Oh, Ada, we weren’t talking about Phil! He’ll never do anything like that again.’
‘And Myfanwy has learnt her lesson about allowing strangers to sleep there,’ Cecily said hastily, to overcome the embarrassment.
Van had taken pity on two homeless people. They sang on the streets and had been thrown out of room after room. She had found them in the lane cuddled up together under a piece of tarpaulin surrounded by the bags and blankets that were all they owned. The skinny, crippled old man called Horse and his wife – named Honoria but simply called Wife – had to resort to sleeping in barns and even shop doorways, so Van had unlocked the stable door each night and allowed them to sleep there. One night, feeling confident that they wouldn’t be discovered, they lit a small fire, luxuriating in the glow and the warmth. Then, becoming more brave, they cooked some sausages on a small paraffin stove. Full, warm and sleepy, they dozed off and as they slept the stove was kicked over and set fire to the boxes and papers that were carelessly stored there.
Gareth Price-Jones, who had once been engaged to marry Cecily, had been out on a midnight stroll to avoid another confrontation with his difficult mother when he saw the smoke. He and Willie, the sisters’ delivery man, got the old couple out, shocked but unharmed, before the firemen arrived.
They spent a few days in hospital where they were cleaned up and fed, then a room had been found for them. Two weeks later they had vacated the room, scared of not earning enough to pay the rent, and were now back on the streets holding out a tin for coins.
Edwin and Van were sad that their idea of helping had ended so badly, wishing Horse and his wife hadn’t been discovered and had enjoyed the shelter for many months more. For Edwin the plan had been kindly meant but for Van it was the pleasure of outwitting her mother that gave the plan its appeal.
Since she had learned that her Auntie Cecily, was in fact her mother, her anger against Cecily hadn’t eased. She dreamed of a revenge that was at that moment vague, knowing that one day an idea would come and her mother would know she had been the instigator. Sitting in the kitchen playing with the two cats, she and Edwin moaned as usual when told it was time for the visitors to leave.
Goodbyes were said, promises to meet were arranged and the visitors departed.
It was Saturday evening and the shop was closed for the day. Cecily and Ada were scrubbing the counters and putting the rubbish ready for Willie to take away. The fresh fish that hadn’t sold they would cook for their supper, the few less-than-perfect apples and pears and bananas put in a box for children to help themselves. They didn’t talk much, both wrapped up in thoughts of their future.
Ada wondered if today might be the day Phil changed his mind and allowed her to visit him. She desperately wanted to see him and assure him she would be waiting when his sentence ended. So far only his mother had seen him and she brought back little news of him. There was a letter on the shop counter, one of the many Ada had written but to which she received no reply. She would post it and hope it would be the one that finally broke down his resolve.
Even though it was mid-summer, the day was dark with rain threatening, making the shop, with its door blind down, seem even more gloomy.
Cecily became aware of voices and saw that outside there was a group of people talking in subdued voices. That the people outside were talking about them was in no doubt as they glanced frequently in their direction and at times spoke behind their hands.
‘I wonder whether it’s your affair with Danny or my criminal husband Phil?’ Ada whispered with a sigh. ‘We certainly give them plenty to talk about, don’t we? You seeing Danny Preston, even though he’s married to Jessie, and my Phil convicted of burglaries.’
There was a quiet tap on the door as the rest of the group walked away. It was Gareth’s mother, Mrs Price-Jones. Cecily opened the door and the woman pushed her way in.
‘Mrs Price-Jones. Sorry but we’re closed,’ Cecily said, beginning to guide the woman back out of the shop.
‘I just called to say I’m sorry about your Phil attacking a prison guard,’ she said, addressing the words to Ada, who stared in shock at the news she was hearing for the first time. ‘Lose any chance of getting out early now, won’t he?’
‘Phil, yes, he’s so unhappy and I think anger against himself flares sometimes and he loses his temper.’ She prevaricated a bit more, hoping the information matched the story Mrs Price-Jones was so gleefully passing on. Why hadn’t her mother-in-law told her what had happened?
She learned very little after Mrs Spencer visited Phil; she seemed to pretend he was ill and she had visited him in hospital, not the prison where he was serving a sentence for burglaries and assault. Anger towards her mother-in-law flashed and was gone. She couldn’t blame the poor lady for the way she dealt with the disgrace and anxiety of her son’s imprisonment.
Mrs Price-Jones obviously wanted to say more but Cecily firmly led her to the door. ‘How is Gareth? she asked politely. ‘We don’t see him so much these days.’
‘Gareth is fine. Happy and content with his business and meeting friends now and then.’
‘Yes, a barber is a steady job, isn’t it?’
‘More than a job! My Gareth has a high-class business.’
Cecily smiled as she closed the door behind her. ‘I was sorry when my wedding to her son was stopped but imagine having her for a mother-in-law. We’d have had to leave the country or kill her!’ She chattered for a while, giving time for Ada to recover from what had been a shock, then asked, ‘Did you know about this?’ Then, as Ada didn’t reply, she saw the look on her face and said, ‘You hadn’t been told, had you? If Mrs Price-Jones and her cronies know, your mother in-law must. So why hasn’t she told you?’
‘She hardly says a word about Phil. When she’s been to see him, she answers questions vaguely telling me nothing except that he’s well and hopes I’ll be there when he comes home. Assures me that he loves me.’
‘You must ask her about this. What if
she
doesn’t know? Is there any way others could find out? Do we know anyone with a relative in the same prison?’
Myfanwy burst into the shop and nodded to her Aunt Ada and ignored her mother and went straight upstairs to her bedroom to change out of her tennis clothes.
The sisters finished cleaning and went to check on the casserole simmering in the oven. When the food was on the table, Cecily called her daughter, who came down and at once said, ‘What were you talking about that I can’t hear? The minute I come in you two go quiet. I’m not a child and I don’t like being treated like one!’
Cecily sighed. Van only opened her mouth to complain these days.
‘Nothing to interest you, Van, lovey.’
Ada disagreed. ‘We’ve just heard that your Uncle Phil is in trouble again. I don’t know the details but if the gossip is correct, he was fighting and hurt a prison guard.’
‘Delaying his release, is he? He must dread coming home, to face you and all the disapproval.’
‘Van! What rubbish you talk! Of course he wants to get home. Longing to be back with your Auntie Ada where he belongs.’
Van shrugged. ‘Auntie Dorothy thinks that he’ll do something every time he gets close to … parole is it called? Early release he dreads and he’ll do something to stop it.’
‘Dorothy told you? You knew about this and didn’t tell me?’ Ada was upset.
Van shrugged. ‘You never talk to me. How could I know you hadn’t been told?’
‘Your Auntie Dorothy is a wicked and very unkind person and I wish you wouldn’t listen to her lies. She makes up facts and persuades others she knows more than everyone else.’
‘She doesn’t stop talking when I appear,’ Van said defiantly, ‘and secrets are no better than lying. My own mother knows about that! Pretending to be a friend of my mother all these years.’