Paint on the Smiles (23 page)

‘Damn me, yes,’ they chorused.

Willie finished the letter to Danny suggesting both the builder’s yard and the idea of working on the large-scale rebuilding of the town that must begin soon. He posted the letter and went to talk to Gladys Davies, who still cleaned the workshop for him and helped Annette in the house.

She was just leaving, having helped his wife to repaint the walls of their bedroom, painted white, then decorated with a second colour dabbed on with small pieces of sponge. No wallpaper of any quality could be bought. He waved to her then stopped to look at his neat and happy home.

His home. The first house he had bought on the advice of Bertie Richards an age ago. He had come a long way since then but it had all begun with Bertie Richards taking him in hand and telling him to help himself and not spend his life being a cog in someone else’s wheel.

‘Annette,’ he called when his plump and beautiful wife ran out to greet him, ‘If this new baby’s a boy, I’d like us to call him Bertie.’

‘Hush, love, we don’t want everyone to know just yet.’ She linked with his injured arm, aware that he always wanted his strong arm to be free. ‘What about Roberta if it’s a girl? Then you wouldn’t be disappointed.’

‘You’ve never disappointed me in anything, my dear, sweet, lovely girl.’

C
ECILY KEPT HER
promise and she went with Peter every week to inspect Gareth’s barber shop and also called on Rhonwen, who was living with Gareth’s mother, since Mrs Price-Jones had become unwell. One day they found Rhonwen crawling on the floor measuring curtains. She was trying out a pattern for a two-piece suit, checking to make sure there was sufficient sound and unfaded parts of the material to make the design she had chosen. The curtains were in a small floral print. Gareth’s mother sat, shaking her head and insisting that Rhonwen was wasting her time.

‘Curtains are curtains and frocks are frocks,’ she intoned. ‘Where you get these ideas from I don’t know.’

‘Women’s magazines,’ Rhonwen replied, reaching for the pins.

‘Is it to welcome Gareth home?’ Peter asked, getting down and helping to straighten the paper pattern which he held while Rhonwen pinned.

‘Of course. I want something to wear and I haven’t any coupons left,’ Rhonwen said, through a mouthful of pins. ‘It seems the war will end soon and I’d hate to meet him wearing what he saw me in last.’

‘I think we’ll have to wait a while yet,’ Peter warned. ‘There’s still a way to go before the mad decorator is beaten.’

‘Still, it gives me hope, doesn’t it, if we start preparing? It’s like Christmas. When we were children Mam used to amuse us on wet, boring autumn days by talking about the fun we’d have at Christmas. We’d mark the days off on the calendar and start making lists of people we’d make cards for and it made the waiting a part of the excitement. The trouble is, we don’t have a date like 25th December so we can’t count the days.’ She looked at Peter, sober-faced, supporting the curtains and waiting for her pins. ‘I know he’ll come home,’ she said firmly. ‘Oh, I know there’s still a lot of fighting to do and there are many alive now who, having survived this far, won’t make it, but I just know Gareth will come home.’

Ironically, it was Rhonwen who didn’t survive the war. She was walking home after selling savings stamps to her regular customer and as she passed an empty building, a bomb, lying unnoticed for over a year, was moved slightly as a rat ran over the loose rubble close to it. The delayed explosion killed Rhonwen instantly.

It was old Zachariah Daniels who saw what happened. He was walking back from his early round, getting to the ash bins before the dustmen emptied them, and picking up unwanted items from the tops of bins. He’d been lucky that day, having found three pairs of shoes in fair condition, a filthy old china teapot with only a small chip in the lid, and several pieces of matting. The matting he would keep. He had layers all around his shed, the best inside on the floor and tacked against the walls to keep out draughts. The older pieces he nailed to the roof. He was whistling cheerfully as he prodded the donkey to greater effort, contemplating the cup of tea he would make as soon as he had unloaded his haul.

The explosion happened as he neared the corner of the docks road and the hill leading to his lane. It blew him and the donkey a staggering ten yards, causing the poor animal to bray continuously long after the noise of the bomb had faded.

Zachariah was panting, leaning on the animal who trembled and complained and struggled against his hold on the reins. The cart was still upright and even before the shock had left him, Zachariah studied his load suspiciously as if the bomb had been a device by someone who wanted to rob him. The teapot was still intact and he smiled happily. It was only then he remembered the woman.

He knew who she was, that Mrs-the-barber-shop. That Mrs Owen as was. She must have touched something, but he remembered her just walking along the pavement beside the derelict hotel. Shame that. Only been married a few years, an’ all. Tidy little ’oman, often slipped him a bob or two for a meal, she had. Now he’d have to tell someone.

People were running towards the area, and already the wardens were there, blowing whistles and shouting for people to stay away, and the police and the fire brigade had arrived. He wondered how long he had been standing there. It seemed like a couple of seconds but he realized it must have been longer. A policeman was walking towards him. The shock of what he had just witnessed overcame him and he collapsed, his legs slowly dissolving until he sat on the ground, leaning against the still-braying donkey.

‘The poor ’oman,’ he said in little more than a whisper. ‘Rhonwen she’s called. Wife of Gareth-the-barber-shop, you know her, Rhonwen Owen she was.’

‘Mrs Gareth Price-Jones?’

‘That’s what I said, didn’t I?’ Zachariah snapped. ‘Shame too. Tidy little ’oman. Gave me a bob or two now and then, she did, for me to buy an ’ot meal.’

‘And that’s what you could do with now, old man. Or at least a hot drink. Come on, we’ll get your statement and get you fixed up, shall we?’

Zachariah took the offered hand and hauled himself upright. ‘Shame,’ he said, then shook his fist at the sky. ‘Bloody ’itler!’ With the donkey walking between them, they moved away from the now busy scene.

From the thick of the fighting, Gareth came home to see Rhonwen buried and the loneliness hit him like a blow. When he saw the new suit hanging in the wardrobe with the simple blouse she had planned to wear under it, he cried like a baby. He and Marged grieved together in the short leave he had been allowed then he went back to where death was commonplace and home was only a dream.

Before he left, Gareth called on Cecily and Peter.

‘Thanks for keeping an eye on the business,’ he said. ‘That’s all there is now for Marged and me. If it went, there’d be nothing for us when I get home for good.’

‘That’s not true,’ Cecily said at once. ‘Besides Marged, there’s your mother to care for, friends who will welcome you, and the shop will still be here, Peter and I will make sure of that. And remember, we’re still here.’

Cecily looked at the man who had been her regular dancing partner for years and who had almost been her husband. He had changed. There was no sparkle now in the light brown eyes. He was thinner and his ears, about which she used to tease him, seemed larger against the pale, slender neck. The mouth was still full and sensitive and to her surprise she felt a surge of love and affection that startled in its intensity. She gripped Peter’s comforting, familiar arm and drew him close; protection, perhaps, against the ghost of a past love.

Marged stayed with Gareth’s mother. It had been her home since Gareth had left, and besides she was afraid to leave her. Mrs Price-Jones was suffering from the loss of a daughter-in-law who had become very dear to her, and was becoming frail, needing help with many of the tasks she had managed before.

Cecily and Ada had offered Marged a home but understood her reasons for staying with Mrs Price-Jones and praised her for them.

Van went to Cardiff to tell her gran the sad news. Between tears of grief over the death of someone so young and the thought of Marged being left alone, Van explained to her that despite the loss of the much-loved Rhonwen, the widow of Cecily’s brother, Nan’s son, her mother was still unwilling to forgive Gran and make contact. ‘Very bitter woman, my mother,’ Van said with dishonest sadness.

In her grief, Kitty wondered, as she studied the young girl’s face, whether there were reasons that she wasn’t being told about why Cecily and Ada were adamant in their determination never to forgive her for running away from a marriage in which she was desperately unhappy, to find the happiness she had known since.

Van went down to the Old Village one Wednesday afternoon. She walked along the lanes but this time not retreading the wandering stroll she had taken back in July with Edwin. She walked with a purpose in mind. She wanted to talk to someone, and she chose Annette, her cousin and the wife of the boy she had known for many years as a stable boy, then general assistant to her mother and Auntie Ada.

As she approached the white cottage, where the door stood open to let in the warm, September air, she glanced across to the house where Auntie Ada and Uncle Phil had once lived, which was now a ruin. She saw someone in the garden and, recognizing Willie, she waved.

‘Not working today, Willie?’

‘Not much to do in the shop these days,’ he said, coming to join her. ‘Damn me, your auntie’s let things slide good and proper.’

‘She’s doing her best. It isn’t easy, you know, with Uncle Phil to watch as well as the shop.’

‘We don’t have a single ration book now, did you know that? People gradually took them from us, preferring the bigger shops, like the Home and Colonial or Lipton’s, or shops like yours where there’s an occasional treat for registered customers.’

‘Can’t blame them, I suppose. We have an allocation of tinned pears this week and we even managed two eggs per ration book a few weeks ago. Then there’s fat bacon. We handle so many sides every week there are often spare, fatty pieces. Rendered down they make a tasty bit of fried bread to fill the kids at breakfast time.’

‘Phil still goes out very occasionally,’ Willie told her. ‘He brought back
some duck eggs and even a few goose eggs too. Just one of them fills a dinner plate when it’s fried!’

Two boys appeared from the side of the ruined building and Van recognized them as Graham and Leonard Williams. ‘What are you doing in the Spencers’ old place?’ she asked.

‘Just an exercise at present,’ Willie explained. ‘I thought I’d talk to Phil about rebuilding it.’

‘You?’

He smiled and touched his handless arm. He had fastened a notebook to the sleeve with elastic and had been writing measurements on to it when she had called him.

‘Willie! I didn’t mean that and you know it!’

‘Yes, I shouldn’t be so sensitive. You mean my firm, mine and Danny’s. Well, we’re thinking of expanding. There’s a lot of rebuilding to do and we think we ought to get started, be in on the first wave of enthusiasm, like.’

‘That sounds a good idea. Good luck, Willie. You’re a man after my own heart.’

She watched him walk across to rejoin the twins. As the boys shouted figures he wrote them down on the pad fixed to his arm. There’ll be a lot of people like him, Van thought sadly. She crossed her fingers and hoped both Edwin and Paul were safe.

Annette had seen her coming and had brewed some tea. Small biscuits had been placed on a pretty plate, green and white and trimmed with a thick band of gold. The cups and saucers set out were the same. ‘Aynsley,’ Annette said proudly. ‘My Willie bought them as a belated wedding present. I keep them for special occasions and you call so rarely I decided this was one.’ Annette was heavily pregnant and Van carried in the tray.

As they drank the tea, Annette could see something was on Van’s mind. She tried to coax her to talk. ‘Is everything all right? Your Paul? Your mother?’

‘Yes, so far as I know Paul is safe and sound. Oh, Annette, I think I’m going to have a baby.’

Taken aback, Annette took only a few seconds to recover and say, ‘But that’s wonderful news. Paul will be so proud. Men are so thrilled, especially with their first. Does he know yet?’ Van seemed unwilling to add anything more and Annette prattled on, but then, seeing the serious expression on her cousin’s face, she asked, ‘There’s something else, isn’t
there? Oh Van, don’t worry about gossips. They all had a great time with me and Willie, but they soon forget.’

‘It isn’t Paul’s child. He and I never – you know.’

‘Then whose is it? Or don’t you want to tell me?’

‘It’s Edwin’s.’

‘But I thought you and Paul were engaged to be married?’ She glanced at Van’s left hand where the diamond ring sparkled in mocking disregard of the announcement. ‘Have you changed your mind?’

‘No. But Edwin and I, we’ve always loved each other. Paul is – different. If Paul really loves me, he’ll still marry me.’

‘You’ve told him about this?’

‘Not yet. I didn’t want to worry him while he’s fighting and so far away. This is something I have to tell him, face to face, and only when he’s safely home to stay. It shouldn’t be long now, the war, I mean.’ She looked at her empty cup and added, ‘If I lose the baby he never need know.’

‘You aren’t planning to get rid of it!’ Annette was more shocked by the suspicion of an abortion than her cousin’s pregnancy.

‘No, Annette. I’d never do that. If my mother can face bringing up an illegitimate baby, then I can too.’

‘I don’t know what to say to you. It was so different with me. I’ve never loved anyone but Willie and it’s always been so right between us. I’ve never even thought of another man in the way I think about Willie.’ Annette refilled their tea cups, shyly avoiding Van’s eyes.

‘Lucky you are, to be so happy.’

‘I suppose I am. Happiness isn’t something you think about often. I know I wouldn’t change a single thing in my life.’

‘I still don’t know where life will take me,’ Van said thoughtfully. She twisted the ring on her finger and for a moment, her lovely face, with its small features and brilliant blue eyes, looked pensive and a little sad.

‘You still want to marry Paul?’

‘Yes. But if he doesn’t want me when he learns about “Blodwen”,’ she said, patting her belly, ‘then I’ll probably marry Edwin.’

The coldness, the arbitrary decision making, made the gentle and loving Annette shudder.

‘Edwin loves you?’

‘There’s never been any doubt in my mind about Edwin’s love.’

‘And Paul is special? You hardly know him and Edwin’s been there all your life.’

‘Perhaps that’s the trouble. I spent a lot of time with his family when Mam went dancing and since Uncle Waldo died, and I learned that he was my father, I’ve lived permanently with them. Edwin is too much like a brother.’

‘“Blodwen” wouldn’t have happened if you thought of him as a brother,’ Annette said wryly.

‘What about another cup of tea?’ Van sighed. ‘It’s the usual solution when things are impossible.’

She stood up to help with the dishes, inches taller than the plump Annette and probably two stone lighter. We aren’t alike, the cousins in the family, Van thought as she watched the efficient way Annette dealt with the preparation of the fresh brew. Annette was a natural homemaker. Owen was lazy, overfed and useless. Marged was woolly, giggling and a lot of fun, Johnny Fowler anxious, skinny and awkward. And me, she wondered, as the kettle spurted boiling water onto the fire, making it hiss. How would someone describe me? She glanced again at Annette and wished, just for a moment, that she had been as easily content as her glowing, serene cousin.