Authors: Catrin Collier
‘Pardon?’
‘Nothing. Keep the bed warm and miss me?’ he called back as he walked along the landing.
‘I already am,’ came the careless reply.
Jane stirred sleepily as Haydn left the bed. She was conscious of him moving about the room, collecting his clothes. When he lifted the latch on the bedroom door, she opened her eyes, looked around and remembered where she was. Stopping to check that Anne was sound asleep, she grabbed her borrowed slippers and ran down the stairs after him. Phyllis was alone in the back kitchen, stacking dirty breakfast dishes on the table.
‘Good morning, would you like some tea?’
‘Not for a minute, thank you,’ Jane answered, wondering if she dared to go into the washhouse.
‘Evan and Alexander left for work five minutes ago.’
Reassured that Haydn would be alone, Jane opened the door and walked in to find him stripped off in front of the stone sink.
‘I heard you get up.’
‘Charlie will be here in a few minutes.’
‘What about breakfast?’
‘No time, I’ll get something in the station.’ Keeping his back to her he pulled on his underpants and trousers.
‘About last night.’ She rested her cheek against his shoulder and wrapped her arms around his waist. ‘I’m sorry you fell asleep before I settled Anne.’
‘So am I.’ He turned to face her as he picked up his vest and shirt.
The front door opened and closed. He lifted her chin in his hand and kissed her.
‘We’ll save what has to be said for the next leave, love. I’ve got to go.’
Bethan opened the door to Laura’s house and called down the passage. Ronnie appeared in the kitchen doorway, shirt-sleeves rolled to the elbow, a tea towel in his hand.
‘I know you said you’d be early, but I thought you’d give a man a chance to finish his breakfast.’
‘I was hoping to get a couple of hours’ sleep before going back down Alma’s.’
‘Her mother’s worse?’
‘She died early this morning. In her sleep,’ she added, compounding the story she and the relief nurse had concocted.
‘I’m sorry. How’s Alma?’
‘As well as can be expected with Charlie just gone and her mother dead. Diana is with her now.’
‘I’ll call in.’
‘Is that wise?’
‘Isn’t a man allowed to visit an old friend any more?’
‘You and Alma were a lot more than friends, Ronnie, and unfortunately the whole town knew it. The gossips even had her pregnant.’
‘The bitches.’
‘It’s different in Italy?’
‘Not really.’ He took her bag as she walked into the kitchen. ‘Tea?’
‘After I’ve seen to your leg.’ She opened her bag and removed two enamel bowls. ‘You have boiling water?’
‘The kettle’s full, it’s not long off the boil.’
‘Put it back on, please.’
‘You’re going to scald me?’
‘Of course.’ She laid a white cotton cloth on the corner of the table, and set out a packet of cotton wool, a roll of bandages, a bottle of antiseptic, and a pair of scissors. ‘Drop your trousers.’
‘Charming! What about my dignity.’
‘You are wearing underpants?’
‘Fortunately, yes.’ He unbuckled his belt and unbuttoned his braces. ‘I’m beginning to think Tina wasn’t joking when she said the women in this town are starved of male company.’ He unfastened his fly and kicked off his trousers.
‘You’ve only just found that out? Sit in the chair and prop your leg on the stool.’ She unwound the bandages that covered his left leg from his knee to his ankle. ‘Dr Evans said you’ve a wound in your chest as well.’
‘It’s healed.’
‘Not according to what he told me. Ronnie, this is an appalling mess!’ she exclaimed as she surveyed the length of his shin.
‘The bullet went in below the knee and came out above the ankle.’
‘And both the exit and the entry wound are infected,’ she said, as she inspected the weeping sores, ‘and judging by the colour of the skin, probably the bullet path as well.’
‘Not as badly as they were. At least the bleeding has stopped.’
‘And to think you walked down the Graig hill last night.’
‘I can’t sit around and do nothing. Besides, I have a crutch. I don’t put any weight on this leg.’
‘I doubt you’d be able to. You should be in bed.’
‘I’d go mad. I start in the café today. Tina’s offered me a job on vegetable preparation.’
‘I’ll allow you to take it, only if you can sit down to do it.’ She sponged off the remains of the dressings that had stuck to his wounds, and picked up the antiseptic.
‘Go easy, that stuff stings.’
‘If you don’t keep this clean and dry, and rest the leg as much as you can, you’ll have to go into hospital to have it cauterised and stitched under anaesthetic.’
‘I’ll rest.’
‘Did you see a doctor when you did this?’
‘There aren’t many in the Italian Alps.’
‘Did you see anyone before you saw Dr Evans here?’
‘A doctor on the RAF base. I was there for a few days before I came home. I thought he performed miracles.’
‘I wouldn’t like to have seen it before he did.’ She washed, dried and laid clean dressings on both wounds, bandaging them firmly into place.
‘Can I put my trousers on now, before someone comes in and catches us?’
‘It’s all right, they never gossip about nurses.’ She took the bowl that contained the soiled dressings, and emptied it into a strong paper bag. After going into the washhouse to wash and disinfect both bowls and scrub her hands, she returned. ‘Now your chest.’
‘You won’t be happy until you’ve examined every inch of me, will you?’
‘Only the damaged bits.’
He unbuttoned his shirt and pulled up his vest.
‘There’s no dressing on it.’
‘I took it off, the wound’s dry.’
‘Since when?’
‘This morning.’
‘Take off your shirt and vest.’
‘Bethan …’
‘Do as you’re told or I’ll have you admitted to hospital.’
‘Does bullying run in the family?’
‘Maud bullied you? I don’t believe it.’
‘Only when I wouldn’t do what she wanted me to.’ He stood patiently while she examined and cleaned the wound.
‘You’re nothing but skin and bones,’ she commented as she wound bandages around him.
‘I’d put some weight on if you’d allow me to eat breakfast.’
‘You can eat now. I’ve finished.’ She pinned the bandage securely.
‘Tea and toast?’ he asked. ‘There’s some brawn Diana brought up yesterday to put on it, then you don’t have to bother about breakfast when you get home.’
‘Sounds wonderful.’ She went into the washhouse to clean up. ‘Now don’t go overdoing it in the café,’ she warned when she returned to the kitchen.
‘Me?’ he asked with an innocent expression.
‘Dr Evans told me yesterday he’d given you permission to go into munitions, but don’t make any immediate plans. It could take weeks for that leg to heal completely, and it would be madness to go into a TNT contaminated atmosphere with open wounds like those.’
‘You don’t know me. Now I have a dry place to sleep and enough food to eat, I’ll heal fast.’ He pushed a piece of bread on to a toasting fork and held it over the fire.
‘It was that bad in Italy?’
‘The last few months weren’t good, but Maud died before the worst, if that’s what you’re thinking.’
‘Diana told me she was pregnant when she died, and you blame yourself for her death.’
‘I suppose I should have expected her to.’
‘She only told me because she was concerned for you. As we all are. Ronnie, it’s doubtful that Maud could have survived the war, what with all the food shortages and strain. It was a miracle that you managed to keep the disease at bay as long as you did.’
‘No more gratitude, please.’
‘The last thing Maud would have wanted is for you to spend the rest of your life mourning her.’
‘If you’re trying to tell me that I’ve been selfish in wallowing in my own grief, I know.’
‘You’re making me feel heartless.’
‘You heartless?’ He shook his head as he took the fork from the fire and turned over the bread to toast the other side. ‘You couldn’t be heartless if you tried. Meeting everyone last night, especially Jenny and your father, led me to do some thinking on the way home, and I made a resolution to get on with my life.’
‘I’m glad.’ She took the toast he offered her and put it on a plate. ‘If ever you want anyone to talk to …’
‘I know where to come.’ He laid his hand over hers. ‘Thanks, Beth. You Powells have made coming home much easier than I thought it would be.’
‘Don’t be a stranger, Ronnie. Call in any time. With Andrew and Haydn away, my children need all the uncles they can get.’
He looked at her and remembered what Diana had said about keeping Maud’s memory alive. ‘You’ll soon be so fed up of me, you’ll throw stones when I land on your doorstep.’
Despite Bethan’s warning, Ronnie limped past the café on the Tumble, and carried on hobbling through Taff Street until he reached Charlie’s shop behind the fountain. The shop was open, but there were two girls he’d never seen before manning the counter, and the blackout curtains were pulled in the upstairs rooms. There was a door alongside the entrance. While he was trying to work out if it led to the living accommodation above the shop, or was part of Clayton’s gramophone and radio store next door, it opened and Diana came out with a baby in her arms.
‘Ronnie, what are you doing here?’ she asked as she put the baby in the pram she’d parked in the shop.
‘Trying to work out which is Alma’s front door. I thought I’d pay my condolences.’
‘Now isn’t a good time. The undertaker’s just arrived.’
‘Shouldn’t someone be with her?’
‘My mother and my Uncle Huw are helping her with the arrangements.’
‘What about Charlie, shouldn’t we send a telegram?’
‘Alma won’t hear of it. She said he won’t get any more leave no matter what.’
‘Then there’s nothing I can do?’
‘Not until the funeral. Which way are you walking?’
‘Up to the Tumble café.’
‘I’ll come with you. I’m meeting Wyn later to do the banking, but I’ve got an hour to waste before then, so I thought I’d take the baby to the park.’
‘And this I take it is your baby?’ He peered into the pram at the bundle swathed in layers of soft white wool. ‘Do you know, I didn’t even realise you were married until Gina told me yesterday afternoon. Congratulations.’
‘Thank you.’
‘If you can put up with my company I’ll go with you. I can afford the time. There’s not as much to do in the cafés as there used to be.’
‘Between the canteens in the factories and the food shortages is it any wonder?’
‘Not really. It’s just that I’d rather be busy.’
‘Me too.’
‘I thought you already were, and with Wyn going into munitions you’ll be run off your feet looking after the shops as well as the baby.’
‘My mother helps with the baby, there’s only two shops and we’ve got a girl in each. What I’m dreading most of all is the long hours Wyn will be working, I hardly see him now, I can’t say I’m looking forward to seeing even less of him.’
‘You’re welcome to call into the café any time.’
‘I already do. Perhaps it won’t be so bad now spring’s finally arrived. It’s certainly a beautiful day.’
He looked up at the clear blue sky. ‘I suppose it is.’
‘You sound as though you’ve only just noticed.’
‘I’ve been so busy trying to acclimatise myself to being back in Pontypridd, I haven’t had time to monitor the weather.’
‘It must be totally different to what you’re used to.’
‘Not really. It was colder than it is here, in the mountains.’
‘Maud wrote and told me so much about Bardi, I feel I know the village as well as I know Ponty. I’d love to go there.’
‘Not now you wouldn’t.’ He limped alongside the pram as they headed up Taff Street towards Woolworth’s and the turn into the park.
‘Wyn said the Germans can’t possibly be as bad as the papers paint them.’
‘The ones I met were. But then I didn’t exactly stop to chat.’
‘Because they were shooting at you?’
‘Guns put a damper on any conversation. But Wyn’s got a point. I don’t think we can believe everything that’s in the papers these days. You should see the things the Italian press print about the British.’
He stumbled over the bridge and looked around. After the thorough cleansing Bethan had given his leg, it was more painful than it had been in days. ‘I’m sorry, I can’t go much further. How about we sit over there?’ He pointed to a long row of covered seating that fronted an enormous lawn studded with flowerbeds that had been patriotically turned over to vegetables.
She peered into the pram as she followed him to the bench. ‘Suits me. Billy’s a bit restless. Mam warned me she didn’t have time to wind him properly after his morning feed before coming down to take over from me in Alma’s.’
‘Here let me,’ Ronnie offered, holding out his arms as she took the baby from the pram.
‘No really, there’s no need. I can manage.’
‘He certainly looks a fine, healthy little chap.’
‘You’re an expert on babies?’ She leaned Billy against her shoulder, turning his face away from Ronnie.
‘Unfortunately. Being the eldest of eleven I had little choice in the matter. Billy’s at the best age. Soon he’ll start teething in earnest, and dribbling with it, and once he starts sitting up and crawling he’ll be into everything he shouldn’t. You’ll spend hours teaching him to talk and when he finally learns, all he’ll do is answer back. Then when he’s really on his feet he’ll start playing with the kids in the street, and you’ll get nothing but complaints from the neighbours about broken windows and footballs destroying gardens. He’ll probably refuse to work in school, and as a result end up with a lousy job. About fifteen or sixteen years from now, he’ll start courting, more than likely with the most unsuitable girl in town and …’
‘And on the other hand, he might work hard, get a scholarship to the grammar school and go to university?’
‘That would be the worst outcome of all. He’d be so highly educated, you wouldn’t be able to understand a word he says.’
‘Some kids turn out all right,’ she contended, realising he was teasing her.