‘You’re that keen?’ Huw asked drily.
The man shrugged. ‘Just like to know where I stand.’
‘You’ll most probably find out tomorrow. I may as well warn you now, boys, you’re not going to be all that popular. There’s still a lot of unemployment around here and some men will think that you’re taking jobs away from them, and bread from the mouths of their families.’
‘Then why did the Ministry send us here?’ Alexander Forbes asked.
‘Since when have those in charge ever needed a reason to do anything? Right, boys, if you pick up your bags and follow me we’ll start getting you organised.’ Huw herded the men along the platform towards the stone steps that led down into station yard, stopping to send a warning look towards Dai and the group of porters who stood, poised to spit again as the group passed. ‘A word?’ Huw took Dai to one side as the men descended the steps.
‘Bloody conchies, they’ve no right to be in this town …’
‘I don’t see you in any uniform, Dai.’
‘Home Guard and ARP, and I would have joined up if –’
‘If there’s one thing I’ve found out, it’s that there’s always an ‘if’ with men like you.’
‘I’m doing my bit!’ Dai exclaimed defensively.
‘Your bit may not amount to very much in the scheme of things, Dai. Now I’ve seen a nephew, who’s like a son to me, off today, and I tried to join up myself, but they put me on the reserves because of my age, so I reckon I’ve as much a right to speak out as any other man here. As I see it, everyone’s entitled to their own way of thinking, and if these men have volunteered to go down the pit instead of shoot Nazis, that’s their choice and no one’s business except their own. I was in the trenches in the last show and I’ve worked down the pits, and as I remember there’s not much between them. And if any of you feel that strongly about the lack of manpower in France, you know the way to the recruiting office.’
‘I …’
‘I don’t want to listen to any of your excuses, Dai. Just give you a word of advice. Stay out of the way of anyone you don’t like, and keep your nose clean. Or I’ll have to lock you up. And we wouldn’t want that now, would we?’
Alexander Forbes could discern hostility in the air as he walked through the industry-blackened streets of Pontypridd, the first Welsh town he’d seen, let alone been in. But then he was growing accustomed to hostility. He’d existed in an atmosphere fraught with animosity since his principles had led him to register as a conscientious objector.
Before he’d made his decision, he’d discussed the implications
ad nauseam
with his colleagues and friends in the university town he’d lived in; read Rupert Brooke and every essay he could lay his hands on that examined the concepts of war and patriotism; and all the time he’d tried, really tried to allow himself to be swayed by notions of right, glory and heroic meaningful death.
But when the time came to examine his conscience coolly and dispassionately, he realised that he’d remained unswayed by the fundamental argument that every man could be turned into the killing machine that was a soldier. That no matter what his basic moral standpoint, any man would return the fire of an enemy shooting at him or his mates.
It was the thought of ‘mates’ that had given him the courage to own up to his convictions. He had no way of knowing for certain, but he suspected he was incapable of killing another man, even if that man was about to shoot him or his best friend; and from what he’d been told by the survivors of the last show, comradeship was the best and only mitigating factor in war: that men learned to entrust everything, including their lives, to their mates, especially in battle. And feeling the way he did about shedding blood, he refused to allow himself to be engineered into a position where his inability to take life could jeopardise the lives of others.
But his aversion to killing didn’t lessen his animosity towards the Nazi creed, which was why he’d been one of the first conscientious objectors to volunteer his services for non-combative war work, or whatever use his country saw fit short of what he privately saw as ‘legalised murder’. So he hadn’t been surprised to find himself bound for Wales and the coal mines, but he did find it difficult to understand why the men of the valleys with their history of free thinking and Communism should show so much hostility towards one small group of ‘conchies’.
‘Left at the next corner,’ Huw Davies shouted from the back of the line. ‘That’s it, up through the Arcade.’
Alexander hung back, studying the hills that hemmed in the town. ‘I don’t see any pits.’
‘We don’t keep them in the centre of town, sir.’ Alexander glanced at the constable’s face. There wasn’t a trace of humour.
‘Then we’re going to be billeted out of town?’
‘No idea, sir. We only had the telegram to say you were on your way an hour before you arrived. But don’t worry, the sergeant will soon have you all sorted into nice pits and billets.’
‘That’s good to know,’ Alexander replied drily as he shifted his heaviest case from one hand to another.
‘If you don’t mind me saying so, sir, you don’t look as though you’ve held a pick much less been down a pit in your life.’
‘None of us has, sergeant, and I wish you’d call me Alexander, or Forbes.’
‘What are you good at then, Mr Forbes?’
‘My last job was in a museum, but I’ve also been a teacher.’
‘Grammar school?’
‘University.’
‘The lads in the miners’ institute will be happy to hear that. They’ve got a programme of classes going.’
‘I’d be glad to help out.’
‘If I were you, I’d wait to see how you take to working a twelve-hour shift, six days a week underground before you volunteer for anything.’ Huw looked across Gelliwastad Road. ‘There it is, boys. The grey building. If you’d like to go through the front door –’ He stood back and saw the ragged column of men across the road. ‘Were you a teacher long, Mr Forbes?’ he asked as he and Alexander brought up the rear of the column.
‘Five years.’
‘That explains it, then.’
‘Explains what?’
‘Why you’re a conscientious objector. Seems to me anyone who’s studied the past can’t fail to come to the conclusion that war never solves anything.’
‘You’re a scholar, Constable?’
‘I wouldn’t call myself that, sir.’
‘A Communist then.’
‘I was never one for extremes. Socialist will do.’
‘From what I’ve seen so far I think it would be difficult for any man to live around here for long and remain a capitalist.’
‘If you intend to live around here for more than a week or two, Mr Forbes, you might be glad of a little advice.’
‘I’ll be glad of anything you can give me, constable.’
‘Speak only when you’re spoken to, and don’t talk about socialism or Communism until you learn to live Owain Glyndwr’s ways like the natives. And last, but most important, watch your back. Given time, the boys may get used to you, but for the moment jingoism has taken over, and I’d hate to see you or any of these lads get hurt.’
‘I’ll remember that, constable, and thank you.’
‘You’ve nothing to thank me for, sir.’
‘The first civil word, constable,’ Alexander said as he walked into the darkened interior of the station. ‘It means a lot.’
Harry Griffiths tried to ignore the slamming of doors and the scraping of furniture being dragged over the floor upstairs as he went about serving his customers and unpacking the boxes that the delivery boys had humped into his stockroom. His wife was angry and letting the whole world know it. But he didn’t want to think about his wife, he wanted to remember Megan Powell. Her warm smile, her welcoming arms, the quiet, companionable evenings he had spent at her fireside. The way she had listened to his problems, calmly, attentively without ever passing judgement.
He wished he had known she was about to be released. He would have rented a house for her in Leyshon Street. Not her old house, that had been let a long time ago, but another one. He would have arranged to have all her old furniture moved from her brother Huw’s house where it had lain in storage ever since William and Diana had been forced to give up their home. He would have …
He suddenly recalled the reality of his relationship with Megan. Having to creep down the back lane of Leyshon Street after dark. Opening the door in the garden wall and sneaking into Megan’s kitchen when no one’s curtains were twitching. Never being able to say more than ‘Hello’ to her in public. Never being able to give her a present ostentatious enough for her to wear or display, lest she have to account for its origin.
Megan was a woman who deserved much more than lies and subterfuge. This time it would be different between them. He’d divorce his wife and marry Megan – not straight away, of course. Divorce took time – years, even. But then as Bert had said, a wife like Megan was worth having. The only wonder was why he hadn’t left his wife and moved in with Megan years ago. But it wasn’t too late. He had time. Time to make up to her for all she had suffered. Time for them to be happy.
‘I can’t take any more of them and that’s final.’ The manager’s representative from Lady Windsor colliery glowered with an expression hardened miners had learned to back away from. Crossing his arms over his barrel chest, he faced the sergeant square on.
‘Then where am I supposed to put them?’
‘There are other pits.’
‘I’ve tried them. They’ve all been very helpful,’ the sergeant lied, ‘but it’s not just the pits, it’s the billets. And there’s a handy lodging-house within walking distance of the gates of the Lady Windsor that’s prepared to take all twelve.’
‘I don’t doubt it. It’s renowned for its bedbugs and rats, which is why the landlady’s always prepared to put up men at short notice.’ The representative pretended not to notice the alarm registering in the eyes of the men sitting on the bench in the waiting area. ‘I can understand why people aren’t queuing up to take them in,’ he continued as though they were dumb animals incapable of either thought or comprehension.
‘You can?’
‘You’re a working man, Sergeant. Imagine how you’d feel if you came off shift and found one of these sitting with his feet under your table.’
‘These?’ Huw Davies queried innocently, looking to Alexander Forbes who was sitting at the end of the line, listening attentively to the conversation.
‘They can call themselves whatever they want, but I can see the yellow in their skin.’
‘It’ll soon turn black, same as all the other miners around here,’ Huw said shortly.
‘Well, thank you for your help, sir,’ the sergeant curtailed the conversation. ‘If you take yours, we can see to what’s left.’
The man nodded to the two clerks he had brought with him. Within minutes they had ushered half the men out of the waiting area.
‘How many does that leave us with, sergeant?’ Huw asked.
‘Two, if the Lewis Merthyr take four.’
‘The Maritime?’
‘Still waiting to hear, but as I said, it’s not persuading the pits, they’ll do whatever the Labour Board directs them to do, it’s finding the billets. You’ve got contacts on the Graig, haven’t you?’ he asked, knowing full well that Huw had family there; the constable had asked for enough blind eyes to be turned towards their doings in the past.
Huw was slow of speech and slow of action, but only a fool took him to be slow-witted, and the sergeant wasn’t usually a fool. ‘The answer’s no.’
‘Come on. Evan Powell’s two sons have joined up, and I hear your nephew went today. They’re swimming with room up there.’
‘My sister’s moved in, and my niece is still living there.’
‘The boys must have slept somewhere. Bed and board for two men for a couple of days, that’s all I’m asking. We all have to do our bit now there’s a war on.’
‘I don’t see the crache doing much except draw their one and threepence an hour when they’re on fire-watching duty.’
‘We’re having enough trouble with the unemployed in this town grumbling about those payments without you starting, Davies.’
‘I’ll ask around when I cover my beat.’ Huw lumbered towards the door. ‘I can’t do more.’
Alexander watched the constable leave, and prepared himself for another hour or two of hungry, mind-numbing boredom. The railway warrant and summons to Pontypridd had come so suddenly, he hadn’t had time to consider what he’d find at journey’s end. He’d seen newsreels of the Rhondda, filmed when the pits had closed during the depression. He’d helped serve meals in church halls to miners when they’d walked south on hunger marches, and he’d been amazed at how widely read and intelligent they’d been. Talking to them had consolidated his belief in Communism and a fair share for all, and he’d expected to find plenty of other like-minded people in the valleys. But as the day wore on and the mutterings in the waiting room grew louder every time someone looked their way, he began to despair of finding anyone in Wales capable of understanding his motives for declaring himself a conscientious objector.
By six in the evening he was exhausted from travelling, aching from sitting on the hard bench, and in urgent need of a wash and something more substantial than the tea and biscuits the sergeant had doled out at inadequate intervals. And still half a dozen of them waited. After some hard telephone bargaining the sergeant had exacted a promise from the Lewis Merthyr colliery to take three men, but that had been hours ago and there’d been no sign of any movement since.
‘Trust this government,’ a whisper came from the top end of the bench as Alexander rose to his feet to stretch his legs. ‘They couldn’t organise a piss-up in a brewery, let alone a war. I knew there was no way they’d be ready for us here.’ The speaker was a pasty-faced Cockney who looked as though he’d never breathed a lungful of fresh air in his life, and probably wouldn’t be given the chance to now, Alexander reflected grimly. He put him down as a troublemaker, a man who enjoyed manufacturing grumble bullets he handed to others to fire. Ignoring his moans Alexander paced to the door.
‘Hey, you there! Where do you think you’re going?’ the sergeant shouted from behind his desk.
‘Work off cramp,’ Alexander answered.
‘No further than the door,’ the sergeant warned, as though he expected Alexander to add whatever energy was left to him after his long day, to the German war effort.
Alexander leaned against a noticeboard screwed to the wall and surveyed his fellow sufferers. There was an intense fidgeting and whispering around the troublemaker. The only one who hadn’t joined in the activity was a young lad sitting at the end of the bench. He looked nearer sixteen than eighteen, and his worn corduroy trousers and jacket spoke volumes about his class and financial status. With nothing better to do, Alexander watched him for a while, but the boy continued to sit, eyes down, cap in hand, completely withdrawn from the others and the scene around him. Alexander tried to follow his example and retreat within himself. He had a rich store of literature to tap into. A choice selection of the works of the great poets, Chaucer, Milton, Donne and Shakespeare that he had committed to memory and heart, but although they had proved a diversion on the journey down, they eluded him now. The muse clearly didn’t feel at home in a gloomy police station in Pontypridd on a Monday evening in-late winter.
‘You –’ the sergeant beckoned to the three men clustered around the troublemaker, but not the troublemaker himself. ‘If you go with this man he’ll take you to your billets.’
‘And us?’ Alexander enquired hopefully.
‘There’s a chance you’ll be taken on at the Maritime if billets can be found for you. There’s a housing shortage in the valleys,’ the sergeant added superfluously.
‘In that case why didn’t they sort it out before sending us here?’ the troublemaker demanded.
‘Probably because the Ministry has more important things to concern itself with than the fate of a group of untrained miners.’
‘I never wanted to be a miner,’ the man retorted belligerently.
The sergeant laid down his pen with the resigned air of someone who’d seen and done it all before, and of choice wouldn’t be doing it again. ‘What’s your name, boy?’
‘I’m not a boy,’ the man responded sullenly.
‘I asked you a question.’
‘Alfred Hawkins.’
‘Well, Mr Hawkins. You don’t want to be a miner and you’ll meet plenty around here who don’t want you on the job. By the look of you,’ the sergeant flicked a critical eye over the man’s scrawny physique, ‘I doubt you’re up to the rigours of life underground, but time will tell. In the meantime I suggest you sit down, shut up, and get on with what you’ve been ordered to do.’