Finders and Keepers (12 page)

‘The first Ellis who came here built the house we live in, and it's a fine place,' she countered forcefully, proud of her heritage.

‘It's fine all right, but the roof leaks, the walls are cracked and let in the damp, and the windows are rotten. We've had to sell almost every stick of furniture we possessed, and the way things are, we'll never be able to furnish it again. And although we may live in the house, Mary, we don't own it – there's a big difference.'

‘Dad showed you the carving over the lintel, just as he showed it to me. The name of the first David Ellis and his date is up there.'

‘Have you ever thought that we only have Dad's word for that?' he challenged. ‘He couldn't read those words any more than we can. For all we know it could be Bob Pritchard's great-great-great-grandfather's name up there, and between you and me it would make more bloody sense if it was.'

‘Dad told us the truth, I know he did.' Mary was glad of the rain because it hid her tears. ‘The first Ellis to come here built the house. He owned everything and left it to his son -'

‘Who left it to his son until it was taken away from us in seventeen fifty-four by another greedy landlord. I know the story as well as you, Mary.' He brushed his sodden sleeve over his forehead. ‘And look what happened to Dad when he tried to buy it back. I was the one who held his legs when you and Mam cut him down, remember? Is that what you want for me? To be killed by hard work and the swindling landlord and his agent, like Dad?'

‘Davy, I had no idea you felt this way,' she protested wearily. ‘I thought you understood that we were working to try and keep the farm for you, and for the little ones to have somewhere to live until they grow up.'

‘Why won't you see further than the work that has to be done every day, Mary?' He threw a stone aside and it hit one of the few low, scrubby bushes that grew in the pen, breaking a branch. ‘The only future any of us will have if we stay here is the workhouse, or tramping the roads. We have to get out and make a living that will keep us and the little ones somewhere else.'

‘By soldiering you'll only make enough to keep yourself,' she warned soberly.

‘There are other jobs.'

‘All both of us know is farming. You said it yourself, we can't even read and write. I'd be lucky to get a job as a kitchen maid. And if I did, what would happen to Martha, Matthew and Luke?'

‘The doctor and his family would keep Martha on as a live-in maid.'

‘So, what are you saying? That we should put Matthew and Luke into the workhouse?'

The silence between them grew tense and unbearable, as the rain continued to pound down, pulverizing them and the earth. David turned back to the wall when another peal of thunder heralded a second cloudburst.

‘And I thought it couldn't get any wetter. Here.' He took the stone she held out to him and thrust it on top of the one he had already placed.

‘Davy, you won't really go, will you?' she pleaded.

‘Not without talking it over with you first.'

‘Talk – or have you already made a decision?' She was shivering more from the prospect of trying to live without him than the freezing rain.

‘I haven't decided anything – yet. I heard you talking to Mam before she died. I know she made you promise to look after all of us until we were old enough to look after ourselves.' He held out his hand for another stone. ‘Well, you don't have to bother about me, not any more. I can fend for myself. But you can't look after the other three and do everything that needs doing around here, not all by yourself you can't.'

She didn't argue with him. She was too heartbroken by his declaration that he didn't think the Ellis Estate worth fighting for to try further persuasion. All her hopes for a better future when the family might actually live her father's dream of owning their rightful inheritance had been shattered.

And she had struggled too long to keep the family together on the farm to consider what she might do with the rest of her life if they no longer lived there.

*……*……*

Harry woke early the next morning to the sound of rain hammering relentlessly on his bedroom window. There was no sign of Toby at breakfast. Mrs Edwards told him that he had risen early, taken one look at the weather and caught the train into Swansea to buy paints and canvases. Harry breakfasted alone, and afterwards sat in the cheerless dining parlour and tried to read, but he spent more time watching the hands crawl round on his wristwatch than looking at his book.

As the morning wore on, the rain grew even heavier. At a quarter past ten, he dressed in his mackintosh and gaiters, jammed a waterproofed felt hat on his head and crossed the yard to put up the hood on the tourer. He'd garaged it in the old barn, which Alf had turned into a mechanic's workshop.

He drove to the station half an hour before the train was due in. The ambulance was already there, parked outside the stationmaster's house. He left his car alongside it, pulled up the collar on his mackintosh, angled the brim of his hat to stop the rain from falling into his eyes and headed for the platform. He handed over a penny for a ticket and waited in the doorway of the ticket office.

He heard the train before he saw it. Then he spotted a mist fogging the rain above the trees that bordered the track. The engine slowed, crawling towards the station at a snail's pace before finally drawing to a steam-spitting halt. Doors banged open and half-a-dozen men and women emerged. They stopped to put up umbrellas before hauling the shopping they had bought on Swansea market out of the station. Harry caught the whiff of fresh fish and the vinegary tang of cockles as he walked along the train and peered into the carriages in search of his family.

When he was halfway along, he saw his Uncle Joey jump down from a carriage at the end of the train. He turned and lifted out a suitcase. Lloyd leaned out and passed him a wheelchair. Harry ran towards them, reaching them just when Victor emerged carrying his grandfather.

Even wrapped in his woollen winter overcoat, with a muffler around his neck and his cap pulled down low, Billy Evans looked fragile. In the three days since Harry had seen him, his face had shrunk, his teeth suddenly seemed too large for his mouth and his eyes were dark, glittering, pain-filled hollows. Harry had difficulty keeping his voice steady.

‘Hello, Granddad.'

Billy looked at him as Victor set him gently in the chair. ‘Harry,' he whispered, with a ghost of a smile. ‘I've put you to a lot of trouble, boy.'

‘No trouble, Granddad. The ambulance is waiting.'

Lloyd picked up the suitcase. Joey folded a blanket over his father's lap, tucking it beneath the shoe on his artificial leg. It said something that Billy didn't protest at his youngest son's fussing. He touched the hand Harry set on his shoulder.

‘Lloyd tells me that you've arranged everything in the sanatorium.'

His grandfather's voice was so weak Harry had to crouch down to hear what he was saying. ‘And I've found good lodgings at an inn, Granddad. So I can come down to see you as often as they'll let me.'

‘Stuff and nonsense,' Billy said with a trace of his old spirit. ‘You should be in Paris, painting … you should go …' The effort of speaking was too much after the journey. He fought for breath, his face turned blue and he fell back weakly in the chair.

‘We'd better get you out of this rain before you get soaked, Dad,' Lloyd said.

Lloyd and Joey walked either side of the chair, Victor wheeled it to the gate and Harry hung back, hoping there'd be time for him to tell his grandfather just how much he loved him.

The ambulance driver and his mate hauled the chair, and Billy with it, into the back of their cab, secured the doors and drove off. Harry unlocked his car doors and his stepfather put the suitcase into the boot.

‘You'll take us straight to the sanatorium so we can see Dad settle in, Harry?' Joey climbed into the back seat.

‘I'll take you there, but they may not let you see him, Uncle Joey.'

‘Yes, they will.'

‘Not everyone falls prey to your charm, Joey.' Victor sat beside him. ‘And the last thing we want to do is upset the people who are going to be caring for Dad.'

‘How is Edyth?' Harry asked urgently.

‘No change,' Lloyd answered briefly. ‘But a word of warning: we had to tell Dad that she tumbled downstairs because he heard her cry and saw the rest of us panic before he passed out. But we've told him she's fine, just collected a few more bruises.'

‘Granddad looks terrible,' Harry ventured.

‘Doctor Williams warned us that he might not survive the journey,' Lloyd said quietly. ‘But we all agreed that he would be better off here than in the Graig.'

‘Even Granddad?' Harry pressed.

‘Doctor Williams asked him for us, but we already knew the answer. Like most miners, he's been afraid all his life of dying in the workhouse,' Joey answered.

Subdued, they drove the rest of the short distance from the station to the castle in silence. Harry turned into the courtyard. The ambulance was outside the main entrance. He parked opposite it.

‘I've ordered lunch for all of us at the inn I stayed at last night, but I told the landlady I couldn't be sure when we'd be there, so she said she'd sort something that won't spoil if we're delayed.'

‘Just as well.' Joey opened the car door.

‘You're not coming in?' Lloyd asked Harry when he didn't make a move.

‘No, Granddad's so weak it will be as much as he can do to say goodbye to you three. As there's no change in Edyth, I thought I might stay over for a day or two, to make sure Granddad settles in all right.'

‘And when did you make that decision?' Lloyd asked.

‘When I saw him just now,' Harry admitted.

‘As you said, you might not be allowed to see him.'

‘Even if I'm not, I'll be on hand to make enquiries, Dad. It's only four miles from the inn to this place and they both have telephones. Besides, the weather is foul for driving.'

‘It is that.' Lloyd nodded agreement, and shut the door behind him.

Harry turned off the ignition. He watched his uncles and stepfather cross the courtyard and mount the steps to the front door. As he suspected, he didn't have to wait long. Ten minutes later the door opened again and all three trooped out.

Joey waited until he and his brothers were finishing their lunch in the dining parlour of the inn before voicing his opinion on the cavalier treatment they had received in Craig-y-Nos.

‘Was I the only one who took exception to Doctor Adams's attitude?' He looked at his brothers but didn't give either of them time to answer him. ‘All we're concerned about is
our
father, yet he insisted he didn't have time to talk to us and ordered us out of the place as though we were tramps who'd come begging at the back door for a handout.'

‘I felt the same way at first.' Harry sprinkled vinegar over the remaining food on his plate. The silent Enfys had served them ham, salad and chips; although there was no garnish, the ham had been well carved and the salad and chips were plentiful. ‘I thought Doctor Adams imperious, and his daughter condescending, but after talking to the nephew of a patient who has seen them almost every day during the month since his uncle was admitted to the sanatorium, I've come to the conclusion that neither of them have much time for relatives, but all the time in the world for their patients.'

‘How can you be sure about that?' Joey took the vinegar bottle from him.

‘I saw most of the wards in Craig-y-Nos, and although the doctor can't offer a cure or even much in the way of treatment, what little he can do is carried out meticulously. The beds of those strong enough to be moved are wheeled out into the fresh air every day. The place is spotlessly clean and constantly being disinfected in an effort to stop the spread of secondary infections. And when I went into the children's ward with Miss Adams, it was obvious they all adored her. I really believe that although neither she nor her father can be bothered with the social niceties when it comes to relatives, they truly care about their patients.'

‘Perhaps it's just as well that you and not Joey made the arrangements for Dad to be admitted,' Victor commented philosophically. ‘Tact has never been one of his strong points.'

‘No?' Joey demanded caustically.

‘No.' As even-tempered as ever, Victor looked his younger brother coolly in the eye.

‘Doctor Adams told us that he won't allow Dad any visitors for at least a week, if then,' Lloyd warned, ‘but -'

‘I'll go over there first thing tomorrow morning to ask about him, and I won't drive back to Pontypridd until they tell me he's recovered from the journey and settled in,' Harry interrupted.

‘I warned you there wasn't much life in the upper valley, but it was still a shock to see it again for myself from the train after so many years. If you'll excuse me, I'm going to have a word with the landlady.' Victor finished his beer, blotted his lips in his napkin and folded it beside his empty plate.

‘Megan asked Victor to enquire after her family,' Joey explained to Harry after Victor left. ‘She hasn't heard anything of them since the Baptist minister moved from the Rhondda to Cardiff eight years ago. And before that it was only the odd snippet of news passed on by his sister in her letters.'

‘If he'd mentioned it before I drove down here, I could have asked around for him.'

‘I think he'd prefer to make the enquiries himself. You're too young to remember the visit Megan's father made to the Rhondda before she married Victor. But I've never met a man as unpleasant and mercenary as Ianto Williams before or since. He certainly didn't deserve a daughter like Megan.' Lloyd pushed his empty plate aside and sat back with his beer.

‘How is Mam? Really?' Harry asked.