Finders and Keepers (36 page)

An hour later, refreshed, his appetite satisfied by two rounds of ham sandwiches and a pot of tea, he set out to fetch Toby. He had deliberately waited until the end of evensong when the chapels and churches would be closed in the hope of picking up the Ellises. After the scene with Ianto Williams the week before, he didn't want to go to the chapel again.

He drove slowly up the valley and caught up with the Ellises on a lonely stretch of road half a mile up the valley from Craig-y-Nos. He stopped the car ahead of them and Martha ran up to him.

‘Mr Ross is painting the lake today. He gave Matthew and me some of his picnic, but we missed you.'

‘I'm sorry, Martha. My grandfather was ill and I wanted to be near a telephone.' Harry left the driving seat, opened the back door and she climbed in. Matthew followed, but David and Mary, carrying Luke, were walking at a slower pace.

‘Mr Ross said your grandfather was taken ill this morning, Mr Evans. I hope he is better now,' Mary said when she drew close. She wasn't wearing her shawl, which he presumed was still wet, and her thin black cotton skirt and blouse made her look positively emaciated. There were also deep shadows beneath her eyes as if she hadn't slept for days. David didn't look much better.

‘My grandfather's marginally better than he was, thank you.' He braced himself. ‘Dolly?' he ventured.

‘I walked her to the pit this morning and shot her.' David sat in the front passenger seat.

‘I'm sorry, I knew how much she meant to you – to all of you,' Harry sympathized. He waited until Mary settled herself in the back seat with Luke before closing the door. He returned to the driving seat, started the car and drove off.

Matthew leaned forward from the back. ‘The pit is where we burn our favourite animals, Mr Evans, so they don't have to go to the knacker's yard. Do you think they go to heaven from there? The minister doesn't, because he said in one of his sermons that animals don't have souls. But I think they do.'

‘You shouldn't contradict the minister, Matthew,' Martha said primly.

‘Why not? He's only a person, same as us,' David chipped in.

‘He's an important, educated person,' Martha countered.

‘Who wouldn't let us bury Dad in the family grave, old -'

‘David.' Mary's voice was weak with exhaustion.

‘For what it's worth, Matthew, I think animals do have souls.' Harry was finally able to answer the boy's question. ‘And when I get to heaven I hope to see the dogs, cats and horses my family has owned over the years.'

‘You're not just saying that, Mr Evans, because David had to shoot Dolly?' Martha pressed.

‘No, I really do believe that animals have souls. If they didn't they'd all be the same, wouldn't they? And each one I've met has its own personality.'

‘I'm glad you think the same as me, Mr Evans.' Matthew settled back contentedly.

Martha shouted in Harry's ear, ‘Miss Adams came up to see me this morning and she said that I can go back to work a week tomorrow.'

‘I'm glad to hear that.' Harry glanced across at David, who was sitting, sunk in misery. He knew exactly how he felt. Lloyd had always insisted that any decisions that had to be made about ending an animal's life because of accident or disease had to be made by its owner. The memory of one particular Labrador, Brutus, whose kidneys had failed after eight loyal years, still haunted him. ‘Do you still want me to take your produce down to Pontardawe on Wednesday, David?'

David said two words Harry had never expected to hear him utter. ‘Yes, please.'

Harry parked the car outside the farmhouse and walked through the yard to the back gate. Toby was standing in front of an easel he'd set up close to the reservoir on the floor of the valley. Harry shouted to him to attract his attention. Toby waved back and pointed to the canvas. Harry pointed to the house. The Ellises had already gone inside, he presumed, to change out of their ‘best' chapel clothes.

He returned to his car, opened the boot and took out the cardboard box he had filled with newspapers, pencils, paper scissors and his spare sketchbook. Already he knew the family's routine. As soon as they changed, Mary would most probably start making supper, David and Matthew would bring in the cows for milking, and Martha would be taking care of Luke. He couldn't think of a better time to start teaching her to read.

When it grew too dark to see the newspapers Harry had spread out, Mary pushed a spill into the fire. She waited until it caught, then lit the wick on a homemade tallow candle and set it between Harry and Martha in the middle of the table. David came in from the yard after shutting the poultry into the barn for the night. He unlaced his working boots, set them in the corner behind the door, put on a pair of knitted slippers and sat alongside Martha, Luke and Matthew on the bench opposite Harry.

‘I didn't know people could paint in the dark. That friend of yours down by the reservoir has just lit his lantern, Harry.'

‘Toby may have lit his lantern, but he won't be painting. He's probably doing what I was last night, studying the colour of the landscape in the moonlight and wondering how best to capture it in paint.' Harry watched Matthew, who had stayed at the table after supper, to help Martha to cut out letters and words from the papers. Without any prompting from him, Matthew put the first and second letters of his name in order.

‘That's the first letter over the door.' David pulled a ‘D' towards him with his forefinger.

‘That is the first letter of your name.' Harry found the remainder of the letters that spelled out David and put them in front of the boy.

‘Then David Ellis
is
written above the door?' He looked to Harry for confirmation.

‘David Ellis sixteen twenty-four,' Harry echoed, suppressing a smile at the astonishment on the boy's face.

‘I thought it was a story Dad made up.'

‘I told you it was your name, David.' Mary finished sweeping the hearth, emptied the dustpan into the fire and sat next to Harry. ‘Dad told me that the eldest son of the family has always been called David Ellis.'

‘Then that means that your family and a David Ellis has lived in this house for three hundred and two years,' Harry moved the ‘h' Matthew had put into his name and pushed in a second ‘t'.

‘Three hundred and two years,' Martha repeated in wonder. ‘Is that right, Mr Evans?'

Harry smiled. ‘Absolutely right, Martha. Now, look at these sheets of paper. I've written out the alphabet on them, and there's space under each letter for a small picture. I thought you could draw something that starts with that letter under every one to remind you of the sound. Let's see if we can think of things that you have on the farm.' Conscious that although they were silent, David and Mary were also listening to him, Harry pointed to the ‘A'.

‘That's the “A” from my name,' said Martha.

‘It is, and what starts with an “A”?'

‘An apple?'

‘That's good, Martha, and that is a perfect apple you've drawn,' he complimented when she added a stalk to the top.

‘Can you see what we're doing, Matthew?' Harry asked after Martha had drawn a bee, cow, dog and egg. ‘Can you think of something that starts with “F”?' He shook his head slightly at Martha who looked as though she were about to speak.

‘Fish?' Matthew answered doubtfully.

‘We don't see many of those round here. I can't remember the last time we had fish for dinner,' David complained.

‘A fork?' Martha was already drawing a hay fork.

‘“G” …'

‘Gate,' Matthew said with more confidence, and when Harry didn't contradict him, Martha drew a gate.

‘Looking at those pictures, Martha, I think Mr Ross would be better off trying to teach you to paint instead of me,' Harry complimented.

‘That's an “H” like in Martha so it could be a -'

‘Hay.' A tear rolled down Mary's cheek.

‘J for jam,' Harry continued briskly, assuming that she was thinking of Dolly. ‘Now we come to “K”.'

‘Kitchen,' Matthew shrieked, carried away by the new game.

‘Excellent.' Harry ruffled the boy's hair. ‘But that will be hard for Martha to draw so let's look at something else that is in the kitchen.' He looked pointedly at the stove.

‘Kettle,' Matthew and Martha called out simultaneously.

‘“L” for leek … mouse, nose, otter, patch …'

‘We've plenty of those,' David quipped, and the others laughed.

‘Quill.' Harry pulled a feather from his pocket that he'd picked up in the yard. ‘People used to dip the end in ink and write with these years ago.'

‘So that's why there were so many in the old oak desk drawers. The agent threw them in the rubbish when he took the desk. Do you remember, Mary?' David turned to his sister.

Mary looked so pale, drained and exhausted that Harry quickened the pace so he could finish the lesson. ‘Snail, rabbit, trap, udder, vicar, wagon, “X” – that's a hard one. The word that's most often used in the alphabet books for “X” is xylophone.'

‘What's a xylophone, Mr Evans?' Matthew asked.

‘A musical instrument. Let's cheat, Martha, there's an “X” at the end of fox, so you can draw one of those. And that leaves the last two letters – “Y” for yard and “Z” for zoo.'

‘What's a zoo?' Matthew looked to Harry again.

‘A place where they house animals from all over the world so people can go and see them.'

‘What kind of animals?'

‘All sorts.' Harry listed the most exotic creatures he could think of. ‘Elephants, camels, zebras, lions, tigers, monkeys …'

‘We saw a monkey once, in Pontardawe, with an organ-grinder, didn't we, Davy? He was only small but he could make a lot of noise.'

It was then that Harry realized the Ellises had probably never seen photographs of the other animals he'd mentioned. ‘There's a wonderful zoo in Bristol. It's not too far by train. You learn to read and write, Martha and Matthew, and I'll take you there as a reward.' He glanced at Mary and David. ‘And you two, of course, if you'd like to come.'

‘As if we can leave the farm,' David growled, reverting to his customary sour humour.

There was a knock at the door. Mary blanched.

‘Who is it?' David moved close to the box of logs next to the stove.

‘A weary painter,' Toby answered.

Matthew ran to open it. ‘Come in and look at what we're doing, Mr Ross. Mr Evans is teaching us to read.'

Toby glanced at the table. ‘So I see. I'm sorry to spoil your evening, but Harry and I will be in trouble with our landlady if we're any later than this for our supper. Ready to go, Harry?'

‘Yes.' Harry picked up his hat from the windowsill where he'd left it. ‘Thank you for the tea, Mary.' He looked back. David was spelling his name with the cut-out letters just like Martha and Matthew. And he noticed that, like Martha, he hadn't made a mistake in the order.

‘You will come again tomorrow, Mr Evans, and teach us some more?' Martha pleaded.

‘If your brother and sister don't mind, Martha,' he answered cautiously.

‘You'd be welcome, Mr Evans,' Mary murmured.

‘You know what time we have tea, Harry.'

As there was no anger, bitterness or sarcasm in David's voice, Harry smiled and nodded. ‘Thank you, David, I'll be here.'

‘So that's what you did in your room last night. It's not bad, Harry.' Toby stood back and eyed the watercolour Harry had painted.

‘Not bad,' Mrs Edwards said as she crossed the yard to Alf's workshop. ‘It's brilliant. That moonlight on the water looks real to me, Mr Evans.'

‘Thank you, Mrs Edwards. It's the first painting I've done that I'm not ashamed of.' Harry covered the canvas and lifted it into the back of the car.

‘You taking it to the sanatorium to show your grandfather?' Toby asked.

‘I am.' Harry looked at the shrouded canvas Toby was carrying. ‘Can I see yours?'

‘It's not finished,' Toby answered evasively.

‘I thought your lake only needed a lady's arm holding a sword?'

‘I'd still rather you saw it when it's ready for London.'

Harry stood back and crossed his arms across his chest. ‘It's that much better than mine?'

Realizing that Harry wasn't going to take no for an answer, Toby unveiled it.

Harry stared for a moment, then let out a low whistle. ‘Compared to that, mine's dead. I feel as though I could dive into the water.'

Toby covered it up. ‘What you have to remember is I have had four years' tuition at the Slade and a lifetime of watching Frank paint, as well as private tutoring from him.'

‘And if I had all that and more, I'd never be as good as you,' Harry climbed into his car.

‘That's where you're wrong, Harry.' Toby secured his painting in the back of the car alongside Harry's. ‘If you are prepared to put in the work and the hours, you'll improve. You certainly have the talent. Believe you me, the first landscape watercolour I did was nowhere near the standard of yours.'

‘And how old were you when you did it?' Harry drove out of the yard on to the road.

‘I can't remember.'

‘Really?' Harry questioned sceptically.

‘You have talent, Harry,' Toby insisted. ‘I wouldn't say so if you didn't. What I don't know is if you have the dedication and application to push yourself to the absolute limit of that talent and wring all you can out of it.'

Harry thought about what Toby had said. ‘You know something. I haven't a clue if I have or not,' he said seriously.

‘Talent is only half the battle,' Toby mused. ‘There were students at the Slade who were fantastic, streets ahead of me. But …'