Finders and Keepers (6 page)

‘People waste away to skeletons and cough up their lungs,' he continued. ‘It's messy and terrible to watch when the patient is a stranger. We all know how fond you are of Dad and him of you, Harry, but are you sure you know what you're volunteering for, in visiting this place?'

‘I haven't overdosed on Keats's poetry or
The Lady with the Camellias,
if that's what you're thinking, Uncle Joey. And I've visited hospitals. I delivered food to some when the General Strike was called in May.'

‘And you let this blackleg into your house, Lloyd?' Victor's poor attempt at a joke fell leadenly into the heavy atmosphere.

‘The volunteers only kept essential services going, they weren't after anyone's job.' Lloyd stared thoughtfully at his stepson. ‘Well, all I can say, Harry, is you're right. One of us should see the sanatorium before subjecting Dad to the journey there. Thank you for taking it upon yourself.'

Harry winked at Bella, the only other one of his generation who had been allowed to eat with the adults. She was very obviously close to tears.

‘I wish we could see Dad, if only for a couple of minutes, to ask him how he feels about going to this Craig-y-Nos,' Victor said feelingly.

‘If Doctor Adams does agree to take Dad as a patient, and Harry thinks the place is suitable, we might see Dad sooner than we think,' Lloyd consoled him.

‘If everything is as Doctor Williams said, will you stay in the valley until we take Dad to the sanatorium, Harry?' Victor asked.

‘That depends on how soon it can be arranged.'

‘If they'll take him, we'll bring him down the day after tomorrow,' Joey said firmly. ‘I don't think he should be left on the isolation ward of the Graig a day longer than necessary. On Doctor Williams's own admission they can't offer him any treatment.'

‘In that case I'll stay. There's bound to be a pub or a farmhouse nearby that rents out rooms.' Harry turned to Megan. ‘You're from the Swansea Valley, aren't you, Aunty Megan?'

‘Yes, but it's a long time since I've been there, I couldn't recommend anywhere.' Megan was estranged from her family. Her chapel deacon father had warned her that if she married Catholic Victor, he would count her name among the dead, and that he would do the same to her mother, brothers and sisters if they tried to contact her. But instead of deterring her, his threats had made her all the more determined to marry the man of her choice.

‘Is the climate there as good as Doctor Williams told us?'

‘To be honest, I don't remember it being much different from Pontypridd, but I was only thirteen when I left. There's iron and tinplate works as well as coal pits in the lower valley but the upper valley is pretty. There are woods, a river and a couple of waterfalls. I remember the castle. It's huge and the gardens are beautiful; the river runs through them and there's a small lake. There's even a winter garden. I peeped in there once and saw lemons and oranges growing on trees. But when I was a girl Madame Patti was still alive and living there between tours. She built a theatre in Craig-y-Nos and gave free concerts for the local people. She had an incredibly clear and haunting voice. The chapel minister told us that theatres paid her five thousand pounds in gold to perform for a single night, and all the kings and queens in Europe would come to hear her, yet she'd sing for us for nothing. After the concerts her servants would give us tea and there'd be a present for every child. Two of my sisters worked there as maids and loved the place and her. For all I know, they could still be at the castle.'

‘Sounds pretty, so there's bound to be better views from the windows in the castle for Granddad to look at than there are from the Graig.' Harry pushed his empty cup aside and leaned his elbows on the table. ‘I'll drive to the valley tomorrow, find myself a room and try to see Doctor Adams right away. If he is willing to treat Granddad, I'll ask him to show me the room where he will stay, and if it looks all right, I'll telephone you and then you can bring him down.'

‘Train would be best,' Victor said decisively. ‘We'll book a private carriage so he can lie on the seats. But you'll have to arrange transport from the local station, Harry. He may not be able to sit up in your car.'

‘The sanatorium should have an ambulance if we need one.'

‘Then it's settled. We'll wait for your telephone call, Harry.' Victor stood.

‘Thank you, Harry.' Joey also rose to his feet and slapped Harry on his back.

‘Yes, it's good of you to offer to do this, Harry.' Victor watched another tear escape from Megan's eye and squeezed her hand.

‘I've a road map of South Wales that you can have.' Lloyd stared ruefully at the boxes piled in the corner of the room. ‘That's if I can find it.'

‘I'll give you a hand to sort through the packing cases this evening.' Sali handed her handkerchief to Bella, as the tears started to fall from her daughter's eyes.

‘Best get an early start, Harry,' Victor advised. ‘You know what cars are like. The minute you're the maximum distance from the nearest garage, it will break down.'

‘Are you wishing that on me, Uncle Victor?'

‘It's happened too often to me to wish it on anyone else. I've been to the Swansea Valley, and Megs is right – it is a beautiful place but the sheep outnumber the people a hundred to one, and there's nothing there but isolated farms, scenery and the castle. It's twenty-odd miles to Brecon, eighteen to Swansea and there are precious few shops in between. Take a good book if you're intent on staying overnight.'

‘Do you think Harry really knows what TB is like?' Victor asked when Lloyd walked him and Joey to the door.

‘If he doesn't, he's going to find out.' Joey lifted his hat from the stand. ‘That was some homecoming party we gave him.'

‘We'll have a party again some other time.' Lloyd tried not to think when that might be.

‘Funny to think of little Harry all grown up,' Joey reflected as they walked outside. ‘It only seems like the other day that he moved in with us in Tonypandy when Sali became our housekeeper.'

‘Some other day,' Victor commented. ‘You looked in the mirror and counted your grey hairs lately, Joey?'

‘Ready?' Joey opened the passenger doors of his car for Rhian when she brought out his three daughters and two sons.

‘I am.' She turned to Sali and Megan. ‘See you all very soon.'

Victor opened the doors on the lorry and called impatiently, ‘The cows won't milk themselves, boys, Megs.'

Megan hugged and kissed Sali, Rhian and the girls one last time. She was halfway to the lorry when she turned and ran back to Harry.

‘You will make sure that this place is right for Dad, won't you, Harry?'

‘I promise, Aunty Megan.' Harry picked up Glyn and encouraged him to wave goodbye along with the rest of his family.

Chapter Three

Mary lifted the final basket of eggs on to the back of the cart David had harnessed.

Dolly was the sole remaining mare in the stable that had once held two dozen riding, cart and shire horses. Knowing that Mary used Dolly to ferry the produce she kept from him, Bob the Gob had once demanded she send her to market. But even he had to admit that that at twenty-one, Dolly was too old to attract a bid from anyone other than the glue manufacturer, who never paid more than two shillings for an animal. So, he had grudgingly given in to Mary's pleas that they be allowed to keep the horse. But only after reminding her that in return, he expected her to pay a proportion of their rent in hard cash. He also added that it could only be a matter of months before the mare died and she would be forced to give up her clandestine dealings.

Dolly was slow and arthritic but Mary dreaded losing her. She was their only means of transporting produce out of Bob's clutches and, as with the ever-present threat of the workhouse, she refused to speculate about what would happen when the horse went.

She walked around to the front of the cart where David was sitting, reins in hand, Luke firmly tucked in between himself and Matthew.

‘There's twelve dozen eggs, six pounds of butter, four cheeses, two dozen chickens and a dozen geese plucked and ready for the oven,' she reminded him. ‘You'll make sure that Miss Adams, not Cook – after the way she tried to cheat you last time – has first pick at Craig-y-Nos. And you'll double-check everything Miss Adams takes and the money she pays you. Take whatever's left to the Colonial Stores. With luck we should have at least ten pounds left after you've bought our goods.'

‘I can barter and look after money as well as you, Mary,' he countered irritably.

‘Take care of Matthew and Luke. And only buy what we need; no sweets, no bargains, just flour, salt, tea, sugar, oats, chicken feed, soda and soap.'

‘I know what to get,' he snarled. ‘Martha, where are you?' he bellowed at the open back door of the house.

‘Coming.' Martha ran out in her maid's uniform.

‘You'll be walking to Craig-y-Nos if you don't climb on to the cart this minute.'

‘See you all at teatime. You'll be hungry so I'll make a stew,' Mary shouted as David steered the cart through the arch.

She watched them leave before turning back to the farmyard. Ten gallons of milk – over and above what they were contracted to put out in the churns every morning to be picked up by the cart that went into Brecon – waited to be turned into butter and cheese in the dairy. All the churns needed to be scoured and cleaned ready for the evening milking, the cowsheds cleaned, the pigs fed, vegetables dug up for the stew, the sheep checked, and that was without the housework – and Bob Pritchard.

Sick to the pit of her stomach she put the chores in order of priority. Churns first; the longer they were left after they were emptied, the harder they were to scour. And she couldn't take the risk of sending dirty milk to Brecon. The last thing she needed was the dairy withholding payment to the agent for sour milk.

Harry pushed his foot down on the accelerator and watched the needle on his speed dial creep from thirty to forty miles an hour. The sky had darkened; the air felt heavy and portended rain. Yet he was loath to waste any more time by stopping to put up the hood on his car after losing an hour changing his front tyre, which had punctured on the stony track of the Bwlch Mountain that separated the Rhondda and Afan Valleys.

He'd left Pontypridd after an early breakfast in the hope that he would reach the sanatorium before lunchtime and, with luck, arrange an appointment with Dr Adams for that day. But the puncture had delayed him and, suddenly hungry two hours later, he had broken his journey at a roadside pub outside Swansea and bought a pork pie, which he'd eaten in the car while travelling up the road that led into the Swansea Valley.

His Aunty Megan had been right. Once he'd left the industrial area that stretched as far as the small town of Pontardawe behind him, the upper valley was beautiful. But as his Uncle Victor had warned, it was also sparsely populated, except for sheep and cows. The few villages and hamlets he passed through were a fraction of the size of those in the Rhondda. He had seen several inns and pubs but only a couple of dozen shops – mainly grocers, seed merchants and butchers – and after comparatively bustling Pontardawe, most of those had been set up in the front rooms of terraced cottages. If he had passed a garage, he hadn't spotted it, and although he'd been careful to fill his petrol tank and the two spare cans he carried in the boot, the supply wouldn't last long with his tourer barely managing fifteen miles to the gallon.

He glanced at the map his mother had dug out of a packing case, then back to the old coaching inn up ahead. If his calculations were right, he was in the village of Abercrave, only a couple of miles from the hamlet of Penycae and no more than three or four miles from Craig-y-Nos castle.

He eased his foot off the accelerator and turned into the yard in front of the pub. To his relief a single petrol pump stood in a corner. He parked next to it and hit his horn. A short, stocky, dark-haired young man about his own age walked out of the barn built at right angles to the inn.

‘Nice tourer, sir,' he said, brushing his hands together to rid them of sawdust.

Harry picked up the lilt of someone more accustomed to speaking Welsh than English. ‘Thank you.'

‘We haven't seen many new ones in the valley, not since Madame Patti passed on. Back then we used to get the lot in here. Rolls-Royce, Bentley, Mercedes – you name it, we saw and serviced it. That's why my father opened this workshop, to sort out the toffs' cars.' Suddenly remembering he was there to serve, he went to the pump. ‘Do you want petrol, sir?'

‘I most certainly do. Fill her up, please.' Harry left his car and stretched his cramped legs and arms. ‘Am I on the right road for Craig-y-Nos?'

The man stepped away from him. ‘You going to the sanatorium, sir?'

‘As a visitor. But if the treatment they offer is as good as my family have heard, and the doctor in charge will take him, my grandfather may become a patient.'

‘They say it's the best in Britain for lung disease, sir, but we locals don't go near the place if we can help it.'

‘That's understandable. Is it close?'

‘About four miles up the valley. You can't miss it. It's a huge place on the right-hand side of the road.' He eased the nozzle from the tank. ‘That will be a shilling and a penny halfpenny, sir.'

Harry dug his hand in his pocket, pulled out a fistful of change and handed over two sixpences and two pennies. ‘I'm glad there's a garage close by.'

‘Only one between Swansea and Brecon, sir,' the man announced proudly.

‘Do you do repairs as well as servicing?'

‘Yes, sir.' He put his hand in his pocket, checked the coins he drew out and handed Harry a halfpenny change.