Goodbye to Dreams (2 page)

‘Dance, sailor?’ The young girl stopped and faced him, pert face looking up into his, a hand spread on the opposite wall, her arm a slender barrier.

‘I don’t dance. I just came to see someone.’

‘Won’t I do instead, sailor?’ She put her head on one side appealingly.

‘I’m not a sailor and no, you won’t!’ He was so angry with himself for bothering to reply, repulsed by the expression in the young/old face. She succeeded in delaying his departure and he backed away and re-entered the hall. He continued to stand amid the revellers, thinking his own angry thoughts, oblivious to the merriment around him, hating himself for being there but unable to leave. In his distressed mind, Cecily and the young
prostitute
were alike. He watched, feasting his eyes and his anger on the sight of Cecily dancing as close to Gareth as ivy to an oak tree.

The dancing was little more than a blatant excuse for cuddling; clear to see now the crowd had thinned a little. Their cheeks were touching and he felt the familiar jerk of pain when he saw the glazed and dreamy
expression
in Cecily’s eyes, a look he remembered so well. Good luck, Gareth, he thought bitterly, you’ll need it! The sight produced the deep agony of
jealousy
, but still he stayed.

At one o’clock the Master of Ceremonies announced the last waltz. The lights were lowered and partners chosen. To the surprise of the man watching, Cecily and Ada left the floor. He searched the heads of the dancers as they drifted past his shadowed corner but there was no sign of
Gareth. He must have slipped away to avoid the dance which tacitly asked to escort a girl home. ‘Best for him too,’ he muttered with mild satisfaction.

People dawdled out, reluctant to end the evening, a contented tiredness slowing their steps, and he began to push his way through. Reaching the door, the cold hit him and he tightened his navy coat more tightly around him, pulling up the collar against the icy night air. He had left his
motorbike
propped against a tree but when he reached the place it had gone.

Gareth felt guilty about hurrying away before the end of the dance but he did not want to take Cecily home, not with Ada there too – it would have been embarrassing. Besides, Willie would be waiting for them with the horse and trap. He knew how close the sisters were and how difficult it was going to be to get between them. If he tried, that is. Mam was against him taking Cecily out. ‘No prospect there,’ she repeatedly told him. ‘With two sisters-in-law to argue about the shop when Owen Owen goes, those girls will have nothing.’

Gareth didn’t consider that a disadvantage. Better to have a wife dependent upon a man; there was less likely to be any trouble that way. No, with his barber’s shop doing very nicely, he thought he and Cecily would manage very well. But it was best to listen to Mam, for a while yet anyway.

He broke into a run, the tunes he and Cecily had danced to ringing in his head. It had been a good night. Pity not to end it by walking Cecily home though. Perhaps if he invited her home for tea one day, he mused. Mam might soften towards her if she talked to her a bit more. He walked past the barber’s shop where he earned the money to keep himself and his mother. The adjoining shop was a tobacconist, both shops sharing the same triangular-shaped entrance. Now if he could buy that as well as his own he’d be comfortably off. He wondered idly how much old man Owen would leave to Cecily. If Mam thought her prospects were good she would be more tolerant.

He removed his shoes before going into the house. Light sleeper was Mam. No need for her to know just how late he got home. He ate some bread and jam and went to bed to dream about Cecily.

The man who had watched Cecily and Gareth dancing cursed when he failed to find his motorbike in the vicinity of the dance hall. He went back to the doors which were spilling out the last of the laughing, happy revellers and listened to the shouts of friends arranging other venues and calling affectionate goodbyes. The doorman shook his head when questioned. He didn’t remember hearing a motorbike start up.

‘Not a chance in the rowdiness of the past hours,’ he grumbled. ‘Young
people today, never happy unless they’re making a row. A real suck-in this job is. Told me I’d finish at twelve and here it is gone half past one and me still trying to get them off the premises.’ He turned and shouted for the stragglers to hurry.

The man left the doorman still complaining and went to begin a search of the streets. Outside he bumped into the girl he had been watching but had hoped to avoid meeting.

‘Danny!’ Cecily gasped.

‘Hello, Cecily, Ada.’ He nodded at the surprised sisters. ‘Someone has stolen my motorbike,’ he said foolishly, as an explanation of his presence there at that time.

‘Willie’s waiting for us with the trap if you’d like a lift?’ Cecily spoke nervously, quickly. She didn’t know whether to stop and talk or run away.

Danny shook his head. ‘No, I’d better search for the bike.’

‘No, come on, Danny,’ Ada said, taking his arm, ‘come with us. Willie won’t mind driving around. Better chance of finding it then.’

Cecily was in a daze. She stood, silent, as Danny approached the trap, and it was Ada who explained to Willie what had happened. The young stable boy nodded and jumped down to help Cecily and Ada up to their seats.

‘Come on, Cecily,’ Ada said with a laugh. ‘Don’t fall asleep yet!’

‘I’m sorry.’ Danny belatedly offered his arm to help her.

His arm was something long lost and recently found. The others were talking, discussing where they should look for the bike, but to Cecily their voices sounded far off, as if she were in the strange state when sleep had almost claimed her yet allowed her to eavesdrop on what was going on around her. Ada poked her cheerfully. ‘Budge up, sis, make room for me.’ And Cecily shook off the disbelief of seeing Danny so unexpectedly, and smiled at her sister.

‘I can’t remember seeing a bike, or hearing one start,’ young Willie was saying. ‘Fell asleep I did. Damn me, someone could have stolen the horse and I wouldn’t have noticed.’ He clicked at the horse and they began to pull away. ‘Leave it to me, I’ll go round the locality in a pattern. Find it for you we will, no trouble.’

Cecily sat next to Danny, her heart pounding painfully, unable to start a conversation, unable to believe that after seven years she was sitting beside Danny Preston. He too seemed unable to speak. It was Ada who filled the air with her chatter. Cecily shrugged herself deeper into her fur-collared coat and listened as Ada began to talk about the dance.

‘There’s a pity you don’t like dancing, Danny. Great fun it was, all crowded together and sharing the celebration.’

‘More for the out-of-doors, me,’ Danny replied, his voice deep and strong, making Cecily start. She had been telling herself he was a ghost, an unreal image, dragged out of her heart by thoughts of being married to Gareth. She saw his head move slightly and knew the remark was for her. Dancing versus the great outdoors, that had been their constant problem. Dancing was the one subject she needed to avoid, and Ada, bless her, had jumped straight into it.

‘You always did prefer walks to dancing, didn’t you, Danny?’ Ada was saying. ‘Just as well, you taking a job as a postman! Still a postman, are you? Haven’t heard of you for years, Danny Preston.’

‘Still a postman.’

‘And we’re still helping Dadda in the shop. Doing most everything now, mind. With our mam not with us any more.’

‘I heard about her going off with some man and leaving you all.’ A brief embarrassed silence and he added, ‘Your father, still on the docks, is he?’

‘Yes, but he helps us with the heavy stuff. Young Willie too. He does a lot to help us. Couldn’t manage without Willie, could we, Cecily? But it’s me and Cecily running things, ever since Mam … left.’

Cecily felt the blush heat her face despite the freezing air. The second worst subject to discuss with Danny was their mother running off with the coalman and apart from a scrappy note written on the back of a used
envelope
, no explanation or a word telling them she was sorry.

‘What about trying up round the park?’ she suggested, hoping to change the subject. ‘Aren’t we supposed to be looking for a bike?’

‘I’m heading there now,’ Willie said. ‘Keep a good lookout.’ He showed no embarrassment at listening to their conversation. He was sixteen and had worked for the Owens in one capacity or another since he was nine.

‘Where are you living now, Danny?’ Ada asked.

Why doesn’t she be quiet, give him a chance to say something? Cecily thought irritably. Tell us what he was doing outside the dance hall for a start.

‘I’m back home with Mam, for the present, that is.’

Cecily’s breath shortened. She waited for the next words. Was he about to say he was married? Living at home with his wife? Or soon to be married and expecting to change accommodation? She had heard nothing of him since they parted when she was eighteen.

Willie called for the horse to ‘whoa’ and stopped near a lamppost. ‘Come on, Miss Ada. You walk around one side of the park with me and these two can walk round the other. Save us time, that will.’

They all obediently stepped down and Danny walked beside Cecily, leaving the other two to walk in the opposite direction and circle the small
park. He didn’t touch her and only an occasional cough revealed his
nervousness
. Cecily still failed to think of a word to say to him. Questions abounded in her head. She wanted to know what he had been doing, whether there was someone else in his life, if marriage was on his mind, or whether he had found it impossible to let another New Year pass without seeing her and finding a way back to what they’d had all those years ago. His unreasonable jealously had ruined their love and she wondered if he would remain her only love. Guilt brought Gareth to mind. Gareth was different. She would have married him and cared for him, but there would never have been the excitement and passion she’d known with Danny Preston. Perhaps, she thought with a brief moment of understanding, perhaps that was how it had been for her mother.

‘What have you been doing since we parted, Danny?’ she asked at last. ‘None of the crowd have seen you and no news of you has filtered back. You might as well have gone to Australia.’

‘I did leave, I went to sea. For five years I travelled in cargo ships in and out of a hundred ports. Then I grew tired of it all. I lived in Spain for a while but politics made things difficult so I came home. Went back to
delivering
letters.’

‘I’m glad,’ she whispered, but he appeared not to hear.

‘I came home, got a job and found myself a girl and now I’m going to be married. Next month my wife and I will be moving into rooms in Foxhole Street.’ He said the words fast, as if to prevent her from commenting.

‘Foxhole Street. That’s over the far side of the docks, near the Pleasure Beach, isn’t it? Very nice over there.’ She was amazed at how calm she sounded, coming so soon after his unexpected reappearance had hurled her back into a dream of his returning to her. All thoughts of Gareth had fled. He was here, walking beside her in the darkness, then the foolish, fanciful, golden dream had been shattered.

‘Sudden, wasn’t it?’ she forced herself to ask. ‘Meeting this girl and
planning
to marry her?’

Why did you come? she asked silently and, as if she had spoken the words aloud, he said, ‘I came to the dance to look for you.’

‘Why?’

‘I’ve thought about you a lot during the last seven years, Cecily. I’ve wondered, in the dark loneliness of nights in foreign places, whether we’d made a mistake all those years ago. When I came back and heard you weren’t married I wondered, for a while, if I should come back into your life.’

‘Supposing of course that I wanted you to!’ she couldn’t help blurting out. ‘But you didn’t.’

‘I didn’t. I met Jessie and she seems to suit me, want the same things and we, well, we’re getting married.’

‘Love match, is it?’ Her voice was sweet but the sarcasm was clear.

‘I wouldn’t marry her if I didn’t love her,’ he defended.

‘Then why did you come and find me tonight? That was what you were doing, wasn’t it? Probably watching me dancing and having a good time and even though you no longer love me, you still felt the old jealousy writhing inside you like an evil snake.’ She fought down the temptation to hit him for his stupidity. After seven years she still wanted to hit out at the foolish jealously that had forced them to separate. ‘Danny Preston, with all your world travel and vast experiences, you’re still a fool.’

Voices came then. Willie and Ada in muted voices, conscious of the
lateness
of the hour and of people sleeping in the nearby houses. ‘Danny! We’ve found it!’ Ada called.

‘Not damaged so far as I can see,’ Willie added.

‘Not even hidden. It’s just by the wall over by there!’

Cecily couldn’t decide whether she was glad the painful interlude was over, or sorry they couldn’t have worked through the anger and
recriminations
to something approaching harmony. After seven years it was unbelievable that they were at once on the defensive and even attack, after just moments in each other’s company.

Willie and Ada didn’t approach them but walked away waiting for Danny to follow to where they had found his motorbike.

Danny reached for her. ‘Cecily, why do we fight so?’ He pulled her close and his lips touched hers, gentle at first but then with ever growing hunger. His touch, his arms enfolding her, the very scent of him were so familiar she sobbed as he released her. In the dim light of a distant street lamp, his eyes were moist too.

‘Danny, it’s been so long,’ she whispered. ‘I hoped you would no longer make me feel this way.’

‘I was a fool to come.’ He walked away, calling to Ada and Willie. ‘Where are you? Thanks for finding the bike. It’s a long walk home.’

Cecily didn’t move to join them. She heard the sound of his feet running on the gravel road, the muffled talk and laughter. Then the sound of the bike starting up and moving away put an end to her anticipation of his returning to her. She wiped her eyes and called in a firm voice, ‘Come on, Ada, I’m frozen. Let’s get home.’