The Hidden Years (41 page)

The front door of the house opened and a slim, dark-haired
woman came hurrying out. As his mother stepped out of the car she was
already embracing her, drawing her towards the open door.

This must be his uncle's wife, Daniel realised, studying
her. She was probably around the same age as his mother, maybe even
older, but she looked so different… Her clothes were
different, for one thing, and she didn't look tired the way his mother
always did. Her nails weren't broken from scrubbing floors and her hair
was thick and glossy.

'Megan… it's been so long. Come in. Mam's
waiting for you… I've sent the boys over to a friend's for
tonight, thought it would give you time to get settled in a little.
You'll be staying at Mam's of course, but we thought… well.'

'Don't forget this young man, Sarah,' his uncle was
saying, one hand resting comfortingly on his shoulder as though he knew
how alien he felt, how unsure of himself and awkward.

'Of course not… Come on in, Daniel. Mam's been
driving us all mad telling us how clever you are.'

Somehow or other they were marshalled inside, through a
shabby large hallway cluttered with heavy furniture and into a warm
sunny room, equally over-furnished, and yet somehow warm and welcoming.

A small still dark-haired woman was sitting in a chair,
her face turned towards the door.

She didn't get up as they walked in, and Daniel realised
that she was actually in a wheelchair and that her hands were gnarled
and twisted, the knuckles and joints badly swollen.

'Mam…' He heard the emotion in his mother's
voice and felt tears prick his own eyes as she hurried towards the
wheelchair and its occupant.

'There, there, Megan, my lovely. There's no need for
tears… Come and sit down here beside me and tell me why it's
taken you sixteen years to bring my grandson to see me.'

'I couldn't, Mam… I just couldn't, what with Da
and John…' Her voice broke, and, remembering the bruises he
had seen on her face, the fear he had seen in her eyes, Daniel felt a
sudden hot resurgence of his hatred for his father, and for all men
like him, who used violence against others weaker than themselves. What
kind of man had his grandfather been, that he had not known how his
daughter had suffered, that he had not cared enough to find out what
her life was?

'Daniel, come here and say hello to your grandmother.'

Obediently he went to his mother's side.

'So this is Daniel…' Clear grey eyes the same
colour as his own searched his face, and one twisted hand covered his
own. The skin felt paper-thin and hot to his touch, and he knew without
knowing how that those swollen joints ached and burned with pain, and
that behind her calm smile this woman who was his grandmother had known
many hours of emotional and physical suffering.

'He's a fine boy, Megan. A fine boy, and a clever boy as
well.'

Daniel felt himself flushing with embarrassment. He had
never felt able to forget that it was his mother's hard work and his
grandmother's generosity that had made it possible for him to take up
his scholarship, and yet now, when he wanted to thank her, when he
wanted to tell her how conscious he was of that debt, there were no
words… He could only stand there feeling awkward and foolish.

'You'll be staying for a while?' Daniel turned his head as
his uncle addressed his mother.

'Well, we'd like to…'

'You've always got a home here, Megan, you know that. You
always have had.'

Daniel saw his mother shake her head. 'No, not while Da
was still alive. I couldn't… I hurt him so badly when I
married John.'

'Well, he had such high hopes for you… He
wanted you to follow in Gareth's footsteps, to become a doctor.'

His mother, a doctor… Daniel stared at her. He
had never known, never guessed when she had spent those long hours
helping him with his school work, encouraging him… His
mother, a doctor…

She could have had so much… but she had married
his father instead.

Daniel was no fool. He was sixteen years old and he could
count. He had been born five months after his parents' marriage. His
heart bled for his mother. How had she felt when she discovered that
she was pregnant, when she had known that she must marry his father?
She must have loved him then, unthinkable though it seemed now.

His grandmother was saying something about a drink of
tea before they left for her bungalow. Sarah was exhorting them to stay
for their evening meal. Daniel let their conversation flow over him,
going to stand by the window and stare outside.

'All right, son?'

The kind voice and gentle touch of his uncle startled him.

'Yes—yes, I was just wondering if you could see
the sea from here—it's so different here from at
home…'

'You can see it from the attic windows. I'll take you up
there some time. I'm sorry about your father. I never knew
him—'

'I'm not.'

The denial came thick and bitter, causing him to flush and
clench his fists, this uncomfortable sign of impending manhood, the
startling change of his voice from boyhood to manhood, embarrassing
him, just as other manifestations of his adolescence also did.

He held his breath, fearful that his uncle would question
him, knowing with an instinct that needed no definition that his mother
would not want the painful bones of her marriage to his father laid
bare before the compassion of her family, knowing that her pride would
never allow her to tell them just what kind of husband John Ryan had
been.

They had been staying with his grandmother for just over a
week. He had become firm friends with his uncle's twin sons and had
begun to feel as though he had finally found a place where he was
actually accepted, when he looked up from the book he was reading at
his grandmother's kitchen table to hear her exclaiming in a pleased
voice, 'Here's Robert Cavanagh—he must be over to visit
Nora's folk. Daniel, get up and let him in, will you? Your legs are
younger than mine.'

As he got up, Daniel happened to see his mother's face. It
had gone the colour of old putty, drained of all the healthy warmth
which these last few days had put into it.

The transformation within his mother had amazed and
delighted Daniel. Since coming home she had seemed to shed
years… She laughed and sang as she worked in his
grandmother's kitchen, her eyes shone and she even moved differently,
as though a weight had been lifted from her shoulders, and now in the
space of half a dozen seconds she had once again become the woman she
had been in Liverpool—cowed, nervous, frightened. Why?

He opened the door before the man approaching it could
knock. Tall, dark-haired, he had the lightest, most piercing blue-grey
eyes Daniel had ever seen. His skin was weatherbeaten and tough like
that of a man who worked out of doors, and yet he was dressed in a dark
suit and crisp white shirt and he looked as though they were the kind
of clothes he wore all the time. He wore them with the same ease which
Daniel had already noticed in the fathers of his schoolfriends, as
casually as his own father had worn his own workclothes. This was no
suit donned for a special occasion. This man had wealth and power,
Daniel recognised. He also recognised that for some reason his arrival
had terrified his mother.

She had her back to the door now and was busy scraping
potatoes for their lunch. He saw the man smile at his grandmother and
then stiffen slightly as he saw his mother. A second's hesitation
before he walked in and embraced his grandmother, saying calmly at the
same time, 'Megan. What a wonderful surprise. I had no idea you were
back.'

'She's only been here a week, Robert, and this is her son,
Daniel.'

'Daniel.'

The firm handshake, the man-to-man smile, the cool, brief
meeting of their eyes told Daniel a lot and yet kept a lot hidden from
him as well. This man was astute, astute and cautious. Daniel could not
sense the hotheaded streak of violence which had been so powerfully
obvious in his father. This man was obviously well liked by his
grandmother, and yet he could almost feel the waves of fear emanating
from his mother as she resolutely kept her back towards the visitor.

Robert Cavanagh didn't stay long. Just long enough to
commiserate with Daniel's grandmother on the loss of her husband and to
refuse the proffered cup of tea.

In all he could hardly have been in the house more than
ten minutes, and during that time, although she had finished scraping
the potatoes soon after he had walked in the door, Daniel noticed that
his mother kept herself busy at the sink, refusing to join in the
conversation despite both her mother's and Robert Cavanagh's attempts
to include her.

Only when he had gone did she make any comment, asking in
a voice that was unfamiliarly hard and flat, and which fell sharply and
discordantly against Daniel's sensitive ears, 'And where was his wife,
then—I see he doesn't bring her to visit with her
folk…'

'Heavens, Megan, didn't I say? Poor Nora's dead. Her bad
spells had been getting much worse recently. She'd gone into hospital
again for more treatment and it was while she was there… she
just walked out and went straight under a lorry… Instant, it
was, the doctor said. Of course Robert blamed himself but there was
nothing he could have done, poor man. A good husband he'd been to her.
There's many a man who would not have stuck by her the way he has. It
was losing the child, of course. She was never the same after that.
There's many a time when they were here that your father was called out
in the night to her. And she was such a pretty little thing when they
married, and both of them so young.'

When they were on their own Daniel asked his mother, 'What
was wrong with Mr Cavanagh's wife?'

What he really wanted to know was why his mother was
frightened of the man and why no one seemed to be aware of it but him.

They had gone for tea to his uncle's, and when his
grandmother had mentioned Robert Cavanagh's visit, immediately both his
uncle and aunt had been full of enthusiasm and praise for the man.

It seemed that his father had been the local builder, and
that on his death Robert Cavanagh had taken over the business and built
it up into a much larger concern. So large in fact that he had moved to
Cardiff where he had become very successful indeed.

'He hasn't forgotten his home, though,' had been Sarah's
comment. 'When the chapel roof needed replacing Robert sent a gang of
his men over and virtually did the job free.'

'She had a baby, a little girl,' his mother told him
quietly. 'A pretty little thing, she was. I think I must have been
about fifteen at the time. She and Robert still lived here then. She
was a pretty girl, Nora… always one to like a bit of a laugh
and a joke with the boys… Bit of a flirt, like, some said.

'Anyway it seems she'd gone for a walk along the cliff and
she'd taken the baby with her in the pram. Only while she was up there
she'd met this lad, whether by accident or on purpose I don't really
know. They got chatting and she must have forgotten to put the brake on
the baby's pram, because the next thing they knew it was rolling
towards the edge of the cliff. They tried to stop it, but it was too
late. It was a full tide, and a good two-hundred-foot drop over the
cliff there… The poor little mite had no chance
really…

'Totally changed Nora, it did… Took to
wandering along the cliff top late at night crying and wringing her
hands. She had to be sent away for a while to a special
hospital…' She gave a brief shake of her head. 'It's a
terrible thing to happen to a woman, that… Poor woman,
indeed. God willing, she's at peace now.'

'And Robert—Mr Cavanagh. How did he…?'

'Well, Robert was heartbroken… Fair doted on
the child he did and no mistake, but it's different for a
man…'

'And did they have any more children?' Daniel wanted to
know. His mother shook her head.

'She couldn't, see… something went wrong when
she had the first and the doctors told her then that there wouldn't be
any more. That's what made it so hard for her.'

It was only later that Daniel recognised that this
conversation with his mother had marked a turning point in his life:
that she was now treating him as a co-adult and not a child, that with
the removal of his father from their lives he had now become the man of
the family.

Later, looking back, that summer in Wales was one of the
happiest in his life.

The twins, his cousins, Andrew and Anthony, although
almost two years his senior, welcomed his company.

The small town had no senior school, there weren't many
other young adults in the town, and their nearest friends lived in
Aberystwyth.

A bike was found from somewhere for Daniel and the three
of them would sometimes cycle into Aberystwyth to meet up with a gang
of the twins' friends, and to spend the afternoon watching the girls on
the beach and the pier, occasionally throwing out flirtatious remarks
to them, talking light-heartedly about what they would do, if they were
lucky enough to get one of the girls to take up their vocal invitations.

In the end, and much to his own surprise, it was Daniel
who aroused the most interest in the groups of girls who gathered on
the beach ostensibly for the purpose of sunbathing, but in reality in
order to amuse themselves by teasing the boys.

He had his first amateurish kiss in the shadows beneath
the pier, experienced his first unsteady and half shocking thrill of
groping clumsily with the clothing of the girl wriggling in his arms as
she exhorted him, 'No, not like that… it unfastens here like
this, see?'

Perhaps because of his height and the breadth of his
shoulders, perhaps because his voice had now well and truly broken, and
his jaw was already shadowed with his first beard, or perhaps simply
because the twins were older and he was accepted as being their peer,
the crowd all seemed to assume that he was older than his sixteen years.