Tiger Bay Blues (35 page)

‘Edyth, what on earth do you think you’re doing?’

‘Bringing you tea and cheese on toast,’ she answered in confusion.

‘Never,
never
walk into my study without knocking.’

As her father’s study door was always open to the entire family she stared at him in amazement. ‘But, Peter, we’re married –’

‘And I could have visitors. A newly bereaved widow, a couple about to embark on marriage, parishioners entrusting me with confidential information. Imagine how they would feel if my wife waltzed in without as much as by your leave to bring me tea.’

Feeling justly rebuked, Edyth murmured, ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t think.’

‘No harm was done this time, but please, always knock in future, even if you think that I am alone. It is as well that you don’t develop bad habits.’

She set the tray on his desk. ‘I’m going upstairs to look at the bedrooms and bathrooms. You’ll join me?’

‘As soon as I’ve eaten this.’ He shuffled through the letters he had been opening. She had been dismissed, and she felt exactly as she had done when the headmistress of the grammar school had told her to leave after a particularly unpleasant interview.

‘I heard you on the stairs, Mrs Slater.’ Mrs Mack joined Edyth on the landing as she was looking at the doors and debating which one to open first. ‘Reverend Slater had the bedroom suite your parents bought you put into this bedroom.’ She opened the door to a back bedroom. It was situated above the sitting room and just as gloomy because the wall of the church extended beyond the height of the window. The pale beech wood suite would have looked better set against plainer wallpaper, but the bed linen was all wrong. The bed was covered in a crimson draped and gathered satin bedspread. Edyth turned it back. The linen was thick and coarse.

‘I’d like this bed made up with the linen we were given as wedding presents, Mrs Mack,’ she said shortly.

‘I made the beds up according to Reverend Slater’s instructions, Mrs Slater. He knew exactly where he wanted everything to go.’

Edyth saw her trunks and packing cases stacked in the corner of the room. She was tired after travelling but she was determined to unpack all their things in the morning and set them out. ‘Show me the other bedrooms, please, Mrs Mack.’

‘Mrs Slater senior will be next door to you, Mrs Slater.’ The housekeeper opened the door on a room Edyth suspected had been arranged exactly like another in a vicarage in Mumbles many years earlier. The bed was a four-poster. The writing desk, chest on chest of drawers, washstand, bedside cabinet and wardrobe were all of dark-stained mahogany, the bedspread a carbon copy of the one in her bedroom, only in navy-blue.

‘This is Mother’s room.’ She looked up. Peter was in the doorway.

‘So I understand. That will be all, Mrs Mack. Reverend Slater and I would like to eat as soon as dinner is ready, please.’

‘Soup and hotpot won’t be hurried, Mrs Slater.’

‘As soon as you can make it, Mrs Mack,’ Edyth repeated in a strained voice.

She waited until she heard the housekeeper walking over the tiled hall before turning to Peter. ‘Did you give orders for the beds to be made up in your mother’s linen?’

‘Of course. I assumed that you’d want to unpack our wedding presents yourself. Surely it won’t hurt to use Mother’s linen for a week or two until you have a chance to get the house as you want it?’

‘No, of course it won’t.’

‘You’re tired, Edyth, it’s the strain of the last week,’ he avoided mentioning David’s name, ‘and the travelling, coupled with the unfamiliarity of the house. You’re determined to find fault with everything because it’s so different from your parents’ house and Mrs Mack’s ways are not the same as Mari’s. But don’t worry, you’ll soon settle in.’

‘I hope so.’

She wished she could be as convinced as Peter seemed to be. But she wasn’t accustomed to Mrs Mack’s ideas of ‘economies’ on food or cleaning, and she had a feeling she would never accept them as adequate.

Peter wrapped his arm around her shoulders and she rested her head against him for a moment. If only he would always hold her this way. She moved closer to him and he stepped back.

‘Come and see the bathroom. It’s so clean and bright.’

‘Bright?’

‘I’ll grant you the two bedrooms on this side of the house are gloomy, but then all you and Mother will be doing is sleeping in them.’ He opened the door to the bathroom, which was tiled in black and white chequerboard tiles. He was right, it was clean and bright, and smelled of soap.

She rubbed her finger around the bath. ‘This at least looks clean,’ she commented.

‘It should do. The people who installed it cleaned it. I told Mrs Mack that she should continue to use the washstand in her attic room and the outside lavatory, to leave the bathroom solely for our use. Is that all right?’

‘Yes.’ She smiled at him. ‘Thank you.’

The bedroom Peter had reserved for his own use was lighter and brighter than the two at the back of the house. It was so spartanly furnished it reminded Edyth of Micah Holsten’s room, with a single bed, wardrobe, chest of drawers, bookcase and small desk all in oak, and a crucifix above the bed. Then she realised none of the furniture was new.

‘This was your furniture when you were a boy?’ she asked.

‘It was.’

‘But most of the time you’ll sleep in my bedroom?’

‘That’s the doorbell. I told Mrs Mack to ask the carriers to put most of the things that were transported from your parents’ house into the box room. But you’ll have to wait to see them. We’re about to have our first visitor.’ He left the room and ran downstairs without answering her question.

Chapter Eighteen

‘Edyth, come downstairs. Quickly, please,’ Peter called above a hubbub of voices in the hall.

Edyth ran down the stairs to see him ushering in a delegation of a score or more small children, who were being shepherded by three older girls. If the knife-edge, ironed creases on the boys’ shorts, their pressed shirt collars and the starched frills on the girls’ frocks were anything to go by, they were in their Sunday best. The smallest girl was carrying a bunch of flowers almost as large as herself, and another was struggling beneath the weight of a basket of fruit. Behind the group stood a dozen men of varying ages in dark suits, white shirts and sober ties.

‘The church council and Sunday school have come to welcome you to your new home, Edyth.’ Peter beamed at everyone.

‘Please, do come in,’ she invited. ‘I’ll call Mrs Mack. Hopefully we can find some biscuits for the children.’ She made the offer out of politeness. There had been tins in the pantry, but after she’d spoken she realised it was doubtful that anything edible lurked in their depths.

‘No, please, Mrs Slater.’ One of the girls stepped forward.

‘This is Prudence Smart, she’s only fifteen but she teaches the infants’ class in our Sunday school, Edyth.’ Peter moved to make room for the men to enter alongside the children. Rain was hammering down, and they closed their umbrellas outside, shaking the worst of the water from them before depositing them in a brass umbrella stand in dire need of polishing.

Edyth shook the girl’s hand. ‘I’m very pleased to meet you, Prudence.’

‘Please, don’t put yourself out for us, Mrs Slater. My mother said you must have a hundred and one things to do in the house. The last thing we want to do is hold you up, but if you can spare a few minutes, the children have been practising a hymn they’d like to sing for you.’

Edyth tried not to look relieved. ‘In that case, all of you must come to tea another day.’

‘Soon?’ the little girl holding the flowers asked hopefully.

‘Very soon, in the next week or two,’ Edyth promised.

‘Will there be jelly and blancmange?’ a small boy asked.

‘Nigel!’ Prudence reprimanded.

‘It’s all right.’ Edyth stroked the boy’s curly hair. ‘There most certainly will be jelly and blancmange, Nigel.’ She made a mental note to add both to the shopping list she intended to write that evening. She took the flowers and basket of fruit. ‘For Reverend Slater and me? How very nice and thoughtful. You’re spoiling us.’ She stood next to Peter while the children sang ‘All Things Bright and Beautiful’.

Halfway through their rendition, which was amazingly accomplished considering they had no instrumental accompaniment, she felt the weight of Peter’s arm around her waist. She leaned against him, wondering if this was what he intended their life to be; public shows of affection concealing private remoteness in separate bedrooms. Surely not. But every time she thought of Harry and Mary, Bella and Toby, and her parents, she knew something was wrong between them.

‘That was charming. Don’t you think so, Edyth?’ Peter nudged her.

Edyth realised the children had stopped singing. She clapped enthusiastically, hoping they hadn’t noticed that her mind was elsewhere. ‘Absolutely charming,’ she reiterated. ‘I look forward to getting to know all of you during the coming weeks. Thank you again for these beautiful flowers and the fruit.’

‘See you tomorrow in Sunday school, Mrs Slater.’ The older girls rounded up the children and led them outside.

‘My study is too small to accommodate the full council, so we’ll use the dining room for our meeting. That’s if you don’t mind, Edyth?’

‘Not at all, Peter. Don’t forget to set a match to the fire.’ She only wished the room was cleaner and more welcoming.

‘This is Anthony Jones, the youngest member and secretary of the council.’ He introduced her to a fair-haired, good-looking young man. Edyth knew she had seen him before, but it took her a few moments to recall that he was one of the policemen who had rounded up Anna Hughes and the other ‘ladies’ the night she had arrived at the vicarage.

‘Very pleased to meet you, Mrs Slater.’

His smile wasn’t as friendly as it might have been. Ever-sensitive, Edyth assumed he disapproved of her.

‘Mr Williams, chairman of the council.’

‘My wife, Eirlys, and I would be delighted if you would come to tea tomorrow between services, Mrs Slater.’

‘How kind.’ Edyth looked to Peter.

‘Edyth and I would be delighted to accept your invitation,’ Peter answered for her.

‘Shall I ask Mrs Mack to serve you tea, Peter?’

‘Please, Edyth.’ He stepped back, watching the last of the council walk into the room ahead of him. ‘We will have a quiet evening together, I promise you.’

Wondering if all the problems between Peter and her were in her imagination, Edyth waved off the Sunday school children. She was just about to shut the door when Micah Holsten walked around the corner. Ridiculously pleased to see a familiar face after so many strangers, she called out to him, ‘Micah, how lovely of you to visit us on my first day in the vicarage.’

He produced a small bunch of flowers from behind his back. ‘They pale into insignificance set against those.’ He fingered the enormous bunch she was holding. ‘Someone must have raided every garden in the Bay to supply you with them. Not to mention a couple of fruit and vegetable shops,’ he added, eyeing the basket.

‘These are from the church council and Sunday school. But I love heather; it reminds me of the mountains in Pontypridd. And it’s white heather, too.’

‘Lucky heather. I bought it off a gypsy in Loudoun Square. She blessed the recipient but you’d better not tell Peter,’ he added in a dramatic whisper. ‘I don’t think High Anglicans go in for gypsy blessings.’

‘I’m sure they don’t,’ she laughed, feelingly suddenly preposterously happy. The combination of the flowers and Micah’s smiling face had somehow put all her problems into perspective. There was nothing that she couldn’t sort out – given time to talk to Peter. ‘Please come in. Peter’s holding a church council meeting in the dining room but you’re welcome to wait in the sitting room until he’s free.’

‘I give you fair warning: if I step over that doorstep, I’ll drip all over your floor.’

‘It could do with some water on it.’

‘It doesn’t look too clean,’ he conceded, looking down at it. ‘But no doubt, like most housewives, you’ll soon remedy that.’ He stood on the cork doormat and slithered out of his dripping mackintosh. She hung it in the porch. His trilby was sodden and he shook it outside the door. ‘Perhaps I should leave this out here?’

She took it from him and set it carefully on the newel post so it wouldn’t dry out of shape. ‘You haven’t an umbrella?’

‘I hate them. You can’t see where you’re going when you’re walking under one, or what your neighbours are doing, and I was born nosy.’

‘I have no idea how long church council meetings last.’

‘Aeons and aeons, I should think,’ he answered mischievously. ‘But it’s not Peter I’ve come to see, it’s you.’

‘Really? Please, you must know where the sitting room is, go on in. I’ll ask Mrs Mack to bring us some tea.’

‘Must you?’ He made a wry face and she laughed again before remembering that the members of the church council could probably hear her.

‘You’ll be wanting tea, Mrs Slater?’ Mrs Mack materialised in the kitchen doorway.

‘For the church council in the dining room. And Pastor Holsten and myself in the sitting room, Mrs Mack. Make sure both pots are freshly made.’ She went into the sitting room and closed the door behind her. Micah was sitting bolt upright on one of the wooden-framed easy chairs. He looked as though he would have been more comfortable on a park bench.

‘Sorry, the furniture is my mother-in-law’s,’ she apologised.

‘I’m glad to hear it. I’d hate to think it was your taste. You seem far too nice and considerate to want to give your guests backache.’

‘From what you said, I take it that you have drunk Mrs Mack’s tea before?’

‘I think she makes it in the morning and leaves it warming on the range all day. As I’ve discovered to my cost, some people in Wales believe that’s perfectly normal, which is why I usually drink coffee.’

‘I looked in the pantry earlier, I didn’t see any coffee, but I will buy some just as soon as I’ve had a chance to go shopping. However, there’s no need to worry about Mrs Mack’s tea. I had a word with her about it. The pot will be fresh.’ She sat on the sofa. If anything, it was even more uncomfortable than the chairs. It certainly didn’t encourage relaxing and it was impossible to loll on it the way she and her sisters did on the ones at home.
Home.
She forced herself to remember that this was her home now, for all that it didn’t feel much like it at the moment.

‘You’re attempting to knock Mrs Mack into shape?’ Micah said admiringly. ‘I’ve already taken my hat off to you, so I bow to your courage.’ He left the chair and gave her a theatrical, three-circle hand movement, Shakespearean bow. ‘No one on the Bay has ever managed to make that woman do an honest day’s work. She has to be the idlest person of my acquaintance. But then, I’ve never known a drunk to be industrious.’

‘Drunk?’ Edyth repeated in astonishment.

‘You didn’t know? Well, you’ll no doubt see her with a brown medicine bottle, for a cold she can feel coming on, or sciatica, or –’

‘A sore throat.’ Edyth recalled the bottle she’d seen Mrs Mack nursing in the kitchen.

‘That’s a new one. If you dared to take the bottle from her – and I’m not advising you to try, because she’d probably turn vicious – you’d discover the contents are odourless but not quite tasteless. She buys home-made vodka by the litre from the Russian seamen when they come into port. Which is why no one ever smells drink on her breath. It doesn’t have a distinctive scent like whisky.’ He left his seat. ‘This chair is not made for someone as long or thin as me. In fact, I’m not sure who it was made for. Possibly a deportment school that tortures young girls in the belief they’re being turned into ladies?’ He took a cushion from the chair, sprawled on the floor next to the hearth, stretched his long legs over the rug and, pushing the cushion behind his back, leaned against the wall. ‘That’s better. You should try the other side. Perched up there, you remind me of one of those American pole-sitters who stay on tiny platforms for days.’

‘I feel like one.’ She did as he suggested and sat on the floor on the opposite side of the hearth to the one he had taken.

‘If the tea is drinkable we can put it next to the coal scuttle. That way any spillages can be easily mopped from the tiles.’

‘You seem to know a great deal about Mrs Mack.’ As Edyth arranged her skirts over her legs, a disturbing notion occurred to her. She was more relaxed and happier in Micah Holsten’s company than she was in her own husband’s. She pushed the disloyal thought from her mind.

‘Everyone who’s lived for any length of time in the Bay knows Lizzie Mack for what she is.’

‘Scottish?’

‘Probably, I’ve no reason to believe her accent isn’t authentic. But she turned up here long before my time. She used to run a house.’

‘A house?’

‘One lived in by several ladies of the Anna Hughes ilk. You recall the lady you met the night you came to the Bay to look for Peter?’

‘I do.’ She blushed at her own naivety.

‘Age forced Mrs Mack into retirement. But not before, or so rumour has it, she amassed “a tidy bit of money”, which her drinking habits undoubtedly drain, although Russian vodka is generally cheap enough. About two years ago, Mrs James, who runs the seaman’s lodging house in Bute Street, took Mrs Mack on as a housekeeper. She put up with her for six months before ordering her to leave. Then Mrs Mack took a caretaker’s job in Moore’s shipping offices, in exchange for living accommodation and a small salary. Mr Moore senior is a tough man; he had her out in three weeks.’

‘But she told Peter and me that she’d been with Reverend Richards and his wife for over forty years, that she’s a friend of the Bishop’s cousin.’

‘And you believed her?’ He exploded with laughter.

‘We had no reason not to.’

‘More fool the pair of you. Sorry, I didn’t mean that,’ he apologised, but clearly finding it difficult to keep a straight face. ‘You weren’t to know. And she has pulled the wool over many people’s eyes in her time, including, I’m ashamed to say, me. Among her many and varied qualities Mrs Mack is an inveterate liar. Fantasy at short notice is her speciality. And she can be convincing. She conned me on my second day in the Bay six years ago. I believed her story that she had lost her home and job when the family who employed her had moved out of Loudoun Square. I even gave her ten shillings from the mission’s poor box. But you have to hand it to the woman. She knows how to pick gullible victims. Isn’t that so, Mrs Mack?’ he asked when she carried in a tea tray.

‘What, Pastor Holsten?’ She eyed him warily.

‘You know how to pick your victims,’ he repeated.

‘Why are you both sitting on the floor?’ she asked, instantly changing the subject.

‘Because it’s more comfortable than the furniture.’ Micah sat up, took the tray from her and laid it in the hearth. ‘I was just telling Mrs Slater that you’ve had many jobs in and around the Bay, and been with Reverend Richards for … oh … I’d say about eight months, wouldn’t you? Before he went into hospital, that is.’ His eyes shone with suppressed humour when he turned to Edyth, ‘Old Mrs Arnold, who
was
Reverend and Mrs Richards’s housekeeper for over forty years, left him when Mrs Richards died. She thought there’d be gossip about a widow keeping house for a widower. Although, as she was well over seventy and he was over sixty and in failing health, I can’t imagine what she thought people would say about them. Or more to the point, what they’d get up to.’

Mrs Mack pulled herself up to her full height. ‘I might not have been Reverend and Mrs Richards’s housekeeper for all that time, Mrs Slater, but I “did” for them.’

‘You helped Mrs Arnold occasionally on Saturdays when she cleaned the range and gave the house a good going-over ready for Sunday because Reverend Richards didn’t like anyone working in the house, not even to cook the dinner on Sundays,’ Micah corrected.