Tiger Bay Blues (6 page)

‘Congratulations, Edyth.’ He winked at her again and her spirits soared. There
was
something between them. And she knew – just
knew –
that he sensed it, too.

Holding the bouquet, Edyth followed Bella and Toby outside. Harry burst into laughter when he saw her.

‘That settles it, sis, you’re definitely next. So much for college.’

‘She’s going,’ Lloyd growled. He opened the back door of Harry’s car, kissed Bella and shook Toby’s hand. ‘Look after our daughter.’

‘I will, sir,’ Toby promised solemnly.

‘It’s wonderful to have another son.’ Sali kissed Toby’s cheek. Harry helped Mary into the front passenger seat, closed the doors on Toby and Bella in the back, and drove off to the clattering of the tin cans the boys had fastened to the bumper of his Crossley tourer.

The crowd dispersed, with most of the guests making their way to the marquee where the waitresses were serving wine and savouries. The band saw the car moving down the drive and Jed, who’d rejoined them, broke off mid-tune and signalled the others to switch to a jazzed-up version of the old wartime favourite ‘Goodbyeee’.

Lloyd wrapped his arm around Edyth’s waist. ‘Make no mistake,’ he warned, ‘Reverend Slater or no Reverend Slater, you will be going to college, miss.’

‘Reverend Slater?’

‘Don’t look so innocent, I saw you two talking nonstop throughout the wedding breakfast.’

‘We were just talking. And, if I pass my exams, I promise I will go to college.’

He kissed her forehead. ‘Good girl.’

‘But you have to admit the Reverend Slater
is
very good-looking, Dad,’ she teased.

‘He’s not my type.’

Joey playfully slapped Lloyd’s back. ‘How about breaking open that bottle of old malt you’ve been keeping for a special occasion, big brother?’

‘His idea or yours?’ Lloyd asked Victor, who was hovering close by.

‘Does it matter?’ Victor smiled in anticipation.

Lloyd disappeared into the library with his brothers, and Edyth turned to the kitchen to fetch a vase for Bella’s bouquet. Peter Slater touched her arm and she stepped back alongside him.

‘Congratulations again on catching the bouquet.’

‘Not that I’m superstitious enough to believe it means anything. But I will press it and frame it so Bella can keep it as a reminder.’

‘Your sister looked very elegant. The softer lines of the longer skirts in fashion now are more attractive than the harsh silhouettes of the last decade. And she chose her colours well. Coffee and cream go well together, especially when worn by someone as dark as your sister.’

‘She did look lovely.’ Edyth was astounded. She had never met a man who had been remotely interested in women’s clothes before. Certainly not to the extent of daring to express an opinion on an outfit.

‘There are more hats here than in your average milliner’s.’ He flicked through the dozens of caps, panamas and trilbies on the shelf above the coat rack and lifted one down.

‘You’re not going just when I’m free, Peter?’

‘I have no choice. But thank you for your warm welcome. It was kind of your parents to invite a newcomer to a family wedding.’ He glanced in the mirror and dropped his panama on his head.

‘The pleasure was all ours.’ She repeated the standard phrase without thinking. ‘I had hoped that we could continue our conversation over supper.’

‘As you pointed out earlier, tomorrow’s the busiest day of my week.’ He moved back against the wall when Mrs Hopkins sallied forth in search of her coat.

‘The band is still playing and we’re serving light refreshments. Couldn’t you stay just a little while longer?’ she pleaded.

‘Forgive me but Reverend Price has asked me to take the early-morning service and I need to revise my sermon.’ He gave her a conspiratorial smile. ‘I’ve found out the hard way that a curate’s reputation can be made or broken by the first sermon he preaches in a town. Too long and he’s considered pompous and boring; too short and he’s slapdash; and pick the wrong subject – well, I won’t go into that one until I know you better. Suffice to say that when I preached about Jesus overturning the usurers’ tables in the temple, one tally man in Llanelli moved his entire family to a neighbouring parish. But we spoke about the youth club earlier?’

‘We did.’ Although he had removed his hand from her arm, her heart was pounding erratically.

‘Our next meeting is at half past six on Monday evening in the church hall. We have a dozen or so girls among our members. Unfortunately they have a tendency to indulge in horseplay and wear too much cheap scent and make-up. They might respond to the advice of someone like yourself. That is, if you can spare the time to give them a few tips. I noticed that you wear no make-up at all and your complexion is perfect.’

Edyth didn’t have the heart to tell him that she was wearing the discreet make-up her mother had taught her and all her sisters to apply. ‘I would be delighted to help in any way that you think I can, Peter.’

‘See you on Monday evening, Edyth.’

‘Until then.’ Edyth spotted Maggie bearing down on them. She handed her Bella’s bouquet. ‘Be an angel and put these in water for me, please, Maggie, while I walk Reverend Slater to the gate.’

Maggie snatched the flowers ungraciously and thumbed her nose at Edyth, just as Peter Slater turned to offer her his hand to say goodbye.

Night had fallen when Harry and Mary returned from taking Toby and Bella to Cardiff station. The air in the garden was warm, thick, and velvety; heavily scented with flowers and wax from the candles that Sali and the girls had lit and dotted among the plants in the flowerbeds. The maids were serving coffee, cake and sweet biscuits, but mindful of the noise of the music carrying down to the town, Lloyd had asked the band to stop playing at ten o’clock and most of the guests had left. Harry and Mary found the musicians sitting at a table that had been carried out from the marquee, drinking beer and talking to the family.

‘Did the honeymooners make their train?’ Lloyd lifted the chair next to his out from under the table and offered it to Mary.

‘They did.’ Mary sat down. ‘But not before Toby and Harry quarrelled about Harry’s driving.’

‘I gave Toby a choice,’ Harry said airily. ‘I told him that I could either get him and Bella to Cardiff station on time or drive safely. Toby said he preferred me to drive safely. But Bella asked me to get to the station on time, and everyone knows it’s the woman who makes the decisions in every marriage.’

‘Well said, Harry. Here’s to the legions of hen-pecked men. Poor Toby has no idea what’s in store for him.’ Joey drained his beer mug and held it out to Harry. ‘As you’re getting yourself and Mary drinks, you may as well refill all our glasses.’

‘Thank you, Uncle Joey. You know I love to play barman.’ Harry took the glass and turned the tap on the beer barrel set up on a side table alongside an array of bottles of sherry, wine, raspberry cordial and lemonade.

‘I like to make everyone happy.’ Joey beamed at the table in general.

‘Especially yourself,’ Victor quipped. ‘How many shorts did you feed our little brother, Lloyd?’

‘As many as he fed you and himself, judging by the width of the smiles on all your faces,’ Sali answered for Lloyd.

‘Whatever you do, Ruth, don’t grow up into a nagging wife like your grandmother and great-aunts.’ Joey gravely addressed the sleeping child on his lap.

‘Let me take Ruth from you, Uncle Joey,’ Mary offered shyly. Harry’s extended family had welcomed her and her orphaned brothers and sister as if they were long-lost relatives, but her upbringing on an isolated farm in Breconshire hadn’t brought her into contact with many people and she still felt a little shy of them, especially when they were gathered
en masse.

‘Absolutely not.’ Joey shook his head. ‘My children insist they’re too old for cuddles these days so I’m making the most of it.’

‘Does that mean you’re getting broody and there’ll soon be another Evans joining the clan?’ Victor asked.

‘Six is enough for me,’ Rhian stated decisively.

‘We only have five.’ Joey frowned at his wife.

‘Five and you makes six, and you’re more trouble than all the children put together.’ When the laughter died down she said, ‘I’m looking to the next generation to provide us with babies.’

‘As am I,’ Megan added. ‘Unless Sali would like to surprise us.’

‘There are no surprises coming from this direction but I would like dozens of grandchildren,’ Sali said, ‘especially if they’re all as pretty and sweet-tempered as Ruth. You’ve done a magnificent job of bringing her up, Mary, as well as teaching her the hardest lesson of all. She understands the word “no”. It’s a pity you weren’t around to tell me your secret when Edyth was small. If you had been, you might have saved her some broken bones.’

‘I wasn’t that bad.’ Edyth handed Harry her empty sherry glass.

‘As I recall, you spent more years with your legs and arms in plaster than out of it.’ Harry looked around. ‘Everyone have a drink?’

‘We do. Cheers and good health to the father and mother of the bride for hosting the wedding and hiring us to play here today.’ Jed King rose to his feet and lifted his glass ceremoniously. ‘And here’s to the bride and groom, Mr and the new Mrs Ross.’

‘Lucky ducks, going to America,’ Susie murmured sleepily.

‘Do you play at many weddings?’ Joey asked.

‘That’s something you won’t need to know for a few years yet, Joey. You have to keep your girls for a while longer before you can marry them off,’ Victor warned.

They all laughed again. Joey’s eldest daughter was only ten.

‘Parties like this and audiences like your family are unfortunately rare for us, Mr Evans,’ Jed answered.

‘I’ve a feeling that much as we all enjoy them, parties will become rarer still in the next few years,’ Lloyd said cautiously. ‘Times have been hard since the Wall Street crash last October and they will be getting harder. The government is expecting the number of unemployed to reach two million next month, and that’s bad news for everyone.’

‘It’s catastrophic for those of us living on Cardiff docks, Mr Evans,’ Micah Holsten said quietly.

‘Why worse for those in Tiger Bay?’ Harry lifted a chair out from another table and sat next to Mary.

‘Because trade is always the first casualty of a recession,’ Micah explained. ‘Markets shrink, fewer goods are produced, fewer ships sail and hundreds of seamen will find themselves without a berth, which means their families will go hungry. And fewer ships also means a cutback in the number of workers needed to load and unload cargoes. Dockers or seamen, coloured men are always the last to be taken on by those hiring labour and the first to be let go. And a large proportion of the seamen and dockers in Tiger Bay are coloured.’

‘It would be naive of us to suppose otherwise,’ Lloyd said seriously. ‘I’ve spent my life fighting for workers’ rights and an end to discrimination based on class, colour and creed, but I sometimes wonder if we’ve made any progress since my father and his fellow miners formed their unions in the last century.’

‘You’re too hard on yourself, Lloyd. We’ve come a long way in the last fifty years.’ Victor opened a packet of cigarettes and offered them around.

‘We have further to go than we’ve come,’ Lloyd said thoughtfully.

‘There’s no discrimination within our community, Mr Evans. Thank you.’ Jed took one of Victor’s cigarettes. ‘We’ve all sorts living on Bute Street and in the smaller houses behind it. Black, brown, white, yellow, Arab, Muslim, Hindu, Jew –’

‘A regular box of liquorice allsorts,’ Tony King joked.

‘And no one there gives a toss about colour.’

‘Except for some of the constables and their families, who live in the Maria Street police station,’ Tony chipped in.

‘Most of them are fair blokes,’ Jed qualified. ‘Generally speaking, we’re like one big happy family.’

‘With a few black sheep.’ Tony nodded at Micah. ‘Take this one, for example. He’s too forgiving with the drunks and certain ladies –’

‘Tony, you’re not in the Pilot in George Street now,’ Jed interrupted.

‘I heard a lot of stories about Tiger Bay when I went to that party in Moore’s shipping offices with Bella and Toby.’ Edyth took a biscuit and broke it in half. ‘I’d love to walk around there and see the place for myself.’

‘What kind of stories?’ Lloyd enquired warily.

‘One of the clerks was telling us that he and his brother had been invited to someone’s house for supper, but they never made it. He said as soon as they left Bute Street and went into the side streets, everyone was singing and dancing, all the front doors were open and he felt as though they’d walked into one enormous street party. They ended up eating supper with total strangers.’

‘It can be like that around carnival time,’ Jed agreed, as relieved as Lloyd that Edyth hadn’t been referring to anything more risqué than the music that was played in the streets around the docks practically every night. ‘It only takes one person to bring out an instrument and start playing to get the whole neighbourhood joining in.’

‘With spoons, comb and paper, and saucepan drums, if that’s all they have.’ Micah flicked his cigarette into the ashtray on the table. ‘In Tiger Bay, music has an impromptu and international flavour.’

‘You’re welcome to visit any time you want, Miss Evans. My grandmother would love to make your acquaintance,’ Judy Hamilton offered shyly.

‘Thank you, Miss Hamilton. After your performance here today I suspect I’ll have the life plagued out of me until I bring the entire family down for a visit.’ Lloyd glanced at Glyn, who was almost asleep on the chair next to him. ‘It’s time the little ones were in bed.’

‘I’ll chase them.’ Sali left her chair.

‘I’ll give you a hand,’ Rhian offered.

‘We should round up the boys and head for home, Megs.’ Victor rose to his feet. ‘You did Bella proud, Lloyd, Sali. It’s been a wonderful day but my legs feel as though they don’t belong to me. I’m getting too old for dancing.’

‘Judging by the amount you’ve done since I met you, I’d say that you were born too old for dancing, my darling.’ Megan left her seat and slipped her arm around Victor’s waist.