The Hills and the Valley Read online

  ‘Yes. Time is short and she wanted to let us know as soon as possible,’ Amy explained.

  ‘I can’t see that there’s anything very urgent about that,’ Maureen said. ‘They’ve been engaged for years. Why are they suddenly in such a hurry to get married?’

  ‘I really couldn’t say and it’s none of our business anyway,’ Amy said crisply.

  Privately, her suspicions were always aroused when a wedding was arranged at such short notice just as most people’s were. ‘Of course our Jim had to get married in a hurry,’ Charlotte had said when Amy had driven up that afternoon to discuss it with her and her meaningful look had almost shocked Amy. It was true Jim had gone to the altar a little sooner than he had intended and when Alec had been born there had been those who had done some counting on their fingers but this had never been mentioned in the family. To bring it into the open simply wasn’t done.

  ‘Perhaps he’ll ask me to be a bridesmaid,’ Maureen said hopefully.

  ‘I shouldn’t think so.’

  ‘He might. I’ve never been a bridesmaid. Well – can I have a new dress anyway?’ Maureen persisted.

  Amy ignored her, glancing at Barbara. She was curled up on the leather topped coalbox beside the fire, completely oblivious to the conversation as she pored over a letter which had arrived for her in the morning post. It was from Huw, Amy knew, having recognised both the writing and the postmark and when Barbara had come home from school and she had given it to her the reaction had been just as it always was – an unconcealed delight which glowed on her face like the flickering reflected firelight coupled with an air of disconcerting secrecy.

  ‘Barbara?’ she said sharply. ‘Did you hear what I said?’

  ‘Hmm?’ Barbara looked up, holding the letter close to her chest.

  ‘Alec and Joan are getting married.’

  ‘Oh, are they?’ She might have been told the dustcart was passing by outside for all the interest she took. Amy’s anxiety expressed itself as irritation.

  ‘I should have thought you’d be pleased. Most people like a wedding.’

  ‘Will Huw be able to come home for it?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Amy said. ‘I shouldn’t think so.’

  ‘Oh – well,’ Barbara said and went back to her letter.

  ‘I said, can I have a new dress Mum?’ Maureen persisted.

  ‘It all depends. I should think you’ve got more than enough dresses anyway,’ Amy snapped, her mind still on Barbara and Huw.

  It was all very well for Ralph to tell her not to worry – she was worried. All Barbara could think of these days was Huw – Huw – Huw. And with him writing to her so regularly she could no longer dismiss it as a onesided crush on Barbara’s part either.

  ‘Mum – please …’ Maureen begged.

  ‘For goodness sake, Barbara, leave that letter and go and wash your hands. Mrs Milsom is ready to serve dinner,’ Amy said crossly.

  Margaret stood in the centre of the kitchen, a worried frown creasing her features. On the table beside her her handbag stood open; she rifled through it quickly, moving around letters, diary and comb to peer into the depths, then returning her attention to the purse which she was holding.

  She had been sure there had been three pound notes in it yesterday. Now there were only two. For the umpteenth time she did a quick calculation of what she had spent since Harry had given her the housekeeping money. No, there was no way she could have spent all that. A pound was a lot of money. A few shillings unaccounted for she could have understood. But a pound …

  Have I left my bag lying about when Elaine has been in the room? Margaret wondered, and instantly hated herself for the thought. But it had to be faced. Too many things had gone missing and either turned up under suspicious circumstances or not turned up at all. The unpleasant possibility that the child was a compulsive thief seemed to be becoming more and more likely with each new incident.

  I can’t just let it go on unchecked, Margaret thought. If she is stealing I shall have to do something about it. But what? It was such a delicate situation and if she handled it badly she could completely upset the relationship she was establishing with the girls. Worse, she could push Elaine over the brink. At least she was behaving herself a little better now – nor had Gussie complained of anything going missing during the time they had been staying with her.

  If she is taking things it’s probably just because she’s lonely and wretched, Margaret thought, recalling again the lack of contact the girls’mother had with them. I mustn’t accuse. I must try to understand and then gently show her it’s not very nice to help yourself to things that don’t belong to you and particularly not nice to go to other people’s purses …

  The sound of a car on the drive outside made her look up and to her surprise she recognised Harry’s Morris. Strange. What was he doing home at this time of day – and using up precious petrol too! She closed her purse quickly and put it back in her bag. She had still not told Harry of her suspicions and she did not want to. Not until she had sorted things out in her own mind and was sure. Harry would only huff and puff and make things much worse.

  The door opened and he came into the kitchen unbuttoning his overcoat.

  ‘Hello. It’s nice and warm in here.’

  ‘What are you doing home?’ she asked.

  He did not answer her directly. ‘Have you got the kettle on? I could do with a cup of tea. It’s blooming cold out.’

  ‘I haven’t, but it won’t take a minute to boil.’ She reached for the kettle and filled it. ‘But you can’t tell me you came home just for a cup of tea. Your Miss Vranch always makes sure there’s plenty of that at your office.’

  ‘I wanted to talk to you. On our own, without those blessed girls listening to every word.’

  She crossed and gave him a quick hug, sliding her hands under his overcoat.

  ‘Well, it’s nice to see you, whatever the reason. I get quite lonely here on my own all day. I shall be jolly glad to get another job – unless of course we manage to start another baby …’ She looked up at him meaningfully and got quite a different reaction to the one she expected.

  ‘You’re not, are you?’ he asked, looking at her seriously.

  She shook her head.

  ‘No, I’m not – more’s the pity. Why do you say it like that?’

  ‘Oh, just that – well, our circumstances might be about to change.’

  ‘What on earth do you mean?’

  ‘That’s what I’ve come home to talk to you about.’ He glanced towards the kettle, already singing on the gas. ‘Make the tea and I’ll tell you. It will go down better over a cuppa.’

  ‘I want to know now! What is it Harry?’

  ‘Wait … Oh, all right. It’s just that I don’t want to give you too much of a shock.’ He held her at arms’length, his hands resting on her trim waist. ‘How would you feel about being the wife of a Member of Parliament?’

  ‘A … what? Harry – is this some kind of joke?’

  ‘Not a joke, no. Look, the kettle’s boiling, Make that tea.’

  She did so, thinking she must have fallen asleep and be dreaming.

  ‘It’s like this,’ Harry said, sitting down at the table as she set the pot and cups on the scrubbed wood surface. ‘You know David Reece was the prospective Labour candidate for this constituency? Well, he’s been called up to active service. He was a reservist and he received his papers a few days ago. That means the party has to find another candidate.’

  ‘And they want you? Oh Harry!’

  ‘I know. I could hardly believe it myself. I mean, I know I’m a loyal party member and a councillor and all that, but all the same … Of course, I may not be selected even if I agree to let my name go forward. There will be others on the shortlist. But Roly Everard thinks I stand a good chance with my background. “You’re used to sorting out problems,” was how he put it. And I suppose he’s right. I sort out the men’s problems every day. An MP simply sorts out problems over a wider sp
ectrum.’

  ‘I’m sure nobody could do it better than you,’ Margaret said loyally.

  ‘I don’t know about that.’ Harry grinned, looking pleased with himself in spite of his assumed modesty. ‘Obviously, coming out of the blue like this we have to give it some thought. But quickly. Reece is definitely out of it and they can’t be without a candidate for too long at a time like this. There has to be somebody to oppose Mrs Lincoln and her reactionary ideas.’

  Mrs Lincoln was the sitting MP – a true blue Tory and a remarkable woman. But, as Harry said, the seat was there for the taking and with the mining industry making up a good part of the constituency there was plenty of support locally for the Labour Party.

  ‘Well?’ Harry said. ‘What do you think?’ Margaret got up, crossed to the pantry and fetched the jug of milk. A little flame of excitement was flickering inside her but she calmly milked the cups and poured the tea before she spoke. Then she passed Harry his, looking at him steadily.

  ‘I think you should let your name go forward,’ she said. ‘Be honest, Harry, it’s what you have always wanted. Even before you knew me I think you wanted it and for years you have been working towards it. Perhaps you haven’t even realised it, but I have. I knew you wouldn’t be content to stay in local government or even to be the best Miners’Agent Hills bridge has ever had. You’re cut out for more than that. Let your name go forward and see what happens.’

  ‘And if it came to it and I was selected, you wouldn’t mind? It would mean a lot of separations I shouldn’t wonder, nights away from home, that sort of thing. And a lot of work for you. You wouldn’t mind?’

  ‘Harry, I was born and raised to politics. Of course I wouldn’t mind. Especially when I know it’s what you want.’

  ‘Even if I should get elected?’

  ‘If you get elected I should be the proudest woman alive.’

  He reached for her hands and they sat in silence for a few moments, each with their own thoughts. Then Harry laughed lightly.

  ‘Of course we may be putting the cart before the horse. I might not even get selected.’

  Margaret smiled back at him, her eyes glowing with loyalty and love.

  ‘They’d be fools not to have you. Oh Harry, of course you’ll be selected!’

  On a Wednesday evening at the beginning of March Alec Hall was once again alone at the cottage, pottering from room to room and looking for any odd jobs which still needed doing.

  There was very little need for him to be there. The house was in apple pie order, gleaming with new paint and with every conceivable defect attended to, but to Alec it had become a place of refuge. His home seemed to have been taken over by the arrangements for the forthcoming wedding. Sarah, his mother, and Joan were in a constant state of excitement, rushing here and there, fussing, fretting and planning, and when he was around they were given to pouncing on him to draw him into a discussion about one of the innumerable details which in his opinion at least were at best unnecessary and at worst a wicked waste of money. Marriage was, after all, basically a private business between two people; surely it should be enough to enter into it quietly along with the immediate family to wish them well and the minimum of fuss. Yet there seemed to be no end to the frills Joan was intent on adding now that she had finally persuaded him to walk down the aisle – and all had to be attended to in record time. The dresses were being made by a dressmaker who lived in South Hill Gardens, not just Joan’s, which Alec assumed would be white, but also creations in pink organdie to be worn by the four girls Joan had asked to be bridesmaids. There were frantic fittings for these dresses and Joan said the dressmaker would have to burn the midnight oil to get them done. Invitations had been sent out to forty guests for a reception to be held in the Victoria Hall and a three-tier cake had been ordered from the Co-op. Add to this a photographer and cars to be booked, flowers ordered, and the details of the wedding service itself to be arranged and the whole thing had become a massive undertaking.

  It was what women liked, Alec supposed, and since it was Joan’s day he’d have to go along with it. But it was his firm intention to involve himself as little as possible and finding that any suggestion of taking himself off for a drink at the Miners Arms produced screams of protest from both Joan and his mother that he should even think of such a thing when there was so much to be done, he had discovered his best course was to get out his bicycle and go down to the cottage on the pretext of having some necessary job or other in hand there. At least that way he got a little peace and quiet and he could always stop off for a pint on the way home with no one the wiser.

  I don’t know what I’ve let myself in for I’m sure, Alec thought, scrubbing a stubborn streak of paint off the kitchen window with a cloth dipped in turps. Sometimes I think I’ve been a bit of a damn fool.

  It was a thought which had occurred to him frequently over the last weeks and it was worrying him more and more. In a vague sort of way he had expected that once the decision was made and plans were underway he would accept the whole thing as inevitable. Well, that had happened, he supposed. But the inevitability did not make it any better. If anything it had made it a good deal worse, for try as he might to be philosophical about it, Alec could not rid himself of the kind of feeling that might be experienced by a prisoner about to be given a life sentence – and with the whole daunting court procedure still to be gone through into the bargain.

  Perhaps when the deed was actually done he would feel better about it, Joan would be a good wife, not a doubt of it. She would make him a comfortable home, cook him the sort of wholesome food he was used to and, if the other evening was anything to go by, do a little more than simply keeping him warm in bed. They would have children, three or four probably since Joan had always said she favoured a big family, and he would settle down to being the head of the household. Not a bad prospect for any man of twenty-five. Alec only wished he could feel a little more enthusiastic about it.

  He went into the little living room and switched on the wireless. He’d been lucky to get hold of it, he thought, as it warmed up and Donald Peers’voice came crackling through. It wasn’t a new set – he had bought it from a man he worked with – but he had got a different battery for it and besides being a source of entertainment the wooden cabinet was attractive enough to make it a very acceptable piece of furniture. The same man had said he might be able to get hold of a gramophone, too – if he did it would be worth splashing out a few shillings on. If Joan could spend all his money on frills and furbelows for the wedding, darned if he didn’t see why he shouldn’t have a gramophone!

  It was when the Donald Peers song came to an end that he heard the knocking at the back door and went back through the kitchen to answer it, wondering vaguely who would come calling. One of his mates, perhaps, suggesting he should slope off a bit earlier to the Miners Arms tonight? Alec did not think that in his present state of mind he would take much persuading.

  He opened the door and the light spilling out showed him the slight figure of Bryda Latcham standing on the doorstep.

  ‘Oh, hello!’ he said, surprised and awkward suddenly.

  ‘I’m sorry to bother you.’ Her voice was hesitant.

  ‘That’s all right. You’d better come in. If a warden sees this light showing we shall be for the high jump.’

  ‘Oh …’ She hesitated. ‘No warden is likely to be coming round the back here, is he?’

  ‘No, s’pose not.’ Perhaps she was afraid of being in a house alone with a man, he thought. Not surprising, considering the way her husband treated her. A moment later this idea was negated when she said:

  ‘I was wondering if you could do something for me. The light has gone in my kitchen and I can’t see to get the bulb out. Eric’s out – he won’t be back until gone ten – and I can’t see to do a thing.’

  ‘Oh, right you are. I’ll come round.’

  ‘You don’t mind me asking?’

  ‘Course not.’ He closed the door behind him and followed her ne
xt door. As she had said her kitchen was in almost complete darkness, lit only by a faint glow which crept in from the hall, and he almost fell over a chair which she had placed beneath the light fitting.

  ‘Sorry …’ she said.

  ‘It’s all right.’ He climbed onto the chair, removed the spent bulb and replaced it with one she handed to him. There was a click and the light came on.

  ‘Oh, that’s better!’ she said. ‘I hate being in the dark. Stupid really I suppose, but …’

  ‘No, it’s nothing but a nuisance. I hate it myself.’

  In the glow of light which came from beneath the faded shade he could see the kitchen now as well as feeling it – a nice kitchen, homely and sparklingly clean in spite of the comfortable clutter, a heap of laundry waiting to be ironed on the oil-cloth topped table, two flat irons piled on the gas ring, a stewpan soaking in the sink.

  He got down from the chair, turning to look at Bryda. And saw the livid mark at the side of her mouth, darkening to a deep purple bruise just above the line of her jaw. His stomach turned. As she realised he had noticed her hand flew up defensively covering the mark. But before he could stop himself he heard himself say: ‘Has he been hitting you about again?’

  The moment it was out he knew he should not have said it. Her eyes went dark and she seemed to draw back into herself.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Leave it! the voice of caution urged him. But he could not.

  ‘You know very well what I mean! He beats you up, doesn’t he?’

  ‘Well, he …’ She looked even smaller and more vulnerable now, on the defensive again. ‘He doesn’t mean it.’

  ‘How the hell can he not mean it?’ Alec said. ‘How can you possibly hit a woman and not mean it?’

  ‘He – he’s got a temper. He gets drunk. He’s always sorry afterwards.’