All That Glitters (20 page)

‘Seven ice-cream cornets, please, Dai?’ He picked out a shilling and two pennies from the change in his pocket.

‘You’ve got a nice day for it, Will.’

‘Nice day for what?’

‘Courting, by the look of you’

‘Me? I thought you knew me better than that.’

‘I know you, all right. You Powells are all alike. Haydn was down here this morning with a very nice bit of blonde skirt on his arm. Wouldn’t have minded giving that one an airing myself. Don’t suppose you know who she is?’

‘Haydn’s too afraid of losing his girls to introduce them to me.’

‘Judging by the way she was hanging on to his arm I think there was more danger of him straying, than her. And talking of straying,’ Dai smiled at Jane as he pushed an ice cream into the last cornet, ‘aren’t you going to introduce me to your friend?’

‘No.’ William took the cornets from him. ‘She’s a sweet, innocent country girl, and as she’s temporarily in my charge I intend to see she stays that way.’

‘She won’t if she remains in your company.’

‘Better my company than that of a lecherous old man like you.’

William divided the cornets between Jane and himself and led the way out.

‘Haydn is your cousin and Eddie’s brother, isn’t he?’ Jane asked, not quite sure if she’d sorted out the Powell family connections correctly.

‘He is.’

‘You and Eddie look more like brothers than Eddie and Haydn. Eddie is so dark, and Haydn is so fair.’

‘Their mother’s fair, and you’ve seen Uncle Evan. I’ve never really thought about it before, but I suppose it is odd. You haven’t met their sister, have you?’

Jane shook her head as she licked a cornet that was melting over her hand.

‘Bethan’s dark like Eddie.’

‘She doesn’t live at home?’

‘Married crache, a doctor no less, but she calls in, not quite so often now she’s expecting at the end of the summer. There’s a younger sister too. Maud, she’s blonde like Haydn. She married and moved to Italy.’

‘Lucky girl.’

‘You wouldn’t say that if you knew her husband, Ronnie. He’s Tina and Gina’s brother. He used to run the café like a Tartar. Made people pay in blood if they didn’t settle their bills on time,’ he hissed in a theatrical voice.

‘You want to go on stage like Haydn?’

‘Me? Not on your Nellie. I’m happy where I am. Besides, I haven’t Haydn’s voice. That’s the only edge he has over me, of course. When it comes to looks, I am, without doubt, the best looking of all the Powells. If silent pictures were still being made I’d be a star.’

Jane laughed, a rare sound that made Diana look up.

‘What’s dear brother said that’s so amusing?’

‘He’s just told me he’s the best-looking man in the family.’

‘After me,’ Eddie contradicted.

‘Lots of girls in Pontypridd would disagree with both of you,’ Tina said provocatively. ‘Haydn looks very handsome on the posters advertising the Summer Variety.’

‘His picture’s been touched up by an artist. Any fool can see that.’

‘It’s just like him,’ Tina maintained.

‘It doesn’t matter whether it’s been touched up or not, cousin Haydn is unavailable as far as the ladies of Pontypridd are concerned.’ William sat as close to Tina as he could get. Stretching out his long legs he started to lick his cornet from the bottom up.

‘What do you mean?’ Jenny asked sharply.

‘Dai just told me he saw Haydn parading around the park this morning with a very tasty blonde.’

‘So that’s what he calls rehearsing.’ Eddie leaned forward so his cornet wouldn’t dribble on his shirt.

‘I didn’t know Haydn was going out with a showgirl.’ Jenny failed to keep her voice steady. Hoping no one had noticed, she busied herself by wrapping a handkerchief around her cornet.

‘He isn’t,’ William answered blithely, oblivious to the suspicious look Eddie was sending Jenny’s way. ‘Not
a
showgirl. Last I heard he had at least two or three on the go.’

‘William!’ Diana reprimanded.

‘What’s the matter’

‘Ladies present.’

‘Where?’

‘If you’re going to be like that, I’m going to walk to the bandstand. One of the cadets told me a military band’s playing there today, from Cardiff. Coming girls?’

Only Gina left her seat.

‘Can I come?’ Jane asked, as William sidled closer to Tina.

‘Of course,’ Diana held out her hand. ‘Right, let’s see who can get the most, how-do-you-dos from the soldiers. Winner gets free tea from the losers back in Ronconi’s.’

Jane smiled, happy even at the thought of losing. She was beginning to find out just how much difference friendship and family could make to life.

Chapter Eleven

‘Haydn! Time to move.’ Rusty dug the comatose figure in the ribs.

‘What’s the time?’ he mumbled sleepily.

‘Six o’clock. You promised to buy me evening dinner.’

‘Did I?’ His eyes remained closed as he dug his head deeper into the pillows.

‘Bathroom’s next door. I’ll get us a drink.’

‘Tea?’ he opened one eye.

‘Whisky if you prefer. I bought a bottle for the house, they won’t miss a couple of glasses.’

‘Just a small one.’ He watched as she slipped a red silk dressing gown over her magnificent body. He followed the sounds she made walking down the stairs, heard her opening a cupboard door. Time to move! Swinging his legs out of the bed he slumped forward and buried his face in his hands. He felt as though he was suffering from a mammoth hangover although he hadn’t had more than a couple of beers in days. His head was fuzzy and every muscle ached like toothache, probably the result of too many vigorous rehearsals, too much sex, and too much concentration – the inevitable result of telling different stories to different women, and trying to remember just who he’d told what to.

Picking up his clothes, he staggered into the bathroom. The bath was enormous: a massive, white-enamelled, cast-iron affair. There would have been room in it for him, Rusty and Babs if he could have persuaded both of them to join him. On impulse he put the plug in and ran the cold tap. The dip didn’t do a great deal for his aches and pains but it certainly woke him up. All he had to suffer now was Rusty’s moans throughout dinner about the precariousness of her position as the Revue’s leading lady, then he could go home, to bed or even better to see his father. He hadn’t done much in the way of real talking to anyone since he’d been home – or for that matter since he’d been on stage. And then what? Sleep, more rehearsals tomorrow, followed by another two performances of Revue. What was the matter with him? He had a budding career, more sex than he could handle, and yet he still couldn’t shake off this emotion-numbing sense of depression that was slowly paralysing his senses.

‘You work in the Town Hall?’ Tina sat next to Jane at one of the tables in the front room of Ronconi’s café. Of choice Jane would have played cards with the boys to see if she could add to her savings, but both the boys and Diana had made it plain that it wasn’t done for any girl to sit in the back.

‘Only since Monday.’

‘Have you seen the Revue?’

‘A couple of numbers.’

‘I don’t know how your Haydn can do it,’ Tina continued in a low voice to Diana. ‘Walk around all those naked girls, and sing while they’re -’

‘How do you know what he’s doing, Tina?’ Jenny interrupted as she carried a cup of cocoa over from the counter.

‘Tony and Angelo went on Friday night. They told Papa they were going to an Italian club meeting, but Glan Richards saw them and told me where they’d been, so I threatened to tell Papa what they’d been up to unless they told me everything.’

‘Everything?’ Diana echoed suggestively.

‘I couldn’t get a lot out of them. Tony said the girls were stark naked, although Angelo complained that between the feathers and the lighting he couldn’t see all that much.’

‘Tina!’

‘I’m only repeating what Angelo said.’

‘The lighting is dim,’ Jane agreed. ‘And most of the girls do wear something, even if it’s only a body stocking and a couple of sequined stars.’

‘Then you have seen the Revue?’

‘As I said, only bits of it. The opening numbers when we show people to their seats and wait for stragglers, and the last number before the interval when we go out with our trays.’

‘I don’t know how you can sell ice cream in front of something like that,’ Jenny asserted primly, uncertain just where Jane fitted into the Powell household, but wanting to make it clear that the nature of her job put her on a par with the nudes.

‘I needed a job, it gave me an immediate start.’

‘I bet you see a lot of Haydn,’ Tina giggled.

‘Haydn doesn’t strip off,’ Diana stated forcefully.

‘But those girls do,’ Tina nudged Gina. ‘Imagine standing on stage naked as the day you’re born. How can they do it, even with a few bits and bobs covering … well, covering … you know what I mean.’

‘Six pounds a week.’

‘Six pounds? You sure, Jane?’

‘I’m sure. Some of them get more. The head girl, for instance.’

‘What’s a head girl?’

‘The one in charge of the chorus, she gets an extra two pounds a week, and Mandy, she sits on a swing that’s hauled up high, close to the ceiling. She gets an extra ten bob a week danger money; and Rusty, the female lead. She gets a lot more.’

‘I couldn’t do it,’ Tina declared. ‘Not for a hundred pounds.’

Jane didn’t answer. From the way Tina had been back and forth to the counter helping herself to hot chocolate and chewing gum she guessed that the girl had never gone short of anything in her life. The first lesson she was learning on the outside was that it was easy to express moral outrage when you hadn’t tasted parish charity.

‘Time I went.’

‘It’s not ten yet, Jenny.’

‘I promised my father I’d open the shop for the early-shift miners tomorrow.’ She reached for her coat and stood in the open archway that divided the front and back rooms of the café. As she’d hoped, Eddie saw her. Five minutes later he was escorting her through the door.

‘Something going on between Jenny and your Eddie, Diana?’ Gina asked.

‘Nothing I know about.’

‘Wasn’t she sweet on Haydn at one time?’

‘Haydn and Jenny Griffiths?’

‘They were as good as engaged.’ Tina informed Jane knowledgeably.

‘No one’s really sure what happened between them, but they stopped talking to one another before Haydn went away. Now it seems if she can’t have one brother, she’ll settle for the other.’

‘Jenny …’

‘One kiss, Eddie Powell, that’s your lot.’

‘Just five minutes.’ His hands gripped her waist.

‘No.’ Jenny pushed him aside and opened the storeroom door creating a gap just wide enough for her to slip through. She closed it in his face.

‘Jenny,’ he whispered from the yard.

‘Go away, Eddie.’

‘You’ll see me tomorrow?’

‘You know where to find me.’

Leaning with her back against the door she heard the outside gate open and close. Wrapping her arms around her shoulders she tried to stop herself from shaking. She’d succeeded. She’d sent Eddie home and for the first time that day she was free to think of Haydn.

Was it serious between him and the blonde he’d been seen with in the park? Or was the blonde an acquaintance from the show? A girl he was using to make her jealous? Of course. She sat down abruptly, lightheaded with relief. That had to be it. He was deliberately flirting with the showgirls, flaunting them around town, knowing only too well that everyone he met would be delighted to give her the news about his latest sweetheart. They hadn’t progressed very far since the days when their quarrels had been confined to the school yard. But even then, despite the childish games of one-upmanship, she had known that deep down Haydn had really cared for her. Just as she knew he cared for her now, even though she had allowed his brother to make love to her. It would have been better, far better for both of them, if she had gone to him as soon as she’d heard he was home. A whole week wasted because she hadn’t the sense or the courage to tell him the truth: that she loved him, and would always love him. Feeling the chill of the floor she rose to her feet and went into the shop. The street outside the window was deserted. A thin line of light shone beneath the door that led to their living quarters. Her mother was home and in bed, but not her father. The lamp was always left on until he returned from the pub. The fact that it was a Sunday made no difference. The landlord of the Morning Star unlocked his back door for selected regulars. Her father wouldn’t return until the early hours of the morning. And who could blame him, when her mother wouldn’t even allow him into her bedroom, let alone her bed.

When she and Haydn were married, she’d never banish him to another bedroom. She’d sleep with him all night, every night of their lives. Making love … she closed her fists tightly, trying to forget that Eddie had been her first lover, consoling herself with the thought that it wasn’t the first, but the last who was important. And it wasn’t as if nothing had ever happened between her and Haydn. He’d been the first man to unfasten the buttons on her blouse, the first to touch her breasts – to kiss her. But then after hob-nobbing with nude Revue girls she couldn’t expect him to be satisfied with half-measures like those again. She’d have to be prepared to allow him to do what he wanted. Give him everything she had to give – she trembled at the thought of the nights they’d share for the rest of their lives. Then she’d show everyone – especially her mother – that a marriage could have a fairy-tale ending, ‘happily ever after’.

She pictured Haydn as he’d been on stage, his fair hair shining beneath the spotlight, suave and handsome in his dinner jacket and bow tie. A man to weave dreams around like Clark Gable, Robert Taylor or Leslie Howard. Remote, sophisticated and unattainable while performing, yet hers. The Haydn she had grown up with and come to love more than anyone else in the world. She had been stupid to allow him to leave Pontypridd without making an effort to clear up that last quarrel. Perhaps she should have stayed in the café and waited for him tonight? Tony’d said he’d promised to call in. But then staying on in the café would have meant remaining with the girls, listening to their speculations about Haydn and various showgirls. Besides, although he’d told Tony he was going to call in, he might have been held up – but where? Eddie and William didn’t even know where he was spending the day. Eddie had mentioned something about rehearsing, but did the Town Hall rehearse on a Sunday? Jane hadn’t known, but then Jane was so mousy no one was likely to confide anything of any importance to her.

Mousy and small – her heart contracted as she recollected the slight, insignificant figure who’d stood next to Haydn on the hill the other night. Haydn worked in the Town Hall and so did Jane. Why had it taken her so long to put two and two together? Jane! As suspicion hardened into certainty it hurt more than the knowledge that Haydn had been seen around town with a blonde. Everyone knew showgirls were flighty, that no man took them seriously. But Jane! How could he go around with such an insignificant nobody – so thin and downright plain – after courting her?

Perhaps he’d walked Jane home because they lived in the same house? She had a vision of him singing on stage, gazing at the blonde as she descended on the swing. She’d had a stunning face and figure, and for all her immobility she’d stared at Haydn with adoring eyes. Had it been acting, or simply a trick of the light? Either way, no man, Haydn included, would look twice at girl like Jane while he was surrounded by a glamorous chorus.

Trying to put all thoughts of rivals firmly out of mind, she continued to gaze out of the window. Unless Haydn walked up the steps in Graig Street and along Leyshon Street he had to pass this way. And he couldn’t be much longer. Hardly anything was open on a Sunday night, although he could be visiting one of the chorus girls in her room. Did landladies allow that? A vivid image of Haydn, dressed in evening clothes kissing a naked girl, came to mind. If she didn’t stop tormenting herself, she’d drive herself mad.

She leaned against the counter and began to wait, her eyes focused on the blackened street, seeing flickers of movement on the fringes of every pool of lamplight. Straining her senses to their utmost, she tensed her muscles and remained motionless. A man walked out of the Morning Star; pulling his cap down low he walked past the shop and turned the corner into Factory Lane. Old Mrs Evans opened the door at the side of the small shop opposite and put out her cat for the night. Footsteps echoed up the hill. Heart pounding, Jenny looked, and looked again.

A tall, slim figure walked purposefully upwards, long, light-coloured coat draped over one shoulder, a trilby on his head. She tried to decipher the features but the face was in shadow. There wasn’t time to do any more. Another minute and he’d be alongside the shop, then past it. What if she went outside, called out and it wasn’t Haydn? And what if it was? She could wait weeks for another opportunity like this.

Running around the counter she tripped over a sack of carrots and broke a fingernail in her eagerness to wrench open the door. The bolt stuck. Manipulating it from side to side, she finally succeeded in wresting it open just as the man drew alongside the shop across the road.

‘Haydn?’ she murmured softly, uncertainly.

He slowed his steps. ‘Jenny.’ He tipped his hat and would have walked on, but she crossed the road and blocked his path.

‘I haven’t seen you since you’ve been back.’

‘I haven’t had time to see anyone. I practically live in the theatre.’

‘So I’ve heard. Diana and Eddie told me.’ She could have kicked herself, she hadn’t intended to mention Eddie’s name.

‘Well if you’ll excuse me …’

‘Couldn’t we talk, just for a minute. It’s important.’

‘I have to get home. Everyone except me has to be up early for work tomorrow. I don’t like disturbing them by walking in late.’

‘Just a few minutes.’ She hated having to beg. This wasn’t the way she’d intended their reconciliatory conversation to go. ‘I was just making cocoa …’

‘I couldn’t eat or drink another thing today.’

‘Just a few minutes.’

He hesitated. Footsteps rang out higher up the hill. If he stood here arguing with her he risked attracting attention he could well do without.

‘Five minutes,’ he agreed reluctantly, following her across the road and into the shop.

‘Cocoa and cheese sandwiches all round?’ Diana offered as she walked into the house with Jane, Eddie and William.

‘I could make them.’

‘You mend, I cook, remember.’

‘Sandwiches and cocoa isn’t cooking.’

‘It is in the boys’ eyes. They can’t even manage that much.’

‘That’s the last pot of tea I make you, sis,’ William sniped.