Winners and Losers (13 page)

He nodded, opened the umbrella and offered Megan his arm. ‘Perhaps I should put the umbrella between us to stop you dripping over me,' he joked. ‘There really is no need for you to come with me, Ned. The weather's foul, it's late and Betty will be wondering where you are.'

‘As I'm older and uglier than your Joey she won't be wondering that much.' Ned thrust his bare hands into his pockets. His leather gloves had been one of the first things to be pawned when their savings had run out. ‘Betty knows that at my age the only thing keeping me from my bed at night is union business. And if you have to stay in the station for any reason, you may need an errand boy.'

Sali went inside and listened to Mr Evans locking the door. She watched them walk down the street from Mr Evans' bedroom window –two middle-aged men and a slight young girl between them.

Shivering, she returned to the kitchen and realized that, for the first time since she had moved into the house, she faced the prospect of spending a night behind two locked doors with only her son for company.

Luke Thomas thumped his fist against the stone wall of the holding cell in the police station. ‘Another thing about your father and his cronies on the bloody strike committee -'

‘Give it a rest,' Joey snarled. ‘It's bad enough having to spend the night in this damned dungeon, without having to listen to you go on about how you'd handle the strike if you were in charge.'

‘The trouble with you -'

‘The trouble with me is you've killed my patience. And I'll kill you if I have to listen to one more of your tirades against the strike committee for the way they're handling the dispute, the colliery owners for working us to death for slave wages or the police for arresting us when all
you,'
Joey jabbed his index finger into Luke's chest, ‘were doing was demanding
your
rights.'

‘I'm fighting for all of us,' Luke asserted pompously.

‘And we believe that, don't we, Victor?' Joey mocked. ‘Luke Thomas, the great and noble martyr of Tonypandy, soon to be sainted for the sacrifices he's made for the cause.'

Victor held his fingers to his lips, walked to the steel door and pressed his ear against the grille.

Joey was furious with Victor for silencing him, Luke for his ranting, the police for depriving him of his freedom and incarcerating the three of them in a freezing cell, but most of all with himself, for being stupid enough to join the morning's unofficial picket. He yanked the single grey army issue blanket from the top ‘bunk' that was a six by two-foot sheet of steel hinged to the wall and fastened by chains. Shaking it out, he wrapped it around himself.

‘You look like one of those Indian squaws in the comic books,' Luke sneered.

‘Be careful, Victor. Those beds, if you can call them that, are cold enough to give you an ice burn.' Joey decided the only way he was going to cope with Luke was to ignore him.

‘I always said you Evanses were soft.'

‘What can you hear?' Joey joined his brother at the door.

‘Someone shouting. I couldn't swear to it but it sounded like Lloyd.'

‘Lloyd has more sense than to get himself arrested,' Joey said tersely.

‘If he's here he's probably drunk.'

It took all Joey's will-power to remember that he was ignoring Luke.

Luke sat on the bunk below Joey's and tested it with his weight. ‘We'll turn into ice blocks by morning.'

Joey paced to the small barred window and peered outside.

‘See anything?' Victor asked from his post at the door.

‘Bugger all,' Joey answered. ‘The town's quiet.'

‘Not surprising if they've arrested every innocent man in the valley on trumped-up charges ... Did you hear that?' Luke asked, as a thud resounded down the corridor.

Joey vaulted up on to his bunk, tucked most of the blanket under him, wound his scarf twice round his neck, settled his cap on his head, pulled his overcoat sleeves over his gloves and closed his eyes.

‘How you can sleep?'

Joey rolled to the edge of his bunk, opened one eye and glared at Luke. ‘One more squeak out of you and I'll go from tamping to murdering mad.'

Luke kicked up his feet and fell silent.

Victor frowned from the strain of listening. If only he could be sure it was Lloyd's voice he'd heard –but there were so many sounds. The tiled walls, floors and metal doors had transformed the corridor into an echo chamber, magnifying footsteps and rendering conversation unintelligible. But he hadn't picked up on so much as a whisper outside of their cell in ten minutes.

‘Come on, Victor, whatever you heard, you can't do a thing about it locked up in here.' Joey settled back on his bunk and closed his eyes. ‘You may as well try to get some sleep.'

‘You're right.' Victor pulled the blanket from the bunk across from Luke's, draped it over his shoulders and sat down. But he couldn't forget the voice he'd heard. The years Lloyd had spent working in colliery management had given him a distinctive accent. Not that he'd lost his Welsh intonation, just that he sounded more educated than the average collier. There weren't many men in the Rhondda who spoke like him.

Chapter Seven

‘We have witnesses who saw you throw the brick that hit Constable Lamb, Evans. Witnesses who are prepared to stand up and testify in court that you took deliberate aim, so there's no point in you trying to deny that you're responsible for his injuries.' Constable Shipton pulled a chair out from under the metal table Lloyd was sitting at, lifted his foot on to the seat and, shifting his weight on to his other leg, glowered down at him.

Lloyd met the officer's gaze without flinching. ‘I was outside the railway station yesterday evening, not in Dunraven Street. Several members of the strike committee were with me.'

‘The strike committee,' Shipton echoed. ‘And, of course, we
always
believe
everything
the members of the strike committee tell us, don't we?'

The constable stationed in front of the door sniggered.

‘There were police officers there to prevent us from reaching the station platforms,' Lloyd said calmly. ‘They saw me.' He winced as the officer standing behind his chair pulled the handcuffs that secured his arms high behind his back. The strain on his shoulder muscles was agonizing. He felt as though his arms were being torn from their sockets. His wrists burned, skinned raw by the cuffs. But determined to keep his temper, he continued to stare impassively at Constable Shipton.

Shipton tossed a pen down beside a bottle of ink and sheet of paper on the table. ‘The court will be more inclined to be lenient with you, if you plead guilty and show remorse, Evans, Agree to sign that confession and we'll unlock your cuffs.'

Lloyd raised his voice in the hope of being heard outside the cell by someone with more integrity than his interrogators. ‘How many times do I have to tell you that I will not confess to a crime I did not commit?'

There was a knock at the door. The officer standing in front of it opened it, and Sergeant Lamb walked into the interview room. Shipton kicked the chair he was leaning on back under the table and snapped to attention. When the constable standing behind his chair followed suit, Lloyd tentatively moved his shoulders. Weak and dizzy from relief, he focused on the sergeant.

Sergeant Lamb walked across the small room and glanced at the sheet of paper on the table. ‘This confession not signed yet, Shipton?'

‘No, sir.'

‘Why not?'

‘The suspect refuses to confess, sir?'

Lamb circled Lloyd's chair. ‘Refuses,' he murmured. Without warning, he lashed out, kicking the chair from under Lloyd. Trussed and unable to save himself with his hands, Lloyd fell awkwardly. He lay sprawled on his back, fighting for breath. Sergeant Lamb returned to the door and stood next to the constable in front of it. Lloyd realized that all four officers were watching him.

He rolled on his side and struggled to his knees. The handcuffs bit into his damaged wrists as he fought to regain his balance. He was poised on the balls of his feet, ready to rise, when the sergeant gave an almost imperceptible nod. The three constables moved. There was no time to tense his muscles before the first kick connected with his stomach.

‘You ready to sign now?' Shipton barked.

‘I refuse to -' A steel toe-capped boot smashed into Lloyd's ribcage and the remainder of his words dissolved into a scream he barely recognized as his own. He curled instinctively into a foetal position in a futile attempt to protect himself.

Walls and floor blurred into a jagged kaleidoscope of white tiles and grey concrete punctuated by flashes of crimson lightning. Lloyd tried to divorce himself from the pain by concentrating on the light and shadows in the room. The oil lamp was smoking. There was a smell of grease in the air. The oil had to be contaminated. Why would the police buy contaminated oil?

He was aware of the sergeant leaving the room. Of the door clanging shut behind him.

‘Are you ready to sign?'

Too wracked with pain to speak, he lifted his head and shook it. A blow sent him flying into the wall. An ear-splitting crack preceded a tidal wave of agony that flooded from the back of his skull throughout his body, washing all coherent thought from his mind. He felt as though he were dissolving into a sweet grey mist. His last thoughts were of Sali. Then there was oblivion, a nothingness that blotted everything from his consciousness, even pain.

Sali lay tense and rigid, her senses strained to their utmost as she listened intently for the sounds of Mr Evans returning. The bed beside her stretched cold and empty. She caressed the void, aching for Lloyd's presence with a pain that was almost physical. No matter how she struggled to concentrate on other things, she couldn't stop picturing him locked in a police cell, officers with batons closing in ...

She made a valiant effort to block the scene from her mind. Since the night of the worst riot, the
Rhondda Leader
had been full of articles about police brutality towards innocent people. Church and chapel ministers, solicitors, doctors, teachers, tradesmen –all had written to the paper to complain about incidents they had witnessed. She recalled what had happened to Betty Morgan. If the police didn't balk at knocking down women in the street in broad daylight, what would they do to a strike leader they were holding in the isolation of a police cell?

She felt for the box of matches she kept on her beside cabinet. Sliding it open she removed a match and struck it. The hands on the clock showed two o'clock. Mr Evans had left for the police station before ten –could they have arrested him as well? She lit the candle, pushed her feet into her slippers, slipped on her flannel dressing gown, threw a shawl over her shoulders and walked into the front bedroom that had been Lloyd's before he'd moved into hers.

Leaving the candle on the bookshelf next to the door, she went to the window that overlooked the street, hoping to see Mr Evans returning from the police station.

She jumped back. The street was crowded with shadowy figures in dark capes and helmets. Then, two enormous crashes shook the front of the house, rapidly followed by the tinkling of breaking glass and the harsher sound of splintering wood. Harry screamed. She ran across the landing. He was standing in the doorway of his bedroom, shaking from cold and fear. She gathered him into her arms. Torchlight flickered into the hall below them. The front door swayed drunkenly inwards on its hinges before falling flat into the passage and shattering on the flagstones. Two policemen burst into the hall, both wielding axes. One looked up at her.

‘Your name?'

She stared at him, too traumatized to answer.

‘This is William Evans' house?'

‘Yes.' She finally found her voice but it sounded hoarse, strange. She wrapped her arms around Harry, burying his face in her shoulder, covering the back of his head with her hands.

‘Who else is in the house?' Sergeant Lamb picked his way through the wreckage of what had been the front door. Rain blasted in forming puddles around the debris on the flagstones at his feet.

‘No one.' Sali forced herself to remain calm for Harry's sake.

‘You live here?'

‘Yes.'

‘A woman lodger?' he queried sceptically.

Sali heard voices raised in anger outside and realized the police had woken the neighbours. Drawing courage from their presence within earshot, she retorted, ‘I am Mr Evans' housekeeper.'

‘And the child?'

‘Is mine.'

‘And which of the Evanses'?'

It was one question too many for Sali. Fear was replaced by anger. ‘Not that it is any of your business, officer, but I am a widow.'

The sergeant looked to the men behind him. ‘Keep everyone back, well away from the house. You, you, you and you.' Two officers joined the two already in the hall. ‘You know what to look for. Miscreants in hiding. Letters or papers pertaining to the strike committee or the Federation of Mineworkers. Evidence related to the crimes that have been committed.'

Furious at having strangers smash down the front door, walk in and ransack the house at that time in the morning, Sali snapped, ‘Do you have a search warrant, officer?'

‘A what?' The sergeant looked up the stairs at her.

‘A search warrant,' Sali reiterated loudly, drawing courage from the noise the neighbours were making outside. She lowered Harry to the floor and pushed him gently towards his room. ‘You can't take anything from this house unless you have a warrant.'

‘I don't need a warrant, madam. Not for the lair of men who have no respect for the law or its officers.' Sergeant Lamb began to walk slowly up the stairs towards her. Sali was terrified, but she stood her ground. She was acutely aware of her own heartbeat, of Harry clinging to her legs, of the commotion outside, of crashes and bangs emanating from the downstairs rooms.

The sergeant reached the landing and stood close to her. ‘You're as red as the bastards you live with, aren't you?' he hissed. ‘And just like them, you think police officers are fair game. Targets to be maimed and even killed. You Marxist bitch -'

‘Harry, into your bedroom, shut the door. Now!' Sali had never spoken roughly to her son before. Frightened, he scuttled into his bedroom.

‘Your name?' Sergeant Lamb barked as if he were on a parade ground.

‘Mrs Sali Jones.'

Hobnailed boots continued to grate and rasp over the flagstones downstairs. A loud smash accompanied by swearing resounded from the kitchen.

‘Have you a warrant?' Sali repeated, shouting in the hope that she could be heard in the street.

‘We have men in custody charged with serious crimes. We are looking for evidence.'

‘You need a warrant.' Aware of Harry watching through a crack in his open door, she leaned forward and yelled. ‘Close your door and turn the key, Harry.' Her foot caught in the hem of her nightdress. The sergeant lifted his hand. Assuming that he was about to hit her, she jumped back and missed her footing. Her knees buckled. She reached out but failed to reach the banister. Stairs, ceiling and walls whirled crazily around her as she tumbled headlong. The last thing she saw was Harry looking down at her and screaming.

Megan was walking with Victor on Barry Island beach. The sky was a clear, cloudless cerulean blue, the sun was shining, but a cold wind blew around her ankles. The screams of gulls, high-pitched, ear-splitting, drowned out all other sounds. She opened her arms to embrace Victor, the wind blew colder ... the gulls' screeches grew more piercing ...

Megan woke with a start. The sheets and blankets had pulled free from the bottom of the mattress and her feet were numb with cold. Tucking them back beneath the bedclothes, she sat up to rub them. Although it was darker than a coalhole, she knew she wasn't in the box room she shared with Daisy. In the few seconds it took her to recall the events of the previous day, she became aware that her throat was sore and she had a headache.

The stench of sulphur filled the cold, still air and the gulls stopped screeching. Lena had struck a match, lit a candle and switched off the alarm clock.

‘Good morning,' Megan mumbled thickly.

‘Time to lay and light the fires.' Lena dived out of bed and poured water from the jug on the washstand into the bowl. She splashed her hands and face, dried them on one of the towels draped over the stand and went to the chair on which she'd folded her clothes the night before. She picked up her drawers and pulled them on beneath the cover of her nightgown. Turning her back to Megan, she shrugged her arms out of the sleeves and pulled on her chemise and petticoats under the tent-like, flannel gown, only removing it when she was ready to put on her dress. She buttoned the bodice and sleeves, sat on the side of her bed and rolled on her black stockings, gartering them below her knees.

Megan peered at the clock. Five o'clock, her normal waking time in her uncle's house, but she had never been so reluctant to leave her bed. Then she thought of Victor, Joey –and Lloyd. If Mr Evans had managed to get them released last night, Victor may have written her a note. She folded back the sheet and blankets, swung her legs to the floor, padded over to the washstand, tipped the water Lena had used into the slop bucket and poured in fresh.

‘Mrs Palmer says there's no point in washing properly until all the dirty work's been done for the day.' Lena watched Megan try to lather soap in the icy water.

‘She's right,' Megan croaked, taking her flannel from her American oilcloth toilet bag.

‘You're talking funny.'

‘I got soaked in the rain last night. I must have caught a cold.' Megan fingered the black woollen dress she had worn the day before and hung on the back of the door. It was as wet as when she'd taken it off, which was little wonder given the temperature of the room.

‘There's four fires that need seeing to downstairs. I'll do the ones in the kitchen and Mrs Palmer's private room. You do the ones in the lodgers' dining and sitting rooms. Afterwards, all the furniture downstairs has to be dusted and the floors swept while Mrs Palmer makes first breakfast.'

Her throat too sore to speak, Megan nodded. It was only after Lena had left that she realized the girl had taken the private rooms, leaving her to cope with any lodgers who were around, and after yesterday, the last people she wanted to see were Sergeants Lamb and Martin.

Constable Gwyn Jenkins unlocked the door to the corridor that housed the holding cells of the police station. ‘Number six, you say?' he called back to the duty officer over his shoulder.

‘That's right.'

Gwyn unlocked a door halfway along the corridor. Billy Evans and Ned Morgan were sitting on steel beds opposite one another. Their faces were grey with exhaustion, their chins stubbled with beard, but their eyes glittered, darkly antagonistic, as they glared at him.

‘Come to see the monkeys in the zoo, Gwyn?' Billy said bitterly.

‘You're free to go,' Gwyn muttered shamefacedly.

‘We came down here last night to find out why Lloyd had been arrested. The second we set foot in this place we were charged with affray and thrown into this cell.'