Free Black-eyed Devils by Catrin Collier Page A

can’t.’ Huw Davies saw that Tom was determined to leave. ‘But if you have to go, at least let me look outside to make sure there are no colliers watching the entrance.’ He went to the door.
    â€˜Is the street clear?’ Tom asked.
    â€˜It is at the moment, but don’t take your time. Someone from the colliery company could come to fetch you at any minute.’
    â€˜That’s not likely,’ Gwyn Jenkins said. ‘They need more than one lucky blackleg who escaped a hanging and a beating if they’re going to keep the colliery going without the workers.’
    â€˜Tom, be careful.’ Huw Davies found himself talking to a closed door. Tom Kelly had gone.
    Mark Watkins had spent all morning standing across the road from the soup kitchen. He was cold, wet, hungry and bored but he forgot his troubles when he saw Tom Kelly round the corner and run up the hill towards him.
    Mark waved his arm. Half a dozen colliers armed with planks of wood they’d torn from the colliery railings left the shelter of the lane behind him. They joined Mark, but were careful to stand back out of sight of someone climbing the hill. All they had to do was wait.
    Arnold Craggs picked up the jewellery box Anna had given the clerk. He opened it and turned it around on the desk so it faced her.
    â€˜It’s been years since we last spoke, Anna. I’m surprised you kept the locket I gave you.’
    â€˜You put a picture of yourself in it. It was the only one I had.’
    He pressed the catch. The front flew open to reveal a head and shoulders portrait that had been taken of him when he’d been a young man. On the other side was a photograph of a baby. ‘I wanted to help you.’
    â€˜You did.’
    â€˜Not enough.’
    â€˜I wouldn’t let you do more. You had a wife. I was young, foolish and wanted to believe in the fairy tale “Happily ever after”. We had an affair that resulted in a baby. It’s an old story, Arnold. All that needed to be said about it, was said years ago.’ She picked up the locket, returned it to the jewellery box and closed the lid.
    â€˜I’ve seen Amy,’ he murmured. ‘She’s beautiful. Just as you were at her age.’
    â€˜You always knew how to flatter a woman, Arnold. But I’ve never been beautiful. Not even twenty years ago.’
    â€˜You were to me, Anna. I never stopped loving you. Or regretting what might have been.’
    Despite her earlier refusal of a chair, Anna found herself in one of the guest chairs next to the fireplace. Arnold sat on opposite her. Close but not close enough to touch her.
    â€˜You live close to Mary and Jim Watkins. You must have seen a lot of Amy when she growing up.’ Arnold sounded envious.
    â€˜I did. Mary and Jim Watkins have done a good job of bringing Amy up, Arnold. They wouldn’t have been able to look after her as well as they have done without the money you gave them to buy a house in Tonypandy. And the job you organized for Jim in the Glamorgan Colliery.’
    â€˜You married.’
    â€˜A good man who believes Amy is Mary and Jim’s child. He wouldn’t have married me if he’d suspected the truth.’
    â€˜Who would have thought that you could have silenced so many gossips by moving a few miles away from Pontypridd?’
    â€˜People in Pontypridd lost interest in me when I moved to Tonypandy with Mary and Jim. I was careful never to leave Mary and Jim’s house without my cloak until after Amy was born. So, people in Tonypandy never doubted Mary when she said Amy was her child.’
    â€˜Gwilym Jenkins isn’t that good a man, Anna. He’s a strike leader,’ Arnold said.
    â€˜You know the name of the man I married?’ She looked at him surprise.
    â€˜Do you think that I could forget about you and Amy? She is my only child, Anna.’
    â€˜You have no children, Arnold.’
    He clenched his fists.