Spoils of War (21 page)

‘Yes, Dr John.’

‘And ask sister to make sure that someone sits with the patient at all times. That’s an order.’

‘Yes, Dr John.’

‘How’s Bethan?’ Diana asked Andrew.

‘Well. Everyone’s well.’

‘And William? Mam is always so worried about him. The war …’

‘Don’t you go worrying about the war, young lady. We’re winning it on all fronts.’

‘You’re not just saying that, Dr John?’

‘Would I lie to you?’

‘Yes. Both of you would. It’s what doctors do when they’re worried about their patients. Bethan told me.’

‘Then I’ll have to tell Bethan off for giving away trade secrets.’ Andrew heard the squeak of a rubber-soled shoe behind him as a replacement nurse walked into the cubicle.

‘You get some rest, Diana. I’ll be back in a little while.’

‘But I will be able to see Wyn and Mam?’

‘As soon as the specialist has taken a look at you and given his permission.’

‘They send their love, Diana. Everyone sends their love,’ Andrew reassured as he followed his father out of the cubicle.

Chapter Eleven

Charlie paid the taxi driver, picked up his case and looked up at the front door of the house in Tyfica Road. He tried to view the house dispassionately, as if he were a stranger and a foreigner seeing it for the first time – as Masha would on Wednesday. But all he could see was their house in Russia. He didn’t even have to close his eyes to recall every detail of the farm he had been born in, grown through babyhood and childhood to adulthood in, and carried his bride into. The home he’d expected his eldest son to inherit after his death just as he’d expected to inherit it from his father.

Two storeys high with gabled windows on all four sides that curved the roof into the gentle, rolling lines that he had since come to recognise as uniquely Eastern European. Solid walls and deep-set windows crafted from oak-planking, weathered grey by more than four hundred hot, dry Russian summers and sub-zero, snow-filled winters. The windows of the two principal rooms on the ground floor thrown out into bays that opened into the garden – vast by Pontypridd standards – and lush and green in spring and summer. There had been an orchard of cherry, apple, plum and walnut trees and a fruit garden crammed with raspberry canes and black, white and red currant bushes. Closer to the house were flowerbeds filled with bulbs, and great clumps of perennial flowers that his mother and grandmother had lovingly nurtured from seed. And at the back, behind the kitchen door, neatly tilled, carefully weeded lines of vegetables and salad that his father had taught him to tend, separated from the geese and chicken runs by a fence of close-nailed palings.

And here! Apart from a square of grass the size of an average tablecloth, there was no garden to break the line of steep concrete steps that led up to the front door. But there was the small back garden, terraced in three layers, each higher than the last and none large enough to hold more than a single cherry or apple tree.

He walked slowly up to the door and unlocked it with one of the keys Alma had given Bethan to pass on to him. The tiled porch had been cleaned, the stained glass in the door polished, the floor disinfected. He could smell it. Unlocking the inner door he stepped into the hall. He found himself enveloped in unexpected warmth that was all the more welcoming after the frost outside. The stairs and passage stretched before him, sterile, dead areas wallpapered in an uninviting dull tan and dark brown abstract pattern, and carpeted in a vile weave of brown and beige leaves and pink and orange roses that he couldn’t imagine anyone selecting from free choice.

The front door at home in Russia had opened directly into the large, comfortable room his family had lived in for twelve generations. Like the outside of the house, the walls had been lined with oak planking, oiled and polished by scores of Raschenko women until it gleamed, rich and dark, cool in summer and warm in winter. Opposite the door the stairs led upward to the second storey, an integral part of the room that lent height and an extra display area for family pictures and portraits. Paintings had been hung on every available inch of space, some expertly executed, most not, and one or two unashamedly childish. By-products of lessons in the village school to be framed by proud parents.

Here and there, they’d been interspersed with newer photographs of his parents, grandparents and even one of his own wedding. Him standing proud and erect in a sober dark suit and new shirt Masha had stitched for the occasion. And Masha beside him in a simple, calf-length white dress carrying a posy of flowers from her garden. Both impossibly young, bright and hopeful, looking to a future together after a public secular service and a clandestine one with a priest arranged by his mother-in-law who refused to give up her religion even after the state had outlawed it. Recalling the photograph, he reflected that it had been as well neither he nor Masha had been able to see exactly what that future held in store for them.

Aside from the pictures, colours sprang to mind. A veritable rainbow of vivid, beautiful shades. Rich red, sea green, gold, turquoise and deep sapphire blue – like that of the eyes set in the Icon of the Virgin in the village church before it had been taken down and stripped of its jewels and gold frame by order of the party. All those colours and more had been woven into the wool rugs that covered the wooden floor, one wall and the three vast couches, every one of them large enough to serve as a bed. A massive square table filled the centre of the room. There must have been many tablecloths but the one he remembered was dark green cotton, embroidered with a border of red and cream roses.

An enormous stove dominated the north-east corner of the room, large enough for the entire extended family to sleep on when winter set in and finished in blue-and-white Delft tiles that his grandfather insisted had been carried all the way from the Netherlands by a well-travelled Raschenko son in the eighteenth century. But that room – that house – was lost. He hadn’t dared think of it for sixteen years. Did Masha regret it? Was she hoping, even now, that he’d recreated it here? Would she be disappointed?

He pushed open the door to the parlour Alma had shown him, expecting the same red-plush-upholstered, dark wood furniture, unfashionable reminders of someone else’s taste and memories. But the red plush had been hidden by throws in a colourful red and green print that looked suspiciously Russian. There were plants in beaten brass bowls and Alma had found pictures to replace those Mrs Harding had taken – prints of her favourite Pre-Raphaelite painters that he suspected hadn’t been too hard to track down in the pawnshops of Pontypridd. He recognised a Burne-Jones and a Mucha; then as he turned to the fireplace he stopped in his tracks. He was looking at the work of Elena Polenova, a copy of an illustration from his favourite childhood book –
The Little White Duck.
This hadn’t been something Alma had picked up by chance.

‘I intended to be gone before you came.’ Alma stood beside him. ‘Do you like it?’

He nodded, not trusting himself to speak.

‘Your friends in Cardiff heard about Masha. They visited the shop and asked if there was anything they could do to help. They supplied the material and prints and some Russian books and magazines for your son and Masha. I put them in the kitchen. As you’ll have to keep the stove alight there for cooking and hot water, I thought you might want to use it as a living room until the warmer weather.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Thank your friends, Charlie. They gave me all sorts of other things – spices for cooking, glass jars of salted cucumbers and herrings – and vodka. If you look around and in the cupboards you’ll find them. Are you moving in now?’

‘I thought I’d familiarise myself with the place before Masha comes.’

‘Bethan told me she’s arriving on Wednesday.’

He took her hand. ‘I’m glad you’re here.’

‘The chimneys have been swept,’ she continued quickly, conscious of the warmth and pressure of his fingers on hers. ‘The kitchen stove’s been lit for over a week so the downstairs is well aired. We lit fires in the bedrooms for the first time today but the beds have been aired with warming pans and Mrs Lane made up all of them this morning because I wasn’t sure where you’d want to sleep. Mrs Lane will be in every day to see to anything that needs doing. I told her to treat the place as her own in the sense of look round and do what needs doing, unless of course, Masha orders her to do something different.’

‘Alma …’

‘There’s a good stock of coal in the coal-house but it won’t last more than a week or two if you light all the fires every day and you won’t get a ration big enough to keep everything going. I suggest you keep the range in the kitchen alight and, as I said, use that as a living room and light the fires in whichever bedrooms you are using for no more than an hour or two every evening. The pantry’s stocked with enough food for a week and there’s soap, shampoo, toothpaste and brushes in the bathroom. I’ve tried to think of everything but that doesn’t mean I have. If there’s anything you need I’ll be in the shop.’

Relinquishing her hand he reached out and gripped her shoulders. She was trembling and it wasn’t from cold. Instinctively he pulled her close, wrapping his arms around her. She tried to move away but his touch was so warm, so familiar she succumbed to temptation and rested her head on his shoulder.

‘I know I told you Masha would always come first, Alma, but please, believe me, I never thought I’d find her again.’

‘I know.’

‘I’ve hurt you and Theo.’

‘Theo’s young, he accepts things easily and he’ll be fine as long as there’s enough people to love and look after him. It’s you I’m worried about, Charlie. You always want to do the right thing, putting everyone else first and yourself last. You have given Theo and me all we could possibly want. A nice flat to live in, more than enough money to buy whatever we need. Please, for your own sake, concentrate on Masha and Peter for a while.’ Pushing him away from her, somehow she found the strength to extricate herself from his arms. ‘Now, if you don’t mind I’ll leave you to look around by yourself. I’d rather not come here again.’

‘You don’t want to meet Masha?’

‘No.’

‘After she hears about you and realises how hard you worked on this house she may want to meet you – and Theo.’

‘You can bring Theo here, Charlie, but I’d prefer to stay away.’

‘I understand.’

‘I don’t think you do. I don’t want to meet Masha because I rather suspect I’ll end up liking her and, given the circumstances, we can hardly be friends.’

‘No.’

‘Unless you turn Muslim and set us up in a harem. That was a joke,’ she explained swiftly when he didn’t smile.

‘After Masha and Peter have settled I’d like to come back to work. I thought I could manage the Treforest shop.’

‘Or the Pontypridd one. I spend most of my time travelling between the others but we can sort out the details in a week or two.’

‘You won’t mind working with me?’

‘We’re working together now. You do the books.’

‘Hardly a full-time job.’ He watched her button her coat. ‘You know Andrew and Bethan are travelling with me?’

‘Bethan told me. I’m glad you’ll have company. It’s a long journey.’

‘I’ll be round before we go, to see Theo.’

‘He’ll look forward to whatever time you can spare. When Masha is with you, it won’t matter if it’s every day or not.’ Winding her scarf around her neck, she pulled on her gloves and adjusted her hat. ‘You will remember what I said about taking care of yourself,’ she pressed earnestly.

‘I will.’

She turned her back on him and walked to the front door. He followed. Opening the inner door she slipped her hand into her pocket. ‘I almost forgot.’ Taking his hand she pressed her set of keys to the house into his palm and closed his fingers over them. ‘Bye, Charlie.’ Unable to bear the pain in his eyes she ran down the steps.

He continued to stand in the porch watching, as she walked down the road. She didn’t see him looking after her – she didn’t have to. She knew he was there. She could sense his presence.

He waited until she rounded the corner. Closing the door, he locked it. The house was ready, waiting expectantly – for what? Picking up his case, he looked up the stairs. Time to move in and begin a new life, or perhaps simply pick up the threads of an old one he had assumed had been broken for ever.

Andrew drove slowly down Broadway. Seeing the sign for Myles’ Garage he slowed his car, turned right and parked on the forecourt. He must have passed the place hundreds of times without noticing it, but then no one he knew had owned it before. Opening his door, he stepped out and walked across a concrete parking area littered with cars in various stages of disrepair. A mechanic stood in front of the open bonnet of an Austin, cleaning a lump of metal with an oily rag, while two boys watched disinterestedly.

‘Mr Ronconi?’ he asked.

‘The office.’ The older of the two boys pointed to a ramshackle shack that stood behind a couple of dilapidated petrol pumps. Home-made, spidery lettering on a wooden board that hadn’t even been cut straight, grandly proclaimed ‘OFFICE’. Andrew decided he could be forgiven for missing it. He knocked at the door and pushed it wide.

‘Ronnie?’

‘Here.’

‘So this is your new business?’

‘Andrew, nice of you to call in. Grab a chair if you can find one that’s safe to sit on. Frankly, I’d rather you’d waited until Will and I had a chance to clean this place up before paying a call.’

‘It could do with some sorting.’

‘Not burning down, which some people have suggested? So, how can I help you? Your car needs servicing or, better still, you want to buy a new one, or a good second-hand one for Bethan?’ Ronnie glanced up from the stack of unpaid bills he’d been wading through. ‘Ianto wasn’t good on paperwork. It’s a miracle the audited accounts showed a profit …’ He studied Andrew’s face. ‘You haven’t come here to support the business, have you?’

‘Diana came round a couple of hours ago.’

Ronnie left his chair and reached for his overcoat.

‘Ronnie, sit down.’

‘I have to see her.’

‘Please, sit down!’

‘What’s wrong?’ Ronnie perched on the edge of the steel table and looked Andrew in the eye. ‘Whatever it is, tell me. I’d rather hear the truth than any number of
“don’t worry, it will be all rights”.
You know me. Know what I went through with Maud. Please …’

‘The absolute truth is, we don’t know exactly what Diana’s mental and physical condition is – yet. We called in a specialist. He examined her this afternoon but he says, and my father and I agree with him, that it’s too early to predict the full extent of the damage that has been done to her brain or if the damage that we can assess is permanent. What I can tell you is that she has lost some control over the left-hand side of her body.’

‘She’s paralysed.’

‘At this moment she has little control over the movement in her left arm and leg. But, as I said, it is far too soon to predict whether that condition is permanent or not.’

Ronnie took a deep breath. ‘So she’s going to need a lot of help to adjust and someone to come in and run the house and look after Billy and Catrina. She may need a wheelchair – constant attention. I can cope with that.’ He reached for his cigarettes and pushed one into his mouth. ‘But that’s not all – I can see it in your face.’