The Earth Hums in B Flat (30 page)

‘I didn't know you had a dog,' I say. ‘You never said. Does it bark a lot, then?'

He laughs. ‘Haven't you heard that before?' he says. ‘Having the black dog? It means being depressed. I told you about Dad being depressed after the war from all that flying and dropping bombs. Mum says he's in good company, though; even Winston Churchill has the black dog. Trouble is, it makes Dad angry. He never shouts at Mum or Caroline but he goes on and on at me. I could tell Miss Davies about your mother being cross with you all the time, if you like.'

I shake my head. ‘I'll ask her,' I say

The black dog is not a real dog. I was looking at the answer all the time, and I couldn't see it. Why didn't I know that? Why didn't I guess it? So, the dog I saw with Ifan Evans last Christmas was Mot after all. And when I remembered what happened I imagined it was a bigger and fiercer dog because I was so afraid of it when it licked the fox's blood from me. And that's why Angharad, or maybe it was Catrin, couldn't see the dog – because there wasn't a dog there, not a real one, only an invisible beast that made Ifan Evans behave like a beast himself. So, when Catrin used the poker to hit and hit the black dog that wasn't there she must have hit and hit . . . The blood on the floor can't have come from a dog that wasn't there, it must have been Ifan Evans's blood. My stomach starts to ache. Catrin, my little wren. Now I know why Mrs Evans confessed; now I understand. It wasn't just Guto she wanted to save.

‘Gwenni.' Richard shakes my arm. ‘Did you hear me? I have to find out about eye colour and stuff for biology. Do you want to help me with this homework or not?'

Do I? I look around the library. There are shelves and shelves weighed with books that are full of stories or ideas, or best of all, with both. Would one of these books have told me about the black dog? And there are shelves and shelves still empty. If all the shelves were filled with books, would I be able to learn everything in the world there is to know from them? Would they tell me what to do now? I put my hand into the front pocket of my satchel, and feel for my blotter rocker. Will this tell me what to do? Mrs Evans said: Keep us in your heart. Sergeant Jones said: This is how Elin wants it. And now I know why. I don't need to read anything to know what to do. I do nothing. I let it go. Like a good detective.

Richard reaches for a large book with a dust jacket so faded I can't see its title. ‘Here,' he says. ‘This should have something about it. Let's sit at that table by the window.'

I leave the rocker in my satchel and carry the book over to the table. The tops of the pages are covered in dust, and I blow a small cloud off them. I rub my eyes with my sleeve.

‘Look at your eyes watering,' says Richard. ‘You're not crying, are you?'

‘It's the dust,' I say. ‘And I've got a cold.'

‘Don't give it to me,' Richard says. He puts two more volumes down on the table. ‘I think that book you've got is probably best; I think it's one Miss Edwards gave the library from her own books.' He pulls a bag of sweets from his pocket and puts it on the table. ‘D'you want a Black Jack?' He takes one and peels the paper off it. ‘I thought they were your favourites. That's why I got them.'

‘Thanks,' I say. ‘I don't want one just now. And anyway, we're not supposed to eat in here.'

Richard tuts and puts the bag of sweets back in his pocket. ‘If I look stuff up, will you write it down?' he says. ‘But start with my eyes. What colour are they?'

I concentrate on his eyes. They're the colour of Catrin's eyes. Luminous as the rockpools the tide leaves behind in the summer sun. Blue, with the shadow of grey rocks and a little bit of sandiness in the depths.

‘Blue,' I say.

‘Your eyes are green, with chips of blue,' he says. ‘Green eyes are unusual, aren't they? I've never seen any before. We'll do your family colours too. Write down mine and yours.'

It's like the family tree Mrs Evans showed me how to make, but with colours instead of names. I take my tin of coloured pencils and my roughbook from my satchel and draw two trees, then I colour a bright blue eye on one for Richard and an emerald green eye on the other for me. They look like leaves.

‘My mum and my dad have got blue eyes,' says Richard. ‘It's a bit boring, really. Look, it shows you here.' He points at a diagram in the book. ‘Two blue-eyed parents will have a blue-eyed child. It's a bit obvious, isn't it?'

I take up my bright blue pencil and colour two more blue eyes on Richard's tree for his mother and father. ‘So, Caroline's got blue eyes too,' I say, and when Richard nods I put a blue eye on the tree for her.

‘That was too easy,' says Richard. ‘Who do you get your green eyes from?'

‘Tada,' I say. Mam always says Tada must have cats in the family somewhere. I colour Tada's eye in emerald green on my tree.

‘What colour are your mother's eyes?' says Richard.

‘Blue.' I colour Mam's eye the same blue as Richard's, though they're not the same. But I have only one blue pencil.

‘See, that's a bit more interesting,' says Richard, pointing at the diagram again. ‘One blue-eyed parent and one green-eyed parent can have children with blue or green eyes. Mmm . . .' He begins to leaf through the book. ‘I wonder what else you can determine.'

In the hush of the library ideas and stories and information lie quietly in the books until somebody needs them. They don't clamour for attention.

‘This genetic stuff is really interesting,' says Richard. He looks at my roughbook. ‘Perhaps it would look more scientific if you drew a proper diagram.'

‘I like drawing it this way,' I say. ‘And it describes it better.'

‘I'll do a proper diagram when I get home,' says Richard. ‘I didn't have to spend any extra time looking up Caroline's since she's the same as me. But Caroline says she told Bethan I'd find out about hers as well. They think it's a waste of time to come to the library at lunchtime.'

‘No,' I say.

‘No what?' he says. ‘Not find out about Bethan's? We may as well. What colour are her eyes, blue or green?'

The silence travels around the shelves, and in and out of the books until every volume holds its breath.

‘Brown,' I say.

‘Brown?' Richard says. ‘No, that can't be right. Look . . .' He moves the book around for me to see the scientific diagrams clearly. ‘A blue-eyed parent and a green-eyed parent can't have a child with brown eyes.'

‘Brown,' I say and colour Bethan's eye with my only brown pencil, which makes it look as if it's a leaf that has changed colour and is about to fall from the family tree.

39

‘You're a bit quiet, Gwenni,' says Nain. ‘What's the matter? Is it your mam? She's been up and about today; she must be feeling better.' Nain's preparing supper in the scullery. The potatoes are peeled and in their saucepan and she's scraping baby carrots over a sheet of newspaper.

‘Tada took her to see Dr Edwards this morning,' I say. ‘Maybe he gave her some more new tablets. I don't know. Tada's taken her out for some fresh air.'

Nain stops scraping and looks at me. ‘Cheer up. Worse things happen at sea.'

Do they? I make my mouth smile at her.

‘Hmm,' she says. ‘Well, don't stand there like an ornament. Help me with these.'

I pick up a baby carrot and scrape it and hand it to Nain to wash. Then I scrape another one and pop it into my mouth and crunch it. Sweet baby carrots are my second-favourite vegetable in the world. Broad beans are my first.

‘Are you here for your supper?' says Nain.

I shake my head. ‘We had chips from the chip shop,' I say, ‘and egg. Tada fried mine hard the way I like it. I fetched the chips. Greasy Annie was asking after Mam, I think; I never know what she means. And she said not to take a dish for the chips again; she wraps them in paper now.'

‘Take no notice of her,' says Nain. ‘She's not a nice woman, that Annie. I'm never sure if she's not a ha'penny short of a shilling. Something went wrong when she was born. Her poor mother nearly died and Annie was ill for a long time. Just before I had Lol; that's why I remember it.'

‘Is Greasy Annie the same age as Aunty Lol?' I say. ‘She looks as old as you, Nain.'

Nain peers at me over her spectacles and laughs. ‘She must really look old, then, Gwenni.'

Nain's skin is wrinkled like the prunes Mam used to soak for breakfast and she wears her grey plait twisted round and round her head so that she looks like the witch that tried to capture Hansel and Gretel. But I don't tell her that.

‘It's hard for you to think that we were all young once, just like you, Gwenni,' says Nain.

It's true. ‘What did you like to do when you were young, Nain?' I ask her. I slip another tiny carrot into my mouth.

‘Oh, like,' she says. ‘That didn't come into it. I left school at twelve and went into service as a maid. It was hard work, but by the time I was in my twenties I was housekeeper of a big house in London. Then I came home to the farm to look after the younger ones for Tada when Mam died.'

‘And you met Taid,' I say.

‘And I met Taid,' she says. ‘You did what you had to do in those days, Gwenni.'

What does that mean? ‘I saw Taid's gravestone in the cemetery when I was looking for dates for my family tree,' I say.

‘Did you, now?' says Nain. She scrumples up the newspaper with the carrot scrapings and takes it to the compost bucket outside the back door. The lid clangs like a bell when she drops it back in place.

‘And his other wife's,' I say.

‘Sarah,' says Nain.

I nod. ‘And all her dead babies.'

‘Another thing about those days,' says Nain. ‘The babies came regular as clockwork. Poor Sarah, she never got over losing so many, and the last one killed her.'

‘William,' I say. ‘The daring young man on the flying trapeze.'

‘Your father was very fond of Wil,' says Nain. ‘But Wil flew away just like Lloyd George. Saw his chance and left. Except Wil never flew back again.' She holds the pan with the carrots in it under the tap and runs water into it, then gives it a shake.

‘Bethan says Miss Edwards told her class that you don't have to have babies if you don't want to. You can have contraception instead.'

‘Whatever next,' says Nain. ‘The things they teach you at school these days.'

‘So why did Mam have me when she didn't want to have me, Nain?'

‘Of course your mother wanted you,' says Nain.

‘She says she didn't,' I say.

‘That's just her nerves talking,' says Nain. ‘Take no notice of her.'

‘But she never says it to Bethan.'

Nain doesn't say anything. She concentrates on reaching for the saucepan lids from the top of the wall cupboard.

‘I know about Bethan,' I say. ‘About Tada not being her father.'

‘Hush,' says Nain. One of the lids drops from her hand to the stone floor where it rings and rings until she puts her foot on it. ‘How?'

I shrug. I promised not to tell, didn't I?

‘Nanw Lipstick's girl; goes without saying,' says Nain. She bends down and picks up the lid. ‘Leave it alone, Gwenni. It's up to your mother and father to tell Bethan, not you.'

‘I wouldn't tell Bethan,' I say. ‘But I don't understand, Nain.'

‘Do you have to understand?'

I nod. ‘I do,' I say.

Nain sighs and rubs her hand along her forehead. ‘Let's get these pans on the fire, Gwenni. You take the small one through for me, and don't pinch any more carrots or there won't be enough for Lol's supper.'

We carry the pans into the living room and when Nain has poked the fire just right and put the pans exactly where they should be on the coals, she sits in her rocking chair and I sink down and down into the old leather armchair. Lloyd George shuffles on his perch and gives a soft sigh.

‘I don't know,' says Nain. ‘I suppose I'm about do the right thing here. It must be better for me to tell you than for you to hear dribs and drabs of old gossip.'

There's no book in any library that will tell me this story. ‘Please, Nain,' I say. ‘You've always told me how useful it is to know things so you don't go and put your foot in it.'

‘Hmm,' says Nain. ‘This is a bit different, Gwenni. A bit near to home. Well, listen closely, because I'm not telling you twice.' She leans back in her chair and begins to rock slowly; the chair gives a faint creak every time she rocks forwards. ‘Your mother and father married when your father was on leave from the army. He only had a few days. People were marrying like that all over the country then, in haste, because of the war. Everyone was afraid that they'd never get a chance to marry their sweethearts; that they might die fighting, you know.' Nain glances up at Uncle Idwal's picture on the wall. ‘Your grandmother wasn't well so your mother decided to carry on living with her until your father came back again.'