Black-eyed Devils Read online

  Anna Jenkins couldn’t sleep for thinking about Father Kelly. She had never seen him as upset as he had been when she had helped clean the kitchen that evening. She had tried to explain the situation to Gwilym when he had come home from the picket line but Gwilym had seen the situation from a strikers’ viewpoint.

  “A blackleg is a blackleg, Anna, whether or not he’s been tricked into signing a contract with management. Tom Kelly might be Father Kelly’s nephew, but he’s no different from the other black hearted Irishmen who’ve come to Wales to steal our jobs. If we get hold of him we’ll beat him seven shades of black and blue and white shirt him out of town. And Father Kelly will just have to live with it as best he can. I agree with you, Father Kelly is a good man. But his nephew is less than dirt as far as I and every right thinking union man is concerned.”

  After that pronouncement Gwilym had gone to bed. Anna had followed him upstairs but unable to sleep had returned downstairs an hour later. The parlour was no colder than the kitchen so she had retreated there. Because she and Gwilym had no children to feed they were surviving the strike better than most families. She hadn’t had to pawn the china she had inherited from her mother. Or sell the books she and Gwilym had collected. And she still had her one piece of valuable jewellery. She unlocked the drawer in the bureau bookcase Gwilym had inherited from his parents and reached in the back.

  Her hand closed around a small red leather case. She took it out and opened it. Nestling on a bed of blue velvet was a gold locket. She sprung the catch at the side and looked at the two photographs it contained. She was still staring at them ten minutes later when she heard a noise outside.

  She read the parlour clock. Half past three. Were the soldiers or police hoping to catch the miners working the drifts?

  She blew out the candle, went to the window and pushed the lace aside. Amy Watkins was standing outside her front door. Next to her was Tom Kelly. He had his back to her, but Anna was sure it was him. There weren’t many men in Tonypandy his height. And, as she watched, he bent his head to Amy’s, cupped her face in his hands, and kissed her.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Tom walked in the shadows of the houses as he made his way from Amy’s house back down the hill to the town and the White Hart. He heard voices raised in anger when he reached the corner of the main street. He looked out and stepped back into a shop doorway. Hundreds of strikers filled the street. Some of the men were holding their arms above their heads, tossing white shirted men to one another.

  As Tom watched, one man slipped down between the strikers. He heard a scream and a thud when the man hit the road. The strikers hid his body from view. He gazed at the faces of the men who were being carried high by the crowd and recognised the blacklegs who had been locked into the stable loft with him. Hoping no one would give him a second glance he crouched low.

  The blacklegs’ arms and legs were bound by ropes. On the opposite side of the road a striker had climbed a lamp post. Hooking his arm around the crossbar for support, the man wound a rope around the lamp. Half a dozen other strikers handed up a blackleg. The miner clinging to the post tied the rope around the blackleg’s chest, and hooked it beneath his armpits. Pulling the rope tight, the miner knotted it securely before releasing the prisoner. The blackleg swung free, his bare legs and feet flailing in the freezing cold air.

  Tom looked down the street and saw five other blacklegs strung up to lamp posts in the same way. Each had attracted a crowd. They dangled helplessly in mid air as the men and women beneath them, took turns to beat them with cane carpet beaters and sticks.

  The striker who had tied the last blackleg to a post jumped down and moved on to the next lamp. Tom looked around for the constables who were supposed to be guarding them. They were nowhere to be seen, but a dozen police officers had gathered at the other end of the street, close to the police station. They were watching the strikers. Not one of them had unhooked the truncheon they wore on their belts. Tom didn’t blame them. A dozen men could do nothing against hundreds. He only hoped his fellow blacklegs were fit enough to cope with the indignity and rough treatment the strikers were subjecting them to.

  He looked back up the hill. The street was empty and quiet. He didn’t dare risk entering the main street or returning to the stables. Too many people had seen him around town with Amy and his uncle. A man of his height was easily recognised. Neither could he return to Amy’s house and put her and her family at risk if the mob should follow him. That left the ruined cottage.

  If he could reach it without anyone seeing him.

  ‘What’s the matter with you this morning, Anna?’ Gwilym Jenkins asked. ‘You’re behaving as though you can’t wait to get me out of the house. I might want a second cup of tea.’

  ‘Then you can drink what’s left in the pot. I’d like to go up to the soup kitchen early for once.’ Anna carried on picking coals from the fire and smothering them with the coal shovel. To her husband’s disgust she had begun raking out the fire as soon as he had sat down to breakfast.

  ‘Is something happening in the soup kitchen that I should know about?’ Gwilym demanded.

  ‘Not that I know of. Father Kelly was very upset last night. I want to make sure he’s all right.’

  ‘You think more of Father Kelly than you do of me,’ Gwilym grumbled.

  ‘I do not. You’re being ridiculous,’ Anna snapped.

  ‘Am I? Look at yourself? You should be sitting at the table drinking your tea not playing in the fireplace.’

  ‘I’m not “playing” as you put it. Just trying to save every ounce of coal.’

  ‘For Father Kelly’s soup kitchen?’

  ‘You know he burns wood not coal in the church hall range, Gwilym.’ Anna sat back on her heels and looked at her husband. ‘We’re both under enough strain as it is with the strike. Let’s not quarrel.’

  ‘I’m not quarrelling with you. I just wish that you’d stick to being a wife.’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean.’ In spite of what she’d just said about not quarrelling Anna felt anger building inside her.

  ‘It means I don’t want to hear another word from you about Father Kelly or his nephew.’

  ‘Father Kelly has supported every miner during this strike, Gwilym. He’s fed the children, arranged as many meals as he can for the colliers’ families, driven miles to gather donations for the soup kitchens.’

  ‘And invited his black eyed devil of an Irish nephew to stay under his roof,’ Gwilym interrupted. ‘He welcomed him into his home. Even had the cheek to introduce him to Amy Watkins although the man only came to Tonypandy to take our jobs.’

  ‘Father Kelly didn’t know Tom Kelly had signed up to be a blackleg when he arrived.’

  ‘So, Father Kelly says.’

  ‘I believe him.’

  ‘I’ll not argue any more with you about this, Anna. I have to be on the picket in half an hour.’ Gwilym left the table, went into the hall and lifted his overcoat and cap from a peg.

  ‘Gwilym, don’t go like this,’ she pleaded.

  Gwilym turned back at the door and looked at her. ‘How would you like me to go, Anna?’

  When she didn’t answer him he left the house, slamming the door behind him.

  Anna dropped the tongs she was using to lift coals from the grate and stared at the dying embers of the fire. She didn’t know what she should do. She only knew that she had to do something. The question she kept asking herself was what?

  Mathew and Mark Watkins drank their tea and ate thin slices of apple tart the next morning before leaving their house for the picket line. Ten minutes later they were both back in the house, talking non-stop to Jim and Jack who had lingered at the kitchen table.

  ‘You should have seen the blacklegs before the constables cut them down,’ Mark moved close to the range. Mary had raked it out but the metal surfaces were still warm. ‘All of them were blue were cold, and so stiff the constables had to carry them into the back of their van.’

  ‘
Where had management hidden the scum?’ Jim asked.

  ‘In the stable behind the White Hart. Ned Morgan told me he had a tip-off they were there.’

  ‘Who told him?’ Jack took his boots from beside the range and began to lace them on.

  ‘Ned wouldn’t say. But all the barmaids and stable boys in the Hart are the daughters and sons of colliers. Any one of them could have said something to the strike committee.’ Mathew rubbed his hands together. His fingers were white, wrinkled and numb with cold. ‘So many strikers turned out in the early hours to white shirt the blacklegs, the police didn’t dare go near them for hours. They just left them there, hanging from the lamp posts.’

  ‘The strikers hung blacklegs.’ Amy clutched the doorpost for support. She had been outside looking for eggs in the hen house and had missed most of the conversation between her father and brothers.

  ‘Not by the neck,’ her father said gruffly, ‘although they deserved it.’

  Amy sank down on the nearest chair.

  ‘They hung them from ropes tied around their chests and gave all of them a good beating. I wish the boys who’d organized it had come here and woken us, so we could have seen it.’

  ‘You’re barbarians,’ Amy said angrily.

  ‘It’s barbaric to want to keep your job, is it?’ her father asked her.

  ‘No, it isn’t. But it’s barbaric to beat helpless men.’

  ‘Was Tom Kelly one of the blacklegs?’ Jim Watkins asked Mark the question, but he was watching Amy.

  ‘No. He wasn’t in the Hart with the others, so management must have hidden him somewhere else. I asked Ned Morgan if he’d seen Tom, but Ned hadn’t. They hung eleven blacklegs in all and the police cut six down before Mathew and I got there. We ran back here because we thought you and Jack would want to know about it. As Gwilym Jenkins and Ned Morgan said, this sends a clear message to management. Don’t bring any more blacklegs into Tonypandy.’

  ‘Management isn’t in the mood to listen to any messages from us.’ Jim went into the hall and fetched his cap, muffler and coat. He turned to Amy. ‘What I said to you yesterday still stands, Amy. If you see Tom Kelly you are to walk away from him. You are not to look at, or talk to him. Understand?’

  ‘I understand,’ Amy repeated. She crossed her fingers under cover of her skirt. It was an old superstition. Cross your fingers and you can tell a lie. But then it wasn’t exactly a lie. Because all she had told her father was that she understood him. She hadn’t promised to obey him.

  When Anna Jenkins finished her morning chores, she washed her hands and face in cold water and rolled down her sleeves. She put on her cloak and bonnet, picked up her basket, and crossed the road to the Watkins’ house. She knocked the door once, turned the key and walked down the passage, passing the twins who were on their way to school. Amy was in the kitchen with her mother.

  ‘You’re off to the soup kitchen early, Anna,’ Mary said.

  ‘I was hoping that Amy would help me pick up a dozen loaves from the baker’s on the way. The baker’s boy doesn’t usually deliver to the hall before twelve and Father Kelly asked me to make sure we have enough bread in for the babies’ breakfasts.’

  ‘You two be careful if you’re walking into town,’ Mary warned.

  ‘Why?’ Anna asked.

  Amy told her what her brothers had said about the blacklegs being hung.

  ‘If the police have cut them down and taken them away, town will be quiet,’ Anna predicted. ‘It’s not too early for you to be going to the soup kitchen is it, Amy?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Go on admit it,’ Mary smiled. ‘You two can’t wait to get in the warm of the church hall.’

  ‘You’re welcome to join us, Mary,’ Anna offered. ‘Father Kelly can do with all the help he can get.’

  ‘I volunteered to help at the school today, so I’ll be as warm as you soon. And don’t talk to me about Father Kelly or his nephew. Not after the way Tom Kelly walked around town yesterday with this stupid daughter of mine.’

  ‘No one knew he was a blackleg at the time, Mary. Come on, Amy, let’s see if we can get the pick of the loaves as they come out of the oven. The children like them brown and crusty.’

  Anna and Amy walked down the hill in silence. A number of police were in Dunraven Street. They were cutting down the last of the ropes tied around the lamp posts. There was no sign of the blacklegs or the strikers.

  ‘The men have returned to the picket line,’ Anna commented.

  ‘It looks like it,’ Amy agreed.

  ‘Do you know where Tom Kelly is?’ Anna asked.

  ‘No,’ Amy replied. ‘What makes you think that I do?’

  ‘Because I saw the two of you outside your front door last night. He was kissing you and you were kissing him right back.’

  Amy eyes grew large frightened. ‘You won’t tell Mam and Dad, will you? Not for my sake but Tom’s. You heard what they did to the other blacklegs.’

  ‘Amy, child,’ Anna begged, ‘do you know what you’re doing?’

  ‘Auntie Anna, I love him with all my heart and soul.’

  ‘You only met him yesterday.’

  ‘That was all the time I needed to fall in love with him.’

  ‘Then God help the pair of you.’ Ann shook her head in despair. ‘There’s nothing more to be said, except are you sure you don’t know where he is?’

  A tear fell from Amy’s eye. She brushed it away. ‘I only wish I did.’

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Anna and Amy reached the church hall to find a cart parked outside. It was stacked high with sacks of vegetables. Father Kelly was standing next to it talking to the carter.

  ‘Look what Mr Robinson has brought us from the farmers in the Vale of Glamorgan, ladies.’ He went to the back of the cart. ‘Enough carrots, turnips, potatoes and swedes to keep the kitchen going for a week. Would you be kind enough to show the boys where to take the sacks, Mrs Jenkins?’

  ‘Follow me.’ Anna went to the back door of the hall and held it open so the carter’s boy could carry a sack inside.

  Father Kelly shook the carter’s hand. ‘You and your boys will have a cup of tea with us, won’t you, Mr Robinson?’

  ‘We will, thank you, Father. It’s been slow, cold and wet work driving here.’ The carter climbed off his cart.

  ‘Mrs Jenkins will find you a table near to the stove so you can have a warm. Amy?’ Father Kelly stopped her as she was about to walk through the door. He drew her aside. ‘Sergeant Martin was here before I opened the hall this morning. He came to tell me that Tom handed himself into the police station at first light.’

  ‘He’s all right. He’s really, all right.’ Amy cried in relief.

  ‘Sergeant Martin said there’s not a mark or a bruise on him. He hid when the strikers broke into the barn last night and took the other blacklegs. You heard what happened to them?’

  ‘I did.’ Amy leaned back against the building for support.

  ‘From what Sergeant Martin said, Tom made his way down to the police station end of Dunraven Street while the strikers hung the blacklegs in and around Tonypandy Square. But the most important thing is he’s safe and unhurt.’

  ‘Thank you for telling me, Father Kelly.’

  ‘I’m sorry I introduced you two, Amy. Given that Tom is a blackleg, I’ve brought you nothing but trouble. Your father must be angry with me.’

  ‘My father’s not angry with you, Father Kelly. But he is angry that I was seen around town with Tom. He knows Tom didn’t tell anyone he was a blackleg before the police came here to fetch him.’ Amy recalled the kisses Tom had given her. She could still feel his lips on hers and it made her feel like a traitor to her family and more especially her father and all the other colliers.

  Father Kelly could see that she was upset and changed the subject. ‘We have a lot of vegetables to clean today.’ He smiled at her. ‘Thank you for volunteering.’

  ‘I’m glad of something to do. There’s been a lot less housework
in our house, since the strike started and we haven’t had coal. It’s amazing how much dust a fire makes.’

  ‘That’s what I like, a young girl who can see some good in the worse situations.’

  ‘You’ll let me know, Father?’ Amy didn’t have to explain about what.

  ‘If I find out anything more about young Tom. Of course I will, Amy. You like him, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes I do. He’s funny and he talks like no one else I know, except perhaps you.’

  Father Kelly walked to the back of the cart to see how the boys were getting on with unloading. He thought about what Amy had said, and doubted that it was just Tom’s talk that had interested her. He had never seen two people fall in love with another so quickly. The strike was ruining more lives than even management and the colliers knew about.

  Amy went into the hall. Anna was still supervising the boys who were stacking the sacks in the storeroom. A bucket of carrots and a knife had been set on the table she usually worked at. She hung up her cloak and made a start.

  Anna saw the last load of vegetables into the storeroom, turned the key and locked the door. The carter was sitting at a table drinking tea and talking to Amy.

  ‘Hello, Mr Robinson, we met outside. I’m Anna Jenkins.’

  ‘Pleased to meet you, Mrs Jenkins.’ The carter shook Anna’s hand.

  ‘Are you driving back through Pontypridd, Mr Robinson?’ she asked.

  ‘I only wish Pontypridd was as far as I have to go.’

  ‘Could you give me a lift there, please?’

  ‘If you want one, Mrs Jenkins. But it’s cold, wet and draughty on top of the cart,’ he warned. ‘You can hardly tuck yourself under the tarpaulins with the boys in the back. It’s filthy from the potatoes.’

  ‘I’ll be fine sitting up front with you, Mr Robinson. It won’t be the first time I’ve sat on a cart.’

  ‘I doubt you’ve sat on one in this weather that often. But if you’re determined to travel with us, I’ll be leaving as soon as the boys have finished their tea.’