Chapter 54
“When the winning piece of a national art competition is called The Worm Gatherers, the subjects of that drawing require a closer look. It was for this reason I travelled to the outskirts of Glan Llanfair in Mid Wales, to meet the people who had inspired the work, simply by doing what they always do.”
The article went on to explain the visit, not being able to avoid using clichés such as “stepping back in time” and “salt of the earth”, but that didn’t really matter as the piece was completely upstaged by the photo above it. In it, the Pryces were standing, Father by his chair with his hand on its wing, and Mother beside the table with her hand on the cloth. Neither was smiling and it gave the impression of a Victorian photo that had a shutter speed of seconds, rather than fractions of seconds.
Mr Pryce had his white shirt with the turned collars buttoned up to the top and a hand knitted V-necked jumper that just met his high-waisted trousers. His face was polished by the spit and hanky of Mrs Pryce and his hair was combed with a side parting that ought not to be there. Mrs Pryce stood in her floral summer dress, reminiscent of the lean years of the nineteen thirties. Her pinny was still in her hand and her hair had been given the same treatment as her husband’s. It looked as if a strong breeze were coming from right of stage.
Cleverly, Matt had managed to include the pile of newspapers on the dresser and a 1990 calendar on the wall (they had liked the kittens in the pictures). The teapot was on the table, the tea cosy was on the pot – the volume of which was consumed that afternoon meant that Matt had to visit the tŷ bach at least twice. He took his camera with him the second time to record the square of carpet and the jam jar of wild flowers that had been put in there for the occasion. And, to cap it all, the airer above the fireplace showed a fine pair of Mr Pryce’s grey underpants tucked alongside the faded tea towel that had been slung up there and hidden its less attractive neighbour from Mrs Pryce’s sharp eyes.
All around the country people settled down to what was usually the most relaxing part of their day. Reading the newspaper keeps one informed and up to date, as well as blocking out the miserable morning spouse or the breathless fellow commuter and makes the morning cup of coffee last far longer than it needs to. On that particular morning there were the usual items about this company doing well, that one doing badly, that star wearing a new dress, this one behaving badly. But it was the item about the Worm Gatherers that caused the occasional chuckle between commuters, the unexpected comment to the miserable spouse and the revelation that the office worker wasn’t solely checking the business pages.
It reminded them of stories that their parents had told, of the older generation that they had once revered, of childhood holidays staying with remote relatives on farms in order to educate them where milk really came from. It was a life in which extra layers were put on rather than the heating cranked up, where everyone congregated like a proper family around the fire to keep warm, probably telling tales and discussing the events of the day.
It was a romantic story of happiness championing over poverty, a tale that, if they were honest, would actually be a bitterly cold, inconvenient pain in the arse in reality, but it moved people and warmed the heart. Matt’s readers were glad that there were still people like that out there somewhere, even if, well, they themselves didn’t actually have time to heat a tin bath full of water and just let the Pryces try getting their Tara to wee in a tŷ bach in the mid of winter; she’d be hospitalised within days.