Rosemary stared in disbelief as blood spurted from Larry’s nose. Then she jerked into action and found a handkerchief for him to hold against his face while the lady behind the counter offered water and tissues to clean him up. Her mind was in turmoil. Larry was a stranger there, how could he have offended someone so drastically that they would punch him viciously and in such a public place?
The man who had hit him so suddenly and without any reason that she could imagine, had disappeared, walking out into the rain and back down the hill to the town. The incident had been so sudden, yet at the same time it had seemed to have occurred in slow motion. The man’s arm shooting out like a piston; the expression on Larry’s face; the look on the face of his assailant … they would stay in her mind for a long time. The man, she would most certainly recognise again.
It was only minutes before the bleeding had eased and Larry managed to talk.
‘I don’t know,’ he said in answer to Rosemary’s questions. ‘I don’t know the guy and I’m sure he doesn’t know me. It’s obviously a case of mistaken identity.’
‘An American,’ one onlooker whispered, ‘gangsters, the lot of them!’ And Rosemary was relieved to see a cautious smile crease the corners of Larry’s eyes.
They went back down the hill in a small procession, as the people who had been sheltering in the cafe considered Larry their special charge. One old lady tried to cover him with an umbrella, but as she only reached his shoulders he considered himself in more danger from the spikes than from a soaking.
Rosemary was shaking with the shock of it. It seemed so unbelievable that on a summer’s day in a small Welsh town someone should suffer such an attack.
‘It happens all the time in cities,’ Larry said, as she once more repeated her disbelief. ‘You only have to look hard at someone and you get a bottle in the face.’
‘Told you so,’ said the little woman who had described Americans as gangsters.
They drove back to the cottage in the Citroen and Rosemary suggested they call a doctor. ‘Hell no! I’ll be a bit sore for a day or two but that’s all. It isn’t the first time I’ve been at the receiving end of a punch,’ he said ruefully. ‘I just wasn’t expecting this one. Or that rock the other day! Someone around here sure hates my face!’ He grinned at her, tried to make light of it.
‘Who was it, Larry?’ she asked.
‘I’ve no idea, honey. I certainly haven’t been flirting with his wife or anything. The guy mistook me for someone else, that’s all. Now, let’s forget it and think about food. Something I can take through a straw I think!’
The picnic they had planned to eat at Borth, was eaten while sitting on the carpet before the fire. Larry went to bed early and slept through the night, while Rosemary failed to relax for long enough to do more than take occasional dozes. She puzzled over what had happened, wondering if there was more to the attacks on him than he was telling. First that rock thrown at him while he sat in his car, now this unwarranted punch.
Larry returned to London on the following day. His face still showed the results of the blow. He was bruised, his lips were fat and swollen from the cuts he had received from his own teeth, his voice thickened by the damage to his nose. He promised to phone her that evening, and Rosemary was left with a loneliness greater than she expected, but also the fear that there was still a lot about him she did not know. However unlikely and unbelievable; she had the strong conviction that Larry knew the man who had hit him.
Gethyn had given up making regular visits to the employment agency. Since he had left the quarry, where he had worked since leaving school, he had only managed to find two temporary jobs, both in shops and both of which he hated. Uneasy with people, it was soon apparent that customers avoided him, sensing in him the inability to help them. After a short time he was requested to leave.
By spending as little as possible on food, he managed to pay his rent and deal with the few bills that came through his letterbox without too much worry. Entertainment was almost nil. Apart from the television, music and books, he did nothing except sit and daydream about an imaginary, different life which one day he hoped he would live. His mother had left a little money, but that was for when he and Rosemary got together. It wasn’t much but it would be a start.
Rosemary was the central figure in his dreams. Although he knew, deep within the core of his imaginings, she would never consider him as anything more than a neighbour, he still grasped at her every word, her every kindness, to perpetuate the dream.
It was all that American’s fault, he told himself, unreasonably. If he hadn’t come on the scene, Rosemary would have come home to him; of that, he was more and more certain. Damn the man with his flattering tongue and pushy ways, forcing himself into Rosemary’s life where he had no business to be. He knew he was being unfair and a little childish, but it helped. Having someone to blame for his disappointment eased the pain, just a little.
Larry phoned almost daily now, but did not commit himself to a meeting. From the small front bedroom where she worked, Rosemary saw the postman stepping out of the van with a parcel one morning. He waved at her as he crossed the footbridge and she presumed it was for her. On the rare days Larry did not phone her, he wrote a letter, so a parcel was a possibility, she thought with excitement. She ran down and opened the door but the parcel was for Gethyn.
She was surprised. He never seemed to receive any post apart from official letters. There was no reply when the postman knocked on his door, so she took it, put it on one side and went on with her typing.
When she was eating her lunch, through the shared wall she heard the sound of Gethyn poking his fire and, picking up the parcel, she went around to give it to him.
‘Rosemary. Thanks.’ He seemed a bit flustered and put the parcel into a cupboard without examining it. ‘Will you come in and have a cup of tea?’ he asked. ‘You’re so busy, we never have a chance for a chat.’
‘Well,’ she hesitated. There was a chapter to finish if she were to keep to her schedule.
‘Please, Rosemary.’
‘Thanks, I could do with a breather. This chapter isn’t going very well.’
‘You work too hard.’
While he made tea Rosemary looked around the room. She hadn’t been inside the house for years and was startled at how little it had changed. Nineteen-fifties! she thought to herself as she looked at the faded, heavily patterned wallpaper, faded and in places, torn.
There were photographs everywhere, mostly of people she did not recognise. There were family groups and pictures of children taken on beaches, in gardens and in the room in which she now sat. She smiled as she recognised herself as a child in one or two groups, taken, presumably, on one of her holidays with Gran, who also figured in the gallery of memories. Memories, she mused, belonging to Gethyn’s mother. She wondered how long it would take before he took them down. Many were faded and yellow and looked as if they had been there as long as the house!
It was the house of an old woman. She felt a surge of pity for Gethyn, having to cope alone after having his mother to look after everything for so long. He hadn’t left home as a teenager like so many people did today, he had stayed to look after her and he was lost because of it. At twenty-seven, he was living like a middle-aged man, in a house that was almost a museum piece.
But how could he not care about the place where he spent so much time? It was a house that was in urgent need of some loving care. How could Gethyn live in such discomfort and with a lack of anything beautiful? Couldn’t he see how shabby it all was?
He came out of the kitchen with an enamel tray on which he had set biscuits and tea and one of the cakes regularly supplied by Mrs Priestley.
‘The old place could do with a face-lift, couldn’t it?’ he embarrassed her by saying.
‘I suppose I’m lucky, earning enough to keep things nice,’ she excused, ashamed of her silent critisism of him. ‘It takes time and money, to do even basic decoration today, and I know it isn’t easy for you, not working.’
‘Time I’ve plenty of, but not much money.’
‘Perhaps if you sorted out your mother’s things it would give you a bit more room. I’ll help if you like,’ she offered.
‘Would you?’ His brown eyes glowed as he looked at her. Then he looked swiftly away, down at the dusty carpet. ‘That would be great. Perhaps later on, when you aren’t so busy.’
‘You tell me when you’re ready to do it and I’ll find the time, I promise.’
He stared at her, she felt his gaze upon her, so piercing she began to feel like a specimen in a jar of formaldehyde. Yet, when she looked at him, his eyes darted away from making contact to stare at the walls and the ranks and ranks of photographs. She finished her tea, made her excuses and hurried home. She sighed with relief to be back in her own, clean, orderly house, away from the sadness and emptiness of Gethyn’s existence.
The following day, Larry arrived at the library and invited her out for lunch. He looked tired and the bruises on his face were still visible.
‘Larry! I never know when you’ll appear,’ she laughed.
‘It’s a fleeting visit I’m afraid,’ he said. ‘But if you’re free at the weekend perhaps you’d come to London with me.’
‘I’d love to, but you look tired, wouldn’t you prefer to have a quiet weekend at the cottage?’
‘I love it here, you know that, but I think I’d prefer to be somewhere livelier, somewhere where we can find something to do in the evenings. A city is where I feel at home, not a peaceful village, no matter how beautiful. Please, won’t you come with me?’
‘You’ve never complained before about the way we spend our evenings,’ she whispered.
‘Wanton woman!’ he whispered back.
‘I shouldn’t, I’ll get behind with my work.’
From his pocket he took out the folder of Her Majesty’s Theatre and from it took out two tickets for Phantom of the Opera. ‘There, will that persuade you if my charms fail?’ She hugged him, ignoring the surprised glances from some of the silent browsers.
‘I’ll ask Megan if she’ll take my shift on Monday morning,’ she said. ‘Fortunately, I have Saturday free. I’ll have to work very hard next week though, I am anxious to finish my story and get it to my agent before the end of August.’
‘I’ll be busy myself next week. I think I’m on the trail of the missing members of my family at last,’ he said. ‘I need to go to St Catherine’s House for some birth certificates, then I’ll be almost there.’
‘Is the mystery of the Red House solved?’ she asked.
‘Yes,’ he groaned. ‘Goddammit, the whole area’s been replaced by a housing estate!’
Larry waited until Rosemary had finished for the day and they went for a cup of coffee before driving home. In a small tea-shop, they were about to sit down when Larry rose suddenly and pulled her out through the door.
‘Larry! What is it?’ she demanded, a bit ruffled by the peremptory change of plan.
‘I didn’t think it looked all that hygienic,’ he said, hurrying her across the road to the cars.
‘Nonsense! I’ve eaten there often and—’ She turned to glance back and saw quite clearly, standing in the doorway, the man who had punched him in the face at the top of Constitution Hill in Aberystwyth.
‘Come on, Rose Mary, I’ve a better idea. We’ll go home, then try a pub for a meal. Better than tea-cakes,’ he teased. ‘What in hell are tea-cakes anyway?’
‘Larry, isn’t that the man who hit you?’ He pretended to look back, then shook his head.
‘Nothing like him. The man who hit me was taller, and not so dark.’
‘But I’m sure—’
‘You drive ahead and I’ll follow. We’ll use my car for the journey to the station on our trip to London. I’m sure looking forward to seeing a city again. All this quiet, it’s bad for my nerves!’ Joking and chattering as if nothing had happened, he led her to the car, took her key and opened the door for her, then went to his own, parked close by.
When she drove out of the car park, still bemused and startled by the cavalier way he had ushered her out from the tea-shop, she saw the man standing near the entrance, watching them go. She saw him clearly and knew without doubt that she had been right, he was the one who had struck Larry. But why did Larry deny it? He might have been unsure about the man, it all happened with such speed and a blow to the face makes it impossible to remember precisely what happens. But he had been so certain it was not the man, surely he would have at least have doubts?
She considered the possibility that he had recognised him, and that was the reason he had rushed her out, before the man could hit him again. But why not tell her? And, back to the same question, why would a stranger want to hit him?
She was serious-faced when she got out of her car and crossed the footbridge with Larry beside her.
‘Is something wrong? Have I ruined your day by depriving you of a buttered bun?’ he joked.
‘Larry, it was the man who hit you, wasn’t it? And you recognised him. That was why we left in such a rush, before he could hit you again? Why?’
She saw the smile fade, his shoulders droop and he admitted quietly, ‘Yes, it was he. But please, Rosemary, trust me. It’s a lot to ask, I know that, but I promise you, one day soon you’ll have the full story, but I can’t say anything just yet.’ It was unsatisfactory, but when he pleaded with her, looking into her eyes, love for her showing clearly in their depths, she nodded and promised to wait.
It was easy enough to promise, but not as simple to put aside all her questions. All through the evening, she had to keep forcing her mind back from the many unexplained little quirks, many of them, she was certain, nothing more than simple misunderstandings. But there were problems looming, threatening their relationship, she could see that.
They left early, in the Citroen, and stopped on the way to Aberystwyth railway station in a small village, where Larry spent a while searching through the graveyard, deciphering the names on the almost obliterated stone lettering.
They were both quiet during the train journey after an initial perusal of the London map to plan their days. At Euston they continued their journey on the underground to the same hotel they had stayed at before. They bathed and rested before setting out for the theatre and supper.
Later that night, their love-making was sweet, tender and she knew that whatever problems he had, his love for her was real. No one could pretend to be the way he was with her. Yet the realisation that they were deeply in love kept her awake for long into the night. How could there be love without trust? How could he love her and not disclose what was worrying him?
The time when he would be leaving was drawing nearer by the minute, although he had not given a date on which he would depart. And the undeclared problems seemed to be coming more and more into their relationship, looming larger and larger and threatening to ruin everything they had. Neither fact could be ignored, not if they were to have any future. She was sure that a future together was what they both wanted. She clung desperately to that thought and slept.
They returned to Wales in a glow of contentment. Rosemary had committed herself to trusting Larry, telling herself that when the time was right he would explain everything and they would be together.
Larry stayed one night then he went off in the Citroen, explaining that he once again had to travel to chase some information. Before he left, he showed her his family tree and she saw recently added information; names, dates and places, and the gaps he was hoping to fill.
While Larry was away, Rosemary and Megan often walked on the hills, sometimes borrowing a friend’s dog and spending the day out, eating at a country pub.
Megan greeted her one day by saying, ‘He didn’t stay away from you long this time, did he?’
‘What d’you mean?’ Rosemary frowned.
‘That American of yours. I saw his car parked in Aberdovey, yesterday, and there he was, sitting in a cafe, talking to a man of about fifty; laughing they were as if they were old friends.’
‘What was he like?’ Rosemary asked.
‘Big chap he was, fairish hair flopping about like a dish-mop. Know him, do you?’
‘Oh, yes,’ Rosemary said. ‘I know him. Friendly were they?’
‘Yes, for sure! Laughing and slapping each other’s back, in the daft way men do.’
Rosemary turned and tried to concentrate on her work. Yet another twist to the confusion that surrounded Larry. Not only was he seen in Aberdovey when he had told her he would be in Cardiff, the man he was talking to in such a friendly manner was almost certainly the man who had attacked him in the cafe on top of Constitution Hill.