Had to get going. With this one not knowing what a beating is he would start the same business within seconds of consciousness. Blinded with weariness, my shoulder like fire from the thump of his pistol, I spreadeagled myself on Randy, snatched up the petticoat and stuffed it in my pocket. By the time I reached the Tywi my strength was coming back. No more dragoons between Kidwelly and Cae White, thank God, and when I reached home we were into a gallop again. Opening the barn I shoved Randy in. Damned near dawn. Cocks were crowing from Bayleaves Farm as I rubbed myself dry and got into the bed, awaking an instant later, it seemed, in bright sunlight.
No mam to contend with, just dull looks from Morfydd and Mari. Not so bad in the mirror, really; nose, that was all, half way over my face, and skinned.
“Justin Slaughterer again by the look of it,” said Mari, banging down the plate. Only the three of us now not counting Richard and Jonathon.
“More like the yeomanry – good beak-busters, them – the colonel himself, was it?” Morfydd now, acid curious, frightened. I saw her trembling hands,
“Second-in-command,” I said.
“Good grief,” she replied, “we are coming down the scale,” and turned to Mari. “Make the most of your brother-in-law,” she said. “We will not have him long.”
Inclined to agree with her at this rate.
CHAPTER 25
WALDO BAILIFF caught it that June, got it proper from Flannigan’s daughters, though I had no hand in it, more the pity.
“Terrible, disgusting,” whispered Mari at breakfast next day.
“Waldo Bailiff you speaking of, or Rebecca?” asked Morfydd.
For the first time since Cae White their eyes met in challenge over the table.
“Took him through on the pole, saw it myself,” said Richard, his eyes like saucers. Growing fast, this one, regular man.
“Hush,” said Mari. “It is too indecent to think about.”
“Ask Gipsy May,” said Morfydd, chewing. “Indecent all right. Things are coming improper indeed when a man pays a shilling for a child, though I hold no grief for Gipsy. Cross her palm with silver, turn her out. Do you call that justice?”
“A public exhibition. Better horsewhip him in private – never have I seen the like of it,” said Mari. “It has a bad effect on the children.”
A bad effect on Waldo, too.
The rumours varied but I knew the truth of it. Flannigan and ten of the daughters went up to the Reach and caught Waldo sprucing himself for his Saturday outing with Betsi Ramrod. Heading for marriage these two, arm in arm, large as life, peas in a pod in their treatment of Gipsy. Lucky for Betsi she wasn’t carried, too. Trial, sentence and punishment, all within the hour, and they brought him through the village on the pole near midnight; staghung, naked but for his trews, screaming for a pigsticking, begging for mercy, while windows went up and doors came open and Betsi Ramrod weeping and tearing out her hair when they dumped him in the taproom of Black Boar tavern. Six pounds savings they found under the bed, six pounds for Gipsy May, said Flannigan to me later, though the trouble was getting it to her. Wonderful to see Flannigan in Chapel next day with Dai Alltwen Preacher roasting Rebecca up in the pulpit for dastardly attacks on God-fearing people; not a hair out of place had Abel Flannigan, and Toby Maudlin sitting next to him beating his breast for the sins of the village and Justin Slaughterer giving his bass Amen. That was a week back and not a daughter recognized: recognized, no doubt, but nobody dared breathe a name, and not a soul had seen Waldo since. Still going, said Flannigan. Thank God, said Morfydd.
“You ready?” she asked me now.
“Aye,” I said, rising from table.
It was three days or so since I had tangled with the soldier and my bruises were going down and my nose coming normal. I had been lying low of late though every Rebecca and daughter in the county were out doing overtime on burning ricks and gates, and the victory was practically gained. The Trusts had lost all heart for rebuilding and the splintered remains of gates littered the highways, the charred timbers of the tollhouse rafters grinning at the summer sky. Due on shift at Gower’s pit that morning, Morfydd and I took the endless road to coal. Strangely, she was looking better since Mam had left; as if the constant suppressing hand of my mother had lifted, leaving her free of criticism, but I knew the truth of it when we were half way to Ponty on that bright June day.
“I am bringing Willie O’Hara home tonight, Jethro. D’you mind?”
She glanced at me sideways and I winked.
“None of that,” she said. “Respectable is Willie, never mind the tales – a woman could do worse.”
“Handsome devil, I’ll say that for him.”
“Knows how to treat a woman,” and she smiled. “Opening doors, closing gates, and he wants me.”
“Are you in love with him?” I asked.
“Take me out of coal, mind.”
“I am doing that,” I said. “The end of this month. I asked if you loved him.”
“I will only ever love one,” she said. “I am thinking of my son. His father for the next world, if there is one. Willie O’Hara will
