Read Evan Only Knows Online

Authors: Rhys Bowen

Evan Only Knows (4 page)

“So what are you doing here? I thought you were stationed in Colwyn Bay now.”
“They’ve sent me back here, now that DCI Hughes is one step away from God and will only take the most important of cases. Bad timing, eh? I arrive back and you’re off to HQ to start your course.”
“Not any longer. All courses have been postponed. I’m stuck here with instructions to help the Min of Ag.”
“Bad luck. It’s a bugger, isn’t it?”
“Especially for those of us who live and work out in the countryside. They all think I’ve turned traitor, but what else can I do?”
“I know. Sometimes our job stinks. But I seem to remember you’ve got a lot of leave piled up, haven’t you?”
“At least five weeks. I didn’t take a proper holiday last year, but —”
“Well then,” Watkins cut in, “why don’t you make yourself scarce for a couple of weeks until the worst is over?”
Evan sighed. “I wish I could, but in case you haven’t heard, they’ve cancelled all leave too.”
“Oh right. Except for compassionate,” Watkins said.
“Yes, but I don’t think they’re likely to be compassionate to me when I tell them it upsets me to do my job, are they?”
He expected Watkins to laugh, but the inspector was looking at him thoughffuhy. “So how is your mum these days? Last time I heard she was poorly.”
“Yes, she did have a nasty touch of bronchitis last spring.”
“Takes a long time to get over—bronchitis, so I’ve heard.”
“Oh no, she’s up and around again now, just fine.”
“I said, it takes a long time to get over bronchitis,” Watkins repeated patiently. “It can easily turn into pneumonia. You never did get time to go and visit her in the spring, did you? These things can flare up again when you least expect them, you know.”
“Can they?”
Watkins burst out laughing. “Sometimes you’re as thick as a plank, Evans.”
“Oh, I see.” Evan laughed too. “But I couldn’t ask for compassionate leave right now. It wouldn’t be right.”
“Do you want to be out of the area or don’t you?”
“Of course I do.”
“Well then.” Watkins sucked through his teeth as he thought. “Tell you what. I’ll have a word with old Bill Mathias who does the duty roster. He owes me a favor, as it happens. I’ll tell him about your poor mum and let’s see what he can do.”
“If you can pull this one off, I’ll be in your debt for life,” Evan said.
Watkins slapped him on the back. “I won’t forget that, boyo. When you’re working for me in the plainclothes division, you’ll be getting all the three A.M. stakeouts. And I’ll have you writing all my reports for me.”
“Worth every second, if you can spirit me out of here.”
“Well, go on then. Get lost,” Watkins said, giving him a gentle shove. “It won’t do if you’re seen hanging around here. We don’t want them to think it’s a conspiracy, do we?”
Evan hurried back to his car. He had scarcely arrived back in Llanfair before the phone rang.
“What did I tell you?” Watkins’s voice boomed down the line. “I’m a bloody miracle worker, that’s what I am. I told Bill Mathias about your old mum and how poorly she has been, and he said no
problem. He’ll just leave you off the roster, quiet like, so that the super doesn’t notice. So there you are. Get packing.”
“Bloody brilliant,” Evan exclaimed. “I’ll go and tell Bronwen right now, and I’d better call my mum to tell her we’re coming.”
“So it’s ‘take Bronwen to meet the old folks at home time,’ is it?”
“That’s right. I’m not looking forward to it, I can tell you,” Evan said. “In fact restraining crazed farmers only just wins out over sitting with my mother and Bronwen in the same room.”
“Bit of a tartar, your old mum, is it?”
“No, I wouldn’t say that. But she’s very good at stirring, if you know what I mean.”
“Knowing how to make you feel guilty? I’ve got a wife who’s an expert at the same thing. She never yells or has tantrums—she just has to give me this pained look.”
Evan chuckled. “Yes, I’d say that describes my mum pretty well. She’s not such a bad old thing. It’s just that she’s never quite forgiven me for moving so far away.”
“Playing on the old guilt, like I said. Rather you than me, boyo. Oh, and Evan, you owe me a pint.”
“Anywhere other than the Dragon. The atmosphere is decidedly frosty at the moment.”
“It can wait till you come back,” Watkins said. “Go on. Bugger off before I realize that I’m getting soft.”
“It was a good idea of yours to slip away without telling anyone,” Bronwen said as she climbed into the passenger seat of Evan’s car. “We don’t want the whole village speculating that we’ve run away together.”
Evan laughed. “It will be a bloody miracle if we do slip away unnoticed. You know what this place is like. It’s round the village in ten minutes each time I come to visit you—and what time I leave again too!”
“I can’t imagine that anyone is awake at this hour to watch us leave.” Bronwen peered out at the starry night where just a faint glow over the eastern mountains announced that dawn was not far off.
“And a good thing too, seeing that we’re carrying illegal cargo,” Evan commented as he got in beside her.
Bronwen swung around to the backseat where a mournful-looking lamb peered at her from its crate. “We had to take him with us, Evan. What if they had decided to have him slaughtered while we were gone? It would have broken Eirlys’s heart.”
“But it’s still illegal,
cariad.
You know as well as I do that any transportation of livestock is forbidden at the moment. We’ll be in a hell of a jam if we’re stopped.”
“He’s not livestock; he’s a pet. That’s completely different.”
“He’ll still look like a sheep to any road check that we might meet,” Evan said.
Bronwen nestled up close to him. “You wouldn’t want to see a little girl’s special pet killed, would you?”
“I do things for you against my better judgment,” Evan said. He started the engine. It coughed several times before roaring to life loudly enough to awaken most of the village. “If we’re stopped I shall claim no knowledge of what you’ve stowed in my backseat. I’ll tell them you’re a hitchiker I picked up with dubious cargo.”
Bronwen laughed. “Lucky you haven’t given me a ring yet, or you’d be sunk.”
“Yes, well it’s not official yet, is it? That’s what we’re doing now. Making it official.”
He let out the clutch and the car moved away from the curb. At that moment he saw a strange specter in his rearview mirror. A large figure was flapping its way after them, arms waving in distraught fashion. “Oh no.” Evan stopped the car.
“What is it?”
“Someone’s running after us. There must be some kind of emergency.”
“Hen Diawll,”
Bronwen muttered. “Can’t we just drive off and pretend we didn’t see?”
“There speaks the wonderful Miss Price, adored by the whole village?” Evan chuckled as he wound down the window.
The flapping figure caught up and paused, holding on to the roof of the car, gasping for breath. “I thought I’d left it too late, Mr. Evans.” The words came out between gasps.
“Mrs. Williams,” Evan exclaimed, recognizing his former landlady. “Whatever is wrong?”
“Wrong? Nothing at all. I didn’t think you’d have time to make yourselves any proper food for the journey, so I made you one of my egg and bacon pies you like so much, and a
bara brith,
and a few sandwiches, just in case you got hungry.”
“That’s very nice of you, Mrs. Williams, but you really didn’t have to—” Evan began, but she cut him off in midsentence. “Swansea is a dreadful long way away.” She poked her head in through
the window. “Good morning to you, Miss Price. I hope you have a lovely trip, just.” She handed Evan a large shopping bag. “There’s a thermos of tea too. You’re going to need some breakfast.”
“Mrs. Williams, I don’t know what to say.” Evan gave an embarrassed laugh. “How did you know we were going to Swansea?”
“Well now, that was easy enough. Evans-the-Milk told me that you’d stopped your delivery for two weeks and so had Miss Price, and then Evans-the-Post said you’d had a letter from your mother saying how she was looking forward to seeing you and to meeting Miss Price.”
“I never thought he’d have the cheek to read my mail. There’s no way of keeping secrets in this village there?” Evan gave Bronwen a look of amused despair.
“And no reason why it should be a secret, either,” Mrs. Williams said. “What could be more natural than taking your betrothed home to visit your mother? Go on, off you go and have a lovely time. We’ll want to hear all about it when you come back.”
She stood there waving as they drove away.
“So much for our secret getaway,” Bronwen said. “Now the whole village will know.”
“If they don’t already. My, but that food smells awfully good, doesn’t it. Is that egg and bacon pie still warm, do you think?”
“If anyone wanted to bribe you, all they’d have to do is know how to cook well.” Bronwen opened the bag and extracted the pie.
“Well, I have been trying to survive on my own, but it hasn’t been easy after Mrs. Williams’s cooking.”
“I must say, it does smell heavenly,” Bronwen said. “And she’s even provided plates and a knife. I’ll cut you a slice.”
“Look, I see Mrs. Powell-Jones has taken over as usual.” Evan pointed at the banner, draped across the front of Capel Beulah, where the Reverend Powell-Jones was minister. “Village meeting tomorrow night. Foot-and-Mouth Contingency Plans. Let’s all pull together and do our bit!”
The billboard outside the chapel had a new text on it: IT IS REQUIRED OF A STEWARD THAT HE BE FOUND FAITHFUL! Across the street, Capel Bethel’s billboard text was not in sympathy. I KNOW MY
SHEEP AND MY SHEEP KNOW ME. A GOOD SHEPHERD LAYS DOWN HIS LIFE FOR HIS SHEEP.
“I don’t think Mrs. Powell-Jones’s village meeting is going to run very smoothly, do you?” Evan said. “I’m glad we’re going to be far away.”
As they drove south and the rugged mountain scenery gave way to gentle green hills and distant seascapes, the sun came up over the horizon and the whole eastern sky flamed pink.
“Rain before tonight,” Evan said, glancing at it.
“You’re such a pessimist sometimes.” Bronwen slapped his hand.
“No, just a realist. Let’s hope we get there before it starts in earnest.”
Bronwen’s gaze swept across the countryside, taking in the hillsides dotted with fat lambs and wooly sheep. “It looks so beautiful and peaceful, doesn’t it?” she asked. “It’s hard to believe that only a few miles north of here they are already starting to slaughter whole flocks. Do you think this mass slaughtering actually does any good?”
“I’m not an expert,” Evan said. “But nothing else seems to stop it. They have to try everything, don’t they?”
“It seems like overkill in the true sense to me. Killing healthy animals—that’s just not right.”
As if in agreement, Prince William gave a plaintive
baa
from his crate.
 
“You wouldn’t think it would take all day just to drive a hundred miles across Wales, would you?” Bronwen commented as the first road signs to Swansea in English and Abertawe in Welsh appeared.
“It would have gone quicker if we hadn’t stopped so many times to let that bloody sheep stretch his legs.” Evan was feeling irritable. He put it down to the egg and bacon pie, plus several of Mrs. Williams cold beef and pickle sandwiches sitting heavily on his stomach, although the thought of an imminent meeting between Bronwen and his mother could also have had something to do with it.
“It’s stupid that there is no direct road from North Wales to
South Wales, isn’t it?” Bronwen went on. “You’d have thought they’d have put one in by now.”
“You know how most people feel—the less contact between North Walesians and South Walesians, the better.”
Bronwen chuckled. “We’re a funny lot, aren’t we? It might actually have been quicker to have gone back to England and picked up the motorway.”
“Yes, but not as pretty, eh? We’ve seen some lovely country today.”
“Before it started raining.” Bronwen peered through the streaked windscreen at the gray mist.
“Funny, this is how I always think of Swansea,” Evan said. “It always seemed to rain a lot. Especially when we were playing rugby.”
“Let’s go and visit your old rugby club. That will be fun.” Bronwen rested her hand on his shoulder. “I’m really looking forward to hearing tales of your misspent youth.”
The outskirts of the city came into view—large, uniform housing estates sprawling over hillsides. Evan was beginning to have serious second thoughts about the upcoming encounter. As they drove past row after row of gray, terraced houses, past pavements slick with rain and women in macks and headscarves scurrying home from the corner fish shop, it occurred to him that this could be a very big mistake. Bronwen was, after all, from another world. He hadn’t yet met her family, but she referred to her parents as Mummy and Daddy. And she had been to Cambridge. Therefore she was several rungs above him on the social ladder.
Usually such things didn’t bother Evan, but suddenly he was reluctant to let Bronwen see the plain row house where he had spent his youth. If he could have come up with a credible excuse, he would have turned around and driven away. Instead he gritted his teeth and kept driving until familiar landmarks came into view: the railway station and the castle ruins, the new Quadrant shopping center, the museum, and beyond it the upscale new waterfront development where the most depressed dockland area had been. Then
they could see the old prison with its prime waterfront position and great views across Swansea Bay.
“This is nice,” Bronwen said as the bay itself opened up on their left, gray sea merging into gray sky in the rain, with just a hint of hills visible on the far shore. “I hadn’t realized Swansea was on the seafront.”
“Bristol Channel, actually, but yes, they’re always comparing Swansea to the French Riviera. The resemblance is obvious, isn’t it?”
Bronwen gave him a sharp look. “I think it’s attractive,” she said, “and I like all these old houses. They’ve got character, haven’t they?”
“You could say that. And I’m glad you like them because my mother lives in one.” The road swung inland from the seafront and started to climb. Gray mist had washed out the hilltops. Townhill Road appeared through the mist at last with its gray stone, terraced houses, all alike. A whole world of gray.
“These used to be workers’ cottages once, when the steel mills were flourishing,” Evan said. “One of the first housing estates.”
“Great views for a housing estate.”
“Actually all the housing estates are on the hills in Swansea.”
“A very proletariat kind of city.”
“The rich don’t live in the city at all. Ah, here we are then.” He came to a halt outside one of the identical gray stone cottages. He had forgotten how small it was, not much bigger than the tiny two-up two-down he now inhabited in Llanfair. Small and ordinary looking. He thought he saw the lace curtain tweaked as he pulled up. Sure enough, the front door opened while he was still helping Bronwen from the car.
“Here you are at last then.” His mother stood in the doorway. She seemed to have shrunk. “I thought something had happened to you.”
“It’s a long drive from North Wales, Ma.” Evan continued to hold Bronwen’s hand as she stepped onto the pavement.
“I know that, but there are so many terrible drivers on the roads these days, aren’t there, and all these dreadful big lorries coming
across from the Continent and breaking the speed limit, isn’t it?”
“We’re here now and we’re fine.” Evan went up to her and enveloped her in a hug. She felt small and bony, and he couldn’t feel her hugging him back. “So how are you?”
“Not so bad, considering. The doctor doesn’t quite like the sound of my chest yet, but then at my age, what can you expect?”
“Your age! You’re only sixty-five.”
“Don’t shout my age for the whole street to hear.” Evan’s mother looked around, then her gaze fastened on Bronwen. “Does she understand us?
Ydych chi’n siarad cymraeg,
Miss Price?”
Bronwen laughed. “Of course I do. I teach in a Welsh school.”
“Oh, well, that’s nice. It will be a treat to speak my own language for a change.”
“What do you mean, for a change?” Evan asked.
“Nobody speaks Welsh in Abertawe any longer,” she said, giving the city its Welsh name. “It’s all changed. Full of outsiders.

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