One Blue Moon
cooking,’ Ronnie explained nonchalantly, amused by the amazement on Eddie’s face. ‘Diana and Maud are home,’ he murmured, pouring a generous measure of brandy into two of the three-quarter full cups of tea Angelo carried in. He handed one to Evan and took the other himself. ‘Boxer indulging?’ he enquired, holding the bottle poised above Eddie’s cup.
    Eddie shook his head. ‘Hope to be fighting next week,’ he explained defensively.
    ‘The girls back for the weekend?’ Evan took the cup into his freezing hands.
    ‘No, for good. Maud’s ill.’
    ‘TB.’ It was a statement, not a question. Evan had read the signs when he and Eddie had taken the cart down Cardiff way a month ago and called into the Infirmary. The only reason he hadn’t dragged Maud home with him then was the hope that she’d be better off working in a hospital than anywhere else.
    ‘I took her to see Trevor. He said he’d call in your house after he finished in the hospital for the day.’
    ‘That’s good of him.’
    ‘It’s what you pay him for,’ Ronnie said casually. ‘Diana went to your house with Maud, but she came back down this afternoon. She’s looking for a job and –’ Ronnie took a packet of cigarettes out of his top pocket and handed them round. Evan took one but Eddie didn’t’ ‘– she said, a place to stay. Apparently the only empty room in your house is unfurnished.’
    ‘We’ll manage to put her up somehow.’ Ronnie didn’t have to say any more. Evan knew precisely what had gone on between his wife and his niece.
    ‘William said he put all his mother’s furniture in Huw Davies’ place. Even if Huw’s on duty the key’ll be in the door. I offered to go over in the Trojan and get whatever Diana wanted, but Haydn thought it might be better if we waited for you. You know the size of the room, what it will take, and what it won’t,’ he added diplomatically.
    ‘Is Diana here now?’
    ‘She was until half an hour ago. Then she got edgy. She went to Rivelin’s with Tina to see if there’s any jobs going. Not that they’ve a snowball in hell’s chance of finding anything.’
    Evan stared down at the dregs in his cup. Just when he’d been congratulating himself on keeping his head above water, two more mouths had appeared who’d need feeding. And not only feeding. Illness meant bills for medicine and extra, invalid’s food. He stubbed his cigarette out in the sink. Ronnie looked into the teacups. The tea had gone, but that didn’t prevent him from pouring more brandy into his own cup, and Evan’s.
    ‘Sure you don’t want a hand to shift the furniture, Mr Powell?’ he offered, raising his cup to Evan’s.
    ‘Sure, thank you,’ Evan echoed hollowly, downing the contents of his cup in one gulp. ‘Tell Diana to go home when she gets back. I’ll fetch what’s needed for tonight. If she wants more it will have to wait until Monday.’ He turned to Eddie. ‘We’d best be off, boy, if we want to finish before midnight.’
    ‘I’ll pass that message on to Diana.’ Ignoring the covetous looks that Tony and Angelo were bestowing on the brandy bottle, Ronnie corked it and returned it to the cupboard. ‘But don’t expect her back too early,’ he warned. ‘I know Tina and her idea of job hunting. She’ll do all she can to inveigle Diana into the pictures. I bet you a pound to a penny they’re sitting in the back row of the Palladium this very minute on the strength of a rumour, which Tina alone has heard, that an usherette is about to hand in her notice.’
    ‘I just hope she doesn’t raise Diana’s expectations too high.’ Evan laid his cup down on the edge of the stove. ‘Sounds to me as though the poor girl has had enough knocks for one day.’
    ‘Nothing in Rivelin’s, nothing in Wien’s, nothing in Leslie’s,’ Tina opened her umbrella and held it more over her own head than Diana’s as they stepped out of Rivelin’s doorway into the street. ‘And none of the other shops

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