MORNING SERIAL
HE had glanced at the station clock; it had been just past nine. The day would be gone before he got home. The porter who had helped him must have had something in mind; he wished now he’d asked him what. And wherever it was he was heading he had no ticket. He had left that with the ticket collector and the stationmaster had taken it off the collector. He wondered what there was about him that seemed to have aggravated the stationmaster. Was it because of his Glamorgan valleys accent? Some west Walians like some Northerners got real uptight and all patriotic about it. Stuck in the dark, in a railway van smelling of fish, hungry, without a ticket and knackered made him, angry. ‘Bl**dy Welshie b*st*rd!’ he muttered. And almost immediately he felt guilty. His father’s first language was Welsh. When his father was with his brother and his sisters they spoke only Welsh to each other. As they had done since the days when they were children at their home at the Neuadd in Heol Senni. The other side of the mountains. The train slowed down, it stopped. He waited, people moved about, orders were shouted but the van door stay closed. The guard’s whistle blew and they were off again. The train stopped twice again, but the door remained shut. But the next time it stopped the van door slid open. ‘Castell Nedd! Neath!’ announced the grinning porter who had got him to help with the box of fish. The porter held out his hand, ‘Mr Price, the stationmaster asked me to give you this!’ he laughed and handed him his ticket. ‘This was the first train he could put you on, to get rid of you, and get you back to Neath!’
THE END
> Boys of Gold by George Brinley Evans is published by Parthian at £4.99 www.parthianbooks.com