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the dining room and the cawl for the men into the tureens as soon as she’s ready,’ Mari ordered the maid, who had returned with the newly polished, offending spoon.
    â€˜Yes, Mrs Williams.’
    â€˜Ready, Miss Sali?’ Mari looked apprehensively at her.
    â€˜Yes.’ Sali lifted her chin and held her head high as she left the dining room and crossed the hall where the footman, Robert, and two parlour maids were standing, waiting to attend to the mourners’ overcoats and hats. Nodding to Robert, she opened the door to the drawing room where the ladies had congregated to mourn while their men attended the chapel and grave side services.
    â€˜Sali.’ Edyth James beckoned her over to a high-backed sofa. When Sali drew closer she saw that the old lady was holding Llinos’s hand under cover of their black crêpe skirts. ‘How are you bearing up, child?’ Edyth asked, making room for Sali to sit the other side of her.
    â€˜I won’t be sorry when this day is over, Aunt Edyth,’ Sali confessed guardedly, lowering her voice lest the wives of Pontypridd’s crache overhear her. She sank in a crackle of stiff crêpe on to the sofa.
    â€˜Harry was a fine man who understood Christ’s concept of charity. He will be sorely missed in the town, and not only by his tenants and miners.’
    â€˜Thank you.’ Sali wondered why she found it so easy to accept her aunt’s references to religion when she felt either angered or embarrassed by her Uncle Morgan’s constant biblical allusions.
    â€˜Sherry, Mrs James, Miss Sali? Lemonade for you, Miss Llinos.’ Tomos held out a tray.
    â€˜Thank you, Tomos.’ Sali took two sherries and handed her aunt a glass.
    The butler lowered his head close to hers. ‘Masters Geraint and Gareth have just walked through the door, Miss Sali.’
    â€˜All right Tomos.’
    â€˜Llinos is fine with me, aren’t you, dear?’ Edyth handed Llinos her own bordered handkerchief to blot her tears. ‘You see to the others, Sali.’
    â€˜Thank you.’ Sali took a glass of sherry from the tray for her brother Geraint and headed for the hall.
    â€˜Thank you, Mair.’ Geraint divested himself of his hat and coat and handed them to the maid who had been ordered to look after the family’s outdoor clothes. ‘And thank you, Sali.’ He looked her in the eye and took the sherry she handed him.
    â€˜How was it?’ Sali reached out and briefly grasped her younger brother Gareth’s hand as he walked past them to join their aunt and Llinos on the sofa.
    â€˜The singing was beautiful, especially from the miners,’ Geraint said loudly. He lowered his voice as they instinctively headed for the quietest corner of the drawing room, furthest from the fire, ‘but Uncle Morgan delivered the service as if he were on an election platform. And he didn’t spare us at the graveside. We were there a full hour. The gravediggers looked too frozen to move, let alone dig, when he finally stopped sermonising.’
    â€˜I am sorry.’
    â€˜So am I.’ Despite his apparent composure Sali knew Geraint was as devastated by their father’s death as she, Llinos and Gareth were, but nine years in public school had taught him to conceal his emotions. ‘The man’s impossible. He said more about the wages of sin than the way Father lived his life.’
    â€˜That is just his way.’ Sali forced herself to be tactful as she glanced around to check if anyone was listening in on their conversation.
    â€˜He behaved as if he was preacher, minister and chief mourner rolled into one. Never mind that I’m the eldest son and you, Gareth, Llinos and I thought more of Father than him, or any of our damned aunts except Aunt Edyth –’
    â€˜Geraint,’ Sali admonished, afraid that one of their elderly relatives would hear him swearing, on today of all days. ‘They will all