Tiger Bay Blues by Catrin Collier

years,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘Edyth, have you any idea what I’m asking you to give up? If you became a teacher you would earn an excellent salary, be able to keep yourself in comfort and, in time, even buy your own house. If you marry me, I couldn’t possibly hope to offer you the same standard of living. Vicars’ stipends have never been generous. They have to pay rent to the Church and can only live in their vicarage as long as they are able to carry out their duties. My salary will provide for our needs but few if any luxuries.’
    ‘You’re warning me that we will be poor?’
    ‘We certainly won’t be rich,’ he said decisively, ‘even after I get my own parish. Not if we remain in Wales.’
    ‘With my family here, I can’t imagine living anywhere else.’ Edyth meant it. She had never considered moving away from her parents.
    ‘You know Reverend and Mrs Price. You’ve seen how hard she works for St Catherine’s.’
    ‘She sits on as many charitable committees as my mother and father combined,’ she agreed. ‘And that’s without running the jumble sales, Mothers’ Union and Young Wives, organising the Sunday school and its annual outings, and overseeing all the parish’s Christmas activities. You know her nickname in the town is Mother Jesus.’
    ‘That’s very Welsh – and disrespectful.’
    ‘It’s not meant to be,’ she explained. ‘People are very fond of her.’ She couldn’t resist repeating the word he’d used, but if he saw the joke he didn’t smile or comment on it.
    ‘Some people say it’s unfair of the Church to expect vicars’ wives to act as unpaid secretaries and helpers to their husbands, but that’s simply the way it is. I can’t see things changing. I’m asking you to sacrifice a great deal, Edyth. Your own career and social life in favour of mine,’ he continued soberly.
    ‘I know that, Peter.’
    ‘Do you, really?’ he asked seriously.
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘And you still want to continue seeing me?’
    ‘More than anything else in the world.’ She lifted her face in the hope that he’d finally kiss her. But he simply began to walk on again.
    ‘This last month, working alongside you with the parish children and in the drama group has been wonderful. I would have spoken sooner if I hadn’t been concerned that I was asking you to give up too much.’
    ‘Nothing is too much to ask of the person you love,’ she said softly.
    ‘Then I have your permission to ask your father if I can call on you?’
    ‘Yes, although I warn you, I don’t know what he’ll make of your request after the rather obvious way Toby chased Bella.’
    ‘Toby didn’t ask your father’s permission to court Bella?’
    ‘To get engaged and marry her, yes. But court her?’ She laughed. ‘No. Toby didn’t need to. He followed Bella around with a hangdog expression on his face from the very first moment he saw her – or so my mother and father say.’
    ‘I can’t believe that you love me.’
    ‘I do.’ She laughed again, when she realised that she had unwittingly repeated the vow from the wedding service.
    ‘If we don’t hurry we’ll be late.’
    He quickened his pace and she fell into step alongside him. A curtain moved in one of the bay windows when they passed a terrace of houses. The Reverend Price was right; she and Peter had attracted gossip and she realised that meant Peter would never risk kissing her in public. But if he stayed for supper after he had spoken to her father, and she walked him to the gate when he left, anything could happen under cover of darkness.
    She recalled the confidences Bella had entrusted to her, glanced at Peter and wondered what he would look like naked. She blushed when she caught him looking back at her. It was only then she considered her parents. She had no idea how either of them would react to Peter’s proposal that he ‘court her with a view to becoming engaged’.
    She consoled herself with the thought that it wasn’t as though