Fall of Giants

The musicians were paid in cash every night. All the girls brought large bags in which to carry the bundles of banknotes.

On the way out, Maud picked up a newspaper left behind by a customer. Walter would read it. They could not afford to buy papers.

She left the club and went straight to the bakery. It was dangerous to hold on to money: by evening your wages might not buy a loaf. Several women were already waiting outside the shop in the cold. At half past five the baker opened the door and chalked up his prices on a board. Today a loaf of black bread was 127 billion marks.

Maud bought four loaves. They would not eat it all today, but that did not matter. Stale bread could be used to thicken soup: banknotes could not.

She got home at six. Later she would dress the children and take them to their grandparents’ house for the day, so that she could sleep. Right now she had an hour or so with Walter. It was the best part of the day.

She prepared breakfast and took a tray into the bedroom. “Look,” she said. “New bread, coffee… and a dollar!”

“Clever girl!” He kissed her. “What shall we buy?” He shivered in his pajamas. “We need coal.”

“No rush. We can keep it, if you want. It will be worth just as much next week. If you’re cold, I’ll warm you.”

He grinned. “Come on, then.”

She took off her clothes and got into bed.

They ate the bread, drank the coffee, and made love. Sex was still exciting, even though it did not take as long as it had when first they were together.

Afterward, Walter read the newspaper she had brought home. “The revolution in Munich is over,” he said.

“For good?”

Walter shrugged. “They’ve caught the leader. It’s Adolf Hitler.”

“The head of the party Robert joined?”

“Yes. He’s been charged with high treason. He’s in jail.”

“Good,” said Maud with relief. “Thank God that’s over.”

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO – December 1923 to January 1924

Earl Fitzherbert got up on a platform outside Aberowen town hall at three o’clock in the afternoon on the day before the general election. He wore formal morning dress and a top hat. There was a burst of cheering from the Conservatives at the front, but most of the crowd booed. Someone threw a crumpled newspaper, and Billy said: “None of that, now, boys, let him speak.”

Low clouds darkened the winter afternoon, and the streetlights were already lit. It was raining, but there was a big crowd, two or three hundred people, mostly miners in their caps, with a few bowler hats at the front and a scatter of women under umbrellas. At the edges of the crowd, children played on the wet cobblestones.

Fitz was campaigning in support of the sitting M.P., Perceval Jones. He began to talk about tariffs. This was fine with Billy. Fitz could speak on this subject all day without touching the hearts of Aberowen people. In theory, it was the big election issue. The Conservatives proposed to end unemployment by raising the duty on imports to protect British manufactures. This had united the Liberals in opposition, for their oldest ideology was free trade. Labour agreed that tariffs were not the answer, and proposed a program of national work to employ the idle, together with extended years of education to prevent ever more youngsters coming into the overcrowded job market.

But the real issue was who was to rule.

“In order to encourage agricultural employment, the Conservative government will give a bounty of one pound per acre to every farmer-provided he is paying his laborers thirty shillings a week or more,” said Fitz.

Billy shook his head, amused and disgusted at the same time. Why give money to farmers? They were not starving. Unemployed factory workers were.

Beside Billy, Da said: “This sort of talk isn’t going to win votes in Aberowen.”

Billy agreed. The constituency had once been dominated by hill farmers, but those days were over. Now that the working class had the vote, the miners would outnumber the farmers. Perceval Jones had held on to his seat, in the confused election of 1922, by a few votes. Surely this time he would be thrown out?

Fitz was winding up. “If you vote Labour, you will be voting for a man whose army record is stained,” he said. The audience did not much like that: they knew Billy’s story, and regarded him as a hero. There was a mutter of dissent, and Da shouted: “Shame on you!”

Fitz plowed on. “A man who betrayed his comrades-in-arms and his officers, a man who was court-martialed for disloyalty and sent to jail. I say to you: do not bring disgrace on Aberowen by electing to Parliament a man such as that.”

Fitz got down to ragged applause and boos. Billy stared at him, but Fitz did not meet his eye.

Billy climbed onto the platform in his turn. “You’re probably expecting me to insult Lord Fitzherbert the way he insulted me,” he said.

In the crowd, Tommy Griffiths shouted: “Give him hell, Billy!”