just before we were due back on, he said, ‘Cled, I don’t feel too clever.’
I said, ‘Is it your guts?’
‘No,’ he said, ‘I keep coming over dizzy. Ask Mostyn to give us another five minutes.’
Mostyn was the emcee. He said, ‘It is stifling tonight. I’ll open another window.’
I fetched a glass of water and carried it through, and there was Sel, collapsed on the floor, turning blue around the mouth. I thought it was his heart. You do hear of it happening in young men. His eyes were open but he appeared not to hear me. We needed to phone for an ambulance but the telephone was in Mostyn’s office and he had to find the key.
Avril was shouting, ‘Hurry up, you silly old sod. There’s a boy dying while you’re going through your pockets.’
‘I am hurrying,’ he said. ‘You go out front and keep the punters happy.’
‘Send the gargler on,’ she said. ‘I’m not leaving Selwyn.’
Chucky Crawford said, ‘Don’t worry, I’ll go back on.’
By the time Mostyn came back from the telephone Sel’s eyes had rolled back in their sockets.
Avril said, ‘Did you tell them to hurry?’
Mostyn said, ‘Ambulances always hurry. And you’ve got a few things to learn about show business, my girl. Rule number one, whatever’s going on backstage, you look after your audience.’
‘Mostyn,’ she said, ‘there’s hardly anybody in and as long as the beer keeps flowing they won’t complain.’
And it’s true. It’s been my experience that people would rather take part in a heart attack than watch card tricks any day.
That ambulance had no great distance to come but it seemed to take hours. We were in a cubbyhole that passed for a dressing room, boxes of Christmas trimmings piled up on the shelves, mops and buckets in the corner, wondering if Sel was going to last the night.
Avril had his head cradled on her lap, stroking his hair. ‘Beautiful curls,’ she said.
I could have told her where those curls came from: a Toni home perm done in our Dilys’s living room.
When they arrived they gave him oxygen and asked me a lot of questions. All I knew was he’d had a ham salad and a glass of orange squash for his tea, the same as I had except I’d let him have my spring onions. I didn’t like to eat anything like that on a club night, in case I got lucky with the ladies. Also, he’d had brown pickle instead of salad cream, and three rock cakes. He’d seemed right enough during the first set apart from missing a line or two, but he did that sometimes, when he ran out of wind. He never breathed properly, for a singer. They said they were rushing him to the General Hospital and I might want to notify his next of kin.
Then Uncle Teilo turned up, alerted by Mostyn. ‘Oh dear,’ he kept saying. ‘My star turn. Oh dear, oh dear.’
By rights I should have ridden in the ambulance. I was family. But Teilo whispered something to the ambulance people, elbowed his way in.
‘You go and fetch your mam,’ he said. ‘Don’t worry about Sel. I’ll make sure he gets a top doctor.’
I’d have had to wait for a bus only a very nice couple called Jean and Dennis offered to run me home in their Hillman Minx.
‘We couldn’t bear for anything to happen to him,’ Jean said. ‘We follow him all over, don’t we, Dennis?’
He had fans like that even in those days. The husband didn’t say a lot. It always was the ladies he appealed to, but still, that Dennis drove like the clappers to get me back to Ninevah Street.
Jean said, ‘And then we’ll run you to the hospital, won’t we, Dennis? Who’d have thought it! Selwyn Boff’s brother riding in our motor!’
‘Did you loosen his cummerbund?’ That was the first thing Mam wanted to know. ‘Did you tell them he was invalided out of the RAF?’
I could have strangled her. Three times she ran back into the house, fetching things to take to the hospital. Indigestion pills and his hairbrush and then the evening paper, for the crossword puzzle, and all the while the car was ticking over, burning juice.
I said, ‘Leave that! He’s in no state for crosswords.’
‘He will be,’ she said. ‘He’ll perk up once he knows I’m there. Did you tell them he can only drink sterilised milk?’
I said, ‘He’s unconscious, Mam. He won’t be drinking any milk tonight.’
She said, ‘Well, if they give him the wrong milk and he comes out in hives we’ll have you to thank.’
I said, ‘I’m not his keeper.’
‘Yes you are,’ she said. ‘That’s exactly what you are. He’s only a bab.’
They allowed us to see him for five minutes but he was in a big machine, to help him with his breathing so we couldn’t really see him at all. They said they hoped to be able to tell us more in the morning.
Mam said, ‘I’ll just brush his hair. Tell him I’m here.’
‘Not tonight,’ they said. ‘He’s too ill.’
That’s when it hit her. ‘Oh, Cledwyn,’ she sobbed. ‘Whatever can it be? Don’t let me lose him. I couldn’t bear to lose him.’
She wouldn’t come home, insisted on waiting there all night though there was nothing to be done.
I said, ‘Should I ask Dilys to come? She could wait with you.’
‘No,’ she said, ‘Dilys is neither use nor ornament at this time of night. She can’t manage without her sleep the way I can.’
I said, ‘Well, if I’m going to be up all night, I’d better phone Greely’s, tell them I shan’t be in tomorrow morning.’
‘Just go home,’ she said. ‘I don’t need anybody to sit with me. It’s a mother’s job to keep watch. And it’ll be me he asks for when he wakes up.’
So Jean and Dennis kindly drove me home and when I offered them something for their trouble and their petrol, Jean said, ‘You keep your hand in your pocket. We don’t want your money, do we, Dennis? Of course, what we’d really love is an autograph.’
‘Happy to oblige,’ I said. ‘Where’s your autograph book?’
‘Oh no,’ she said. ‘This wouldn’t be the right time. He’s a sick boy. But when he’s on the mend, if you think to mention it to him, a signed photo would be lovely.’
I expect she lived to regret not letting me sign her book, especially after I’d had my hit single.
Sel got worse before he got better. He was on the critical list for several days and Mam instructed us on what we were to say to the reporters.
Dilys said, ‘There aren’t any reporters, Mam.’
Mam said, ‘That’s because you keep using the front entrance. They’ll be round the back, thinking to catch you out. That’s what they did when Judy Garland was in hospital.’
Avril tried to visit too, just the once, but Mam soon saw her off. ‘Family only,’ she said. ‘Doctor’s orders.’
This wasn’t quite true because Uncle Teilo was buzzing around every day, looking for progress reports, wondering how many more bookings he’d have to cancel. Sel was unconscious for a whole day and when he came to we had a bit of a fright. ‘I’ve gone blind,’ he said. He was clinging to Mam. ‘I can’t see anything. I’m too young to go blind.’
Mam said, ‘Don’t worry, Selwyn, Mam’s here. Mam’ll send for a specialist. Cledwyn, tell your Uncle Teilo to