Welsh Journals

ADVENTURES (Money for Old Rope' THOMAS WYNDHAM AFTER SEVEN YEARS ASHORE I was itching to get to sea again. A tropical disease picked up in a South American port had kept me in hospital for nearly two years and on my release the doctor advised me to give up all idea of sea-going or, for that matter, any other strenuous way of life. I was fortunate, however, to be offered a home with a truly warm-hearted uncle and aunt who had a small farm on the edge of Dartmoor and for the next five years I lived very happily with them, going for long walks on the moor and, later on, helping with the work around the farm. Time passed very pleasantly but the day came when the urge to do at least one more trip to sea was stronger than the memory of the doctor's warning, and one January morning in 1937 I said 'Good-bye' to my uncle and aunt and bought a railway ticket to Cardiff. As soon as I arrived in Cardiff I made straight for Tiger Bay, booked a room in a boarding-house and then went to look up Patsy Whelan. Patsy was a sort of one-man seaman's advice bureau and general fixer-upper. For a consideration he would cash an advance-note, find you board-and-lodging or-and this was what interested me at the time-fix you up with a job. He never seemed to have a home to go to but, night and day, could be found propping up the front of one of the dockside buildings like an extra stone pillar. Sure enough, there he was, holding court just the same as ever. I leaned against the wall and waited for the chance of a word with him. The street was crowded with out-of-work seamen, standing at every comer or polishing the walls with their shoulders. It was 10 years since I had seen Patsy. Perhaps his thick gold watch- chain was stretched a little tighter over his bulging waistcoat and his bowler hat a shade more weatherbeaten but there was no dimming of the keen glance that weighed you up as a source of profit-or danger of loss. 'Are yez just in then?' he said. 'Ye've been away for quite a while.'