by Tony Black
Whilst she was gone, Joey prayed to God for forgiveness, begged absolution for the grand sin committed by them both, but nothing would cleanse his guilt. How could he imagine how Shauna must have felt, especially later on? The way people reacted when they knew she had committed a sin worse than any other sealed their fate. And when the Bishop said no to Trinity, everything had been for nothing.
“I did it all for nothing. I killed our child for nothing, Joey,” she said. “By God, Joey, what have we done?” Shauna was so young, too young to carry a burden like it, and it broke her. She was never the same girl again; nobody in Kilmora let her be.
Joey felt the rage fly into him when he remembered the people who spat in front of them in the street, the foolish old women who blessed themselves and kissed the beads and crosses round their necks at the sight of them. They were like lepers, pariahs they were.
Australia was supposed to mend it all – wasn’t it supposed to be a fresh start, a chance to put it all behind them, forget about it. Wasn’t that the plan, thought Joey. It had worked for a while, then the Black Dog appeared and Shauna became like a crazy woman, picking up babies in the street and bringing them home, breaking down worse than their own mothers when the children were returned. It all changed again when Marti was born. They were happy then, sure they were … until she started with the babies again, bringing them home again. But there could be no more babies after Marti, wasn’t that what the doctors told her. Why couldn’t she see Marti was special? He was her child as well. They could do nothing about the child lost, but, God above, didn’t Marti need a mother.
“Marti is your child, Shauna. How could you do this to him?”
He looked at Shauna. She had dried her eyes. She was lucid like she hadn’t been in ages, like she was unburdening herself. “I did this for him, Joey. Don’t you see that? I did it for Marti.”
None of it made any sense to Joey. “What are you saying?” he said.
“Open your eyes for once, please. Try and see, for once. I took Marti away from you so he would be happy.”
“He was happy.”
“No, Joey. He wasn’t, none of us were. Raising the boy in an unhappy home with a father who had given up on himself wasn’t what I wanted for him.”
The words lunged into Joey. He had only ever done his best for Marti. He loved the boy, loved him in more ways than he could count, loved him a million times more than his own father had ever loved him. “How can you say these things to me, Shauna, how can you? I am a better father than I ever knew.”
“That’s it, Joey, suffocating Marti with affection doesn’t make up for the love ye never got from Emmet. Shutting out our past and abandoning your dreams, somehow hoping your son will fill the gap is wrong … The boy learns from example and you’re not the example I want for him.”
It was wrong; it couldn’t be right, thought Joey. Even though she meant it, it was all wrong. How could she say these things to him? Had they been stored up? Had she blamed him for it all – for everything – all this time and said nothing, hoping somehow that he would stumble on the answers by himself? None of it made any sense. Joey didn’t recognise the person she was talking about. It wasn’t him, it just couldn’t be him, because if it was then he was the problem surely.
“Shauna, do ye think I am to blame for everything?”
“No, Joey, I don’t think that.”
“But you’ve just said so.”
“Joey, I haven’t. If you don’t understand what I have said to you, then you’ve had a wasted journey.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“I don’t want you to see Marti.”
“You can’t mean it.”
“Can’t I? I think you should leave now, Joey.”
26
All morning Mam was at the bubbling with the tears. Marti had said he wanted his dad, that he wanted to see him and didn’t want to go to school, but Aunt Catrin said there would be school this day as sure as there’s a hole in yeer arse. Aunt Catrin had to make the signs that were the cross when she said arse, and Marti thought she must be very angry to be saying a bad word when she was the very image of piety like everybody said. Marti knew the image of piety meant believing in God and he thought God was great like Aunt Catrin said, because now Dad was back and hadn’t the Mass and the confession and the visit to the little wooden box just done the trick.
When he set off with Pat for school there was a cold chill in the air that sometimes turned to mist and sometimes turned to little bursts of rain that were like icy needles. It was Miss Glynn, the music teacher, who was taking Marti and Pat’s first class and Marti knew there would be the singing. Nobody liked the singing, apart from Colm Casey who was soft in the head and would clap and dribble along with the others’ singing and would tap his foot to the tune when Miss Glynn played the piano. All the boys in the class would laugh and nudge each other and say, “Lookit, Casey’s foot tapping away.”
Pat said Miss Glynn had a mighty backside on her and wasn’t it like looking at two eggs in a handkerchief when she bent over in the corduroy trousers, but Marti had never really noticed Miss Glynn’s lovely backside before. He thought it was the diddies you were supposed to be looking out for and he thought it must have been Pat’s brothers, Brendan and Kenny, who had spotted it and told Pat it was mighty and worth the looking at.
Miss Glynn’s class was always very noisy before she got there in the morning, with the boys clanging on the cymbals and making the chopsticks on the piano keys. Colm Casey sat with his feet up on the rim of the chair and his hands up over his ears and dribbled and then a boy went over and said, “Casey, Casey, there’s the firebell!” He went mad and ran around, screaming and wailing like a wild thing. There was laughter at him running around, and when Miss Glynn came in the door with her long red coat all wet and an umbrella dripping with rain she had a look of meanness in her eye.
Miss Glynn threw the umbrella down on her desk and there was water flown everywhere and the boys nearest said, “Ah, Miss. Ah, Miss,” and lifted their arms over their heads like it was a downpour.
“I will have no more of this,” said Miss Glynn. “Do ye hear me? No more of this.” The class was silent when Miss Glynn spoke and when her rust-coloured hair fell down over her face she threw back her head for all to see this was not a day to be trying her patience.
“You, the books,” she said, and Ciaran O’Dwyer jumped out of his seat and ran to the press to fetch the books with the songs printed in them. There was to be no talking and no acting the maggot, said Miss Glynn, and the first one to step out of line would feel the sharp end of her tongue. Pat looked at Marti when she spoke, and when Marti looked back at Pat he thought he would run out of the classroom or climb down the drainpipe at any second to get away from Miss Glynn and the singing.
“Now, tis the ‘Bunch of Thyme’ we’re singing, so after me,” said Miss Glynn, and she started, “Come all ye maidens young and fair.” She played the notes out on the piano and the class joined in. “All ye that are blooming in your prime.”
Marti heard Pat singing, and when he turned to look at him he saw him making the words of the “Bunch of Thyme”.
Always beware, and keep your garden fair,
Let no man steal away your thyme.
For time it is a precious thing,
And time brings all things to my mind.
Marti watched Pat at the singing and he felt himself start to giggle at the sight of it.
Time with all its flavours, along with all its joys,
Time brings all things to my mind.
It was really hard to watch Pat at the singing, he thought, and then Pat started to poke him in the ribs with his elbow and make the rolling movement with his eyes that he knew meant go away. The poking only made Marti worse, though, and then it was too late to stop the laughter coming out and Miss Glynn stopped playing the piano and shouted, “You boys, get out here this instant.” The look of meanness in Miss Glynn’s eye was all for Marti and Pat w
hen she spoke, and Marti wondered what would be said or done when they walked out to the front of the class.
“Is it a joke ye have, Driscol?” she said.
“No,” said Marti.
“Oh, there’s no joke, so it is disrupting the class and depriving these boys of an education the pair of ye are at, is it?”
“It wasn’t,” said Pat, and then he was quiet and bowed down his head.
“No, I didn’t think that was it – sure isn’t it always the empty vessels make the most noise,” said Miss Glynn, and she wrapped on their heads with a ruler to try and make the noise of an empty vessel. Miss Glynn said it was casting pearls before swine she was and there was not one boy who could afford to act the maggot in the music class. Wasn’t the Driscol boy and Pat Kelly a fine pair to be coming in looking for a laugh and a joke when it’s on their knees praying for the miracle of enough voice to hold a tune they should be.
“Is it rivals to Christy Moore yees think ye are?” said Miss Glynn, and there was more laughing in the class.
“No,” said Marti.
Christy Moore was a true artist and a lovely and blessed man into the bargain, said Miss Glynn, and if she found another voice like Christy Moore’s for Ireland she would gladly meet her redeemer a happy woman. She said there were no Christy Moores to be found in this class, but as sure as God made the birds sing in the trees she would hear the “Bunch of Thyme” sang properly this day and Marti and Pat would be doing the singing.
She made them sing the song all the way through by themselves and it was so bad that not even Colm Casey was after tapping his foot. There was laughter in the class by some of the boys and others sat with their mouths open when Marti and Pat were at the singing. Miss Glynn said if she had heard a worse pair carry a tune in her lifetime then she must have blocked it out of her memory, because that was truly woeful and worse entirely than hearing any heathen curse or malediction make its way to your ear. If this was the level of singing these two boys had attained after all these years of schooling then she was ashamed of her profession and ashamed for them. They would face life unable to utter a note in tune and spend their days confined to humming and whistling their way through parties and weddings and many other social occasions. Wasn’t it just the limit and more than she could bear entirely to think of these two boys giving praise in Our Lord’s house when it was like two wounded cats they were.
“I can see this problem is further gone than I thought, boys,” she said.
“How do you mean?” said Pat.
“There is severe remedial attention required here, boys, and I will see to it that you get it.” There was laughter when she said remedial, which was where Colm Casey who was soft in the head went for extra lessons, and when Pat looked at Marti there was a worried look on his face and Marti wondered what was coming. “Yes, ye will both report to me for detention tonight … I will start ye on the tin whistle and when ye can hold a tune ye can go.”
“But, Miss,” said Pat.
“No buts. Ye can thank me later tonight … when I have ye whistling away like a pair of sweet larks.”
At lunchtime Pat said it was sick to the back teeth he was with school and music especially, for didn’t Miss Glynn have it in for the pair of them because of the old sexual frustration. It was two fine figures of men they were, said Pat, and wasn’t the detention for that reason only, sure wasn’t she just getting her own back entirely. She could take her tin whistle and she knew what she could do with it, and if she could make a tune whilst she was at it, then it’s a stage she should be on and not minding the likes of them at Saint Joseph’s. Pat said he was for mitching. He didn’t care about the detention, and it didn’t matter anyway, because he was going to Italy one day where he would get the scooter like they have on the films and ride around Rome giving the two fingers to the Pope.
“Are ye coming, Marti?” said Pat.
“To Italy?”
“No, Jaysus, on the mitch with me.”
Marti knew he had been in a lot of trouble lately. He’d already had the guards at the door and the brothers, and hadn’t Aunt Catrin said it was time to stop acting the giddy goat when it was a sick mother he had in need of the love and comfort of her only son. Marti knew if he went on the mitch with Pat and missed the detention then there would be more trouble, from Miss Glynn this time, but he didn’t care anymore. He hated living with Aunt Catrin, who was always making him and Mam cry, and he didn’t care if he made her angry anymore.
“Okay, I’ll mitch … but can I say where we go?” said Marti.
“Sure ye can,” said Pat, and there was a yee-ha noise from him when the two boys ran off to squeeze through the gap in the railings where they could get out of the school without the pass.
Marti didn’t really know where he wanted to go but he knew he wanted to find his dad. He told Pat about his dad coming all the way from Australia and about Aunt Catrin dragging him away. Pat said Aunt Catrin was a bockety-arsed old witch, sure she was, and shouldn’t she be minding her own business. Pat said Aunt Catrin wasn’t Marti’s mam and he didn’t need to do what she said anyway. Marti thought it would be terrible to have a mam like Aunt Catrin because it was bad enough the way things were. He hoped Mam would get better soon, because if she needed to go to the Cabbage Farm then he would be left all alone with Aunt Catrin and that would be like she was his mam, and then he would have to do everything she said.
“So where is your old fella, Marti?” Pat wanted to meet Marti’s dad because Marti had said he always had lots of funny stories and wasn’t the type to be giving out like other grown-ups. Pat wondered if Marti’s dad might even have brought some presents from Australia, because weren’t people always bringing presents when they came from far away places.
“I don’t know where he is … We would have to look for him,” said Marti.
“No bother at all. Sure isn’t Kilmora only small and he would have to be in one of the places people stay.”
“Like a hotel?”
“Or a guesthouse.” Marti had never heard of a guesthouse, but Pat said he had stayed in one in Cork with his mam and dad when he went to kiss the Blarney Stone. He said it was like a hotel, but smaller, and there was more of them in Kilmora than anywhere else in the whole world.
“Really?” said Marti.
“Well, I think so, sure my dad’s forever saying the place is turned into the world capital for guesthouses now.”
Marti didn’t like the look of their chances if there were so many guesthouses about the place, but when they got to the water fountain and Pat pointed to the little signs on the houses he could only count twelve of them. There didn’t seem to be too many places that Dad could be staying, and then Marti followed Pat when he started running in and saying, “Howya. Have ye an Aussie staying here?”
Marti told Pat his dad wasn’t an Aussie and didn’t speak like him, and Pat looked very confused when Marti told him Dad was Irish and had to change what he said to the people in the guesthouses.
“Howya. Have ye an Irish fella from Australia staying with ye?” said Pat. They went down the whole street with Pat asking the question and then they crossed over to the other side and started to walk back the way they had come. In the next place they tried, a very old lady with hair the colour of snowflakes started laughing at Pat when he asked the question, and Marti wondered what was so funny.
“Oh ye will be talking about my new fancy man, Joey,” said the lady. “Tis a lovely man, a gentleman entirely.” She smiled when she spoke and sometimes let out a little giggle, and Marti thought she must be a very nice old lady and he liked her more because she liked his dad.
“Can we see him?” said Marti.
“Ah, well ye could, son, surely, but isn’t he away out. He’s looking for work, ye know. Not one to sit about waiting for it to come to him, my Joey.”
Marti and Pat walked away from the old lady and when they said thanks she said it was no problem at all, at all and gave them both a butterscotch for show
ing such lovely manners. Marti and Pat decided they would wait by the water fountain until Marti’s dad came back, but when the hours started to pass Pat said he would have to go home. Mitching school was one thing but missing his tea was another entirely, and he didn’t want his arse blemmed by his own old fella, who was as fat as a bishop and put his weight into every lash.
“Are ye coming, Marti?” said Pat.
It was starting to rain again and it was very cold, but Marti didn’t want to leave without seeing his dad. “No, I think I’ll wait for him.”
“What about Old Kiss the Statues? Won’t she be sour at ye?”
“She always is anyway,” said Marti. “I’m staying for my dad.”
Marti stared down into the water fountain and remembered when he had dropped in the coin and made a wish for his dad to come to Ireland for him. He wanted another coin to make another wish and ask for his dad to make Mam happy and chase away the Black Dog so she wouldn’t have to go to the Cabbage Farm, but Marti had no coin and he knew there could be no more wishes made.
27
So there it was, he was back at Gleesons Bakery, after leaving the place a disgrace entirely. The little man in the brown suit shook Joey’s hand and said he could start Monday week on the early shift. Joey remembered the morning starts at Gleesons were a mighty awakener. Frankie Fogarty, who used to mind the ovens, had told him once, “Sure, ye get used to them, and don’t the early starts mean the early finishes.” But he knew the early finishes were no good to anyone because didn’t the entire working day spent yawning only make you ready for bed at the end of it.
