His Father's Son: To save the son he loves, a desparate father must confront the ghosts of his past

by Tony Black

  “There now, will ye dry yourself on that,” she said, and handed him a fluffy white towel that was so big it could be wrapped around him more than twice. She gave Marti a warm drink that made him cough when he sipped at it and then she laughed and said, “Tis only a tot added, boy … drink up the toddy.”

  Marti liked sitting by the fire and drinking the toddy with Mrs O’Shea, and when Dad came back Marti asked could he stay there now, but Dad looked shocked and said he couldn’t.

  “Marti, yeer mam will be worried where you are.”

  “I don’t want to go back there, Dad.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because Aunt Catrin is always telling me I’m bold and Mam is always with the Black Dog … I want to stay with you, before Mam’s taken to the Cabbage Farm and I’m left with Aunt Catrin forever.” Marti started to cry, and Dad picked him up and sat him on his knee. He knew he was too big to be sitting on Dad’s knee but wasn’t it grand to be sat up on his knee getting the hugs again.

  “Dad, did Mam take me here because I was a bold boy and took the blue ten dollar bill?”

  Dad’s eyes went really wide and then he spun Marti round and looked straight at him. “No, son … No way. It was nothing you did at all. Do you hear me? I don’t want you thinking that now.”

  Marti nodded.

  “I mean it,” said Dad. “It was my fault entirely … not yours or Mam’s either.” Dad looked very sad when he said it was his fault Mam had taken him to Ireland and Marti didn’t want Dad to be sad. It had been so long since he had seen Dad that all he wanted was for him to be happy and have a laugh and a joke like they always did before. Dad rubbed at Marti’s hair with the fluffy white towel and then Mrs O’Shea said about the toddy and Dad said, “I think he’ll live, sure.” A soaking to the skin was no laughing matter though, said Dad, and hadn’t Marti better be getting home for some dry clothes and the sooner the better.

  “Okay, fella, up ye are,” said Dad. “Tis time we got you home to Mam. There could be guards out looking for you.”

  Dad carried Marti, wrapped inside the towel, all the way to the house made of stones all piled up on top of each other right to the roof.

  When Aunt Catrin opened the door straight away she reached out for Marti with her hands and he was grabbed away from Dad. The fluffy white towel was pulled away too, and thrown into the street like it was some manner of dirty old rag. “Tis soaked to the bone he is,” said Aunt Catrin. “Why haven’t ye got him out of these wet things?”

  Dad’s mouth was wide open when Aunt Catrin spoke and Marti thought he looked more shocked yet, but didn’t Aunt Catrin only seem to care about shouting and screaming at everyone. “Up them stairs now and get some dry clothes on,” she said, “or is it a child with pneumonia ye want to add to your mother’s troubles?”

  “Leave the boy, will ye,” said Dad. “You can save the giving out for me.”

  “Oh, I have plenty to say to you, Joey Driscol, don’t worry about that,” said Aunt Catrin, and then she made a long mean look at Dad.

  “Where’s Shauna? I want to see my wife.”

  “Oh, yeer wife, is it? Well in name only, sure. She is out pacing the streets, sick with worry, looking for her only son, the only child to survive your unholy union. Tis a disgrace the way ye have treated that woman.”

  Marti stood on the stairs and watched Dad and Aunt Catrin fighting. He saw them stood on the doorstep and the rain falling on them both with the plink-plink sound. “I didn’t come here to discuss my affairs with you,” said Dad.

  “Oh, no, ye wouldn’t, would ye? I have heard all about your reluctance to face responsibilities, sure.” She was leaning forward and waging her finger at Dad. Marti wanted to tell her to stop or to grab the finger and snap it right off but he knew he had to be very quiet on the stairs. “That boy of yours is running wild, so he is. Tis had a terrible, terrible effect on the boy, yeer behaviour.”

  “Terrible effect?” said Dad. “I know Marti’s upset and confused, but—”

  “I’ll have none of yeer buts – wasn’t he traumatised, sure, acting like a child possessed by the Devil himself. If it’s not the guards at the door, it’s the brothers, and tonight it was the music teacher. The music teacher, would ye believe it? I bet ye never would. What class of cur acts up in a music class?”

  Dad said nothing back to Aunt Catrin, only stood staring and staring in the rain, and then the door was slammed hard in his face and Marti ran upstairs to get changed into the dry clothes like Aunt Catrin had told him. He knew he was in big trouble for mitching with Pat and missing the detention, but he didn’t care what Aunt Catrin would say to him and he didn’t want to see her after the look she had put on Dad’s face. Marti thought his dad looked very sad when Aunt Catrin was at him with the finger poking and he wondered would he maybe even cry. Dad had never cried before, but he looked very near to it, thought Marti, and then he started the crying himself.

  Marti cried for a long time; he didn’t want to go back downstairs because that’s where Aunt Catrin was. Even when he started to shiver in the cold upstairs, and even when he heard Mam come back home, he still didn’t want to go back downstairs where Aunt Catrin was. Marti was tired of all the fights with Aunt Catrin, which were worse entirely than any fights had ever been between Mam and Dad in Australia. He shut his eyes tight and shook his head. He wanted all the bad things he was thinking to go away, but he knew they would never go away as easily as that and he knew he would have to face Aunt Catrin again and again.

  When Marti finally went downstairs he saw that Uncle Ardal was back hanging out the rabbit traps and he wondered if he was still the lousy feck like Aunt Catrin had said. There was very little talking in the house, even Mam said nothing when she saw Marti, only lifted her hands to her face and then sat and stared into the fire. The only time she spoke was when Aunt Catrin asked Uncle Ardal to help with the tea. She said the ignorant bogtrotter had put his feet back under the table now, and Marti knew Uncle Ardal must still be the lousy feck like Aunt Catrin had said. When everyone sat down to eat Aunt Catrin said there was hardly enough of the cabbage and potatoes and a bit of a stew to go around but wouldn’t she do her best to make it stretch to the four of them.

  Aunt Catrin had very little on her plate at all and when she spooned out the great load of potatoes onto Uncle Ardal’s plate, Mam made the huh sound very loudly and Aunt Catrin said, “Sure amn’t I hardly famished and doesn’t the man need a good feed after working the entire day.”

  Uncle Ardal started eating before Aunt Catrin had finished with the spooning out and Mam looked away with the folded arms and made the huh sound again. Uncle Ardal ate very fast with his fork and didn’t even touch his knife at all, and Marti thought he was as fast an eater as the knackers at the chipper. Uncle Ardal would smash the potatoes and cut the stew to bits with his fork and scoop it all up into his mouth and then he would poke at the cabbage and cram that in behind it very fast until his cheeks bulged out like he had two great big red apples on the sides of his face. Mam shook her head when Uncle Ardal ate very fast and when she did it Aunt Catrin said, “We had yeer lousy feck round when ye were out.”

  “Joey?” said Mam.

  “Don’t get excited. I put him straight … had Ardal been here then he would have put him straight in the street.”

  Mam had no words at all for Aunt Catrin.

  “Wouldn’t ye know it – brazen he was! But I put him straight, all right. We won’t be seeing any more of him I shouldn’t think.”

  “What?” said Mam. She had the shocked look on her face and the wide eyes were staring out at everyone, darting back and forth with the wondering. “Marti, where is he now?”

  Marti didn’t know what to say to Mam. He might say the wrong thing and get Dad into trouble or he might say the wrong thing and get the hot arse for himself. “He’s gone,” said Marti. “Aunt Catrin told him to go.”

  Mam went straight into the hard bubbling with the tears and Aunt Catrin said stop it now,
for she had no call to that type of behaviour. “I will have no tears shed at my table for that lousy feck, Shauna—”

  “Stop it. Stop it,” said Mam.

  “I will not. Hasn’t he done ye enough damage? Lookit the state of ye now; tis Barry all over again.”

  “Stop it. Stop it. Stop it.” Mam was screaming, really loudly, and everyone stared at her, even Uncle Ardal stopped smashing at the potatoes and poking at the cabbage with his fork to look at Mam. She was red all over her face and even her hands were red where she was banging at the table so hard the plates were made to jump.

  “Shauna, will ye control yeerself,” said Aunt Catrin, and she was out of her seat and grabbing Mam by the arms and shaking her. “Shauna, Shauna,” she said, but Mam just kept at the screaming and the wailing, and then Aunt Catrin slapped her across the face. There was another loud slapping sound and then Mam looked away, but her eyes seemed like they couldn’t see a thing and the screaming was started all over but this time sounded even more desperate.

  “Oh, Sweet Jesus,” said Aunt Catrin. “Oh, Dear Lord.” There was another slap and Aunt Catrin grabbed Mam by the shoulders and started to shake her so much Marti thought she was going to fall off the chair and land on the floor. There were more slaps from Aunt Catrin and then Mam looked so tired that she slumped back in the chair like she was almost sleeping, but with her eyes wide open. Marti wondered what was wrong with her and why she had the strange look, then Aunt Catrin started shouting to Uncle Ardal. “Tis Barry all over, Ardal. I told ye it would be,” she said. “Come on, move yeerself, quick.”

  Uncle Ardal had a mouthful of potatoes and started to chew very fast when he was told to move himself. He stood up and grabbed Mam around the waist. She looked very light and easy to lift when Uncle Ardal picked her up and put her over his shoulder, and Marti wondered what he was going to do with her.

  “Where are you going?” said Marti. He ran after Uncle Ardal and watched him open up the back door and go to the car, where he put Mam on the back seat. “Where are you going?” said Marti. He felt the panic going through him because he didn’t know what was wrong with Mam or where she was to be taken, and then Aunt Catrin came out in her long grey coat, a scarf tied on her head and a little brown suitcase in her hand. “What’s happening?” said Marti, and the panic was all through him again.

  “Get back inside, Marti. Yeer Mam is not a well woman,” said Aunt Catrin.

  Marti looked at the little suitcase and wondered how Aunt Catrin could have packed up Mam’s things so quickly. “Where are you going?” he said.

  “Back inside. Yeer Mam is sick. We’re taking her away.”

  “I want to come. I want to come.” Marti dropped to his knees and grabbed onto Aunt Catrin’s long grey coat. “Please, please, please …”

  Aunt Catrin pulled her coat out of Marti’s hands and he fell face down onto the wet road. “Marti, up the hill is no place for a child,” she said. He watched her get into Uncle Ardal’s car and drive away and then he started to chase after it but it was too fast.

  Marti shouted for them to stop as he watched the car take his mam away from him, but the car didn’t stop, only kept on going, taking his mam away from him, away along the street, then away up the hill, and then away to the Cabbage Farm.

  29

  Joey never expected to feel anything but it was a terrible fright to hear Emmet had died in the night. Sure, he went quickly in the end, said Peggy, which was a blessed relief to everyone, especially those who had watched him hanging to life for months, and please God he’s happy where he is now. There would be no great occasion made of the funeral, she said, because only Joey’s sister Megan would be making the journey, but weren’t the notices posted and ye never could say.

  Joey didn’t know how to feel about his father’s death – didn’t it all happen so suddenly. He knew Emmet felt he had done wrong by him and it had hurt him. But hadn’t he been hurt too? When he felt like he was sorry for his father he wondered was it really himself he was feeling sorry for, because hadn’t he done the same to Marti. He knew now that the person he was wasn’t the person he wanted to be.

  Catrin had laid it down to him. The boy was running wild, with guards and the like at the door. Say what you would about Emmet’s ways, hadn’t he at least taught his children right from wrong. When Joey was a boy he knew he would have been scared witless at the thought of bringing a guard to the door. Jaysus, he thought, it was a failure he was to Marti entirely.

  He had tried to shape the boy in his own way, had he not? Sure, there were no lashings and no harsh words, he used the very opposite, but only made different problems for him. It was a heartscald to think of how he had tried to raise Marti with all the love he never had. He showered him with it and Shauna knew it was wrong – wasn’t he only setting the child up for disappointment. Shauna knew Marti would be forever looking for the same kind of love in the wider world, and he would never find the like of it.

  Joey understood Emmet’s ways now. He had taught him to be tough, to keep the feelings he had locked away, and hadn’t that only made things worse for Marti, and for Shauna. They were both hurting, and he knew it was all his fault. Hadn’t she the measure of him. And Marti himself carried the blame for his father’s mistakes, thinking he caused it all by taking a few lousy dollars from his mother’s purse. It was too much; wasn’t Shauna right, the boy was better off without him.

  Joey straightened his black tie in the mirror. He found it hard to even look at himself, but he knew what he had to do. He would tell Shauna she was right. He was no good for either of them; he could see that now.

  He walked to the decrepit house where he had said his farewells to his father. A black crepe scarf dangled from the lion’s head door knock, a handwritten card told when Emmet’s remains would be removed. Joey pulled down the card and crushed it in his hand.

  Inside, his father’s coffin was balanced on the kitchen table, his mother sat beside it, dabbing her eyes with a handkerchief. Joey’s sister Megan stood up and smiled at him. She came over and kissed him on the cheek, then seemed to remember the occasion and pulled herself away, straightening the sides of her skirt.

  “Are we it?” said Joey.

  “We are,” said Megan, and then she looked at Peggy. “Dermot’s wife is expecting again and Clancy, well ye know Clancy, busy, busy, busy.”

  “The others?”

  Peggy interrupted and put down her handkerchief. “Ye have all lives to lead. Come on, will ye?” Three men in black armbands helped Joey raise his father’s coffin; he recognised none of them. They could have been old hurling players or old drinking partners, it didn’t seem to matter either way. Without the rest of the family wasn’t the occasion a farce entirely.

  The slow cortège made its way to the churchyard, with Peggy out front wearing a brave face for all to see. People on the street greeted them with nods of the head and said they were sorry for the family’s pain. Old women stood outside their doors and blessed themselves as the coffin went by and there were some said they would pray for Emmet’s eternal soul.

  Joey didn’t know any of the people who spoke. He may have once – a word here and there as a child, a pint taken together when a man – but sure hadn’t times changed in Kilmora. He hardly recognised the place. It seemed to have been scrubbed clean. Its past was being rubbed away.

  In the churchyard the sun was blinding. A yellow oblong led the way to where the earth had been broken and the priest stood with a small crowd. They were just more strange faces to Joey, people he may once have known but not now. Even the priest was a stranger, a young fella with pale blond hair and paler cheeks. He stood sweltering, sweat dripping down his flat forehead. It all looked very difficult for him, thought Joey as he watched the priest start to stammer.

  “Emmet Driscol was known the length of the country,” he said. “In his day he knew faith. Not only faith in the Lord, for faith comes in many forms, but faith in himself. When he took to the hurling field Emmet Driscol sh
owed his faith in a strong arm and a winning determination. He showed skill and he showed heart and he was an idol to many.” Joey tried to block out the priest’s voice. Every word was a reminder of what he would sooner forget. “In these times of change, we see the worship of many false idols but it is in men with faith, in the Lord and in themselves, we can look forever to for guidance.”

  Joey had heard enough. He loosened himself from his mother’s arm and walked away from the gathering. Shading under the churchyard’s mighty Irish oak, he lit a cigarette and watched whilst his father was lowered into his final resting place, and then as his mother scattered earth over his coffin. When the little crowd dispersed Peggy came and stood by him and said, “Tis over.”

  “Yeah, tis,” he said. “All over.”

  “Ye know, he talked about you at the end.”

  “Did he?”

  “Every night. He was forever wondering about ye over in Australia. You were his son, ye cannot change that.”

  Joey looked at his mother. She took his arm again. “We all have feet of clay, son … If ye don’t follow your own parent’s mistakes, ye make fresh ones of your own.”

  Joey smiled at her, and she smiled back. “All ye can hope for, son, all ye can hope is that they survive.” Peggy patted him on the arm and turned back to the mourners. “I think that fella wants a word with ye …”

  “Who?”

  Joey looked to a plump figure in a dark suit. There was a brightly coloured shirt, open at the collar, flapping in the breeze beneath. “Howya, Joey,” he said.

  It was Paddy Tiernan, the sight of him made Joey fumble his words. “What the hell are ye doing here?”

  “That’s blasphemy. Tis sacred ground yeer on.”

  “Is it? How did ye get here?”

  “I drove my car …” Paddy pointed to a silver saloon parked beyond the churchyard gates. “D’ye mean, how did I find out? It was in the paper. Your old fella was a bit of a star.”