—I tied Tomáisín, although I’d drunk two score pints and two, and still not a single one of that household came to my funeral, though they’re living in the same village as me. They hardly put a shilling on my altar. They all had a cold, they said. That was all the thanks I got, even though he’d grabbed the hatchet. Can you imagine, if he had to be tied again? …
—I didn’t have a big funeral. The people of Donagh’s Village had gone to England, and the people of Mangy Field, Sive’s Rocks …
—… What do you think of Caitríona Pháidín, Cite, who didn’t set foot in my house from the moment my father died till he was put in the coffin, after all the pounds of his tea she drank …
—Those were the days she went to Mannion the Counsellor about Tomás Inside’s land …
—Do you hear that slut Bríd Terry, and mangy Cite of the Ash-Potatoes?
—Three times I had to put my hand over the mouth of that old empty-head over there, when he was trying to sing “Mártan Sheáin Mhóir Had a Daughter” at your funeral, Curraoin.
—The whole country was at our funeral, newspaper people and photographers and …
—For a very good reason! You people were killed by the mine. If you had died in the old bed as I did, there’d be very few newspaper people there …
—There was bien de monde at the funeral à moi. Le Ministre de France came from Dublin and he laid a couronne mortuaire on my grave …
—There was a representative from Éamon de Valera at my funeral and the tricolour on my coffin …
—There was a telegram from Arthur Griffith at my funeral and shots were fired over my grave …
—You’re a liar!
—You are the liar! I was the First Lieutenant of the First Company of the First Battalion of the First Brigade …
—You’re a liar!
—God help us, forever and ever! Pity they didn’t bring my heap of clay out east of Brightcity …
—The Big Butcher from Brightcity came to my funeral. He had respect for me, and his father had respect for my father. He often told me that he himself had respect for me on account of his father having respect for my father …
—The doctor came to my funeral. That was hardly any wonder, of course. My sister Kate has two sons doctors in America …
—You’ve just said it! It was hardly any wonder. It would have been totally shameful if he didn’t come to your funeral, after all the money you left him over the years. Twisting your ankle at all times of day and night …
—The Big Master and the Schoolmistress were at my funeral …
—The Big Master and the Schoolmistress and the Red-haired Policeman were at my funeral …
—The Big Master and the Schoolmistress and the Red-haired Policeman and the priest’s sister were at my funeral …
—The priest’s sister! Was she wearing the trousers?
—It’s a wonder Mannion the Counsellor didn’t come to Caitríona Pháidín’s funeral …
—A wonder indeed, or the priest’s sister …
—Or even the Red-haired Policeman …
—Checking dog licences in Donagh’s Village he was that day …
—No dog would live on the flea-bitten hillocks of your village …
—… “Tomás Inside was there, grinning and jolly,
For it was Nell would marry him since Caty was dead …”
—I assure you, Caitríona Pháidín, if it cost me my life’s blood I’d be at your funeral. I owed it to Caitríona Pháidín to come to her funeral, even if it was on my two knees. But devil a word I heard about it till the night you were buried …
—A right blatherer you are, Sweet-talking Stiofán. Are you here long? I didn’t know you had arrived. The epidemic …
—… There was a big crowd at my funeral. The Parish Priest, the Curate, the Lake Side Curate, a Franciscan and two Religious Brothers from Brightcity, the Wood of the Lake Master and Schoolmistress, the West Side Master and Schoolmistress, the Sive’s Rocks Master, the Little Glen Master and the Sub-Mistress. The Assistant in Kill …
—There was indeed, Master dear, and Billyboy the Post. To give him his due, he was most obliging that day. He tightened the bolts on the coffin and he was under the coffin leaving the house, and he lowered it into the grave. Faith, to give him his due, he was willing and able. He stripped off his jacket there and grabbed a shovel …
—The thief! The lusty lout!
—… There were five cars at my funeral …
—The car belonging to that clown in Wood of the Lake, who got the legacy, got stuck in the middle of the road and your funeral was delayed for an hour …
—There were as many as thirty cars at Peadar the Pub’s funeral. There were two hearses under him …
—Faith then, as you say, there was a hearse under me as well. The old lady wouldn’t be happy till she got one: “His poor guts would get too much of a shaking on people’s shoulders or an old cart,” she said …
—It was easy for her, Road-End Man, with my turf …
—And with my seaweed wrack.
—… With such an abundance of drink at Caitriona Pháídín’s funeral, there weren’t enough people fit to carry her coffin to the church. And even they began shouting and fighting among themselves. The corpse had to be set down twice, with the state they were in. Indeed it had: on the bare road …
—Ababúna!
—I’m telling you the bare truth, Caitríona dear. There were only six of us from Walsh’s Pub onward. The rest went into Walsh’s or they dropped out along the way. We thought we’d have to put women under the corpse …
—Ababúna! Don’t believe him, the sourpuss …
—That’s the honest truth, Caitríona. You were very heavy. You weren’t long bedridden or suffering from bedsores.
“The two old men will have to go under her,” said Peadar Nell when we reached the Sive’s Rocks Boreen. We were glad to have the old men, Caitríona. Peadar Nell himself was on crutches and Cite’s son and Bríd Terry’s son were snapping at one another again: each of them trying to blame the other for breaking the roundtable the night before. There’s nothing better than the truth, Caitríona dear. Faith, I wouldn’t have shouldered your coffin myself, nor would I have accompanied you one foot of the way, had I known at the time that the heart was so faulty …
—Bloated on periwinkle soup you were, you snarling sourpuss …
—“She wants to act the stubborn mule even now. My soul from the devil, whether she likes it or not, she’s going to the chapel and to the grave,” said Big Brian, as himself and myself and Cite’s son went under you, to carry you up the path to the chapel …
“Devil a word of a lie you said, father-in-law,” said Peadar Nell, as he threw away the crutches and thrust himself under you …
—Ababúna forever and ever! The son of the pussface under me! Big Brian under me! The bearded streak of misery. Of course the coffin was lopsided if that flat-footed round-shouldered slouch was under me. Ababúna búna! … Big Brian! Nell’s son! Muraed! Muraed! … If I’d known, Muraed, I’d explode. I’d explode there and then …
6
—… And do you tell me you can’t insure colts?
—An insurance agent like myself wouldn’t do it, Seáinín.
—You’d think you wouldn’t be taking any risk at all on a fine young colt. It would be a great help, if anything should happen to it, to get a fistful of money …
—I nearly got a fistful myself, Seáinín, in the crossword competition in the Sunday News. Five hundred pounds …
—Five hundred pounds! …
—Yes, indeed, Seáinín. I was only one letter out …
—I see …
—What they wanted was a four-letter word beginning with “j.” The clue said the meaning of the word was “prison.”
—I see.
—I immediately thought of the word “gaol,” but that begins with “g” …
—I see.
—“That’s not it,�
� says I. I spent a long time deliberating and hesitating. In the end I put down “jaol” …
—I see.
—And do you know, when the solution came out in the paper, the word was “jail”! Bad luck forever to the simplified spelling,16 Seáinín! If I had a gun handy I’d have done away with myself. That had a lot to do with shortening my life.
—I see what you mean now …
—… By the oak of this coffin, Sweet-talking Stiofán, I gave Caitríona the pound …
—… She had that sweet smile on her face …
—That sweet smile proved unfortunate for the Small Master! But for the grace of God he’ll end up like the Big Master. There’s a jinx on that school of ours that the masters are unlucky with their wives …
—… The advice I sent in a letter to Concannon after he won the All-Ireland semi-final for Galway:
“Concannon, my friend,” says I, “if you can’t hit the ball in the final against Kerry, hit something else! There must be a levelling of conditions. The referee will be on the side of Kerry anyhow. You’re the man to do it. You have the strength and the skill. Every time you hit something I’ll raise three shouts of triumph for you …”
—… Hitler is my darling! When he comes over to England! … I think he’ll shovel that same England down to hell altogether: he’ll sweep away that scuttering bloated pig of an England like the donkey that was carried away by the wind: he’ll place million-ton mines under her navel …
—May God save us! …
—Faith then, England is not to be condemned. There’s great employment there. What would the youth of Donagh’s Village do without her, or the people of Mangy Field, or Sive’s Rocks? …
—Or this old gadfly over here who has a patch of land at the top of the village that can’t be beaten for fattening cattle …
—… Après la fuite de Dunkerque et le bouleversement de Juin 1940, Monsieur Churchill a dit qu’il retournerait pour libérer la France, la terre sacrée …
—… You shouldn’t allow any black heretic to insult your religion like that, Peadar. Oh, Lord, I wish it had been me! I’d question him like this, Peadar: “Do you even know there is a God? Of course, you’re like a cow or a calf, or like … or like a puppy.” All a dog worries about is filling his belly. A dog would eat meat on a Friday17 too, so he would. Oh, he wouldn’t have the least aversion to it. But, all the same, it’s not every dog would do it … I had a bit of meat left over at home once. “I’ll put it aside till Saturday,” says I. “Tomorrow is ‘avoid-the-joint’ day.” After dinner-time on Friday I was coming in from the garden with a handful of potatoes when I saw the Protestant Minister passing by, on his way up the mountain after fowl. “You would, you black heretic,” said I. “You’ll not even let Friday pass without fresh meat. You’re like a cow or a calf … or like a puppy.” When I went in with my handful of potatoes, the staple was off the dresser door. Every scrap of the meat was gone! “A cat or a dog for certain,” said I. “When I catch hold of you, you won’t get away with it. To go eating meat on a Friday. It serves me right, for not putting them out and closing the door after me!” I found them at the back of the house. The Minister’s dog was gobbling the meat and my own dog barking at him, trying to stop him. I grabbed the pitchfork. “Easily known whose dog you are,” says I, “eating meat on a Friday.” I tried to bury the pitchfork up to the handle in him. The dirty thing managed to escape. I offered the meat to our own dog. May God forgive me! I shouldn’t be tempting him. He wouldn’t go next or near it. Devil a bit of him. Now, what do you think! He knew it wasn’t right … Why didn’t you tell him that, Peadar, and not allow him to insult your religion. Lord, if I’d been there! …
—How could I? The Minister’s dog never stole a bit of meat off me …
—But the Spanish eat meat every Friday of their life, and they are Catholics.
—That’s a lie, you windbag!
—The Pope gave them permission …
—That’s a lie. You’re a black heretic …
—… Do you tell me that, Master dear? If they’d rubbed me with—what’s this you call it, Master?—methylated spirits—in time, I’d have no bedsores. Oh, Master dear, I had nobody to give me proper care. Dimwits. You can’t beat the learning after all. Methylated spirits. Pity I didn’t know about that! It comes in a bottle, you say. By Dad, Master, they must be the bottles the Schoolmistress buys from Peadar the Pub’s daughter. I was told she buys an awful lot of them. For Billyboy …
—Not them, Máirtín Pockface. They’d never be in a pub. She’s drinking, the hussy. Drinking for certain. Or else Billyboy is drinking. Or the pair of them. What a way to spend good money, Máirtín Pockface …
—I assure you, Máirtín Pockface, even if it cost me my life’s blood, I would have been at your funeral. I owed it to you to come to your funeral, Máirtín Pockface, if I had to go there on my knees …
—Muraed! Muraed! … Do you hear Sweet-talking Stiofán babbling again? He’d turn your stomach. Hey, Muraed! Do you hear me? Hey, Muraed … You’re not paying much heed recently. Do you hear me, Muraed? … It was time for you to speak … I was talking about that babbler, Sweet-talking Stiofán. I didn’t know he had arrived at all till very recently. They’re a very unmannerly bunch here, Muraed. They wouldn’t tell a person anything. See how they kept the news about Sweet-talking Stiofán from me …
Oh, I know that Máirtín Pockface has arrived, Muraed. I was talking to him. They tried to bury him on top of me …
True for you, Muraed: if a person has a cross over him, it’s easy to identify the grave. It won’t be too long now till my own cross is ready, but they say the Island limestone is being used up: that it’s difficult to get a proper headstone for a cross there. Máirtín Pockface says you have to curry favour to get a stone there at all now. But he told me my own cross is being speeded up all the same …
You say he didn’t, Muraed … There’s so much limestone on the island that it will never be used up! Now, Muraed, that sort of dishonesty will get you nowhere. Why would I tell a lie about the good man? Neither he nor I has been conniving in the land of lies, since we were stacked away in this haggard …
You say my son’s wife said that, Muraed: “We’ll be very well off in life before we start buying crosses.” I see, faith. You were listening at back doors again, Muraed, as you were in the Land Above … Now Muraed, it’s no use denying it. You used to listen at back doors. The tale you told Dotie and Nóra Sheáinín here about my life, where else did you get it but at my back door?
Oh, you were listening to me talking to myself going the road! … and behind the wall when I was working in the field! Well, Muraed, isn’t it as decent to listen at the back door as it is to listen in the roadway and behind the wall …
Listen here to me, Muraed! Why has everyone in the graveyard turned against me? Why don’t they get someone else to chew the cud over? It’s because …
It’s not because of having no cross over me, you say! What else? What else, so?
The people of the cemetery didn’t like me since I refused to co-operate! How do you mean, I didn’t co-operate, Muraed? …
I see, now. I voted against Nóra Sheáinín! Don’t you know in your heart and soul, Muraed, that I couldn’t do anything else. That scruffy Filthy-Feet. That godsend to sailors, that So-an’-so …
She was the Fifteen-Shilling joint-candidate after all, you say. And you didn’t mind filthy feet or ducks or sailors or drinking behind closed doors, or being a So-an’-so, Muraed …
What did you say the Master called me? … “Scab.” He called me “Scab” for voting against the Fifteen-Shilling crowd, Muraed. But I didn’t vote against the Fifteen-Shilling crowd. I voted against Nóra fat-arse Sheáinín. You know yourself that our people above ground always voted the same way. Nell is the one who changed. It was Nell, the pussface, who was disloyal. She voted for this new crowd because she got a road built to her house …
The Master called me that too. Say it a
gain, Muraed … “Bowsie!”18 “Bowsie,” Muraed! … because I spoke to Siúán the Shop even though she’d insulted me before that! Good God! I never spoke to her, Muraed. She spoke to me, Muraed. I’ll tell the Master that. I will indeed, I’ll tell him out straight. “Caitríona,” she said, “Caitríona Pháidín, do you hear me?” she said. “I’m thankful to you for giving us your vote. You were a courageous woman …”
I didn’t even pretend, Muraed, to hear the tight-arse. If I’d answered her at all I’d have said to her: “You stuck-up wench, I didn’t vote for you or for Peadar the Pub or for the Pound crowd, I voted against that So-an’-so, Nóra Sheáinín …”
He said I was a turncoat for having spoken to Nóra Sheáinín … trying to make up to her … after vilifying her ever since I came into the graveyard … Good God Almighty, Muraed! That I spoke to Nóra Sheáinín! … What’s that, Muraed? … He called me that. The Master! He must have meant Nóra Sheáinín, Muraed. Who else! …
He called me a So-an’-so, Muraed? A So-an’-so! I’ll explode. I’ll explode! I’ll explode …
Interlude Seven
THE MOULDING OF THE CLAY
1
I am the Trump of the Graveyard. Let my voice be heard! It must be heard …
Here in the graveyard is the parchment whose obscure words are the web of mankind’s dreams; whose faded ink is mankind’s defiant struggle; whose withered leaves are the ages of mankind’s vanity …
Above ground, land, sea and sky are a fresh, ornate manuscript. Every hedge is a majestic curve. Every boreen is a streamline of colour. Every field of corn is a golden letter. Every sunlit hilltop and winding land-locked bay with its white sails is a compound sentence of beauty. Each cloud is a glorious dot of lenition1 on the purple capital letters of peak-tops. The rainbow is an apostrophe between the wonderful hemisphere of the sky and the wonderful hemisphere of the earth. For this scribe’s task is to publish the gospel of beauty on the parchment of land, sea and sky …
Graveyard Clay- Cré Na Cille Page 21
