—Oh! Leave me alone! Leave me alone! I’d explode …
—Isn’t that what I said!
—I’d explode! I’d explode!
4
—… “Would you come ho-ome along with me:
There’s roo-oom beneath my shaw-awl,
And indeed, my Jack …”
—Écoutez-moi, mes amis. Les études celtiques. We’ll have a Colloquium now.
—A Colloquium, lads! Hey! Bríd Terry, Sweet-talking Stiofán, Máirtín Pockface! A Colloquium …
—A Colloquium, Red-haired Tom! …
—I’ll say nothing. Nothing …
—Isn’t it a pity Tomás Inside isn’t here! He’d be a good man for a Colloquium …
—The result of my findings concerning the dialect of the Half Guinea. I’m afraid this will not be a proper Colloquium. The only language a Colloquium can be properly held in cannot be spoken fast enough by me or by you people …
—Fast enough?
—Fast, mes amis. The first qualification for a Colloquium is speed. I have to say, my Irish friends, that I’m greatly disappointed by my research …
—Musha, God help us, you poor thing! …
—Mes amis, it’s not possible to carry out learned research into a language spoken by a great number of people, such as English or Russian …
—I’ve a great suspicion he’s a black heretic …
—It’s only possible—and only worthwhile—to carry out research into a dialect known to two persons, or three at most. There should be three senile dribbles accompanying every word.
—… There was such a day, Peadar the Pub. Don’t deny it …
—It’s not worth researching a person’s speech unless the words come out astride one another …
—… Eight into eight, that’s one. Eight into sixteen, that’s two …
—… This Colloquium is a heaven-sent opportunity for me to read The Setting Sun …
—Pas du tout! This is a Colloquium convenable …
—I won’t listen to The Setting Sun. I won’t. Honest! …
—Hold on now, my good Frenchman! I’ll tell you a story …
—Écoutez, Monsieur Cóilí. This is a Colloquium. Not a University lecture on Irish Literature …
—I’ll tell you a story. Upon my soul I will!7 “The Kitten That Committed an Impropriety on the White Sheets of All of Conn’s8 Half of Ireland …”
—… “Mártan Sheáin Mhóir had a daughter
And she was as broad as …”
—… “At the Wattle Ford9 of Merriment he met Moghchat of the round fat thighs. ‘Don’t go any further,’ said the Moghchat. ‘I have just returned from Wattle Ford, after having committed that little impropriety on all the white sheets there. From now on it will be called Wattle Ford of Black Pool. I left this fine conspicuous piece of mischief—the Eiscir Riada10—in my tracks coming down, and before that I committed a little smear of mischief on the fine sheets all over Mogh’s Half of Ireland’” … Mogh’s Half, my good friend, from Moghchat: big cat in Old Irish …
—Ce n’est pas vrai! Mathchat is the word. Matou.11 Mathshlua. Mathghamhain.
—Gast12 was the word for a female cat in proper Old Irish …
—Mais non! Gaiste, a loop, a noose, a snare, a trap, a battery of guns, a convenience. “Oh, gast of gasts in the gast of gasts I am,”13 said Knotted Bottom, as his cloak was being ripped off …
Modern Breton: gast: a woman who has a stall of holy objects, in order to collect money for the poor at pardon in Leon.14 In the dialect of Gwened15 … I’d have to consult my notes about that, Cóilí. But the thèse is right: Old Irish: Gast; S muted before T; Gât: Cat: Pangur Bán:16 Paintéar: Panther: Big Smart Fat-Cat of Learning …
—Hold on now, my good friend, and I’ll tell you how the cloak was ripped off Knotted Bottom …
—Cóilí, Seán Chite in our village says it was how he lost it …
—Seán Chite in your village! It’s not often a man of your village said anything decent …
—… By the oak of this coffin, Little Cáit, I gave Caitríona Pháidín the pound …
—… A big fur coat on her, Red-haired Tom, like the one Baba Pháidín used to wear, till she had to throw it away after all the smuts that fell on it in Caitríona’s …
—You’re a damned liar, Bríd Terry …
—Peace and quiet is what I want. Stop abusing me, Caitríona …
—… Can I give you any spiritual help, Sweet-talking Stiofán?
—… Billyboy the Post, Master? Bloody tear and ’ounds, if a person is going to die he’s going to die. If Billyboy’s to die, Bloody tear and ’ounds, Master, he’ll stretch out, with no life left …
—… Didn’t the little colt die!
—Didn’t the little mare die!
—It’s many a day since that happened, but Beartla Blackleg told me the little colt died only recently …
—It’s many a day since I had her, indeed. She was great! I bought her at St. Bartholomew’s Fair. It was no bother to her to carry a ton and a half against any hill. Two years exactly I had her …
—As soon as Beartla Blackleg told me the colt died, I said: “Soaking rain killed it. The young fellow hadn’t finished putting the roof on the stable, and he left the colt too long in the open.” “Bloody tear and ’ounds, that wasn’t it at all,” he said …
—It was around the Feast of St. Bartholomew, of all the days in the year. I was moving the little mare down to the New Field by the house. She had the upper half of the village picked bare. I met Nell and Peadar Nell at the Meadow Height, on their way up home. “Would you have a match?” says Peadar. “By Dad, I might have,” says I. “Where are you going with the little mare, God bless her?”17 he said. “I’m moving her down to the New Field,” said I …
—“Wireworm so,” says I. “Bloody tear and ’ounds, not at all,” said Beartla Blackleg …
—“She’s a beautiful little mare, God bless yourself and herself,” said Nell. “She would be,” said Peadar, “only for her condition.” “Condition!” said I. “’Tis no bother to her to carry a ton and a half against any hill …”
—“Coughing,” said I. “Bloody tear and ’ounds, coughing!” said Beartla. “Not at all …”
—“Have you any notion,” said Peadar, “of bringing her to the St. Bartholomew Fair, God bless her?” “Musha, I don’t rightly know,” said I. “I’m between two minds. I’m reluctant to part with her. She’s a great little mare. But I don’t have much fodder this winter.”
—“Worms,” said I. “Bloody tear and ’ounds,” said Son of Blackleg …
—“How much would you be asking for her, God bless her?” said Nell. “Musha, if I took her to the fair I’d ask for twenty-three pounds,” said I. “Get away, yourself and your twenty-three pounds!” said Peadar, and he took himself off up the boreen. “Would you accept sixteen pounds?” said Nell. “Indeed then, Nell, I would not,” said I. “Seventeen pounds,” she said. “Get away with your seventeen pounds!” said Peadar. “Come on!” The mother took herself off after him, but she kept looking back at the little white-faced mare …
—“What do you mean, worms?” he said. “Bloody tear and ’ounds, she had no more worms in her than I had! Didn’t they open her up! …”
—Caitríona Pháidín came over from her own Little Fields of Haws. “What did that pussface have to say?” she said. “She offered me seventeen pounds for the white-faced mare,” said I. “Faith, I’d let her have her for twenty, or for nineteen, even. I’d give her to her for a pound cheaper than I would to a man from outside the village. It would brighten my heart to see her going past me every day. I’d say, from the way she fancied her, herself or her son will be down to me again before morning. They won’t let me take her to the fair.”
“Arrah, that pussface!” said Caitríona. “She’ll destroy your white-faced mare going up those steep rocky paths. If she buys her indeed, may she have no luck with her! …”
—“Devil do I know what cause of death the colt would have so,” said I. “It wouldn’t have been a weak heart, would it? …”
—Faith then, she said that, Seáinín Liam. “Go to the fair,” she said, “with your white-faced mare, and get the right price for her, and don’t heed that pussface’s sweet talk …”
—“Bloody tear and ’ounds,” said Son of Blackleg. “What cause of death would it have but to lie down and die? …”
—“Go off to the fair with your white-faced mare,” said Caitríona again. I would never have noticed that she didn’t say “God bless her,” only for the wild way she was glaring at the mare …
—’Tis a great blow for the poor young fellow that the colt is gone. He’ll have plenty to do to get a wife now.
—That evening the mare was puffing and coughing. The following morning with the lark Peadar Nell landed down to me. The two of us went over to the New Field. She was an awful loss, Seáinín Liam! She was stretched out there from ear to tail and not a stir out of her.
—Exactly as the colt was …
—“That is so,” said I. “The evil eye.”
—Indeed then, they say that Caitríona had the evil eye. I wouldn’t buy a colt while she was alive …
—Ababúna! It was pussface Nell put the evil eye on her.
—She went past me without saying “God bless you,” and before I had two more handfuls of oats on the stack I fell off it …
—Faith then, she didn’t say “God bless you” to me, and I twisted my ankle the same day …
—Of course, the Big Master didn’t have a day’s health since he wrote the letter for her. A curse …
—She can’t have put the evil eye on Mannion the Counsellor, for he’s still alive …
—Don’t believe them, Jack! Jack the Scológ! …
—… Did you not hear, Cite, that Tomás Inside migrated yet again? … He did indeed, two weeks ago …
—Ababúna!
—He wasn’t able to get a wink of sleep in Pádraig Chaitríona’s with the grunting of pigs from night till morn. The sow had piglets and they were brought into the house. “Didn’t they have a great need of sows!” he said. “Look at me who never had a sow! I’ll go up to the house where there’s no grunting of pigs and where I’ll have slates over my head.” On his way up to Nell’s he chased Pádraig’s cattle off his patch of land …
—… The cocky old fool, the same Tomás Inside …
—… It would be much more of a shame to you, as you say, if your son had married an Eyetalian. Those blacks are very gentle. Didn’t you see the black who was butler to the Earl long ago?
—Faith then, that same black could be quite short-tempered too …
—Sometimes, as you say, he could be quite short-tempered. Well, I don’t know what my young man at home is going to do, may God guide him to do what’s good for him. The priest’s sister asked him to marry her. They’re keeping company for a while now …
—Isn’t that what happened to my son in England too! He was keeping company with this black for a good while, and she asked him to marry her. What do you think, but didn’t the little fool go off and marry her!
—By Cripes, as you say, that’s how it goes. Foolish lads. I heard my old woman at home was delighted with Nancy—I think Nancy is her name—but if I were alive I’d say to him: “Look out for yourself, now. What’s that little girl able for in a country household? Do you think she could spread a bank of turf or carry a creel of seaweed? …”
—Isn’t that exactly what I wrote to my son in England! “Wasn’t it the fine heifer you married,” said I. “If you ever come home, what good-looking specimens you’ll have on a halter coming into the country: a blackeen, and a clutch of young blackeens running round the village. Your reputation will go all over Ireland. People would come from near and far to look at them. Don’t you know she won’t be able to forage on land or on strand. Devil a bit of seaweed or turf was ever seen where that one came from …”
—There’s no accounting for foolishness, as you say. There was no getting our fellow to listen to advice. He was always … what’s this Nóra Sheáinín called it? …
—A coxcomb? … A bowsie? … A blackguard?
—Faith then, he was not. He wasn’t a blackguard, anyhow. I brought him up a well-mannered, honest lad, even if I say so myself. Why can’t I think of how Nóra Sheáinín put it? …
—Adonis! …
—Faith then, as you say, that’s the way. Nancy brought him off to Brightcity and he put a wedding ring on her finger. It warmed the cockles of my old woman’s heart …
—And my old woman was overjoyed too! She thought a negress was some sort of a grand lady until I told her she had the same colour skin as the Earl’s butler. When she heard that, the priest had to be sent for …
—That’s how it goes, as you say. The priest was trying to get Nancy to marry the Wood of the Lake schoolmaster, but faith then, she told him out straight, without putting a tooth in it, that she wouldn’t marry him. “That miserable nonentity is already married to the school,” she said, “and what would he want to marry me for, then? I don’t like the Wood of the Lake schoolmaster,” she said. “Sure, there’s no pep in him! He’s an impotent old thing …”
—My son was an impotent thing, in any case. Wasn’t he hard up to go and marry a black in London, where there’s as many people as there is in the whole of Ireland … I heard she has hair as curly as an otter …
—Foolishness, as you say. “I won’t marry that impotent thing from Wood of the Lake,” said Nancy. “Road-End’s son has a motorbike. He’s a fowler, an angler, a fiddler, and a top-class dancer. He’s an eyeful when he dresses up. He offered to shoot Lord Cockton if he saw him in my company again. His house is as bright as a villa—a villa she said, on my soul!—it’s so well furnished and ornamental. It clears the clothes-moths out of my heart to go in there …”
—It’s easy for you to boast about your ornamental house, Road-End Man. Ornamental …
—Thanks to my drift-weed …
—… Honest, Dotie. Every word of what I told you was the truth. Caitríona Pháidín never paid for anything: the roundtable, or Cite’s pound …
—You’re a damned liar …
—And her son is like that too, Dotie. Her coffin is still to be paid for in Tadhg’s, and the drink for her wake and funeral in Siúán the Shop’s …
—You’re a damned liar, Nóirín …
—Doesn’t her son get demands for them every second day. Honest. That’s why Peadar the Pub and Siúán the Shop are so annoyed with her here.
—Ababúna, Nóirín, Nóirín …
—Not the least little bit of her burial expenses has been paid, Dotie, except that my son from Mangy Field paid for the tobacco and snuff …
—Oh! Nóirín, you guiding light of mariners! Don’t believe her, Jack the Scológ …
—God would punish us …
—Nell paid for her grave here too, out of pure shame …
—Oh! The pussface, she did not, she did not. Don’t believe Rotten Thighs from Mangy Field! Don’t believe her, Jack! I’ll explode! I’ll explode! I’ll explode! …
5
—… It was I laid you all out, my dear neighbours …
—You were great, Little Cáit, to give you your due …
—I never accepted a pound, shilling or penny from anyone. The Earl sent for me the time his mother died. When I had finished with her, “How much will you charge?” he said. “You’ll get whatever you ask for …”
—You’d be sent to prison for the rest of your life, Little Cáit, if you had as much as tried to lay a finger on her, or even go near the room she was laid out in …
—It was I laid out Peadar the Pub …
—It was not, Little Cáit, it was two nurses from Brightcity, in uniforms and white caps. People said they were nuns …
—It was I laid out the Frenchman …
—If you had laid a hand on him
, Little Cáit, you’d be sent to prison for contravening Ireland’s neutrality in time of war …
—It was I laid out Siúán the Shop …
—That’s a damned lie. My daughters wouldn’t allow you one nostril’s ration of air in the room I was laid out in. Why would they? For you to go pawing me! …
—Even the viewing of Siúán’s corpse was rationed, Cáit …
—The Big Master …
—Indeed it was not you, Little Cáit. I was working over there next to his house, in our own Roadside Field. Billyboy the Post called me:
“Your man is for the stray letters office,” he said. You and I, Little Cáit, were in through the door at the exact same moment. We went upstairs and said a blast of prayers with the Schoolmistress and Billyboy.
“The poor Master has expired,” said the Schoolmistress, with a lump in her throat. “Easily known. He was too good for this life.”
—Oh! The hussy! …
—You went over, Little Cáit, and stretched out your hand to put your thumbs on his eyelids. The Schoolmistress stopped you. “I’ll do all that’s to be done with the Big Master, the poor man,” she said.
—Oh! The cocky little bitch!
—Now, Master, remember that Máirtín Pockface saw you in the school …
—Faith then, there’s nothing better than the truth, Master …
—“Let you go down to the kitchen and rest yourself, Little Cáit,” she said. She told myself and Billyboy to go for food and drink and tobacco. “Don’t spare anything,” she said to Billyboy. “I don’t begrudge it to the Big Master, the poor man …”
—With my own money! Oh!
—When we came back you were still in the kitchen, Little Cáit. Billyboy went up to the Schoolmistress who was snivelling upstairs …
—Oh! The beggar! The frisky little lout!
—When he came down you spoke to him, Little Cáit. “That poor creature up there must be exhausted,” you said. “I’ll go up and help her wash him.” “Rest yourself there, Little Cáit,” said Billyboy. “The Schoolmistress is so grief-stricken for the Big Master that she’s better off on her own for a while,” he said. He grabbed a razor out of a press and I held the strop for him to sharpen it.
Graveyard Clay- Cré Na Cille Page 27
