Graveyard Clay- Cré Na Cille

by Máirtín Ó Cadhain

  —I’ll have nothing to do with you, Nóra Sheáinín. Indeed then, I won’t! …

  —That’s my darling, Tomás Inside! …

  —I used to rub shoulders with the big shots in Nell Sheáinín’s …

  —You useless little fool! …

  —Oh! Them foreign ones are great fun, Caitríona. A big yellow stump was fishing with Lord Cockton this year, and she’d smoke all the fags that were ever made. She would, and so would the priest’s sister. She keeps them in big boxes in her trousers pocket. She has Road-End’s son robbed supplying her. Good enough for him, the blackguard. But I must say she’s lovely herself. I sat into the motor car beside her. “Gug-goog, Nancy,” says I …

  —Your mind, Tomás, dote, is raw and lumpy clay, but I will mix it, mould it, fire it and polish it, until it’s a beautiful vessel of culture.

  —I’ll have nothing whatever to do with you, Nóra Sheáinín. Nothing at all. I got enough of you. I couldn’t put a foot inside Peadar the Pub’s but you’d be in at my heels, sponging drink. Many is the fine pint I bought for you, not begrudging it to you! …

  —Nóróg dear, don’t let on …

  —Good on you there, Tomás! God grant you life and health! Let her have it now, hot and heavy; let Nóirín Filthy Feet have it. Going around sponging! Were you in Peadar the Pub’s, Tomás Inside, the day she made the billy-goat drunk? … The blessings of God on you, and tell the graveyard about that! …

  3

  —… I keened you all, my family oh! Woe is me, alas and woe! I keened you all, my family oh! …

  —You had a fine tearful wail, Bid Shorcha, to give you your due …

  —… Woe is me, alas and woe! You fell off that dreadful stack, my woe! …

  —You’d think, listening to you all, that he fell off an aeroplane! He only fell off a stack of oats! Sure, that wouldn’t kill anybody but a person who was half-dead already. If he drank the bottle I drank! …

  —Woe is me, alas and woe! You drank that awful bottle, my darling oh! …

  —You’ve so much talk about your bottle. If you drank two score pints and two as I did …

  —Woe is me, alas and woe! You won’t drink another pint, never ever oh! And many’s the big pint went down your sluice-gate oh!

  —Arrah, you’ve bored an auger-hole in the clay of my ear with your two score pints and two! If you inhaled as many barrels of ink into your lungs as the Writer did …

  —Woe is me, alas and woe! My fine writer forever more laid low!

  —God bless us and save us forever oh! …

  —Sentimentality again! …

  —I keened you, Dotie! Darling Dotie oh! Wasn’t it far away from your native clay you met your death, my woe! my woe! Alas, my great sorrow and my seven torments, they drove you west without much knowledge! You were cast away from your relations and home! You met your death by the raging foam! Your bones will be laid …

  —In the barren clay of nettles and sandy seaweed …

  —I keened you all, my family oh! … My darling oh! My darling oh! … Never, no more, will he write, my woe! …

  —That’s no loss! A cursed heretic! …

  —… I keened you, musha. I did indeed. Woe is me forever oh! A fine fertile patch at the top of the village! He’ll never set foot there for harvest or tillage.

  —Did you say, Bid, there was no better land for fattening cattle?

  —Faith then, you did, Bid Shorcha. I was listening to you. And then you began to sing “The Lament of the Ejected Irish Peasant” …

  —… I keened you too! I keened you too! Woe is me, alas and woe! He’ll rise in the saddle no more, no more, on a white-faced colt, no! never oh! …

  —Oh! Caitríona Pháidín laid her evil eye on it! …

  —That’s a damned lie! It was Nell …

  —… I cried my head dry over you, Big Master, oh! Woe is me forever oh! The Big Master dying in his prime, my woe! …

  —Now, Bid Shorcha, you didn’t keen the Big Master at all, at all. I should know, for I was there helping Billyboy the Post to put the lid on the coffin …

  —The blackguard! …

  —The Schoolmistress was sobbing. You took her hand, Bid Shorcha, and began to clear your throat. “I don’t know,” says Billyboy the Post, “which of the two of you—you Bid Shorcha, or the Schoolmistress—has the least sense …”

  —Oh! The thief!

  —“Out you go, and down the stairs with all of you whose address is not in the Kingdom Beyond, till I put the lid on the coffin,” says Billyboy. They all went downstairs except you, Bid Shorcha. “But the poor Big Master must be keened,” you said to the Schoolmistress. “He well deserved it, the poor man,” said the Schoolmistress …

  —Oh, the hussy! …

  —“Keening or no keening,” says Billyboy, “unless you get downstairs out of my way, Bid Shorcha, he won’t make it in time for today’s delivery.” You came down to the bottom of the stairs then, Bid Shorcha, and you were snivelling. Billyboy was making the world of noise upstairs, driving in screws and tightening them. “He’ll never leave that coffin after Billyboy is finished with him,” said Big Brian. “If as many screws were put into Mannion the Counsellor’s tongue, Caitríona would have gone to another solicitor about Baba’s will …”

  —Ababúna! The blundering streak of misery! …

  —At that same moment, Billyboy came out at the top of the stairs. “In under him now, four of you,” says he.

  —I remember it well. I twisted my ankle …

  —“It’s not proper to let the Big Master out of the house without shedding a tear over him,” you said, Bid Shorcha, and you went back up the stairs again. Billyboy stopped you. “He’ll have to go to the graveyard,” said Billyboy. “It’s no use nursing him here any longer …”

  —Oh, the arrogant little squirt! …

  —“Faith then, it’s no use nursing him,” said Big Brian, “unless you’re going to put him in pickle! …”

  —You keened me, Bid Shorcha, and I wasn’t grateful to you for it, nor half grateful, nor grateful at all. Oh, indeed you made enough commotion over me, but you were shooting at the hen when you should have been shooting at the fox. You didn’t say a word about the Irish Republic or about the treacherous One-Ear Breed who stabbed me because I fought for it …

  —I said that the people were thankful …

  —That’s a lie; you did not! …

  —Bid Shorcha had nothing to do with politics, no more than myself …

  —You spineless coward, under the bed you were when Éamon de Valera was risking his life …

  —You were no good when you keened me, Bid Shorcha, because you didn’t say out loud in front of everybody that it was Siúán the Shop’s coffee that killed me …

  —And that Peadar the Pub’s daughter robbed me …

  —And me …

  —You didn’t say a thing when you were keening me, about Road-End Man stealing my turf …

  —Or my drift-weed …

  —Or that the man down here died on account of his son marrying a black …

  —I think that man was right a while ago when he said that Bid Shorcha had nothing to do with politics …

  —… I’d have keened you better only for my voice was hoarse that day. I’d keened three others already that same week …

  —Faith then, it wasn’t hoarseness at all, but drink … Speechless from drink you were. When you tried to begin “Let Erin Remember,” as you usually did, it was “Will Ye No’ Come Back Again?” came out …

  —Indeed it was not, but “Some Day I’ll Go Back across the Sea to Ireland” …

  —I’d have gone to keen you, Beartla Blackleg, but I wasn’t able to get up out of bed at the time …

  —Bloody tear and ’ounds, Bid Shorcha, what does it matter to a person whether he’s keened or not! “Hoh-roh, Mary …”

  —Why, Bid Shorcha, didn’t you come and keen Caitríona Pháidín, when you were sent for?

  —Yes,
why didn’t you come and keen Caitríona?

  —But you went to Nell’s, although you had to get up out of your bed …

  —I couldn’t bear to refuse Nell, and she sent her motor car to my door to collect me …

  —Hitler will take the motor car off her …

  —I would have keened you, Caitríona, without a word of a lie, but I didn’t want to be competing with the other three: Nell, Nóra Sheáinín’s daughter, and Big Brian’s daughter. They were whining …

  —Nell! Nóra Sheáinín’s daughter! Big Brian’s daughter! The three who got the St. John’s Gospel from the priest in order to kill me! I’ll explode! I’ll explode! I’ll explode! …

  4

  —… Jack! Jack! Jack the Scológ! …

  —… Gug-goog, Dotie! Gug-goog! We’ll have a cosy little chat now …

  —… What would you say, Red-haired Tom, about a man whose son married a black? I think he’s a heretic himself, as well as the son …

  —Indeed, that could be so, so it could …

  —The sins of the children are avenged on the fathers …

  —Some say they are. Some say they’re not …

  —Wouldn’t you say, Red-haired Tom, that any man who drank two score pints and two is a heretic?

  —Two score pints and two. Two score pints and two, then. Two score pints and two …

  —Faith then, I did …

  —Tomás Inside rubbed shoulders with heretics …

  —Tomás Inside. Tomás Inside, then. It’s a wise man would say what Tomás Inside is …

  —Faith then, I’m not so sure about the Big Master either, Red-haired Tom. I’ve been observing him for a while now. I’ll say nothing till I see …

  —A person should keep his mouth shut in a place like this. Graves have huge big holes …

  —I have my doubts about Caitríona Pháidín too. She swore to me she was a better Catholic than Nell, but if it turns out that she had the evil eye …

  —Some say she had. Some say …

  —You’re a liar, you dumb redhead …

  —… By the docks, don’t you know well, Master dear, that he’ll die. Look at me who never had an ache or a pain, and isn’t it a wonder that I died all the same! I died the same as a man who had …

  —But do you really think, Tomás, that he’ll die? …

  —Don’t you know well, Master, that he’ll soon have a dock growing in his ear!

  —Do you think so, Tomás?

  —Don’t worry, Master. He’ll die, my friend. Look at me! …

  —If only God would grant it, the skinny little squirt …

  —Ah, musha Master, she’s lovely, herself …

  —Oh! The harlot! …

  —Do you need any spiritual assistance, Master? …

  —I do not. I do not, I tell you. Leave me alone! Leave me alone or I’ll have the skin off your ears! …

  —By the docks, Master dear, didn’t I hear that she used to have cottiers3 in the kitchen, and you upstairs on your deathbed …

  —Qu’est-ce que c’est que cottiers? What sort of things are cottiers? …

  —Tomás Inside is not a cottier, because he had a nice patch of land. Nor is East-Side-of-the-Village Man either. He had a patch at the top of the village that couldn’t be beaten for fattening cattle. But Billyboy the Post was a cottier. The only land he had was the garden of the Master’s house …

  —Billyboy used to be inside with her, indeed, Master. I heard that no matter how fierce the day was he’d come to inquire about you …

  —Oh, the blackguard! The sweet-toothed cock-of-the-roost!

  —Ah, musha, Master, there is no denying the truth when all is said and done. The Schoolmistress is lovely. Myself and herself used to be together in Peadar the Pub’s. If only Billyboy wasn’t sticking his scissor-nose in everywhere, while he was still able to do his rounds! I met her at the Steep Hillock on the Mountain Road a few months after you were buried. “Gug-goog, Schoolmistress,” says I. “Gug-goog, Tomás Inside,” says she. We didn’t have a chance for a cosy little chat because Billyboy the Post was heading down towards us on his bicycle after delivering letters …

  —… They say that unless the first form is filled in properly it’s easy to strike you off the dole.4 The Wood of the Lake Master filled mine in for me the first time ever the dole came out. He wrote something in red ink right across the form. Long life to him, the dole was never taken off me since! …

  —Faith then, it was taken off me. The Big Master filled it in for me. All he did was to draw a stroke of his pen across the form. It wasn’t red ink he used either …

  —The Big Master, the poor man, used to be bad-tempered thinking of the Schoolmistress. Didn’t you hear how he used to keep looking out the window while he was writing letters for Caitríona! …

  —May she do him no good, the same Schoolmistress, couldn’t he fill in a dole form properly for a person! …

  —I always got eight shillings. The Red-haired Policeman did it for me …

  —For a good reason. He was screwing your daughter in the nettly groves of Donagh’s Village …

  —I was done out of the dole completely. Somebody wrote in to say I had money in the bank …

  —God bless your innocence, my friend! Some people envy any improvement in their neighbour’s circumstances. Don’t you see Nell Pháidín’s son, who used to get the dole throughout the year, as his land wasn’t valued over two pounds, and Caitríona did him out of it …

  —He didn’t deserve it! He didn’t deserve it! He had money in a bank and was getting fifteen shillings of dole permanently. It served the pussface right!

  —Faith then, as you say, I had a big dole …

  —You had a big dole, indeed, Road-End Man …

  —A storm never blew but you were the better for it, Road-End Man. The little stray sheep would always end up with you …

  —The little wooden plank washed ashore in the Middle Harbour would always end up with you …

  —And the drift-weed …

  —And the turf …

  —And the scallops for thatching …

  —Anything left lying around the Earl’s house always ended up with you …

  —Even the wooden leg of the Earl’s little black servant, didn’t it end up with you? I saw a pullet of yours laying an egg in its thigh, and you used its foot on Caitríona’s chimney cap …

  —Even the priest’s sister who went around in her little trousers whistling and yawning, she ended up with your son …

  —Oh, do you hear the tailor boasting? You made a white homespun jacket for me, and a bus would get lost inside it …

  —You made trousers for Jack the Scológ and no one in the country could get his feet down them but Tomás Inside …

  —God would punish us …

  —By the docks, dear, my feet went down them nice and sprightly …

  —Didn’t you all know well that’s what would happen, when you brought your cloth to the Breed of the One-Ear Tailor who stabbed me! …

  —Arrah, you shouldn’t be talking, Mangy Field Carpenter! Wasn’t the whole country able to look in at Nóra Sheáinín through the coffin you made for her …

  —She was the first of the Filthy-Feet Breed to go into any sort of wooden coffin at all …

  —She’d be better off, Caitríona, without that particular one. It was as flimsy as the chimneys Road-End Man used to make …

  —What could I do about your chimneys when you wouldn’t pay me?

  —I paid you …

  —As you say, you paid me, but for everyone who did, there were four who didn’t …

  —I paid you too, you crook, and you did my chimney more harm than good …

  —You paid me, as you say, but there was another house in the village where I fixed a chimney shortly before that, and the devil a word, good or bad, I’ve heard about my money since.

  —Was that a reason for making a botch of my chimney, you crook? …

  —But I t
old you to make a chimney-brush …

  —And I did. And I scrubbed it clean from top to bottom, but you’d made a botch of it …

  —I didn’t know, as you say, who would pay me and who wouldn’t. A woman from the village came up to me. “We’re having the priest,” she said. “The chimney is always puffing whenever there’s an east wind. If there happened to be an east wind the day we’d have the priest I’d be mortified. Nell’s chimney draws on all winds.” “I’ll stop it puffing on an east wind, as you say,” says I. I reshaped the top. “You’ll see for yourself now,” says I, “that it won’t be puffing on the east wind, as you say. I’ll go easy on you, as you say, as you’re a neighbour and all that. One pound and five shillings.” “You’ll get it next fairday, with the help of God,” says she. The fairday came and went, but I didn’t get my one pound, five shillings. Oh, the devil a word, good or bad, did I hear about my money from Caitríona …”

  —Isn’t that what I told you, Dotie, that Caitríona never paid for anything! Honest!

  —Why should I pay that crook—Road-End Man—for fixing a few little boards on the chimney top to beckon the wind to them! Even though the wind was from the west it was never as short of breath as it was the day the priest came. It would draw the child off the hearth on a west wind before that. When Road-End Man was finished with it, it wouldn’t draw at all on any wind but the east wind. I offered to pay him if it would draw on every wind like Nell’s chimney. But he wouldn’t touch it any more. Nell, the pussface, gave him a backhander …

  —That’s the truth, Caitríona. Road-End Man would accept a backhander.

  —Any man who stole my seaweed.

  —Now, to be fair, Caitríona, it wasn’t Road-End Man, bad and all as he was, who was responsible for your chimney, but Nell who got the St. John’s Gospel from the priest for her own chimney …

  —And sent the smoke over to Caitríona’s, as she tried to do with Big Brian …

  —Oh! Oh! I’ll explode! I’ll explode!