In total panic we all began to push open the doors and jump out into the raging flood. The minute I got out into the water it caught hold of me, and I could feel the current pulling and tearing at me as I had jumped out on the wrong side of the car. I felt no cold from the water, just a sheer terror and a desire to live come over me. The water was soon up to my waist, and to save myself from being swept away, I tried to hold onto the car door. Even though all this drama was happening fast, it seemed to me to be going on in a kind of slow motion and I saw the others all around me moving real slowly. I felt sure that my life was over, when Black John grabbed hold of my jacket. I grabbed hold of his hands, and both of us waded to safety clutching onto the car as we went. I know without doubt that he saved my life that night, and to my shame I don’t ever remember even thanking him because I was so frightened.
To this day I can recall that sinking feeling that we were all going to drown there and then, and that I was too young to die in that place. I think the trailer both saved us and almost drowned us because the fast moving current just could not move the car while the trailer was attached to it, and by pure luck, the trailer was still on the road.
After the initial shock wore off, which in Kyrl’s case was after about five minutes, he says to Black John, “John, I think we need to take off the trailer and push the bitch out of this water. What do you think?” Never as much as ‘that was a close one lads’ or ‘are ye all ok there, anyone been drowned’ for example. No, not Kyrl. He had a stone to erect, and by God he would do it that night. Failure was not an option for him. As he saw it, no one had drowned and we couldn’t stay there all night, so we had to do something. This was always Kyrl’s way of dealing with any crisis: take immediate and decisive action. It did not matter whether that action was right or wrong, as long as you did something, it was all ok. I loved that way of thinking, as you always felt he would get you out of the situation somehow and he always did.
After a bit of a debate, it was decided that we had to risk being swept away once again, so we were going to have to go back into the water and push the car out from the front. As if to quell the obvious fear of the river, Kyrl kept saying, “Tis not a fucken river, tis a flood across the road. Under the water is the road, and it’s as solid as a rock, so let’s get at it lads”. I believe he simply would not accept in his mind that there was a huge current of water crossing this road, and he just did not believe in danger of any kind. But I knew that I was not going back into that river no matter what he said. We detached the trailer and saw that the car only moved another foot or two in the current, but at least it did not get swept away. With Kyrl and Black John first in, despite misgivings, the rest of us followed and after a struggle, we pushed the car right back out of the flood. Kyrl then got at the engine and kept at it until it spluttered into life. Then with a big cheer we re-attached the trailer and headed back the road to some pub he had passed earlier. We went in soaked, cold, and hungry, and in my case trembling and still scared to death. There they gave us tea and drink as we told of our escape. Most of that part of the night is a blur to me now, as I think I was constantly shivering more with fright than from cold, and I kept thinking about what had happened earlier. They told us where the graveyard was and that it was nearer than we thought, so then at about eight o’clock at night, we arrived at the gates of the cemetery. Even though still wringing water from our clothes, we had the stone erected by midnight. I think I was about sixteen years old then, and all they could talk about on the way home was how I was so scared of fire when it was really water I should have been scared of. Peals of laughter continued over and over with Black John and Buddo later arguing over the name of the river that had almost drowned us all. I believe it was the river Maigue, and I often pass over it these days with a shiver running up my spine. When I eventually got home around two in the morning Nannie was waiting and distracted with worry, having had a bad feeling all day as well. I just told her it was a long day and that we got soaked. I’d say she felt it better not to ask about the job, as her John was alive and home and gone to his bed exhausted.
Uncle Kyrl had no sense of danger whatsoever. During the winter he used a home-made gas heating system to heat his picture hall. It was plumbed like a water system, and he and Black John had done all that work in an afternoon. That plumbing was so bad that it was always leaking gas, and the joke in Buttevant was that Kyrl Cahill’s hall had the best pictures ever, because you got the ‘real experience’ in his hall. If Kyrl was showing a film about the gas attacks of World War One, then you got actually gassed in his hall as you watched. Even more likely though, and as if to add further realism to your experience, you also ran the risk of being blown to atoms by an impending gas explosion because of those leaks.
Kyrl saw it differently though. He saw this gas leaking as a ‘complete waste’ of his gas, and it had to be sorted before the winter ended, so one Sunday he asked me if I had a ‘good nose’ on me. When I assured him that I did, he told me to join him in the hall for some gas fixing work. I was all for an extra few bob until he and his cohort, Black John, told me their plan was to turn the gas full on from the huge tank out the back, and then go along the pipes with a lighting cigarette lighter, all the while watching for ‘the little’ flame that would erupt at the gas leak. I thought they were joking at first, but no, that was their plan and I was supposed to go ahead with the ‘young nose’ and smell out the gas leaks before they arrived on with the lighter and the guaranteed explosion. I flatly refused that job, and after much ribbing I compromised and agreed to work the gas valve on the tank safely outside the building. With the back doors wide open, they agreed to shout out the ‘on-off’ commands to me and that was my compromise. They had to do without the ‘young nose’, as I intended keeping it on my head that day. They spent hours at this gas work, and actually did find all the leaks, or at least to a level that seemed to satisfy Kyrl regarding his losses. My predicted explosion never happened either. Black John assured me again that Michael had named me correctly as a chicken, and as he was leaving, Kyrl says as if to comfort me, “Ahh don’t mind Black John, sure we might have blown up and then you’d have been right”, such was his wit and seriousness at the same time. I never knew which was real with him.
Father had numerous stories about Kyrl and his lack of any sense of danger too. One time when Kyrl had become quartermaster, or somehow was in charge of a small local defence force known as the LDF, he took his platoon out on maneuvers one night. As they crossed a big field, a very dangerous and prize bull took offence at their intrusion. The bull charged and Kyrl shouted to his force, “Stand yer ground I tell ye”. It had no effect, as all the men began to run for the gate and the ditches in overall panic. Kyrl, who seemed unconcerned at this Pamplona event, kneeled down, pulled back the bolt on his 303 rifle, and as the bull turned on him and charged, he shot it dead within feet of where he was kneeling. There was a big investigation of course as it had been a prize bull, and the farmer was demanding compensation from the State and threatening legal action. Kyrl was brought before an investigating council and the judge concluded that he was on official business, had the right to bear arms with live ammunition, and as commander on the night, he took the correct decision to protect his men. All charges were dismissed and he became the talk of the town, being the man with the guns and no fear whatsoever.
I remember also that the attic part of his home was like an armoury. We used to play there among the rifles, bullets and Lugers. Big Kyrl didn’t like it, but every chance we got Kyrle and I would sneak up to his attic and became gangsters. I’m sure that the only reason we didn’t kill each other was that those guns were never loaded and we didn’t know how to load them yet.
Kyrl was also a musician. He played with the father in his band purely to make money. He had no love for music much, and saw it once again as a means to an end. Michael O’Callaghan, a great local musician and dear friend of Kyrl’s, told me one time that my uncle Kyrl was a ‘mechanical player’ unlike
my dad, who was a true lover of the notes. Michael said, “Kyrl Cahill had taught himself how to read music by sheer determination, but only ever saw black dots on the page, not notes”. As we chatted about his music he told me that if Kyrl was playing and saw a fly move cross the page, it was quite likely that he would ‘play the fly’, only ever seeing the dots; and he was serious about it.
There was a logical progression from music and dancing to entering the entertainment business, so that in later years Big Kyrl somehow managed to either lease, or ultimately buy the Old British Legion Dance Hall. This hall then became his main source of income. Both Kyrle and I soon became his part-time workers in the hall, and we had numerous adventures there over the coming years. Kyrle became his projectionist for the cinema and I was known as the ‘ticket man’, both collecting the tickets and ushering the punters to their seats with my flashlight.
After starting the cinema he realized that he could charge more for comfort, and set about doing that. He converted the stage area into what he termed ‘The Balcony’ and there he installed some softer seats at a much higher price. The plebs in the cheap section, known as ‘ninepennies’, got to sit on rows of old hard wooden seats from a disused church. My job also entailed not allowing the plebs to sneak up to the balcony after the movie began. I was like a yoyo going from side to side all night long and rarely got to see any film myself, and all this for a miserly sum each week, as his theory was that we were family and didn’t deserve payment.
During the Buttevant Cahermee festival days when the town would have all kinds of revelry based around its famous horse fair, Kyrl would reconvert his picture hall back into the original dance hall. This would mean a total removal of all seats and the ‘Balcony’ would soon be turned into the stage area for the bands. He would hire out the hall to the local committee for a share of their profits from the many dances they held there, and to add to his profits, one year he decided to open an ‘exclusive’ mineral bar as an added attraction.
Kyrle and I were going to be working in this ‘bar’, which turned out to be a huge hole he had blown through the side wall of the hall. It opened out into a small alleyway that he also owned, and he put a sheet of iron across the top of this alley to act as a ‘roof’. A large wide board was laid across the bottom of the hole to act as a counter, and inside on the alley side we stood on two butter boxes or old mineral crates to give us ‘height’ as Kyrl called it. He said ye better be higher than the tinkers or they will play ‘mockie bawn with ye’. I had no idea what that even meant, but it sounded ominous to me even then.
Our mineral stock was stacked in the alley beside us, and it was just tough luck if it rained on us. He said he didn’t care about ‘a sup of water’ landing on us as long as we made him the money. On the face of it, it seemed easy enough as all we had to do was stand on our boxes and sell bottles of orange. I thought the first night went very well, but not so Kyrl. According to him we had sold no way near enough ‘drink’, and his answer was to nail all the windows shut before the next night’s dance.
When I asked about how we would un-nail these windows later on, he said, “John, the end always justifies the means. Didn’t I tell you that? Don’t you worry about the bloody windows today, I need em sweatin tonight”.
On the second night his window trick worked a treat, and sales were way up because the hall was like an oven causing sweat to pour off both the tinkers and the townies alike. Still he was not satisfied with the profits, so on the third night he took me and Kyrle aside and told us that we had to also collect the empty bottles, as the ‘real profit’ was in the returned bottles. What’s more, he agreed that we would get extra pay for each bottle brought back inside the ‘bar’ before the night was over. For some reason he had got it into his head that people were taking home the bottles after the dance. He was also afraid of fights, as the bottles would then be broken. There was always a fight or two each night, so he saw a risk to his profits and we were to reduce it.
For me though, the thought of just going round collecting ‘empties’ was dead easy extra money, and so I set off first chance I got. I became eagle-eyed, studying the form of the dancers. Who was physically big, drinking fast, and dancing like a mad man? Who was trying to impress a fat woman, as she would drink more and he would buy her more. I had all kinds of possibilities going round in my head as I eyed up both the drinkers and the bottles alike. Soon I collected away and made a tidy sum that night. Kyrle served bar with one of Kyrl’s many casuals and was adamant that he was also collecting the next night, having seen my extra stash of cash.
By the final night the money fever was up on me. I convinced Kyrle to let me serve for the first half, and then I’d collect for the latter part of the night. He was a bit suspicious, but I managed to make him believe that most fights took place in the latter part of the night, and he would be safer inside by then. In actual fact I had worked out that the place got like an inferno towards the end and that meant they drank far more. Kyrl also changed the door policy to ensure that you had to pay again on returning if they went out for a bit of fresh air or ‘a shift’, the term used for a million forms of sexual activity, so no one would be leaving at all that night and profits should soar.
Soon I was watching for each set change in the music, and the minute the dancers leapt up for another set, I would swoop in and grab their bottles. I became greedy and took any bottle that was about two thirds empty. It worked fairly well for a while, but then the inevitable happened. I took a bottle from under the nose of a very large tinker man and his even bigger brother. Unknown to me I was spotted and no sooner was I back in the bar when they arrived at the hole in the wall. The tinker pushed his way through and grabbed me by the shirt and pulled me clean out through the bar opening, knocking over bottles of drinks and empties alike.
He had me up against the wall and was shouting and roaring that I took his drink, and he wanted it back. The only thing saving me was my youth. Very quickly Black John once again came to my rescue, and the tinker and his brother were quickly thrown out of the hall. Kyrl wanted to know if the tinker was right, and I had to admit that he was, so he says to me, “Well John twas not a bad plan and would have worked on the townies, but I’m not so sure about the tinkers though. Maybe it’s just as well it’s our last night huh”. Smirking, he went off on his rounds of the hall and left me to serve away, still shaking from the fright I had got.
That night all of the windows in the hall were mysteriously broken. Next day I arrive for the clean up and Kyrl says to me, “John, you should have left em have their ould drink. Now t’isnt nails we need to worry about but glass”, but that was all he ever said on the matter again. That was a great side of him too that I admired immensely. There were never any recriminations for disasters; no need to state the obvious, and it was all put down to experience. Next year I would not be stealing bottles from the tinkers.
Even when a disaster was a costly one, he would not get really annoyed.
I had been doing the headstone lettering in his workshop known as ‘the shed’ for a long time when my worst disaster happened. By then I had got quite cocky about my spelling accuracy and would letter a stone with almost sheer abandon. Kyrl’s method was different, and he warned me to use his method as the customer was always right according to him. When a name was to be placed on a stone, Kyrl had a book which he would produce for the customer. Then he always, without exception, asked them to print out what they wanted on the stone in his book, and he just copied what they wrote. It worked with total success for him, and he kept telling me to make sure I followed the book. Of course I didn’t need a book by then; I was invincible, or so I thought, because I was being taught by Ma Keely the master speller, and could never get spellings wrong or she would kill me, so I didn’t bother to use the book after a while.
This worked ok for a long time until one day I was asked to print the name Ballymagooly on a new headstone. I lettered away and he placed the stone in the yard for the customer’s usual i
nspection before we erected it.
Disaster struck. I had either added an ‘o’ or should have added one. In any case I spelled it wrong, and as the customer was arguing with Kyrl he dashes in and demands the book. I can’t even find it at that stage as I had used it so little, and he rushes out again all apologies, telling the woman that he will make her a completely ‘new’ stone at no extra cost, and it will be spelled correctly next time. I hear all this going on and figure I am getting no wages for the next ten years, based on what he paid me. I am kicking myself for my arrogance. In he arrives and he is not happy, demanding we find the book. In the end it’s found jammed down beside an old stone, and he gives me this look saying, “What did I tell you about the book?” All I can say is, “I’m sorry. I’ll work it off till the stone is paid for”. Then he starts laughing, “Surely you don’t think I’m going to give that old skinflint a new stone, do you?” I say, “But you told her you would”. He says, “John, there are tricks in every trade, and it will be a new stone, even if half of it’s gone. Am I right”. I still don’t know what he is talking about and look at him blankly.
He is smirking away as he tells me all this, then says, “Let’s get the old stone back in and I’ll make it a new one before your very eyes”.
We get it in, lay it on the bench, and he grabs his sander and begins to grind down the whole front face of the stone. He was one hell of a polisher, I’ll grant him that, and in half an hour or so all my work is obliterated. Now he says, “This time use the bloody book will you, and learn two things from this experience: first you don’t know everything, and secondly there is always a way to fix things,” and off he went. I never again got a stone lettered wrongly either, and I did learn a wonderful lesson in humility that day.
Two Walls and a Roof Page 17
