Collected Stories

by Bernard Maclaverty

Suddenly he felt claustrophobic. The back of the seats closed over his head like a tomb. He eased himself out. His back ached and his bladder was bursting. As he walked he felt the boat rise and fall perceptibly. In the toilet he had to use the handrail. The smell of sick was still there.

  How could his values belong to someone else? He knew what was right and what was wrong. He went out onto the deck again. The wind had changed or else the ship was moving at a different angle. The man who had rolled himself in his sleeping bag earlier in the night had disappeared. The wind and the spray lashed the seat where he had been sleeping. Tiny lights on the coast of Ireland winked on and off. He moved round to the leeward side for a smoke. The girl who had earlier been reading came out on deck. She mustn’t have been able to sleep either. All he wanted was someone to sit and talk to for an hour. Her hair was untied now and she let it blow in the wind, shaking her head from side to side to get it away from her face. He sheltered his glowing cigarette in the heart of his hand. Talk would shorten the night. For the first time in his life he felt his age, felt older than he was. He was conscious of the droop in his shoulders, his unshaven chin, his smoker’s cough. Who would talk to him – even for an hour? She held her white raincoat tightly round herself, her hands in her pockets. The tail flapped furiously against her legs. She walked towards the prow, her head tilted back. As he followed her, in a sheltered alcove he saw the man in the sleeping bag, snoring, the drawstring of his hood knotted round his chin. The girl turned and came back. They drew level.

  ‘That’s a cold one,’ he said.

  ‘Indeed it is,’ she said, not stopping. She was English. He had to continue to walk towards the prow and when he looked over his shoulder she was gone. He sat on an empty seat and began to shiver. He did not know how long he sat but it was better than the stifling heat of the lounge. Occasionally he walked up and down to keep the life in his feet. Much later going back in he passed an image of himself in a mirror, shivering and blue lipped, his hair wet and stringy.

  In the lounge the heat was like a curtain. The sight reminded him of a graveyard. People were meant to be straight, not tilted and angled like this. He sat down determined to sleep. He heard the tremble of the boat, snoring, hushed voices. Ann-Marie must have gone to sleep – finally. That guy in the sleeping bag had it all worked out – right from the start. He had a night’s sleep over him already. He tilted his watch in the dim light. The agony of the night must soon end. Dawn would come. His mouth felt dry and his stomach tight and empty. He had last eaten on the train. It was now six o’clock.

  Once he had arranged to meet his nurse in the Gardens. It was early morning and she was coming off duty. She came to him starched and white, holding out her hands as she would to a child. Someone tapped him on the shoulder but he didn’t want to look round. She sat beside him and began to stroke the inside of his thigh. He looked around to see if anyone was watching. There were two old ladies close by but they seemed not to notice. The park bell began to clang and the keepers blew their whistles. They must be closing early. He put his hand inside her starched apron to touch her breasts. He felt warm moistness, revolting to the touch. His hand was in her entrails. The bell clanged incessantly and became a voice over the Tannoy.

  ‘Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. The time is seven o’clock. We dock at Belfast in approximately half an hour’s time. Tea and sandwiches will be on sale until that time. We hope you have enjoyed your . . .’

  He sat up and rubbed his face. The woman opposite said good morning. Had he screamed out? He got up and bought himself a plastic cup of tea, tepid and weak, and some sandwiches, dog-eared from sitting overnight.

  It was still dark outside but now the ship was full of the bustle of people refreshed by sleep, coming from the bathrooms with toilet bags and towels, whistling, slamming doors. He saw one man take a tin of polish from his case and begin to shine his shoes. He sat watching him, stale crusts in his hand. He went out to throw them to the gulls and watch the dawn come up.

  He hadn’t long to go now. His hour had come. It was funny the way time worked. If time stopped he would never reach home and yet he loathed the ticking, second by second slowness of the night. The sun would soon be up, the sky was bleaching at the horizon. What could he do? Jesus what could he do? If he could turn into spray and scatter himself on the sea he would never be found. Suddenly it occurred to him that he could throw himself over the side. That would end it. He watched the water sluicing past the dark hull forty feet below. ‘The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.’ If only someone would take the whole thing away how happy he would be. For a moment his spirits jumped at the possibility of the whole thing disappearing – then it was back in his stomach heavier than ever. He put his face in his hands. Somehow it had all got to be hammered out. He wondered if books would solve it. Read books and maybe the problems won’t seem the same.

  The dark was becoming grey light. They must have entered the Lough because he could see land now on both sides, like arms or legs. He lit a cigarette. The first of the day – more like the sixty-first of yesterday. He coughed deeply, held it a moment then spat towards Ireland but the wind turned it back in the direction of England. He smiled. His face felt unusual.

  He felt an old man broken and tired and unshaven at the end of his days. If only he could close his eyes and sleep and forget. His life was over. Objects on the shore began to become distinct through the mist. Gasometers, chimney-stacks, railway trucks. They looked washed out, a putty grey against the pale lumps of the hills. Cars were moving and then he made out people hurrying to work. He closed his eyes and put his head down on his arms. Indistinctly at first, but with growing clarity, he heard the sound of an ambulance.

  WHERE THE TIDES MEET

  WE ARRIVE AT Torr Head about an hour before dusk and get out of the car. Three men, Christopher the boy, and the dog. Michael and Martin stand, their guns broken, loading them with bright, brick-red cartridges from their pockets. We have lost the dog’s lead and I use a makeshift choker. It is an ordinary lead but I form a noose with the loop of the handle so that when he pulls too hard the noose tightens.

  ‘For God’s sake don’t let him go,’ they tell me. He is too eager and pulls me at a run when I want to walk. They tell me to tap him on the nose and shout ‘heel’ and he will respond. He is too eager. They keep their guns broken and climb the fence. The boy Christopher is excited and anxious and edges ahead to try and see. He is on tip-toe trying to see over the next rise. Michael, his father, hisses at him, ‘Keep behind the line of the guns.’ I walk behind all three with the dog. It is a black labrador called Ikabod. His tongue hangs out as he strains forward. I must be leaning at an angle of forty-five degrees trying to hold him. The makeshift lead is so embedded into the black folds of his neck that the only part of it visible is the taut line to my hand. The chain at my end bites deeply.

  Suddenly Martin shouts, not a loud shout, but a quiet urgent one, ‘Mickey, to your right.’

  Michael brings the gun up to his cheek, leans slightly forward, all balance. The sound is half way between a crack and a thud. The barrel jerks slightly as he fires. Both barrels. It is only then that I see the white scuts of two rabbits disappearing into some bushes on our right. At the sound of the gun Ikabod goes mad. He pulls me running and sliding down the hill. On the point of falling I decide to let him go. If Michael has hit one of the rabbits it must be the dog’s job to retrieve. Ikabod disappears into the bushes, the lead whipping after him loosely. It is only then that I hear Michael shouting, ‘Hold on to him.’ I hear two more shots and my head ducks down into my coat, thinking Martin is shooting over my head at the same two rabbits, but when I look round he is shooting up the hill. I don’t see what he is shooting at. I go down and look over the bush. It is a sloping cliff of rocks covered in bushes and grasses. Ikabod runs hither and thither looking for the rabbits. I whistle at him and he comes back. He is a good dog. Christopher is beside me looking over, ‘Did he get one? Did he get one?’ We catch up w
ith the others.

  I say defending myself, ‘If you don’t let him off after you shoot when do you let him off?’

  ‘You don’t,’ says Michael.

  ‘What did we bring him for then?’ He doesn’t answer. ‘I thought he was supposed to be a retriever.’

  ‘For birds,’ says Michael and everybody laughs. Both men are pushing cartridges into their guns. We stand a while and talk, scanning the hillside yet knowing we have scared everything within earshot.

  ‘You don’t expect to see something that soon,’ says Martin. Michael, who has been here many times before, points out the sea where the tides meet. Just beyond Torr Head the sea is white and swirling. Waves leap and crash together as if onto rocks but there are no rocks. This is about two hundred yards off-shore. They tell me it is the Irish sea coming up and the Gulf Stream coming down. In a boat they say you would have no chance.

  We double back to a field on the actual Torr itself where they have seen rabbits before. Each fence they break their guns. Each fence Ikabod tries to go through the wire and me over it so that there is an elaborate disentangling and tugging each time. We have reached the field now and they walk in front of me, spread out, Christopher nearer to his father than Martin. The grass is coarse and long but flattened by the wind which must be constant in this place. It has the appearance of grass by a river in flood. The men walk with their guns at the ready, chest high. They stride, but stride quietly, their head turning from side to side sweeping the landscape. I think to myself that they are like hunters and only then realise that that is what they are. We reach the Torr itself without seeing anything or a shot being fired. We stop and talk. Michael asks me if I would like a shot. I say yes, I let the dog off the lead, he runs mad.

  ‘What is there to shoot at?’ He points out an old fence post, a railway sleeper, at the edge of the cliff. He shows me the safety catch. I click it off and take aim. It has begun to get dark and the sea behind the post is slate grey. Flints of white from where the tides meet distract me. The butt seems remarkably close to my cheek and I know to expect the recoil of the gun. I am afraid of it and when I shoot I miss completely. We inspect the post. The noise of the explosion pinging still in my ears.

  ‘I did hit it,’ I say.

  Michael looks closer. ‘It’s fucking woodworm.’ He keeps his voice low so that the boy will not hear. The few small holes do look like woodworm. I go back and shoot the other barrel. I miss again. Martin has gone off looking for more rabbits. We hear a shot from over the brow of the hill. It sounds distorted, plucked away by the wind. Michael loads the gun and fires at the post. It gouges a small crater in the dead wood. Around the periphery when I look closely there are some holes like woodworm.

  ‘Mine’s a pint.’

  It must be two fields before we notice that Ikabod isn’t with us. We stand whistling and shouting but he does not come. We go back to the fence post and look all round, calling.

  ‘Would he have gone over the cliff?’ We climb the small fence edging very carefully down the slippy grass.

  ‘Ik-a-bod, Ik-a-bod.’ Then we hear a definite dog noise from below.

  ‘He’s there somewhere.’ We do not know whether it is a cliff like the last one with bushes and outcrops and paths so we inch forward with care. I get to the edge first. It is a sheer drop. Emptiness for about two hundred feet. A rook sails past on a level with us. There is a rubble of rocks below on the beach. I see Ikabod lying on his side at the bottom. From then on we do not talk. To our right there is an accessible way down to the beach and we run. By now the boy and Martin have caught up with us. We half slide, half run down the slope holding onto the tussocky grass. When we get to the dog it is dead. I put my hand on its side and find it still warm. There is no heartbeat. Christopher talks incessantly asking, ‘Is it dead, Daddy. Is it dead?’ He brushes against a tall weed and seeds fall from it onto the dog’s fur. I take my hand away quickly, irrationally thinking of fleas leaving their dead host. Michael stands looking down at the dead dog. I look up to tell him that it is dead and see that he is crying. The wind is cuffing his hair, blowing it about his face. He cannot answer Christopher’s questions.

  He hunkers down beside the dog and I hear him saying, ‘Fuck it,’ again and again. There is no blood, just a string of saliva which has touched on some rocks. He reaches over and undoes the dog’s collar, then begins to put rocks on top of the dog. In silence everybody helps. The skin seems mobile when heavy stones are placed on it. Eventually the dog is covered with a cairn and we stand back feeling a ridiculous need for prayer. Christopher does not cry but keeps watching his father, doing everything he does except cry. As we turn away Michael says, ‘You get very attached to a hound,’ almost by way of apology for his crying.

  On the way back to the car in darkness, we string out, a single file, about ten yards between each of us, coming together only to help one another over fences.

  HUGO

  ‘I’M SURE YOU’RE walking on air,’ my mother said to Paul at his wedding. He was indeed in a joyful mood and he seemed to communicate it to all those around him. ‘But isn’t it sad Hugo couldn’t be here.’

  Paul shrugged. The remark produced a sobering effect on him.

  ‘Mother,’ I said. ‘This is neither the time nor the place.’ The curtness of my remark, combined with an empty sherry glass, sent my mother away. Together Paul and I began to talk of old times and this led inevitably to Hugo’s tragic end. Between us we fruitlessly tried to arrive at some sort of explanation. Paul seemed to see it only in terms of a simple sadness, nodding his head partly in sympathy, partly in disbelief, whereas I knew it to be a tragedy of a different order. Eventually Paul had to rise and excuse himself and go and look after his other guests.

  Hugo’s life and mine had intersected briefly and this had had an effect on me out of all proportion to its duration.

  My father died when I was eight and it was only at about the age of fourteen that I felt the need of him. I wanted someone I could talk to, someone who would, with wisdom, answer the questions which racked me at this particular time. Someone who would give me confidence to overcome my stammering, someone whom I could ask about the complexities of love and the horrors of sex, someone who could tell me how to dress properly, someone who knew what it was right to like in Art.

  My father had an old gramophone on which he played Schubert piano with pine needles. Huge shellac records, with a red circle and a white dog singing into a horn, which whirred with static but which induced a calm in me, as a child, which I have not known since. When they were finished, after about two minutes, the tick of the over-run seemed the vilest sound in the world. The clack of teeth after divine music.

  Ever since I could remember there had hung on the parlour wall two framed pen and wash drawings of people unknown to me, signed by my father. I thought them good but they lacked something. Alone I would stare at them for hours and try to find words for their shortcomings. Between these two drawings was a tiny picture, sent from the missions, of an oriential Madonna whose robe was made of butterfly wings – deep changing torquoise. I used to think how perfect the natural colour was, surrounded as it was by the gauche, cutout form of the madonna. Nature achieves what is right without knowing.

  We lived in a large old terrace house with four bedrooms in an area of the city which had seen better days, judging by the handles in the bedrooms for calling the maids. I was an only child and used a bedroom and a playroom, which was later to become the study. Shortly after my father died Mother decided, not being qualified to do anything else, to take in boarders to try and supplement her widow’s pension.

  We then had a succession of faceless men, bank clerks in blue suits, an insurance man who was granted the special privilege of leaving his bike in the hallway, a bald teacher whom mother asked to leave one day after some difficulty she had in making his bed. The bathroom shelf held an array of shaving brushes and razors and the house smelt of sweat and cigarette smoke.

  Then Paul arrive
d, a pharmacy student, and became a favourite of my mother’s. He had charm and the good looks and height of a Gregory Peck. He would bring her small presents from the country after he had been home for a week-end, a dozen new laid eggs wrapped in twists of newspaper with the hen’s dirt still on them or a few pots of home-made gooseberry jam, labelled and dated. My mother really appreciated these gestures.

  ‘A bank clerk,’ she said, ‘would never think of it in a thousand years.’ He had a mouth-organ which he played with some skill, although I did not agree with his choice of music, popular melodies and country and western tunes.

  After about a year of Paul’s stay one of our bank-clerks decided to get married to a girl with thick legs whom I had pushed past many nights, in flagrante, at the doorway. Paul asked my mother if, as a special favour, she would take in one of his friends who was at that time living in dreadful digs with a harridan of a landlady. Mother flinched a little at the words ‘digs’ and ‘landlady’ but she could refuse Paul nothing.

  ‘If he’s anything like you Paul, he’ll do,’ she said. Paul laughed and said he wasn’t a bit like him because he would cause her no trouble.

  This was Hugo. I first saw him in the kitchen on the day he arrived. He was small, much smaller than Paul, slope shouldered, wearing a good Sunday suit, sitting with his knees together. His eyes darted behind his thick-lensed glasses at me as I came through the door. His face was narrow, twig-like, his nose like tweaked out plasticine and a thin neck with a large Adam’s apple which jerked when he swallowed. ‘Fatten him up,’ were Paul’s orders to my mother. Afterwards, when I became interested in such things, I found that he bore a facial resemblance to James Joyce.

  ‘Have you met Hugo?’ my mother said. ‘He’s come to stay with us for a while.’ I set my schoolbag in the corner and hung up my blazer.

  ‘Hugo is a pharmacy student too,’ Mother said. ‘Paul told him what a good house this was to stay in. Wasn’t that nice of him?’ I nodded.