The Family on Paradise Pier

by Dermot Bolger

  ‘You’d like his poems,’ Art said, then addressed his young companion. ‘There’s a touch of the poet in Eva, Charlie. Recite the poem you wrote when imprisoned in Mountjoy.’

  Eva liked the bashful way the boy shook his head, having to be gruffly coaxed by the older man – whom she decided was an American who had acquired some local expressions – before beginning to recite. The American helped himself to more whiskey and half listened. Donnelly’s poem lacked ornamentation, with images laid out as precisely as an architect’s plans. Eva liked his Ulster accent and made him repeat the final verse.

  ‘I’m sorry my boots made a mess of your floor,’ Donnelly said when finished, as if anxious to avoid praise. ‘I’ve been walking for days.’

  ‘And sleeping rough before that,’ Art added. ‘Charlie’s father kicked him out.’

  ‘It’s hard for him to understand.’ The poet was keen to defend his father. ‘He was a good cattle dealer who became a bad landlord. Something in him died with my mother’s death. He married again, but unhappily. They’re afraid I’ll indoctrinate the others, start them thinking for themselves. But I’ve a new life now.’

  ‘Like Art,’ Eva said, the hurt visible in her tone.

  ‘We have that in common,’ Donnelly agreed. ‘Some comrades are suspicious of our background, as if only people born into the proletariat can be integral to the struggle. But that’s a reactionary position. Art and I have shown how to push class boundaries aside to create a focused revolutionary movement.’

  Eva wondered what exactly Donnelly felt they shared in common. Although Father treated all men as his equal and cautioned his children to give rather than take and not be beguiled by titles or Mammon, cattle dealers rarely dined at the Manor House.

  ‘Charlie is moving to London,’ Art said. ‘Jim is why we’re here.’

  Eva examined the weary-looking older man whose name struck a chord now, not from newspapers which she rarely found time to read, but from overhearing the maids discuss some man of that name, with Mary blessing herself like he was the devil. But the Gralton mentioned by the maids had been an Irishman wanted by the police in connection with unrest in Leitrim. Eva thought of her children upstairs and how nothing must harm them.

  ‘What have you done?’ Eva asked Gralton.

  ‘I came home after twenty years in New York.’

  ‘That’s hardly a crime.’

  ‘It is to de Valera, the so-called republican who betrayed us all once he got his claws on power.’

  Again Eva discerned the West of Ireland inflection within his American accent.

  ‘You have something to do with the trouble in Leitrim.’

  Gralton laughed. ‘I am the trouble in Leitrim. The living incarnation of the Communist Plague.’

  ‘Jim built a communal hall for his native parish,’ Art explained. ‘He let it be used for dances and set up classes to stop capitalist gombeen men robbing people blind. He lent out books and magazines to help them think for themselves. He wanted to bring people together and by Jove he did. He brought together people who were never on the same side before, with Blueshirt fascists stoning his hall and the IRA firing bullets into it.’

  ‘Not all the IRA,’ the young poet interjected.

  ‘Sorry, Charlie,’ Art retorted. ‘Not your few pals in the Republican Congress. Just the rank and file rosary bead rattlers who tore down the anti-capitalist banner of the Belfast Protestant workers who were persuaded to join the march to Wolfe Tone’s grave last year – the Neanderthals who will crush your Congress as a Red threat to Catholic Ireland. The IRA can’t be reformed from within. Revolution can only come from a single internationalist communist movement owing complete allegiance to Stalin…’

  ‘Will you pair give over your Jaysusing arguments,’ Gralton protested wearily. ‘You’ve my head done in these last two days.’

  Art turned to Eva. ‘The bottom line is that they’re all determined to drive out Jim – the rancher farmers, the government and the church. This Free State has no room for those who won’t conform. You must know this, Eva. Freddie thinks we have nothing in common, but there’s no room in de Valera’s kingdom for the likes of me or for Freddie either, despite his efforts to cling on.’

  ‘Locals here respect us,’ Eva protested.

  ‘As what?’ Art scoffed. ‘Fossils? The further you fall the more they feel their status rising. They may still bend a servile knee but they won’t be happy till this house is levelled.’

  Eva now recalled Gralton being mentioned at a dinner-table conversation. Freddie’s uncle from Turlough Park had mentioned saboteurs attempting to set up a communist canton among the Leitrim lakes, with Catholics warned from the pulpit under pain of excommunication not to give shelter to this dangerous Bolshevik on the run. From the state of Gralton’s clothing it was obvious that people had heeded this episcopal warning.

  ‘What do they wish to charge you with?’ she asked.

  ‘I’ve committed no crime,’ Gralton replied. ‘I spent two decades in the New York unions, staring down the gun barrels of cops bribed to break up strikes. The only reason I took out American citizenship in 1919 was so as not to travel on a British passport. I’m more Irish than de Valera, who used his American passport to save his neck from execution after the ’16 Rising. But now he’s using my American citizenship to brand me a foreigner, claiming it gives him the right to deport me as a subversive. Well, they’ll have to find me first.’

  He glanced at Art who cleared his throat. ‘That’s where I need your help, Eva,’ her brother said quietly. ‘Just two nights’ shelter, long enough for Charlie and me to go ahead and organise a safe house in Munster.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’ Eva tried not to betray her panic.

  ‘Be honest, can you tell if Jim is a Yank or not? What’s to stop him passing himself off as a tourist? Why should the hunted man not pose as a hunter?’

  ‘We’re fully booked, though it rarely happens.’ Eva was relieved to have a valid excuse.

  ‘You could find room somewhere.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘I told you she wouldn’t help,’ Gralton said. ‘Bourgeois people like her…’

  ‘Whatever else my family were,’ Art snapped, ‘we never stooped to being mere bourgeoisie.’

  Eva glanced at the poet to see if this distinction registered.

  ‘Besides I thought we were creating an inclusive society,’ Art continued, ‘abolishing class, instead of rushing to easy judgements. It’s hard for any woman to have strangers land on her at night.’ He looked at Eva. ‘If you can’t help I understand.’

  ‘You won’t be staying?’ she asked, disappointed.

  ‘Charlie and I must start walking for Castlebar soon to catch the first train. We’ll send a coded telegram when we find a safe house. I’ve never sought your help before, Eva, and I’ll never seek it again.’

  Eva wavered. ‘He’d have to sleep in the basement.’

  ‘I’ve slept naked in stone cells,’ Gralton interjected and Eva knew that, however grudgingly he accepted Art as a comrade, he harboured inbred suspicions about a house like this.

  ‘Can you shoot?’ she asked.

  ‘Show me a peeler and you’ll have your answer.’

  ‘I’m talking about snipe and ducks.’

  ‘That was the only way I ever tasted meat as a boy.’

  The grandfather clock struck five. In an hour’s time the morning routine would commence. Freddie was due home this afternoon, having promised Francis a surprise which the boy could not stop talking about. It was madness to contemplate shielding a fugitive, but suddenly it felt like a done deal.

  ‘Freddie would kill me should he find out. You must never tell anyone, Art.’

  Art clasped her hand across the table. ‘You’re a brick, Eva. One last thing, though. We haven’t a penny beyond our train fares. You’ll have to square Jim being a guest with Freddie and pay for his train ticket to join us. Can you do that?’

  ‘Yes,’ she l
ied. ‘I’ll put in my own cash when Freddie is doing his weekly accounts.’

  In fact she hadn’t money to pay the staff until the Tyrone man settled his bill in three days’ time. Even with the Fitzgerald name most Protestant shops in Castlebar had already made noises about it being wiser to go elsewhere rather than be refused credit. Freddie wouldn’t say how much they owed Mr Devlin, the Catholic grocer, whose shop on the Mall was one of many she always quickly passed in case the proprietors came out after her. But there was no time to worry about this. She rose and allotted tasks. The poet was instructed to make sandwiches for the train, while Gralton was dispatched to shave with one of Freddie’s old razors in the basement bedroom. Art tiptoed with her up to Mr Clements’s room, which was kept unlocked even in his absence.

  Years ago – when it became apparent that the Commander intended to stay indefinitely – Mr Clements had sent to London for a large sea chest of clothes. Eva had never opened the chest, nor seen him touch it. Instead a tailor came from Castlebar twice a year to measure him for new outfits. The chest contained the remnants of a previous life put behind him after he chanced upon this hideaway. Over the years the Commander had become Eva’s courteous confidant in times of crisis. Part of what people regarded as his idiosyncratic attachment to Glanmire House was the fact that since his first day out with Freddie he never again fired a gun. Eva didn’t know what Mr Clements thought of Freddie and rarely allowed herself to speculate on his unspoken – though tacitly acknowledged – attachment to her. Yet, although she knew he would have readily assisted her if he was here, rifling through his possessions felt like a violation.

  She opened the chest. An officer’s white cap and dress uniform were neatly placed at the top, beside a photograph of him as a young officer, the inscription embossed in gold leaf as having been taken at The Grand Studio, Malta. The white civilian suits underneath were light and unsuitable for the Mayo climate, but had never been seen by Freddie or the maids. Gralton would have no option but to wear them. The shoes in the trunk were of little use over rough ground. Gralton would look comic and slightly vulgar in this non-Mediterranean setting but this was how Freddie saw Americans anyway.

  Art fingered the Commander’s portrait. ‘So what does he do all day?’

  ‘Walks and reads American thrillers and French books that cause the post office headaches for not knowing if they’re banned. Most are eventually delivered with a frontispiece illustration cut out.’

  ‘Is he in love with you?’

  ‘He’s forty years older than me, Art, and I’m married. Have you forgotten?’

  ‘No.’ Art carefully replaced the photograph. ‘He has a nice face for an imperialist.’

  Eva closed the chest and sat on it. ‘You never wrote to me once from Moscow.’

  ‘It was not easy to get letters out.’

  ‘Or from Dublin since you returned. Have you seen Brendan? Thomas thinks you’re leading him further astray.’

  ‘I have no contact with Brendan.’

  ‘He worships you.’

  ‘He’s no true Verschoyle so.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘They only worship money.’

  ‘What do you mean, they?’ Though fearful of waking the guests Eva could not keep her voice low. ‘They are you and me and Maud and Thomas and Brendan. Name one of us with any real interest in money?’

  ‘Maybe because we’re contaminated by Goold blood. Father was always a disappointment to our Dublin cousins. They felt his solid Dutch backbone had been corroded away. I wouldn’t mind but for all the airs and graces our cousins give themselves we’re not aristocrats at all. Only when I returned to Dublin did I discover where we really came from.’

  ‘From Holland with William of Orange,’ Eva said. ‘Grandpappy said there was a General Verschoyle.’

  ‘If so he was a general dogsbody,’ Art snorted, keeping his voice low. ‘We were foot soldiers, skivvies working our passage. We had no backside in our trousers when we landed in Dublin. The only job available was in the knacker’s yard – the lowest, most horrible work imaginable. That’s how our family started in Ireland, Eva. But being Dutch we were pragmatic. The yard owners were typical short-sighted Irish capitalists, only interested in a quick profit from animal skins. They virtually gave away the blubber and fat and bones. Well, we weren’t long becoming grubby middlemen, finding new markets for the leavings: soap, candles and God knows what. We waded through offal and guts to maximise every last farthing of profit. And what do you think we did after we’d skinned enough old horses that our fingernails stank and no decent person would touch us? We bought a rat-infested slum going cheap after the tenants fled from cholera. We washed our hands, donned frock coats and spent money, not on sanitation but on the shiny plaque that’s still there – Verschoyle Court.’

  ‘That was over two centuries ago,’ Eva argued, although shocked. She remembered how Grandpappy only spoke in vague terms about their family history, though Father – who loved genealogy – had traced the Goold side back to both the Saxon kings and Niall of the Nine Hostages.

  ‘It continues,’ Art replied fiercely. ‘Since returning from Russia I’ve been unloading boats with men whose children are coughing themselves to death in Verschoyle Court.’

  Art sat beside her, the passion gone from his voice. He sounded weary. ‘I love you, Eva, but I want to build a country where we can hold up our heads again. How could I face the men I work with if I still bore a name that married into respectability on the back of animal guts and has grown fat on slum rents ever since?’

  ‘I’m merely asking you to keep Brendan out of your private war,’ she pleaded.

  ‘The day Brendan walked out of Marlborough he became his own man. At one time I thought that he respected me but all along he seems to have been a viper in the nest. I have reason to believe that he betrayed me though I can’t find out if this is true. But surely if he could look into my face he would make contact. Falling out with him is breaking my heart, but personal feelings cannot distract from the class war being fought on these islands and a bigger one stirring in Spain. A war for the soul of Europe.’

  Art’s hair was cut tight with the faint remnant of a bruise on his forehead. Eva took his hand. ‘How could Brendan betray you? He loves you just like I do. If you two have had some quarrel then promise me you will make it up. You have given up too much already, you don’t need to give up your brother. Remember Beatrice Hawkins?’

  Art’s smile returned. ‘Every summer she grew lovelier until the Great War came. Ffrench and I often mention her. Those were happy days, Eva.’

  ‘I wish you had someone.’

  Art gently removed his hand. ‘There is someone…’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘My wife.’

  ‘What wife?’

  ‘I had to leave her behind in Moscow when the authorities felt that I could be of more use by helping to build the Party here in Ireland.’

  ‘How long are you married?’

  Art fingered his stubble.

  ‘We have a son. I write but my letters may not get through. I told Brendan never to mention them until I was able to bring them to Ireland one day.’

  Footsteps on the gravel startled them. Eva opened the wooden shutter a fraction. One of the Staffordshire men whom Freddie regarded as poor shots had wandered out barefoot, with his braces down. Thinking himself unobserved, he began to urinate by the trees. Eva wondered had their voices woken him. His compatriot appeared and strode silently down to lay a hand on his shoulder. He then did something that Eva considered peculiar. He kissed his cheek. Eva closed the shutter.

  ‘You’ll have to leave,’ she whispered, needing time to digest Art’s news. He bundled up the clothes and they crept downstairs to where Donnelly and Gralton waited in the basement bedroom. Gralton sat on the bed, having shaved. She honestly didn’t know if he could pass as a tourist. Art dumped the Commander’s white outfit on his lap.

  ‘You made your dosh in commodities and b
ailed out before the crash. You’ve been swanning around Europe as a capitalist parasite ever since.’

  Gralton fingered the light suit. ‘Well, you needn’t think I’m going to swan around Mayo dressed like a gadfly in this!’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Donnelly commented from the window, ‘if you’re twigged, de Valera will trade you for some pyjamas with arrows down the front.’

  ‘Buster Keaton must be quaking in his boots with you two comedians,’ Gralton said sourly. ‘Move over Laurel and Hardy.’

  ‘Just get changed before the house wakes,’ Art told him.

  Gralton picked up the suit and glanced at Eva. Turning her back she approached Charlie Donnelly who sat on the window table, reading one of her small pile of books which Freddie never touched. They formed an emotional diary nobody else could decode. Wishing she was wearing more clothes, Eva drew closer, curious to see which one he had chosen. The sandwiches he had made were wrapped in newspaper beside him. He glanced up from the book.

  ‘These poems are beautiful. I’ve never read them before.’

  Eva recognised the slender volume – Lyrics from the Ancient Chinese, in versions by Helen Waddell, published by Constable and Company. She could still recall the bustling aisles of Foyle’s Bookshop on Charing Cross Road after skimping on food for a week to buy it when she was an art student.

  ‘I’ve had that for years.’

  ‘The poems are delicate, yet strong,’ he replied, ‘like being inside a woman’s head. Three thousand years old, yet those people had the same dreams and fears as us. It makes you wonder.’

  ‘What do you wonder?’

  He looked down. ‘I wonder why you marked the poem, Lyric XIX, Written 718 B.C.?’

  ‘I must have liked it.’

  ‘In one sense I see why. She holds the lyric line well.’ Holding open the roughly cut pages, Charlie Donnelly recited so quietly that only the pair of them could hear:

  ‘Selling of silk you were, a lad

  Not of our kin;

  You passed at sunset on the road

  From far-off Ta’in.