The Dirty Dust

by Máirtín Ó Cadhain

THE WASTING EARTH

  1.

  —The sky is mine, the sea, the land …

  —The hinterland is mine, what is upside down, the insides, the lower depths. You only have the edges and the contingent …

  —The light of the sun is mine, the shining moon, the sparkling star …

  —The mysterious recesses of every cave are mine, the jagged pits of every abyss, the dark heart of every stone, the unknown guts of every earth, the hidden stem of every flower …

  —Mine is the sunny south, brightness, love, the ruddy rose and the maiden’s smile …

  —Mine is the dour north, darkness, misery, the shoot that gives life to the rose petal, the web of veins that drives the diseased blood of melancholy routing laughter from the cheeks to lighten the brightness of the face …

  —Mine is the egg, the sprout, the seed, the source …

  —Mine is …

  2.

  —… Monsieur Churchill a dit qu’il retournerait pour libérer la France. Vous comprenez, mon ami? …

  —His Irish is slipping away again, no problem, now, since he’s taken up the higher learning …

  —… Fell from a stack of oats, Chalky Steven …

  —… I heard “Haw Haw” with my own two ears promising revenge for the Graf Spee …

  —… The Big Butcher came to my funeral, Chalky Steven …

  —… Hitler himself will cross over to England and stuff a small bomb, about the size of a loaf of bread, down inside those big baggy trousers that Churchill wears …

  —… I spend my time giving people spiritual assistance. If you ever feel the need for some spiritual assistance, I’m the …

  —I won’t, I’m telling you. And I’m warning you now, even if you are Colm More’s daughter, to leave those black dirty heretics to me, and don’t stick your nose into it one way or the other, or else I’ll …

  —… Christ save us all, if England is decimated like that, where will the people sell anything? You have no land at all up at the top of the town …

  —Mon ami, the United Nations, England, les États Unis, la Russe, et les Français Libres are all defending human rights together … Quel est le mot? … Against the barbarism of des Boches nazifiés. I told you already about the concentration camps. Belsen …

  —Nell Paudeen is up for Churchill. All those fowlers and fishermen from England, of course …

  —She was always treacherous, the witch! Up Hitler! Up Hitler! Up Hitler! Do you think there’s a chance, if he comes on over, that he’ll flatten her new house down to the ground?

  —The Postmistress is all up for Hitler. She says that postmistress is a highly valued position in Germany, and if she suspects anyone, she had a bounden duty to open that person’s letters …

  —Billy the Postman is on Hitler’s side too. He says …

  —Oh, the scabby skunk! Whatever other side would he be on? Of course, he doesn’t believe at all in private property or in the traditional values of western Europe. He’s a communist, an antitraditional revolutionary, an Antichrist, an old fogey fart of a blackguard, a demon from hell just like Hitler himself. Up Churchill! … Shut your gabbling gob, Nora Johnny! You’re a disgrace to womankind! Even to say that that filthy shit sucker had a romantic streak in him! …

  —Good for you there, Master! Don’t cool off now when it comes to the White Beauty of the Toejam trotters! …

  —Redser Tom says that Fireside Tom …

  —Fireside Tom! Which side is he on? It would take a wise man to say which side Fireside Tom was on …

  —… Are you saying that I don’t know already? …

  —Nobody would really know, only those in the same town land … Fireside Tom fancied his own little hole of a hovel as much as a king hugged his crown …

  —Son of a gun, anyway, I’m telling you, they let the whole hovel fall down on me in the end! …

  —Ababoona! Fireside Tom is here! …

  —There was a constant drip drop, drip drop into my mouth and eyes, no word of a lie, no matter where I planted the bed. They were bad. They were really bad, I’m telling you. Caitriona Paudeen has one mong of a youngfella, and Nell had another one, and they were a fairly miserable lot that they couldn’t even put a strip of straw on my shack! …

  —Fireside Tom is in the Fifteen Shilling Place, Kitty!

  —That’s it Breed, Fireside Tom is in the Fifteen Shilling Place! …

  —That’s the least you could expect, that they’d bury him in the Fifteen Shilling Place. He has his own bit of land, and they’ll get a dollop of money from the insurance …

  —But Nora Johnny swears that Paddy Caitriona welched on his insurance payments after his mother died.

  —She’s a liar! That swamp Toejam Hag! …

  —Even if he didn’t, what difference will that make to the insurance, after all that Tom had paid? Caitriona’s praying for his death was no help at all. We’ll ask the insurance man …

  —Fireside Tom, how long are you here? …

  —Do you know what now, like, I’m only just about here, Caitriona, my lovely. I never even had a pain nor nothing, and I died just the same as all! I went off exactly the same as all the others. I’ll tell you what the doctor told me …

  —It doesn’t matter a damn now what the doctor told you. Nell buried you first …

  —She’s not great, Caitriona. Not great. She spent three weeks in bed, but she’s hopping about again …

  —The bitch, she would …

  —And look at me, Caitriona, never had a pain nor nothing, and I died just the same as the rest of them! …

  —Did you think you were going to live for ever? …

  —Well, to tell the truth, I thought I would Caitriona, and the priest wasn’t one bit pleased, he sure wasn’t. The day he was up visiting Nell, he passed me by on the road, just as I was on my way to get a plug of tobacco from Peter the Publican …

  —Peter the Publican’s tobacco was better than anybody else’s …

  —True, Caitriona, my lovely. And you’d get a halfpenny’s worth for next to nothing. “The way it is, Father,” I says, “that poor woman up there is totally knackered” …

  —You cunt you! …

  —“It certainly doesn’t look as if she is a hundred percent,” he says. “I feel she is far too long in bed. Where are you off to now, Fireside Tom?” he says. “Off to get a plug of tobacco, Father,” I says. “They say, Fireside Tom,” he says, “that you really fancy that place over there; and that you never take your snout out of the booze …”

  —That whore’s git told him that! She’d always twist the knife in you …

  —“Ah, sure, what harm, I take a drop the same as any man, Father,” I says. “A drop would be no problem, Fireside Tom,” he says, “but they also say that you’ll never know when they’ll find you stretched out on the side of the road dead as a doornail and you on your way home.” “There’s not a bit of bother on me, Father,” I said, “I never had a pain nor nothing, thanks be to God, and of course, I have the new road under my feet all the way to Nell’s door now.”

  —Hitler will rip up that road yet, with the help of God!

  —“My advice to you now, and I’m telling you for your own good, Fireside Tom,” I says, “my advice is to stay away from that place be-yond there, and give up on the old booze. That won’t really suit you from now on. And this lot over here have enough on their plate without having to scrape you off the ground and drag you home every night …”

  —Holy God Almighty, hasn’t the whore’s melt got him by the balls! She wouldn’t fuck with Hitler so easily …

  —“For crying out loud, like, Father!” I says, “don’t they have a car?” “If so, Fireside Tom,” he says, “nonetheless, they have no petrol in the tank. There I am, and look at me I have to go on my bike! They say too, Fireside Tom,” he says, “that you’re like a shopping trolley over and back between the two houses. You’d think now, Fireside Tom,” he says, “that you’d have a small smidgen
of sense and settle on one of the two houses. Good luck to you, Fireside Tom,” he says, “and not a word to anyone.” “If that’s the way it is,” I says to myself, “I won’t give them the satisfaction of bringing me home every night. There are far too many priests hanging around the house up there. It’s not as if they need more priests …”

  —That’s not a word of a lie, Fireside Tom, not a word of a lie …

  —“I’ll toddle on down to Paddy Caitriona’s house where I’ll get a bit of a break,” I says. I turned off down the path towards the Alla in case there’d be a few of Caitriona’s beasts chomping away on my land. But there wasn’t. A few of the useless fences were down. “I’ll tell Paddy Caitriona to come up in the morning and to mend those fences and to put his own animals on my land,” I says to myself …

  —You got it bang on there, Fireside Tom …

  —I came back around to the top of the path again, and I turned down to head towards Paddy’s house. But I swear to Jesus, I’m telling you now, all of a sudden I couldn’t budge a foot or mutter a word! Half of me was dead, and the other half alive. I never had a pain nor nothing, Caitriona, and yet I died the same as the rest of them! …

  —Burst smack bang on the side of the road just like a puncture in a bicycle tube! That’s Nell’s evil eye for you, you poor fucker! …

  —But I didn’t actually die on the side of the road, dearie. Peter Nell came along as luck would have it and shunted me up to their house in the car. If it wasn’t for that, I’d have died in your place, Caitriona. But there I was stretched out on the bed in Nell’s house before I could get my breath back, and when I did I thought it wouldn’t be right to take me down to Paddy’s house …

  —You always made a balls of everything, Fireside Tom, any chance you got …

  —I only lasted the best part of ten days. My speech was coming and going. To tell you the truth, I haven’t a clue if the priest helped me or not. I was never sick nor nothing …

  —You never gave yourself any reason, me boyo! …

  —Sacred Heart of Jesus, Caitriona my lovely, I did huge dollops of work. I slaved all my life …

  —Even so, Fireside Tom, it wasn’t for your own good. You spent most of your time slaving away at booze and boorishness …

  —To tell the truth, Caitriona, I did get a bit pissed the odd Saturday, after Friday …

  —Oh, you did alright, Fireside Tom, and every Saturday, and every Sunday, and every Monday, and a gaggle of Tuesdays and Wednesdays too …

  —Your tongue is as ready as always, Caitriona. I always said that Nell was much more pleasant than you …

  —You’re an old fart! …

  —I’ll tell you what I’d say, Caitriona. “Caitriona wouldn’t have been arsed looking after me if it wasn’t just to spite Nell,” I’d say. If you saw the way she looked after me after I was clocked, Caitriona. Two doctors and all …

  —She called them entirely for herself, Fireside Tom, if the truth be known. That little hussy, nothing bothered her at all!

  —As it happened she called them for me, Caitriona. No sooner was I brought into the house than she leaped out of the bed to look after me …

  —She leaped out of the bed! …

  —Leaped isn’t the word, Caitriona, and then she stayed there sitting up and just looking at us …

  —Oh, you eejit! You total fucking eejit! She had you on. She made a total asshole of you. You never had a pain nor nothing, sure you didn’t, Fireside Tom …

  —Hardly ever, Caitriona, and see how I died just the same as everybody else who was racked with pain. Son of a gun, like. I’m beginning to think that the priest didn’t help me one way or the other …

  —You can swear to that, Fireside Tom! The prick-teaser managed to get St. John’s Gospel from him that night, and she dumped you instead of him, just as she did with Jack the Lad …

  —Is that what you think, Caitriona? …

  —You can’t see it yourself, Fireside Tom! A woman who had her arse in the air one minute, and the next was flitting away like a butterfly! That’s what you deserved for yourself if you went next or near that bitch. If you stuck with my Patrick you’d be alive and kicking today. But anyway, what did you do with your patch of land? …

  —A, sure, Caitriona, love, I left it to them: to Paddy and to Nell …

  —You left them half and half, you little bollix!

  —Ah, no, I didn’t go that far, not half and half. I used to say it like this to myself, Caitriona, when the words came to me: “If it was any more than that, I wouldn’t go one way or the other. There’s no point in chopping it up half and half. Blotchy Brian always said it wasn’t worth dividing up …”

  —Of course, he said that, in the hope it would all be left to his own daughter …

  —“I’ll have to leave it to Paddy Caitriona so,” I said to myself. “I’d have left it all to him if I had been that close to the house when I got the puck. But Nell was always very good to me too. I couldn’t not leave her something seeing as I was about to die in her house …”

  —Oh, you cunt! You bad baldy ball-less bollocks of a cunt!

  —The priest was there and all to write down what I had to say, that’s when it came to me: “Divide it in two, Fireside Tom,” he said. “Either that, or leave it all to one of them.”

  —You’d think after all that crap, Fireside Tom, that you’d make a better fist of it than that. Why didn’t you just saunter in nice and easy to Mannix the Counsellor in the Fancy City? …

  —By the hokey, now Caitriona, I could only get the words out sometimes, and you’d have to have nails of ice on your tongue to start spitting words like Mannix the Counsellor. No matter anyway, Caitriona, I never really fancied having much to do with that same Mannix ever … Your Paddy was there: “I don’t really want it,” he said, “I have more than enough myself already.”

  —Oh, the eejit! I knew that Nell would make a complete asshole of him. He misses me …

  —Isn’t that exactly what Blotchy Brian said! …

  —Blubbering Blotchy Brian!

  —Maybe so, Caitriona, but he sent for the car to have him visit me …

  —To help Nell about your patch of land. And if not, it wasn’t for your good, Fireside Tom. Sending for the car! He’d look a sight in the car. A big bush of a beard. Teeth like a rabbit. Bent over. Stuffed nose. Clubfoot. Filthy flaky skin. Never washed himself …

  —“If the mediator over at that gable-end was here,” he said, “I’d say now, Father, that it would be Mannix the Counsellor rather than yourself who’d be accompanying Milord in by the fireside past the gander …” Nell slapped him in the mouth. The priest shoved him on out the door … “We don’t want your patch of land either, Fireside Tom,” Nell spluttered …

  —That’s another downright lie, the cocksucker! Why wouldn’t she want it? …

  —“I will leave my portion of land to Paddy Caitriona and to Nell Johnny,” I said, when words came back to me. “You can have it, good luck to you.” “What you say is a total crock, Fireside Tom,” the priest said. “It’d only cause confusion and the law would be dragged in, if it wasn’t for the good sense of these decent people …”

  —Decent people! Oh! …

  —I never spoke another single word after that, Caitriona. I never had a pain nor nothing, and see, I died all the same! …

  —You’re not much good to anyone dead or alive, you gimp! …

  —Listen up now, Thomas. That’s the dote. That tiff with Caitriona won’t …

  —What do you mean, a “tiff”?

  —All that vile vituperation will only vulgarize your mind. I will have to establish a relationship with you. I am the cultural relations officer for the cemetery. I will give you some lectures on “The Art of Living.”

  —You, son of a bloody gun, … “The Art of Living”? … What next?

  —A progressive section of us thought we had a duty to our fellow corpses, and so we set up a Rotary …

  —Some
bloody good, a Rotary! Look at me! …

  —Exactly, Tom. Just look at you! You’re a red-blooded romantic, Tom. You always were. But romance always requires the regulated support of culture beneath it to raise it above mere anarchy, and for its superior point to penetrate the meadows of Cupid in this twentieth century, just like Mrs. Crookshank said to Harry in …

  —Hold it right there now, Nora dear! I’ll tell you what Eeval Enema said to Tight Arse in “The Rape of the Cloak” …

  —Culture, please, Tom.

  —Up outa that! I don’t believe that this is Nora Johnny from Gort Ribbuck at all, can’t be? … Do you ever think that I’d ever learn to speak like that in the dirty dust? Come here ’til I tell you now, Nora, you used to have great Irish talk in the old days! …

  —Don’t pretend for one minute, Norita, don’t bother your barney with him at all, at all.

  —Goo Goog, Dotie! Goo Goog! We’ll have a bit of a natter between ourselves in a minute. Just between the two of us, like. A bit of pleasant banter between us, you know what I mean. Goo Goog!

  —I was always very cultured, Tom, but you were never able to tell. It was very plain to me the very first affaire de coeur that I had with you. If it wasn’t for that I might have been able to do something with you. Agh! Such an uncultured person! A partner should really be a companion. Look, I’ll give you a talk, with the help of the writer and the poet, of course, on Platonic love …

  —I’ll have nothing to do with you, Nora Johnny. Sweet fanny all! …

  —Good on you there! Fireside Tom!

  —I used to be hobnobbing with the nobs up in Nell Johnny’s house …

  —The bad brasser! …

  —Oh, I’m telling you, those foreign ones are great fun, Caitriona. There was a big ugly Orange floozy fishing up there with Lord Cockton this year, and I’d say she smoked every fag that was ever made. She would have, and the priest’s sister along with her. She keeps them in big fat boxes down in her trousers pocket. Tim Top of the Road’s youngfella is shagged trying to keep up with her. Too bad for him, the gobshite! But I swear to you anyway, that she’s gorgeous. I sat in the car right next to her. “Goo Goog, Nancy,” I says to her …