West, in the Foggy Valley

by Tadhg O'Rabhartaigh

  “Conor,” she said, “Is it yourself that is in it?”

  This greeting gave him back his courage, because he didn’t expect anyone in this foreboding house to have any welcome for him. He took a firm hold of the hand she offered him.

  “God bless my soul!” he said. “It is Nansai Seimin Ban! I had forgotten about you, love. I suppose you have completely forgotten about us since you came to Inis Colman?”

  “ O Maise, far from me to do the likes of that, Conor,” she said. “I will never forget the nights we spent socialising in your house. Do you still play the flute?”

  “Ah, no I don’t, sister…”

  “ Oh, I’m sorry! Death has taken its toll since I left home….”

  “ It has, sister; and it was that death that has left me here tonight. Is the gentleman himself at home?”

  “He and Marcus are having dinner in the dining room right now,” she said. “Come into the parlour and sit at the fire, they will see you before long. I’ll tell the master that you are here.”

  He sat nervously on the edge of the easy chair, his beret on his knee, and he was warming his hands over the flames of the enormous coal fire. Two dogs were stretched on a sheepskin in front of the fire. They were watching him carefully and decided not to move. He took the full of his eyes out of the grandeur all around him; gold framed pictures; presses with glass doors on them; wood that shone under the light hanging from the ceiling; stylish tables with carved legs; small statues on stands here and there; statues of men and women and not a stitch of clothes on them no more than the day they were born; a mirror that you could see yourself from top to bottom in; a carpet that you would sink to your ankles in; a sofa and chairs that were as soft as a sheep’s fleece.

  Conor wasn’t finished absorbing the grandeur when the door opened and a slender young man walked into the room with a pleasant smile on his face. He greeted Conor heartily, and he took a few long steps towards the fire, then he stood with his back to the mantle.

  “Don’t move from where you are,” he said, when he noticed Conor preparing to rise. “My father is talking to Martin in the kitchen, but he will be in to you in a minute. I hope the dogs did not bother you.”

  He talked to Conor as if he had known him all his life. The old man was relaxed in his company and he was thinking that it would be a lucky day for the people when he became the landlord. Martin was right in all that he had said about him. He wouldn’t have believed it if he hadn’t seen it himself. A son of Mac Alastair’s, paying so much attention to a poor tenant who was behind with his rent? An educated young man with degrees from Universities in Ireland and Scotland, standing there, with his back to the fire, making normal conversation with a poor miner from a mountain cabin!

  The door opened carefully and a thin grey haired man came in. He was wearing stylish flannel clothes and slippers. He looked severely at Conor through gold- rimmed spectacles. He was very busy at that particular moment picking his teeth with an ivory handled toothpick. He was so busy that he did not greet Conor at all. He sauntered across the room, and settled himself down on a sofa in front of the fire. Conor was standing with his beret squeezed in his fist from the moment he saw him entering the room.

  The young man was the first to speak.

  “Father,” he said, “this is one of your tenants, down from the middle of the Gleann, he told me.”

  “You are Big Conor Guildea I think,” Mac Alastair said, putting on an expression that was hard to read, because you would never know whether Mac Alastair was laughing with you or at you.

  “Yes,” the old man said, “and I came…”

  Mac Alastair raised a thin hand to silence him. There was a piece of meat stuck in his teeth yet, it seemed, because he had to start picking again. He waved the thin hand again and he beckoned to poor Conor to sit down. He did as he was ordered to do.

  “You are five pound behind with your tax, I think.”

  “I am,” the old man said, “but if…”

  The hand silenced him again. Mac Alastair raised his spectacles and left them on top of his head, and he wiped his eyes with a handkerchief. Then he took the spectacles from his head and he gave them a good cleaning at his ease. The young man took a few long steps towards the window and he stood between the curtains, looking out at the moon through the branches of the trees.

  “Mr. Guildea,” Mac Alastair said, as he put the handkerchief up his sleeve, “a man of your age should know that I do not permit any one of my tenants to be behind with his tax. I have a mine up there, you know, and plenty of money to be earned in it. The person who is without money in Gleann Ceo has no one to blame but himself.”

  “Sir,” the old man said, “when was I ever without money until age deprived me of my strength and I had to part with the pick for ever. We had no poor day then, either, until my son got sick, and the poor man died. You know, sir, that I was the best miner in your mine in my day; and you also know, that this is the first time ever, for me to be behind with a single penny tax.”

  Mac Alastair threw one leg over the other politely.

  “Now, Guildea,” he said, “don’t you know that I have no interest whatever in things like that? Of course you cannot expect me to consider age or death, every house has that. Haven’t you boys in the house?”

  “I have sir; and the oldest of them will be strong enough to go drawing in the mine out here in the beginning of the summer.”

  “What age is he?”

  “He will be sixteen years old this November.”

  “Sixteen years! And what is he doing?”

  “We have him at school yet, sir.”

  “At school! On my word that is the funniest story I heard for a long time.”

  He twisted his little grey moustache as he snarled.

  “I promise sir, if I was able …”

  The thin hand silenced him.

  “Now, Mr. Guildea,” the landlord said, “are you trying to make me believe that you are in poverty, and you having a young fellow of that age at school? Foolish, man!”

  He got up and went to the door. He left his hand on the knob and he turned it.

  “If you are asking me for space, your journey was wasted.”

  He stood there waiting for Conor to go out. Conor was tempted at that moment to make two halves of his stiff jaw, but immediately he realized these were the thoughts of an angry man. He controlled his mind, and he went to the door. The young man came out from between the curtains and he also went towards the door.

  “Father,” he said, in a stern voice, “listen to me. It is Christmas time! Don’t be so hard on the old man. He has a kindly appearance. I am sure, if you give him a few months, that he will do his best to clear the arrears.”

  “With the help of God,” the old man said, “ I’ll have lambs from the two sheep to sell out here; and myself and my old lady will be getting this pension that is talked about for such a long time. With all that, sir, you will get your five pound, if you will only give us space until St. John’s Eve. The boy will be going to the mine as well, after St. Patrick’s Day.”

  Mac Alastair was fingering the knob, his expression stony. Suddenly he straightened himself.

  “I am going to give you a chance, Mr. Guildea, “he said, “that I did not give to many people ever. I wouldn’t do it only for you were the best man in my mine in your day. You must have half the arrears in ten days from now. Put that boy of yours out into the mine after Christmas. And have the other half of the arrears before St. Patrick’s Day.”

  He was opening the front door at the end of this conversation with his hand on the old man’s shoulder. Anyone looking at them at that stage would not know whether he was politely seeing the old man out, or whether he was in a hurry to be rid of him.

  “Good night,” he said, and he closed the door carefully behind Conor.

  There was light in Eoin and Droighead’s shop when Conor got that far He went in. Eoin was behind the counter counting eggs. The little girl who had brought the
eggs was standing shyly inside the door, and she was glancing nervously now and again at the contrary man who was behind the counter. And of course it was no wonder that any youngster might be afraid of him, because in the first place he had two red eyes, which would scare any young child. He had double chins one on top of the other. His cheeks were bloated, he was bald down to his ears, and he was puffing his breaths out through his moustache. He greeted Conor coldly.

  When the little girl left Conor stated his case.

  “I am returning from Inis Colman,” he said. “Mac Alastair is after me for the tax. He must get half of it inside ten days, and I haven’t it to give to him. I am thinking that you might buy the two sheep from me. They are carrying lambs and I don’t like to have to sell them, but what else can I do?”

  Eoin sighed.

  “I have enough sheep at the present time, far too many.”

  “ You won’t buy them from me?”

  “I don’t need them.” Eoin said. “But under the circumstance, here is what I will do. Bring them in here in the morning until I see them. If I like them I will put a price on them. I will pay you for one of them, and I will keep the price of the other towards the seven pounds ten shillings that you owe me.”

  “In God’s name be merciful,” the old man said. “It is well you know that the price of one sheep won’t satisfy Mac Alastair. Didn’t I tell you that he has to get half the tax which is twelve pound, inside ten days?”

  “And why didn’t you ask for my debt as well from Mac Alastair? Haven’t you a cow out there?”

  “Sell the last cow, is it?” Conor said, his voice shaking. “Eoin an Droighead you have a cruel heart.”

  He turned and went out the door, his heart sick. The night was clear not a cloud in the sky, nor a breeze that would shake a branch. The only company he had, as he trudged along slowly, was the murmuring of all the little rivulets and waterfalls on the way. He could hear the pleasant sound of the River Eas coming to him from one side of the Gleann. He could also hear the barking of dogs, and the looing of a cow waiting to be milked in some byre somewhere, and a cock crowing from a nearby shed but Conor was only letting these sounds in on one ear and out on the other. He was barely conscious of them at all, although he had always enjoyed them in the past.

  Half way between his own house and the Droighead he noticed a little light coming down the big slopes, at an unusual speed. It shook him and he made the sign of the Cross. What would a normal person be doing with a light on a night like this when it is as bright as day? Before long the light returned more slowly up the slope. He watched it as it reached the top of the slope, and then came down again at great speed. Half way down it extinguished suddenly, and he could hear the laughter of the young people who were on it.

  “Maise, Maise.” he said. “Haven’t they little sense? Sliding on the big slopes with that old dray and only a bit of a candle for light. My God isn’t it happy for them.”

  Triona had a powerful fire blazing when he got home, and his supper of oat porridge ready on the hob. The old woman and herself were putting a pair of gloves and homespun socks in a parcel, because the following night was Christmas Eve, and Triona was going to Ballinashee in the morning, with this parcel and a dozen of eggs, hoping to get five or six shillings, that would put them over the Christmas as well as was possible.

  “I know by the looks of you that you did not get on very well,” the old woman said.

  He sat down in front of the fire and he told the story to them. When he was finished talking Triona went to the dresser, and she came to him with the twelve silver pound.

  “It was the boys who earned this without any of us knowing,” she said. “What a pity that it has to go back into Mac Alastair’s pockets after all they suffered earning it.”

  He didn’t say a word to her, but he looked over at the old woman with gladness in his heart.

  “God is strong, Grainne,” he said.

  “He is still up there,” she said.

  CHRISTMAS EVE NIGHT

  The sun arose pleasantly the next morning, and it began to take some of the badness out of the frost and the snow. Smoke was rising dead straight from chimneys all over the Gleann, and the silence was broken by the sound of roosters calling to each other. When the breakfast was over, and Triona Guildea had finished her morning chores, she began to get ready to cross the mountain to Ballinashee. Feargal and Peadar told her that they would be with her; and they were dressing themselves in the best clothes they had which were rough tweed, patched, and a lot too small for them because they had been wearing them for such a long time. They had only one pair of shoes each; heavy shoes with nails and bumps in them. The Greasai Rua who had made them for them a long time ago, and they often had to mend them since, to keep them together for as long as possible.

  Triona stole up to the room, and she dressed in her bonnet and blue cloak. Her shinning nut brown hair fell between her shoulders, and she had a ribbon tied on it behind her neck. Feargal noticed that the shoes she was wearing were so worn that it wasn’t worthwhile mending them. The Greasai Rua had wonderful hands all right, but he couldn’t work miracles. Una was in the corner with a puss on her, because they would not let her come to the town with them.”

  “Pet,” the old woman said, “what would you be doing crossing the mountain on a day like this? You would be lost, love.”

  “I wouldn’t be lost!” she said almost crying. Peadar began to laugh at her. Feargal looked at her sitting sadly in the corner, her small hand under her chin, her hair falling over her face and she looking into the fire. He was sorry for her. With the spirit of the feast he hurried down into the room. When he returned again, he had a sixpenny piece in his hand for her, and a smile on his face.

  “This gift won’t last you long, love,” Peadar said joking.

  “Black eyed Peadar, be silent. You don’t know what Feargal is going to buy for me!”

  “A Trumpet, I believe” Peadar said. “That or a tin whistle, isn’t that what you want, you little robin?”

  “Do you think that I will tell you? If so, you are mistaken, Peadairin!”

  “That’s the idea, Una,” Feargal said. “Don’ give any information to that fellow.”

  “Maise, it’s happy for the three of you,” the old woman said. “God grant that you will always as free from worry as you are now.”

  “We will go.” Triona said.

  “Say ‘In the name of God’,” the old woman said, as she sprinkled the holy water on them.

  “God direct you.”

  “I have business with the market man,” Feargal said when they came as far as Eoin an Droichid’s shop.

  “If you have a few pence to squander,” Triona said, hadn’t you better wait until you get to the town?”

  “I am not going to squander anything,” Feargal said, as he went into Eoin’s shop.

  A policeman from Ballinashee was inside chatting across the counter with Eoin. Feargal had never seen such a smile on Eoin’s face before. His tummy was resting on the counter, he had his two hands in his pockets, and he was laughing and joking with the policeman. He was that proud that he didn’t let on to see Feargal. Feargal shuffled a little before telling Eoin that he was in a hurry. Eoin looked at him, and the look he gave him was filled with malice, a lot different from the way he was smiling at the policeman.

  “Are these the sheep you have with you?” he said gruffly.

  “I have no sheep at all with me.” the boy said.

  “And what the devil do you want?” Eoin said.

  “Is it any harm to ask you,” the boy said politely, “how much debt does my grandfather owe you?”

  “Seven pound and nine pence.”

  “Well here is half a guinea towards it,” the boy said, leaving four half crowns /ten shillings, on the counter.

  The other man was speechless for a minute. He pushed the money aside.

  “Whom did you sell the sheep to?” he said with gruff voice.

  “We didn’t s
ell them at all,” the boy said, and with God’s help we won’t sell them. We may even be buying a few more out here. I am going to the mine after Christmas, and I will be paying all the debts after that, bit by bit.”

  “Well it is about time that someone cleared them.” Eoin said.

  But Feargal did not hear him, because he was already gone out.

  “Take that red eyed mister,” he said to himself as he caught up with the other two who were waiting at the Droighead.

  “What Christmas present did Eoin give you?” Triona asked Fergal, as they faced the steep face of the slopes from the Droighead, leading out through a gap in the mountain – a lonesome gap, which was called Log an Chuilinn.

  “It was I who was giving a present to him, I think. To be sure I shocked the red -eyed man this time. He was speechless like a dummy, when I left my half guinea down on the counter. He is long enough giving tongue –lashings to me; but I promise you he is finished now, if God spares me. We are finished getting anytime on the slate from that buck. If I can we won’t owe him as much as a red penny by this time next year. With God’s help we will be able to go in and out of his shop independently.”

  “I believe that I will be able to stop the knitting, as well,” Triona said.

  “You will stop some of it at least,” he said. “You are killed knitting gloves and socks, and getting nothing for your work.”

  She laughed at that.

  “God help your head, brother,” she said. “Don’t you know that I would be dead if I hadn’t something to do?”

  “You wouldn’t have to be up after mid night slaving all the same. You are long enough looking after us and neglecting yourself.”