2004 - Dandelion Soup

by Babs Horton

  “It’s all right son, he’s not here, he can’t harm you now.”

  “Where is he, Father?”

  “They’ve taken him away to somewhere secure. You’ve no need to worry.”

  Padraig relaxed. Father Daley had called him son. No one had ever called him that since his mammy had died.

  Suddenly the tears came in a torrent splashing down his feverish cheeks, trickling down his neck. His chest began to heave. Oh Jesus, he wanted to talk, to spill everything out, but his throat was a burned-out cave, everything about him felt broken.

  Father Daley looked down at him, a skinny little shrimp of a thing, a boy racked with enormous pain. He leaned tentatively towards Padraig, took him in his arms and cradled him. As he felt the little rib cage heave against him with emotion, he experienced a sudden rush of tenderness, a tenderness he hadn’t felt since his own mother had held him close. He held the boy tightly and soon his own silent tears fell on to the boy’s head.

  Later, Brother Bernardo brought Padraig breakfast in bed. He came in to the room smiling cheerfully, carrying a wooden tray that bore an earthenware bowl containing two coddled eggs in oil, a hunk of freshly baked bread and a bowl of steaming hot chocolate.

  After he’d eaten, Padraig made his way along the corridor to see Nancy Carmichael, but when he approached the door the sight before him took him aback. A man, the bad-tempered-looking man he’d seen down in the hamlet, was bending over her as she lay in the bed. He was stroking her cheek and cooing like a pigeon. A right lovesick gimp. Ugh! It was disgusting! He wasn’t going to stop and watch that kind of thing; he’d come back later when the eejit was gone. He tiptoed silently away down the corridor and as he passed Brother Anselm’s room he saw with relief that the bed was stripped and the room was empty.

  He walked quickly on down the stairs and into the refectory, where Father Daley was talking quietly to Brother Francisco. When they saw Padraig they fell silent and Father Daley smiled.

  “Father, do you mind if I go out for a walk by myself? I’d like a bit of fresh air.”

  “No. No, Padraig. You’re okay on your own, though?”

  “Sure, I’m fine. Is Nancy going to be all right?”

  “According to Brother Tomas she’ll be up and about tomorrow. I’m afraid, though, that we’ll have to go down to Santa Anna without her, but God willing she’ll be able to come with us to Santiago de Compostela.”

  Padraig took a walk along the mule track that led away from Santa Eulalia and across a large expanse of meadow land. Brother Bernardo had told him a few days earlier that they would take that road when they went on down to Santa Anna. Padraig walked along it for some time, then stepped off the uneven track and ambled through a trail of trampled daisies and dandelions.

  Eventually he came to an outcrop of rocks beyond which there was a sheer drop hundreds of feet down into the river valley below.

  He lay down in the grass on his belly and turned things over in his mind. He trembled as he remembered the terrible look of hatred in Brother Anselm’s eyes last night. But why? What had he ever done to Brother Anselm? And why had he shot Nancy? Nancy wouldn’t harm a fly. Thinking about Nancy he remembered how happy she’d been the other night when she’d been humming that song, ‘When Irish Eyes are Smiling’.

  After she’d gone he’d looked closely at the painting. The monk in the brown robes had deep-blue eyes, whereas the white-robed monks round him had dark eyes and swarthy skin. His skin was paler, pinker. He looked more like an Irish fellow than a Spaniard. In his hand he held a rosary and it was the rosary that had caught Padraig’s eye. He’d seen one something like it before but he couldn’t work out where. There was a group of similar pale-skinned monks in the background, some of them swigging from goblets, others holding out goblets to be filled from wine sacks. These ones had wide grins and rude-looking eyes.

  Maybe, just maybe the fresco showed the group of Irish monks who had brought the statue to Spain. There was no sign of a statue in the fresco, though.

  Then when he had scrubbed the blue paint from under his fingernails last night the colour was almost identical to the blue on the fresco, a peculiar shade of blue with a hint of lilac.

  Padraig sniffed. He kneeled up and shuffled forward on his knees and peeped over the edge. A thin curl of smoke was drifting up from somewhere further down the rock face.

  The view from here was brilliant but it churned his stomach and made him feel giddy. It was like being in an airplane, he guessed, because cows and sheep down in the valley looked as tiny as insects. He was about to scramble back up to his feet when he heard the sound of singing coming from below.

  He got as close to the edge as he could without falling but it was impossible to see past an overhang of rocks a yard or so below him.

  The singing stopped abruptly. He sniffed again. No more singing, just the tantalizing smell of woodsmoke and sizzling fish.

  Then suddenly he was flipped gently on to his back like a big fish himself, being turned with a spatula. The sunlight blinded him momentarily. Shading his eyes against the glare, it was some moments before he realized that he was looking up into the eyes of the strange little rag man who had saved him from Brother Anselm last night.

  He was a man with a face as shrivelled and dark as dried seaweed, eyes as black and damp as limpets.

  The cave was surprisingly large, cut into the rock face high above the valley and only accessible through the dark tunnel down which the odd little man had led Padraig.

  A thick rope was strung across the front of the cave and on it were hung an assortment of animal skulls in various sizes that rattled in the breeze. In a brazier, on an overhang of rock, a fire crackled beneath a blackened pan.

  Padraig was impressed; it was a fabulous if dangerous hideaway.

  He looked again in fascination at the oddly dressed little man.

  “Thanks for what you did last night.”

  “That’s quite all right. Pleased to meet you again, Padraig O’Mally.”

  Padraig blinked in surprise. The weird-looking fellow spoke English but with a peculiar twang to it, almost Irish sounding.

  He swallowed hard; half of him was terrified and the other half intrigued. The fellow looked deliriously mad.

  “How do you know my name?”

  “We met before, briefly, a long time ago,” the man answered with a smile and held out his hand.

  “My name is Muli,” he said.

  “Where did we meet Muli?”

  “Ah, you won’t remember. You were tucked up warm beneath your mammy’s coat.”

  “You knew my mammy?”

  “I did indeed, and she was a wonderful woman. I’m only sorry that I wasn’t around when she passed away to give you a helping hand.”

  “Why did you save me, Muli? He could have killed you.”

  “Ah, it was nothing.”

  “You saved my life.”

  The man waved his hand dismissively.

  “How did you know that he was going to come after me?”

  “I was just hanging around the monastery, that’s all, keeping an eye out. I heard the first shot, thought I’d just take a peek.”

  “Muli, would you tell me something? Were you there in the monastery the night we arrived?”

  Muli grinned.

  “I was, why do you ask?”

  “I saw someone hiding at the top of the stairs and thought I was imagining it.”

  “I was just checking, that was all.”

  “Do you live in this cave all the time, Muli?”

  “On and off when I’m not travelling.”

  “How do you live, though, for like food and that?”

  “I live by the lip of the wind.”

  “Come again?” Padraig said, puzzled.

  “The winds bring me everything I need. A few apples and plums blown down here and there on the mountain, sometimes in a storm a bird will get blown in here and then I pluck it and bung it in the pot. This fish, for example, was dropped by a s
tartled eagle.”

  “Honest?”

  “No, I caught this one myself just before dawn.”

  “How come you speak such good English?”

  “Ah, for many years I travel, selling pencils and pads, all over the place I go…wherever the wind calls. Wherever the nubeiro is needed.”

  “Bloody hell, are you a nubeiro? I’ve heard all about them! You can make storms and that at the drop of a hat, isn’t that right?”

  “A little more than the drop of a hat maybe, but yes, I can conjure up storms. Are you afraid of storms, Padraig O’Mally?”

  “No, I love them.”

  “Why do you love them?”

  “I don’t know, it’s the excitement, the electricity and like that lovely fresh smell afterwards as if the world has been shook up a bit…”

  “Like things might change?”

  “Yes, like there’s a bit of hope. Why do you make the storms?”

  “It was my destiny to be a nubeiro. Like my mother before me, her father before her…we just help things along a bit sometimes.”

  Padraig caught sight of something at the back of the cave and gasped. He pointed with a shaking finger at the bundled wedding dress at the back of the cave.

  “You did that?”

  “I helped,” Muli said with a slow grin. “The poor girl couldn’t get married without a dress, after all, could she?”

  “I saw that happen, saw it take off. The girl, the pretty one at Sefiora Hipola’s, was supposed to wear it for her wedding but she ran away.”

  “Did she indeed? Maybe when the wind changed it made her restless, gave her a shove. Take a look at the back of the dress, Padraig O’Mally.”

  Padraig flinched.

  “Ah, you are afraid because it is the dress from your dream?” Muli asked.

  Padraig gawped at Muli.

  “How do you know about my dream?”

  “Sometimes we share our dreams, Padraig. Sometimes dreams serve to point us in the way we should be going or where we have come from.”

  Muli shuffled to the back of the cave and picked up the dress, fiddled round with the neck and revealed a label.

  “A clue!” he said, holding the dress towards Padraig.

  Padraig looked at the label.

  “Does it mean anything to you?”

  Padraig read the label.

  FLORENCE GALLIVAN. CORK

  “She must have been a big woman this Florence Gallivan. Is that who it belongs to?” he asked.

  “No. No. Florence Gallivan was the name of a dressmaker in Cork.”

  “Then how is it a clue?”

  Muli smiled, a secretive smile.

  “It’s a piece of a small puzzle. One of many small puzzles that make up one enormous puzzle.”

  “I still don’t understand.”

  “You will, Padraig O’Mally, you will. Already you are trying to solve many puzzles, is that so?”

  Padraig nodded.

  “I am, but at the moment I’m kind of confused.”

  “Things going round and round in your head but nothing makes sense?”

  “That’s right. Have you ever seen one of those glass snowflake domes that rich kids have? You know, there’s a scene inside and you shake them and the snow makes a blizzard. Siobhan Hanlon has one back in Ballygurry.”

  Muli nodded enthusiastically.

  “What’s inside your dome, Padraig?”

  “A lost statue and…”

  “And what else, Padraig?”

  Padraig was silent.

  “A face in a horse trough?” Muli proffered.

  “My mammy’s,” Padraig said in a faltering voice.

  “It’s a hard thing to lose someone you love, isn’t it Padraig?”

  “Do you know how it feels, Muli?”

  “I do, Padraig. Even a queer-looking thing like me feels loss.”

  “Was it your mammy that you lost?”

  “No, not my mammy, my mammy is still alive.”

  Padraig wondered if Muli was a bit short-changed up top. No way could his mammy still be alive, he was as old as the hills.

  “No, it was a woman called Therese that I lost a long time ago, but enough of that. Small boys aren’t interested in romance. Tell me what else you see in the dome.”

  “I’m not sure, every time I think I can see it it goes all blurred.”

  “It feels as though you have shaken up the dome but all the snow is refusing to settle?”

  “Yep.”

  “It will settle, Padraig, it will, and then all will be revealed.”

  Padraig felt suddenly faint, the smoke from the fire was making his eyes water, the smell of the fish made him nauseous. Muli’s face swam in front of him, a blur of lively eyes and a wobbling grin. He stumbled and Muli took hold of him.

  “Here, take a drink of this,” Muli said, and his voice sounded to Padraig as if it came from a faraway place.

  Padraig took the leather bag that Muli held out to him and drank deeply.

  “Muli,” he said, “when I saw you last night I thought you were the man from the fresco.”

  Muli grinned widely.

  “And so I am, Padraig, so I am.”

  “That’s not possible, though. It was painted hundreds of years ago. You look old, but not that old.”

  “Maybe it’s not me exactly but an ancestor of mine.”

  Padraig’s head swam as he tried to keep all his thoughts on the go.

  Muli went on.

  “That’s enough thinking for now. Come with me, Padraig O’Mally, for I have some secrets to show you.”

  Muli led him back up the slanting tunnel that led away from the rear of the cave and eventually brought them out in the middle of a large clump of long grass on the mountainside.

  “Sit down over there,” said Muli.

  Padraig sat cross-legged on the grass.

  “Now,” said Muli, “to take your mind off solving mysteries I will show you a few tricks of the nubeiro. Not to be attempted by the faint hearted. Though you could try these out and come to no harm, only those who have the wind in their soul can practise this kind of magic.

  “Right. The first thing that I show you is the fumeira. It is one way to conjure up a storm but not one to carry out in front of any ladies.”

  “Why?”

  “No more questions. Watch and see. First I find a molehill. Like this one here.”

  Padraig stared at the molehill, a mound of fine earth a few feet away from where Muli stood.

  “Then I take off my fine clothes.”

  Padraig laughed.

  “Now, being a shy fellow I won’t actually strip naked, but I take off the clothes, wrap them in a bundle, place them on the molehill and set light to them. Then, I stand upon them and then…”

  Muli’s eyes were glinting with such humour and wickedness that Padraig shivered in anticipation.

  “What then?”

  “Like magic, I disappear into the sky with the smoke and then da da da, like magic, within moments you have the storm!”

  “You mean you can make a storm just like that wherever you want?”

  Muli nodded, his face grown very serious now.

  “What is the second way?”

  “Ah, the second way, and no less successful is the polyvorina.”

  Padraig rolled the word round on his tongue and enjoyed the feel of it.

  “Now I will show you the polyvorina.”

  “And will we have a storm?”

  “But certainly.”

  Muli made a low bow to Padraig.

  “Senors, senoras, sefioritas, the great and marvellous Muli will perform today for you the polyvorina!”

  Padraig bit his nails in excitement, never taking his eyes off Muli. The old man beckoned to Padraig and he followed him across the grass to a bare patch of ground that looked as though someone had been busy preparing it for planting. Padraig sat down and watched as Muli scooped up handfuls of dusty earth and began to pile them into a mound.


  “The polyvorina is perhaps the best one to show you. It wouldn’t do after all to take off my clothes in front of such a grand gentleman as yourself.”

  Padraig grinned up at him, laughed aloud.

  Muli worked furiously for ten minutes or so and was soon sweating from his efforts.

  “Remember these things I show you today, for I am a very old man and my powers grow weaker.”

  “I will remember them,” said Padraig honestly, for he had a fine memory.

  When the pile of dust was almost as high as Padraig’s head, Muli stepped back and closed his eyes as though he were praying. Padraig wondered what he was going to do next.

  After a few moments Muli opened his eyes and smiled, a ragged, comical smile. Then quick as a wink he turned his back and pissed on to the pile of earth.

  Padraig leaped to his feet and stared in admiration. Muli pissed as fast and furious as a frightened donkey. He pissed an ocean. As the hot stream hit the pile of earth, dust rose into the air and Muli was soon hidden from his sight.

  The dust found its way into Padraig’s throat and made him cough. His eyes watered and he batted at the air with his hands to clear it away.

  Slowly, the cloud settled. A thin layer of reddish-brown dust now covered Padraig’s arms and legs. Muli was gone. It was as if he had been spirited away by magic. Padraig turned round and looked across the mountainside. A soft wind stirred the grass, but there was no sign of Muli, not even the mark of his bare feet on the dusty ground.

  Padraig called out his name. He turned round and round but there was no sign of the queer little fellow, just the sound of the breeze in the long grass and the shriek of an agitated bird passing overhead.

  The sky grew dark, angry purple clouds blanked out the sun and a cool breeze riffled through the grass. Below in the valley cow-bells clanked.

  Away in the distance the monastery of Santa Eulalia glowed with an incandescent light. Far away the clouds banked above Camiga, thunder growled and the first fat drops of rain began to fall.

  Padraig stretched out his arms wide and ran towards Santa Eulalia, nose-diving, curling and weaving through the clouds of poppies and dandelions that dipped their heads at his passing.

  Part Five