The Wake (And What Jeremiah Did Next)

by Colm Herron

  I was nodding knowingly, not wanting to let on.

  “How did you know I knew Aisling O’Connor?”

  “I saw you with her when I was getting petrol in Claudy.” There was a smile in his voice. He’d waited for me to come out of the chemist’s and sat watching me probably when I was trying to fix my feet. Why had he done this? I was nothing to him.

  “There they are,” he said. “They’ve made good progress.”

  We eased up behind them and some people at the tail end turned their heads to us. One of them waved. Left hand side of the road, orderly march, solid citizens, you wouldn’t have thought some of them were out to bring down the state.

  “I could let you out now but if you wouldn’t mind I’d like to go on ahead a bit to see something. I’m nervous to tell you the truth about what might be up the road and I want to check it out. I’ll come back then and drop you. Is that okay?”

  “Okay.” A lazy lassitude had settled on me, delayed reaction probably to my night with Aisling and the backlog of lost sleep, and I was so comfortable I felt like I might have to be winkled out of the seat when the time came.

  We overtook the marchers then with some toots of the horn and inside of about five minutes I saw something that got me sitting up straight. Just across the road from the bridge at Burntollet there was a line of RUC jeeps and a couple of men with big sticks in their hands were standing talking to four or five cops.

  “What about that,” Frank Gogarty whispered, driving on trying not to make it obvious he was looking at them but they couldn’t have missed his head turning. We went on up the hill at normal speed and when we got round the next bend he did a quick reversing job into a laneway and headed slowly back down towards Burntollet.

  “We’d better let the marchers know,” I said and it was Aisling I was thinking of.

  “Hold on, they won’t be here for another while yet.” And he stopped near the top of the hill, pulling into the left where we could see the men talking to the cops. The thing was, if we could see them then they could see us.

  “They can see us,” I said. “Maybe we’d better go.”

  “Take your time. Here, I’m going to get out of the car now to look at the engine. You come with me.”

  He leaned forward and pulled a lever somewhere and the bonnet gave a nervous jump. The cops and the guys holding the sticks were only about a hundred yards away. Was he mad? We got out of the car and he lifted the bonnet, fixed it carefully on its stand and peered down at the engine.

  “Looks all right,” I said standing there on my nerves.

  “Looks anything but all right. Turn your head round a bit past me. Two o’clock. See up behind where the jeeps are? Can you see? Two o’clock. Can you see the people up there?”

  I gave a quick look. The ones I saw were more like matchstick men, hurrying back and forward carrying things. I didn’t know what they were until this big jagged-looking stone, more like a middle-sized rock it was, dropped out of one of their arms.

  “Christ, that’s ammunition. That could kill somebody. And the police know I’ll bet you. They must know. We have to stop the march. ”

  “Right, we’ll go now. No point in delaying.” He dropped the bonnet with a crash and I nearly wet myself. We got back into the car. I sat waiting, wondering why Frank wasn’t starting the engine. Then I understood why. One of the police jeeps was crawling up the hill towards us. Time seemed to slow to the speed of the thing.

  The music was still playing. Brahms’ Lullaby, unmistakable. Must be a tape. The jeep took a breather, then changed down a gear. Funny the things come into your head. I was sitting there quaking waiting for the front of the march to come over the brow of the hill behind where the cops were and at the same time I was embarrassed for Frank because I could hear the frightened wheeze in his chest but then when I held my breath to check for certain I realized it was coming from me.

  “The marchers will be here any minute,” I said.

  “It’ll be all right. They couldn’t possibly make it in that time. We have to wait anyway to see what our friend wants.”

  The jeep juddered to a stop right in front of us and a cop got out in stages, deliberately maybe, maybe he was trying to put the shits up us, one leg, then the big bottlegreen ass, then the other leg, gun in holster swaying, baton tucked handy. I couldn’t see right but I think there was someone in the passenger seat.

  Frank touched my arm. “Say nothing.”

  “Having a spot of bother there?” I didn’t see the face, didn’t look at it to tell you the truth.

  “No, we’re fine,” said Frank. “We were just about to head back to Claudy.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes, I left something behind there, at the petrol station.”

  “What would that be then? What did you leave in Claudy?”

  “My gloves.”

  “Gloves?” Pause. “Would that not be them there now?”

  “Sorry?”

  “On the dashboard. Them look like gloves to me.”

  In case we couldn’t see them he reached his hand in the window and touched a pair of leather gloves sitting in front of Frank’s face.

  “Ah, those are my spare ones.”

  “Hm. Very good. And what was it in the engine was bothering you?”

  “What?”

  “You were looking at the engine there.”

  “Ah, it was okay actually. I heard a knocking sound and I thought I’d better see.”

  That would have been my heart.

  “But everything seems to be in order.”

  “It’s as well to be sure about these things sir. License?”

  “Pardon?”

  “License please. May I see your license?”

  Two men in civvies walked down past the car and one of them called out “All right Bob?” The other one had some kind of a rod under his arm. I saw it better as they walked on. It was a fucking poker.

  “Hi lads. Take it easy now. Thank you sir. Let’s have a look here.” He perused the license for what seemed like about two minutes and then peered at Frank’s face. “You’re something in this so-called civil rights thing, aren’t you, Mister Gogarty?”

  “That’s right. I’m vice-chairman.”

  “And the Wolfe Tone thing, society is it they call it? You’re in that too?”

  “I am. Good Protestant Irishman.”

  “Well now, are you a Protestant? I wouldn’t have thought that now.”

  “No, I mean Wolfe Tone was a good Protestant Irishman.” Smiling. Trying to smile.

  “I’ll let that pass sir. And who would your friend be?”

  “Ah, this is Jeremiah Coffey.”

  “I’d like your friend to speak for himself if you don’t mind please. Name?”

  “Jeremiah Coffey.”

  “ID?”

  I already had my license out nearly sticking to my hand and leaned over to give it to him. Another minute or maybe two, eyes darting back and forward between me and the license. Then

  “Carry on.”

  We were away. As we drove down the hill towards the clutch of people standing opposite the bridge I could see that the number of civilians had grown. Ten, fifteen maybe, chatting, some among themselves, others to policemen. Frank gathered speed after he passed them, saying nothing. The plum-soft Sperrins lay ranged to our right, undulating and peaceful like on a picture postcard. Normally they’d be coated white this time of year but now they were more like a purple haze.

  “They must be close,” he said. They were close all right, round another bend, struggling up a hill, two tired banners fluttering. Frank stopped the car and got out, spoke to Michael Farrell and someone else, seemed to remonstrate with them and after a minute came back.

  “They’re going ahead,” he said as he got into the car. He started up the engine, waved to the marchers as he passed them and stopped a couple of hundred yards down the road pulling over to the side just beyond a wide laneway. As he reversed he said, “I can understand why. Some
things have to be done. People have to know what sort of a society we’re living in.”

  We chugged in low gear behind the march and when we got to the top of the hill above Burntollet I said, “Can we lock the doors?”

  He didn’t answer and I felt foolish. No, not foolish, I felt like a heel. Aisling was out there and I’d want to be able to open the door quickly and pull her in. One of those rocks thrown down from the field could kill her. So could a police baton or a beating by one of these boys that looked as if they were going to be let run riot. I was in the middle of whispering a Hail Mary into myself when it all started to happen. Everything was calm one second and the next it was like we’d arrived in the middle of it. Marchers were being hit with sticks and there were stones flying across in front of the windscreen from our right. A girl was on the ground in front of us out for the count and this bullnecked man was still laying into her with something that looked like the leg of a chair.

  Where was Aisling? If I’d got out I’d have been no help, they’d have beaten me to a pulp. You could see them coming in legions now carrying cudgels, these weren’t sticks, these were big heavy clubs, past the cops standing there with their batons hanging out of their hands. And then the next shock. I was jolted forward and suddenly we were stopped, blocked, we couldn’t move, we’d nowhere to go. Wherever she was she wasn’t there. I saw marchers scrambling over the ditch into the field to our left and the Prods going after them. Some of them had grabbed ones and were holding them up by the hair the way Indians in cowboy movies hold up paleface scalps. A boy standing, fifteen, sixteen, different looking from the others, neatly dressed, an ash-plant in his hand like you’d have seen an old man with, not sure what to do, standing at the ditch wondering whether to follow maybe, then struck out at the shins of someone running past him.

  “That’s my banner!”

  “What?”

  “That’s my banner!” Frank was reaching for the door handle. Christ. There he was right in front of us, the major himself, Major Ronald Bunting, the guy that led the singing of The Sash outside Belfast city hall on the first, there he was dragging his feet back and forward as if he was wiping the mud off them on top of a banner lying tangled on the road, then jumping up and down laughing and dancing like a madman. He looked like he was singing too part of the time but I couldn’t hear with the doors and windows closed. I didn’t see Frank going but suddenly there was a rush of shouting in my ears and the car door slammed and the shouting stopped and he was gone. Next thing I saw him through the silent screen in front of me pushing Bunting away and then I couldn’t see right, people were blocking my view and somebody was lying on the bonnet and I was rocking from side to side. Then my door flew open and I thought, I’m for it now, they’re going to drag me out.

  “Here are the keys. Take the wheel.” It was Frank and his face was covered in blood. He was rubbing at his eyes with one hand and giving me car keys with the other. They were slippery. I took them, jerked myself out and let him in. The odd thought occurred to me, I think it was then or maybe it was later, hard to know, that I wasn’t covered to drive someone else’s car, in other words once I sat behind the wheel I’d actually be breaking the law and in front of I don’t know how many policemen too.

  How I got round the front to the driver’s side through the milling attackers and marchers was weird. I don’t remember it all but I remember the cop and the club. I bumped into the back of a cop and said sorry. Sorry. I told him I was sorry. He didn’t move, he didn’t turn, and I had to go round him. There was a club with two nails in it on the road next to his feet and I picked it up. I think maybe I was thinking this might puncture our tires but it could have been some instinct was working there somewhere, like nobody was going to go for me with that in my hand, none of the marchers anyway and none of the attackers, definitely not. So for whatever number of seconds it took me to get through the mill and the mayhem I was near enough untouchable. And the funny thing is, to this day I couldn’t tell you what I did with the club. I know I didn’t take it into the car with me but I don’t remember dropping it.

  “I’m sorry to put you through this.” He’d got a towel out of somewhere and had it on his head. “Could you drive me to the hospital?”

  “Okay. Sure.” The cop was in the way. The keys were sticky and slimy at the same time and I dropped them twice before I managed to switch on the engine, found the horn and sounded it. The cop turned round. I smiled apologetically for giving him a start. He looked at me frowning. I smiled again, eyes open wide, eyebrows raised artlessly, trustingly. Let us through please, I smiled, we’re innocent travellers, we’ve just come on this unfortunate whatever it is and we need to get through. If you would be so good. Somebody outside my window screamed “Please! Please don’t! No! No!” I raised my right hand respectfully to the cop, gave the suggestion of a wave and hoped my demeanor was right. Respect above all else, respect was what was needed here. He turned and began to walk slowly backwards, waving us towards him like he was on point duty, looking to right and left, saying some things to men with clubs. I moved forward in first gear, car jumping as I struggled to get used to the clutch. Don’t let it cut out, I cried to myself.

  “My God, look at that poor girl.”

  I mechanically followed Frank’s gazing direction and saw a heavyset woman that looked like Mussolini in drag being beaten with fists and her nose spurting. It was Frances. I looked around for Aisling but she wasn’t there. The cop was staring quizzically at me, beckoning away at me, and I found I wasn’t moving. I raised my hand smiling cringing and drove slowly on.

  “Here, stop. Help her into the car.”

  “I can’t. If I try and do that we’re finished. They’ll get me and that won’t help any of us.”

  He didn’t answer, saw the sense in what I was saying I suppose or maybe decided he was in the hands of a heartless bastard. Suddenly like fog lifting the road was clear in front of us and the cop was no more and I put the boot down and before I knew it we were in Drumahoe. Sleepy Drumahoe with watchers standing sentinel on footpaths waiting. Then Altnagelvin Hospital, trying to remember where the turn to casualty was. I could have cried I was that relieved.

  “You’ll be sorted in here I hope. How do you feel?”

  “I’m all right. I’ll be all right. It’ll take a lot more than sticks and stones.”

  “I’ll wait for you. Just need to find a parking place here.”

  “No, I’ll tell you what. Just leave me off at casualty and drive on into the city. I’m not going to impose on you any further, I’ve put you through enough.”

  Looking for the turn to casualty. “But what about you? How will you?”

  “I’ll find my way to Guildhall Square. That’s where they’re going to assemble. I know Derry. Could we arrange to meet a certain time somewhere and you could tell me then where you’ve parked the car?”

  “Okay. Let’s see, what time is it now? Right, how about half three in the City Hotel? You could be ages here waiting.”

  “That’s the job. Just drop me here. Is this the entrance to casualty?”

  “Aye. But I don’t like leaving you. It doesn’t seem right.”

  “I’m safe now Jeremiah. I’m not going to bleed to death.” Smiling warpainted face under the red turban. “Thanks, you’ve been brilliant.”

  I drove into Derry, past crowds gathered at Irish Street like for a carnival on a newly-mown grass banking littered with mounds of stones, into a city with traffic starting and stopping in ordinary ways. Brilliant. Is that what I’ve been, is that what I am, the brilliant selfpreserver? Well that’s okay isn’t it, that’s the human impulse.

  I found a parking spot near the top of Bridge Street, walked away looking back at number plate, feet crucified, keys stickydry in trousers pocket. Tyrone registration, should be safe, mixed bag of religions up there, bag of cats. What a bloody country. Kings and tribes at each other’s throats long before Westminster, before the Normans, before Christ for Christ sake, the most dist
ressful country that ever yet was seen.

  What did you call the guy that brought the Normans here over some woman he was banging? Dermot MacMurrough, that was him. Bring me the head of Dermot MacMurrough. And his balls too when you’re at it. And out at Burntollet protesting Protestants programd to attack any threat to their way of life and more of them at Irish Street also stating their Britishness. Give me love, give me you know what anyday and everything else can go to hell. Where is Aisling? If she gets by Burntollet she’ll only have one more gauntlet left to run. I’m worrying about her now I’m safe, worried about myself when I was scared. But sure that’s the way anybody would feel. She’ll be fine, she knows how to take care of herself. Run Jeremiah, run, she said in Duke Street the day of the fifth and she ran too. I was batoned and none of them touched her.

  A girl coiffured to the eyeballs bumped into me turning the corner at the bottom of Bridge Street fumbling in her handbag for something. Nice smell off her. Sorry she said and smiled. Not a patch on Aisling. Protestant eyes too. She’ll be okay. As long as she didn’t see Frances getting punched and go and try and help her. She wasn’t anywhere to be seen, they were well separated, she wouldn’t have got involved. I’ll see her in the City Hotel at four o’clock if not before. How long’s that? Plenty time.

  Foyle Street was bad and getting worse the further I got on it. I thought of septicaemia. Maybe I should wash the two of them, wash them and treat them, might even take a bath and all, get the whole hog cleaned. Be set for tonight then. Nuisance, time-consuming, but still be worth it. Taxi! Thanks, thought you weren’t going to stop there. Marlborough Terrace please. Christ, what did I say? Dead giveaway. Fenian written all over it. I appreciate you stopping, good to get sitting down. My feet. No no, I wasn’t marching. It’s these corns, let them go too far. That’s right, Marlborough Terrace. Yeah, I heard that myself. Somebody said there was trouble out past Drumahoe somewhere. Terrible country.

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