Star of the Sea

by Joseph O'Connor

  His face was haggard and he had not shaved. A taint of stale perspiration hung heavily around him, commingling with the odour of rotting meat. A speckling of dandruff lay on the shoulders of his evening jacket. But he was wearing a tie, as was Dixon himself.

  ‘Good-night, Mr Dixon, sir,’ the Chief Steward said. ‘Your usual bourbon?’

  Lord Kingscourt touched Dixon’s arm to prevent reply and said, ‘Fetch up a bottle of Bolly, would you, Taylor old thing? The ’39 if there’s any left.’ He turned to Dixon. ‘The ’24 is preferable but there’s a bit of a drought on. Still, we shall make do as best we can.’

  Dixon sat down beside him and looked at the gaming table. He noticed that Merridith had set out the cards not in hands nor in suits; and yet there was clearly a careful system to their arrangement.

  ‘I’m sort of designing a new set of rules for poker. Little hobby. Played under alphabetical values rather than numerical ones. Bit of fun. Don’t expect it will catch on terribly widely.’

  Silence settled. He fanned out the cards.

  ‘You received my note all right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Decent of you to come. Rather expected you mightn’t. Thought we should sort matters out man to man, as ’twere.’ He gave a strained sigh and peered at the ceiling. ‘Bit out of hand last night, old thing. Surfeit of the demon jungle juice, I expect. I should like to apologise for being such a barbarian. No offence intended to your honourable relative. Quite unnecessary. I am very ashamed.’

  ‘I’d had a few drinks myself as a matter of fact.’

  ‘Rather thought you had. Looked positively whey-faced. You colonial sissies simply can’t take it, of course.’

  ‘You saw the Reverend?’

  ‘Rather saw me, I’m afraid. And scuttled the other way. Tell you the truth, few enough regrets on that score. Can’t abide them. Any of the crew. For Christ’s sake, where’s that bloody grog?’

  ‘You’re not a believer?’

  His face cricked into a jaded yawn. ‘Might be something all right. Just don’t care for their activities in the unmentionable Famine. Prods capering about the countryside offering tenants tuck if they’ll convert. The other team saying they’ll burn if they take it. I say a plague on both their houses for a confederacy of omadhauns.’ He shot a bleak grin. ‘Irish word. Sorry.’

  The steward brought the champagne, opened it and poured two glasses. Merridith clinked Dixon’s – ‘here’s to confession’ – and took a long, luxuriating mouthful.

  ‘What think’st thou of this poison?’ he asked, raising the glass to his eyes and staring into it suspiciously.

  ‘I prefer bourbon.’

  ‘Mm. Do you know – I sometimes wonder if they don’t just slap a vintage label on any old muck. Kind of confidence trick. Half the time we wouldn’t know the difference, I expect. Be sold a pup, I mean.’

  ‘Tastes all right to me.’

  ‘Mm. Good. Though I’m not so sure myself.’ He gave a small apologetic belch. ‘Still. Beggars can’t be choosers, after all.’

  He refilled both glasses, produced a cigar from his breast pocket; tapped it firmly on the pea-green baize of the table. For a while it seemed to Dixon that he was going to say nothing more. He wondered if he was supposed to bring up the subject himself. Perhaps that was the way these matters were approached in England; the adulterer being expected to open the conversation with the husband. England was a place of many mysterious rules. Even its cuckoldries were choreographed.

  ‘Merridith, you said in your note that there was a reason you wished to see me. A certain important matter you wanted to discuss.’

  Lord Kingscourt turned to him and smiled placidly, though his eyes were weary and streaked with redness. ‘Hm?’

  ‘Your note.’

  ‘Ah. Sorry. Miles away.’

  He reached into his pocket and placed a book on the table.

  ‘You left it on the bar. Last night. When you departed. Thought you’d rather like to have it back.’

  He flipped open the cover and removed from the frontispiece a folded-up banknote that had been serving as bookmark.

  WUTHERING HEIGHTS

  by Ellis Bell

  T.C. NEWBY & CO.

  1847

  ‘The prodigal returns to his master,’ he grunted, through a dense mouthful of deep grey smoke.

  ‘That’s all you wanted? To give me a book?’

  Merridith shrugged listlessly. ‘Whatever else did you think?’

  ‘Keep it.’

  ‘Wouldn’t want to deprive you of aesthetic pleasure, old thing.’

  ‘I’ve read it already.’

  ‘Mm. Me too.’ Kingscourt nodded gravely as he pocketed the volume. ‘Half-way through in one sitting. Last night. Damn near made me weep at times. And then it put the willies up me so much I couldn’t sleep. Sat up till nearly dawn this morning devouring the rest. Gifted bloody blighter, this Bell cove, ain’t he. The darkness and so on. It’s quite preternatural. Rubs the words together till the sparks quite fly.’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  He gave a stare of bemused curiosity.

  ‘Well you know – just that it’s magnificent. Didn’t you find? Work of bloody genius, if you want an illiterate’s view.’ He took a long drink and wiped his mouth with his sleeve. ‘My God, I found it simply – I don’t say that all the critics will care for it. Probably they won’t, jealous little peasants. One or two of them fuelled by their own failure, of course. You know the type I mean, I expect. But they shan’t ignore it, not one of them in London. New York either, if it comes to that.’

  Merridith’s eyes stared at him from above the rim of the glass: unblinking. He put it down slowly and pulled on his cigar. Again he picked up the cards and began to shuffle them.

  ‘Christ the stoniness, do you know. The nothingness. Well it’s so clearly Connemara despite the clever way it’s disguised. Connemara, Yorkshire, all poor places. And yet it’s something else again. A kind of universal philosophical state. Keatsian in a sense. Didn’t you feel? The recurring motif of landscape as almost sentient; the way he’s characterised it, I mean. Where a second-team man would merely describe, like some Grub Street lush with the ability to raid a thesaurus.’

  ‘Merridith – ’

  ‘Know him at all? The talented Mr Bell?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘If you ever bump up against him, you must tell him he has a devotee. You might do, mightn’t you? In your literary ramblings?’

  ‘I’m given to understand it’s a pseudonym, actually.’

  ‘Aha. I thought so. In vino ventas.’ He chuckled and brushed the cigar ash from the sleeves of his jacket. ‘Just waiting to see if you’d own up to your baby.’

  ‘Own up?’

  ‘I know when I’m licked. I take it all back.’ Lord Kingscourt put down his glass and grasped Dixon’s right hand – ‘You’re a better man than I had you down for, Mr Bell. Many congratulations. You’re an artist. At last.’

  ‘Merridith – ’

  He gave a curt laugh and shook his head. ‘And do you know, I always thought you were simply an idiot, Dixon. You know, one of those amateurs just out to impress with mediocre short stories and cliché-ridden hackery. A dabbler who would stoop to any depth to be admired, even to using the agonies of the dying to set yourself up. But now – well, now I see the full truth of exactly what you are. The clouds have entirely lifted from my eyes.’

  ‘Look, Merridith – ’

  ‘Such an extraordinary insight into the female psyche, too. And of course – we both know whom your heroine is based on. A remarkably loving portrait; I thought so anyway. You’ve captured her quite uncannily. You don’t mind if I give it to her, do you? Or perhaps you’d rather give it to her yourself. She’d enjoy that even more, I dare say.’

  ‘Merridith, for God’s sake, I am not Ellis Bell.’

  ‘No,’ smiled Lord Kingscourt icily. ‘You’re not, old thing, are you?’

  Dixon felt the sp
latter of champagne in his face before he had even seen him lift the glass. By the time he had managed to wipe his smarting eyes Merridith was standing behind him and drying his cuffs with a napkin. He was trying not to shake, but his rage was making it difficult. When finally he spoke, his voice came hoarsely.

  ‘Come near my children’s mother again and I’ll cut your throat. You understand me?’

  ‘Go to Hell. If they’ll have you there.’

  ‘Go where, old love?’

  ‘You heard me, you bastard.’

  The punch smashed Dixon clean to the floor, spattering blood and saliva down the front of his jacket. The Chief Steward came running over and Merridith shoved him away. Picked up Dixon’s glass and drained it dry. Tremblingly placed it back on the bar.

  ‘Nugget of advice if one might, Little Bwana. Next time you play with the devil, try to have a good hand.’

  And he spat; the Earl. He spat on his enemy. And his enemy wiped the spit from his face.

  Dear son, I loved my native home with energy and pride,

  Till a blight came over all my crops; my sheep and cattle died.

  My rent and taxes were too high, I could not them redeem;

  It’s not the only reason why I left old Skibbereen.

  For it’s well I do remember that bleak December day,

  When the landlord and his sheriff came to drive us all away.

  They set our house on fire, with their cruel, foreign spleen;

  And that’s another reason why I left old Skibbereen.

  Oh father dear, the day will come in answer to the call,

  When Irishmen both brave and bold will rally one and all;

  I’d be the man to lead the band beneath that flag of green;

  And loud and high we’ll raise the cry –

  ‘Revenge for Skibbereen’.

  CHAPTER XV

  THE FATHER AND HIS SON

  AN ACCOUNT OF THE MORNING OF THE TWELFTH DAY OF THE VOYAGE; IN WHICH AN INTERVIEW BETWEEN LORD KINGSCOURT AND JONATHAN MERRIDITH IS CONVEYED; ALL THE WHILE MULVEY IS DRAWING CLOSER TO HIS TERRIBLE PURPOSE.

  33°01′W; 50°05′N

  — 7.45 A.M. —

  – Stammer again and I shall whip you again. The choice is entirely your own to make. What is the definition of a gentle breeze?

  Grinning snarl of pianokeys candleflame mirrored in black gloss lowly burning twisting translating from gold to pearl dancing with cast-back brother pianoblack reflection; a copy. Fake? Skeleton of the magnificent and once common Megaloceros Hibernicus Irish Elk hollowed sockets of antlers gryphonwings.

  – Mmwone in which a w-well-conditioned man-of-w-war, under all s-sail and clean full, mmwould go in s-smooth w-water from one to two knots, s-s-sir.

  The magnificent and once common Daniel Hareton Erard O’Connell grooves cold as a graven raven. Was it? Mama?

  – Correct David. And a fresh gale.

  – Mmmmwone in which the same sh-ship could kak-carry close hauled, sir.

  – A hurricane? Quickly. And do NOT stammer.

  – Please Papa. I’m afraid, Papa.

  The magnificent jawbone in common hand, firebelch spew from skullish mouth. Piano lid slams. Thunder of fists inside it. The candleflame putters and hissingly dies.

  David Merridith flailed awake, his face drizzled with rivulets of sweat, the pulse in his jugular driving like a steam-pump.

  ‘Papa. Papa. I’m afraid. Wake up.’

  His son and heir was shaking him hard by the arm. Milkwhite sailor suit and crumpled nightcap. Mouth messily bloodened with the juice of a plum. That body in the Lowerlock. Deathboy.

  Merridith elbowed up painfully, stupefied with sleep, his mouth sourly slickened by last night’s tobacco. The clock on his locker read ten to eight. A glass of water had overturned alongside it, spilling its contents over the pages of a novel.

  No pity.

  Grind their entrails.

  The wind wuthered and the ship rolled. Somewhere outside, a bell was clanging. Merridith had the strange sensation of being underground. He stretched his chin, massaged his aching neck. He felt as though his brain had come loose from its moorings.

  The cabin smelt warmly of his offspring’s hair, his lineny personal odour mingled with the reek of carbolic. Laura was never done washing his hair. Fearful of lice. Maggots in the fur.

  ‘How is my little captain?’

  ‘Woke up early.’

  ‘You wet in the bed?’

  The boy shook his head seriously and wiped his nose.

  ‘Good man,’ said Merridith. ‘See, I told you it would stop.’

  ‘Had a nightmare, though. Men were coming.’

  ‘Well it’s all right now. Are you all right?’

  He nodded glumly. ‘Maze I come in the tent?’

  ‘Just for a minute, mind. And speak properly.’

  The child clambered up on to the bunk and stuck his head beneath the sheets. He gave his father’s forearm a soft, fond bite. Merridith chuckled wearily and pushed him away. Soon he was gnawing the pillow like a puppy, giving strangled little yaps and barks as he chewed.

  ‘What are you doing, you bloodified lunatic?’

  ‘Hunting for rats.’

  ‘No rats here, my Captain.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Too expensive for them, I expect.’

  ‘Bobby saw one yesterday, the size of a wolfhound. Running up a rope where the poor people are.’

  ‘Don’t call them that, Jons.’

  ‘That’s what they are, isn’t it?’

  ‘I have told you before, Jonathan, don’t bloody call them that.’

  His tone was sharper than he’d meant it to be. The child gave a confused and long-suffering look at the injustice of being punished for truthfulness. He was right to feel affronted; Merridith knew it. Of course they were poor, and euphemism wouldn’t change that. Probably nothing would change it now.

  Lately he’d been snapping at the boys and at Laura. The strain, he supposed. But it wasn’t fair. He reached out and tousled his son’s already slovenly fringe.

  ‘What did he do with it?’

  ‘With what?’

  ‘The rat, you cluck.’

  ‘Shot it and gobbled it on a piece of crunchy toast.’

  The child flung himself on his back and performed a boisterous yawn. The ceiling of the cabin was low enough for him to be able to touch it with his feet. For a while he did that and not much else; stretching and pedalling like an upside-down unicyclist. Then he flopped down again heavily and pulled a pouting scowl.

  ‘I am bored. When shall we be in America?’

  ‘Couple of weeks.’

  ‘That’s not soon. That’s forever.’

  ‘Isn’t.’

  ‘Is.’

  ‘Ain’t.’

  ‘Is. And anyway Mummy says ain’t is common.’

  Merridith said nothing. He was feeling very thirsty.

  ‘Is that right, Pops?’

  ‘Everything any squaw says is always right. Now come on, old scout, let’s have a doze.’

  The boy lay reluctantly down on his side and Merridith curled behind him, feeling his animal warmth. Sleep rolled up gently: a wave on wet sand. Spindrift frothing in the salted air. A picture of his mother was trying to form; he saw her as though from a very great distance, walking Spiddal beach with her back turned away from him. Pausing to throw a bundle into the shallows. Gulls ascended from the seaweed and cheeped around her. And now she was drifting the orchard in spring; a confetti of apple blossom decorating her hair. A catch in his chest made him stir and drove her away. He could feel the boy’s heartbeat coming faintly through the sheet. From somewhere on the deck he heard the shouting of a sailor.

  ‘Pops?’

  ‘Mmn?’

  ‘Bobs has been telling fibs again.’

  ‘It isn’t cricket to peach on your brother, old thing. A shag’s brother is his greatest chum in the world.’

  ‘He says a man came into his cabin early ye
sterday morning.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘He had a big knife like a hunter’s. And a funny sort of black mask on his face. With holes cut away for his eyes and his mouth. He made a funny clomping sound when he walked.’

  ‘I expect he had horns and a long tail also.’

  The child chuckled ludicrously. ‘Nooh, Pops.’

  ‘You shall have to instruct Bobs to look more closely next time, shan’t you. All good monsters have horns and a tail.’

  ‘He says he woke up and the man was standing there looking down at him. All in black. He said – “what room does your daddo sleep in?’”

  ‘That was polite of him. What did Bobs say?’

  ‘Said he didn’t know, but he’d better cut along or he’d biff him one in the head. Then he heard someone coming and bolted out the window, see.’

  ‘Good for him. Now go to sleep.’

  ‘Can’t.’

  ‘Then scuttle down to Mary and she’ll make it all better.’

  ‘May I have some stinking poxlate for breakfast?’

  ‘Speak properly, Jons. Don’t be a bloody ninny.’

  The child uttered a groan of mock impatience, as though dealing with an imbecile who had approached him for alms; the kind of sigh Merridith had often heard Laura give in Athens when contending with a waiter who pretended not to know any English. ‘Drinking chocolate, Pops. May I have some of that?’

  ‘If Mary says so, you can have a double whiskey.’

  His son dropped to the boards and picked up a shirt. He placed it over his head and flapped his arms: a ghost of boyhood in a temperance illustration. When his father didn’t react, he clicked his tongue and tossed the shirt on the back of an armchair.

  ‘Pops?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Did you feel sad when you were small? That you didn’t have a brother?’

  He looked at his boy. His beautiful guilelessness. It reminded him of how Laura used to look around the time that they met.

  ‘Well I did have, old thing. In a way, that is. Before the old stork brought me along he’d brought another little tyke. My big bruv, he would have been.’