Father Neil's Monkeyshines

by Boyd, Neil;

  Mrs. Bacon cooled dramatically toward me.

  “What may I ask does he want books for?”

  She must have imagined any number of illicit purposes Barney might put her precious books to. Such as lighting the fire with them.

  “To look at,” I said.

  “Mind he only takes out picture books, then.”

  I disliked her bureaucratic tone. I said, “He’ll take out whichever ones he fancies.”

  “Is that dog a ratepayer, too?”

  “He’s only looking around,” I said.

  Behind a shelf, Barney said, “I never knew you had the sauce, Father. Now when do they start dishing ’em out?”

  “You can choose,” I said.

  “Cor.”

  He found the art section where the biggest and glossiest books were on display and pulled ten of them out.

  “Only four at a time, I’m afraid.”

  He doubted the value of only four but he accepted my word for it.

  Later, I heard that Liz and her Three Little Sins had also joined the library. That added sixteen to Barney’s four so the shelf was full. Rembrandt rubbed shoulders with Heinz tomato ketchup and Leonardo with a book on Manx cats.

  From time to time, Barney showed me his collection, together with a batch of threatening postcards signed by Mrs. Bacon.

  “That woman,” he said, “must be daft. Why does she keep writing to me when she knows I can’t read.”

  Even when I explained Mrs. Bacon’s point of view, it carried no weight. Liz had convinced him that in some mysterious way, he had paid for them many times in taxes of various kinds over the years. He ought really to demand compensation.

  A few months later when I ran into Barney, he handed me the most recent postcard. He’d run up a fine of twenty-three pounds.

  “What rubbish,” Barney said, and in my heart I agreed with him. “Me bloomin’ ’ouse ain’t worth that.”

  All the same, I gave the library and the chief librarian a wide berth.

  To reward me, one Sunday Barney turned up at church with Big Liz for company. “Just this once,” he said, as he tied Hairy Harry to the railings outside. “’E’s excused, Father, cos ’e’s a prod.”

  I was apprehensive. “You are religious, aren’t you, Barney?”

  “’Course I am. I won a raffle once, didn’t I?” This proved to him beyond doubt that God exists and was on his side. “Even though,” he added, “it were only for a can of macaroni.”

  The pews were not made with Liz in mind. When she knelt, she had to sit as well.

  My sermon happened to be on one of Jesus’s parables. Workers in the vineyard complained that their boss had got their wage packets wrong. He gave the same to those who worked all day and those who only worked an hour.

  Barney and Liz, seated under the pulpit, thought this was hilarious. Barney was laughing and nudging first Liz, then a rather stuffy lady on his other side who tried to distance herself from him. Barney shuffled along the bench after her, asking if Father Boyd was or wasn’t a card.

  He kept laughing. “That’s very good, that is,” and Liz said, “Yes, Pa. He should be on the halls.”

  Finally, he cracked his knuckles like pistol shots to express his delight.

  “I’ll ’ave to come again,” Barney said after mass, as Hairy Harry jumped up and licked me clean.

  I pleaded with him “Remember your promise. Only once, Barney. Don’t overdo it.”

  “Only jokin’,” he said.

  The first hint of trouble was when Liz came to the presbytery.

  I sat her down on a chair that suddenly looked smaller than before.

  She handed me a letter from the council. It informed Barney that there was a compulsory purchase order on his house, to take effect in three months’ time. The whole area was targeted for development. There were to be new blocks of flats and a community center.

  In my view, the development was long overdue but it was bound to be a bitter blow to Barney. He put it down to that Bacon lady in the library who hated him because he wouldn’t bring her books back.

  So far, Liz had told him, the council wanted to thank him for keeping his vegetable patch neat and tidy.

  When I visited him, Barney was in his smoky kitchen with his boots on the table, slicing a sack of seed potatoes for planting. Seeing me, he brightened up.

  “Still digging for victory,” he said.

  I began to explain that the council had interesting plans for his house. In a word, they wanted to buy it.

  “Who wouldn’t?” he said, “but it ain’t for sale now or never.”

  Liz, realizing she had enlisted too timid an ally, bent over her dad like a rugby scrum.

  “They’re making you,” she hollered.

  “Blimey, Liz, I wa’n’t deaf till you just shouted in me ear.”

  “They’re gonna shift you out of here, Pop. They’ve got the power, the sods.”

  “Over my dead body,” Barney retorted. “Hitler couldn’t get me out of here and neither will they.” He went on methodically slicing his spuds. “What would they do with it, anyhow?”

  “Pull it down,” I said.

  “Don’t be daft, Father. Why buy it and then tear it down?”

  He started rambling on about his great-grandfather and how his wife had died there, also their little boy whom I hadn’t heard mentioned before.

  That derelict house, smelling of fish, leeks, and paraffin, was a sacred shrine to him. He wasn’t budging.

  I talked things over with Father Duddleswell. That’s when the row began.

  I came down squarely on the side of the council. I had great affection for Barney but his place had had its day.

  Father D disagreed. “Red tape, so it is. Officials sign a wicked order like that and just send it through the post to an old man who cannot read. ’Tis a wonder they get any shut-eye at night.”

  “The council’s officers are not absent Irish landlords evicting Irish peasants.”

  “Are they not?”

  “You don’t suppose they enjoy this.”

  He spotted my anger. “You are right, lad, they do not even think about it, which is more irresponsible still.”

  “You can’t want Barney living in that hen coop?”

  “’Tis not for anyone but Barney to decide where he wants to live. Ah,” he said, dismissing my views, “you skate over the surface of things like a water spider.”

  I clenched my teeth to hold back a reply I would regret.

  “Let me tell you a tale, lad, if I may. A few years past, I took Dr. Daley with me to the town where I was born. I wanted him to witness this historic place, like, so he could put a plaque on it if and when I die. I knew the old town by heart, so to say. Without looking, I pointed up and said, ‘There came I into the world.’ ‘Where, says Donal?’ I looked up and see nothing but a hole in the sky. The house where I was born had been demolished. It was no more. I have always cherished an image of that room. Meself emerging from me dear mother into the light of day, with my entire career ahead of me. There is a black grate there, with a fire burning in it, a big bed, a picture of me dear parents’ wedding on the wall, the candles lit to keep the night away. And now this sacred space was but part of the sky.”

  He peered over his glasses, misty-eyed, to see how I was reacting.

  “I felt bereaved, Father Neil. As if meself was not entirely real. I stamped on the pavement, not out of anger or pique, God forbid, but simply to makes sure I still existed.”

  His voice assumed a quiet, tender, almost reverential tone.

  “Can you understand that, Father Neil?”

  “No,” I said, and walked out.

  Keen as I was to console Barney, I had no wish to reinforce his stubbornness.

  The council wrote again, quoting a fair price for his ho
use and promising a new flat at a modest rent.

  “You will be better off,” I said, adding hurriedly, “in some ways.”

  “How, Father? Moneywise? I’d have a neater tidier place? Less rheumatics? Come,” and he led me to his window.

  “Look out there, Father.” There wasn’t much to see as far as I was concerned. “That’s my territory, that is. The blackbird has its nest, why not me? See that fence? I like leaning on it and looking over it. Like the edge of my body, that fence is. And down there, the earth. It feels different every day and every moment of every day. Not just warmer or colder by the seasons. But like it’s awake or sleeping. In the spring, it almost talks to me. It’s so wise, the earth is. Been here forever, I suppose. Even Hairy Harry knows there’s something special about the earth. He prefers it to lino.”

  The hound came and licked his hand in sympathy.

  Realizing that a few rooms on stilts with window boxes could not compensate Barney for the loss of his heritage, I persuaded the council to allocate him a ground-floor flat, so he was nearer to the earth.

  Next, I rented a half-acre allotment for a few shillings a year near where he would be living. I brought Barney to see it.

  It was overgrown with weeds and nettles; it was strewn with stones and rusted iron bars, the remnants of wartime fortifications.

  “What do you think, Barney?”

  “I’m sure you’ll make a go of it,” he said.

  “I was thinking of it for you. You could always take it over if the worst comes to the worst.”

  He gripped my arm in gratitude.

  “It’ll never come to that, Father. I’ll nail myself to the wall first.” He bowed his head humbly. “It’s hard to explain but I ain’t got nothing else.”

  “I’ve been to see the flat. Ground floor. Bathroom. Nice outlook.”

  “I don’t fancy sitting around doing nothing all day like a Jew on the Sabbath. I’d sooner be a tramp and sleep in an ’edge.”

  I went home saddened to tell Father D that Barney was still clinging to his hovel and resisting progress.

  “Of course, he is, lad. A sensible feller is Barney Tubman.”

  It was one of those times when we were marching to different drums.

  “Take away his home, Father Neil, and you take away his freedom. Nothing will have meaning for him after that. They are not just wanting to pull out his teeth, y’know, but to uproot him, to tear up his faith in life.” He punched the palm of his left hand. “Who gave them that right?”

  I maintained a loud silence.

  “’Tis not only his property he is guarding; that is holy enough. But himself and his memories and his family ghosts. Like it or not, that hovel, as you call it, is past, present, and future to Barney. ’Tis his ancestors and great-grandad and great-grandchildren. ’Tis England to him and his whole world.”

  “I see that.”

  “Do you? Do you really?”

  “All right, I don’t understand anything about him. I’m so glad you know all there is to know.”

  It was his turn to bite his tongue.

  “Listen,” I said, “I’m looking to his best interests.”

  “Ah, me broth of a boy, maybe Barney is not like you. Maybe he’s not interested in his best interests. Maybe he has best interests you never even heard of.”

  “Could be,” I grunted, conceding nothing.

  “Maybe you only have in mind your own best interest.”

  “What might that be?”

  “A quiet life.”

  I tugged at my hair. “I’m simply trying to get him to accept the inevitable.”

  “When,” he butted in, “you should be encouraging him to fight the council like hell.”

  For a moment, I was too breathless to be angry.

  “You, Father Neil, would have tried to persuade Jesus not to go to Jerusalem in case he got himself crucified.”

  “Is that so,” I said, knowing he was dead right about that. “If you ask me, Barney’s being a foolish old man.”

  That did it.

  “God must have forgotten to give you a ration book for brains, boy. Let me tell you that old man’s foolishness is wiser than any wisdom of yours. You help him fight, you hear me?”

  I welcomed the gloves coming off.

  “He’s making a damn nuisance of himself to no purpose.”

  Father D rose from his chair and stomped up and down.

  “Ah, so you think he should be grateful to the Pharaohs on the council for making him an outcast in his own land. Poor, nasty, frivolous Barney Tubman refusing expensive council handouts while they take from him the only thing he wants.”

  To get a hearing, I dropped to a whisper. “If he fights, he’ll lose.”

  Father D almost squared up to me. “Let him lose, then, boyo, he will be all the more a man for it. At least he will be able to look himself in the eyes.”

  I spoke my next piece with a heavy emphasis. “It will only make him unhappy.”

  Quick as a flash, he said, “Unhappiness, too, goes into the making of a man.”

  I’d had enough. Preparing to leave: “You would take responsibility for that?” he nodded. “Then I’m glad you’re calling the shots this time.”

  “He will be much unhappier if he does not fight, Father Neil. So go tell him, Fight ’em, Barney, and I will be behind you all the way.”

  “No.”

  “Tell him, Make a bloody big noise, Barney. Do not give them the satisfaction of having it all their own way. Do not let them knock your place down.”

  The last words of his I heard as I stormed out were, “Don’t make that brave old man a mealy-mouthed conformist like yourself.”

  The developers moved into the area. When it rained, mud was everywhere. When the sun shone, clouds of dust brought on Barney’s bronchitis. His chest wheezed, his red eyes twitched, he had a runny nose and a hacking cough. If you were near him when he sneezed it was like being knifed in the head.

  He took to sleeping nights in his chair. He said it helped him breathe easier. More likely, it was so he was ready if his place was invaded under cover of dark.

  Soon, only his house was left standing in the street and a big hoarding advertising Bovril: “A Little Bovril Keeps the Doctor Away.”

  Barney needed no encouragement from anyone to continue the fight. He made no arrangements for moving his belongings and, as eviction day drew near, he started barricading himself in.

  During a lunchtime visit, I found him eating corned beef and baked beans, washed down by scrumpy cider. Cans and bottles were stacked everywhere in preparation for a long siege.

  “I don’t like it,” I confessed.

  “Whose side are you on, Father?”

  It was like a squeeze-box talking.

  Ever the coward, I replied, “Whose do you think, my friend?” and I gripped his arm, reassuringly.

  “Good for you, Father. You won’t mind taking my dog for a walk, then.”

  That day and the next, Hairy Harry took me for a walk while Barney reinforced his defenses. Barbed wire was strategically placed. The windows were barred inside and out. Extra locks were fitted on the front door.

  I was there the day men from the council arrived. Two of them were in bowler hats. Very kind-looking they were, too, not at all vengeful, full of apologies. They even said sorry for the noise raised by the developers.

  After them came the bailiffs, no less polite.

  Behind his barricade, Barney refused to parley with them.

  Finally, the law arrived. A superintendent of police addressed him through a loudhailer. He was crisp and firm. This was Barney’s last chance. If he didn’t leave of his own free will, they would have to tear the barricades down. He was given twenty-four hours to comply.

  Next morning, I went straight after breakfast to Barney
’s place. I’d arranged to meet Liz there so we could persuade her dad to surrender. She was late, so I took the dog for a walk.

  When I returned, I found a crowd had gathered. There were bailiffs, a few reporters, representatives of the council, sightseers, and a few youngsters booing for the heck of it.

  But no Liz.

  In the distance, I heard the constant drone of diggers and bulldozers. The air was thick with dust.

  Two police cars drew up. The super shouted out for Barney to come out immediately. Receiving no reply, he issued orders for two young constables to put on leather gloves and begin dismantling the defenses. It was the end.

  The two coppers had wrenched the bolts off the front door with a crowbar when Barney threw open a shutter and appeared striped against the bars of the window.

  “That’s far enough,” he called out.

  The coppers took no notice until Barney held up a petrol can and poured the contents over his head and shoulders. He showed them a box of matches and said, in a quivery voice: “One more move and I’ll set meself alight.”

  The superintendent called his men off. After a brief consultation, he withdrew his forces and drove away.

  “Hello, Barney,” I said after the crowd had dispersed. “It’s me.”

  He unlocked the door and let me in.

  “That was a near thing, Father.” He put the kettle on. “I never interfered with no one. Why can’t they let me be?”

  Not for the first time, I looked around me and despaired. Was this impoverished place, however sacred, worth all this trouble?

  I said, “Would you really have burned yourself alive?”

  “’Course not, Father.”

  I relaxed. “I was terrified you might strike that match.”

  “What was the point? It was only water in that can.” His teeth were chattering. “Pass me that towel, Father, before I catch me death.”

  “Wait a minute.” I clicked my fingers. “I know who put you up to this.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  “Barney!”

  “It wasn’t Father Duddleswell.”

  “Uncross your fingers, Barney.”