The Minstrel Boy

by A. J. Cronin

  Maley smiled. ‘ But yes, I could have swindled you. But that’s not James Maley. Besides, I’ve a hunch you’ll fill the hotel. Now,’ he stood up, ‘ I’ll send Joe in with a drop of tea. He’ll show you to your room. And your dinner will come later.’

  He took Desmonde’s limp hand in a firm clasp, turned, and was gone.

  Alone, Desmonde felt torn between a rising tide of joyful relief and the nervous reaction of tears. The entry of Joe, smiling all over his face, saved him from giving way.

  ‘I know how you feel, sir. You’ve made a smash hit and I’m delighted. Now drink up your tea, it’s good and hot.’

  ‘Thank you, Joe. Thank you a thousand times.’ His voice broke. He could say no more.

  Joe watched with a paternal air while Desmonde gratefully gulped the hot tea.

  ‘There’s a couple of ladies, Mrs Boland and her sister from Ballsbridge, really nice people, ladies of quality, I know them well. They asked if you would favour them by coming to their table.’

  Desmonde shook his head.

  ‘No, Joe. Please thank them, but let it be known that I have made a resolution never, never to accept such invitations.’

  ‘I understand, sir. And I respect you for it. Of course, these ladies, and others like them, who come to us, are quite first class – really good people. Now, if you’re finished I’ll take you to your room.’

  The room, conveniently near on the ground floor, was small with a wash basin and a neat single bed, a window that looked out on the yard, completely quiet at this hour. Desmonde threw himself down on the bed and closed his eyes.

  ‘You’ve a good hour and more before dinner, sir,’ Joe said, as he closed the door.

  Desmonde slept until seven o’clock, awakened by Joe bringing in his dinner.

  ‘Mr Maley chose it himself for you,’ Joe said, laying the well equipped tray on a small table near the window. ‘He thought something light might be in order for your first night.’ He added, on his way to the door: ‘You should see the evening papers, sir. They’re a fair treat!’

  Desmonde had no interest in what the papers might say of him. Hardened by the scurrilous treatment he had already received, his mind was passive, his state of being in a cloak of total indifference, of curious non-receptivity. Good or bad, everything was superficial, nothing important.

  Yet he was perfectly able to enjoy his dinner: a cup of delicious beef bouillon, followed by a thick slice of turbot and string potatoes, suitably accompanied by two glasses of white wine. The dessert was chocolate soufflé with whipped cream.

  Not for many, many months, not since his happy stay in Rome with the Marchesa, had he savoured such a meal, and one which by its very excellence so revived and fortified him. He smiled faintly as he thought of what he would give his audience tonight, and how he would play upon it with careless skill. He was still planning when the door swung open, admitting none other than Maley himself, a smiling, hand-rubbing Maley, a warm, solicitous Maley.

  ‘Was everything all right, Desmonde, the dinner to your, taste?’ And then, reassured: ‘You should see the evening papers, they’re ecstatic, they say you’re even better than John McCormack. We are absolutely booked out in the dining-room, and we’ve had to cram another thirty seats into the lounge. I hope the big crowd won’t worry you.’

  ‘Not in the slightest. But if I should feel tired might I spend the night in this room?’

  ‘Of course, of course, man. And tomorrow I’ll find you a better one.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Maley, but I rather like it here. It reminds me of a little room I had in Spain during my novitiate.’

  ‘Well, well, just let me know. You know I want to please you.’ He paused. ‘You’ll be all ready by eight o’clock?’

  Desmonde merely smiled, a pleasant indifferent smile, symptomatic of his present mood. And at eight o’clock he was ready, brushed and freshened by a wash in cold water. He left the room, impassively, with no thought of a little prayer for renewed success, calm and untroubled by the hum of many voices that came to him, resolved to maintain that calm, never to smile, but to use without stint or reserve the wonderful gift that was within him, to use it as a bitter answer to those who had viciously abused him.

  Chapter Nine

  When Desmonde had been singing for three weeks at the Hibernian an event occurred that could be regarded as unusual. It was the Spring Show, the great Dublin festival that attracts many hundreds of visitors to the city. Maley was at his wits’ end, not only to provide accommodation for his many wealthy patrons clamouring for the best rooms in the house, but, in a word to cope with the unbelievable demand for Desmonde. He had extended the lounge by throwing in two extra rooms and, wisely, had placed a cover charge of two guineas on the seats. He was thereby, apart from preventing a riot, coining money hand over fist, and his attitude towards Desmonde had become more deferential than ever.

  ‘Anything more I can do for you, Desmonde, just say the word. You know, of course, that I’ll give you a bonus at the end of the Show.’

  ‘Very well, Mr Maley. You know, of course, that I shall be leaving you then.’

  Maley started. ‘Good God, man! You can’t do that! We’re not near the peak yet!’

  ‘Nevertheless, I shall go. You remember the terms of our agreement. You definitely said, till the end of the Spring Show.’

  ‘But you see, Desmonde…’

  ‘I do not see, Mr Maley. And as you are, in your own words, an honest man, I hold you to your word.’

  ‘I’ll pay you double – and more.’

  ‘The answer is no. You cannot expect a singer of my quality to continue without some respite. In addition,’ Desmonde lowered his voice, ‘I have a personal reason for leaving.’

  ‘Then, you’ll come back, Desmonde, lad, you must come back.’

  ‘We shall see, Mr Maley. We shall see.’

  That evening, Desmonde was at his best, singing with a distant look, as though, oblivious of his audience, he envisaged a joy that was to come. At the end of the performance he found Joe in the waiters’ room apparently snatching a moment from the tearing rush of his job.

  ‘Listen, sir. There’s a fat little woman, sitting at the very corner of the platform, has ordered me to ask you to see her.’ Anxiously he exhibited a five pound note. ‘I wish you would, sir, for my sake. She’s far from beautiful, I assure you, and I could bet this fiver she’s somebody important.’

  ‘I’ll go, Joe. Just this once. For you.’

  When the crowd had thinned, Desmonde moved quickly across the platform and stepped down to the table Joe had indicated. The woman, rather as Joe had described her, was seated with a tumbler of whisky and soda, barely touched, before her. She was wearing a low necked Paris gown that emphasised her fat bosoms and suited her ill.

  Desmonde stood, silent, with an expression of distaste, awaiting her request, he assumed, for an autograph. She too, studied him in silence. At last, in a vivid southern American accent, she threw out:

  ‘So you’re the little Fitzgerald priest they kicked out for adultery.’

  His face hardened. ‘As you say, madam.’

  ‘Was the fornication pleasant?’

  ‘Excessively.’ He bit out the word and spat it at her.

  ‘And you’re a little bit of a singer too, it seems.’

  ‘As you say, madam.’

  A pause.

  ‘Don’t you use your bottom for sitting on?’

  ‘I prefer to enjoy your pleasantries standing, madam. And now that you have exercised your wit, may I leave you? But before so doing, may I tell you that you are the most foul, fat, obscene, vulgarly got-up and, in a word, repulsive creature I have ever encountered in my entire life.’

  Surprisingly, she burst out laughing and, although he had begun to move away, she shot out a fat arm and little podgy fingers, one adorned with a diamond the size of a hazel-nut, and gripped and swung him into the chair beside her.

  ‘Don’t run away, Desmonde. I think I like you, v
ery much. I’m so used to people pandering to me, lying, licking my boots, trying desperately to win my favour, that it is refreshing, for once, to be told the truth.’ She paused. ‘ You know, of course, who I am?’

  ‘I have not the faintest notion, madam. And I have no wish to know.’

  ‘I am Bedelia Basset. Known all over the U.S. A. as Delia B. Now you know of me?’

  Silently, Desmonde shook his head.

  ‘My God! You are the original backwoods boy. Don’t you know I am syndicated in sixty of America’s best-selling newspapers, that top Hollywood directors tremble in my presence, that famous stars beg and beseech me for kind words that may make them more famous, or dread the words that may send them back on the streets selling candy bars?’

  ‘Madam, I know, and care, nothing of this. My sole knowledge of your fabulous kingdom comes from my friend, my dear friend, the only one I have in the entire world. He is Alec Shannon, now a novelist, he has been to Hollywood and indeed sold his first two novels to the pictures.’

  ‘Alec Shannon! I believe I know the name. But novelists are two-a-penny in Hollywood. We regard them as keech! You say your only friend?’

  ‘Yes. Except for big Joe, the waiter. I am cast off by all the others.’

  ‘What about your wife?’

  ‘I hate her,’ said Desmonde simply. ‘Yes, as much as I love my darling little babe. I am going to see her soon. She is with my wife’s aunt, Madame Donovan, whose whisky you are now drinking.’

  ‘My God, Desmonde, I’m a hard case, yet you startle me. Madame Donovan must be worth millions, she donates cathedrals, yet here you are…’

  ‘Singing in a pub for a few quid a week.’ He paused. ‘It’s my own choice, I don’t care any more. And of course I’m leaving Mr Maley to visit my little one.’

  ‘He’ll not let you go. You’re manna from heaven to him. Unless … you’ve signed nothing?’

  Desmonde shook his head.

  ‘Thank God. That would have been a bad start. Now listen to me, Desmonde. I don’t like often, but when I like … I like all the way. And what I must tell you is this. You’re wasting your time and your talent here. Your magnificent talent! I know you’ve been hurt and you want to hide. But it’s got to stop. I’m off tomorrow to the west country to look at a little village I believe my forebears came from, but I’ll be back in about a week. Before I go will you do one little thing for me?’

  Desmonde inclined his head.

  ‘I’ll be at this same table tonight. Don’t sing those lovely little Irish songs. Sing something big, classical, out of the operas. Do this, and I’ll know you’re with me! Now go and get your dinner. I’ll sit here awhile, send off some cables, and finish your auntie’s whisky.’

  Despite his habitual indifference, Desmonde was somewhat taken by this unusual little woman. When he had finished his dinner he felt compelled to write one of his periodic letters to his friend.

  ‘This afternoon I was accosted by a little fat weirdie of a woman, fearfully ornate and calling herself, with great éclat, Bedelia Basset. Believe it or not, she seems to have taken a fancy to me, or rather to my prospects. It’s a joke, of course, but she does know you, although despising all authors and dismissing them with one unprintable nasty word. You know I am chucking my job at the pub here. The delicious and nourishing food, supplied gratis by the good Maley, has quite put me on my feet again, and I am going to Vevey to see my little darling. I am terribly fond of her, Alec, although no doubt you will regard this as further evidence of my weakness. What has happened to my wife I neither know nor care. We are irreparably parted, and I have no doubt she is finding her own kind of fun elsewhere. Are you by any chance in the mood to take a short vacation and to come with me to Vevey, just for two or three days? It’s too long since we have met, and the Swiss mountain air would do you no end of good…’

  When the letter was finished, sealed and stamped, Desmonde gave it to Joe to post. He had just come in to remove the dinner things, looking particularly jubilant.

  ‘You know that queer little fat Yank, sir?’

  ‘Intimately, Joe!’

  ‘Well, sir, she just gave me a tip to keep that same little corner table for her. Guess what?’

  ‘Sixpence, Joe.’

  ‘No, sir, this …’ Joe exhibited another five pound note. ‘And she did ask me to remind you about them opera songs.’

  ‘She will be obeyed, Joe.’

  For perhaps the first time since his engagement at the Hibernian, Desmonde’s mood was cheerful as he stepped on to the familiar platform at eight o’clock. He actually smiled as he faced his audience, which, as large as ever, was somewhat different in nature from those immediately preceding it. The Spring Show was over, most of the wilder elements had departed, and here, tonight, were members of the Irish gentry who had stayed on, either to hear him or for purposes of their own.

  ‘I hope I won’t disappoint you tonight,’ Desmonde began, very quietly. ‘As you may know, I sing a great many Irish songs and ballads. Tonight, however, at the request of a very distinguished and famous American visitor, I have consented to sing two numbers from operas. The first will be from the beloved Puccini, from Tosca, the last heart-rending song sung by Cavaradossi before his execution. The second will be the Prize Song from Die Meistersinger, which, you might care to know, I sang in Rome, when, as a young priest, I won the competition for the Golden Chalice.’ He paused, waiting for the hum that succeeded his announcement to subside, then said: ‘I shall sing the first in the original Italian, the second in German, exactly as Wagner wrote it.’

  He sat down at the piano, and from memory, partly improvising, played the haunting melody of Tosca, the motif that runs through the last act of the opera, then began to sing.

  Tonight, perhaps because of his impending holiday, he was in superlative form. Into that last passionate, loving, despairing yet courageous cry from the condemned Cavaradossi, he put all the feeling that Puccini had therein ordained.

  When he finished the applause, while orderly, was deafening, led by a series of ‘Bravos’ from the corner table by the platform. Desmonde bowed repeatedly, then sat down at the piano to rest. He could not fail to see that the little American, her cigar discarded, was writing like mad on a pad of cable forms.

  Fully rested, he was ready to sing again. Dead silence. He waited, just for a moment, then threw back his head and began to give forth that sublime ascending volume of delicious and arresting melody, the finest ever written by Wagner, in whom the fatal Germanic mystique was so deeply rooted.

  It is a long, an exhausting song, and Desmonde gave it everything within him. When it ended, he felt spent, and instead of immediately leaving the stage he sat with bent head and let wave after wave of the applause roll over him.

  Everyone was standing up. Vaguely he saw his little American friend, fighting her way to the door and he thought, I’ll never see her again. At last he forced himself to his feet, bowed and bowed again, throwing out both arms and repeating, again and again: ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you.’ Then he turned, made his way to his room, and lay down on his bed.

  Joe was longer than usual in coming to him, but at last he arrived, his hands crammed with cards and torn off pieces of paper.

  ‘You never saw such a commotion in your life, sir, at least I never have, in all my days at the Hibernian. More nor half the gentry o’ Ireland, talking thegether about you, sending in their cards with all sorts of messages, beggin’ ye to call on them, and to stay too. Shall I read them to you?’

  ‘No, Joe, drop them in the wastepaper basket.’

  Joe seemed stunned.

  ‘God bless my soul, sir, you’re not serious. Here’s one from the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and his lady. “Do call on us, Desmonde, we do wish to meet you.”’

  ‘Drop that one in first, Joe.’

  ‘And here is one, sir,’ Joe dropped his voice to a reverential whisper, ‘which is actually from no less than His Lordship, Archbishop Murphy, that says: “
My son, now surely you have expiated your sin. Come to me, Desmonde, and I will see what might be done for you.”’

  ‘Take that one, Joe,’ Desmonde said, bitterly, ‘tear it in little pieces and flush it down the toilet.’

  ‘I will not, sir,’ Joe said, outraged. ‘That would be a mortal sin on me. Whether you like it or not, I’ll tuck it in the pocket of your suitcase.’

  ‘Nothing from that nice, funny little Yank?’

  ‘There is indeed, sir, scribbled on a Western Union cable form. Will ye be wantin’ me to put that one down the jakes also?’

  ‘Stop teasing me, Joe. Read, read, read!’

  Provokingly Joe cleared his throat several times, then read:

  ‘”Darling, darling Desmonde, you have given me the scoop of the year. Tomorrow your name will be splashed in the headlines of thirty newspapers all over the United States announcing my discovery, young handsome ex-priest, Irish, new, better than Caruso, singing for coppers in pub, a story that would bring tears from a stone. Don’t, don’t, don’t sign any contracts till I see you again. Till then I remain with love and kisses your most foul, fat, obscene, vulgarly got-up and, in a word, repulsive creature you have encountered in your entire life.”’

  ‘That’s a real person, Joe,’ Desmonde said.

  ‘She is indeed, sir. Afore she dashed off she gave me another fiver and told me to take care of you.’

  ‘And so you have done, Joe, all along. Drop that message in the suitcase, at least it deserves keeping as a souvenir.’

  ‘And now, sir,’ Joe bent forward obesquiously, ‘what can I do for you in the way of dinner?’

  ‘Cut it, Joe! Bring me something good. I’m hungry and tired. And if you can, pinch me a half-bottle of champagne.’

  ‘No need to pinch, sir, Mr Maley will give you the pick of the cellar. I’ll be along in half-an-hour.’

  Desmonde got up, took a hot bath and soaked in it, then a rub down, and into slippers, pyjamas and dressing gown. He did not know what to think, and therefore decided not to think at all.

  Part Five