Collected Plays and Teleplays (Irish Literature) (4 page)

SHAWN:
Do you tell me so?

REILLY:
He’s going to make his sister, Maggie, wear trousers and drive a thrashing-mill. If he could find a mine, he’d send me and you down, to be working with pneumatic artillery in the bowels of the earth and blasting tons of rocks and stuff down on top of us. Two miles down he’d send us.

SHAWN:
Yerrah, now, you’re coddin’ me surely. You’re trying to take a rise out of me. (
Sits left of table.
)

CULLEN:
Don’t mind him, Shawn.

SHAWN:
But who would see him if he was stretched in his natural state in the meadow? Sure the grass is up to here, look, and lovely rich juicy Irish grass it is.

CULLEN:
Certainly.

SHAWN:
Sure if you drove a small motorcar into my meadow in the morning, you wouldn’t know where to look for it in the evening. (
Caressingly.
) Lovely, tall, nourishing, splendid grass, food and drink for any taste. And nice fresh crisp hay it will make, gorgeous golden hay. You won’t find anything like it outside Ireland.

REILLY:
What about the Czar’s grass beyond in Russia?

CULLEN:
Ah, sure the ould Czar went to the wall years ago. Years ago, man.

SHAWN:
As a young man, the Russian Revolution was a thing that fired me imagination.

REILLY:
If you ask me, them Russians would ate any hay you gave them. Damn the one of them ever heard of a good plate of bacon and cabbage. Vodka and beans is all the order there, I believe. How would you fancy that after ten hours on the thrashing-machine?

SHAWN:
A man was once telling me that in Russia they do have the new potatoes in March. I daresay it’s due to the Gulf Stream. Imagine a plate of new spuds on St Patrick’s Day. They’d have the new peas, too. (
With feeling.
) Begorrah, I’d spend ten years on a thrashing-machine for that.

CULLEN:
(
At the window.
) I think I see a certain Town Clerk wending his weary way.

SHAWN:
I believe that man Stalin is a black Protestant.

REILLY:
He looks like an Orangeman to me.

CULLEN:
Here he is. (
Mimics Cork accent.
) Good ev’nin’. How are ye’s at all? Is de Big Man not here? Shhhhhh!

(
The
TOWN CLERK
enters. He is a small perky man of about 30, wears the fáinne and is well dressed. He has a strong Cork accent.
)

TOWN CLERK:
Good ev’nin’. How are ye’s at all? Isn’t it very warm? Is de Big Man not here? (
He goes to desk left.
)

REILLY:
Mr. Kelly is having a few rossiners down the way and will be here when the temperature below his belt has risen to the right pitch.

TOWN CLERK:
(
Taking papers from desk and going to table.
) I was thinking of going up to Dublin tomorrow, please God, to see the Minister’s Private Secretary. He’s a personal friend of me married sister and he’s half-Cork on the da’s side. . . . He’s a right dacent man, I met him wan time at the Metropole Hotel in Cork and we got on together . . . (
he looks up
) like two canaries in a cage.

SHAWN:
You’re roight, me bucko. A soft . . . well-made . . . dacent . . . God-fearing . . . Irish gentleman.

TOWN CLERK:
Yerrah, don’t be talking to me. I was inside the hotel with Paddy Hourigan, the Lord have mercy on him, an’ didn’t we run into the Minister’s Secretary on the stairs.

SHAWN:
Ah, Paddy Hourigan, may God be good to him, for a finer, neater, better-made, dacenter Irishman never wore a hat.

TOWN CLERK:
Yerrah, don’t be talking to me. “Meet Mr. Hinnissey,” says Paddy. (
He faces the company.
) “I don’t know Mr. Hinnissey,” says the Minister Secretary, “but I’ve heard all about him.” “Come into the bar,” says he to me, “and have a glawsheen.”

REILLY:
And I suppose you walked in and drank the pockets off him.

TOWN CLERK:
Now, Martin, now, now——

REILLY:
You’re another man that ought to go to Russia.

TOWN CLERK:
Russia?

REILLY:
Begob, they’d know how to handle you there, me boyo. They don’t believe in letting able-bodied young fellas live like leeches on the backs of the ratepayers there—no bloody fear. You’ll work for your money there, not heating the seat of a stool but out drivin’ ingines with the sweat and the muck plastered on you.

TOWN CLERK:
I’ll go tomorrow if the Council pays me fare.

REILLY:
(
Angrily, his voice rising.
) By God, they’d make a man of you, then, if they had you out there. Damn the Russian ratepayer you’d live on. You wouldn’t get away with this four fifty a year stuff, with fees for fairs and markets.

TOWN CLERK:
(
Laughs as he sits, going through files.
) Ah, dear-a-dear.

SHAWN:
(
Seriously.
) Tell me, Martin. Phwat are the rates in Russia at the present time?

REILLY:
The rates?

SHAWN:
Ay, the rates.

REILLY:
(
Puzzled.
) Well, I don’t know the figures but I know this—the unfortunate ratepayers out there aren’t saddled with thruppence in the pound for teaching Irish and filling the heads of a lot of poor chisellers with ‘taw may go h-mahs’ and ‘Gurramahaguts’ and the Lord knows what bogman’s back-chat.

TOWN CLERK:
Ah, ná bí ag cainnt!

REILLY:
You shut your Cork gob and keep it shut!

SHAWN:
Now isn’t it a terrible ting to see two fine grand Irishman fighting and back-biting one another to their faces? Isn’t it a great shame to see ye playing England’s game in the offices of the Urban District Council?

CULLEN:
(
Going back to table and sitting.
) I suppose it’s true that Kelly’s going up at the by-election.

REILLY:
O, it’s true enough. My God, imagine that bags a T.D.!

SHAWN:
I do, I do. The Chairman is going to stand. ‘Tis great trouble and tribulation, a T.D.’s life. ‘Tis no life for an idealist.

TOWN CLERK:
Do you know, Shawn, there’s wan thing that often puzzled me, many’s a time I meant to ask you about it. How did you come to lose your seat at all, at all?

SHAWN:
I’ll tell you, boy. Instid . . . of getting work on the roads for strong farmers . . . and instid of getting young farmers’ sons into the Electricity Supply Board . . . and instid of getting the old age pinshin for men with big fortunes that weren’t the age . . . phwat was I at only planting little fir trees on the mountains that I love above meself.

CULLEN:
Tell me, Shawn, have you got the time for God’s sake? What time is it by your gold watch and chain?

SHAWN:
(
Takes out large metal watch.
) I do, I do. The correct time according to me wireless is ten minutes past nine.

TOWN CLERK:
Mr. Kelly must have been delayed on the road. I want to have a private conversation with him about me visit to Dublin.

REILLY:
Ten to one you’re off to Dublin to work some election twist for Kelly.

TOWN CLERK:
De Chairman’s all in favour of keeping de Minister on our hands. The two is personal friends, I believe. Did you get any offer for that small farm o’ yours, Shawn? The one out de Lochatubber road?

SHAWN:
I do. A man rang me up on the wire about it four days ago offering four hundred pounds. Well, do you know, I took him to task. Listen to me here, man, says I, do you know that the man you are talking to is Shawn Kilshaughraun? Do you take me, says I, for a gawm from Kirry or some hungry remote cold distant townland in the County Cork?

REILLY:
Maybe he knew his man. By God, I wouldn’t fancy doing business with you.

TOWN CLERK:
Now, Martin. (
He puts a finger to his lips.
) You’ve had yer say. Hould yer whisht for pity’s sake.

(
He walks to desk and takes large ledgers, brings them to his table and works at them.
)

SHAWN:
Sure he hadn’t a word to say when I was finished talking to him. Don’t you know, says I, that the soil of me little farm is (
caressingly
) the grandest, finest, richest fertile land in de whole country. I was talking to an Inspector from the Department about the soil. Mr. Kilshaughraun, says he, you’ll be surprised at what I’m goin’ to tell ye.

CULLEN:
What did he say?

SHAWN:
Do you know, says he, that in all me travels I have nivir come across soil the like of this. It has phosphates, says he, and the divil knows what. I disremember the names of all the fine, grand, nourishing, rich, juicy properties of me soil. Sure Lord save us, haven’t I a field of oats up there now, as yellow as a bantam’s tail, as thick as a girl’s hair, sure you’d nivir find yer way out if you walked into it.

REILLY:
Sure don’t I pass it every Sunday on me walk after Mass, a rough-lookin’ hungry farm of rocks and scraws that would wear the hands off five men to get any satisfaction out of it in a month of Sundays. Sure don’t I know it well. Six pound valuation on land, four on buildings. (
Bitterly.
) Ask the Town Clerk. Sure it’s down on the list.

TOWN CLERK:
Dat’s right, dat’s right.

REILLY:
Ask the Chief Executive Officer of the Urban Council, four fifty a year with fees for fairs and markets for the privilege of sitting on his Cork backside! Do you know, I think I’m going off me head in his place. . . . What in the name of God is keepin’ that Chairman? I’ve a good mind to go home and leave him without his quorum.

CULLEN:
Yerra, take your time, Martin. Sure what would you be doin’ at home only annoying Mrs. Reilly, yer good long-suffering wife, with your great unrest of mind.

TOWN CLERK:
(
Working at his books.
) Well, do you know, these books are in a terrible condition of confusion. Full of blanks. Do ‘oo know phwat the Council was paid four years ago for twenty-seven planks that were sold to de County Surveyor?

SHAWN:
(
Expansively.
) A good strong well-made, well-seasoned plank of prime timber is worth twelve shillings and sixpence.

TOWN CLERK:
(
Tapping his ledger.
) Blank! That’s what was paid—Blank!

(
He rises again and goes to desk to get papers.
)

REILLY:
Of course, the poor man that was here before you had the great misfortune to be born in this town. He was not a smart maneen from Cork with his degrees and all his orders, he was only paid four pounds a week and fees for markets turned in to the Council (
his voice rises
), he was only an ordinary unassuming decent Irishman that took a bottle of stout like the rest of us, with no flying up to Dublin to the Departments to suck up to a lot of thumawns and pultogues and fly-be-nights. . . .

(
Quite suddenly the door is opened by
KELLY
.
He is accompanied by
THE STRANGER—
a small dark middle-aged man who is formally dressed in striped trousers, black coat and wears a bowler hat. He carries a briefcase. He is motioned into the public gallery at the back of the stage and throughout the Act he sits immovably with his hat on, facing the audience. He receives many curious looks from those present.
KELLY
is dressed in a black overcoat, dark scarf and hard hat. He wears glasses, has a cunning serious face. In his left hand he carries dark leather gloves. He has taken the company completely by surprise. They preserve a complete and surprised silence, which
KELLY
naturally takes as a tribute to his own great importance. The others seem to be asking themselves whether he has been listening outside the door for a time before coming in.
SHAWN
says ‘Hullo.’
KELLY
closes the door with great care. He then takes his overcoat off slowly, hangs it up, puts his hat on the same peg and comes forward to the table slowly and abstractedly, his gaze being downwards and meeting nobody’s eye. He then looks up with a mechanical smile.
)

KELLY:
Good evening, gentlemen. Good evening, Town Clerk. A pleasant summer evening, thank God. How is your good lady, Martin? I believe she had a touch of cold.

REILLY:
(
Non-committally.
) Mrs. Reilly is all right, thank ye.

KELLY:
Ah, good. Shawn, I want a word with you afterwards at your convenience. (
He rubs his hands together briskly.
)

SHAWN:
I do, I do. With pleasure, Chairman.

KELLY:
I want you to see the Minister about a certain matter. A word in the right place, you know. A little matter I want set right. There is certain backstairs work going on about the Fair Green, cattle-jobbers and publicans butting at one another to get the site changed, first here and then there. Result: delay, delay, delay. No Fair Green and the streets up to your ankles in it of a fair day. (
He realises that he still has his gloves in his hand: sighs.
) But that’s another matter. It’s not on the Agenda.

(
He turns and walks back to his coat to leave his gloves.
)

SHAWN:
I endorse, and I re-endorse, every word you say, Chairman. The streets, of a fair day, are a crying, desperate, insanitary shame. Isn’t it a terrible thing to have publicans putting down money to have the Fair held at their doors? Wouldn’t it make you disheartened in democracy? Wouldn’t it now?

(
KELLY
returns to the table, sits down carefully in the large chair at the head of it, sighs and smiles indulgently.
)