The Dirty Dust (7 page)

—“‘But I'd marry his daughter,' said Caitriona's puss to that.”

—“Said Nell's kitty then, ‘That's a chance you won't get.'”

—It pissed Caitriona off even more that Baba took off and stayed in Nell's house more than Nell's son got the money and the dowry that had been promised to her own Paddy …

—I remember well, Margaret, the day that Baba Paudeen went back to America. I was cutting hay above in the Red Meadow when I saw them coming down from Nell's house. I ran over to say good-bye to them. As God is my witness, just as I was jumping across the furrowed dyke, I twisted my …

—Don't you think, Margaret, isn't it twenty years since Baba Paudeen went back to America? …

—She's gone sixteen years. But Caitriona never took her beady eye off the will. If it wasn't for that she'd be dead a long time ago. It added years to her life to be badmouthing her son's wife …

—Yes, Margaret, and the pleasure she got in going to funerals all the time.

—And Fireside Tom's land …

—… Listen to me now, Curran:

“A great big altar as a kind compensation …”

—Don't mind that little scut, Curran. Sure, he couldn't compose a line of poetry …

—The story is getting a bit boring now, Margaret. Honest. I thought they'd be a lot more hassle by now …

—… Listen, Curran. Listen to the second line:

“And to add to my pride, to be in the Pound Place …”

—… Honest, Margaret. I thought there'd be at least a murder and a divorce. But Dotie can assess every prejudice …

—… By japers, I have it now Curran. Listen:

“The cross above me will drive Nell to distraction

And in the cemetery clay I'll have won the race …”

—Hoora, Margaret! … Can you hear me, Margaret? … Nora Johnny has no shame talking to a schoolmaster … Of course, that's true, Margaret. Of course, everyone knows she's my inlaw. You wouldn't mind but there is no place here you can get a bit of privacy, or get out of the way. Sweet God almighty! A bitch! A bitch! She was always a bitch. That time when she was a skivvy in the Fancy City before she got married they used to say—we don't want to even think about it!—that she used to hang around with a sailor …

Sure thing, Margaret … I said it to him. “Patrick, my darling,” I said, just like this. “That thing from Gort Ribbuck that you are determined to marry, did you hear that her mother was hanging around with a sailor in the Fancy City?”

“So what?” he said.

“Ah, Patrick,” I said. “Sailors, you know …”

“Hu! Sailors,” he said. “Couldn't a sailor be just as good as any other person? I know who this girl's mother was hooking up with in the Fancy City, but that's a long way from America, and I haven't the faintest clue who Blotchy Brian's Maggie was knocking around with over there. With a black, maybe …”

Sure thing, Margaret. If it wasn't that she couldn't warm to Nell and didn't want to give her the money, there's some chance that I'd
let my son bring a daughter of Blotchy Brian into my house. I swear, I could have been fond of Blotchy Brian's daughter. The night that Nell got married, that's what the cow threw in my face. “I have Jack,” she said, “You can have Blotchy Brian now, Caitriona.”

Do you know what, Margaret, but those few words hurt me far more than all the other wrongs she did me. What she said was like a plague of stoats buzzing back and forth through my brain spitting out venomous snots. They never left my head up to the day I died. They never did, Margaret. Every time I saw Blotchy Brian I'd think of that night in the room at home, and on the gloating grin on Nell's puss because of Jack the Lad. Every time I'd see Brian's son or daughter, I'd think of that night. Every time somebody even mentioned Blotchy Brian, I'd remember it … on the room … on the grin … on Nell in Jack the Lad's arms! … in Jack the Lad's arms …

Blotchy Brian asked me twice, Margaret. I never told you that … What's that Nora Johnny calls it? … The eternal triangle … the eternal triangle … That was her silly shite, alright … But, Margaret, I didn't tell you, did I? … You're mistaken. I'm not that kind of a person, Margaret. I'm not a blabbermouth. Anything that's my own business, anything I saw or heard, I took it into the clay with me. But there's no harm talking about it now when we are gone the way of all flesh …

He asked me twice, I'm telling you. The first time I was hardly more than twenty. My father was trying to get me to do it. “Blotchy Brian is a good decent man, with a nice little spot, and a decent stash of money,” he said.

“I wouldn't marry him,” I said, “even if I had to borrow the shawl from Nell and stand out in front of everyone in the middle of the fair.”

“Why's that?” said my father.

“Because he's an ugly git,” I said. “Look at his ridiculous goatee beard. See his sticky out teeth. His nasal whine. His bandy leg. See the dirty dive of a hovel he lives in. See the coat of filth all around it. He's three times as old as me. He could be my grandfather.”

And I was right. He was nearly fifty that time. He is nearly a hundred now, still alive and not a bother on him, apart from the odd bout
of rheumatism. He'd be going to collect the pension same time as me when we were up there. The ugly gom! …

“Every brat to her own device,” my father said, and that was all he ever said about it.

Nell wasn't married long when he came slavering for me again. I was just getting a cup of tea in the evening as the shades of night came down. I remember it well. I had put the teapot down on the hearth trying to blow some life into the embers. This guy comes in totally unexpectedly even before I had a chance to recognise him. “Will you marry me, Caitriona,” he said, just like that. “I think I deserve you, coming like this the second time. And as it's not doing me any good, living without a nice woman …”

I'm telling you straight, that's exactly what he said.

“I wouldn't marry you, you rotten poop, even if cobwebs grew out of me for want of a man,” I said.

I had put the thongs down and I had the boiling kettle in my hand. I didn't blink an eye, Margaret, but went for him in the middle of the floor. But he had vanished out the door by then.

I know I am hard to please when it comes to men. I was good-looking enough and had a decent dowry … But marry Blotchy Brian, come on now like, Margaret, after what Nell said …

—… “It'd better win,” I said, sticking my hand in my pocket and hightailing it out the door. “When you lose, you're screwed,” I said, taking the ticket from the wench. She smiled at me: that kind of innocent smile from a young innocent heart. “If ‘The Golden Apple' wins,” I said, “I'll buy you some sweeties and take you to the pictures … Or would you prefer a bit of a dance … or a few quiet drinks in the snug in the Great Southern Hotel? …”

—… Qu'est-ce que vous dites? Quelle drôle de langue! N'y a-til-pas là quelque professeur ou étudiant qui parle français?

—Au revoir. Au revoir.

—Pardon! Pardon!

—Shut your gob, you shitehawk!

—If I could reach that gander, I'd shut his trap for him. Either
that, or he'd talk proper. Every time he mentions Hitler he starts spluttering away in a torrent of talk. Sweet jumping Jesus, but if he really knew I don't think he'd be that happy about Hitler at all …

—Didn't you notice that every time that Hitler's name is mentioned, he calls him a “whore” immediately. Who are we to say he hasn't picked up that much Irish …

—Oh, if only I could get my hands on him! High for Hitler! High for Hitler! High for Hitler! High for Hitler …

—Je ne vous comprends pas, monsieur …

—Who is that, Margaret?

—That's the guy who was killed in the airplane. Don't you remember? He went down in the middle of the bay. You were alive that time.

—Sure, didn't I see him laid out, Margaret … He had a fantastic funeral. They said he was some kind of a hero …

—He jabbers away like that. The Master says that he's French, and that he'd understand him if his tongue wasn't worn away by the time he spent in the sea …

—So, the Master doesn't understand him, Margaret?

—Not the slightest clue, Caitriona.

—I always knew, Margaret, that the Old Master wasn't very learned. It doesn't matter if he doesn't understand a Frenchy! I should have known that yonks ago …

—Nora Johnny understands him better than anyone else in the graveyard. Did you not hear her answering him just a while back? …

—Ara, would you get an ounce of sense, Maggie Frances. Do you Mean Toejam Nora with the smelly feet? …

—Ils m'ennuient. On espère toujours trouver la paix dans la mort, mais la tombe ne semble pas encore être la mort. On ne trouve ici en tout cas, que de l'ennui …

—Au revoir. Au revoir. De grâce. De grâce.

—… Six sixes, forty-six; six sevens fifty-two; six eights, fifty-eight … Now, amn't I great, Master! I know my tables up to now. If I had gone to school as a kid, there'd be no stopping me. I'll say all the tables from the beginning now, Master. Two ones are … Why don't you
want to hear them, Master? You've been kind of neglecting me for the last while, since Caitriona Paudeen told you about your wife …

—I swear by the oak of this coffin, Curran, I gave her the pound, I gave the pound to Caitriona Paudeen. But I never got a gnat's glimpse of it since.

—Ababoona! Holy cow! You lied, you old bat …

—Honest, Dotie. You wouldn't understand: a stranger this way from the rich lands of the Fair Meadow. This is the truth, the unadulterated truth, Dotie. Honest, it is. I was going to swear “by the Holy finger,” but that is unbecoming talk. Instead of that, Dotie, I'll say: “I'll put the blessed crucifix on my heart.” Margaret told you about herself and Nell, but she never told you about the dowry I lavished on my daughter when she married into Caitriona's house. You should know that story, Dotie. Everyone else here knows it. Sixty pounds, Dotie. Honest! Sixty pounds in golden guineas …

—For the love of God Almighty! Margaret! Hey, Margaret! Do you hear me?

I'm going to burst! I'm going to burst, Margaret! I'm going to burst, Margaret! Nora Johnny's young one! … sixty … dowry … for me and us … I'm going to burst! I'm going to burst! O my God, I'm going to burst! … Goi … bur … Go … burs … G … bu … Burs …

You were asking for it. If I hadn't stabbed you, somebody else would have stabbed you, and isn't the fool and his lackey all the same? As you were going to be stabbed anyway, wasn't it better to be stabbed by a neighbour than by a stranger? The stranger would be buried miles away, maybe, over on the flat plains of the Smooth Meadow, or up in Dublin, or the arsehole of the country somewhere, and what would you do then? Look at the satisfaction you get chewing me up here. And if the stranger was lying next to you, you would be at a loss to know what to throw up in his face, as you would know nothing about his seed, breed, and generation. Cop yourself on, you knacker. You wouldn't mind, but I stabbed you cleanly …

—The Dog Eared Lot often stabbed cleanly! …

—… A white-headed mare … She was gorgeous …

—… I swear, Huckster Joan, I swear by the oak of this coffin, that I gave her the pound, Caitriona Paudeen …

—… That's the way it was. Went up to the Bookie's around three o'clock. “‘The Golden Apple,'” I said. “She better win,” I said, sticking my hands in my pockets and turning on my heels out the door. I didn't have a brass farthing …

Won the three o'clock. The race was over. “The Golden Apple” at a hundred to one. Went to collect my fiver. The wench smiled at me again: a sweet innocent smile from a pure heart. It meant a lot more to me than a fiver: “I'll get you sweets, or I'll bring you to the pictures, or to a dance … Or would you prefer … ?” I was mortified. I didn't finish what I was saying.

“I'll meet you outside the Plaza at a quarter past seven,” I said.

Go home. Shave, shower, shite, shampoo, slap on the slime, get ready. Didn't even drink a drop for good luck. I had far too much time for that innocent smile from a pure heart …

To the Plaza for seven. Put a hole in my fiver buying her chocolates. The chocolates would really melt her young pure heart, and the glint of the beauty of the rose would appear in her smile like the first rays of the breaking morning. Wasn't I the eejit who had spent so much …

—Hang on now 'til I read you the Proclamation that Eamon de Valera put before the people of Ireland:

“Irish men and Irish women …”

—Wait now, until I read the Proclamation that Arthur Griffith put before the people of Ireland:

“Irish men and Irish women …”

—… I drank forty-two pints that night one after the other. And I walked home after that as straight as a reed … as straight as a reed, I'm telling you. I delivered a calf from the brindle cow, which was in labour for two hours already. I drove the old donkey out from Curran's oats … and I tied up Tommy. I had just taken off my shoes and about to go on my knees to say a bit of a prayer, when the young one comes in. Her breath was totally shagged. “My Mam says to go over straight away,” she said “Dad is doing his thing again.”

—“I don't give a toss about him doing his thing if it's not the right time,” I said, “just as I was about to say my prayers. What's bugging him now?”

“Downing poteen like water,” she said.

Off I went. He was out of his tree and nobody in the house was able to hold him down. You couldn't say they weren't a bunch of wimps …

“Here, grab this,” I said. “Take a hold of this rope, like, right now, before he goes for the axe. Can't you see he's eyeing it …”