This Man's Wee Boy

by Doherty, Tony;

  ‘I don’t take sugar in my tea any more, Daddy,’ I said, looking up at his face. ‘I gave it up for Lent this year and now I cannae stand tea wi’ sugar.’

  ‘Oh, I remember now. You’ll be giving up milk in your tea next Lent, will you?’ He looked at me for the first time. He didn’t take sugar or milk in his tea either.

  ‘I don’t know, Daddy. I think I like the milk more than the sugar,’ I replied.

  With a cup of black tea in one hand and a Park Drive in the other he sat down across the table. His pale blue eyes were both searching and shifty. Something was bothering him. I said nothing more, afraid that if we talked he would eventually mention the jumper. The coals in the fire crackled and hissed, and the radio was on in the sitting room, which eased the silence.

  After a while he got up and went into the sitting room. I heard the rustle of paper behind me.

  ‘Are you finished, Tony?’ he said.

  ‘Aye, Daddy, that was great,’ I replied. I knew something was up.

  ‘C’mon in here a wee minute. I have to show you something,’ he said.

  Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, I’m caught! I screamed in my head.

  I got up from the table and went through to the sitting room, keeping a close eye on his face. His lit Park Drive was in one hand and a newspaper, folded down to one column, in the other. Is he goin’ to whack me over the head with it? All for an oul jumper? For Jesus’ sake! I should’ve owned up and spared myself all this carry-on!

  ‘I have to show you something, Tony,’ he said, turning the newspaper towards me.

  What’s this got to do with the jumper? I wondered. I found myself staring at a boy’s face, black and white, bespectacled and pious-looking. It was a picture of my classmate, Damien Harkin, from the Bog. This was his First Communion photo from a few weeks earlier.

  ‘Do you know this wee boy, Tony?’

  ‘Aye, Daddy, I do. That’s Damien Harkin from our class. What did he do to get in the paper?’ I asked, not having read the headline.

  ‘He’s dead, Tony. He was killed by a three-tonner army lorry last night in Westland Street, near his house. Did you play with him at school?’

  ‘Aye, I hang around with him, Micky Griffiths and wee Damien Healy.’

  He searched my face for a few seconds.

  ‘We’ll have to go to Mass and say a special prayer for him and his mammy, daddy, sisters and brothers. Go’n get your face washed. You’ve a black ring round your neck. And put on something decent – maybe your new jumper.’

  I suddenly looked up at me da, but he just turned away, sat down on the sofa and began reading the newspaper. I went into the bathroom, washed my face and looked in the mirror. There were still dirt marks from the night before so I used the soap. I couldn’t stretch up far enough to see the ring round my neck in the mirror. What does dead mean? Is he in heaven already? I thought to myself. The only deaths I knew were the fluke we caught out the Line or the rats that Dandy McKinney caught. Damien Harkin dead! And the British Army did it!

  I mulled over this solemn departure while I got ready for Mass. We children had no one to fight with, I thought. The soldiers are all big and the odds against us would be impossible. Maybe if there was a British Army made up of children! They wouldn’t stand a chance against the likes of Louis McKinney or Davy Barbour; they’d flatten the wee Limeys! I went back to the bedroom where everyone was still asleep. I quietly hunted for my Sunday clothes, slipped them on and tiptoed out of the room and went back downstairs.

  ‘Put the fireguard on the fire, Tony,’ me da called in a low pitch from upstairs.

  I did as I was bid, met me da as he came downstairs and we left the house together.

  We walked along Hamilton Street. There were soldiers at the foot of the street but they kept their distance. It was around nine o’clock on a hot summer morning and the streets were barely alive. Everyone’s front doors were closed. The bleach-scrubbed arcs at each doorstep were lilac-white and pretty-looking in the bright sunlight.

  Melaugh’s shop was closed. Paddy Melaugh was the Brock Man. He collected the brock from every house in the Brandywell so that he could feed his pigs which he kept in a pen out in his back yard. Me ma kept the tin brock bucket underneath the sink in the scullery and brought the brock out to Paddy when he came round each week for it in his wee van wearing his huge blue overalls.

  Paddy Melaugh was at his door and me da said hello to him, nodding his head sideways and winking at the same time. Mr Melaugh said, ‘Hello, Patsy’, and nodded sideways and winked back. We kept walking towards Quarry Street and past the Lourdes Hall. I practised nodding my head sideways and winking my eye at the same time as we walked. It wasn’t an easy thing to do.

  The Grotto next to the Lourdes Hall was resplendent in the summer sun, its whitewashed walls gleaming and its cheerful array of flowers saluting the morning. Me da glanced up at Our Lady and blessed himself without breaking his stride. I did the same. We passed the Brandywell Bar on the corner and headed towards the steep, terraced street of Hogg’s Folly and the Long Tower Chapel.

  When we reached Charlotte Street the smell of gas, burnt diesel and rubber from the previous evening’s riot drifted up from the Bog through the early morning heat. We crossed the road to dodge the broken glass, the bits of broken brick and the plastic tops from CS gas canisters.

  The chapel was cool inside; the priest had allowed the side and back doors to remain open to create a cooling draught. We sat down in the main body of the chapel behind the front pews, with me on the inside. Me da’s two muckers, Eddie Millar and Tony Callaghan, whom we’d met at the door, sat beside him. I was hoping not to be on the inside because the oak panels that ran along the walls at the end of the pews had perforated panels through which, if you looked hard and long enough, you could see the dead people.

  Why did they keep the dead in dark places where people have to come and pray? Was there enough room in there for everybody? Was that where Damien Harkin was going to end up, in the dark for ever? Was that where I’d end up? How could he be dead when we were in class together only a few weeks ago? What were his ma and da goin’ to do without him?

  ‘Hi boy, stand up!’ me da’s quiet voice in my ear shook me out of my dark questioning. ‘I didn’t bring you here to sleep!’

  People were looking at me. The whole chapel had been standing except for me and there was a right crowd in attendance. I stood up, red-faced.

  The Mass continued and I went through the motions. But the questions wouldn’t leave my head. I prayed for Damien Harkin, for his mammy, daddy, sisters and brothers. I didn’t know if he had any sisters and brothers, but the order of the day was to pray for them.

  ‘Were you at confession this week?’ me da asked as he got up.

  ‘No, we didn’t go yet. Me ma said we’d go the next night,’ I replied.

  ‘Okay, kneel you there,’ he said.

  Up he got with Eddie and Tony and joined the queue for Holy Communion. He walked towards the altar with his hands joined in front of him and his head down. The queue wasn’t that long and after a few minutes he was at the altar. He raised his head only when the priest placed the unleavened bread on his outstretched tongue. The priest proclaimed ‘Body of Christ’ and me da blessed himself. As he came back to our pew, he kept his hands joined together and his eyes fixed on the floor before him, awkwardly stepping sideways to get past other communicants on their way up to the altar. He was about to sit down when he suddenly glanced at me and, with a playful wink, said, ‘I’m cleansed now,’ before turning back to his devotions.

  When the priest finished Mass everyone stood up while he left the chapel and then began to shuffle towards the doors. Me da didn’t move and neither did Eddie or Tony. When most people had left, me da put his hand in his pocket and brought out an assortment of coins.

  ‘Take a shilling out of that,’ he said, offering me his money-filled hand. ‘You’ll have to buy a blessed candle for your wee mucker Damien to help him on his way up to he
aven. Away you go. We’ll wait here for you.’

  I plucked a shilling out of his hand and moved across the pew past him, Eddie and Tony.

  ‘Daddy, I’ve never bought a blessed candle before,’ I said. ‘I don’t know what to do.’

  ‘Go’n you away up with him, Patsy. The critter has to learn,’ said Eddie.

  Me da made his way across the pew and grabbed my hand. We walked up the central aisle of the chapel towards the altar where he opened the ornate brass gate and silently led me from the off-white marble steps to the lit-candle display to the left.

  ‘What’s the shilling for, Daddy?’ I asked.

  ‘You pay for your candles, son. Put your money in the box there in front of you,’ he said, pointing to the slot in the brass plate. The shilling jangled against other coins as it fell through the slot.

  ‘The candles are there in the wee hatch,’ he said, pointing to them.

  I slipped my hand into the hatch and lifted out a white candle, held it over a lit candle until it caught and pushed it into an empty slot. Following me da’s lead, I blessed myself and knelt down beside him before the bright candle display. After a minute, we made our way back from the altar to the front row, where Eddie and Tony were sitting.

  We came back out again into the sunshine and made our way back down the Folly. ‘Them English Bs flattened that wee boy last night,’ said Eddie, dropping the rest of the curse word for my benefit.

  ‘Aye, ah know,’ replied me da. ‘That’s Eddie Harkin’s young fella. I work with him at Du Ponts. He’s in wee Tony’s class in school,’ he added, pointing towards the Long Tower Boys School, to where I was due to return in September to begin Primary 5.

  ‘They’re saying that the brakes were faulty but they took the three tonner off them and drove it up and down the street before they torched it. There was not a thing wrong with the brakes at all. The soldiers all jumped out and ran up the hill to the camp,’ said Eddie.

  ‘It’s a bad time when not even the wains are safe in the streets,’ said me da as the conversation stopped at the bottom of the Folly. Eddie and Tony said ‘Churrio!’ at the bottom of the street and on we went, past the long wall surrounding the grounds of the Christian Brothers’ School on Lecky Road. As we walked, me da had to dodge branches and brambles overhanging the wall over the footpath. ‘Daddy, I heard that a big rat fell from one of them branches and landed on a wee boy’s head. Is that true?’

  ‘Dunno, son. Could be.’

  The serene whiteness of the Grotto stood in stark contrast with the cement grey of the school wall. As we passed the gate, me da suddenly stopped and, looking up at the statue, said, ‘If you were to go to confession, Tony, what would you tell the priest?’

  ‘I don’t know, Daddy, ahmmmm …’ Usually by the time you reached the confessional door, you’d have your list of sins ready to rhyme off: I stole sweets from my sister; I busted Dooter McKinney’s ball for badness; I thumped Gutsy McGonagle for calling me names …

  Me da was looking down at me. I looked up into me da’s moustachioed face and with no time to think of a list said, ‘I took God’s name in vain last night, but only into meself, and this morning I had hatred in my heart for the soldiers who killed Damien Harkin. That’s wrong isn’t it, Daddy?’

  ‘It is, son. Hatred eats at your heart. Wee Damien’s death is a terrible thing, but hatred isn’t goin’ to bring him back. You have to pray for him just. That’s all you do.’ He paused for a second, thinking what to say next and said, ‘So what’s this about taking God’s name in vain last night? What happened – did you hurt yourself out the Line or what?’ He had a twinkle in his eyes and a smile twitched at the corners of his mouth.

  ‘I tore me new jumper. I didn’t mean to, Daddy. I took God’s name in vain when I thought I was goin’ to get caught.’ It all came out in a rush. ‘Am I goin’ to get kept in, Daddy?’

  ‘We know about the new jumper, Tony,’ he said, taking my hands in his and getting down on his hunkers to my level. ‘Your mammy found it last night stashed in the press upstairs. But you’ve enough going on in your head at the minute. Forget about the oul jumper.’

  And with that we walked on in the mid-morning sun, small hand in huge hand, back past Quarry Street and along Hamilton Street towards our green door, No. 15.

  7

  Elvis

  Me da bought Karen an Elvis poster for the bedroom wall after she sat the 11-plus exam. It was October 1971. It cost him twelve shillings and he had to save up for it for a few months, he told us later. The poster wasn’t of the young, thin Elvis with the lacquered quiff; it showed the more mature, round-faced, long-sideburns version, though he still had pearly-white teeth and wore a denim shirt. His head was huge and filled most of the poster, though it went down as far as his dark chest hair, where a gold medallion nestled. Elvis went up on the bedroom wall. I had to move my Arsenal team poster to the right to make room, Charlie George and all.

  You could see Elvis’ teeth from Chesty Crossan’s front door on the other side of the street if you looked up at our window. I had to tell everyone it wasn’t mine in case they thought I was into Elvis. When the bedroom light was on you could see his whole head. When it was off and the curtains were open, the streetlight made his teeth stand out.

  A few days after her exam Karen looked up from Chesty’s front door at Elvis on our bedroom wall. Elvis was missing a tooth! His other teeth were fine, though, and gleamed as normal.

  She rushed into the house, the three of us following. We all stood facing the poster in the bedroom. One of his teeth had been coloured in with a blue pen. None of us was to blame. By the look of Patrick and Paul it wasn’t them; it wasn’t me either. Her Elvis was dead to her – destroyed. There was no sign of a murder weapon. Karen cried her eyes out with her hands up to her face. She was a wild crier when she started.

  ‘Daddy’ll be home from work shortly. He’ll sort yous out,’ she said between sniffles. ‘How could yous do that to me?’

  She lined us up in the bedroom and scanned our faces for clues – a flicker of guilt or a smirk. Eventually the identity parade was allowed to stand down and we went off to watch Blue Peter on TV.

  ‘Should be “Blue Elvis”,’ our Patrick whispered in my ear.

  We giggled. So did Paul, though he hadn’t heard what Patrick said. Karen sat in the chair opposite and cried her way through the programme. Every few minutes she glared at us from her chair as if she could squeeze the truth out of us with her eyes. This was great craic, as it wasn’t me – definitely not, and definitely a mystery. She wasn’t that mad about Elvis or anything like that so I couldn’t see why she was that bothered.

  As six o’clock drew nearer and we waited for me da to come home, the crisis deepened. Any cockiness among us had reduced to nervous cackling. Me da hadn’t been himself recently, and him and me ma were rowing all the time, mostly when we were in bed. You could hear the tone of the argument but only some of the words. Doors banged and me ma cried. I lay in bed at night worrying that one of them wouldn’t be there in the morning when we got up.

  As soon as Karen heard me da coming in through the front door she ran out to the hall and turned on the crying again.

  ‘Daddy, wan of themuns coloured in Elvis’ tooth!’ she bawled. ‘He’s destroyed, Daddy, so he is. He’s destroyed.’

  The three of us had squeezed into the far corner of the sofa away from the door when me da had come in. When he came through the door his jaw dropped and the fury rose immediately on his face. Aw, Jesus, I thought to myself, here we go.

  ‘Right, the three of yis. Up the fuckin’ stairs! Get up them stairs!’ he roared, as he took off his coat and let it fall to the floor.

  Paul was the first through the door to the stairs and got a sharp crack on the backside on the way past, which helped him up the first few.

  ‘Yous two, get up there now!’

  Me and Patrick paired up and made a break for the door, but he caught both of us with a crack on the ear and slap
ped the arses off us as we scrambled up the stairs in panic, getting in each other’s way.

  We were made to stand with our backs to the poster and facing the bedroom window. Me da pulled the curtains because a group of wee girls had gathered across the street out of sympathy for Elvis’ tooth and Karen’s loss. She stood at the door and watched.

  ‘Right, I want the truth. Which one of ye did it?’ me da roared into our faces. The wee girls across the street had no picture but plenty of sound. ‘Which one of ye? Yis better own up or it’s a hammering for the three of ye,’ he bellowed.

  We knew that without needing to be told. But it wasn’t me so I was saying nothing. God wouldn’t forgive him for thumping me, an innocent boy, I thought.

  ‘Turn around! Turn around!’ he snapped at us.

  We all turned around quickly on his command. He was behind us and everyone was facing the dead Elvis. The blue tooth that killed him was in the very centre of the poster, just above our heads. It didn’t look that bad, I thought. Me da grabbed Patrick by the shoulders and turned him back round to face him. Oldest first.

  ‘Tell me the truth or ye know what’s goin’ to happen, don’t you, boy?’ His voice was calmer but somehow more menacing. This wasn’t good.

  ‘It wasn’t me, Daddy. I like Elvis, so I do,’ he pleaded.

  Both me and Paul sniggered, more out of nerves than anything else.

  ‘Yous boys shut up! I’ll give yis somethin’ to laugh about in a minute!’ he said and slapped the legs off Patrick who was in tears.

  ‘I didn’t do it, Daddy. It must’ve been wan of them two,’ bawled Patrick.

  Me da grabbed him by the shoulders and quarter-turned him to face the holy picture on the other wall.

  ‘Swear to me now in front of that picture that it wasn’t you!’ he demanded.

  Our Lord stared back with mercy and forgiveness in his eyes, his bloody hands open, forgiving. Our Lord wasn’t our da, unfortunately.

  ‘I swear to God, Daddy, it wasn’t me,’ Patrick cried, rubbing the redness on his calves with one hand and his red ear with the other.