The Pornographer

by John McGahern

  It was the bone dust you took home after the bones were raked from the oven after it had been put in a drum they called a pulverizer. Our own custom of lowering the coffin with ropes into freshly dug graves was like a bunch of wild primroses compared to this ghoulish wreath of arum lilies. The organ especially turned the whole thing into a farce.

  I wondered if they’d married in a church or a registry office, but mostly I marvelled at my luck. Other than never to have met, never to have slept together, for that fatal seed never to have swum, it could hardly have turned out better. But had they married? If they had they probably had gone on a glamorous honeymoon, a cruise perhaps. Circumstances being what they were, I could hardly expect a having-a-wonderful-time card, while each evening I went in with the brandy to the hospital, and wrote the story.

  e, and placed him in the shelter of the boat-house, leaving the unfinished bo

  The Colonel collected Mavis outside the office and they drove in the stream of traffic out of the city. It didn’t build any speed till it got past Lucan, but even then they found themselves continually shut in behind slow trucks and milk tankers.

  “Ireland will soon be as jammed up as everywhere else. That’s what’s wonderful about the rivers and lakes. They’re empty. Isn’t it exciting to be spending a whole weekend away from people?” Mavis said tiredly.

  “O people are all right, as long as they’re well shaped,” the Colonel leered. “And if they’re not well shaped, by Jove, I still find them all right as long as they’re willing, as long as they’re not afraid. What’s wonderful is being with you. To hell with the rivers and the lakes. It’s the scene that’s important, love, you and me, not the bloody setting.”

  “It’s all right for you to say that. You don’t work all week in a typing pool, with that bastard McKenzie blowing hot and cold.”

  “Why don’t you take McKenzie into your rich, irresistible quim and drown him in blessedness.”

  “I’ve thought about it,” Mavis yawned. “And it wouldn’t work. There are some people so in love with their artificial limbs that they wouldn’t throw them away if cured.”

  “Never mind psychology. Give us a hand. If someone is strangling you it’s no use knowing that he wasn’t loved by his mother.”

  The tiredness dropped away from Mavis, the whole week of the pool like old crumpled clothes left in the bathroom. She snuggled close to the Colonel, “They should have no gear-sticks in cars,” unbuttoned his fly, drew out the already swelling tool, teasing it till it stretched rigidly towards the flickering needle on the dashboard.

  He pulled his driving glove off, holding it in teeth before dropping it on top of the dashboard and let his hand trail up the long lovely stretching limbs, the warm firm smoothness of young flesh, drew the cloth down, let the finger stroke, slid the hand beneath the cheeks, closing it gently on the hair and soft skin, “I’m holding the whole world in my hand,” he said. Shyly they caught one another’s eyes in the driving mirror and smiled with the faintest vague plea of apology and drew tighter. “Being so feathered with those wonderful plucking fingers, holding the centre of the world in my hand, I start to find the grey arse of that milk tanker I’ve been trying to pass for the last ten minutes growing beautiful. It’s never a change we need. What we need is to hold the familiar eternally in love’s light.”

  “Never mind your psychology,” she laughed. “And don’t get carried away and drive up that milk tank. Metal is not to be confused with soft flesh. It’s a harsh grave.”

  “Everything is riding high,” he said, and seeing a clear stretch of road, he drew out, pressing remorselessly down on the accelerator, the powerful engine taking up with a roar.

  She leaned her head closer, so that the blonde tresses brushed the foreskin, and then she took the helmet in soft lips and started to caress and draw.

  The tanker seemed to stand still, the long line of traffic, and swelling in her hands—cunning young hands—the sperm beat out towards the climbing needle behind the lighted glass, the whole glass milked over by the time the car pulled in ahead of the line of traffic, and the needle fell back to a steady seventy. After the sudden race of speed, the car seemed to stand still, rocked by a light wind and tide, while gently his ungloved hand stroked till rising above the gearstick, fingers gripping the top of the dashboard, her lips going low to touch the sperm on the glass, she came with a cry that seemed to catch at something passing through the air. She tidied up what had been undone, stretching back in delicious tiredness and warmth as the car rolled on at seventy. “I’ve been waiting all day for that,” the Colonel said. “Getting it off on the road like that is like having a trout in the bag after the first cast. It’s like being in the army while there’s no war. You’re doing your duty while just lazing about.”

  “I’ve a feeling it’s going to be a wonderful, wonderful weekend. And it’s already started.”

  After Longford, a great walled estate with old woods stretched away to the left and children from a tinker encamment threw a stone that grazed the windscreen. In the distance, between rows of poplars, the steel strip of the Shannon began to flash.

  “There it is. And there’s the bar on the left. The Shannon Pot.”

  “Charles said he’d have us met there if he couldn’t be there himself.”

  The bar was empty. A large pike in a lighted glass case, its jaws open to display the rows of teeth, was the only hint of a connection with water. A man in a well-cut worsted suit broke off his conversation with the barman and came towards them to enquire, “Would you be the people from Dublin?” and shook hands in the old courtly way. “Mr Smith asked me to give you his apologies. He was called away to England on a sudden bit of business. He hopes to get back before you leave, but if he doesn’t he’ll write. And he asked me to see that you lack for nothing.”

  “That’s very kind of old Charles,” the Colonel said.

  “What’ll you have?”

  “Mr Smith left orders that everything had to be on the house. You’ll not be let buy a drink to save your life,” he said truculently, and introduced them to the barman, a young man in shirtsleeves. They all decided on hot whiskeys with cloves and lemon. They’d hardly touched their glasses when another round appeared, and then another.

  “We’d better see the boat,” the Colonel had to protest.

  “No hurry at all,” Michael waved his arm. “The man that made time made plenty of it.”

  “We better see the boat,” the Colonel insisted. “That is, while we’re able to see anything at all.”

  “It’s just across the road. There’s nothing to it,” he said with poor grace, but led them out.

  It was a large white boat with several berths, a fridge, gas stove, central heating and a hi-fi system. The Shannon, dark and swollen, raced past its sides. Night was starting to fall.

  “There’s nothing to these boats,” he said and switched on the engine. It purred like a good car, the Fibreglass not vibrating at all once it was running. “And there’s the gears —neutral, forward, neutral, reverse. There’s the anchor. And that’s the story. They’re as simple as a child’s toy. And still you’d grow horses’ ears with some of the things people manage to do to them. They crash them into bridges, get stuck in mudbanks, hit navigation signs, foul the propeller up with nylons, fall overboard. I’ll tell you something for nothing: anything that can be done your human being will do it. One thing you have to give to the Germans though is that they leave the boats shining. They spend the whole of the last day scrubbing up. But do you think your Irishman would scrub up? Not to save his life. Your Irishman is a pig.”

  Because of his solid, handsome appearance, his saintly silver hair, it’d be difficult to tell that he was as drunk as he was except for the wild speech. When Mavis opened the fridge she gave a little cry. It was full of wine, smoked salmon, tinned caviar, steak, cheese. There were all kinds of spirits and liqueurs in a cabin beside it.

  “It’s very like old Charles not to do anything by half,” the
Colonel acknowledged.

  “Mr Smith wanted everything to be right for yous. Mr Smith is a gentleman,” Michael chorused.

  When the Colonel wiped the misted port window clear, the gleam of the water was barely discernible in the last light.

  “I don’t suppose we’ll make Carrick tonight,” the Colonel said. “I was looking forward to a few tender loins tonight, including your dear own,” the Colonel pinched. “But I suppose we’d better be sensible and inspect it in daylight instead.”

  “We’ll have a drink,” Michael said and proprietorially got whiskey and glasses out.

  “No more than a taste,” Mavis laughed as she withdrew a glass. “I just need the faintest aphrodisiac.”

  “Like Napoleon,” the Colonel said. “Do you ever feel like an aphrodisiac, Michael?”

  “To tell you the truth, I never sooner one drink more than another. Just whatever gives me the injection.”

  “You get on well with old Charles?” the Colonel asked as they drank. “He’s a nice man.”

  “A gentleman. Mr Smith is a gentleman. No other way to put it. The English are a great people, pure innocent. But your Irishman’s a huar. The huar’d fleece you and boast about it to your face. Your Irishman is still in an emerging form of life.”

  “Did you grow up close to here?”

  “A mile or two down the road, a few mangy acres. The galvanized shack is still standing. I still hang out there for the summer, the hay and that, it does for the summer. In the winter I live on one or other of the boats. It’s in the winter we do up the boats.”

  “Do you do any farming?”

  “Well, I wouldn’t go as far as to call it that. I run a few steers on it.”

  “Who looks after them when you’re on the boats?”

  “A neighbour. I let him graze a few of his own on it that keeps him happy. That’s been going on since my poor father and mother died, God rest them. Before the boats started I used to work here and there at carpentry. I never wanted to depend on the land. Depending on the land is a terrible hardship. I saw it all,” and he filled his glass again to the brim, trying to press more on the Colonel and Mavis.

  “No,” Mavis stretched full length in the cabin. “I’m beginning to feel … If I drink any more I’ll be out of commission,” she laughed.

  For a moment Michael seemed alarmed but with a swig of the whiskey his old jauntiness returned.

  “Have you ever gone in for the girls, Michael?” the Colonel slapped him on the knee.

  “Not in any serious way. I stick to this,” he raised his glass triumphantly. “It’s all right for the rich. But my generation, seeing the hardship our parents had to go through, decided to stay clear. Maybe we were as well off. Anyhow we hadn’t the worry.”

  “No wonder the country is in such a poor state, but privately we’re beginning not to be able to contain ourselves. But there’s enough for everybody. You don’t mind, Mavis? We don’t want to sit down to meat—without offering our guest some.”

  “Not in the least. I was going to suggest it myself. He’s strong, he’s healthy, he’s handsome. What more can a woman ask?” and she stretched her long lovely limbs, the thighs gleaming bare all the way into the darkness.

  “I was beginning to fancy Michael myself. Rough sacking can give a great thrill after silk.”

  The Colonel started to unbutton the blouse slowly, letting the rich soft young breasts swing free; and he turned to Michael, “Forgive the liberty. Of course you’ll be the first, old chap.”

  Finishing his whiskey, and rising in slow righteous anger, Michael said, “I’m getting out. You’re nothing but a pair of fucking huars. I don’t know which of ye is the worse, the young huar, or you, you old bald fool that should know better.”

  “Don’t let him go,” Mavis shouted at the insult. “We’ll teach him.”

  Michael swung at the Colonel, who gripped him easily at the elbow, held him as he went down, where he struggled until the Colonel hit him, and he went still.

  “In spite of all that drinking he’s as strong as a horse, but you can’t beat the old commando training.”

  “He’s not hurt, is he?”

  “He’ll come through in a few minutes. I just gave him the one-two. He’ll probably have a headache for a while.”

  “Tie him. Tie him and strip him. We’ll give him an eyeful when he comes to.”

  They both undressed him, Mavis gripping the limp penis before letting it fall back. “O I’m glad he didn’t join. It’d be worse than Lough Derg to have to fuck with him. He mustn’t have washed since he last went to Bundoran and that must be twenty years before. To hell with him, but we’ll still give him an eyeful.”

  They tied him with the sheets.

  “Shall I bugger him? I rather like the dirt.”

  “Hold it. I’ll take all of it after that. An old boy like that, drinking all round the country, laughing at women, boasting he’d escaped—escaped from what?—wait till he comes to, we’ll give him something to see.”

  Her fingers fluttered toward her true and trusty friend. The Colonel strained above her, bent to kiss her lips, touch the small thumbs of the breasts, and then went beneath the shaved armpits. They waited till they heard a stir. His eyes were open. “Let me out,” Michael shouted, and they laughed as they watched his futile struggle on the floor. “See this.” And they forgot him.

  He lifted up her buttocks and drew down a pillow beneath, feasting on the soft raised mound, the pink of the inside lips under the hair. When she put her arms round his shoulders the stiff pink nipples were pulled up like thumbs, and he stooped and took them, turn and turn about in his teeth, and drew them up till she moaned. Slowly he opened the lips in the soft mound on the pillows, smeared them in their own juice, and slowly moved the helmet up and down in the shallows of the mound. As he pulled up the nipples in his teeth, moving slowly on the pillow between the thighs now thrown wide, she cried, “Harder, hurt me do anything you want with me, I’m crazy for it.” She moaned as she felt him go deeper within her, swollen and sliding on the oil seeping out from the walls. “O Jesus,” she cried as she felt it searching deeper within her, driving faster and faster. “Fuck me, fuck me, Ο Jesus,” he felt her nails dig into his back as the hot seed spurted deliciously free, beating into her. And when they were quiet he said, “You must let me,” and his bald head went between her thighs on the pillow, his rough tongue parting the lips to lap at the juices and then to tease the clitoris till she started to go crazy again.

  “Wait,” she said. “We’ve forgotten our friend on the floor. Is he snoring?”

  “The blackguard,” the Colonel shouted. “Did you ever see such an unholy erection?”

  “It’s huge.”

  Mavis took him in her soft hands while Michael turned away and moaned, “You’re lucky we’re kind,” she said. “We could have left you like this forever,” and she bent her hot body, drawing until he started to thrust towards her. “It’s like milking an old bull.” The spunk started to beat, and he cried as it fell, throb after throb, beating out, years of waste.

  “We may have started something we can’t stop. He may rampage the countryside now.”

  “What will we do with him?”

  “I have something to give him,” the Colonel put a pill in the whiskey and forced him to drink. They waited till he was snoring, untied him, dressed him, carried him out of the, and placed him in the shelter of the boat-house, leaving the unfinished bo by his side.

  “He’ll wake in about half an hour. He’ll be all right.”

  “What do you think he’ll do when he wakes?”

  “He’ll do nothing. He’ll think he was dreaming. Doesn’t the whole country look as if it’s wetdreaming its life away. He’ll want to be no exception. He’s a prime example of yourtrue, conforming citizen.”

  I drove them up through the white mist over the river in the morning, half-remembered cattle and tree trunks and half branches on the ghostly banks. There were two flaxen-haired boys and
a willow of a girl in from the country at the Bush Hotel. They took the girl up the river with them to the village, and left her with the fat man. “I could sleep for a month,” the fat man said, he’d go back to Carrick that evening on a paper run. It had been easy, the old technique, morsel leading to juicy morsel, to lying down to several solid meals.

  They went alone through the lake, the beauty of the glass wall of water touching Mavis. “It’d be nice to have a summer place on the hill up there overlooking the Weir.”

  “Yes, but you’d get tired. There’s nothing more tiring than so-called beauty. It saps energy because it’s an idea. You’d never know what you’d pick up off the boats. And we’d have the insurance of ourselves if the fishing turned out to be poor,” he put his arm round her shoulders as they went through the locks and kissed.

  As I brought them naked into one another’s arms a last time —“straight and affectionate”—the boat at anchor in the arms of the wooded bay, I felt sick enough to want to turn away from what I saw, to shout at them to stop. The old plays were not wrong: there are single moments of weakness when our whole life can be changed to nightmare, set in a sweet flutter so faint that we are uncertain if it touched us at all in passing; but already we had fallen. I remembered how grateful the two of us had been the next day for the boat after that cursed night. The business of having to take it back down the river had kept us from getting on each other’s nerves. And now Maloney had his story.

  I had a second drink while waiting for him to finish reading in the Elbow. He read it standing at the counter. He didn’t touch his drink but stayed completely silent till he’d finished.

  “It doesn’t quite phosphoresce with your usual glow, but it’s all right. We’ll publish it. Anyhow the Shannon makes a change from Madagascar. You’re a younger version of the Colonel of course?”

  “Whatever you think.”

  “And your lady in London is a vintage Mavis? Did she pull you off against the dashboard of the company Beetle on your way down? I liked that. It was one of the better touches.”