‘Well done, Francis.’ said Mr Barry. ‘OK, let’s play a new game, let’s play Cheer and Boo.’ The boys looked at each other, puzzled.
‘Daddy, we never heard of a game called Cheer and Boo.’
‘Well, that only goes to show that you don’t know everything after all. Are you like Ian, Francis? Do you think you know everything too?’
‘He does know everything. I know nearly everything and Francis knows everything.’
Francis had never heard Ian say anything like that before. Did he really think that or was he only messing?
‘Is that true Francis, do you know everything?’
Mr Barry’s eyes were smiling at him in the rear-view mirror. Francis blushed.
‘No, Mr Barry.’
‘Well, there’s one thing I know for sure. I know that there’s no chance in the whole world that either of you could ever have heard how to play Cheer and Boo. Not a chance. You know why?’
‘Why?’
‘Because I just made it up.’
The boys groaned.
‘OK, here’s what you do. You know the names on the posters are the names of the candidates, So the game is you each pick a Party to cheer for and everytime you see a poster you have to shout out the name on it and then either cheer if it’s your Party or boo the other Party, OK? The first one to shout the name and cheer or boo gets a point. I’ll keep score and whoever wins will be in charge of the government. You got that?
‘Is this a stupid game, Daddy?’
‘Of course it is. All the best games are stupid. Now, first you have to pick your Party. OK, who wants to cheer for Fianna Fáil?’
Francis had no idea why he didn’t shout ‘Me, me, me!’ like Ian did. He just didn’t.
‘Maybe you weren’t ready that time, Francis. Will we do it again?’
‘Daddy, that’s not fair, I was first.’
‘No, it’s all right Mr Barry.’
‘Are you sure you’re not just being polite?’
‘No. Let Ian be Fianna Fáil.’
‘Yeah!’
‘Ah, you must be from a Blueshirt house. Are you?’
Francis didn’t know what he meant.
‘So, do you want to cheer for Fine Gael?’
Francis remembered that after the Minister died last year there was a by-election and the Fianna Fáil candidate was a relative of the dead minister and his Granny said, ‘Typical, who does that crowd think they are – the aristocracy?’ So Francis didn’t like him. All the Fine Gael posters had a picture of a teacher in his school called Mr Kennedy and everyone said what a nice smile he had, so Francis decided he liked Mr Kennedy. Did that mean he wanted to cheer for Fine Gael? He could see Mr Barry’s smiling eyes waiting for an answer. Ian nudged him.
‘Go on, pick.’
‘What’ll it be Francis, Fine Gael or would you prefer Labour, maybe? Are you a bit of a Socialist? Well, tell you what, why don’t you cheer for both, they’re all against Fianna Fáil anyway. OK, so are you ready? See that poster coming up? Who is it, Ian?
‘It’s Tom O’Donnell.’
‘And cheer or boo.’
‘Boooo!’
‘Very good. Now Francis, can you see any posters?’
‘Yes. Stephen Coughlan.’
‘That’s Labour. Cheer or boo?’
‘I cheer.’
‘Well, go on so.’
‘Oh… Yeah.’
‘Ah, Francis, come on! Louder.’
‘Yeaaaahhh!’
‘Much better. OK are you ready? Starting – now!’
Even though it was really silly, once they got into it the boys loved the game. It was boisterous and uproarious but they also had to be eagle-eyed and quick to read from far away. As they travelled from county to county the names of the candidates kept changing. On small country roads there weren’t so many posters. The boys would spot one from far away and watch it coming closer and closer until it was near enough for one of them to read and shout.
‘Michael Smith, yeahhh!’
‘Richard Deasy, yeahhh!’
‘Thomas Dunne, booo!’
Sometimes three or four posters would be bunched together almost completely covering a telegraph pole. The boys soon learned to say names very fast to collect more points.
‘Paddy Lawlorboo! Tom Enrightyeahh!’
In the big towns there were so many posters they couldn’t shout out fast enough. By the time they went through Portlaoise the boys had got faster and more excited and the shouting got louder and louder.
‘oliveryeah!!flanaganboo!!berboo!!cowan!!geryeah!!connolly boo!jameskellyyeah!!Jameshoulihancharboo!!lesmacdonaldyeah!! johngalvinboo!!’
Mr Barry, laughing, said, ‘Stop, stop!’ He couldn’t keep score because he couldn’t hear any names any more, only meaningless noise. ‘It’s a cacophony,’ he said, which Francis thought was a brilliant word. The boys answered him by chanting yeah!boo!yeah!boo! until finally he managed to shut them up by promising to stop for ice-cream, but only if they would calm themselves. He said that was enough cheering and booing for a while. They stopped in Monasterevin and Mr Barry said he was going to have a good old-fashioned sixpenny wafer, with ripple ice-cream. Ian asked for an Iceberger. Francis wanted a Brunch, but a Brunch was sixpence, so he thought he should ask for an ice-pop instead, which was only threepence. Mr Barry looked at him.
‘An ice-pop? A plain old ice-pop. Is that all? Really?’
Francis went red. He looked at Ian who shrugged.
‘Francis, just have whatever you want.’
He remembered his Uncle Seán in the Irish American bar in Ballybunion promising to buy him an ice-cream if he sang a song. Francis sang ‘Trasna na dTonnta’ for him, and Uncle Seán said, ‘Go hanna mhaith.’ It was hours afterwards when they left the bar, but all Francis could think about was the ice-cream Uncle Seán was going to buy him. He walked along Main Street with his mam and dad and Uncle Seán and Auntie Mona and Martin and his cousin Eva and they kept stopping at shops that sold ice-cream but they only looked at the souvenirs and the picture postcards and then walked on, nattering about all sorts of things. Then they went into the casino and his mam and dad played Wheel ’Em In with pennies and Martin and Mary went on the Bumpers and Francis saw Uncle Seán put sixpences into the horse-racing game, Derby Day, and he won once. Francis, though he was only six, could tell that no one was thinking about his ice-cream. But Uncle Seán had promised him. Then Auntie Mona and his mam said they’d wander back to Mrs Brosnahan’s with the children and his dad and Uncle Seán said they’d pop in to Harty Costelloes for a quick one. As they separated, Francis knew if he didn’t say something he’d never get his ice-cream. So he spoke up: ‘You promised me ice-cream.’ Even though Uncle Seán said straight away, ‘Oh, I’m sorry. I did, didn’t I?’ his mam grabbed him and slapped the back of his legs. ‘How dare you, the cheek of you!’ Uncle Seán looked really sorry that he had forgotten. ‘Ah no, Ann, in fairness now, I promised the poor child.’ But his mam took no notice. ‘You’re not buying him ice-cream under any circumstances, not after that. The cheek of him, too much auld talk, that’s what’s wrong with him.’
But now, looking at Mr Barry’s face, Francis could see that it was all right to ask for any ice-cream. And anyway, his mam wasn’t here to tell him not to be cheeky.
‘Can I have a Brunch?’
‘A Brunch. That’s more like it. A man of sophisticated taste.’
The three of them sat in the car, silent for a couple of minutes, enjoying their ice-creams. Francis and Ian ate theirs in funny ways, trying to make the other laugh. Ian squeezed his Iceberger so that the ice cream came out the sides, then, showing his teeth, he chomped like a beaver. Francis nibbled the red and white biscuit crumbs off the top in a very dainty way without taking any ice cream. Then he did the same down either side. Then, without warning, he took a huge bite. That made Ian laugh.
As they drove out of Monasterevin, Mr Barry turned on the radio to listen to the sponsored programmes
. When the music for the Jacobs programme started he was delighted and sang along with it, ‘Wah wa-wa waaaaaahh, wah wa-wa waah wa-waaaaahhhhhh,’ and when the presenter, Frankie Byrne, spoke, he imitated her perfectly. Listening to him, Francis remembered that, for a long time, he thought Frankie Byrne was a man, partly because Frankie was a version of his own name and partly because she sounded like a man. But then he found out it was a woman with a deep voice.
‘Now, the problems I talk about today may not be yours, but they could be – someday.’
Mr Barry laughed. ‘Good woman, Frankie, there’s no one like you. I tell you, lads, a truckload of cigarettes and whiskey went into making that voice.’
All the way to Dublin they listened to Frankie reading out the letters that listeners sent, looking for answers to their problems. Helen said her new boyfriend expected her to pay for herself when they went to the pictures or a dance. He claimed it was because women should be treated equally, but Helen wondered was he just mean? What did Frankie think? Frankie thought that if this fellah wasn’t treating her to the price of a cinema ticket now, in the first flush of romance, it didn’t bode well for the future. ‘On the money, Frankie – literally.’ Mr Barry said. Catríona was doing a line with a very nice lad for over a year and recently he had invited her to go away with him for the weekend to a music festival in the west of Ireland. She was sure that all the arrangements would be perfectly proper, but she was worried about what people would say. Frankie said she understood her concerns, but a person who spent her life worrying about what others thought sometimes ended up never doing anything – and regretting it. ‘She tells it like it is, lads,’ said Mr Barry. Noreen was going out with a man for fifteen years and now they were both over forty and she was afraid he was never going to propose. Frankie said she didn’t want to dash Noreen’s hopes, but she wondered if perhaps this man just wasn’t the marrying kind. Mr Barry laughed loudly at this. Francis didn’t know why it was so funny. All the letters were from girls. Did Frankie ever get letters from boys with problems?
As they started passing factories and housing estates it seemed like they must be arriving in Dublin, but fifteen minutes later there were even more factories and the housing estates were getting bigger. Francis began to notice the TV aerials and wondered why they went so high. They looked at least three times higher than at home. They passed a housing estate that seemed to go on and on for miles and the aerials were like a neverending steel forest in the sky. He asked Mr Barry why.
‘That’s so they can receive the British channels.’
‘Can people in Dublin watch BBC?’
‘BBC One, BBC Two and ITV. If they have the right aerial.’
‘And can they still watch RTE as well?’
‘They sure can. It’s only us poor fools down in the sticks who’re stuck with one channel. Discrimination, boys, that’s what it is. You know the way in America they go on about racial discrimination? Well, here in Ireland we have telly discrimination.’
They asked Mr Barry how long more before they were really in Dublin. He said, ‘This is Dublin. It’s all Dublin. The Big Smoke.’
Francis said, ‘No, the middle, where the GPO is.’
‘Oh, you want to see the GPO? I wouldn’t normally pass it on the way to the hotel but if you want me to go that way it’s no problem.’
Nothing was a problem for Mr Barry. He drove along by the river and turned up O’Connell Street. They were able to pass the GPO slowly because the traffic was so heavy. The boys wondered what it must have been like when it was set on fire in 1916. They asked was the whole street in flames, were there British soldiers everywhere with Gatling guns and cannon? How had the Volunteers escaped and into which street? As they talked, Brendan suddenly remembered that day when Gavin showed him around the set of the GPO in Studio One. Jesus. Over three years ago. He recalled the particular moment so clearly. Standing high above the set, even above the lighting grid, in the darkness of the metal gantry, his hands had gripped the safety railing as he’d leaned over to get a bird’s-eye view of the impressive replica below. Then he’d felt a hand placed gently, nervously, on his. A few seconds passed and then, without speaking, and, without thinking much about it, he had turned his palm upward and clasped the hand. The kiss seemed to follow quite naturally. How it all began. And continued so long – on and off. How had that happened?
Mr Barry didn’t seem to hear Ian’s question and then suddenly he said, ‘What? Oh that. That’s the Gresham Hotel, very swish, one of the country’s top hotels. Along with the Inter-Continental, of course.’ Mr Barry then kept talking as they turned back down O’Connell Street and crossed the river. He pointed at what he said were famous places and statues of famous people. He told the boys lots of things about them. He talked so much they didn’t get a chance to ask him anything and suddenly they arrived at the Inter-Continental Hotel. It was even bigger than Francis expected, much bigger than the Inter-Continental where Mr Barry was manager or other hotels back home like the Royal George. The huge lobby was full of people all dressed up, sitting around on couches, smoking and drinking. While Mr Barry talked to a girl at the desk, Francis nudged Ian and pointed to a group of men in suits, laughing and drinking over by the wall. ‘Gangsters, planning a robbery?’ he said. Ian nodded and looked around too. He nodded towards a baldy man, sitting all alone reading a paper – or was he just pretending to read it? Ian said, ‘Private eye? International spy?’ Mr Barry was joking with the girl at the desk. He seemed to know her very well.
‘Doreen, I know you have my usual suite ready for me but I was wondering have you anything at all for these two itinerants? An auld broom cupboard now would be fine.’
The girl looked at the reservations book with a very serious expression on her face. ‘Mmm, I’m not sure if there’s anything available, boys. Oh wait, we have a special room put aside. It says here, for a handsome, well-mannered boy who’s just turned ten years of age. That’s not one of you by any chance is it?’ For a second Francis was amazed that the girl knew about his birthday but when Ian said, ‘Me, that’s me. I was ten yesterday,’ he realised his mistake. Francis didn’t know why he had never told Ian that they had the same birthday – that to him they were sort of twins. Because he had said nothing that first time, years ago, when Ian invited him to his house for his party, it seemed to become harder after that to find a way to tell his friend. Each year, as the day approached, Francis thought about revealing this amazing little secret and then each year he stayed silent. Why? To him it was magical and significant and fateful that he and his best friend had been born on the same day in the same town, maybe even the same hospital, so why not say it? Francis had thought about this so much that he sort of knew why he didn’t. He was afraid, and what he was afraid of was, what if he told Ian and Ian didn’t think it was important at all? Or, worse, if he wouldn’t be his friend any more? But why should that be? That was stupid, wasn’t it?
‘Looks like you’re in luck, lads.’
Mr Barry threw open the door of room 516 and waved a hand.
‘There you go.’
Francis knew that Ian wasn’t as excited as he was because he had already stayed in this hotel with his mother and father and probably stayed in lots of hotels before. Francis had never stayed in one in his whole life. The room had two huge beds, each of them bigger than the double bed Gussie and Ritchie slept in. They had four pillows each. The curtains were thick and went all the way to the ground just like curtains on a stage. There was a writing table with a telephone, and a big television.
Mr Barry said, ‘OK boys, you have five minutes exactly to wash yourselves and get ready before we go to RTE, all right?’
Brendan closed the door of 516 and went to 518, conscious of a feeling quite unusual for him. Could it really be guilt? After all, he was able to tell himself quite honestly that both boys were having a whale of a time and he had pulled out all the stops on the journey to keep them amused and he was quite certain that Gavin would entertain them mi
ghtily showing them around the studios. If Brendan was using them a little for his own ends was that so bad? He thought about this as he undressed and had a quick shower. Did he want a room all to himself tonight or not? He did. So, rather than dump Ian in a room on his own, wasn’t letting him bring a pal along the best arrangement? It was. So end of story, no harm done. A bit sly, maybe a bit mean, but as he had no intention of changing his plan for tonight, Brendan accepted that he’d just have to cope with this little spasm of conscience as best he could.
*
Francis was a bit surprised when Mr Barry turned round with a really big smile as he drove into RTE and asked if he was enjoying his day out so far. When Francis said, ‘Yes.’ Mr Barry said, ‘You’re sure?’ and Francis nodded and said it was brilliant, the best time ever. Mr Barry, still smiling, said, ‘Good.’ Then they went into the studio building.
A man standing near the reception desk waved at them as they came in.
‘Mr Barry and entourage, right on time. Now, let me see, at a guess I’d say this is your young swain and you are the best pal, is that right?’
‘Got it in one. This is Ian, the birthday boy.’
‘Ten, I hear. Have I been briefed correctly?’
‘Yes.’
‘A fine age, an impressive age.’
Because of the way he smiled at Ian, Francis was sorry the man didn’t know it was his birthday too.
‘And his compañero, Francis. Boys this is – do you want them to call you Gavin or Mr Bloom?
‘No formality around here, I’m Gavin lads.’
‘Now, you should know that Gavin is one of the most important people in RTE. He’s a senior floor manager, which is very close to being God. Nothing moves in the studio without Gavin’s say-so.’
Unspoken Page 40