by Paul Charles
THE
PRINCE
OF
HEAVEN’S
EYES
by
Paul Charles
Parkway Publishing Ink
First published in 1974 by Future Legends Music.
This edition published in 2012 by Parkway Publishing Ink
Copyright © Paul Charles 1974 & 2012
The Author has asserted his mortal rights.
Original Art by Graham Marsh
www.paulcharlesbooks.com.
Paul Charles
was born and raised in the countryside of Northern Ireland. He now lives with his wife in Camden Town, where he divides his time between writing and working in the music industry. He is currently working on his 2nd Castlemartin novel, The Lonesome Heart.
Other Titles by Paul Charles:
The Christy Kennedy Mysteries:
Last Boat To Camden Town
I Love The Sound Of Breaking Glass
Fountain of Sorrow
The Ballad of Sean & Wilko
The Hissing of the Silent Lonely Room
I’ve Heard The Banshee Sing
The Justice Factory
Sweetwater
The Beautiful Sound of Silence
A Pleasure To Do Death With You
The Inspector Starrett Mysteries.
The Dust of Death
Family Life
Other Novels:
The First Of The True Believers
The Last Dance
Other Books:
(The Complete Guide To) Playing Live.
A short introduction concerning Fruupp, Annie Austere, Mud Flanagan and his search for the end of the rainbow.
In the early 1970s I was working with Belfast band Fruupp and apart from numerous other tasks including, but not limited to, finding the weekly wages I wrote some of the lyrics for their songs and wrote the spoken word links that connected the songs on stage into a kind of show. It’s probably also important to note that swords, costumes, dry ice (loads of dry ice) and blood capsules were also involved.
For the third album I had the idea of reversing the process, that is to say writing the links first, in the form of a short story, and then the band’s song-writers, Vincent McCusker and Steve Houston, writing the songs to bring the story to (stage) life.
I often wondered how the legend grew about a pot of gold being buried at the end of the rainbow and so I created a legend of my own to explain it and named it The Prince Of Heaven’s Eyes. From childhood I’d always seen a rainbow as being the top eyelid of the almighty.
It has to be said that Vince and Mr Houston came up with the musical goods and in trumps. Fruupp as a band, Vince McCusker, Steve Houston, Peter Farrelly and Martin Foye, wrote their one and only song, The Prince of Heaven, about the show as opposed to being part of it, and so was released as a single and not on the album.
The album was released (with the first 5000 albums containing a free booklet of my short story) and we took the show on the tour and that as they say was that. The following year Fruupp could be heard to mutter, “Houston we have a problem.” They were of course referring to their keyboard player and a year and an album later it was all over.
The Prince of Heaven’s eyes album was re-mastered and re-released a couple of years ago as a CD. I thought it might be a good idea, once that dust settled, or revisiting, tidying up the story and e-publishing it on Kindle so here we are…
T hanks are due and offered to: The Pye Records team, Fruupp - the band and crew, Paul Fenn, Bob Gold, The Crawley gang, Eddie Levy, Graham Marsh (for the original art) and Walker Prints.
Chapter One – IT’S ALL UP NOW
Not so very far from the place now known as Youghal, Co. Cork, the hero of our tale was born and spent most of his early life. His life, or should I say his entry into this life, was not greeted with a fanfare of trumpets, or even anything less suitably spectacular. No, he enjoyed a humble birth on a starry winter night, the first, and last, son of two of the kindest and generous of the little people you could ever wish to meet, Finbar Flanagan and his wife, Mable. After much debating and mind changing they finally decided to call their son Mud Flanagan.
Now Mud grew up to be an honest young lad well trained in his father’s trade of shoe making. Indeed, at a very early age Mud’s gift as a shoemaker far surpassed his father’s and soon the business which his father had just managed to keep ticking over grew quite prosperous.
Beyond the obvious reasons this pleased Mud because, for the first time in his life, he was able to see his mother and father take a well earned rest from the hardships of life. Thus life was not a chore; it was a pleasure to work at what he did best and see the rewards of his work bring peace to the two people that had given him the gift of life.
So, it was as a cobbler that he lived the first twenty years of his life. Day after day, excepting Sunday’s, of course, he would go into his little workshop in the early hours, work diligently away until mid-day when he would take out his wine, bread and cheese and go for a walk into the quiet peaceful countryside and share his lunch with the birds.
Mud’s first love was the countryside and the secrets of nature. His lunch breaks were the joy of his day. He would either walk through the beautiful green grass up and down the country or just still on his favourite chair shaped rock on the mountain side and look for as far as the eye could see and drink in the wondrous visions around and about him. Oh the joys of to see and not to touch; to feel and not to see; to hear and not to listen; to be king for a second from his feet to the horizon. Sometimes he would lie back in the soft velvet grass allowing his eyes to roam the skies; the kingdom of the birds.
How sweet it would be to be as free as the birds; to fly; to climb; to glide; to soar; to roam while feasting their eyes on the beauty below. The pleasure they must enjoy from living their lives as they searched for just enough food to keep them alive and provide them with energy to travel the heavens seeing the earth in its true magnificence.
On one such day, a week before his twenty-first birthday, Mud was lost travelling the heaven’s with the birds when he was brought quickly back to earth by the cries of his mother shaking him violently from his slumber, “Mud! Mud!” she wept, “Your father’s dead, your father’s dead, dead, dead, dead, dead………”
Mud could feel himself floating quickly back into reality. He opened his eyes only to see his mother shaking above him, blacking out the lovely blue sky with her shawls. The news was devastating particularly as it had been delivered in contrast to the peacefulness of the pleasures of nature against the anguish of death; the death of his father.
A month later Mud and his mother had come to terms that, even though their minds weren’t, they were still physically living. Time was passing without the one they loved. Mud thought the bitterness they felt in their hearts would not last forever, it couldn’t last forever.
He couldn’t bear to see his mother so sad. Never a smile on her face, never a word to say, day after day just sitting looking out the window, across the hills and dales, over the beautiful landscape. No longer living, barely existing.
Seven weeks, to the day, after his father’s death the rain had soaked the land for seven days and in the late afternoon Mud noticed that his mother’s eyes were sparkling, gazing in awe at a rainbow. “He’s there,” she cried, rising out of her chair for the first time, “Your father’s waiting for me over there at the end of that rainbow. He’s smiling, he’s happy, he wants me to join him, please don’t stop me.”
With that she ran out of the door of their small cottage and ran down the field with her arms outstretched. Mud followed her and then, as if heeding a voice from the skies she suddenly stopped and by the time
Mud had caught up with her she fell into his arms. Mud lowered her gently to the ground. By the time she was resting on mother earth she was dead.
Mud couldn’t feel grieved. His mother had died with a smile on her face. She couldn’t live without the man she had loved all her life. But now she’s in the land of peace. Perhaps she’s one of the birds of the air, thought Mud, as he carried her back to the cottage. Perhaps she is flying to the end of the rainbow to be with my father. Then, as if running into a stone wall, something else hit Mud. He was alone.
Loneliness Mud wore like a cloak of dark blue. He greeted it the way a sailor greets a storm, the way explorers greet the unknown. Time turned his dear parents into a sweet memory. It sealed his sadness to his past with the dawn of each new day.
As Mud drew near to the twenty fourth year of his life he grew restless. Nothing had changed drastically; it was just that … well you know, the only thing that separated the days was darkness. Life today would be just as life tomorrow, which would be just like the day after. No sorrows, no joys.
Mud saw himself mirroring the end of his mother’s existence. Days turned into weeks and on, and on, and on. Money was still coming into his business, in fact, he had become quite rich with his dedication to his work. But what good was it doing him. What, or who, was he actually living for? Should he die, who would miss him.
For many a long hour these thoughts ached his head. Even his beautiful peaceful countryside no longer brought ease to his mind. And so after many a troubled day and night Mud was walking home from work when his eyes were lit up by the magic of a rainbow. Seeing the seven magical colours paint a picture in the sky, Mud had a flash about what he could do with the rest of his life.
He would gather together all his money, a few necessary possessions and set off to find the end of the rainbow in order that he may bury his fortune there. Somewhere over the rainbow he would find happiness and would leave his wealth there to bring joy to others.
His heart set on a goal Mud found new energy to start the days. So after settling all his affairs and saying his farewells to a few friends Mud set out one bright sunny morning on the greatest adventure of his life; his search for the end of the rainbow, the home of peace and happiness.
Chapter Two - THE PRINCE OF THE NIGHT.
It was Monday, not a bad day for travelling, thought Mud, and so, with all his worldly possessions under his arm he merrily trod off down the road. Spring made its presence felt by the fresh sharp air. The earth was soft beneath his feet. Mud took a large deep breath; it felt really good. He decided that, perhaps after all, life was worth living and maybe this road upon which he now trod would take him through many an exciting adventure and bring him to meet many an interesting person.
Suddenly the silence was broken by this large horse trotting up behind him. The horse was glossy black and ridden by a young prince dressed head to toe in black.
“Good morning young lad,” began the horsed youth, “Mount up with me and I’ll show you pleasures that you never knew existed.”
Suddenly a sweat crept over Mud because he had heard stories about how the fairy people used to visit the earth in the day time, always dressed in black because the fairies could not stand the sun, and take humans to the underworld; here the fairies would make the humans drunk and keep them till after midnight. If they could succeed in doing this then the fairies would have complete control over them and make the humans their servants.
Mud quickened his step and kept his eyes to the road because he was also aware that if the Black Prince caught his stare, Mud would fall under his power. The Black Prince kept on talking to Mud in a very sweet voice trying to persuade him and soon became impatient at Mud ignoring him. So the Prince dug his spurs into the horse’s side and just as he was galloping past Mud he bent over to the side and swooped Mud off his feet.
By the time Mud had recovered his senses he could feel the horse beginning to rise off the ground and, at the same time, he sensed that the trees and fields around him were getting bigger and bigger. This was not the case. Mud and his unwelcomed partner were, in fact, getting smaller and smaller until they were small enough to pass through a hole in the trunk of an old oak tree. They now travelled down through the tree, out through the roots and into the fairies’ underworld.
“Come! Don’t be shy,” yelled the host in a bassy devilish voice, just as Mud was recovering his senses and found himself at the fairies’ feast table. “Eat, drink and be merry, like those around you,” the Prince paused and took a deep breath to bring as much drama as possible to the occasion, “I take offence to those who sit at my table and refuse to partake of my fine food.”
Mud was in for it now, to be sure he was. He knew that if he wined and dined with the fairy people there was no way he would be able to escape from them before midnight. On the other hand, if he refused to eat of the feast the Black Prince must surely take offence and banish him into a dog, or a goat, or a worm, or some other of the lesser animals for the rest of his life.
The latter appeared to Mud to be the eviler of the two and so, slowly at first, Mud took of the meat, drank of the wine and, to his surprise, he found the meat to be the tastiest ever to have had the pleasure of entering his mouth. The wine, oh the wine, the wine was so sweet that it made his taste buds rule his body. More food, more wine, and more, and more.
Seconds turned to minutes and the minutes turned to hours as the hands of the great clock flashed around before Mud’s drowsy eyes. He could feel himself going under but he just couldn’t help it. Bit by bit he was losing the power of his body and mind to the fairies.
After the feast had finished, the entertainment began. Fanfare of trumpets, blown on daffodils, and Mud watched transfixed as three beautiful young ladies danced. As they danced, all in circles within circles they cast a spell of happiness on all the party. Once again Mud was aware of the change of character overcoming him; he was becoming very merry and was reaching a state of contentment he never believed existed.
With a snap of the Black Prince’s fingers the dancing stopped. The Black Prince then rose to his feet gathering his cloaks about him and he strode backwards and forwards along the length of his table, the master table, the very same table at which Mud was also sitting.
“And now, stranger from the land of light,” began the Black Prince again slowly picking his words to draw more effect from them, “In return for our hospitality you must give us of your words and entertain us, this grand company gathered before you, with a story. Pray tell us a tale of life, here or beyond. If your story be too short, or insincere you will remain a servant to us until eternity. If, on the other hand, your tale is of such content that it satisfies the company you will be returned from whence you came.”
Chapter Three – The Legend that was Finn McCool.
Mud thought hard. Hard? Well, as hard as it was possible for him to think in his present state. His worry was soon overcome by his high wine content, false confidence, as it were, so he rose out of his chair, clambered up onto the table, feeling giddy at his new altitude, and began to address the company. Mud decided on a story which had been told to him many times in his youth.
“Come gather round, all that doubt,
I won’t whisper, and I won’t shout.
But with my words I will weave
A picture for you all to believe.
And when I complete this tale, so true.
You can bet your life I’ll be leavin’ you.”
That got then, thought Mud. He once again cleared his throat, nearly falling off the table in the process, “Quite a few years ago now, way up in the northland there was this giant. Oh what a giant sure he must’ve been the biggest giant ever. Anyway his name was Finn McCool and he was so big that he could walk the length of Ireland in four or five steps, depending on whether he was drunk or sober.”
“One fine day, Finn was out for a walk, over by the coast of Ulster, I believe it was on the Antrim coast, when he spied this fair damsel of a giant calle
d Dorothy Dean. Dorothy captured the imagination of Finn’s heart and he immediately fell for her, trouble was she was on the next land mass (later to become England) and he was on the Irish coast. In the twixt they nere would meet as neither could swim.
“So, a very sad Finn went up the Antrim coast and sat down on the northeast shore with his feet in the water and began to cry. Slowly at first then more violently, so violently in fact that he shook the whole of Ireland and his falling tears, being so strong in weight and content, began to cut crazy patterns in the rocks beneath Finn. These crazy patterns can be witnessed to this day, they are popularly known as ‘The Giant’s Causeway’.
“Noticing what his tears were doing to the rocks amused Finn somewhat and he cheered up a bit and stopped sitting on the rocks feeling sorry for himself. He started to scheme as to how he could cross the band of water that kept him from his own true love. By the way I should tell you’re here that Dorothy had been informed of Finn’s love by the seagulls, who’d reported back Dorothy’s equally strong attraction to Finn.