by Dermot Healy
Joejoe was mad to chat. And the chat was mighty. The wine was out, and the whiskey. I was allowed one glass of white and I drank it in a very old-fashioned way. Like in an ad. Rain was lashing against the windows.
Ma was about to carve the leg of lamb that was doused in wild mint leaves.
Good luck, said Joejoe.
Good luck, said Da.
Then the lights gave and the house suddenly went black.
This is grand, said Joejoe.
For a moment we sat there in the dark by the table as the storm raged round us.
Here, said Joejoe and he struck a match and handed the box to Da.
What the hell – Da cracked a match.
Buck it, he said, the shagging salt has eroded the insulator again!
The match went dead.
He lit another and got up on a chair and looked up at the fuse board. No good, he said. We’re out.
The search for candles began.
I have two boxes below, said Joejoe.
I meant only yesterday to buy some, said Da.
Blast it, said Ma.
You know what, said Joejoe in the dark, we could have the dinner down in my house.
Joejoe, will you stop. Why did this have to happen?
There were no candles to be found except one tiny Christmas candle that Ma had in her room. Da struck another match and went looking for the lamp. No lamp.
Where did you leave the torch, he asked me.
I don’t know, I said.
I headed round the dark house looking and found nothing.
This is bucking disastrous.
Everything is going cold, said Ma.
We’ll find a way. I knew I should have got them to install a new generator, said Da. The salt has it eaten.
That’s the third time this year, said Ma.
It’s shocking.
Well now, said Joejoe, you know what you’ll do, go down and get my oil-lamp.
Right, I suppose, said Da, eventually.
And remember the candles are in the kitchen-table drawer.
OK. Yeh. Yeh. The shame of it.
When he opened the door the wind blew the candle out. Feck it, he said.
Then he stood looking round him.
The whole country is in the dark, he said. They are all out.
He closed the door, stepped in and lit the candle again, left us the matches and went out the back. We sat there in the dark by the one fluttering butt. Our faces swam. We disappeared from each other. Then Ma served the meat and spuds in the dark. It was touch-and-go. Thank you very much, said Joejoe, you could be feeding us anything. She was a shadow. You could not see the plates. Then the little candle went out. For good.
Good luck, said Joejoe in the dark.
Good luck, I said.
Whiskey tastes better in the dark.
Is that so?
Oh yes, said Joejoe and he put a glass into my hand.
Then Ma’s hand touched my shoulder.
What’s keeping him, I wonder, said Ma.
We were there for ages. Rowing. Going over and back across the same wave. In the distance my mobile rang. It was like a firefly. I lifted it to my ear. What’s happening, said Anna. I’m sitting down to a very pleasant dinner, I said, by candlelight. Ah so your lights are gone as well. Yes, I said. Chat ya, she said. Now we were back in the time of the stone man that built the henhouse. He was having his revenge. We ate with our hands. You felt round the plate and took whatever came handy. Then Da came back at last with the lamp. I got lost, he said, in your house. I had no matches. I could see nothing. Joejoe lit the lamp and placed it centre of the table. Soon candles were blinking everywhere and slowly we could all see something of ourselves. We were a funny crew. We kept going and coming.
All around us was the dark.
And the dark was frothing.
It’s like old times, said Joejoe. Good luck.
Good luck, said Da.
I’m glad you asked me up. This is the way I like it. Thank you Miss Lockett for your kindness. We forget what we owe to what we’ve forgotten till we encounter it again out of the corner of the eye, in passing.
We were sitting by the roaring fire when Joejoe said: The mind is a terror.
It is that, said Ma, and the body is something else.
True for you. I didn’t know I had a body for a long time.
How come?
Me body was a sort of a ghost. Coming behind me. But I knew from the beginning that the mind was there. Take the Blackbird, he has a fierce mind. But he has only a slither of a body like myself. Do you think a lot?
– Who are you talking to? Ma asked –
– That fellow over there –
– Me? –
– Yes, you –
– I do, I said in his direction, I think a lot –
– But you don’t tell us what you’re thinking, do you, though I can see you at it all the time –
– Anna thinks out loud, I said –
– That’s because she’s an honest person –
– The mind is never asleep, continued Joejoe. I was in bed the other night and I spent hours trying to get back into my old house. I was haunted. I was down on the beach there looking for the gate, and eventually I found it and came up to the house and went round it and round it looking for the door, but was there a door, there was no door.
That’s terrible, said Ma.
Anna had a dream the other night, I said, that she was trapped in a coffin, and she began to shout and shout for them to let her out.
But they didn’t come, said Joejoe.
No.
They never do. That same dream goes back in the Conan family. I remember her grandmother telling me she used to wake screaming thinking she was in the grave. And her father before her. One of them a long time ago must have been buried alive back in France –
– I didn’t know that–
– It’s true –
– Jesus, no one ever told me that before –
– And it’s stayed in the memory.
– This is rare talk, said my father –
– It is. You’ll get that. The mind is a bad actor. Good luck –
– Good luck –
– Christ, I said.
Joejoe drew on his fag and he tapped sparks into the grate.
We were still sitting by candlelight and the oil lamp at midnight when things went wrong. Ma had just filled out another round of drinks, when Da suddenly said Sure you might as well stay the night.
No thank you, said Joejoe.
But we have your lamp.
I have more candles below. I have all I need.
The bed is there, made up, and ready for you.
I don’t want to stay.
There’s no need to be angry.
I came up here for the dinner, do you understand.
Joejoe, I was just offering you a bed.
You were trying to trick me. To get me out of me house below.
No I was not. Was I Geraldine?
No.
I’ll go now thank you.
OK, I’ll get the car.
There’s no need for the car. I’ll walk.
Across my dead body.
Joejoe stood and his face went into the darkness.
You can bring me my lamp tomorrow. The young fellow can walk me down. Isn’t that right – you.
Yes, I said, though I could not see him.
Hold on there, hold on everyone. Look I can drive you.
No. But there’s one thing you can do. You can say you’re sorry to the Blackbird.
I will.
Are you right? he said to me.
His shadow grew on the back wall.
You can’t walk on a night like that. And if are going to walk, said Da, you’ll need a blooming lamp.
I’m walking.
God help us.
I need my independence. Where’s me coat?
Ah dear.
Where’s me coat!
Just the
n the electric lights came back on.
It was like someone had suddenly taken a photograph of us. There was the three of us looking at Joejoe and he was standing with his arms out reaching in the wrong direction for the door. He turned and looked back at us as if struck. We seemed to have leaped back into existence. Next door in the kitchen the radio started talking about Baroque music. In the corner the TV came on speaking of a new rise in wages. We had been in the black without faces, just a nose or a mouth, then suddenly we were in colour, and the whole face was a surprise; before there had only been the voices, then suddenly there in front of you was the face and the body that accompanied what was being spoken. We had gone in one evening from darkness to a single candle, then to lamplight, then back to electric light.
And into an argument.
I was sorry we were back in the known world.
This is all wrong, said Da. You’re taking me up all wrong.
Forget about it.
Sit down now for a while.
Are you right, said Joejoe, turning to me.
Yes.
Take the lamp with you at least, said Da.
No, bring it down tomorrow.
He took my arm and we set off across the yard with Ma and Da standing behind us at the open door. We took a right down the lane, stopped, and tried to let our eyes adjust. I felt out for the small wall with my foot. His fingers dug into my arm. I could not see a fucking thing. The hedge of olearia had disappeared. The wind from the north-west struck my left ear like a knife. Over the rocks the sea pounded.
Do you know where we are?
No, I said.
We went on a bit further.
We’ll be straight into the rocks.
Steady.
We stood a minute.
I heard the car start back up at the house. Then it came on down behind us till the full lights bounced over our shoulders. And that’s how we walked, being shepherded by the Fiat down the lane, like folk being driven from some town for wrongdoing, it was like walking on the moon, then onto the road, two long bustling shadows ahead of us, till we reached the gate, and I walked him to the door while the car stopped out on the road for home and lit up the front of the house. It was blinding. Joejoe said nothing as he unlocked the door. I lit a match and he took out the candles and lit four, one for the window, one for the bedroom, one for the toilet and one for the mantelpiece.
Ma came in with Joejoe’s lamp in her hand.
Here you are, she said.
There was no need.
No bother, she said.
He followed her out to the gate.
Thank you Nurse Lockett, he said to Ma as she sat in behind the wheel. You are a lady. That was one lovely Sunday dinner.
I’ll see you, she said, Joejoe.
Goodnight.
Goodnight!
I sat in and Ma turned round on the road, flashed the lights as Joejoe waved, and we crawled back to the house.
Why did that have to happen? said Ma.
Don’t worry.
Da was seated inside by the fire looking into the flames.
The cursed lights, he said.
We sat round for a while, then the phone rang and Ma answered it.
Yes, OK, she said.
I have to go in, they’re short of staff.
A few minutes later she took off. I sat with Da a while, then said good night.
When I went to my room I found the missing torch to the left of my bed. I got in beneath the sheets and started building stone after stone after stone into a wall.
Chapter Sixteen
Working the Beach
I went down to feed the pots and took home eight lobsters. As I worked on the wall I saw the Fiat pull in. Later I came up for a cup of tea and tiptoed through the house for fear of waking Ma. Then I heard the TV on in the living room. I found Ma in a white sheet lying out on the sofa trying to change stations with the father’s mobile.
Ma, I said, that’s the mobile phone.
Is that what it is?
Yes.
Can you believe it!
The item you need is the remote.
Thank you, I know that. There is no need to be so condescending.
This is the lad, I said.
No, you do it. Get me something nice. Something where everything is light and airy. I’ve had enough of tragedy. There was a football final in town yesterday, and so in they came, all night, one drunk after another, and they flutered.
I found her a black-and-white movie on TV 4.
At least there was one bit of crack. Owney Brady came in and he says I’m after stout in Clarke’s and it’s fastened to me lips, then he fetched down on the bed. The mother laughed. And he says, You know it’s only five-thirty in the morning in New York. Now that’s casualty for you, she said. There was pure enjoyment in her voice. Is that Greta Garbo I wonder? She watched the box a while. Turn it off, she said, I’m so moidered I can’t follow it.
I turned to the news.
No thank you, she said, I’ve had it up to here.
I switched the TV off.
Thank you. Good, some silence.
She undid her shoes.
It’s a strange life. By the time I get in, he’s gone. And by the time he’s back I’m on my way out the door. I’ll be glad when nights are over.
So will he.
And what will we do with the auld fellow. Bullets through the blooming window. I’m losing touch. If anyone hears what’s going on we’ll all be put away.
She stood and wiped down her skirt.
Then paused.
I saw the saddest thing as I was coming off duty. She lifted one foot then the other to look at her heels, and pointed a finger toward me. About a month ago the gynaecologist died. And his dog seemingly comes up to the hospital every day looking for him. So I’m told. She rubbed her eyes and forehead, lifted her head as if to concentrate on the sentence she had just finished. I never saw him till this morning. A fox terrier. And there he was being walked round the grounds by one of the patients at the crack of dawn. And this happens every day. Leaping in the air, she said, chasing the ghost of his master.
With her toes she traced semicircles on the tiles.
I’ll go up now, I think.
See you later, Ma.
Aye. And there we were standing around an agitated man in the nude and what were we nurses talking about – community hours, overtime, planning permission and the days off that we are entitled to – that sort of crack, and then she mounted the stairs shaking her head.
The thing now was to stay quiet. I boiled the lobsters and left them out to cool down then I got a book by Grisham and sat in on a shooting downtown. I heard the father’s car coast to a stop in the early noon. He took off his boots at the door, came in and heated a can of Heinz spaghetti and had it with toasted soldiers.
How’s things, he whispered.
Grand.
The mother all right?
She’s fine.
Good.
Jesus, so that’s where it was, he said lifting his mobile. Do you want to take a break from the wall and come with me in the bucket for a while?
I’d love to.
He washed the dishes, dried them, made ham sandwiches and a flask of tea and left a note for the mother, then we drove to the next beach where his digger stood on the dunes. We put on our ear muffs. The beach looked like it was inhabited by aliens. Piles of small rocks had come in with tall pods of seaweed flowering from them. The roots clenched the stones with a drowning man’s grip. There were hundreds of them, standing up straight, going this way, that way. It was like a demented garden. I climbed into the bucket and we drove down toward a crowd of huge rocks brought inland by the storm. Then I got into the box behind him. It was freezing and full of draughts and the loud noise of bad memories.
Now, he said.
I leaned forward, turned the ignition and shot back in time.
He pressed down with his foot.
We started forward, then I gr
abbed the handle to lower the bucket and we tucked in under the first rock. He pushed forward, tipped, let her weight carry her in, the iron roared, then he lifted the bucket high and we turned back to the sea wall and dropped the huge rock into place.
Now, he said. The trick is to imagine that there is always an electric wire running over your head, just up there, and if you touch it you’ll blow your self up, so that’s how you teach yourself that you should only go lifting to a certain height. Right?
Right, I said as he pointed up at where there was only an open sky, and said Do you see it – the electric wire?
I do.
Good.
What you imagine soon becomes a law. Isn’t that so?
Yes.
Good lad.
He got in behind me and I sat into the seat. I let in the pedal and we took a jump then hurtled forward.
Now, take yon one!
We jumped again, I turned the tracks, the digger braced itself.
Lower her.
I did.
And went in nicely underneath but when I swung the bucket up the weight of the rock carried it out over the lip.
Buck it, I said.
I backed and screeched forward into the sand an inch at a time, got well underneath and swung her up.
Aisy, he said.
The bucket swayed dangerously.
Remember the wire, he shouted.
I will, I shouted.
Easy son, easy!
I levelled. Turned. She was a great weight. I throttled forward slowly, then when I reached the sea wall I held her a moment, this way that way, then dropped her clean onto his rock, and she shivered, then held. I nudged her in with the bucket. Then he took over, the box warmed up, and for a couple of hours without talking we took turns to traverse the beach and the lane like moon men going through the tall shoots of seaweed, pulling out from inland the debris from the storm, screeching in under one rock after another, all soaked black and blistered with fossils, the sand heaved and fell, the tracks screamed, we lifted, swivelled and trundled in.
At last he switched the engine off. I took off my muffs and heard the sound of rocks and steel and the roar of brakes still screeching in my ears. He turned on his transistor. The Pogues were singing. We sang along. He broke open the sandwiches and we sat in the box eating and drinking the tea. You could tell that he had spent a lot time in here. It was another room from home.
Beyond the sea was panting white, spuming across the lava and flurries of salt blew by.