Long Time, No See

by Dermot Healy

  And Joejoe said not a word.

  At one o’clock seated round the coffin was Frosty and Mister St Patrick and the General; at two o’clock there was Frosty and Sean Caraway, Freddie Hart, while out in the drawing room was Da, Joejoe, Mister and Mrs Conan, Mick Doyle, Stefan, and the General; in came Mister Awesome; Ma and Anna, like the night of the Stations, kept going to and fro with the stew and the sandwiches; then round three, Frosty sang and Joejoe accompanied him on his fingers.

  He sat there till dawn broke.

  Then he went to the bedroom and tipped a handful of sea shells into the coffin.

  We all went home to bed for a couple of hours, then got up to dig the grave. The crew from the night before were there waiting at the gate of the graveyard with shovels and spades. Da and the General began the dig in front of the tombstone erected in memory of Johnny and Catherine Feeney.

  Then myself and Frosty took our turn in the grave.

  As we reached about four feet down we hit a few bones of the ancestors.

  Frosty looked me in the eye, and nodded, and we dug another hole deeper down, and buried them.

  Before the removal that evening we all sat round in the bedroom till the undertaker came. The smile on Tom Feeney’s grey face began to tighten, and the lips straightened. I put the dudeen in his top pocket. Joejoe leaned in and stirred the shells. The lid was closed and the Bird was moved to the local church. We carried him up the aisle to the front, and the rosary was said by the priest and a few locals. It was there he spent his second night, on a trolley just below the altar.

  Next morning the four front rows to the left of the altar where relations would sit at a funeral Mass were empty.

  Our family kneeled in the fifth row behind, with Joejoe, in his old black suit and new black tie, seated next the aisle. And scattered round the nearly empty church behind us there were a few mourners. Anna came in and sat beside me. To my right-hand side I saw the three hippies enter and kneel. Angela had her hands joined in front of her face. The priest looked at the empty seats to the front and slowly began the Mass. Just then a man in his twenties appeared, walked up the middle of the church, and, with a great sense of unease, sat alone in the front row. The priest made no speech but just offered up the service in memory of the soul of the bachelor Tom Feeney, late of Cooley, then he shook incense on the remains, and turned and shook Joejoe’s hand, then shook the young man’s hand.

  The family would like to invite you all after the burial to a meal in the Sea Café, he said.

  Go in peace, he said, the Mass is ended.

  The man looked back at us; and as we rose he came over and said he was Jer Feeney, Tom’s nephew. We shook hands; then he followed us at the head of the queue of mourners as we carried the coffin on our shoulders to the graveyard, and lowered it on lengths of rope into the open grave. Anna threw in a handful of blackberries. We took our turns with the shovels at the filling-in as the priest said the Five Holy Mysteries. Joejoe stood with his cap to his chest beside Jer. With each clash of earth on the coffin it felt like we were burying two men, one a stranger and one a friend. I saw Jer stiffen with each clout of clay. It was Frosty, Terence MacGowan, and Mister McSharry threw in the first round of shovelfuls. Then, we tapped them on the shoulder and they stood aside and now it was myself, Da and the General digging into the pile of earth.

  The widows stood chanting the responses as rain fell.

  And just as the grave was near full a taxi pulled up at the gate of the graveyard and Miss Jilly got out and stood at the gate and watched and listened to the final prayers, then she got back into the taxi and took off. Mrs Currid, in her feathered cap, looked me in the face and said: Wonders will never cease, Philip.

  Chapter Forty-One

  Passing the Time

  The last layer of earth was flattened; the wreaths were spread, and we stood in silence a moment, then suddenly Jer shook Joejoe’s hand, waved to us and crossed the graveyard alone.

  Where is he going? asked Ma.

  He has to catch a flight from Knock, said Joejoe.

  Ah dear.

  Sir, said Angela and she kissed my granduncle’s cheek, I am sorry you lost your friend.

  Mister Feeney, said Tommy and Aaron together, and they shook hands.

  We started down the path and on the way Joejoe took off his cap as Da knelt at Grandma’s and Grandda’s tombstone, then we went on.

  Now we’ll head to the Sea Café, said Da at the gate. Everyone is invited.

  I’ll not go, whispered Joejoe to me.

  OK, Joejoe, I said.

  Outside the graveyard the crowd were getting into their cars and Da stood waiting by the Volkswagen with the front passenger door open.

  Now Uncle Joejoe, step in, he said.

  He does not want to go, Da.

  What?

  Look, said Ma, I’ll take him home.

  Myself and Joejoe and Anna climbed into the Fiat.

  Ma looked into the rear-view mirror.

  Will you not change your mind, Joejoe?

  No, Nurse.

  And so Ma drove us back to his cottage, while Da sat in – with the General beside him – to lead the cortège to the restaurant.

  There was not a word in the car till we pulled in at Ballintra.

  Enjoy yourselves, Joejoe said, stepping out.

  I better stay with him, I whispered into Anna’s ear, on instinct, and I got out as well.

  And are you not coming with us? asked Ma.

  I’ll stop with him, I think.

  Ma sat a few seconds without moving while we stood by the gate, then she let down the window and said: Are you sure Joejoe? – while she looked at me. Yes Ma’am, he said, so reluctantly she turned the car around to face inland, and slowly they went up the road.

  Immediately they were gone I released the dogs and Joejoe began his jaunt.

  For the first hour he was up and down the road outside his house.

  I walked him up; I walked him down while the two dogs went before us and behind. Everywhere the fuchsias were shedding their leaves and the clocks were scattering. The montbretia were being shredded down to their veins as the gusts from the Atlantic struck inland.

  And the rowan berries were growing a more violent red by the minute, a sign, said Joejoe, of a bad winter ahead.

  We went out on the battery wall with our clothes being torn apart by the wind; and he sat in his place for a while on the giant sloping rock; then it was off walking again, up to Cooley and back as if he was following the Bird’s litany…Up Cooley and across Poll an Baid. Poc Awokatche. Culleens. Culleens. Poll and Saggart. Through the Bent. The Night Field. The raven. Dromod. Through the willows. Take a left. Onto the New Road.

  Jer, he said.

  Then there it was, without a word being said, the same mantra I heard in my head as we took off again…Into the quarry. Hens. Ballintra. Ballintra. Cooley. Hens. I was reared under their wings. Sea holly. The long squares. Christ’s tears. Sally Anne. Culleens.

  The poor man, he said.

  Off again…The blooming General. Culleens. Cooley. Then suddenly the Merc appeared before us on the road and at last Joejoe stopped.

  Dido and the ambassador got out smiling with a bare questioning look.

  How are you sir? asked the ambassador.

  I am fine.

  Chest! said Dido.

  You gave my friend here and his wife a wonderful night.

  Yes, said Joejoe, staring ahead, with his feet thrashing. Last Friday, three weeks ago, and he started to beat his chest with his hands.

  Is something wrong? the ambassador said turning to me.

  We are just back from a funeral, I explained.

  I am sorry, and he translated for Dido, who bowed.

  We go now, said the ambassador.

  Do widzenia, said Dido, and he said something else in Polish, and the ambassador translated and said: He says goodbye and he says he will sing for you again sometime, and they got into the car and drove down to the pier; the
n seeing the state of the ocean they sat looking out; and at last turned and passed us on the road as myself and Joejoe headed off on another search. Dido held up the palm of one hand in a blessing, then it was the journey of…The foxgloves. St John’s Eve. Cooley graveyard. Childer, Childer. The long awns. The moon. The urchin. The rake. Hens flying in the rafters. Sea pink. Sea pink.

  A woman in a builder’s jacket went by power-jogging followed by a spaniel she had tied to her wrist. Overhead the chopper flew in a circle. We ended up outside the Bird’s house. The starlings were lined up on the electric wires overhead ready to take off with a whoosh.

  I have lost a friend, said Joejoe, like you did.

  Yes, Joejoe.

  I unlocked the door and Cnoic leaped in and went round every room barking as Joejoe sat in the Bird’s armchair.

  Psyche, is there a tipple left?

  I found a half-bottle of whiskey with a tincture remaining, and poured him a half-one.

  He whisked the glass round and round in his hand then leaned forward and shot the full drop into the grate.

  Good luck, he said.

  I put the perfume bottles in a little box and led him home. The sheep above on the hill were lying in a long straight line along the ditch in Ewing’s field. In the far distance a new storm was throwing her skirts in the air. The Apostles were gathering. The yellow and red marigolds were dipping their heads. Timmy and Cnoic ran and rose onto their back legs at the door. We let them in, and they flattened on the floor, shivering.

  I filled the grate with paper and timber and turf and struck the match.

  He stood and shook the old draper’s bell.

  Cuckoo! he said and Timmy whined. Our shadows went round the walls followed by the flames.

  We sat by the fire in his house till darkness fell and slowly he returned from wherever he’d been. I filled him two glasses of poteen.

  His phone rang.

  I picked it up and said Hallo and the phone rang off.

  Who was that, he asked.

  No one.

  That’s going on all the time, he said.

  He turned on the small portable TV and we watched ten minutes of a film set in Vietnam. As the soldiers shot into the forest he pointed the remote at the screen, said April 1965, and turned it off; You were some bird when you left Raspberry hill, he sang to himself, you were, you were; then he moved on to The crows are alive on the trees, like honey bees; then he moved on to the song ‘Black is the Colour of My True Love’s Hair’; and he sat, doing that mad movement with his feet, the tap then the pawing and the kick-back in rhythm to a tune inside his head. On to the song ‘All around the bloomin’ heather, will you go lassie go’. Then he oiled the saw and the blades. He oiled the lock on the front door and then fell asleep in the armchair.

  There was a small knock on the window. I opened the door and Miss Jilly entered under an umbrella; said Excuse me, as she downed it.

  Is he asleep?

  Yes Ma’am.

  I hear a voice I know, he said, without opening his eyes, who is it?

  Miss Jilly, she said and she went over and shook Joejoe’s hand.

  It was in your house, he said, that I saw my first tomato and I carried it home like it was a marvel. Now for you. That’s how I got to know tomatoes.

  I used to see you always wandering about at all hours in the glasshouse.

  Yes, and up and down the stairs in the main house cause I loved the carpets. I asked your father once what he would like most in this world and he said he would like to hear again. He had gone deaf.

  Yes. And that was me on the phone, she said, a few minutes ago but I could not speak.

  Sit yourself down.

  I’m sorry, Mister Psyche, she said and she shook my hand. I could not enter the graveyard.

  Please stay a while.

  No, I am only infringing.

  Just then through the open door we heard a car pulling up and Anna came in with two bags of fish and chips, a box of mushy peas and a cold bottle of Chablis.

  Oh Anna, said Miss Jilly, and she hugged her.

  Lala will chat you later, said Anna.

  I followed her out to the car.

  How is he, said Ma.

  He’s not so bad.

  Is there anything we can do, asked Da.

  It’s all right.

  Jesus son, I’m sorry for putting all this on you, and he shook his head.

  It’s OK, Da. It’s OK. Miss Jilly has just arrived.

  I know – we saw the car at the pier, that’s why we did not go in.

  I’ll be up soon.

  Right son.

  They took off and I waved them away.

  Anna held both my hands, put her head down, and followed me into the house. Inside Miss Jilly had sat alongside Joejoe. She would not eat, so myself and Joejoe ate out off our laps by the fire. He ate every last chip and every morsel of cod. Then I made tea in the dark scullery and the ladies accepted a cup. He lit a candle and asked me to read and I searched through the Psalms trying to find a piece that did not speak of death or murder till I came to Revelations 16 and I found these words:

  Behold I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked and they see his shame.

  And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon.

  And the seventh angel poured out his vial into the air, and there came a great voice out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, It is done.

  And there were voices and thunders and lightnings –

  – Yes, he said, the signs –

  – Beautiful, Anna said –

  – They are always there –

  – They are, said Miss Jilly, Just yesterday I put my husband’s urn in the mausoleum –

  – Read on, he said –

  Psalm 50 –

  I will take no bullock out of thy house, nor the goats out of thy folds.

  For every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills.

  I know all the fowls of the mountains: and the wild beasts of the field –

  A belt of rain pelted down on the roof. I stopped, put the Psalms next to the Wayward Lad on the dresser.

  Would you people like to be on your own? Miss Jilly asked.

  I am on my own, said Joejoe. Stay a while longer. It will pass the time, and he stood and patted my shoulder.

  I opened the bottle of wine and poured out four glasses.

  Good, good, he said.

  It’s French.

  We touched glasses and drank.

  You’ll get that, he said.

  You will, said Anna.

  Miss Jilly looked at him, turned away and stood silently a moment then she flung the long black scarf back round her neck.

  How are you? she asked.

  I know I’m here but I’m inclined to wander.

  Are you sad?

  No. That would be the wrong word. I’m in a hurry, he said.

  A hurry?

  Aye.

  Well wait for me.

  I will.

  I’m glad I called, she said, cheers.

  Good luck.

  Thank you Mister Psyche.

  Again, another belt of rain thrashed the galvanised roof and steam poured from the fire. And just as quickly the battering stopped. Then a minute later the showers began drumming across the roof again in earnest.

  There’s a hurricane out there somewhere, he said. The sea wrack will be up the beach on the morning.

  I poured another few glasses. He suddenly tore at his back, and then settled down.

  I felt the loss coming, he said, but the real thing brings on the guilty plea – the selfishness.

  There is no such thing as remorse, said Miss Jilly, only alleviation. It is best, perhaps, said Miss Jilly, to say goodbye privately.

  Yes, he said, and then he said Apples. Apples I love, but not the skins. He stared at the ceiling. His eyes never flinched. He smiled quietly to himself.
r />   Can I admit something Anna? said Miss Jilly –

  – Do –

  – I abhor sentiment because I indulge in it –

  – Oh –

  – while pretending I don’t. The strict face has a tear blocking its view.

  Indeed you’re right Ma’am, said Joejoe.

  I stood and opened the Blackbird’s box of perfumes.

  Pick a bottle, Madam, I said.

  Miss Jilly reached in and lifted a dark bottle, undid the cap and smelt in.

  My God, he said, it’s him.

  It’s yours. They were Tom Feeney’s private collection.

  That is so thoughtful of you.

  I had better go, I said. They are waiting for me above.

  And we’ll go with you, said Miss Jilly.

  Joejoe stepped out the door with us and we all looked at each other as the dogs circled us. The sky was a ball of black. The clouds were at war, stalking the map of the heavens. Miss Jilly unfurled her tall blue umbrella.

  Goodbye Miss Jilly and Miss Anna, he said, thank you for calling. Say Hallo to the family, Mister Psyche, he said. C’mon in lads.

  The dogs went in. The door closed. He blew the candle out. There was only the odd flash of the flames in the house as I looked back. We walked Miss Jilly to her car in the dark. She put her hand on the back of my hand.

  Thank you, she said, for everything. Will you take a lift?

  No, I’ll walk, said Anna.

  Miss Jilly drove off. I looked south. The lights of dozens of houses were twinkling on another shore. Then I smelt the perfume Miss Jilly had rubbed into my skin. Smell that, I said. Anna let my hand go and headed home walking in her black coat and shoes. I watched her till she went out of sight

  The gang were round the table.

  I thought you would never come, said Da.

  How did the meal go?

  First that man Jer left, the meal without him was wrong. The meal without Joejoe was worse. We should have just come home. I never felt so lonesome in my life.

  It was sad, said Ma.