Leila

by J. P. Donleavy

  ‘Here take these, my dear fellow, the whole place is being incited against us. Every one of those evil bastards whose prick is not securely plunged up something or someone, will want to bathe themselves in our Anglo Irish blood.’

  Rashers tugging and pulling up the bottom of the window. Lifting up his foot and smashing out the panes. And up on his knees on the sill and disappearing out into the darkness. As one feels something stuck in one’s back.

  ‘This is a Schmeisser, you fucker. And I’ll blow your spine to pieces if you move.’

  Darcy Dancer shoved with the barrel of a gun. Out the door. Along the corridor into another dungeon room. Gathered faces in the candlelight.

  ‘Here he is. He’s yours.’

  Gunman pushing the long barrel of the pistol back in under his coat, hunching up his collar and disappearing. Face this crowd of baleful faces leaning against this wall. Staring at me. As this man malevolently stands with his sour breath accosting my nostrils.

  ‘Did you hit that man with an axe.’

  ‘He was hit with my fist.’

  ‘You hit him with an axe, or keys or something, no fist could do that damage.’

  Other faces gathering ominously closer. Moving. As I move. My back closer against the wall. While the man with the gun is gone. I may only have to face gouging hands, kicking feet, kneeings and butting heads. My demise in all their eyes. Rashers to whose rescue one goes. Also gone. At least his cufflinks and pawn ticket are unsafely in my pocket. To whom does one shout for help. And have even the merest hope of being heard from this dungeon room. All I can do. Is fight. Foot and fist. At least make one die with me. Smash in this first nearest face. Kick the goolies of the smirking man behind him. Send them splattering on the ceiling. And distinctly announce my intentions.

  ‘If you so much as move a hair to touch me, I will part your face in two with the same fist that demolished your associate.’

  A furtive sheepish grin stealing over the lips of the interrogator, uneasily shifting his weight from foot to foot. Eyes slowly believing what I’m saying. But still smiling, knowing half a dozen pair of hands stand safely behind his back. Ready to beat me to a pulp. But my fist will reach his jaw before I die. Now. Here. Within steps of her touch. As the silence shivers. The interrogator has just given some signal. And one of them now. I spy. Moving sideways along the wall. But at least this interrogator is going to go down dead in front of me. Before this chilling sound is over. The end smashed off a bottle. A voice. Firmly loud. Word by slow word announcing.

  ‘Anyone here who is interested to know. Better know that I’m on the side of Darcy Thormond Dancer Kildare. And that the end of this will have your jugular cut before it’s jammed deep in your face. Just any of you make one move to put a hand on him.’

  The candlelight flickering. Distant sound of singing. The Old Orange Flute. And in the doorway. The broken dark green thick jagged glass of a champagne bottle held up. Glinting in the fist of Foxy Slattery. Full of courage just as his smaller brother is full of cunning. And here. An ally. Braving all this assembled brawn. Just as he did in the battles of our childhood. When he taught me how to fight the world. In the uneasy silence. His voice speaking so sure and solemn.

  ‘Now that that’s understood. One by one, each of you. Vacate out of here.’

  Out the brick arched entrance, the figures slowly departing past Foxy. Off up the passage back into the mêlée of this bleak underground jungle. The last one, the interrogator. Stopping. Looking back.

  ‘We’re not finished with you yet.’

  Darcy Dancer putting out his hand. To clamp it gratefully hard upon that of the Foxy Slattery as his brow furrows and he noddingly grins.

  ‘Foxy you saved my life.’

  ‘You can bet I did and all. And if it wasn’t for the man with his face pouring blood, coming out front there where I nearly had a horse and car sold, and hearing them say they were stringing up a man called Dancer who did it, named after the racehorse, I wouldn’t have bothered coming back here. But follow me, we’d be as well to wander out of this place as fast as our feet can take us. And you can be bloody sure they’d be this second gathering up a bigger gang. There’s a way by the back we can go.’

  Past more dungeon rooms. Opening a door. Out into the misty night. Soft rain still falling. Darcy Dancer and Foxy clambering over broken bottles, dead rats and a dead cat. Vaulting up on the roof of a water closet. A woman inside screaming, as the toilet flushes.

  ‘Don’t mind the lady in distress now boss, she’d be that way anyway when she gets back inside.’

  Climbing a wall, jumping down the other side into an alley. Foxy shimmying up a drainpipe. Darcy Dancer following. Past a window. And higher on to a roof. Hands scratching clawing crawling up the wet slippery slates splitting under their weight. Clambering over the ridge tiles. Knocking one loose to tumble clattering down. A voice from a window shouting.

  ‘Call the Guards that’s the second of them tonight from out that bloody sewer over there and breaking this place down.’

  Darcy Dancer and Foxy lowering on another drainpipe to the pavement. And running along an alley and out another. To emerge on the street. And cross over to slowly walk along the banks of the canal. Its still water flowing past under the flecks of lamplight. Catching their breath.

  ‘Well that’s a nice little bit of exercise boss I don’t mind telling you.’

  ‘It was Foxy. And I can’t thank you enough.’

  ‘Well you just remember that I’ve not ever forgot. Your own footsteps coming once. When I was huddled cold up hid hardly with shelter saying the act of contrition thinking I was already dead from starvation when you brought me the bit of a bite to eat that saved my life. And it’s only just and fitting that I had at last the chance to save yours. I’ll be going now boss. Can I drop you anywhere. My car’s not that far.’

  ‘No thank you, Foxy. I’ll walk here a bit by the canal.’

  ‘Slán agat go fóill, boss. See you again.’

  ‘Goodbye Foxy. And thank you.’

  The great heavy timbers of the canal locks, over which the water pours. Two gleaming white swans cruise. A dead bloated dog floats. The weeds and rushes. There goes Foxy. A moment of brief kindness given once, repaid this day with my life itself. Walk now under this lamp light. Take out Rashers’ cufflinks and the pawn ticket to redeem my own silverware. Stare at them in my hand. And wouldn’t you believe it. A bloody punched tram ticket to Dalkey. And as for priceless cufflinks. These trinkets, aside from being most awfully garish, are clearly nothing but imitation jewelry.

  Darcy Dancer walking the path along the canal. Houses the other side with big gardens up to their entrance doors. A light on in a window. Only sign of life. Man standing in dressing gown in the middle of the room looking at a book held open in his hand. And out here. Wet. Cold. Bereft. My trousers torn. Shoes scuffed. One hears Sexton’s voice. Telling of when he was a little boy, often without a shoe. Up at two in the morning to drive his dead father’s cattle ten miles over the hilly winding roads to the market in the town. Arriving at dawn, waiting soaked and chilled by his scrawny hungry bullocks for a buyer. And sometimes no one would even look at him, never mind the cattle. And then drive the beasts home again unsold. Many a sad time that happened Master Darcy, many a sad time. It would drain your heart of blood, but it would never stop you doing it again.

  Darcy Dancer walking north across the empty city. Past shop fronts. The mist lifting. The air chilling. A star or two blinking in the sky. One does miss loyal old Sexton. With his razor sharp hedge hook, he’d have been a help down in the catacombs. If he weren’t shocked rigid by the goings on. Knuckle of my thumb swollen where my fist landed. Stood up Miss von B. A heart searing glimpse of Leila, I walk with. As I go from one sadness to another. The damp penetrating one’s bones. Nearly hear the huntsman’s horn calling to the hounds. Out there westwards on the wild lonely land. And without a horse, quicken my steps back to the Shelbourne and a warm bed. What bleak desolat
ion through these streets. One has no one at all. And is it, that all anyone really wants in this world, is just each other. One body enfolding another in comfort when it carries so much pain. Turn now. North. Charlemont Street. At least a name bespeaking some elegance out of the past.

  The sky widening with more stars. A faint moon lighting clouds. Darcy Dancer stopping to stand on a corner. Where this road divides. Look up. A sign over a pub. The Bleeding Horse. Such a name, Mr Arland mentioned once. Said he came here to buy cheap vegetables, haggling with the barrow women. Took him from the walled safety of college out into the harsh world. Sexton used to say, know about horses and you know all there is to know about the rest of life. A cinema over there. Camden Street. Must go on. Just as I feel I am bleeding. And need someone. With whom to console. A friendly voice to hear. While the whole city is asleep. Eggs, butter and cheese in this glass front. Nice nourishing name on the sign, Monument Creamery. Down this way somewhere is Lois’s street. Am I hearing things. A voice. This utterly ancient hour of the morning. O my god. There’s Horatio Macbeth. Declaiming at his reflection in a shop front window. I suppose I’m not that lonely that one feels the need to pass the time of night with him. But what a convenient way to amuse oneself. And avoid thinking how sad life is. I know no lines to orate. To put alive again my hopes and dreams. I had that night as Leila stood in my mother’s room. When I should have reached out for her. Gathered her into my arms. Without fear of rebuff. Even with all the household’s spying and listening behind doors. Not let her have escaped. As my mother’s admirers had let her in her scrapbook. Their love poems. I worship thee from afar. And had one of them worshipped my mother from near, she would not have married a gambling waster called my father. With his whisky reddened face, mean and pinched. And shall I now. Sell land. Go away forever somewhere. Preferably sophisticated. Rid one’s mind of Leila. Of mad stallions, butlers, rot, falling slates, dying cattle and other troublesome servants. To London. Where I shall of course avoid the Marquis’ most stupid sounding club. Go instead to one of those hotels where during the season, my mother stayed. A suitable one I remember called Claridge’s. Yet is there anywhere or time when one can ever be safe from grave injury to the spirit. Or the more mortal of embarrassments. Such as one, once befallen my mother’s mother. Gone bald in bereavement over my great grandfather’s death. The scarves she wore over her pate often blown off by the wind. Till family members insisted she get a wig. Which, the first time she wore it out hunting, was knocked off with her hat. And there her red tinged hair lay against the green grass. And as it resembled a fox, it was instantly set upon and eaten by the hounds. She did however jovially say to the huntsman. O dear, little left isn’t there, not even the tail.

  Darcy Dancer walking along this shadowy dingy street. An undertaker’s. Can smell the stables. Black horses who pull the carriages. A church. Outside a statue to the Blessed Virgin. Inside it must have walls lined with boxy wooden confessionals where the whole city pours out their sins. Now every Dubliner will be rushing down into the dungeons of the catacombs instead. And I’ve not yet come to Lois’s street. Gone the wrong way. Remember looming a big grey granite hospital on the corner. Perhaps if I turn right now instead of left. Vaguely recognize this shoemaker’s. A grocery. A timber merchant’s. And here. At last is the alley. God it’s as late as one is desperate. No street lamp to see by. Hers is the only door. A green one numbered four. Knock. Or better bang on it. Peer in the letterbox. Not a sign of life inside. She may tell me to go away. I must be waking her. Wait for her to dress and come to the door. Just sit a moment on this box. So tired. Intended tomorrow to have my hair cut. Go to the chiropodist’s to have my toe nails trimmed. Then to the races. And I may instead in my present state, leave Dublin altogether. Go home. Back across the lonely flat bogs. Let my life live and die out there on that rolling hunting land. Away from the sordid world. Out where the banks of earth, streams and the boughs of beech are friends one knows. And not these bereft pavements. Down those dungeons, tonight someone shouted that when Adam and Eve left the Garden of Eden it became the Garden of Evil called the catacombs.

  Darcy Dancer slumped asleep back against the stone wall. Suddenly awakening, shivering and cold. Sound of footsteps approaching up the alley. A voice whispering and calling to a cat.

  ‘Here pussy puss. Here here pussy puss.’

  A shadow. A figure. Stopping. Looking down. Two feet in black Wellington boots. Her face in the hood of her duffle coat, one, she said, her husband wore on the bridge of his ship during the war.

  ‘Good god, it’s you. What are you doing here like this.’

  ‘I’m afraid I called upon you to collect my etching and fell asleep.’

  ‘This time of night. How dare you assume you can arrive like this. Just whom do you think you are to take such prerogative.’

  ‘I do apologize.’

  ‘Well I should think so. Just because I am an artist does not mean you can take for granted that I am a bohemian whose privacy can be invaded willy nilly. I happen to be of a distinguished family. With Admiralty and Foreign Office connections.’

  ‘But you did invite me earlier at the Count’s party. However I am sorry to have given you vexation. Goodbye Madam.’

  ‘You did earlier of course ignore me. For the company of that fortune hunting very aptly named philistine called Rashers. Well of course if you wish to say goodbye, do. I won’t stop you. But you are you know, practically shivering with cold. Why aren’t you more warmly dressed foolish boy. And I of course am not so inhospitable as to not at least offer you a cup of tea or cocoa. As little of that as I may still possess.’

  ‘Thank you, that would be very kind.’

  ‘Well come in. Don’t stand there making a draught. And just remember I am now celibate.’

  Church bells. Tolling three over the city. Climbing up these stairs. Where once I had convulsions of laughter. With Lois tripping and falling on her arse over bottles. And now one is utterly embarrassed at her mercy. Her so British nasal voice. Her age. From which one suddenly wants to run. Despite her lack of wrinkles, she must be nearly thirty eight. Or in her god forsaken forties. She does have a certain smoothness to her skin. But o god, she does so damn moan on. Ought to be bloody glad someone’s calling upon her. She is of course considerably more ancient than even Miss von B. O god. This big grim room. How cold. The black of night above on the skylight. And dear me. A wash line hung with her personal underthings. Smell of turpentine. The sweeter smell of linseed oil. Her bookcase crammed with books.

  ‘If it weren’t for the fact that I had to remain late at the Count’s conferring over some ballet sets I’ve been asked to design, I should have been soundly asleep. Or at the very least, having one of my nightmares. And I should not like dear boy since I’m inviting you in, for you to ever get the idea that if you call upon me at this hour of the night again that you will be welcome. It does make one think that beneath your English exterior, you may be just like the Irish.’

  ‘I do wish, since you are now in fact having me in, that you did not continue to complain about my not making an appointment to call upon you.’

  ‘Well I shall stop. But I also think with that cruel edge to your voice, that you can be hurtful when you choose to be, can’t you.’

  ‘Perhaps yes. I can be.’

  ‘Spoilt I think as well. However at least you are not obnoxious.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘And you are young and beautiful. I do like young and beautiful men, and if they are extremely young and extremely beautiful, I like sucking their cocks.’

  ‘I hope then, madam, that being just merely young and beautiful does not exclude me from your latter category.’

  ‘It most certainly does. No matter how enticingly beautiful. I must make it quite clear in case you’re getting ideas that my celibacy most certainly excludes sucking your cock.’

  ‘O dear. Well I hope the youth and beauty you refer to does not also imply you’re preferring too, lack of brains.
’

  ‘I regard beauty as being part of intelligence. However without wanting to sound trite, intelligence makes an ugly face beautiful. Put those drawings on the chair on the floor and do sit down.’

  Lois vigorously riddling her stove. Sparks flying up from the dying embers as she throws in pieces of turf. Taking off her duffle coat. Scratching herself under both bosoms through several layers of sweaters. Pours milk and puts it on a gas ring. Her little world here. Fewer balls and pricks on display than I previously remember. Must be her celibacy. Even has a sketch or two of country scenes.

  ‘I like that watercolour very much Lois.’

  ‘O that. That’s nothing. Done on an excursion. Enniskerry village.’

  ‘But it’s very attractive.’

  ‘Thank you. Well at least I can tell you something nice did come of our previous brief little association. An awfully cultivated American at Trinity College came and bought an entire portfolio of washes of the male nude. Choosing as it happens all those I did of you. If you can recall your being somewhat difficult when you posed, ruining the tension of line with your constant erection. Actually, although I thought at the time your erections an artistic imbalance he was enthralled by what he called the refreshing tumesced quality the drawings had. I do wish there were more cultivated Americans like him. Of course Count MacBuzuranti could so easily be my patron now, since he has come into his inheritance. Having bought his previous portrait at such a reduced price, you’d think he’d now have the courtesy to commission me to do another. I am so continually being exploited by people. Now what about you. Surely you can commission. I’ve heard all about your stately home, you know. And your extravagant dinner parties. And balls. And I just wonder. I really do, why I am not invited. I feel quite put out. After all, we have previously at least been in the same bed together. And there. Just look. It’s leaking from the skylight right on top of my stove. And o god, did you see that. Right in the corner. A rat. O no. He’s gone under the bed. O god, not that, I don’t think I shall be able to stand being in here with a rat. O dear with my cats dead.’