You want peace and quiet again, do you! You’ll be a laughing-stock here if you keep on talking like that … Bid Shorcha is badly crippled, you say? The kidneys still at her! Good enough for her! Apart from Nell and my son’s wife, there are very few people I’d rather see coming here than her … And Little Cáit’s back is bad again? May the devil take her! She’s as bad as the rest of them … Big Brian is as frisky as a donkey in May, you say. Not wishing to demean him! … He’s still able to go for the pension? Don’t some people have all the luck! He’s old enough to be my grandfather—may God forbid, the ugly streak of misery! …
Now Bríd, it’s many a one as well as you fell into the fire. Your time was up. It’s not too serious, seeing you didn’t burn the house down as well … Two of Pádraig’s calves died? … Of blackleg!4 Musha, God help us! Isn’t it strange that they had to be Pádraig’s calves! … Nell dosed hers in time. Some spirit is watching over that pussface. I wouldn’t mind only that her land was always a nest for blackleg. It’s the priest …
Pádraig cut hardly any turf this year, you say? How could he cut turf when he has to care for that hob-hatching wife of his? He should smother her under a pot like a cat, if she won’t die of her own accord … Five of our hens gone in the one day! By Dad, that hurt! … And it didn’t take as much as one hen from Nell? Weren’t the rocky places around her up there always a breeding-ground for foxes! Of course she has Big Brian’s daughter in her house, a woman who can keep hens, which is more than can be said for Nóra Sheáinín’s daughter from Mangy Field. I believe that even the fox is afraid to touch Nell’s hens. It’s the priest …
Pádraig has no pigs now, is that so? Oh, the pigs went since I went, Bríd. I used to turn out two batches of pigs every year … Nell got thirty-five pounds for her own! Ababúna! … Yours were better than them, and you only got thirty-two pounds fifteen? Nell would get the highest penny, of course. The priest …
No word came from Baba in America recently, you think … Not that you’ve heard of? Big Brian says Nell will get all of Baba’s money … Is that what he said, Bríd? “Who would Baba give her money to, but her only sister Nell? In any case she can hardly give it to a woman who’s thrown into a hole in the ground” … Of course, what else would he say, and his own daughter married to Nell’s son! …
You heard them saying that Tomás Inside is still mad to get married? The useless yoke! He’d be better employed preparing his soul for eternity … You think Pádraig doesn’t visit him as often as he did when I was alive? I always had to keep on at him to do anything at all for Tomás. That’s the sort Pádraig is. He won’t keep house with me gone. Nell will play on him … You tell me Nell paid a man to cut Tomás Inside’s turf for him this year? Ababúna! What’s that you said, Bríd? Don’t mumble like that, I tell you … Tomás Inside said that if he doesn’t marry he’ll leave his patch of land and the cabin to Nell! “Caitríona wasn’t half as good-hearted as Nell,” he says. “Faith, then, she wasn’t. After my patch of land Caitríona was” … Well, the dirty, useless, rattle-brained packman, that same Tomás Inside! …
A fine story you have, Bríd Terry! Doesn’t the whole of Ireland know that Nell’s land lies alongside Tomás Inside’s land? … The way you’re talking, Bríd, you’d think Nell is more entitled to his land than my Pádraig … Don’t I know as well as you do, Bríd, that Nell’s land is all stones and boulders … By God, you have a nerve, Bríd, to say a thing like that up to my face. What is it to you who gets Tomás Inside’s land? What have you got to lose? …
Peace and quiet again! You don’t deserve it, you slut … What are you saying, Bríd? That I should squeeze down in the grave and make room for you? You’d think, listening to you, that the grave was your own. Do you know that I had my fifteen shillings paid for this grave a year before I died? Wouldn’t I have a fine piece of goods stretched alongside me: a scorched woman! … What’s the world coming to that yourself or any of your breed should be buried up here in the Fifteen-Shilling Plot! But it’s easy for you now. There are five of you drawing the dole in your house …
You want me to leave you in peace! Have your peace, so! But you’re not going to sneak yourself up against my thigh here. I had the best coffin in Tadhg’s and three half-barrels of porter, and the priest shook the holy water …
Now, you slut, if you push me that far I’ll tell you in front of everybody in the graveyard who you are … What are you saying? … “As rare as a cat with a straddle,5 one of the Páidín clan buried in the Fifteen-Shilling Plot!” Well now, Bríd, look who’s talking: one of the beggar-folk. Wasn’t it I reared your father? Coming over to me night and day sponging cups of tea, when there was nothing to be had at home but potatoes and salted water? And the stuck-up talk of you now! No doubt about it, the dunghills are coming up in the world these days … What’s that, you slut? … There isn’t a cross over me yet as fine as Nóra Sheáinín’s? Be off with you, you slut …
3
… Bríd Terry, the Slut … Bid Shorcha, the Sponger … Cite of the Ash-Potatoes … Little Cáit, the Grinner … Tomás Inside, the Good-for-Nothing … Big Brian …
It’s easy for the ugly streak of misery to be boasting, now that his daughter’s husband is doing well again. Was that winkle-picker Seáinín Liam telling the truth when he said he’d never do another tap of work as long as he lives? Cured at St. Ina’s Well! Cured indeed! Faith, then, if he was cured, it was that pussface of a mother of his got the St. John’s Gospel from the priest for him. Poor Jack the Scológ is the one who’ll pay the piper. His name will be in the raven’s book now, on account of the St. John’s Gospel. He’ll be here soon. And I’m sure they didn’t even warn him. Good Lord, have they no scruples at all?
The priest and Nell and Big Brian’s daughter whispering in low voices:
“Faith, then, Father,” Nell would say, “if anyone has to go it’s old Jack should be sent on his way. He’ll be off soon anyway. He’s unwell for a long time. But let’s not say a word about it. It would worry him. Nobody wants to part with life, God help us …”
That’s what she’d say, the pussface … My son’s wife had another baby. It’s a wonder it didn’t kill her. But that scullion is tough. Tough as the rocks of Mangy Field, that the roadwork bosses were always cursing because no explosive could break them … But she’ll be here on her next childbirth. I’d bet anything on that …
And they called the infant Nóra! What a pity I wasn’t there! My son’s wife tried the same trick when Máirín was born. I had her in the baby-blanket ready to bring her to the font. Muraed Phroinsiais was there: “What will you call the little bundle, God bless her?” says she.
“Máire,” says I. “What else? My mother’s name.”
“Her mother back there in the bed says to call her Nóra,” said Pádraig.
“Nóra Filthy-Feet!” says I. “Naming her after her own mother. What else would she say? Why should we, Pádraig?”
“You have no shortage of names,” says Muraed. “Caitríona or Nell or …”
“May the pussface smother and drown,” says I. “I’d rather give her no name at all than call her Nell. There’s no name more suitable for her, Pádraig,” says I, “than her grandmother’s name: Máire.”
“Is the child mine or is it yours?” says Pádraig, flying into a rage. “Nóra is what she’ll be called.”
“But Pádraig, my dear,” says I, “think of the child and the life ahead of her. Didn’t you hear what I told you before? Sailors …”
“Shut your mouth, or may the devil take my soul …”
It was the first cross word I ever heard him say to me, I think. “If that’s how it is,” says I, “carry on. But it won’t be me will bring her to the font. I have some respect for myself, thanks be to God. If you call her Nóra, go ahead. It’s enough for me to have one Nóra calling to the house without having another there permanently. If that’s the way it’s to be, I’ll not be staying. I’ll take to the roads …”
I handed Mura
ed the infant and I grabbed my shawl off the back door. Pádraig went back into the room to Nóra Sheáinín’s daughter. He was back out again in the flick of an eyelid. “Let you call her whatever name ye want to,” he says. “Call her ‘Hi Diddle Diddle6 the Cat and the Fiddle’ if you want to. But don’t be making a show of me any more. The pair of you have me between hammer and anvil every day of my life …”
“’Twas your own fault, Pádraig,” says I. “If you’d taken my advice and Baba’s advice …”
He had stormed out of the house. From that day till the day the thumbs were placed on my eyelids there wasn’t another word about calling any of the infants Nóra. But that hussy of a wife of his knows that I’m gone now …
The cross is ordered anyhow. Pádraig is a good scout, though he’s probably left penniless by that stiff-jointed wife of his who’s not able to raise a calf or a pig or go out into a field or on a bog. I know in my heart it’s hard for him to attend to everything. When Máirín is a schoolmistress she’ll be able to help him out.
Wasn’t Bríd Terry7 ready with her tongue when she said, “There’s no cross over you yet as fine as Nóra Sheáinín’s.” But there will be, you slut. A cross of Island limestone like the one over Peadar the Pub, and railings like Siúán the Shop’s, and flowers, and an inscription in Irish …
Only for I don’t like to, I’d tell Peadar the Pub about the cross. Amn’t I more entitled to talk to him—seeing as I’m voting for him—than Muraed or Cite or Dotie. They’re the ones with the crosses, of course. I wouldn’t mind but for all the attention he paid to Nóra Filthy-Feet! But the porridge is spilt now. Good Lord, they gave each other a right scolding the other day. If Peadar the Pub had heeded me in time I’d tell him who Nóra Filthy-Feet is. But it’s not easy to talk to that lot in the Pound Plot. They have far too high an opinion of themselves …
I’ll leave Peadar the Pub alone for the moment. He’s too busy with the Election anyhow. I’ll tell Siúán the Shop, and she’ll tell the Pound crowd. I’d better say that the cross will be put over me within …
—… He stabbed me through the edge of my liver. The One-Ear Breed were always a treacherous lot …
—… Wasn’t it stupid of us to let go of the English market, Curraoin? …
—… “It’s the War of the Two Foreigners, Paitseach,” says I …
—… Honest, Dotie! Our people had great intellects. Myself, for example … My son, who’s married at home in Mangy Field, has a young lad who was going to school to the Big Master, and he told me there was no surpassing him. Literature was his pet subject: “He had culture in his bones,” he said. “I knew by looking at him.” Honest, that’s what he said, Dotie. You know that daughter of mine who’s married to Caitríona Pháidín’s son. A young girl of hers has just gone off to be a schoolmistress. ’Twas from my daughter she got the brains. It wasn’t from the Loideáin or from the Páidín clan at any rate …
—That’s a damned lie, you bitch! Drinking secretly in Peadar the Pub’s snug! Drinking secretly! Sailors! Sailors! … Hey, Muraed! Hey, Muraed! … Do you hear that? … Do you hear what Nóra Filthy-Feet said! … I’ll explode! I’ll explode! …
4
—… Would you for the love and mercy of God, Nóra Sheáinín, leave me alone. It’s a fine time you pick for novelettes! I must have a conversation with my old neighbour Bríd Terry. I didn’t have a chance to talk to her since she came, what with yourself and your culture and your elections! …
Are you there, Bríd Terry? … Fell into the fire! That was always the first science lesson I taught in school, Bríd, how important it is to keep air away from a fire. Air is what nourishes a fire, Bríd. That should be widely understood … Oh, nobody was left at home who could have kept the air off you, Bríd? In a case like that the best thing to do would be … I’m afraid science would have no remedy for a case like that, Bríd … Oh, looking for peace, are you, Bríd? … I’m afraid science has no remedy for a case like that either … What’s that, Bríd? … The whole country was at the wedding, Bríd! …
—That’s the truth, Master. The whole country was at the wedding. You can be proud of your wife, Master. There was lashings of everything: bread, butter, tea, six kinds of meat, porter, whiskey, and Seán Payne,8 Master. Seán Payne, Master. When our fellow—Séamas—got fed up drinking whiskey and porter, into the parlour he goes to drink the Seán Payne, Master. Every bit as good as Éamon of the Hill Field’s poteen, he said.
Don’t worry, Master, it was a lavish wedding—as lavish as if you’d been alive yourself. She’s a generous woman, the Schoolmistress, Master. She came up to our place two nights beforehand to invite the whole household down to the wedding. Myself, I wasn’t able to stir, Master. By the book, if I were, I’d have been there, not a word of a lie. “Maybe you could spare a can of fresh milk, Bríd,” says she. “Indeed I could and two cans, Mistress,” says I. “Even if it were much more than that, you’d be welcome to it, and so would your poor husband who’s in the graveyard clay—the Big Master—the Lord have mercy on him!” says I.
“I mean to make it a good wedding, Bríd,” says she. “Billyboy the Post and myself were talking about it,” says she: “‘A good wedding,’ says Billyboy the Post,” says she. “‘That’s the way he’d prefer it himself, the Lord have mercy on him!’”
“‘I’m sure if the Big Master knew that I’m getting married again, Billyboy,’ says I, Bríd,” says she, “‘that’s what he’d tell me, to make it a good wedding. He wouldn’t begrudge it to the neighbours. And of course he wouldn’t begrudge it to myself.’ And he wouldn’t, either, Bríd …”
“Bedad then, Mistress,” says I to her—I don’t know if I should have said it at all, Master, only for my tongue being too loose—“Bedad then, Mistress,” says I, “I thought you wouldn’t marry again.”
“Well indeed, Bríd my dear,” says she, “I wouldn’t either—no fear of me—only for what the Big Master said to me a few days before he died. I was sitting on the edge of his bed, Bríd. I took his hand. ‘What will I do,’ says I, ‘if anything happens to you?’ He burst out laughing, Bríd. ‘What will you do?’ says he. ‘What would you do—a fine active young woman like you—but marry again?’ I began to whimper, Bríd. ‘You shouldn’t say a thing like that,’ says I to him. ‘A thing like that?’ says he, and he was deadly serious this time, Bríd. ‘A thing like that!’ says he. ‘It’s exactly the right thing. I won’t rest easy in the graveyard clay,’ says he, ‘if you don’t promise me that you’ll marry again.’ Faith then, that’s what he said, Bríd,” says she.
—The harlot! …
—May God forbid that I’d tell a lie about her, Master. That’s what she said. “You’re going to great expense, Mistress,” says I. “You’re in the way of money, and of course the postboy isn’t badly paid, may God spare you both to earn it,” says I, “but faith a wedding’s an expensive undertaking nowadays, Mistress.”
“Only for what he had put aside himself before he died, and the insurance I got on him, I wouldn’t have a hope of doing it,” says she. “The Big Master was a thrifty man, may God be good to him,” says she. “He wasn’t given to drink or debauchery. There was a pretty penny in his purse, Bríd …”
—The harlot! The harlot! She wouldn’t spend half as much on putting a cross over me …
—Isn’t that what I told her, Master: “But you shouldn’t do anything till you’ve put a cross over the Big Master first.”
“It’s a better place the Big Master is in, the poor man,” says she. “The Big Master is on the path of truth, and seeing that he is, it’s not crosses he’ll be worrying about. But I’m sure, Bríd, if he knew about myself and Billyboy the Post, who are still on the path of untruth, he’d tell us not to bother with a cross, but to give ourselves every comfort we can. It was no lie to call him the Big Master, Bríd,” says she. “He was big in his heart and in everything.” Upon my soul that’s exactly what she had to say, Master …
—The harlot! The thi
eving harlot! …
—… I fell off a stack of oats …
—… The heart! The heart, God help us! …
—… I’m absolutely certain it was Galway won the All-Ireland football final …
—In 1941, is it? If you mean 1941, they didn’t …
—In 1941 is what I’m saying. But they can thank Concannon. The devil his like of a footballer was ever seen. He smashed and he thrashed and he bashed and he gashed the Cavan players one after another. He was a powerful footballer and a stylish one! I was watching him that day in Croke Park in the semi-final …
—They won the semi-final against Cavan, but they didn’t win the final …
—Oh indeed they did! Concannon won it on his own …
—Do you mean in 1941? Because if you do, Galway didn’t win the All-Ireland final. They beat Cavan by eight points, but Kerry beat them by a goal and a point in the final.
—Oh, for the love of God, how could they? Wasn’t I in Dublin watching the semi-final against Cavan! Three of us went up on the bicycles. I’m not telling you a word of a lie: on the bicycles every bit of the way. It was midnight when we got there. We slept in the open that night. We didn’t even get a drink. You could have wrung the sweat out of our clothes. After the match we nipped in to the footballers. I shook hands with Concannon myself. “My life on you,” says I. “You’re the greatest footballer I’ve ever seen. Wait till the final a month from today. I’ll be here again, with the help of God, watching you beat Kerry,” … and of course they did …
—1941, is it? If it is, Galway didn’t beat Kerry but Kerry beat Galway …
—For the love of God! Tell that to a supporter. “Kerry beat Galway.” What sort of an eejit do you take me for? …
—In 1941, was it? Were you watching the final?
—I wasn’t, so I wasn’t. But I was watching the semi-final against Cavan, I tell you. What sort of an eejit are you that you don’t understand me? We came home again that Sunday evening on the bicycles. We were hungry and thirsty. There was never such hunger! Devil a town we passed through that we didn’t shout “Up Galway!” It was broad daylight on Monday morning when we got home. I came down off the bike at the head of the boreen. “If it turns out,” says I to the other two, “that we’ve recovered from our hunger and thirst in a month’s time, by God we’ll go up again. I’d love to be watching Concannon beat Kerry.” And of course he did. It was no bother to him …
Graveyard Clay- Cré Na Cille Page 14