The Year of the French

by Thomas Flanagan

  MacCarthy stood up and walked to the door. Beyond the village, in the final light before darkness, the river glistened, net upon silver net. Quick-waning sunlight fell upon the square stones of the bridge. In the silence of the airless room, the ear of his imagination caught the quick-beating French drums, the heavy tread of the pikemen. A child ran out from a cabin across the road, barefoot, small face beneath a mat of brown hair. Beyond a small field, birds flew homewards, a shower of dark wings.

  “You have marched with the army of the Gael.” Laverty’s voice came to him from the darkened room, and the conventional, grandiloquent phrase jarred him. O’Donnell’s clansmen, Sarsfield’s cavalry: the army of the Gael. The lime white palaces set afire by Tyrone, array of ancient battle. Aughrim, Limerick, Kinsale—a poet’s litany. Not cowherds with scythes, scrambling awkwardly to die in pastures, spalpeens giggling and sobbing, blundering into eternity.

  “The army of the Gael crossing over Drumshanbo bridge,” Laverty said. “You could make a poem of that.”

  “I make you a present of the subject,” MacCarthy said. A proper poem for a blind man, who would not see the scarecrows, frieze faded by rain and weather, the baffled, frightened faces.

  “You ran off from them,” Laverty said. His voice whined with accusation.

  “Sure ’tis little you know of it,” MacCarthy said, resting his shoulder against the door. “ ’Tis a throng of country people from Mayo and Sligo, shoved this way and that by Frenchmen who don’t give a damn about them. The gibbets have been built for them.”

  “Ach, ’tis all one. There is no luck in the country. What are we but a poor misfortunate people?”

  “Jesus, but were you not the foolish man to abandon poetry,” MacCarthy said. “You have the stuff for a hundred weepy lamentations in you.”

  “There is no call for you to take amiss everything I say. I spoke the truth. We were destroyed at Aughrim and at Limerick. The old stock sailed away from us after Limerick, and since then we have been sheep without a shepherd. A black, bitter century it has been, and there is no poem can put a shine on it.”

  “True enough,” MacCarthy said. “The whiskey in me was speaking.”

  The silent street of cabins and low shops was no different from the towns of his boyhood. Youth had magnified them, sent their names spinning like golden guineas across the lines of his verse. Tralee, Macroom, Kilmallock: what were they but dirty clusters of cabins, pothouses transformed into pillared palaces by whiskey and song? But the poetry was a potent magic, the bare feet of dancers moving across dirt floors, the sound of harp and violin. Alone, in the evening hour before nightfall, rising a crest of hill, a valley stretched before him, Aherlow, and Slievenaman in the distance. Shattered towers lay hidden behind hills, the delicate arches of ruined abbeys. A boy, barefoot, he had climbed their winding stairs. Winds whispered through smitten windows of a dead past.

  They finished his jug, and then drank Laverty’s bottle. Thirsty, they walked through the village to Dunphy’s. Night had fallen. A clock in the trim, spare-spired Protestant church told him the time: nine O’clock. How far towards him had they travelled by now, drums and pikes and battered feet? Bent-backed, Laverty walked with a stick clutched in his right hand, stabbing the road. MacCarthy, drunk now, rested his back against the iron railings of the churchyard, and stretching out his arms above him seized their spikes.

  “You are gloomy as an owl, Martin Laverty, but I am not. Oh, by Jesus I am not. I have my life before me to live.”

  “You have your own two eyes to see the daylight with,” Laverty said.

  Heavy-shouldered, MacCarthy held tight to the spikes and let his weight rest upon his arms.

  “We are a fine pair to be washed up here in the County Leitrim. ’Tis a shabby place. Today I told a man that if the dogs and cats of Kerry knew about Leitrim they would come here to piss. They would come here to piss.”

  He dropped his arms, and turned around to stare at the clock. Slender, gilt in moonlight, the hands of the clock formed a right angle. Protestant spires stretched across the kingdom, snug within their railings. Dowered by their own moon, they stood apart from ruined fortresses. Well-tended grass and polished gravestones shielded them from the mean cabins. English marched with the Protestant gravestones, mile by mile. SACRED TO THE MEMORY. CONFIDENT THAT THE MERCY OF THE REDEEMER. DUTIFUL SON. Language of order and power, tomorrow’s language. Somewhere along the road, past the village, would be the Big House, broad avenue of crushed stone, pillars by the entranceway, surmounted by stone eagles, hard of eye, beak, claw.

  “What does the clock say?” Laverty asked.

  “It is late,” MacCarthy said. “Time is running out.”

  In Dunphy’s, the men were crowded around a stranger, a man from Granard. He was a fat, broad-shouldered man, a belt pulled tight against his bulging gut, and a pistol stuck in the belt.

  “You would be fools not to believe me,” he said. “There is not a man from the countryside around Granard and Longford who is not in arms, and the men of Cavan are rising up. If there is one man there are five thousand.”

  When his glass was empty, the tavernkeeper refilled it. He held it in his hand as he talked.

  “ ’Tis the United Men who hold all the land between there and Mullingar. By God, you have never seen such a thing in your life. There have been yeomen killed and landlords killed. By Jesus, there are yeomen cowering in Mullingar and they don’t dare come out to meet us. We would slaughter them. We would cut them to tatters.”

  Laverty rapped on the bar, and bought glasses for MacCarthy and himself. MacCarthy drank his off quickly, and bought a second. The room was close and sweaty. He steadied himself against the bar. Weariness tugged at him.

  “By God, that is a wonderful thing,” one of the local men said. “First Mayo and now Longford. The people of the Gael are rising up.”

  “It is wonderful that the people of Leitrim have not risen up as well,” the Granard man said. “It is wonderful that they are standing upon their own spittle in the taverns of Drumshanbo. Are you Irishmen at all?”

  “ ’Tis a quiet place,” Dunphy said. “There have never been so much as Whiteboys in Drumshanbo.”

  “Whiteboys, is it?” The Granard man hawked up a contemptuous gob. “Fellows slipping into pastures by night to hough cattle. The United Men are the boys for the task. ’Tis not a pasture that we have seized, but the whole of the County Longford.”

  “By God, that is wonderful,” the local man said again. “You are a United Man yourself, are you?”

  “Do you not know what this is?” the Granard man asked, and put his hand on the butt of his pistol. “ ’Tis a captain of the United Men I am. Hans Dennistoun made a captain of me.”

  “You will have another glass on the strength of that,” Dunphy said, and held a bottle to his glass.

  “I will,” the Granard captain said affably.

  “He will,” MacCarthy said to Laverty. “A most courteous man.”

  “He is a large man by the sound of his voice,” Laverty said.

  “A large man,” MacCarthy said. “A captain. He has a great murderous pistol the size of a cannon.”

  The Drumshanbo men were staring at the pistol, as though the tumult of Longford had been brought into their tavern, hardened into metal. They would turn away from it, seek out each other’s eyes, and then their glances would steal back to it, furtively.

  “They have the towns,” the Granard captain said. “They have Granard and Longford and they are sitting frightened within them, but we have all the sweet County Longford in which to roam.”

  “There is one of you,” Dunphy said cautiously, “that has roamed as far as Drumshanbo.” It was a question, and it hung in the air.

  “Not roaming nor wandering,” the Granard captain said. “There are some of us that have been sent to find the Mayo men and tell them what has happened in Longford. I will ride up along Lough Allen into Sligo. I would be upon the road now if darkness had not fallen.”
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  “There is no need for that,” MacCarthy said, but only Laverty heard him. He raised his voice. “There is no need to bestir yourself,” he said. “The Mayo men are at Lough Allen themselves. They will be in Drumshanbo tomorrow.”

  They turned then to look at him. The Granard captain stared with small eyes sunk deep into his meaty face. “What in hell does that mean?”

  “There is no need to find the Mayo men,” MacCarthy said. “They will cross the bridge here tomorrow on their way to Longford. And the Frenchmen with them.”

  The Granard captain rested his glass on the counter, and said to Dunphy, “Who is this fellow?”

  “A friend of mine,” Laverty said quickly, turning his sightless eyes towards the sound of the voice.

  “And why is he here, Martin?” Dunphy asked.

  “They will cross the bridge,” MacCarthy said, “and the English cavalry after them. Go back and tell that to the people in Longford.”

  “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,” one of the local men said.

  “He was a schoolmaster with me in Munster,” Laverty said. “I knew him years ago, when I had my sight. He is a most respectable man.”

  “He was then, perhaps,” Dunphy said. “He is not now. He is drunk now.”

  “What would a Munster schoolmaster know about the Mayo men?” the Granard captain said to the room.

  “God preserve us,” another of the local men said. “The Mayo men and the English cavalry. There will be slaughter here.”

  “Here or somewhere,” MacCarthy said. “There are thousands of the English soldiers waiting for them in Carrick. They must know that in Longford, surely.”

  “You are the fellow that I know nothing of,” the Granard captain said. “Who the hell are you?”

  “I was with them,” MacCarthy said. “I was with them in Mayo and in Sligo. I saw them turn south.”

  Laverty put a cautioning hand upon his arm.

  “Is there a man in the room who believes this fellow?” the Granard captain asked. “If you were with them in Mayo, you would be with them now in their time of triumph, and not sitting drunk in Drumshanbo. Do you claim to be a United Man?”

  “Time of triumph,” MacCarthy repeated. “ ’Tis running they are, as fast as they can, with great English horsemen after them. The one hope they have is for the Longford men to keep open the road to Dublin. Get back with you to Granard and tell them that.”

  “Are you a United Man at all? Let you say the oath.”

  “You stupid great ox,” MacCarthy shouted, as Laverty’s hand tightened on him. “Don’t talk to me about oaths.”

  “ ’May the King’s skin make a drum for the United Men to beat, and may all Ireland be free from the centre to the sea.’ That is the oath of the United Men, and there is not a United Man in the kingdom who does not know it.”

  “A lovely oath,” MacCarthy said, “couched in noble and stately language. I am a poet myself, and by God I envy you that oath.”

  “There is a drink for you here, Owen,” Laverty said, and moved it towards him with his free hand.

  MacCarthy picked up the glass, his hand shaking with drink and anger. Whiskey splashed upon his fingers.

  “Look at that fellow,” the Granard captain said. “So drunk he cannot get the drink to his mouth. If you look at that fellow you will know why we have been slaves upon our own land.”

  “He has the right of it there, Martin,” Dunphy said. “Take your friend out of here before he does himself a hurt.”

  “ ’Tis dark night,” Laverty said to MacCarthy. “Come along back with me to the school and bide there until morning.”

  “I will go if I please or bide if I please,” MacCarthy said. “And I have no wish to bide in this town. Will no one talk sense to this man, and bid him go back to Granard?”

  Cautious, voice dry as thatch, Laverty said, “Let it be, then, Owen. Lead me over to the bench by the fire, and we can have a quiet drink on our own.”

  “You can indeed,” Dunphy said. “You can have a drink without call for payment.”

  The Granard captain said, “ ’Tis not yourself talking, but the drink. I accept that. But drink or not, you should be less quarrelsome. You have a sharp tongue in your head.”

  MacCarthy nodded towards his belt. “That is a handsome great weapon you have there.”

  “It is.” The heavy, pale face broke into a sudden grin, teeth yellow, dark in flickering flame. Awkwardly, he hauled the pistol from his belt, and held it for their inspection. “Two days ago I killed a man with this pistol. Do you believe that?”

  “I do indeed,” MacCarthy said. “If you have been waving that engine in the air, I wonder have you any family left at all.”

  “I am no stranger to weapons,” the Granard captain said, but he placed the pistol back in his belt. “I understand their ways.”

  “You do,” MacCarthy said. “But you do not understand the ways of armies. No more than I do myself. And that is why we are slaves. If you would pay heed to me, you would be doing the Mayo men a good turn and yourself as well. ’Tis no concern of mine.”

  He turned, and walked to the bench by the fire, leaving Laverty to find his way after him with Dunphy’s help.

  “There now,” Dunphy said, handing them their glasses. “Have a quiet drink the two of you and then clear off for Martin’s school. You have had a long evening, the two of you.” He nudged Laverty.

  “We will so,” Laverty said.

  MacCarthy rested his elbows on his knees and looked up at Dunphy. The room was heavy with the smell of bodies pressed together, shapes lit weakly by candleflame. Whiskey was a sick, sweet taste in his throat.

  “Have you believed a word of what I have been saying?”

  “I don’t know,” Dunphy said. “ ’Tis always quiet in this town. Some of those fellows you see there are full of swagger, but ’tis all talk. I don’t know what to make of either of you, yourself or that big fellow from Granard. In this place we are at the latter end of things.” He rubbed wet hands along the length of his apron.

  “We are all of us at the latter end of things,” MacCarthy said.

  Ghostly, lit by pale moon, gilt clock hands swung through time.

  “ ’Tis prodigious,” Dunphy said. “The midlands risen up and the Mayo men marching here.”

  “That is a terrible temper you have always had, Owen,” Laverty said, after Dunphy had walked away from them. “You are too old to be brawling in taverns.”

  “The army of the Gael!” MacCarthy said. “They strap a belt around a faction fighter and call him a captain.”

  “Sure that is all we have.”

  “They have more. Horsemen with swords and men in uniforms who have been to the four corners of the earth. English or French—’tis all one.”

  Laverty twisted his glass between his fingers.

  “ ’Tis true,” MacCarthy said. “The Frenchmen value us no more than they would the shit from a goat. They came here upon their own quarrel, and they swept up a few thousand of us to do their dirty work. We are a nation of scullions and stable boys.”

  “ ’Tis no business of yours. ’Tis a poet you are and not a soldier. Yours is the noble calling.”

  “Hired boys and cowherds,” MacCarthy said. “Sure when have cowherds ever been free?”

  “Ach, sure we were a great people once, for all that. ’Tis in the poetry. You have written it yourself.”

  Stately bumpkins, wigs clapped over matted black hair, the gentlemen of Ireland rode behind James to the Boyne—Clancarty, Mountcashal, MacMahon, O’Gorman. Their levies trudged behind them, barefoot, frightened or ferocious, pike or firelock clutched in awkward hands. William did for them. Scattered them at the Boyne, levelled them into the mud at Aughrim. Behind Limerick’s walls they starved. Patrick Sarsfield, Ireland’s darling, sailed off for France with his bumpkins, his broad back turned against the barefoot mob on the Limerick shore. Wreathed with the bays and laurels of an intricate language, dead heroes rode through looping lines of poe
try, noble and courteous, generous in defeat. Ploughs and cabins, stinking dunghills and the roads of beggary. Poetry shelters us.

  “Oh, to be sure,” he said. “A great people.” Sheep without a shepherd. Dark gold in candlelight.

  A far crossroads, the Drumshanbo bridge across the Shannon. He turned to look at the men gathered around the Granard captain. He brings them a miracle, the midlands risen up, mobs with sharp-edged swords attacking companies of yeomen, slashing at bridles. Scraps of verse floated down to them, the army of the Gael, sifting through tavern dust.

  “Have you been in Granard, Martin?” he asked.

  “Have I not! I was there two, no three years ago, when they had the famous competition of the harpers. Oh, but it was lovely, Owen! There were harpers there from all over Connaught and Munster, and they played the one against the other in competition, like stairs mounting upwards. Harpers from Munster as well.”

  “The best harpers are from the north,” MacCarthy said. “And the best poets from Munster. That is accepted knowledge.”

  “Wasn’t Art O’Neill himself there, the finest of all harpers. But his fingers were so stiff with age that he couldn’t coax the music from them, and the prize went to a man named Fallon. Was that not a shameful disgrace to fall upon a man like Art O’Neill?”

  “Two days ago,” the Granard captain was saying, “on the road outside Ballinalee, there were thirty or forty of us, and I was the captain. Most of us had scythes, and a few of the fellows had nothing but long poles sharpened to points on the one end.”

  “Mother of God,” a local man said. “And you went up against the English with those?”

  “There were three or four of us had proper weapons, that we had taken away from Mr. Shaw at Castlehaven. That is where I got the pistol. But the rest had but the scythes and the poles. And down upon us rode eight of the Castlepollard yeomen, from Westmeath. Lord Longford’s yeomen. We made slaughter upon them. We pulled them down from their horses and killed them. There was one big fellow that was pulled from his horse and began to rise up again. I put this pistol into his eye and pulled the trigger.”