by Edward Toman
‘Jesus, Mary and Joseph, he’s getting the young one to push it!’ Cornelius exclaimed. ‘She looks half frozen with only that pair of sandals on her.’
McCoy was heaving at the van and exhorting Chastity to put her back into it. He slipped, cursed and lifted his boot once more to it.
‘Maybe you’ve run out of petrol, Daddy,’ they heard the girl calling.
‘Didn’t I fill her with Free State fuel! Nothing but dirty dogpiss, no wonder she’s choked!’ He flung himself into the driving seat and tried again.
‘They’ll go no further tonight by the look of things,’ said the Canon, displaying no feelings one way or another about the matter. ‘I dare say it’s comfortable enough inside in its own way.’
‘It’ll not be the first night he’s spent in it,’ laughed Joe nervously. ‘But I’d say it’s the first he’s spent in Indian territory.’
‘What in God’s name has brought him here?’ asked the Canon.
‘The very question I’m asking myself. He’s hardly come to pay his respects or say his prayers.’
‘What am I to do?’ wailed Cornelius.
‘Well, if I were you,’ said Joe, ‘I’d keep my eye on that particular bucko till I knew what he was up to. If it was my house I’d make sure he didn’t leave my sight till I knew what he was after.’
‘Are you saying I shouldn’t let him in?’
‘It’s your house, Mister Moran! Licensed premises, bia agus leapa. You’re fear a’ tí.’ The Canon was beginning to feel the cold at the window; he settled himself back in his chair beside the fire, throwing on a few more sods, while Cornelius wrestled with his dilemma.
Joe joined the Canon. ‘We’re in for a white Christmas at any rate,’ he said.
‘If he comes knocking, do I let him in or not?’ pleaded Cornelius.
Outside, McCoy turned his attention away from the van and looked out over the white countryside. He took in the details of the village, its handful of deserted houses, the church, the snow-covered cemetery. Then he turned his gaze towards Moran’s. He stared at it for a long time, the snow falling insistently on his features.
Will I make up the beds in the back?’ asked Chastity. ‘It’s wild cold for you to be standing out there.’
‘He looked at the lights burning in the parlour, the only lights, save the guttering tilly lamps of the native speakers, to be seen anywhere. His eyes lit on the poster in the window promising fine ales and select whiskeys. He looked up at the chimney, and smelt the majestic spire of turf smoke rising up into the Donegal air. He made his decision. ‘Leave the beds,’ he told her and, taking her by the hand, he marched through the snow up to the house and knocked on the front door.
The Canon busied himself with the whiskey bottle, ignoring Cornelius’s pleas for guidance. ‘Will I let them in or not? It is Christmas!’ There was a second knock on the door. ‘Sure what harm can he do us? And Joe here can keep an eye on the pair of them till they’re out of harm’s way.’ He went to the porch and opened the front door. A blast of icy wind filled the parlour, and the fire spluttered. A moment later Cornelius was back in the room, ushering into his house the bulky figure of Oliver Cromwell McCoy.
He rubbed his hands in front of the fire, feeling its warmth on his frozen face. Only when he had thawed out a bit and wiped the snow from his forehead did he turn to face the company in the room. He acknowledged the curt, silent nod of the priest of Rome; he signalled his thanks to the man of the house. A priest in civvies? he wondered. He noted the pinched look of him and marked him down as maybe one of their spoiled priests. But there was nothing of the priest about the other one, the one now hogging the whiskey bottle and glaring at him. He knew that face from somewhere; it was a real Fenian face and no mistake. He’d put a name to it soon enough. There weren’t that many Fenians in his life, and he knew that he had run across this particular specimen somewhere before.
The social round in Ulster offers few occasions for mixed intercourse, and a lesser man than McCoy would have felt out of his depth in mixed company. But his years on the Stranraer boat had shown him the world, and it was one of his boasts to Magee that he could mix with anybody. A sceptic might not consider the daily run between Larne and Stranraer to be international travel at its most broadening (if the truth were to be told McCoy had spent most of his time below decks cutting up chips for the lorry drivers and the rest of his time hosing down the undigested fruits of his labours from the lavatory walls after each rough crossing) but even this restricted view of the outside world had taught him the rudimentary social skills. He had spent many happy hours playing cards in public houses round Stranraer and Cairnryan, sharing with drunks their monotonous obsessions. It was a lifestyle he would later repudiate when he heeded the call of the Lord, but he still thought of it as the university of life. From the kitchen came the smell of boiling bacon and cabbage. Somewhere in the background lingered the hint of mince pies and stuffing. An array of powerful-looking bottles adorned the dresser. Outside it was getting dark and pishing snow. He had his arse to a warm turf fire. If there was going to be trouble, he told himself, he wouldn’t be the one to start it.
Who hasn’t, some time in life, let expediency rule? Is there an RC who hasn’t at one time or another fallen foul of his doctor with his narrow UCD training and slipped into the waiting room of the Protestant GP for a proper diagnosis? Is there a housewife pulling her headscarf round her who hasn’t at some stage passed by the Catholic butchers with its smell of cheap meat to duke into the cleaner world of the Protestant victualler? Does such behaviour lead to a row? It does not. She will be addressed by her name and served with civility, with perhaps a polite joke as the money changes hands. And is there a Protestant, itching for a drink or a bet and finding the facilities for vice in short supply in his own quarter, who hasn’t at one time or another slipped across the divide to drink unmolested outside the walls as long as his money was good and his tongue civil? Magee, now, could never learn how to behave himself, thought McCoy. He would start ructions without any heed for the consequences. Magee was a full-time bigot, like most of his fellow townsmen. Was it any wonder he had chickened out at the thought of actually crossing the border, going like Daniel into the lions’ den. Never send a boy on a man’s errand, thought McCoy. With the help of God he would survive this night among the heathens, and by the morning he’d be gone from among them, his business done.
He took in the details of the room and its occupants slowly as he felt himself thaw out. He took his time, saying nothing, feeling their embarrassment and nervousness. Out of the corner of his eye he watched Joe. That would be the bastard to look out for all right. The others were no harm, but the man from South Armagh (he’d placed the accent the minute he’d opened his mouth) would give him trouble if he wasn’t careful. Slowly he unbuttoned his coat and removed his astrakhan hat, handing it to the girl with a grunt. He turned to Cornelius. ‘I don’t, you will understand, in the normal way, take a drink, but under the circumstances …’
‘Have a drink, man,’ said the Canon frostily. ‘It’s a cold night.’
‘You’d need a drop of something in you all right if you’re not to starve to death,’ Cornelius agreed, pouring him a small measure.
‘And a grand drop it is too, sir,’ McCoy said. He raised his glass to them and downed the contents in one gulp.
‘You’ll both be wanting a bite to eat?’ suggested Cornelius after a pause.
‘To tell you the truth I wouldn’t say no.’
‘Noreen will get two plates.’
‘You’re a long way from home,’ said Joe with an air of studied disinterest. ‘Do you have far to go?’
‘I might say the same for yourself,’ McCoy answered. ‘What brings you to this part of the world?’
‘The same as yourself. Mixing business with pleasure.’
Noreen came through from the kitchen with two plates of bacon and potatoes, and Cornelius beckoned to them to sit down and not to stand on ceremony.
> ‘We’ll be on our way in a minute or two, Mister Moran,’ McCoy assured his host, having ascertained his name. ‘That snow will never lie. The motor just needs a while to dry out.’
‘You’ll go no further tonight,’ Cornelius said, looking out at the thick blanket of snow that covered the countryside and obliterated completely the Yellow Meal Road. ‘We’ll manage somehow.’
‘Well, if the worst comes to the worst we can spend the night in the van. It can be grand and comfortable though you’d never think it to look at the outside of her. Am I right?’ He prodded his daughter with his elbow and she nodded sullenly.
‘The pair of you would freeze to death out there,’ said the Canon. ‘I wouldn’t have it on my conscience.’
Cornelius sighed again. If he was going to be treated like a registered charity he might as well pack in the catering business here and now. It didn’t look as if McCoy had two pence to rub together – but you never knew with boyos like that. He didn’t think there’d be much point in presenting him with a bill for B and B in the morning, but at least he could drop him a hint not to eat him out of house and home. On the other hand it was Christmas, the season of good will to all men. It wasn’t often they had house guests, and though they were an odd couple, Noreen might be glad of the girl’s company for a while. He went to the window and drew the curtains. He lit another lamp, and stirred the fire. Then he refilled the men’s glasses.
‘Give the children a glass of lemonade,’ ordered the Canon when he went to sit down. ‘Isn’t it Christmas Eve! Not that a man of your calling would be seen celebrating Our Lord’s birthday,’ he added, turning to McCoy. It was an old jibe, with some truth in it, for many of the more exclusive brethren regarded all festivities as blasphemous paganism, and went about their business on the day as usual. But McCoy let the Canon’s taunt go unchallenged. He hadn’t come all this way into the bosom of the great whore merely to trade insults with some lackey of Rome.
‘We have our own ways, it is true,’ was all he answered, fixing the Canon with a stare.
‘But when in Rome, eh?’ laughed Joe.
McCoy looked at him for a while, and for a minute Cornelius thought he was going to rise to him. But suddenly McCoy threw back his head and began to guffaw. Even the Canon saw the funny side of it and joined in the laughter.
‘Your wee lassie looks a fine girl,’ said Joe when they had filled their glasses once more. ‘Didn’t I read somewhere of the tragic death of her mother?’
‘God’s will be done!’ said McCoy, declaring by his tone of voice that the subject of snakes was off limits.
‘I’d say the same girl could give us a song,’ Joe went on, ‘after she’s had a chance to warm up. What is it they sing down Mexico way?’
‘I don’t know nothing but hymns,’ said Chastity defiantly, speaking for the first time.
‘Well, give us a hymn then,’ he said. ‘What better way to get the festivities rolling!’
‘You’re only trying to take a hand out of me, mister,’ Chastity bristled.
Joe laughed. She was a big girl for her age, gauche, awkward and sullen, but she had obviously inherited some of her mother’s Latin temperament. If he couldn’t get a rise out of the father, he’d get one out of the daughter. But McCoy, steaming and mellow at the fireside, was wise to his country cutery, and intervened to head off any unpleasantness his daughter might give rise to.
‘No one’s taking a hand out of you,’ he shouted roughly. ‘The gentleman here is only asking you for to sing a wee hymn. Is that too much to ask you? Now get up on your hind legs and do as you’re bid before you feel the back of my hand.’
‘Sure leave her be,’ Cornelius intervened. ‘We’re grand as we are.’
‘She’s been asked to sing for her supper, and that’s what she’ll do,’ McCoy said stubbornly. ‘“Abide with Me.” Let’s hear you, girl!’
‘Hush now for the wee girl,’ said Joe, silencing Cornelius’s objections. He knew that, somehow, the preacher had got the better of him.
Chastity’s voice was loud but tuneful, and she sang without self-consciousness or artifice. What’s more she knew the words without a prompt. And though it was a Protestant hymn, the great mournful anthem of the Saved, Joe had overheard it often enough round the North, pouring out of gospel tents and salvation halls and over crackling Tannoys, to recognize the tune. He even surprised himself by knowing some of the words, and joined in with gusto when she came to the second verse.
‘Swift to its close, ebbs out life’s little day;
Earth’s joys grow dim, its glories pass away;
Change and decay in all around I see;
O thou who changest not, abide with me.’
Even the Canon, who had to admit that the tune was catchy, deigned to hum along.
‘Give them another!’ her father ordered when she had finished.
‘I could sing “To Be a Pilgrim”,’ she said.
‘By God that sounds more in our line,’ Joe said, winking broadly across at Cornelius. ‘“To Be a Pilgrim”! Give us a verse or two of that one.’
The Canon put his finger to his lips in an exaggerated show of caution. He had a suspicion that McCoy’s visit to Ballychondom might be in some way connected to the Silent Madonna and the shrine they were shortly to open. But where the preacher fitted in to all this he didn’t know. Was he after a cure, perhaps, and coming out of season to avoid prying eyes? Highly unlikely, he admitted. He knew enough about the northern Protestant mind to know that devotion to the Mother of God was not high on their agenda. Quite the opposite; in fact, didn’t they go to great lengths to insult Our Blessed Mother? So what was McCoy’s business here?
Chastity struck up the new hymn. Joe didn’t know the words of this one, but he liked the lilt of the tune, and he joined in as best he could, picking up the words from her and coming in a bar or two behind. Then McCoy himself joined in on the line ‘Let him come hither’, his rich bass voice filling the small room. Frank and Noreen clapped.
‘You managed that well between the pair of you,’ said Cornelius.
‘Not to mention the contribution of Mister Feely here,’ sneered the Canon.
‘“Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion,”’ said McCoy. ‘Zachariah, Chapter Nine, Verse Nine. Not that I need to remind you, sir,’ he said to the Canon. Canon Tom looked at him coldly. He was searching his meagre stock of holy writ for a reply that would put the big man in his place. Joe saw the difficulty and intervened, for once the peacemaker.
‘Come on now, lads, keep it secular,’ he cajoled. ‘We’ll only get ourselves hot and bothered if we start taking that line.’
‘You’re not a believer in the Holy Scripture I see, Mister Feely,’ McCoy challenged. He had the name now. There were Feelys up round Keady, little better than tinkers if he remembered rightly; he could be one of them. He’d place him when he got back to the Shambles.
‘I’ll give you a quotation,’ Joe said. ‘Try this:
‘Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Doctor and Saint, and heard great argument …
About it and about; but evermore
Came out by the same door where in I went.’
‘“The same door where in I went,”’ echoed Cornelius. ‘The poor wife, God rest her soul, was a great one for Omar Khayyam.’
‘“I often wonder what those vintners buy that’s half so precious as the stuff they sell,” ‘McCoy said suddenly.
‘Maith thú,’ laughed Joe.
‘“Drink no longer water, but use a little wine for thy stomach’s sake,” ‘added the preacher, helping himself to the bottle.
‘“Drink to me only with thine eyes and I’ll not ask for wine,”’ crooned Joe.
‘Give us one yourself,’ ordered the Canon, ‘as you’re in such humour for a song.’
‘Sure the only songs I know are old Republican come-all-yous. I wouldn’t want to give offence in mixed company.’
‘No offence meant and none taken so far,’ Mc
Coy said. ‘Go ahead Mister Feely.’ (There were Feelys round Lurgan, some of them right die-hards. Magee would know the seed, breed and generation of them, he decided.)
‘Sure I never can remember the words,’ he said, clearing his throat.
‘Give us something by Tom Moore,’ urged Cornelius. The drink and the occasion, the mention of his wife and the heat from the fire all combined to make him sentimental. ‘Anything by Tom Moore!’
‘Go ahead,’ ordered McCoy.
‘We’ll help you out,’ the Canon conceded. There was a ritual in these things that had to be observed to the letter. The pressure was firm but not oppressive. Joe would sing when he was ready. They allowed him to top up his glass and wet his whistle, to hum about till he found a key he seemed happy with, to run haltingly through the first line, break down and shake his head as if disowning the whole thing. Then the formalities over, he turned to the wall, put his hand to his ear and began to sing:
‘In Mountjoy Jail one Monday morning
In his lonely prison cell
British soldiers tortured Barry
Just because he wouldn’t tell …’
The British have a lot to answer for before God. Poor Kevin Barry …’ said Cornelius.
‘Whisht!’ the Canon ordered. ‘Can you not let the man finish?’
But one verse was all Joe could manage. ‘I’ll give someone else a chance,’ he said. ‘Maybe our host himself.’
Cornelius needed little persuading. He had a sweet, high voice that trembled with barely checked emotion.
‘She is far from the land [he sang] where her young hero sleeps
And lovers around her are sighing
But coldly she turns from their gaze and weeps