by Fred Allen
Chapter V
PETER DANIEL MARSHALL
Peter Marshall was still in a state of shock as the station wagon moved along the highway. Fresh in his mind was Marie-Louise’s angry retort last night that had left him totally speechless. The first consequence was that all thought of sleep vanished as he became aware of all the implications of her remarks. First, Sandy was pregnant and unable to identify the father with the desired degree of certainty. Then, as he exploded in anger about being one of the last to know, Marie-Louise’s startling revelation that Sandy was not even his daughter! The impact of the two statements was almost impossible to describe. It was as though someone had reached into his heart and challenged all of the years of love he had felt for Sandy; and the same hand had reached into his mind to cloud all the happy memories of the experiences he and Sandy had shared.
He looked in the rear view mirror and focussed on Sandy sitting behind her mother and reading what appeared to be a school text. Sandy was the image of her mother, and in all his recollections he could not recall facial features that he would attribute to the Marshall family. There were mannerisms, but these would have been acquired. On the other hand Robbie, sitting directly behind him, strongly resembled his father. He had never been able to spot resemblance in babies, but everyone commented on how much Wee Willie resembled Robbie.
Perhaps, this would provide the explanation for Sandy’s “premature” birth. Peter and Marie-Louise’s first physical encounter had been in Regina about the 20th of March and Sandy’s birthday was October 30th. The period of between two hundred and twenty and two hundred and thirty days did not quite meet the biblical standard but could fit with the more flexible standards of “premature birth”. He also recalled that Marie-Louise’s mother had commented that a “preemie” was a first for her family and he had never thought of asking his mother whether “preemie” or full term babies were the norm in the Marshall family.
He also thought back to Regina and their first encounter on that tiny bed with such limited space further reduced by their hastily discarded clothing. In retrospect, Marie-Louise’s passionate responses might have been taken as evidence of experience, but nearly all of Peter’s sexual contacts had been on “one night stands” while out with Sharkey and this had seriously curtailed his experience with virgins and other girls of limited experience.
It had been nearly morning before sleep finally overtook him and when he opened his eyes he saw MarieLouise seated at the vanity. As she completed her makeup Peter was touched as she appeared to make the sign of the cross perhaps in a silent supplication for forgiveness. He then felt a wave of disappointment as he realized that she was merely applying her deodorant.
During the farewells that morning Peter realized just how much he missed his own family. His brother had been his idol during his teens and he now recalled how he had been challenged by the achievements of his brother, two years older but because of a combination of birth dates and family moves, only one year ahead of him in high school. His father had been the “rock” upon which the family had been built. Robert Marshall was a World War I veteran who had come up through the ranks to become one of the youngest Regimental Sergeant Majors (RSMs) in the Canadian Armed Forces at demobilization.
Robert Marshall decided on a teaching career and attended Normal School on his return to Saint John. It had been a wise choice, and he moved up quickly through the ranks of class room teachers as he completed his undergraduate degree during the summers, met and married a young teacher on the staff of his first school and by the late 1920s was Vice-Principal in a large rural high school. He came to the attention of the Provincial Minister of Education-also one of the legislative representatives for Saint John-and he was promoted to the rank of Inspector of Schools for a region that included parts of York and Sunbury Counties. The family then moved to Fredericton.
Peter remembered his father as the busiest person he had ever known and the opposite of everything depicted by the common caricatures of career teachers especially those who had been RSMs. He was quiet, sensitive, deliberate and always well organized. There were occasions, however, when either Paul or Peter, or for that matter, both of them, crossed the clearly defined line, that he demonstrated the capacity for quick and effective discipline that had made him so successful as an RSM.
Robert Marshall was always totally involved whether it be the church, community affairs or his long time hobbies of golf and curling. When he expressed his dissatisfaction with city management, he entered the political fray and won a seat on the city council. The travelling required of an Inspector of Schools for quite a large area left the Marshall home the undisputed realm of Elizabeth Marshall and she ruled with a firm but ever loving hand. Her teaching career had been shortened when she had been obliged to choose between a career and marriage when marriage, for women teachers, was akin to living in sin and thus grounds for instant dismissal to be avoided only by respectfully worded letters of resignation. All matters relating to the school activities of her two sons came under her purview. Even when the boys encountered the more difficult subjects in the high school curriculum, she took great pains to make herself knowledgeable in each subject so that she would have the answers when the boys required assistance.
Their deaths in the automobile accident, and the loss of Paul during the war, deprived him of the secure refuge only offered by family and this loss was most painfully brought home to him at times such as these. He longed for someone to just talk things over with. Here he was, returning to Fredericton without any real plan of action. There was really no one in Fredericton to whom he could unburden the great weight that had fallen on him in the last few days. First had been the former German tank commander at the reunion and then Marie-Louise’s angry outbursts last night. His closest friend in Fredericton was Trevor’s father, Lawrence Martin, but in consideration of Trevor’s possible involvement with Sandy, Peter would be very reluctant to discuss his problems with him.
At times such as these most people’s minds will conduct a quick inventory of people who have had a significant influence on their lives. Teachers, members of the clergy, career associates and relatives will stream through a person’s consciousness. The only possible names that paused briefly in his mind’s eye were Lawrence Martin and his father-in-law Walter Ross. Again, because of his son’s possible involvement, Peter would be reluctant to discuss the matter with Lawrence Martin. On first thought, Walter Ross would seem to be an unlikely source of advice on Peter’s problems but over the eighteen years since Peter had become a member of Walter’s extended family, he and Walter had become very close. After his parents’ tragic deaths, and having lost his only brother in the war, Peter had come to respect Walter’s wisdom and never hesitated to seek his advice.
Walter doted on his grandchildren and had become a very important figure in their expanding lives. This was particularly true with Robbie who had spent many of his waking hours while in Quebec City with his grandfather and took great pride on having become his confidante in many matters.
The current situation certainly represented an extremely delicate situation with both Walter’s daughter and granddaughter involved but Peter knew that he would be offered both comfort and wise advice.
One other important name had come up in the inventory of people who had had a significant influence on his life and that was Sharkey. This was only reasonable to expect after Peter’s encounter with the former German tank commander just a few days earlier at the regimental reunion. Sharkey was dead and thus unavailable for such a discussion, and Peter doubted if his current problems were such that he would ever have wanted to discuss them with his old friend. Sharkey had never been the family type and his opinion of emotional involvement, women, and the institution of marriage, were rarely expressed without the inclusion of expletives. But in an inventory of those who had exercised significant influence on his life, Sharkey must always be near the top of the list.
/> Chapter VI
PATRICK O’BRIEN SHAWKEY(SHARKEY)
Peter would never forget his second encounter with Patrick O’Brien Shawkey-his first was at the recruiting desk outside the Armouries-known throughout the brigade and, probably the division, as “Sharkey” because that’s the way he always pronounced his own name.
Sharkey had been born in a small farming and fishing community in County Sligo on the West Coast of Ireland. He had been the oldest of three sons of a career soldier in the British army and a mother who adamantly refused to follow her husband in his travels. This was because she had difficulty in distinguishing between the orderly transfer of dependents in the British Regular Army and the hordes of camp followers who had accompanied the brutish British troops that had occupied her beloved Ireland as required by the volatile relations between Irish patriots and those troops which had, over the years, been similar in nature to the infamous “Black and Tans”.
Bridget Shawkey, Sharkey’s mother, who demonstrated her erudition by always pronouncing the “w” in the family name instead of the “r” sound used by nearly everyone else, operated a small tearoom in the community and was a devout Roman Catholic. She was probably the most faithful of all the members of the small but active congregation whose spiritual needs were administered by the formidable parish priest Father Patrick Ignatius O’Brien. At six foot eight and twenty stone (about 280 pounds), the good Father was, in the words of local citizens, “a fine figure of a man”. A special large scale chair had been obtained by John Maguire, a local publican and installed in the main lounge of his pub. This chair was the exclusive domain of Father O’Brien while he, as he would explain, “administered to his flock” in their more natural element. It was the oft-stated opinion of the Bishop for that region that Father O’Brien’s major expenditure of time on his “field work” had become a serious impediment to his moving on to a larger parish and better things. But the good Father appeared to be quite happy with his lot as parish priest and, among other things, as coach and principal supporter of the local rugby team.
Despite all of the hours he spent on “field work” or, perhaps, because of it, Father O’Brien was able to demand and receive a higher standard of good Catholic Christian living in his parish than most other parishes. This seemed to be achieved by a combination of cajoling and threats. There were very few parishioners who dared to brave the wrath of the huge bear of a man, and those foolhardy enough to stray from his well defined path lived to regret it.
Father O’Brien believed in the inspiration he offered each Sunday from his pulpit but was never averse to providing his own form of guidance out behind the parish hall.
Sharkey’s father, Shamus Shawkey, had been a regular hell-raiser in the community in his youth and had been subjected to several sessions of physical persuasion by Father O’Brien out behind the parish hall. Father O’Brien took a special interest in Shamus Shawkey because, for all his hell raising, Shamus was a fine all round athlete and not only the star of the local rugby team but had been selected as an alternate for the Irish National Team where he had been capped twice.
However, as much as the priest admired Shamus’ athletic ability and the contribution he made to the success of the local team, the good Father had come to the conclusion that Shamus was a slow learner and was becoming increasingly difficult to handle in the sessions behind the parish hall. At about the same time that the good Father began to recognize his problem with Shamus, the good Lord, as always, provided a solution in the form of the persuasive recruiting poster displayed in Maguire’s pub where Shamus spent most of his waking hours.
With strong letters of recommendation from Father O’Brien, Shamus was accepted in the Irish Guards and it became immediately obvious that he had found his niche. His physical and athletic prowess earned him early promotion and by the time the Boer War broke out Shamus was Sergeant Shamus Aloysius Shawkey of Her Majesty’s Irish Guards.
Shamus had long been attracted to Bridget Gallagher the comely manageress, and owner, of the local tearoom although both he and the good Father spent far more time in the pub next door than the tearoom. When Shamus returned on leave prior to embarking for South Africa and the Boer War, resplendent in his dress uniform, medals, and with his sergeant’s stripes prominently displayed, Bridget was impressed and Shamus quickly moved to consolidate his beach head. However, no matter how smitten Bridget became he soon realized that his primary objective would not be achieved without the benefit of clergy. Father O’Brien, with some reservations as to Bridget’s choice of a husband, performed the ceremony on the day before Shamus was to return to his unit and the happy couple disappeared after a very brief and impromptu reception at Maguire’s pub. During the reception, Father O’Brien proposed the toast to the bride in which the good Father issued clear warnings to Shamus as to the dire consequences he would suffer at both the hands of the Lord and those of Father O’Brien if he ever mistreated one of the good Father’s favorite parishioners.
Despite Shamus’s pleadings, Bridget refused to accompany him back to his unit and Shamus had only his wedding night to enjoy the achievement of his primary objective. He deeply regretted having to depart the following day when he discovered a potential volcano under Bridget’s seemingly cold virginal exterior. However, the wedding night was highly successful in that Patrick O’Brien Shawkey was born precisely nine months later. Father O’Brien had noted Bridget’s gradually increasing girth and he was greatly relieved when the calendar revealed that there had been no bedding before the wedding.
A few months later, while now Color Sergeant Shamus Shawkey was on leave, Father O’Brien christened the baby and, on Bridget’s insistence, the baby boy’s middle name was to be O’Brien.
Precisely nine months after the christening of Patrick O’Brien Shawkey, Bridget gave birth to Michael O’Brien Shawkey. Again Bridget insisted that the middle name be O’Brien. The devout Bridget was convinced that, short of a Second Coming, there was no greater security that she could bestow upon her children than the name of God’s servant in the parish.
Again, exactly nine months after the leave at which Michael had been christened, Bridget gave birth to another boy. She named him Sean O’Brien Shawkey but the christening had to take place without benefit of the presence of the recently promoted Sergeant Major Shamus Shawkey now on station in India with his regiment. Father O’Brien was somewhat relieved. Three years and three children; such virility could represent an unexpected increase in his flock and with Bridget’s insistence that they all be named for him he was afraid that so many “O’Briens” in the community might just give the Bishop the wrong idea.
Bridget’s three sons were healthy from the day they were born, and gave every indication that they had an enthusiasm and zest for life that filled Father O’Brien with a measure of apprehension. “Dear God” he pleaded in his prayers; “not three Shamuses”. A short time later he considered that God had recognized his potential problem when news arrived that Sergeant Major Shamus Shawkey had been killed in action while in defence of the ever shrinking Empire. The British War Office granted Bridget a full pension which, while not that generous, would enable her to hire some additional help in the operation of her tea room. This also would allow her more time to devote to her three increasingly active sons-two still in diapers-but it soon became obvious that she needed more than time to exert any meaningful influence upon the development of the three rambunctious boys..
Father O’Brien was saddened at the news of the death of Shamus and arranged for suitable prayers during three successive Sunday masses. At the same time, he could only confess there was just a slight feeling of relief. Three children in exactly three years; dear God, such evidence of Shamus’s virility and Bridget’s fecundity posed an alarming potential. Twelve children in twelve years? And that might represent a projection on the light side. Twelve Shamuses; that would be enough to drive a poor priest to full time occupation of
the big chair in the pub, or early retirement, or both.
Aside from the usual childhood diseases Bridget’s sons thrived. Only one minor physical defect emerged. While none of them was completely bald, as their hair grew in it was in uneven and unseemly patches on all three heads. The local doctor had no answers nor did the specialist whom Bridget went to see on a visit to relatives in Dublin. It was a very unusual condition that went unexplained in medical texts and journals. The solution was simple. Until the condition cleared up, the boys’ heads should be shaved at intervals that would be determined by rates of growth, which varied from boy to boy. While bald heads were not that attractive, the appearance would be far superior to the strange pattern of blotches of hair that would occur if no effort was made to exercise what control they could over each boy’s hair.
The boys took the situation in their stride. When they reached school, Father O’Brien received numerous calls from the teachers who were all Sisters in the same charitable order. It soon became obvious that the presence of three Shawkeys in the same school would represent a strenuous challenge to even the solemn vows the Sisters had undertaken as novices. It wasn’t that their transgressions were that serious, it was more the frequency and when all three were in school it was a completely unfair challenge to even the most dedicated Sister. As had been the case with their father, all three boys loved to fight and many times they just fought amongst themselves. Even the youngest, Sean, could hold his own against his older brothers. Father O’Brien was constantly caught in the middle and found himself longing for the day when they would be old enough to be taken out behind the parish hall for one of his spiritual indoctrination sessions.