The Dead School

by Patrick McCabe

  Marion!

  So that wasn’t very nice was it, no indeed it wasn’t, no one was saying it was and of course obviously it would be hard to know quite what to do about it but there must have been a better way – attacking her was not the thing. As I suppose he knew. But knowing made no difference. After a good eight whiskies in Martin Coyningham’s pub, he went right ahead and did it. One word borrowed another and soon they were at it hammer and tongs. ‘What do you want me to be?’ he snapped at her. ‘A fucking rock star? Would you like me better then, would you?’ He was trembling as he stood there in the kitchen facing her.

  Her voice was shaking too. ‘Leave him out of it. You have no right to bring him into it. He’s just a friend!’

  ‘A friend. Some fucking friend. You think I’m stupid – wrapped round him outside the Project like a fucking tramp – ’

  As soon as he had said it, he knew it was wrong. Very wrong. She went pale. ‘What did you say?’

  He wanted to take it back. He would have given anything to be able to take it back. But he couldn’t. It was too late.

  ‘I asked you a question, Malachy,’ she said. ‘What did you say?’

  ‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘It doesn’t matter.’

  ‘You followed us, didn’t you? That’s what you did – you followed us!’

  ‘I didn’t have to follow anyone! I’m not blind, Marion! I’m not fucking blind!’

  ‘I can’t believe it. I can’t believe you’d do that. How could you do a thing like that, Malachy?’

  ‘I told you – I didn’t follow you! I didn’t have to fucking follow you! You were open enough about it!’

  ‘Jesus Christ! Will you stop it! Shut up, Malachy!’

  ‘What the fuck do you expect me to do? What am I supposed to think? How long has this been going on? How long have you been deceiving me? How could you do it, Marion? How could you do it on me!’

  All of a sudden, she looked away and said, ‘I’m sorry, Malachy.’

  The way she said it, you could have knocked him over with a feather. He just stood there staring at her with his mouth open. ‘Marion!’ was all he could manage to say.

  ‘I never wanted to deceive you. I swear to God I never wanted to do that,’ she said, and then it all came out. He didn’t want it to. He didn’t want her to tell him these things that he was terrified he’d hear. That ever since they’d started working, things hadn’t been the same. Maybe they’d been a bit hasty in moving in together, she said.

  His head was buzzing and he knew that if he didn’t do something now, he was finished. But he didn’t know what it was he could do.

  She went into the bathroom to get a towel for her eyes. When she came back, Malachy was still standing exactly where she’d left him. Still trying to get some words to come to his lips. But they wouldn’t come. Why would they not come when there were so many things he had to say? He wanted to ask her if it wasn’t too late could they try again? He would forget about the school and Bell and everything else. It would be all OK then, just like it had always been. They could put all that behind them and start again. He knew they could. You didn’t love one another the way they did then stand back and watch what you had being destroyed like this in front of you. You couldn’t. As if it mattered, for in the end, the only word he could manage to get out was ‘Marion!’, and it was so faint and weak and pathetic you could barely hear it.

  Not that it made any difference because she’d left the room and all you could hear was the sound of her sobbing in the bedroom and outside the whole world going on about its business.

  The Abortionist Walks

  Evans was put in charge of playground supervision the day the rumours started on the radio about getting rid of The Walton Programme once and for all. It was a good old programme but was no longer relevant surely. So I’m afraid it’s good luck Walton Programme very soon, they said.

  As he sat there in his office, Raphael’s cheek jerked a little. Ah well, he sighed, that’s that. No more Walton Programme. No more Leo Maguire and no more Tommy Dando with his Lowry organ. Sure what would you want him for? He’s too silly. Nobody wants silly men with silly organs. Not nowadays. What you want now is Evans. Mrs Evans. Or should I say Miz Evans as she calls herself. Well excuse me! Miz Evans, chairperson of St Anthony’s Management Board. Miz Evans, Bachelor of Abortion. There she is now walking around the playground with a big smile on her, laughing and joking with the kiddies – the ones she didn’t abort, that is. They are very nice clothes she is wearing, aren’t they? Very appropriate I would have thought. Red bell-bottom jeans and beads if you don’t mind. Red bell-bottom trousers and beads, walking aound the playground. Hello, children – my name is Evans. I am an abortionist. Perhaps you have heard of me? I’ve come to kill your school. Yes indeed I have, that’s all I came here for and you must admit I am doing a very good job. Look – here comes Father Stokes. He’s my friend now. He’s a priest but he doesn’t care that I killed some babies. He thinks it’s good. He smiles and laughs and jokes with me. That’s because he is my friend. We’re all friends here now. All except old Baldy over there in the office and sure who cares about him? The days when he had it all his own way are long gone. Did you hear the news? They’re going to take off the stupid old Walton Programme. Well thanks be to God for that! Goodbye and good riddance, that’s what I say to you, Mr Walton, and your bog-trotting dirges and bogs and stone ditches into the bargain. I suggest now you might start playing some decent songs for a change – such as ‘Babies in the Fire’ and suchlike. That would be more like it now, I think. Hello there, little Paul. Working hard at your sums? Hello, John. Hello, Michael.

  Raphael didn’t realize his hands were all chalk. He just went on turning the stick round and round in his hands as he stared out the office window across the playground.

  Waterworld

  The last straw came when Evans overruled him on the school journey. Every year Raphael took the boys to Kilmainham Jail to honour the dead who had fallen in the 1916 rebellion. Where they could read the letters written by the insurgents the night before the executions. Where they could see the bloodstained vest of James Connolly who had been tied to a chair and shot to death by the British. But this now was not to be, apparently. The Parents’ Committee had deemed it ‘inappropriate’. Evans swung her bag and crossed her legs as she sat before him. ‘We really think the boys would have a much better time at Waterworld.’ Great fun, by all accounts, this Waterworld. Slides and skating rinks and fountains and adventures and fun-packed excitement of all kinds. It had only just been opened and every child in Dublin was mad to get going there. The way she spoke about it you would be forgiven for thinking she was eight years old herself. ‘It’s fantastic!’ she said, beaming at him. Raphael said nothing for a long time and then, ‘They’re going to Kilmainham Jail where they always go.’ When he said that, Evans’s mood changed dramatically. She went sort of grey and her lips tightened. ‘I don’t think so, Mr Bell,’ she said, and stood up. Raphael stood up too. He could not believe how much he loathed the woman. In that instant he thought of Maolseachlainn, his poor dead boy, and all the infant corpses she had thrown into the fire. She laced her fingers as she spoke again.

  ‘What you don’t seem to realize,’ she went on, ‘is that Father Stokes has already agreed to this.’

  Raphael paled. ‘Then he has exceeded his authority,’ he said quietly.

  ‘Ah, Raphael, we don’t want to get on the wrong side of them. You know what parents are like these days. It’s not like it used to be. You step on their toes and you have the whole lot of them down on top of you. And a lot of them do good work for the school now, it has to be said. Sure we’ll let them go, just this once. What harm can it do?’

  Raphael did not show it but was deeply disappointed as he listened to the priest. It saddened him to think that his old friend would turn around and do this.

  ‘She’s trying to kill my school. She’s trying to ruin everything we’ve worked for.’

  �
��Ah now, Raphael, not at all. Sure she’s not the worst of them.’

  ‘She has had an abortion.’

  Father Stokes went white. ‘For the love of God, Raphael!’

  ‘She has! And she’s in my school!’

  ‘Keep your voice down, man! Do you want to land us in court?’

  ‘I don’t care where I land us! She is interfering in the running of my school and you are supporting her. My boys are going to Kilmainham – do you hear me? My boys are going to Kilmainham and I want you to tell her so. Do I make myself clear?’

  Father Stokes lowered his head and when he looked again, Raphael was gone.

  The school journey date was set for the 12th of February 1976. As they arrived with their packed lunches that morning, the boys were as giddy as could be with all the excitement. Especially since this year they were going to Waterworld instead of boring old Kilmainham Jail. Not only because of that but because lots of the mammies and daddies were going with them! Mrs Evans clapped her hands as they all piled onto the bus.

  ‘Come on, you guys!’ she cried. ‘Shake a leg!’ She was great fun. She was wearing a T-shirt with Goofy on it. As the bus pulled out the gates, she went up to the front and before you knew it, had everyone singing. This was going to be the best school journey ever.

  Raphael Bell wouldn’t be going however, so he wouldn’t know that. He was too busy lowering whiskies in the Harcourt Hotel on this, the first day, outside of sickness, that he had taken off school in forty-three years.

  That night, he fell in the door, muttering and mumbling the whole story about Evans and Father Stokes with a smell of whiskey off him that would knock a dog. Nessa had never seen him like this before and she was livid. When he started muttering again, about what he was going to do to Father Stokes, and Evans too, when the time came, she told him to catch himself on and could not believe her ears when she heard him swear at her. Nor believe her eyes when he caught a hold of her arm and squeezed it, asking her whose side was she on? She had never seen him like this before in her life. His face was blood-red and his eyes were wild. He squeezed her arm again, even harder, and bellowed, ‘Do you hear me? Listen to me when I am talking to you! Whose side are you on? Whose side are you on, Nessa Conroy?’

  He was hoarse as he shrieked, ‘Tell me! Tell me!’ She cried out and pulled away from him, burying her face in her hands as she ran from the room.

  That night in a drunken dream, a little boy came to Raphael, came floating up the stairs to smile and then went floating back down again as Evelyn Bell in a field of golden corn reached out to her son and whispered softly, ‘It’s going to be all right, Raphael, Raphael, son, I promise you it’s going to be all right,’ and it made him feel so good, made him feel just so peaceful except that when the words ‘Will it, Mammy? Will it?’ escaped his lips she didn’t answer him because she was gone.

  Old Friends

  Another little surprise for Malachy around this time was the mysterious return of our old friends Alec and the lads. Just standing by the harbour grinning away, as if they hadn’t moved in years. Not quite real, of course, but not exactly unreal either, like a lot of other things lately. But they were in good form. As soon as they saw Malachy, they were all smiles. ‘Ah, hello there, young Dudgeon,’ said Alec. ‘We were just wondering when you’d come along. It’s about time you’d show your face.’ When he said that, all the lads started to laugh. Alec flicked his cigarette away and hooked his thumbs into his belt. ‘We only heard the news a while ago. Isn’t it daft the way things turn out – first Packie and now you. Man but aren’t youse the pair of bollockses!’ Then he turned to the boys and said, ‘I say, boys – aren’t they the right pair of fucking bollockses all the same!’ There was great laughing for a while and then Alec decided it was all a wee bit more serious. He smiled as he stroked Malachy’s cheek, ever so slowly as he whispered, ‘You’ve really fucked it up now, haven’t you, Dudgeon? Not that it’s any big surprise or anything. But by Jesus you’ve really gone and done a good job on it – I have to hand it to you. Can’t even handle a bunch of kids and now look what’s happened. She’s going to leave you. She’s going to do a Cissie on you and there’s not a thing you can do about it! Do you hear me, you stupid dumb fuck? Do you hear what I’m saying? She’s going to leave you – can’t you see that! What happened, son of Packie? Couldn’t cut the mustard, could you not? Was that it? Tell us the truth – tell us the truth now! It all got on top of you and you couldn’t cut it any more! You weren’t able for it, were you not? Couldn’t give her the baldy fellow any more! Oho boy, but you’re a son of your father’s and no mistake! He’d have been proud of you! Proud, boy!’ All he could hear was Alec’s voice, rising until it became a shriek. ‘Come on now – tell us! You can tell me and the boys! We’re your old friends!’ he cried and you could tell that he was prepared to go on and on until Malachy went mad.

  Which, by the look of things, would be sooner rather than later. The doctor gave him librium and tryptasol for anxiety and depression and said they would do the trick. Most likely they would have, if he hadn’t had naughty boys to teach, who pointed at him and said, ‘Psst! Psst! Dudgy’s falling asleep at the desk!’ or remain on full alert in case a baldy headmaster who seemed to have gone crazy lately would decide to launch one of his lightning raids and catch him on the hop.

  So between all that and Marion wanting out, which she did, as was becoming more evident every day, it was hard to see how things could get much worse. But then, that was before he went and organized his stupid walk in the park, wasn’t it?

  A Walk in the Park

  Well, good morning, children, and how are you today? All feeling well, are we? Very good. Right now, what I want you to do is sit up straight in your seats and listen very carefully because I’m going to tell you a little story. It’s called ‘A Walk in the Park’ and although it is just a teeny little bit sad I still think you should all hear it because as we all know boys, sadness is part of life too, isn’t it? It certainly is, boys and girls, it certainly is.

  Our story begins one beautiful spring afternoon when everything was covered in a soft white blanket of snow. The children were so excited they didn’t know what to do with themselves. They were excited because they were going on a nature walk. Yes – off to the park to gather up some leaves and conkers and little bits of sticks and all sorts of nick-nacks for their nature table. They just could not wait until it was time to go. ‘We’re going to the park! We’re going to the park and it’s snowing! Hooray! We are going to make snowmen! We are going to make lots and lots of snowmen!’

  They all had to make sure and wear their welly boots and duffle coats. They made sure to do that because they knew if they didn’t take precautions they might catch cold. That was what Kyle Collins had said to his friends Stephen Webb and Pat Hourican as they walked across the playground that morning. He said, ‘My mammy says I can play in the snow as much as I like so long as I have my gloves and my welly boots and my woolly hat on.’

  Stephen smiled and said that that was what his mammy had said too. ‘And she said I could make snowballs and snowmen if I wanted to. She said I could make as many as I liked.’ Kyle and Pat smiled when he said that. They smiled because they were looking forward to making them with him. Pat could hardly contain himself he was looking forward to it all so much. Stephen and Kyle had been his best friends for as long as he could remember. Right back as far as their first day at school. Stephen and Kyle and Pat liked school. Sometimes they were a little bit afraid of Mr Bell because if he saw you he might shout at you. If he saw you running he would definitely shout. He would call you back and make you stand outside his door with your hands down by your sides. Then he would say to you, ‘Would you mind telling me what you were doing? Would you mind telling me what you were doing just now, boy?’

  It was very hard to know what the correct answer to that question was. If you said, ‘Nothing, sir’, his spectacles would steam up and his cheeks would go red and he would say, ‘So you hav
e nothing to do have you not? You have nothing to do except barrel along the corridors like some kind of wild animal, is that it? Very well then. Perhaps you’ll come inside now to my office and we’ll see if we can find you something to do. Do you think that might be a good idea, Mr “Nothing, sir”?’

  When he talked to you like that you had to hang your head and play with your fingers while your cheeks burned. But that didn’t mean you didn’t like Mr Bell. It didn’t mean that at all. That was one thing about him. Even if he scolded you sometimes you still liked him. It was only teachers like Dudgy you didn’t like because they weren’t really like teachers. They weren’t really like teachers because it was so easy to annoy them. If you wanted to annoy them all you had to do was keep putting up your hand and ask questions over and over again, especially if you didn’t want to know the answers. Kyle and Stephen and Pat liked doing that. They liked it when they made Mr Dudgeon lose his voice. They sort of smiled when he lost it. It was funny when they did that because it made him lose it even more. Which would then of course lead to another of Mr Bell’s investigations. Mr Bell didn’t like that, having to lead the investigations. He said he had other things to do. He asked the class did they think he had nothing better to do than run in and out. ‘Is that what you think?’ he said. ‘That I have nothing better to do than run in and out?’ Also of course it often proved quite difficult to find out exactly what it was that had happened. For instance if a ruler had been broken one boy would claim that he had done it. And would appear quite convincing. But then another boy would put up his hand and say, ‘No, teacher. I saw what happened. I’ll tell you.’ Then Mr Bell, quite relieved, would say, ‘Very well then – tell me.’ But almost as soon as he had said that yet another boy would say, ‘No – he didn’t see it, teacher. I saw it. I can tell you exactly what happened.’