A Father Before Christmas

by Neil Boyd

  Mrs Pring was keen to know if I felt really settled in St Jude’s. In my reply I carefully avoided the word ‘settled’. I said life was full of interest.

  ‘Don’t take too much notice of Daddy-Short-Legs,’ she advised. As his steps sounded on the stairs, she stood up. ‘As you’ve probably guessed by now, his great weakness is the strength of his convictions.’

  There was a thump on the door. ‘Are you alone, Father Neil?’ When I called out that only Mrs Pring was with me he made as if to retrace his steps saying, ‘That giddy woman is too many for me altogether.’

  Mrs Pring opened the door and signalled to him that she was on the point of leaving. She was not offensive to him, maybe to reward him for his good work on behalf of widows.

  His own uncharity and deviousness had returned full blast. ‘Run away, Mrs Pring, and I will call you back when you are out of earshot.’ When she had gone, he turned his attention to me. ‘I cannot understand why you associate with her, Father Neil,’ he barked. ‘In every other particular you are a commendable curate. D’you not know that herself would build a nest in your ear and twitter-twitter all the day long?’

  ‘She was talking, Father, about——’

  ‘And never confide in a woman, either. Secrets leap out of their mouths faster than tigers out of paper bags.’

  ‘She was talking about her husband,’ I managed to get out.

  That quietened him down. ‘’Tis always the young,’ he said, biting his lip, ‘who die in old men’s wars.’ He settled in to an armchair clutching a large tome ‘As to the purpose of me visit.’

  First came a reminder of the next day’s Clergy Conference on Life After Death. Interdenominational, it was to be held at St Luke’s under the chairmanship of the Anglican incumbent, the Rev. Percival Probble. In addition to the three Anglican ministers, two Methodists and a Jewish Rabbi had agreed to take part. The true Church was to be represented by the two of us and Canon Mahoney, D.D. The Canon was Bishop O’Reilly’s personal theologian. He had been deputed to keep us on the path of orthodoxy and answer all non-Catholic objections.

  Fr Duddleswell handed me his tome. The Mysteries of Christianity by Matthias Scheeben, priced $7.50. ‘Hot from the States,’ he said. The author was the greatest nineteenth century German theologian. ‘I want you to mug up the passages on life after death, you follow? in case the Canon and meself are unable to cope, like.’

  Even as I smiled, I wondered how I was going to get through all those pages in twenty-four hours.

  ‘There is a particularly good chapter on Hell, Father Neil. It had me wriggling like a worm, at any rate.’

  ‘Weighty arguments,’ I said, my arm already beginning to ache.

  ‘This Conference is the Bishop’s idea not mine. But we have to do the Christian thing and give the impression we like these people.’

  ‘Are we going to pray with them for reunion, Father?’

  ‘Certainly not,’ he growled. ‘We are far too divided to pray for that.’

  The phone call, he explained, had been from Mother Stephen, Superior of the Convent. She had invited herself and Sister Perpetua, our sacristan, to the presbytery at 5 p.m. No reason had been given for the visit but Fr Duddleswell needed no telling. It was the same every year. Mother Stephen wanted to cancel the Fireworks Display at the last moment. The pretext was usually the likelihood of damage to the Convent’s lawn or trees, or complaints from neighbours about the noise, or the good sisters having to keep the children in order when they should be reciting the divine office in chapel according to the rules of their holy Foundress.

  ‘Be ready to buttress me should I begin to flag,’ Fr Duddleswell said.

  Grasping a golden opportunity, I said, ‘Father, I’ve always wondered, do nuns have hair under their veils?’

  ‘What nuns wear under their veils is as mysterious as what Scotsmen wear under their kilts.’

  ‘I didn’t know there was any mystery about that.’

  He screwed up his eyes. ‘I was referring,’ he said with a wicked grin, ‘to articles of clothing.’

  In the early afternoon, I became aware of smoke filtering into my study via the window. Fr Duddleswell lighting another fire, was my immediate reaction.

  I was wrong. This time, Billy Buzzle was the culprit. In our garden, Fr Duddleswell was even then creeping up to the fence like a cat, the garden hose spurting cold water. He was out for revenge.

  I rushed down to Mrs Pring’s kitchen to tell her to watch out for a good scrap. She hadn’t noticed that Fr Duddleswell had attached his hose to the tap in her sink.

  ‘I’ve never heard such nonsense,’ Mrs Pring declared, and smartly turned the water off.

  I could see Fr Duddleswell’s shoulders droop in disappointment at the loss of his water supply.

  ‘Let them have their little game, Mrs P,’ I said, knowing how much these squabbles meant to those involved. And I switched the tap on again.

  That was the moment Fr Duddleswell chanced to be looking straight at the nozzle of the hose. Once more, and this time at very close quarters, he received an icy jet in his face.

  ‘See you later, Mrs P,’ I said as I withdrew to my study.

  Billy was enquiring sympathetically, ‘What’s wrong, Fr O’Duddleswell?’ as he peered over the fence.

  ‘You are what is wrong, Mr Buzzle.’

  ‘What have I done?’

  ‘You were born in soot and reared in smoke.’

  Billy, who must have learned from their last encounter that a soft word turns away wrath, simply said, ‘Thanks very much.’

  ‘Cromwell’s curse on you, Mr Buzzle. May you itch and lack ever a nail to scratch.’

  ‘Do you mind telling me what this is all about?’

  ‘Turn your ugly face about, Mr Buzzle,’ Fr Duddleswell cried, aware that it was his turn for victory. ‘Jesus, a face like that would make a funeral turn back.’

  ‘Have it your own way,’ Billy said, putting the last shovelful of leaves on his bonfire before going indoors.

  ‘If you owned a harbour,’ Fr Duddleswell shouted after him, ‘I would empty me tea pot into it.’

  He came squelching and triumphant into my study. ‘There, Father Neil,’ he crowed through chattering teeth, ‘didn’t I deal Billy Buzzle some good eye-openers?’

  ‘Did you?’ I said, non-committally.

  ‘You are wet as a baby’s chin,’ he said.

  ‘Am I, Father?’ And I rubbed my finger over his damp cheek.

  ‘Indeed, I expect you to take all sides in any dispute, you jelly fish.’

  That threw me. ‘But, Father, I didn’t take any sides.’

  ‘That is exactly what I meant.’ He stamped across to the phone on my desk and dialled. ‘Billy Buzzle,’ he said, blazing away and determined to complete his triumph, ‘this is Fr Duddleswell. No, not one word from you. Just you listen. I want no more bonfires in your garden, d’you hear? Remember me holy fist is always ready to hand and if I catch you polluting the atmosphere once more with your stinking leaves I will personally see you laid low beneath a grey gravestone.’

  He paused to take in the reply and what he heard caused a great change in his demeanor.

  ‘I am deeply sorry,’ he murmured at length, ‘I really am. I would not have gone on thus had I any idea.’ As he put the receiver down he was still mumbling, ‘Forgive me, forgive me.’

  ‘Has Billy’s mother died or something?’ I said.

  He shook his head. ‘Wrong number, Father Neil.’

  On the dot of five, Laudetur Jesus Christus from Mother Stephen and Semper laudetur, ‘May Christ be always praised’ from Fr Duddleswell. The Superior dismissed the offer of tea with a twitch of her bony hand.

  ‘Fr Duddleswell, I have not come to ask you to cancel the Fireworks Display tomorrow evening.’ So the old man was mistaken. ‘No, Father, I have been obliged to cancel it myself already.’

  Fr Duddleswell enquired the reason. He was unruffled as if he were used to setbacks of this sort.r />
  ‘Two-fold, Father.’ For first-fold, Mother Stephen had recently read a book on the Gunpowder Plot written by a convert to Catholicism. His thesis was that Guy Fawkes Day was a Protestant ruse to blacken Holy Mother Church. Guy Fawkes’s attempt to blow up the Houses of Parliament in 1605 had been made a pretext to persecute Roman Catholics ever since.

  ‘I should imagine, Mother,’ said Fr Duddleswell, ‘that had he succeeded, the whole country would have been beholden to him.’

  The joke was lost on the black shroud seated opposite him.

  Fr Duddleswell stated politely that the Bishop had appointed him defender of the faith in this area and he was perfectly satisfied with the theological propriety of burning a straw man on a bonfire. In fact, it was irrefutable proof of Catholicism, a proof not immediately evident to Mother Stephen or to me. Protestants ridicule Catholics, he said, for making use of images in their religion, and here are the Protestants availing themselves of Catholic methods of festivalizing. Before Mother Stephen could object he instanced the burning of heretics at autos da fé, apart from Catholic belief in the retributive fires of Hell and Purgatory.

  It convinced me that Guy Fawkes was a sound Catholic investment. Fr Duddleswell looked across at me as if to say, one down and one to go.

  Mother Stephen was already fumbling in the folds of her habit for her second argument. ‘This leaflet, Father,’ she said, ‘has been sent us by the Council. The police have co-operated with the fire brigade and the local hospitals to provide statistics of accidents to minors during last Guy Fawkes night.’ She read out figures. Five children under ten had burned their hands and sixteen under six had burned their legs, and so on. It was pretty grisly.

  Fr Duddleswell pretended to see no significance in the figures whatsoever.

  ‘Fr Duddleswell, I have taken the liberty of going through the parcel of lethals you despatched to our Convent. Crackers, rockets, smellies, smokies, Catherine wheels—a whole arsenal of destruction.’

  Fr Duddleswell forced her to grind to a halt as he unfolded a leaflet taken from his inside pocket. He pressed out the creases noisily. ‘Police statistics, Mother, on the local children killed on the road in the last year, together with the number of accidents on the pedestrian crossings themselves.’ He smiled pityingly. ‘You are not proposing, Mother, that children should be forbidden to cross the roads?’

  The Superior accused him of flippancy. Crossing the roads was a necessity, whereas she was about to prove that a Fireworks Display was not. He was already promising that he and I would set off the fireworks. ‘The only persons, Mother, in any danger are meself and me curate.’ He seemed confident that Mother Stephen would agree to the Display on such generous terms.

  ‘Fr Duddleswell, you may set yourself alight or indulge in any other solitary pleasure on our Convent lawn that brings you satisfaction. Our children will not be there to see it.’

  She was rising to her feet when Mrs Pring banged on the door and entered without an invitation. Fr Duddleswell was annoyed at being interrupted at this delicate stage in the negotiations.

  Mrs Pring, clasping a copy of The Universe, was not in the least perturbed. ‘Father, I only wanted to ask you something about the Display tomorrow evening.’ His face fell to below zero. ‘Are you using the Holy Father’s blessing?’

  Fr Duddleswell thawed instantly and met her enquiry with a quizzical smile.

  ‘Last New Year’s Eve,’ she explained, ‘the Pope blessed the fireworks and the children of Rome. A lovely prayer, as you remember, Father. Will you be using this’—she pointed to where the prayer was printed in capitals in the newspaper—‘or the one in the Ritual?’

  Fr Duddleswell assured her that of course he would be using the Holy Father’s own blessing written specially for such occasions.

  Mrs Pring departed to be followed soon by Mother Stephen. She had been faced with a straight choice: to obey God or Caesar. Sister Perpetua bowed out her defeated Superior before winking at us.

  ‘Sister Perpetua,’ croaked Mother Stephen without turning round, ‘would you kindly regulate the movements of your eyelids in the manner of which our holy Foundress would have approved.’

  Mrs Pring expressed delight that the poor little orphans would not be deprived of a rare chance to enjoy themselves. ‘I didn’t do so badly, did I?’ she asked seeking approval.

  ‘You were marvellous,’ I assured her.

  ‘Do not encourage the woman,’ Fr Duddleswell snorted. ‘She is that conceited already you would think she had garlic in her nose.’ But in a happy mood, he took the opportunity to relate his favourite tale about statistics.

  In the west of Ireland, ‘in the dark days,’ a local deputation approached the English Chief Secretary, then visiting, with statistics proving that they needed finance for the railway so they could send their produce to market. Next day, another deputation arrived with another sheaf of statistics proving conclusively that they needed food subsidies because not so much as a sprig of parsley would grow on their land. Fr Duddleswell laughed merrily before putting on a very posh English accent.

  ‘“Now, my good man,” said the Chief Secretary to the leader of the second deputation, “yesterday’s statistics prove the exact opposite of yours. How do you account for it?” “So be it, your Honour,” says the leader of the second deputation, “but y’see, yesterday’s statistics was compiled for an entirely different purpose.”’

  That same evening at Benediction, Fr Duddleswell got in some practice for the next day’s Clergy Conference. From the pulpit, he outlined his faith in the Hereafter.

  ‘And after death, me dear people, comes judgement. And after judgement, ’tis Heaven or Hell for all eternity.

  ‘Did y’hear the good one of the feller,’ he said, leaning over the pulpit, ‘who passed over after a life-time of thieving, drunkenness and debauchery? One chappie at his funeral looked down on the gleaming coffin and said to his mate, “Pat,” says he, “the divil has nabbed him at last.” “Do not say such a terrible thing, Tom me bhoy,” says Pat. “We must not ever speak ill of the dead.” “Not at all,” says Tom, “if the divil hasn’t got that feller down there, what is the use in our keepin’ a divil at all?”’

  From my seat on the sanctuary, I could see the faces of the congregation. Their expressions seemed to say that hellfire was no fit subject for jest. Undeterred, Fr Duddleswell continued:

  ‘This world is a dangerous place, me dear brethren. Have y’ever thought that not one of us here tonight is going to get out of it alive?’

  The glum looks of the congregation suggested that they never thought of anything else.

  ‘I pray for you to be chaste and holy so you do not fall into the divil’s black hands and be toasted worse than kippers or muffins. Imagine, fire and brimstone. For all eternity.’

  Fr Duddleswell removed his biretta and signed himself before giving out, ‘And now the beautiful Hymn, Number 159, Day of Wrath! O Day of Mourning.’

  On the church steps I was button-holed by Mrs Rollings. She’s taking advantage, I complained to myself. She’s not entitled to another ‘bout of destruction’, as I now called her instruction, for several days.

  Mrs Rollings sent her twins on their way with their father so as not to let them hear. ‘I was at Benediction, Father,’ she began.

  ‘That’s nice,’ I said, treading warily.

  ‘It was horrible.’

  I tried to pretend I had no idea what she meant.

  ‘That sermon, Father.’

  ‘Not one of his best,’ I admitted, ‘and pretty inflammatory.’

  ‘Fr Duddleswell’s a good man so how can he believe such nasty things as people being toasted like kippers for all eternity?’

  I felt I had to make a stand in the interests of Catholic truth. ‘All Catholics believe in Hell, Mrs Rollings.’ I took a guilty pleasure in seeing her astonishment but quickly remembered my pastoral duty. ‘Only those who die in mortal sin go to Hell, Mrs Rollings.’

  ‘But acco
rding to you, it’s a mortal sin to miss Mass on Sundays or eat one mouthful of meat of a Friday.’

  ‘If it’s your own fault and you do it to insult Almighty God.’

  ‘And isn’t getting drunk a mortal sin?’

  ‘Only if you intend——’

  ‘My Wilf got blindo and blotto once. On V.E. day. Everybody did.’

  ‘I’m sad to hear that,’ I said, for I genuinely liked her husband and felt sorry for him on principle.

  ‘The Magistrate didn’t even fine him.’

  ‘That’s lucky,’ I said, not immediately grasping the point.

  ‘Yes, Father, if he’d got knocked over by a bus that would have been different, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘How “different”?’

  ‘Well, if you’re right, God would have sent him to Hell for ever and ever.’

  ‘Not necessarily,’ I said, doing my best for poor Wilf.

  ‘You mean he would only have gone to Hell for a spell?’

  ‘No, Hell lasts for ever. I mean your husband might have sobered up just long enough to be sorry for getting drunk.’

  ‘Even if the bus crushed his skull?’ asked Mrs Rollings, who obviously didn’t mind the grizzliest hypothesis involving her Wilf.

  ‘That might present a problem,’ I had to agree, half turning to intimate I had to rush off to a life and death appointment. Scheeben, to be precise.

  ‘And where is this Hell place?’

  I stalled in a scholarly way as I often did when I was stumped. ‘Christians even in Dante’s day used to think it was under the earth.’

  ‘Australia?’

  I smiled superiorly. ‘Somewhere between London and Sydney.’

  ‘Where do you think it is, Father?’

  I’ll fix the old hen, I thought. ‘Nowhere, Mrs Rollings.’

  ‘It doesn’t exist?’

  ‘It does—but not anywhere. You see, only souls go to Hell and they are spiritual. That means they have no shape or size or weight.’

  ‘They don’t take up any room.’

  ‘That’s right. More or less.’

  ‘And you can get lots of them into a little space.’ I nodded for the sake of peace. ‘Until they get their bodies back at the resurrection.’