Wild Decembers

by Edna O'Brien

  “It’s mine … It’s all mine,” he said to anyone who cared to listen.

  At the end of the day, with dusk coming on, he sat and smoked a cigarette and listened to all the gathering life, creatures coming out, big creatures and little creatures, birds, animals, wading in the brackenish water, the air sweeter now, not so scalding, and a curlew letting out its lonesome cry. Once again he spotted a figure coming in at the gap, taller than the one earlier, and he whistled to challenge it to make itself known to him.

  It was on the Monday that O’Dea’s letter came. He knew what would be in it even before he tore it open.

  Dear Sir:

  For the past week I am informed that you have been cutting turf in breach of your own rights and that of others. From the information that I have received from my client Mr. Joseph Brennan, you have been cutting turf into a bank which projects thirty or forty feet into the Brennan portion of the bog. You have also left several piles of turf to dry on the Brennan area just north of the boundary line. Mr. Brennan has claims of the turbary rights over fifty-two acres south of the boundary line, some of which includes the area which you suppose to be yours. All work on this must be suspended until it is established clearly where you are situate. Should you ignore this warning, we will, reluctantly, have to institute proceedings.

  THE CALVES HAD been separated from their mothers that morning. It took three men to do it, and afterwards Joseph stayed outside. Outside he felt safer; his fields, his boundaries, his wall to sit on, to think things over. A vantage over the four surrounding counties; hills soft, undulating, misted at the rim, the sky with cavities of turquoise between the skimming cloud. Refuge and sanctuary, were it not for the tension in him. Ten brokenhearted sucky calves bawling, beating at the fence to get back to their mothers.

  “Calm down, calm down,” but he pitied them all the same. He pitied and recognised their predicament. The mothers from the lower field were answering back, but not at the same pitch and not with the same tenacity, the mothers maybe knowing within that there would be another season and more young, whereas the calves were banished for ever, their despairing choir more pitiful and heartfelt than any human. In a huddle they tried to storm the fence, kicked and pucked at the wooden posts so that the wires began to rasp, their big trusting eyes and the bouclé curls on the crown of their heads in direct contrast to their assault.

  Gradually the cows saunter up from the lower field and stand around him, expressions of murderous stupidity in their blank and rheumy sockets. They converge around him, stomping, tossing their square heads as if intending to attack.

  “Ye’re cowards, blasted cowards,” he said, disliking them because they did not match the tenderness of their young, who for months lived in the precincts of milk, milk smell, milk warmth, the soft bosomy udders to drink from, to pillow on, and overnight without warning were driven through a gap into a big wide world called nowhere. Were they not calves themselves once? Were they not once, a few years back, as disconsolate as that? Or had they forgotten? He expected answers. He didn’t care if they butted him. Looking up then, he thought he must be imagining it as three calves came flying over the upper barb of wire, trapezewise, so fast they did not even touch it, two of them landing topsy-turvy into the field and the third falling back, then trying again as the wire bent, recovered, then slammed it back to make a gash on its pink underbelly, back to hard ground where it lay, its little thin legs scrambling in the air. The new arrivals leapt and romped as a host of mothers circled around them.

  “What’s going on?” Breege called as she hurried up, stumbling, because Goldie, excited by the pandemonium, kept walking between her legs, or in front of her, impeding her, in a lava of joy.

  “I couldn’t believe my eyes … Two of them leapt the fence … lurchers … The third cut herself.”

  “This came,” and as she handed it to him, he scoffed.

  “You read it,” he said sullenly.

  She had to shout to be heard. The two calves had nuzzled under their mothers, causing others to mutiny, to implore for the young that they had recently forgotten. Out there juxtaposed against all that bedlam the letter seemed uglier and more indicting. It had been forwarded by O’Dea, who had written at the top: “Where do we go from here?”

  Attendance on Mr. Michael Bugler, who called by appointment. He denies that he has wrongfully cut turf on your client’s lands as alleged or at all. He and his ancestors in title have for upwards of 200 years had a right to cut turf as part of a lease agreement between his ancestors and your client’s in consideration of a certain sum.

  I said that in default of documentary evidence that he should produce to us persons who were familiar with the bog and who lived in the locality and could swear they had seen him or his ancestors cut turf in the area under dispute for the last 70 or 80 years and that to their knowledge there was no objection.

  I showed him the land registry map of his holding. I also showed him the map which was attached to the civil bill. I asked him to establish for us his right to cut turf within the area edged in green on the map attached to the civil bill. I pointed out that this was a basic question to be established.

  Mr. Bugler took with him the map attached to the civil bill and also the land registry map of his folio 13037 and said he would consult an engineer and return to us.

  We cannot understand the claim made by your client or why he should place barbed wire and other impediments across the exit gate by which Mr. Bugler could take out his turf.

  We would suggest that in the interest of good neighbourliness that your client does not interfere with our client or his heirs or assigns in the quiet and peaceful enjoyments of the said turbary.

  To summarise, my client denies that he has wrongfully cut turf on your client’s lands as alleged or at all.

  My client denies that he at any time sought or requested or received the consent of your client to cut turf as alleged or at all.

  My client denies that he has at any time interfered with your client when they lawfully worked on their lands or boglands.

  Yours faithfully,

  “It’ll break us … Joseph,” she said pleadingly.

  On the other side of the fence the calves passed up and down, with a furious and useless motion, the injured one berserk and bawling.

  “You better get a poultice for her,” Joseph said, and he began to pelt the cows with soft fistfuls of earth to drive them back to the lower field.

  SLURRY DECOMPOSES in storage and produces a mixture of gases including methane, carbon dioxide, ammonia and hydrogen sulphide. All are unpleasant, some can be inflammable, and one in particular, hydrogen sulphide, is extremely poisonous to humans and animals alike and is the most likely one to be involved in fatal accidents. Hydrogen sulphide is a clear gas with the characteristic smell of rotten eggs and is slightly heavier than air. It burns in air, but its main danger is that it is poisonous. It affects the nervous system, causing symptoms which range from discomfort to sudden death. High concentrations over one thousand parts will cause breathing to cease, while low concentrations will, after a time, affect the nervous system, causing severe headache, dizziness, excitement, and a staggering gait.

  “How about that … Discomfort to sudden death for the bastard,” the Crock says. They are in his caravan, plotting. Rain against the curtainless windows and from a leak above the lintel drops the size of pennies plopping into a burnt saucepan. There is barely room enough for the two of them, squashed in between odd bits of scrap furniture, broken chairs, stacks of newspapers, and a television over which flecks of snow randomly scattered. A calendar pinned to the wall shows a young girl in a yellow cling vest, very suntanned, her nipples sprouting. At times, the caravan and the contents seem to tilt and the two men sway as if on board ship.

  “Let’s o’er to delicious murder,” the Crock says as he lifts a used tea bag from the waste bucket, dips it into two mugs of boiling water, and ceremoniously hands one over. His “Maundy” money from the state, as he
calls it, isn’t due for two more days and his luck at the cards and the bingo, dire.

  “We’ll shambolical his entrances and his exits … How’s that! We’ll lock the outer gate for starters … the one near the little hut. We’ll lock it and we’ll put barbed wire all around it. Not one little loop. But loop after loop … Like you see on the gaol wall in Port Laoise. Picture it … He’ll get there on the tractor in a big hurry. He’ll jump down. He’ll probably be able to break the lock with a pickaxe or a hammer, but by Jesus he will have cut his hands in numerous places from the barbed wire. Now, that takes him the best part of an hour and he’s cross … He’s bucking. He’s effing and blinding and he’s in a bigger hurry. Wasted a fecking hour … Back up on the tractor across to the second entrance, farther up where there’s no gate at all. He’s making up for lost time. Speeding … And lo and behold, there’s this godawful lurch. The tractor starts to sink … Down … Down. He’s sunk. Are you with me?”

  “Not entirely.”

  “Well, there’s a slatted wooden bridge in that second entrance. It’s covered over with briars and gorse, but underneath it there’s a big drop, a gorge, full of bogwater. So … if we remove the beams and put the briars back, Bugler is in a hole shouting for help and no help in sight. He’ll get himself down, but he won’t be able to pull the tractor. He has to go back home and ring Vinnie from the garage. Vinnie takes his time about coming … They eventually pull the machine out … But it’s a sick Dino. It needs surgery. Net result: a whole day wasted, a broken tractor and a bill for several hundred pounds. In short, a warning, a foretaste of things to come. Stop cutting turf, boyo.”

  “Can we do it?”

  “Treason, stratagems, and spoils,” the Crock says, dragging his toolbox from under the bed, picking out his hacksaw, then putting it across his knee, and with a delicacy that is new for him, he begins to sharpen each tooth with the long sharpening rod, all the while whistling, “If I were a blackbird I’d whistle and sing and follow the ship that my true love sails in.”

  THE LETTERS WENT back and forth, faithfully and in grinding succession, the dry words as distant from their daily lives as a thronged city street from the bronzed ghostliness of Yellow Dick’s Bog. Sometimes there came two in a week, then a silence, as if by some miracle, some amelioration, it had resolved itself or Bugler had got fed up and was preparing to go back to Australia, as some said. He bought his groceries and his diesel now in a town twenty miles away and he was not seen at Mass. Just as once Breege had prayed for a glimpse of him, she now prayed that he would go away.

  * * *

  Dear Sirs:

  I act for Mr. Joseph Brennan of Cloontha, who has handed me a copy of a preliminary letter from Mr. Michael Bugler via his solicitor.

  It is clear that you have not been correctly instructed in this matter. The true facts are as follows:

  Your client and his predecessors in title did have a right to cut turf in a spot on my client’s bog a few hundred yards distant from the place where he is now cutting turf.

  This turf bank in respect of which he had bona fide right to cut turf became exhausted. It was in fact “cut away” for several years past.

  Now, without any right or authority whatever, your client has moved over to another place, a few hundred yards away from the original turf bank, and has calmly proceeded to open a fresh bank.

  In other words, having abandoned the original bank he has proceeded to move to a different spot and open a new bank.

  About two months ago he asked Mr. Brennan for permission to cut turf in the present spot, but Mr. Brennan refused.

  Now, Mr. Brennan has no intention whatever of tolerating an invasion of his rights in this fashion.

  If your client enters into this part of my client’s bog again, my client will at once issue proceedings in the Circuit Court for damages and an injunction.

  Yours faithfully,

  Bugler thought first to tear it up, then decided to make a scrapbook for Rosemary to let her see why he had to keep postponing to save her from this mess.

  * * *

  Dear Sir:

  Our client Mr. Bugler insists that he is entitled to cut turf on Yellow Dick’s Bog, and he objects strongly to your client trying to cut off his mode of ingress and egress thereto. He cannot understand why your client should place barbed wire across the gate by which Mr. Bugler was endeavouring to enter.

  We have bespoken Mr. Bugler’s land registry map to see if it can be of assistance in solving this difficulty. In the meantime, you might kindly let us know if your client denies that Mr. Bugler and his predecessors have been cutting turf on this bog for many years as claimed.

  Yours faithfully,

  * * *

  Dear Sir:

  We are not able to go ahead with our enquiries, and you will see from the enclosed file the difficulties with which we have had to contend. Mrs. Cleary of Messrs. Dowling & Co., architects, has visited the bog on a number of occasions but has met with great difficulty in drawing a map and instructing us as to whether or not Mr. Bugler is cutting turf in the area occupied by your client.

  Your client has on occasion used improper if not to say foul language and once tried to frighten Mrs. Cleary. This is totally inappropriate and unacceptable. You must instruct your client to give Mrs. Cleary proper access with regard to the boundary under dispute, as otherwise your client runs the risk of losing his tenancy altogether if a map cannot be prepared and presented to both parties.

  Yours faithfully,

  * * *

  Dear Sir:

  I acknowledge receipt of your letter dated 10th instant, the contents of which I have discussed with my client. My client has confirmed that he did attend his bog on the 6th instant accompanied by Guard Cosgrave, as they wished to request Mr. Bugler once again to leave his property, on which he was cutting turf and furthermore interfering with the drain which our client created at great expense. When Mr. Brennan, accompanied by his sister and Guard Cosgrave, arrived at the area in dispute, they were very much amazed to discover that Mr. Bugler and two persons unknown to them were walking on Mr. Brennan’s property at a place not referred to in the proceedings. Mr. Brennan, in the presence of his sister and Guard Cosgrave, asked them to remove themselves from his property. You are wrongly instructed that the people concerned, i.e., Mr. Bugler and helpmates, proceeded onto the public road, because in fact they were in clear view the entire time it took them to cross from those lands to the dwelling house of Mr. Bugler. After Mr. Bugler had gone, Mr. Brennan and his sister discussed the situation with Guard Cosgrave, who then left the scene, as he said the Bugler crowd would probably not return to the bog. However, shortly after this time, Mr. Brennan and his sister saw Mr. Bugler returning to their property accompanied by one of the strangers, and Mr. Brennan requested Mr. Bugler not to go on his property. For the first time during the evening the person accompanying Mr. Bugler, now known to be Mrs. Cleary, the architect, approached Mr. Brennan to tell him he was not the registered owner of the lands in question, and when requested by Mr. Brennan to identify herself and the purpose for which she was standing on these lands Mrs. Cleary said nothing and did not engage in any further conversation. Mr. Brennan denies completely that he shouted at her or behaved in a most unreasonable manner. In fact, to be quite clear about the matter, it was Michael Bugler who removed his coat and used words to the effect that he would fight Mr. Brennan, something which caused such distress to Mr. Brennan’s sister that he was obliged to take her home. Later in the day he had again gone for Guard Cosgrave, who returned to the scene and who spoke to Mr. Bugler, who in due course left the bog with Mrs. Cleary and went home.

  Yours faithfully

  VIOLET HILL, fluid, flowing, a brindled phantom upon the mountain in the early morning, a vision that streaked back and forth like a painted picture and then again in the dusk, becoming one with the dusk, except for her eyes, which glowed wildly. “You flyer,” Joseph would say each time she broke out of her kennel. What he did not know
was that she was digging the soft clay under the surround of the wire meshing. It was in wet and dusk that she ran to her delirious destination.

  Bugler had been going slow on account of the poor light, and when he heard the cries and turned off the ignition, he knew that it was a wounded animal and hoped that it would not be Violet Hill. He found her at the side of the road, and kneeling, he picked her up and listened to her small strangled cries. Then he carried her, willing her not to be dead, carried her into their yard and down the three steep steps to the back door, which he knocked on with his foot, holding her with both hands lest she unmesh. Her hind leg was broken and bent backwards, and the long sleek trunk of her body was damp with blood, but she was still alive. The blood dripped harmlessly onto the outdoor mat as he waited for the door to be answered. Opening it, he saw Breege first with a smile and then drawing back shocked, unable to look at the crumpled heap in his arms.

  “Oh no,” she said.

  “I found her out on the road.”

  “Oh my God,” she said in a whisper, and looked in towards the kitchen.

  “Where’s Joseph?”

  “He’s sick … He’s in bed.”

  “Can I go up to him?”

  “I’ll tell him … It’s better that I tell him.”

  “She’s still breathing,” he said, and together they listened for the little splutters of breath, faint as a faltering watch. Between them they held her then as if somehow holding her they would keep her alive but letting her go would bode the end of everything.