We didn’t know. We heard him order something for all of us, and when I saw what it was I was puzzled by its colour. It was in a tall glass, and as I looked at the two Daleys they were already drinking it, and so I took a sip. By God! It was gorgeous, the nicest drink I ever had, and when I swallowed, it had a beautiful smell of some sort of fruit. I later learned that it was raspberry juice. Dick Senior himself was drinking a half pint of porter that seemed to disappear with a couple of swallows. Then he said, ‘Come on,’ and we quickly finished our raspberries and followed him out the door. We had been in the pub less than ten minutes. The thrill of the horse and cart ride has stayed with me for many years. I had never been so high off the road before, and the rapid speed of the horse, the sound of the cart wheels and the excitement of looking out over the high creels of the cart gave me a feeling of wild adventure that I really enjoyed. After a mile Dick Senior pulled up outside our gate. My father was sweeping the yard and when he saw us he began walking towards the gate just as I was descending from the cart.
‘Dick, thanks for minding Paddy,’ he shouted. ‘The Lord leave you your health!’
‘Not a bother, Christy, not a bother,’ Dick replied. Then he shouted at the horse, ‘Get up there, get up!’ and away home they went.
11
The Fancy Dress Parade
Our teacher returned and said she had been talking about the upcoming fancy dress parade to Father Cronin. She said anyone who wanted to enter the competition would have to write their name and the name of their entry on a card. She held up a pack of pink cards. ‘Here are the cards and I will leave them over on the table next to the door. You must return them no later than Friday after class and they are only for those who will take part in the competition.’
At home my mother was saying that everyone around was very excited about the parade. ‘It’s the talk of the town,’ she said. She told my father that women in the post office and grocery shops were all looking forward to the day of the parade.
For the next couple of weeks the town was alive with talk about who was competing in the fancy dress competition. There were posters everywhere and an amusements carnival arrived and set up its business near the side wall of the courthouse square. There was a dance in the town hall on the Saturday night before the parade with music by the Ballinamere Céilí Band. I was too young to be taken to the dance but heard one of my cousins talking about how great the band were.
The next day a large crowd of people gathered at the top of the town, which had a Y-shaped crossroads. The parade began slowly with a children’s fife and drum marching band, dressed in green and white. It was a boys’ band and they looked very organised as they marched along three lines abreast. Then they were followed by the parade. As it began, my mother, sister Moira and myself ran down a back lane so we could see the parade as it came towards the town square. Soon we had a good vantage point and saw that some adults had joined the parade and were dressed in clowns’ attire. I saw another dressed as a cowboy and he was riding a white horse and wore a vizard on his face. The girls and boys of our school were well represented with a wide variety of colours; some were dressed as queens, witches or vampires, with capes covering their shoulders, while one little lad had a full cowboy outfit which was black with silver buttons and a studded belt and holsters with cap guns with white handles. He looked very impressive as he waved his black hat and fired a couple of shots.
The parade moved along slowly, and then there was a small break. My mother said, ‘Look! Look!’ She lowered her voice and said to me, ‘Will you look at him! Paddy, don’t you see who it is?’ I wasn’t sure who she was talking about. ‘Look, look,’ she said again. ‘Look at the goat!’ And then I saw him. It was Vincent Cuskelly! He was from my class and he had a sheet wrapped around him, hanging from one shoulder. He was also wearing sandals and his face, shoulders, arms, hands, and legs were painted brown. His hair was also shaven close to his scalp, and in one hand he held a short rope that was attached to the neck of a small goat. As he passed by we saw a placard on his back with clearly written block letters that read: ‘Gandhi and His Goat’. Vincent was ambling along almost as though he was sleepwalking, with his small goat following him in the middle of the street. People were clapping and cheering him on and it was a supreme moment of magic for everyone. The little lad from the townland of ‘The Little Island’ was the hero of the afternoon.
Father Doran came through a side door and walked onto the dance floor. Then came our headmistress and one of the teachers from the boys’ school. They all stood at a microphone that was clipped to a stand in front of the stage. Father Doran welcomed everyone and praised the parade. The fourth prize was given to a little girl for dressing as an old crone. The third was for the ‘Florence Nightingale’ entry by another little girl. The second prize was for the lad from the boys’ school who wore the black cowboy suit. And first prize went to Gandhi and His Goat! Vincent Cuskelly came out of the shadows to receive his prize. He was still wearing the white bedsheet and his goat followed him as he walked onto the dance floor. Father Doran said he was proud to present Vincent with the first prize for his excellent portrayal of Gandhi.
Everyone stood in their seats and wild cheers and applause shook the hall. We all whistled, shouted and clapped when Vincent and his goat came walking up the steps between the seats. My mother got up and we followed her to the entrance area as Vincent was going towards the front door. ‘Well done, Gandhi,’ she shouted. ‘You’re a great little lad.’ Vincent’s sister appeared with an ice cream for her brother. She was much older than Vincent and my mother was glad she was there to help the little fellow and usher him through the crowded square. Shortly after they were gone we also headed off and took the shortcut home by way of the back road.
It was many years before I was to learn about the significance of what Vincent Cuskelly’s prizewinning entry meant to so many people, and why the result of the competition was so popular. During the 1950s nationalism was an emotive issue in Irish politics, and the story of India’s independence, and Mahatma Gandhi’s passive resistance movement, was very much alive in the Irish consciousness. The very idea of this little man taking on the might of the British Empire stood well with Irish people who had seen him on the newsreel reports shown before the main attraction in their local cinema. Remembering that time, I also think of Vincent Cuskelly himself, who was my classmate and playmate when we ran and hid and shot our cap guns as cowboys and rustlers. Like Mahatma Gandhi, Vincent too was a very passive young fella. In school he was shy, humble and somewhat private. He was a scholar and avid reader of cowboy comics. He was the lad who introduced me to stories of the Old West with tales of Billy the Kid and the James Boys of Missouri.
12
The Sure-Sures
We had an old grey horse that my father used for carting stones when he worked for Offaly County Council. It was 1955 and I was ten years old, and my sister Moira was nine, when one day we heard him talking to our mother about the horse, saying he was going to get rid of him. He said the horse had become wicked and had nearly bitten him earlier in the day while he was unharnessing him from the cart. ‘It’s dangerous for Paddy and Moira to be near him,’ he said. He showed our mother the sleeve of his coat, which was torn where the horse had tried to bite him. ‘I’ll tell yeh, he’s become a bad bastard and the sooner we sell him the better.’
A few days later I was playing with Moira and was taking a shortcut between the back of the hen house and the hedge behind it. It was a narrow passage and when I was almost at the end of it the horse’s head rounded the corner of the shed. It was as if he was waiting for me. I saw him stripping his teeth and can remember their brown colour with bits of juicy green grass stuck between some of them. I’m glad to say that I was too fast for the old horse. I made a quick retreat back behind the hen house as the animal tried to force his way in after me, but the space was too narrow. I waited a long time before he rambled away. My
sister didn’t notice anything unusual, otherwise she would have told our mother. When I came through the door of the kitchen my mother saw my hands shaking and asked me if I was all right. I told her about my lucky escape and she put her arms around me and held me close. Within a week my father had traded the horse for a two-year-old that had to be broken in. My mother was unhappy about the choice, saying the horse was too flighty to be around children.
Meanwhile we put the new pony to graze in a field next to the road. This caught the attention of some of the travellers who had an eye for good horse flesh. A couple of weeks later the Mullowney brothers came knocking at our door. ‘Is the boss at home?’
‘He should be home any minute,’ my mother answered. It was very cold outside and the two men looked like they needed something hot. My mother said, ‘Come in and sit by the fire.’
‘Sure, sure,’ said the elder brother, ‘sure, sure.’ My mother closed the door to keep the wind out of the kitchen and the two brothers pulled their chairs close to the fire. They were wearing heavy brown topcoats with high collars, and wore nothing on their heads. Our mother gave them some hot chicken soup and they held the warm mugs gratefully with both hands, and sipped. In a little while they began to praise the young horse, asking if it was for sale. My mother said she didn’t know and that they should ask the man of the house, repeating that he should be home shortly. However, the two brothers were impatient and after they finished their soup stood up to leave. The younger one said, ‘Sure is a fine little horse.’ Then they thanked my mother for the soup and were gone. They had their own horse and trap waiting for them outside our gate. I ran onto the road to look after them as they sped away. It wasn’t the last I saw of them.
My father was amused when my mother told him about the two travellers. He said, ‘Those fellows are goin’ to plague me from now on.’ He was right. They returned on their way back from Edenderry with two horses tied to the back of their trap. My mother again invited them to sit by the fire and made tea and buttered bread and then pasted it with jam. They immediately asked, ‘Is the boss home?’ My mother said she was sorry that he wasn’t but he would definitely be home in half an hour. They drank tea and ate a slice of bread and asked who played the whistle that was on a nearby chair. My mother looked at me but I remained silent. The elder man asked, ‘Can I see it?’
‘Of course’, my mother said, and he lifted the slotted end to his mouth and blew. He ran his fingers back and forth along its six holes, playing a scale before breaking into a slow jig. It was wonderful to hear the whistle being played by someone who knew how. My father came in and the music stopped.
‘Good day, boss,’ said the whistler.
‘Hello, men,’ said my father.
‘These are the Mullowneys who want to talk to you about sellin’ the pony,’ my mother told him.
My father looked at each one of the brothers and said, ‘I never said I would sell her.’
‘We have a good workhorse outside and he’s only six years old,’ the younger brother said. ‘What about makin’ a swap?’ My father distrusted the offer and said he was training our two-year-old to plough and would try her out with a breaking harness next week. The two brothers rose from their chairs and said they would be back in a couple of weeks. After they were gone my father said he had little doubt they would return to see if he’d changed his mind.
The following week the breaking harness was put on the little horse, who appeared jittery and nervous. My father used a long rein to drive her around the bog pasture. It went very well until he yoked the horse to a plough. As soon as he said ‘giddy up’ the horse took off, dragging the plough after her with my father pulling hard on the reins. The horse stopped when she ran blindly into the corner of the field. My father coaxed the horse, patting her gently, and removed the harness. In a few days the Mullowneys returned. My father and mother were dropping potatoes and moulding the furrows for closing the drills in the field behind the garden. When I saw the Mullowneys at the gate I ran out from the yard, around the back of our house and into the garden and began shouting at my parents, ‘The Sure-Sures are here! The Sure-Sures are here!’ This was our nickname for the travellers, who used the two words after nearly everything they said.
My father came around to the front of the house and told them he’d sold the horse and bought an old black one from the McCormacks who lived outside Daingean. The Sure-Sures were clearly disappointed and walked away in silence. In minutes they had disappeared in their horse and trap. We never saw them again.
13
Long Trousers
Mick Hayes arrived on a night when we were expecting little of any kind of human company. He was in a foul mood. Shep had made another charge as he came through the gate and had barely missed Mick’s right leg; instead the dog had torn the bottom leg end of Mick’s trousers. We could see Mick’s white leg when he walked into the kitchen. My mother put her hand over her mouth to shield her giggling as Mick cursed. He looked at my father and said, ‘Where in the name of our Holy Mother did you find that vicious fucker, that poorly bred fiend that you call a dog?’
My father told him to sit down. ‘Let me have a look. Did he bite yeh?’
‘No,’ shouted Mick, ‘but not for want of tryin’!’
My father gave Mick a bottle of stout, which transformed his mood. He lifted his glass and said, ‘Here’s to the power of music, there’s nothin’ like it for puttin’ a man in good form, not to mention the man himself, Arthur Guinness.’ My father knew exactly what he meant and lifted his mug of tea and clinked it against Mick’s glass. ‘Happy Christmas,’ he said.
My mother looked at my father. ‘You must be losin’ all yer wits,’ she said. ‘Don’t you know that Christmas is four months away?’
Mick laughed. ‘There’s nothin’ wrong with lookin’ forward to it. By the way, did Christy tell you we are goin’ out with the wren this year?’ My mother looked astonished. ‘We’re hopin’ to bring Tom Brewer with us,’ Mick continued. When my mother laughed heartily at the mention of the name my sister Moira asked, ‘Who is Tom Brewer?’
My father intervened. ‘He’s the one-man band! He plays the mouth organ and beats the tambourine and the foot drum, all at the same time. He’s goin’ to be on the radio in a couple of weeks.’
‘That’s right,’ said Mick. ‘He’s goin’ to be on Céilí House on Saturday night week.’
My mother was curious. ‘How did he manage it?’ she asked.
‘He went to Dublin a few months ago,’ Mick told her, ‘and did some sort of test for the radio.’
‘Nobody tells me anythin’!’ my mother complained.
‘I just found out, the same as you,’ my father said in solidarity, ‘and Mick heard the news as late as last night. Brewer would be a great attraction if we had him with us on Saint Stephen’s Day.’
Mick could understand the logic of the choice. ‘I’m goin’ to Daingean tomorrow night,’ he said, ‘and I’ll drop by his house and ask him. We also need a couple more to make up the batch. What do you think, Christy?’
‘Well,’ said my father, ‘what about Tom and Paddy Brien from Clonadd?’
‘The very fellows I was thinkin’ of,’ said Mick. ‘We should run into them next Sunday after Mass.’
‘One of them goes to first Mass and the other goes to last Mass.’
‘There’s no need for both of them to be together,’ said Mick confidently. ‘One of them will be enough, when we see him.’
It was a typical night at our house when Mick stopped in. There were a few more tunes, more tea with my mother’s bread, and Mick pulling at the lobes of his ears. When he was leaving he took his accordion with him. I was sorry to see it go, and so I was left with my own box to fare away with. As Mick was on his way he asked my father to see him to the gate, just in case Shep came at him in the darkness. He was takin’ no chances, he said, with such a vicious little bastard!<
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When Saturday night came we were very excited about Tom Brewer being a guest on Seán Ó Murchú’s Céilí House. The featured band for the programme was Joe Delaney’s Céilí Band, who were based in the Rhode/Croghan area of northeast Offaly. Seán Ó Murchú introduced Tom Brewer of Daingean as the first and only one-man band he ever heard. Tom played two marches on his mouth organ and whacked away on his tambourine with his foot drum beating a strong thud, thud, thud. We were very proud of Tom, and Seán Ó Murchú said he was one of Daingean’s truest heroes. Later he played two more selections, which were jigs and hornpipes. On the same night my father was in Daingean and met Tom Brewer himself on the street, and when he returned home my mother told him about Tom playing on Céilí House.
‘Woman, you must be dreamin’,’ my father said. ‘Didn’t I talk with Tom a little over an hour ago?’ He couldn’t be in two places at the one time.’ My parents jokingly argued about Tom’s radio performance for over a week, until the next time my father went to town for his Saturday-night drink. The next morning I heard him say to my mother, ‘I found out last night about Tom Brewer.’
‘What did you find out?’ my mother asked.
‘Céilí House was recorded a month before it went on the radio and they played the recordin’ on the night you heard him. That’s the way they do it nowadays with the radio, and if anyone makes a mistake, they can always re-do the recordin’.’
When my mother heard this she said no more, and neither did my father. And so it was time to talk about something else.
In the coming months I tried my luck with my mother’s bicycle, but its saddle was a little too high. Another difficulty was staying on as it moved while trying to steady it and keep it balanced. An idea of putting my right foot on the right pedal came to mind and soon I was allowing the bicycle to take me down a small incline in front of our house. I practised this routine of riding down the small hill with my left foot hanging close to the ground as a precaution. All went well until I tried pedalling with both feet and then I lost control and rode into the doorway of a shed. I hit my forehead against a crossbeam and fell sideways, with the bicycle running from under me. The initial shock and throbbing ache in my head unsettled me, and I didn’t even look at the bicycle for almost two weeks. In any event my determination returned, and in a matter of months I was able to cycle back and forth to Aunt Mary’s or take our battery to Daingean for charging. There was a great demand for my services as a messenger and delivery boy.
The Road from Castlebarnagh Page 8