Bless Me, Father

by Neil Boyd

  She drew up a chair for herself and, carefully seated with her back to Mother Foundress, she produced from the labyrinthine folds of her habit an enormous tea cup.

  Back at the presbytery, Fr Duddleswell coaxed me into his study. ‘Delightful, sensitive lady, that Mother Superior.’ A burp brought him to his senses. ‘Cucumber,’ he explained.

  ‘I said, ‘No need to swear, Father,’ just as I noticed a large-brown-paper parcel on his desk.

  Mrs Pring entered with her broom. As Fr Duddleswell cut the string and began to remove the wrapping, she told us, ‘It came by Post Office van.’

  Fr Duddleswell, snowy-faced, held up a second portrait of Mère Magdalène, indistinguishable from the first.

  ‘Cucumber! Cucumber!’ I cried. ‘A present from the Bishop?’

  Fr Duddleswell shook his head and proceeded slowly to read the attached letter. ‘Monsieur le Curé … Dear Father … ’Tis from the Mother General in Aix-en-Provence. She thanks me cordially for all the help I am giving her Order and the orphans and … she states there were in fact five portraits done of the dead Mère Magdalène at the one sitting—and … and would I like another?’ He looked up, his mouth agape. ‘D’you reckon that old crow at the convent knew all along her picture was not the only original in existence?’

  He handed the picture to me while he picked up the phone and dialled a number. For a moment I thought he was going to have words immediately with Mother Stephen.

  ‘Fred? Fr Duddleswell here. Just to let you know I think we may have acquired another Tichat … You heard me. Another Tichat.’

  In her curiosity, Mrs Pring came closer to examine the picture in detail. She tripped on the carpet and her broom went through the canvas. She herself ended flat on the floor like a plate of porridge.

  Fr Duddleswell raised his eyes to heaven but his mind and heart were in the other place. ‘Hell!’ he yelled before he could contain himself. ‘Forgive me, Fred, I was just saying safe home to a fallen woman … Yes, Fred, by the most ugly of coincidences this one, too, has a whopping great hole in it.’

  XI The Doomsday Chair

  It was a chance remark of mine that turned the breakfast conversation to the topic of superstition.

  ‘It says in today’s paper, Father, that a Church of England vicar doesn’t believe in the fires of Hell.’

  ‘Then,’ said Fr Duddleswell, slitting open a letter as though it were an infidel’s throat, ‘I hope he has made provision in his will to be buried in asbestos underwear.’ He nodded to Mrs Pring at the end of the table. ‘A cut of bread, if you would be so kind. Ah, yes, Father Neil, ’tis always the absence of faith that leads to superstition.’

  Mrs Pring, her bread knife poised, said, ‘The Irish are superstitious enough.’

  ‘Incredible as it may seem, there is something in what the lady says. In me parents’ home-town in County Cork …’

  ‘Will one slice do,’ interrupted Mrs Pring.

  ‘Two,’ and he proceeded to direct her hand with his wagging index finger. ‘Thicker, please. That way the butter ration goes further.’ He signified approval of her efforts. ‘Yes,’ he went on. ‘In County Cork, now, there was a superstition among some that if a dog bit you, you should take a hair from his tail and ’twould heal the wound forthwith.’

  Mrs Pring was putting the bread on his plate. She touched his head, pretended to claim a hair, and gave me a wink. ‘Insurance against an attack of rabies,’ she said.

  ‘A feeble-minded feller, name of Seamus Crowe,’ Fr Duddleswell proceeded, ‘was one day accidentally scratched by a huge, thin mongrel. A gentle dog was Rover,’ he emphasized, ‘but something of a cross between a Great Dane and the Eiffel Tower. ’Twas but a wee scratch on the leg. Even so, Seamus pulled a hair from Rover’s tail.’

  Instead of continuing his story, Fr Duddleswell crammed his mouth with toast. ‘So much for that superstition,’ he concluded.

  ‘It didn’t heal the scratch?’ I asked.

  ‘I have no idea. But I do know that afterwards, Seamus Crowe had to make do with four fingers on his right hand.’

  ‘I don’t suppose there’s much superstition round here, Father.’

  ‘The usual dependence of the weak-minded, Father Neil,’ he replied with a glance at Mrs Pring, ‘women mostly, on mascots, mediums and fortune-telling.’

  ‘There’s one gentleman not far from here,’ growled Mrs Pring, ‘who thinks he’s God.’

  Fr Duddleswell took no notice. ‘Many who would not dream of coming to church decorate the dashboards and windscreens of their cars with St Christopher medals.’

  ‘Don’t you?’ challenged Mrs Pring.

  ‘Of course, woman. But I believe in St Christopher.’

  ‘And they don’t, I suppose.’

  ‘Certainly they do not. They expect a little bit of unconsecrated metal to assist them,’ he said, starting to shake the salt cellar over his fried egg. ‘Whereas I rely on the intercession of the saint himself with … God Almighty!’ The last words were more an expostulation that the conclusion of a sentence. The top of the salt cellar had come off and there on his plate was a pillar of salt as big as Lot’s wife. ‘Woman,’ he exclaimed, ‘I have told you a thousand times to well screw the top of that salt cellar.’

  ‘You’re not superstitious, I suppose,’ said Mrs Pring unperturbed.

  Fr Duddleswell took a pinch of salt with his right hand and threw it over his left shoulder where Mrs Pring happened to be standing. ‘Indeed, I am not.’

  Mrs Pring dusted the white crystals from her dress and apron. ‘You read your horoscope every day, you can’t deny it.’

  ‘Only to find out how marvellously mistaken ’tis. You, now, get St Vitus’s Dance if even a stray black cat enters the house lest death should enter with it.’

  I went on munching, not very involved, until Mrs Pring, obviously riled, said, ‘What about The Doomsday Chair, then?’

  Fr Duddleswell put down his fork and leaned on his elbow. ‘The age of persecution is not over by any means, Father Neil.’

  Mrs Pring explained for my benefit that The Doomsday Chair was a chair in the local public house, ‘The Pig And Whistle’. Legend had it that whoever sits on it, dies.

  The parish priest sighed and shifted to his other elbow for support.

  ‘Is there anything in it?’ I asked.

  ‘As much,’ said Fr Duddleswell, ‘as you would find with a miscroscope inside that lady’s head. ’Tis all dreamed up by the publican, Fred Bowlby. His wife Eileen is a darlin’. She always appreciates a visit, by the way. But Fred is another who would do well to invest in a fire-proof shroud.’ With that satisfying observation he resumed eating.

  ‘I thought,’ sniffed Mrs Pring, ‘that Jesus was the friend of publicans.’

  Out of the corner of a crammed mouth, Fr Duddleswell managed to joke, ‘The friend of tight men and loose women, eh?’

  Mrs Pring didn’t let go. ‘Last Saint Patrick’s Day, Father Neil, Fred Bowlby issued a public invitation. Any Irishman who wanted to, was free to sit on his Chair. Including Fr D.’

  Fr Duddleswell didn’t care much for my asking whether he had accepted or not. ‘I would not be seen dead in Bowlby’s pub, you follow?’

  ‘That’s the truth of it,’ jumped in Mrs Pring. ‘He was afraid he’d die. So everyone said, “If the Catholic priest at St Jude’s is scared out of his wits, there must be something to that Doomsday Chair.” The legend grew because of his Reverence’s superstition.’

  Once more, Fr Duddleswell put down his knife and fork. His voice was soft but there was menace in it. ‘I … am … not … superstitious.’

  Mrs Pring turned to address me. ‘Do you know, every time he sees a ladder he has to walk under it.’

  The tiger broke loose in him. ‘Woman,’ he roared, banging the table, ‘I am not superstitious, I tell you.’

  The shock wave was considerable. Lot’s wife jumped a foot in the air with most of what was on the table. A mirror fell from its nail on the
wall and smashed into a thousand pieces on the sideboard.

  A stunned silence ensued.

  Mrs Pring, without stirring, whispered, ‘Fr D, you broke that mirror without even looking in it.’

  ‘Seven years bad luck,’ he retorted in the same reverential tone, ‘after herself has been with me twenty years already.’

  At ten o’clock that same morning I was banging on the black, brass-knockered side door of ‘The Pig And Whistle’.

  A tense, red-eyed, middle-aged lady, smartly dressed, opened up. She no sooner saw me than she relaxed into a smile. ‘The new assistant. I’ve seen you at Mass, Father.’

  Soon we were seated at a small table in the well-kept public bar sipping tea and nibbling biscuits. Several tables were already set out for lunch. I had an overall impression of large bow-windows, gleaming mahogany, polished brass, hundreds of upturned glasses, coloured bottles of spirits hanging downwards like so many udders from the shelving behind the bar. The air was heavy, smelling slightly stale and sour.

  ‘My Fred’s still in bed, Father,’ Mrs Bowlby said apologetically. ‘“The Pig And Whistle” keeps us up very late at nights.’

  I smiled understandingly.

  ‘Another cup of tea, Father?’

  I pointed to my collar. ‘I’m full up to here, Mrs Bowlby.’

  ‘And so am I, Father,’ she said in a choking voice, as she reached for her handkerchief.

  ‘Have I said something to upset you, Mrs Bowlby?’

  ‘No, no, Father.’ She dried her eyes. ‘Forgive me. It’s just that I’m fed up to the teeth with … with that Doomsday Chair.’

  Without looking, she thumbed across the floor of the bar. Between the piano and dartboard was a cane chair. It had a gold cushion on it and was chained and padlocked to a fixture on the wall. On the cross-section of the back-rest was a silver plaque inscribed with the words: THE DOOMSDAY CHAIR.

  ‘Time and again,’ said Mrs Bowlby, ‘I’ve asked my Fred to get rid of it. He even sells models of it. Look.’ There were a dozen wooden models on the bar counter. ‘Five shillings each. He says the Chair is good for business.’

  ‘Is it?’

  ‘It does draw in hundreds of tourists a year,’ she conceded. ‘Americans mostly. They come to see the Crown Jewels and that.’

  She was in such a highly-strung state I tried to comfort her. ‘Is there any harm in that?’

  ‘Precisely my sentiments.’

  The voice belonged to the publican who had made his way, very quietly for such a burly man, into the bar. He was wearing a loose pink shirt and baggy tweed trousers. The trousers were supported by a broad leather belt studded with badges and from the belt dangled a large bunch of keys. He was holding his tea mug. ‘Fred Bowlby,’ he said in introduction, ‘you must be …’

  ‘The new curate at St Jude’s, Fr Boyd.’

  ‘Eileen’s told me about you. Made quite a hit with the ladies, so I believe.’

  ‘Take no notice, Father,’ said Mrs Bowlby, ‘he has no respect for the cloth.’

  Fred started to pour himself a mug of tea. ‘Come to see The Doomsday Chair, have you, Father?’

  Mrs Bowlby rose immediately and hurried out clutching her handkerchief. Her back was shaking as if she were in tears.

  ‘Are you off, then, love?’ But she was already out of hearing. Fred turned to me. ‘She takes it hard, Father. But you Catholics are a superstitious lot, aren’t you? What with your medals and statues and incense and dressing up like Masons and kneeling in front of bits of bread.’

  ‘Mr Bowlby,’ I said, raising my fist, ‘we are not superstitious.’ Remembering only too well the effect of Fr Duddleswell’s fist on the breakfast table, I brought mine down soundlessly beside the tea-pot.

  ‘You do realize, Fr Boyd,’ Fred said, testing the warmth and texture of the tea on his tongue, ‘Catholic superstition well nigh ruined the beginning of my marriage. Know what my wife made me do all through our honeymoon?’

  That question revealed at once Fred’s talent for and delight in double-meanings.

  ‘No,’ I gulped.

  ‘I thought it was odd at the time, mind, but’—he gave me a knowing wink—‘well, you’re a man of the world, when you’re newly wed you’ll go to any lengths to please the little woman. That’s why Eileen and me spent all our time in … churches.’ The last word, beautifully timed, brought a self-satisfied smirk to his flabby face.

  ‘Rome,’ he went on, when he had recovered from his own joke. ‘The Holy Year it was. And in St Peter’s Basilica was this big, black, horrible-looking statue of St Peter. The foot was worn smooth by kisses.’

  ‘Italians are very passionate,’ I told him, determined to hold my own.

  ‘Eileen said, “For my sake, Fred, give it a kiss.”’ Fred nodded amusedly several times. ‘Like a coalman’s boot. “Give it a kiss, Fred,” she says. A bleeding funny honeymoon, I can tell you.’

  ‘I’m laughing,’ I replied with a Stan Laurel face.

  ‘As I bent down to kiss it, I slipped and my tooth went clean through my bottom lip.’ He pulled the pink rim of it down to show me the actual site of the wound. ‘After that, Eileen had to do without. Kisses, I mean. “It’s all right, love,” I said, “I’m off to Lourdes next week for a cure.”’

  ‘About this Chair.’

  ‘Come and see.’ As we walked across, he asked, ‘Care for something stronger?’ I shook my head. ‘A glass of Holy Water?’ He apologized before pointing to the Chair. ‘There she is Father,’

  Above this harmless-looking Chair was a notice board on which were pasted yellow newspaper photographs and press cuttings. I spied headlines like THE KILLER CHAIR and DEATH CHAIR’S LATEST VICTIM.

  ‘When we took this pub over three years ago I found her in the cellar. Newspaper cuttings, too, which spoke of a Doomsday Chair. Anyone who sat on it died inside the week.’

  ‘Week?’ I packed the word with scorn. ‘How childish. And that’s the Chair, I presume?’

  His answer surprised me. ‘Dunno, to be honest. Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. In the beginning, it never occurred to me there was anything haunted about that Chair because,’ he said sarcastically, ‘I’m not that way inclined. I even threw the cuttings in the fire. Then to jog business along in a slack period I got the Chair out, gave it a lick and a polish, and stuck it in the public bar where you see it today.’

  He broke off from his story. ‘Sure you won’t have a snifter?’ When I shook my head, ‘You might need it.’ I let him see he wasn’t impressing me any.

  ‘Well, then, Father, for fun I called it The Doomsday Chair. The locals came in, eyed it suspiciously and asked me why I called it that. I told them whoever sits on it dies inside a week and, hell—begging your pardon, Father—not one of them dared sit on the flaming thing. “A free drink,” I said, “to any chap who plonks himself down on my old cane chair.” And know what?’

  ‘Surprise me.’

  ‘No one would.’

  ‘You said you threw away the press cuttings.’

  ‘Oh, those,’ Fred said, pointing to the notice board, ‘those are new ones. I tell you. A year or so ago, a posh, red-faced city gent came in here. Six o’clock of a thirsty evening, the whole place bursting at the seams. “I’m not afraid of that nonsense,” he said. And he sat down there.’

  Good for him I wanted to say but didn’t.

  ‘“Called your bluff, he has, Fred”, all my clients laughed. “Give the brave bloke a pint.” “Why not?” I said. “He’ll be stiffer’n his rolled umbrella inside a week.” Well.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘One sip of his pint of best bitter, he puts his glass carefully on the table. And drops dead on the spot. Right where you’re standing.’

  ‘A heart attack,’ I suggested, moving slightly to one side.

  ‘No sign of one before, mind.’

  ‘From Beer To Eternity, so to speak.’

  That took Fred off his guard. ‘Very jovial’ was all he could manage.

&nb
sp; ‘Came to a bitter end,’ I said.

  ‘Ha, ha, Father. Must store up these little witticisms for my grandchildren. But,’ he turned solemn, ‘such a waste.’

  ‘Married with kids, you mean?’

  ‘No, I was thinking of the rest of his beer. No one would finish it for him. Next,’ he went on, ‘a Jehovah’s Witness. Came in screeching “Godlessness, Superstition.”’

  I said I agreed with him.

  ‘But so do I,’ said Fred, touching his heart. ‘He sat down on it and wouldn’t even take a pint for his pains.’

  ‘And that didn’t put a stop to it?’

  ‘Nah, well, it wouldn’t, would it? He caught a plane to a big Witness’s Convention in Miami six days later and it sort of … crashed.’

  ‘All killed.’

  Fred nodded delightedly. ‘It never made the headlines, though, till the third victim.’

  I could feel my Adam’s apple rise and fall quite painfully.

  ‘Charlie Skinner, a regular, should have known better. Folks used to say, if ever Charlie has a post-mortem they won’t find a trace of blood in his alcohol. So, there was Charlie soaking his back teeth for two hours, one double Scotch chasing another down the tunnel, and, I suppose he sat down without realizing.’

  I swallowed hard.

  ‘After that, not one of his mates would lend a hand. Charlie staggered to his feet, went out to his car and drove straight in the river. Only three feet deep and Charlie six feet two.’ Fred Bowlby wiped his eyes with the back of a hairy hand. ‘Drowned.’

  ‘Ironic,’ I said.

  ‘Very,’ returned Fred, cheerful all of a sudden. ‘Normally, he didn’t take water with his whiskey. His car was a write-off.’

  ‘So was Charlie,’ I said.

  ‘And the Coroner’s verdict?’

  ‘Dead drunk.’

  The smartness of my reply made Fred say admiringly, ‘You beat me to it.’

  He leaned over the plaque of the Chair, breathed on it and polished it with his sleeve. ‘My pride and joy, Father.’ He touched his belt. ‘I had a special silver lock made for it. Keep the key in my belt here, day and night. Unnecessary, really. No thief is going to break into this pub. Not with the Chair there.’