The Secret Journey

by James Hanley

  ‘Look at you! Yes, look at you, and then look at Desmond. There’s a difference, isn’t it? How long did Desmond remain wielding a hammer? Not long. Look where he is now.’

  ‘Yes. Look where he is,’ snapped Mr. Kilkey. He had turned pale, a quite unusual thing. Maureen stepped back from him as though he were going to strike her. ‘Yes. Look at him. He can’t earn the respect of a decent man. Who wants that? I don’t. I’m not worried about Desmond. Sometimes I think that when your mother was a girl somebody poisoned her—somebody filled her with ambition. It’s pitiable, for she seems to have poisoned all her children. You’re a mean, restless, dissatisfied lot. Peter’s hardly any different. You’re all incredibly selfish, and this goes to your heads. It carries you away. The only thing one can say in your mother’s favour is that she had more spunk than her children. Maureen, we’ve been married two years. I love you very much. I love our child. I’m really happy and contented. I don’t want any change—any rushing about—any ambitions—any more than what I’ve got. Call me anything you like. I don’t care. I earn good money. I have constant work. We have a nice home. Life doesn’t last that long. Why worry? That’s the kind of a person I am. Understand? And now you’re let out properly, you’re like a stubborn little child. You’ve stolen the cake and now you’re mad because you can’t get any at the party. That’s what you’re like. Peter is working now. So is your father. There’s Anthony’s money. The old man’s pension. Many a woman with that coming in would feel she was a millionaire. Listen to me. If all you children had got together you could have helped your mother; instead, all you do is look on from a distance and hate her for the way she treated you all. Maybe she was rather impossible. But she meant well, Maureen. In her heart she meant well. You see, that helps, doesn’t it? One laughs at a man who thinks he can beat the steeplejack at his own game and only a few feet up falls on his behind—but one admires him for his courage. Maureen, if you don’t try and settle down, I don’t know what will happen.’

  He sighed, then slumped into the chair by the fire. The woman watched him stroke his bald head, and there was something about this action that seemed repulsive. It made her squirm. She stood watching him. A silence stole over the kitchen. What had made her so angry? Not Mrs. Ragner’s note. That didn’t worry Maureen overmuch. After all, that was her husband’s affair. No! But that talk she had had with her brother had opened up old sores. Nothing could have suited her better. It gave her her opportunity. Oh! But she mustn’t think about that now. Quite useless. Here was a man who, to look at him, one might imagine had a heart so soft as to melt under the touch—when really behind it all lay a deep determination. Joseph Kilkey was satisfied. And Maureen knew this. It goaded her. She hated satisfied people. Her spirit rebelled against it, fortified by the bitterness of frustration. Three times she could have married, but that mother had prevented it. Now she was married—was tied at last.

  ‘Maureen! Let’s not argue any more. You know how I loathe arguments, don’t you? Worrying makes you grow old. Try and be sensible.’

  ‘God! Don’t I try?’ she stormed at him. ‘But do you? Sometimes I wish I were a man. Yes. A man. A working man. I’d kick from the day I was born. I’d kick against everything. That’s what men should do. Kick and keep kicking. Sometimes I think we’re fools. The way we have to live. The continued scrounging—the little humiliations—the vain hopes. Christ! One should kick against the lot. D’you know what is wrong? I’ll tell you. We’re pressed together too closely. We can’t breathe. We smother each other—get on each other’s nerves—we crucify each other. Here in this street. In every street. Yes, by God! I wish I were a man. I wouldn’t be satisfied. No! No! No!’

  She threw her head back and stamped her foot upon the floor.

  ‘I used to hate Peter! I thought he was cowardly, sly—but he’s not satisfied. He is going to get what he wants. I don’t blame him either.’

  ‘All that won’t get you anywhere, Maureen. It’s not always kicking that makes men. I agree that the workers are fools. But the fact that the world is made like it is, and that some people rebel and some accept it—that doesn’t make character. It’s character that counts, Maureen, all along the line. Character. Desmond hasn’t any. Nor will Peter be able to pride himself for long, if he keeps on as he is. People make me sick. Do you know when I feel most happy? When I can come home from work of an evening and shut the door behind me. Yes. Shut all these irritating, sulky, desperate, unsatisfied people out. A simple pleasure. Well, maybe I’m blowing my own trumpet too hard. If you want to leave this house, say so, and we will shift. Not before time. I told you when I married you that we ought to have gone miles away from Hatfields.’

  ‘So you are seeing sense at last,’ said Maureen. ‘But before you go I want you to do something. I want you to go round to Mother and put it quite plain. We ought to have been freed from this obligation long ago. It’s a year gone by. You get Mother to sign a note relieving you of any responsibility—understand? You know that if you don’t we won’t be able to call our furniture our own. That’s what I want you to do.’

  ‘What has brought this about?’ asked Joseph Kilkey. ‘Has something happened? Did Peter tell you something? What is it? It’s hardly the atmosphere of a confession night.’

  ‘Peter told me nothing that I don’t already know—and that’s less than nothing. Mother has got into some queer entanglement with Mrs. Ragner, and I want to keep out of it. The best thing you can do is go round and see her.’

  ‘What! Pull the floor from under her feet and at the same time invite her out on this drive. You must think I’m crazy. I wouldn’t do such a thing.’

  ‘Well and good! If you think I’m going on with that thing hanging over my head, you are very much mistaken. I’ve had one experience of my own,’ she raised her voice again and shouted, ‘but we wouldn’t have any of these experiences if men had more spunk in them. The only person in Gelton who has done well out of that silly bloody strike is Mrs. Ragner and a few more like her.’

  ‘Maureen! You’re not going to the altar in the morning, surely?’

  ‘Of course I’m not going to the altar. Of course I’m not going to Holy Communion.’

  ‘My God!’ exclaimed Mr. Kilkey, ‘my God!’ Quite dazed by this revelation, he walked out of the kitchen and went upstairs. On the landing he again stopped, put his hand to his head, and said, ‘Oh, my God! Is Maureen losing her faith?’ Then he went into the bedroom, lit the candle, and sat down on the bed. ‘Something has happened to make that girl like this. Oh, dear God!’ he said.

  Slowly he unlaced his boots. ‘Always thinking of themselves,’ he said to himself. ‘And that poor woman. Tied for ever to that house. Not a word of complaint. Not a word. Ah! she might be foolish—even to craziness, but she’s got guts, more guts than her selfish family. Such a conceited lot.’ In imagination he could see that woman laughing. ‘Aye! She can laugh too. The same Fanny Fury. She has always a spirit. But some people want the bloody moon.’

  Hearing no sound in the kitchen, he called out from the bed, ‘Maureen, are you coming to bed? It’s very late.’

  She called back, ‘Yes. Coming now.’

  A few minutes later she reappeared, carrying the child. ‘You forgot the cradle.’

  ‘Hang it! I was so excited, I forgot all about it,’ said Mr. Kilkey and jumped out of bed.

  ‘I believe I forgot to lock the front door,’ she shouted after him.

  Joseph Kilkey, having returned with the cradle, placed it at his side of the bed. It was a habit of his, whenever the child cried, to put one foot out of the bed and gently rock this wooden cradle—one that he had made himself. Maureen placed the child in it and then began to undress. By the light of the candle he watched her. ‘Ah!’ he thought, as his eyes fell upon her bared breast, ‘she’s everything she shouldn’t be—but she’s a woman, and a comely one too.’

  He embraced her passionately as soon as she climbed into bed. ‘I’m sorry, Maureen,’ he said, ‘if I sai
d anything to offend you. You know I wouldn’t do that,’ and he heard the sharp intake of her breath as he put one of his cold, clammy hands between her breasts. ‘Ssh!’ he said. ‘Ssh,’ and smothered her face on his breast. ‘Ssh!’ One foot stole quietly out and began a slow gentle rocking of the cradle.

  Peter Fury had found his sister sitting on the bench behind the pulpit. There was something about its shape—about the very close, sickly smell of the chapel, that stirred repugnance in him at once. It was as though somebody had gripped him by the neck and with a sudden movement dipped him into the past—as though he had been temporarily covered with the skin of the old life. He found Maureen praying. But praying with that absent-mindedness of a person who prays rather from habit than conviction. There was something about her that betokened an attitude of faith, of respect for one’s duty—yet at the same time one sensed the blind obeisance to something never hoped to be understood. Yet it could not be said that Maureen Kilkey’s attitude towards her faith and the way of life it embodied was an indifferent one. It had reached that stage where the incomprehensible is no longer a mystery but a fact. She could sit here and say her penance with the conviction of a person who is certain as to the ultimate end. And she could pray and think at the same time. She could, indeed, whilst she murmured her prayers, talk to her brother at the same time.

  ‘Peter,’ she said, ‘Peter! What are you doing here? How are you? How you’ve grown! Well! Well! This is a surprise.’ She held his hand firmly in her own. ‘When did you get home? What a pity you missed Anthony. He’s only just gone. Tell me, what did Mother say? I mean, how did she act? And Dad. What did Dad say?’

  All this was spoken breathlessly, in a whisper, yet she could at the same time keep her eye upon the tabernacle, as though some tongue of the spirit waited three Hail Marys and Our Fathers, whilst that fleshly one, flooded with words, poured out a continuous expression of whispered sounds. Delight, surprise, curiosity. These were the things that took root in Mrs. Kilkey as she held her brother’s hand. Peter smiled at her. Fortunately, there were not many in the chapel at this time of the evening, and not being a Wednesday or Saturday, Maureen had discovered more than one priest ready to hear her confession.

  ‘I’ll wait till you are ready,’ Peter said. ‘But I must talk to you. I’m in rather an awkward position.’

  He looked searchingly into her eyes.

  ‘What position are you in?’ asked Maureen.

  Peter put his hand upon her mouth. ‘Ssh!’ he said. ‘Ssh! Outside. We can talk there. After all, this is a chapel, isn’t it?’

  She did not answer him, merely nodding her head. She watched him hurrying from the bench—heard his feet sound ghostly upon the aisle as he walked quickly out of the chapel. She wondered if he had genuflected—if he had blessed himself at the font. She made a sign of the Cross, then followed him outside. Peter was standing by the lamp-post, hands thrust into his pockets, his attitude careless, leisurely, and quite unlike Maureen’s, who, as soon as she came up, exclaimed, ‘Peter! You have changed.’

  She kissed her brother; he put his arms round her.

  ‘Well!’ she said.

  ‘Let’s walk somewhere,’ Peter said. ‘I don’t want to talk here. I hate the place.’

  They passed into the darkness of St. Sebastian Place. There they stopped, looked about, and finally stood in a shop doorway.

  ‘I called at Price Street, but only Joe was in. What a fine little chap you’ve got, Maury. Joe is excited, isn’t he? When I called he was bouncing Dermod up and down in the air—and singing the craziest song I ever heard. He did look a fool, Maury—honestly.’

  ‘Well! What is it that you are in such a hurry to tell me? Hurry up. I have to go back and feed that boy. Anyway, why stand here? Let’s go home.’

  She pulled her brother’s arm, but Peter said, ‘I’d rather talk here. Really, I hate talking about these things in front of relations. Well, to begin. I found Mother changed. Anyhow, I’m not going into that. She’s changed. So has Dad. He is as cold as ice. Maybe he thought if he shook hands with me his arm would drop off. I can’t tell you how uncomfortable it’s made me. Really, I can’t.’

  Suddenly he gripped his sister by the arm—laid his head on her shoulder.

  ‘Maury,’ he said, with passion and conviction, ‘Maury, Dad has feelings and Mother has feelings. But I’m not supposed to have any. I hate it. Hate it. Have I to keep hanging my head for ever—have I to be sorry for ever? God—if you had seen them at dinner-time you’d imagine I was slowly poisoning them. But the main point is this. Dad is going back to sea. That’s what I came to tell you. You would have heard in any case, no doubt—but you see, as I’m affected, I thought I would come over and see you. Maury, you understand me, don’t you? You do agree that Mother took advantage of me when I was a child? Don’t you?’

  ‘Of course I do!’ She began stroking his hair with her warm red hand.

  ‘Dad says it is I or him. If I don’t go, he’ll go. He’s quite serious about it. Honestly.’

  Maureen Kilkey’s comment upon this was to burst into a fit of laughter.

  ‘Peter,’ she said, ‘is that all that worries you? What Dad has threatened to do? Good Lord! If you had seen as much of him as I have you’d laugh too. I don’t believe a single word he’s said. Not a word. He just brags, threatens—that’s his way. He wouldn’t leave Mother. He’d sooner kick you out. Don’t forget that. Dad may seem an easy-going man, even a bit soft, but he knows what he’s doing. I shouldn’t take the slightest notice of it. You wouldn’t leave home, would you?’ She looked long and earnestly into her brother’s face.

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I wouldn’t mind so much if they didn’t treat me as a child. They never tell me anything. Mother has something on her mind even now, but she says nothing. I feel all this secrecy has something to do with me. I feel ashamed all the time—and I don’t want to be like this—after all, I’m no child. Mother has shown by her very attitude that she still hangs on to this crazy idea she has.’

  ‘What crazy idea?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. This being her boy—her favourite—wanting me to forget all that ever happened and then be smothered with her affection. But I won’t do that. Listen, Maureen. I know you’ll be shocked, but I have a confession to make. I don’t believe any more. I mean, I don’t believe what you believe in—or what Mother believes in. In fact, when I think of the time I tried to find Limbo on the map of the world—it makes me want to burst out laughing. No, Maureen, I don’t and can’t believe in that thing any longer. I’m open to be convinced like anybody else, but when it is used just to suppress people—well, then it’s time to kick. You see, I am a man now. I stand on my feet. If I stay with Mother—if I live at Hatfields—it will always be under a cloud. I could never be happy. I would be observing the other things, obeying the very things I didn’t believe in. It would be one long series of lies, lies, lies. It couldn’t be otherwise. I haven’t the heart to tell Mother what I really think. That’s why I hated the college. Hated being a boy at school. You couldn’t say anything at all. Now I want to say almost everything—but am prevented.’

  ‘What prevents you?’ asked Maureen. They had moved out of the shelter of the doorway, and walked slowly along past Miss Pettigrew’s sweet-shop. Then they turned the corner and did not stop until they came to Mr. Dingle’s wine-shop, in whose spacious doorway they sought shelter.

  ‘Oh, I can’t help it. I love Mother, you see, and she knows it. In fact, I sometimes think she plays on it. Really, at heart, I believe she wouldn’t rest.’

  Maureen stopped his mouth with her own. ‘I have to run now. Good-night. Remember what I told you.’

  He stood looking after her until she vanished in the darkness. Then he thrust his hands in his pockets and walked slowly on. His thoughts carried him to that dark and deserted street near the Custom House, but his feet were carrying him towards Hatfields. Suddenly he stopped.

  ‘Why should I go back there now? To
sit and listen to them talking. About what might have been—about what Dad didn’t do. What he should have done. What Mother would do if she had her time all over again. To the devil with that!’ thought Peter, and turning round walked back the way he had come. Fresh air was much better. He went on smiling to himself, whistling a tune of a popular song. He was grown up. He was feeling very happy.

  The only early visitor Mrs. Fanny Fury had ever received into her house was her own husband—and in those far-off days when he was at sea. Sometimes his ship docked in the middle of the night—sometimes in the early morning. But the early open door had been closed for nearly three years. There were no early visitors. Mr. Fury went off to work at six, and the door did not open again except to the usual tradesmen until he returned home from work at five o’clock in the evening. With the exception of the head of the household, everybody at number three used the back-door entrance. In fact, much of Hatfields’ business was done at the back entrance. Front doors were only for one purpose. To be opened to visitors. Families went in and out of the back door. Number seven’s front door had never been opened for a year, so that people had ceased to believe that anybody lived there at all. Its occupants, however, could generally be seen passing up and down the entry.

  When Mrs. Fury opened her front door at half-past eight in the morning it was to find her daughter with the child standing on the step. (When Maureen Kilkey wanted business done she liked to get it done at once.) Without showing the surprise she naturally felt, she opened wide the door, and mother and child passed into the kitchen.