Wandering in Exile

by Peter Murphy

  “Patrick,” his father sighed and sat down beside the fire and pulled his chair forward. He stopped looking craggy and looked the way he did the night before Patrick went away. “You’ve always carried the cares of the world on your back. Don’t put me up there too. I can be getting along fine for a bit yet.”

  “But you’d tell me when you can’t anymore?”

  His father didn’t answer and just stared at the fire. He looked older than so many Patrick had been with at their ends. His skin was wrinkled and crinkled around his neck. “Like an old tom-turkey,” his mother used to say before she died. It was a blood clot in the brain and she died out in the fields. His father insisted that it was the way he wanted to go too. “The fields have had the blood, sweat and tears of this family for years. They may as well have what’s left of me, too, for fertilizer.”

  “Daddy?” Patrick felt strange calling him that but he was so tired of hearing ‘Father’ everywhere he went.

  “I will so. If it’s the only way I can get a bit of peace and quiet.” He snuck his pipe out from under his hat. He had put it there so Patrick couldn’t hide it like he did whenever he came over. “But you’ll have to tell me what you’re going to do. His Grace has been telling me that you’re thinking about Rome. Are you thinking about it and wondering if I will be all right?”

  “No, Daddy. I’d never think like that.”

  “Good enough,” his father said and smiled as his face faded into his cloud of smoke. “Because if things were like that I’d die tonight. I’ve had my life, Patrick. It’s time you started enjoying a bit of yours.”

  ***

  “Grand now.” Fr. Reilly leaned to pour the tea as Mrs. Boyle and Mrs. Flanagan settled at opposite corners of the coffee table. It might be a bit too soon, but he couldn’t watch them suffer any longer, particularly Mrs. Flanagan. She had come to him after her son’s funeral and begged him to tell her what really happened. She said the version the Guards had given was very formal and stilted. She had made no sense of it and wanted him to find out what he could. He had gone to his uncle for advice and was told to bring the two of them together and let the holy mother of God do her work.

  “Do you both take sugar and milk?”

  His guests nodded without making eye contact with each other.

  “Grand so.” He served their tea and followed up with a plate of finger sandwiches that Mrs. Dunne had made in advance. “Well then,” he explained as he sat in his armchair and tried to balance his cup on the armrest, “you might be wondering why I brought the pair of you together like this.”

  “Well,” he continued when they didn’t answer, “I was hoping that we could have a little chat about all that has happened with Danny and Anthony.” His guests stiffened so he offered more sandwiches. “It has been a terrible tragedy that has touched you both.”

  The two women nodded and briefly made eye contact but Fr. Reilly pretended he didn’t notice and smiled to himself; he had them. “And when a mother’s heart is broken, who could offer more comfort than a mother with a broken heart?”

  They looked at him like he was mad so he had to continue. “I thought I could give you both the chance to share some of the things you are feeling—things that might be helpful.”

  Neither woman spoke so Fr. Reilly was silent too. The whole room was silent except for the passing sounds from outside and the ticking of the clock on the mantle, ticking off each moment of silence.

  “I’m very sorry for your troubles,” Jacinta finally blurted toward Mrs. Flanagan and quickly raised her tea cup.

  Mrs. Flanagan didn’t respond so Fr. Reilly rose and offered more tea and sandwiches. “Now, Mrs. Flanagan, do you have anything you would like to say to Mrs. Boyle?”

  Mrs. Flanagan shuddered a little and struggled to compose herself. When she did look up her face was whiter and her eyes were darker. “That’s kind of you to say, Mrs. Boyle, but it’s like the heart was torn out of me. At least you still get to see your Danny; I’ll never see my Anthony on this earth again.”

  “But,” Fr. Reilly gushed before Mrs. Boyle had a chance to speak, “it still means more coming from a woman whose only son is far away.”

  Both women looked like he had punched their hearts. He’d never get the hang of talking to them. Perhaps he’d be better off in Rome, in a dusty part of a library where no one else’s problems would come poking, like cows through a gap. “I have always believed that a sorrow shared is a sorrow halved.”

  “You don’t have children. Do you?” Mrs. Flanagan snapped at him as she began to shake. “You don’t have any idea of a mother’s suffering.”

  He didn’t, but at least Mrs. Boyle was nodding in approval and moved a little bit closer to Mrs. Flanagan and sat like an old chicken roosting. “It must be terrible for you,” Mrs. Boyle comforted as Mrs. Flanagan shuddered and sobbed some more.

  “The worst part,” she managed to get through her tears, “is that no one remembers the real Anthony.”

  “Well now, Mrs. Flanagan,” Fr. Reilly tried to encourage but was cut off.

  “Well now nothing. I’ve heard them with my very own ears. ‘Good riddance’ they say and my poor little boy lying dead in the cold ground. And the worst part is that I can’t even get a reason why he had to die.”

  Before Fr. Reilly could try to take charge, Mrs. Boyle moved closer and put her arm around the other mother and rocked gently back and forth.

  “My Anthony,” Mrs. Flanagan said, her cadence in time with the rocking, “would never do a bit of harm to anyone. Isn’t that right?”

  Fr. Reilly looked at his feet as he tried to think of the right thing to say, but Mrs. Boyle jumped in to save the day. “Of course he wouldn’t—not really.”

  “Then why did he end up shot and left on the side of the mountains? The Guards tell me nothing but lies.”

  “Well Mrs. Flanagan,” Fr. Reilly said as he tried to regain control, “it was a delicate matter. And at times like these we have to remember that God has a plan, even if it is not apparent to us. Remember that he does work in . . . ”

  “He died saving my Danny,” Mrs. Boyle announced when it was obvious that the priest was going to make a mess of it all. “He gave his life so my son could live. Just like Jesus,” she added in Fr. Reilly’s direction, but he just sat there in stunned silence.

  *

  Danny rode the elevator down to the lobby where the heater blasted every time the door was opened. He walked across the carpeted floor and was shocked when he reached for the metal handle. There were a lot of things to still get used to. It was fuckin’ freezing all the time and everyone was talking about the wind chill—that that was what really got to you. But everyone still went out in it.

  He and Martin had holed up from Christmas to New Year’s and only went out when they had to. But Martin went back to work and Danny started getting cabin fever. Martin told him he had to start going out on his own. He’d have to get used to it when he was working and all. Martin had friends looking out for anything Danny could do while he was getting his band together.

  He tugged at the zipper of his anorak, which was nowhere near as warm as it had been in Ireland. It didn’t really block the wind; it just deflected it down to his thighs and made his arse freeze. He kept one hand in his pocket as he cupped his cigarette with the other.

  The wind made smoking miserable as it squeezed down between the high-rises and scraped the length of Davisville Avenue. Martin had told him how to get to the subway and gave him a few tickets too. He would go southbound and get off at Bloor. It was just a few blocks east of there—whatever a block was.

  He was a bit disappointed when he got to the subway platform; it wasn’t really underground like it was in London. The platform was open to the winds and he shivered until the train arrived.

  It was warm and clean inside and he settled by the window and watched the graveyard slide by until the train tunneled beneath the street. “St. Clair station,” the distorted, scratchy voice announced and Dann
y checked the map again. Summerhill, Rosedale and then Bloor; it was only going to take a few minutes. Martin had even suggested where he could go for lunch.

  Dooley’s wasn’t what he had expected. It was large and clean and bright with deliberate little Irishisms everywhere. It was the type of place he would have to bring his parents to, after he got settled and all. The young woman who came to take his order didn’t look very Irish. In fact she looked Vietnamese or Filipino, but she was friendly. She smiled and asked what type of beer he wanted. Her skin was clear, a yellowish brown, and her eyes were dark like pools. Her lips were almost too big for her face and her hair was straying from under the white hat of her maid outfit.

  “What type do you have?”

  He ordered Carlsberg. It was what Martin had filled his fridge with, along with some anemic light beers that were for David. Danny tried one but couldn’t finish it and, without thinking, said he thought it was faggoty.

  “Over here we’re called gays,” Martin had warned him. He also asked Danny to stay out for the day. David was coming home and they wanted the place to themselves for a few hours. Danny didn’t mind; it would give him a chance to explore his new city.

  After lunch, he wandered toward Parliament Street in the bright cold sunshine. He wanted to see Corktown and the old church down on Queen Street. Martin had marked it on the map for him even though he hadn’t been down to see it.

  Martin’s tour led him through Cabbagetown where the Irish had migrated to from Corktown, once the Irish ghetto that waited for those who survived the “Fever Sheds.” He had read all about it and wanted to see the places for himself—where the children of “Black 47” had fought their way up. Martin had suggested he not talk like that in front of other people; it was all in the past now and besides, Canadians got very sensitive when immigrants criticized them. “And they have every right to, too. People come over here from the backend of nowhere and, no sooner than they get set up, they start telling everybody they’re doing it wrong, that everything was better back in the old country. Don’t be one of those guys, Danny. Please?”

  Still, he had to go where those who had gone before him had been and he’d pay his respects. A lot of Irish had come to Toronto and had to claw their way up. Just the Catholics, mind you. The Protestants got to run the place right off the boat, but Martin said it was better to forget about all that too. “It wasn’t like being Catholic was such a great thing.” Danny knew what he meant.

  Still, the houses along Winchester didn’t look like the kind of houses that Irish people would own. The Irish had moved into them when their more Anglo residents had moved up the ladder. That, Martin had told him, was how it worked. Each time a new group of immigrants arrived, they started near the bottom. “That pushes everybody up a bit. Well, almost everybody.”

  Most of them were rooming houses now, with rows and rows of buzzers implanted into their Victorian facades—a public notice of their continuing decline. Danny had noticed a big change in his uncle too. Now that Martin was openly gay, he wanted people to start accepting each other and not judge. And not just gays; he was on about the way Danny talked about black people, too, but that was understandable.

  Danny agreed and tried but, sometimes, it was just reflex. Everyone at home talked about black people like they were afraid of them. Most of them had never met one but they inherited the attitudes of those who said they had. But Martin was right; Danny didn’t want to be a part of anything he was back there. He was being given a new beginning—just like everybody who came over.

  Martin was still Irish, but in a different kind of way. He always acted like he never missed it but sometimes, after they had been drinking, he’d let it slip out. He also made it plain that he had no time for religion anymore. He missed Ireland—not being Irish. It was understandable. The Church was against people having sex unless they were trying to have children and there was no way two guys were ever going to be able to convince anyone that that’s what they were up to.

  He shivered in the blast of wind and the noise of a highway right in the middle of everything that met him at the edge of Riverdale Park. It was right beside the overgrown river, white in its winter stillness except for a few bits and pieces of garbage that flew off the highway. Most of Toronto was clean. He couldn’t believe it—almost sterile—but Martin bristled a little at that and said he needed to see the rest of it before deciding. Sometimes, Danny was beginning to wonder if he ever really knew his uncle. Most of what they had shared had been all about him. That’s why he wanted to try so much, for Martin’s sake.

  The cold cut his tour short but he did get to walk along a part of Queen Street. It wasn’t what he expected, especially around Sherbourne, where a steady flow of shabby-looking men filed in and out of the tavern on the corner. It was called the Canada House but it didn’t look like the type of place he’d go to.

  He did stop in at McVeigh’s New Windsor Tavern. Martin had marked it on the map, too. It was dark and smoky and warm, and he felt at home in a moment. It was a quiet afternoon but Martin had told him it was the place to go when you were in the mood for being Irish.

  Danny was. He missed Dublin and he missed Deirdre, even though they weren’t really back together. He felt totally alone and wanted to be somewhere warm and familiar for a while. He wasn’t second-guessing coming over—he had no choice really—but it was hard to get used to. Everything was all very different now that he was actually here.

  “What can I get you?” the waitress asked.

  “I don’t suppose I could get a pint?”

  “Not the type you’re thinking about. Most of the guys who come in drink ‘EX.’ It’s a bit like Carlsberg but they seem to prefer it.”

  “Can I get a pint of that?”

  “Most of the guys drink it by the bottle.”

  “Okay then, that’s what I’ll have. Thanks.”

  There were a few others tucked into the shadows and alone with their thoughts, glowing every once in a while when they pulled on their cigarettes. But one was different. He was very dark-skinned but he had a white beard, a neatly trimmed hedge along the side of his face. He wore a beret and a checkered shirt, like the ones lumberjacks wore only his was blue and black. He was very tall even though he was sitting down and, when he crossed his legs, Danny could see that he was just wearing sandals and no socks. He reminded Danny of a Yeti or something from the bar in Star Wars.

  The beer brought little comfort. It had a hard taste to it, but, if it was what the locals drank, he’d get used to it. It wasn’t bad, it was just different and the bottle was weird, a short stubby little thing with a big label on it. He thought about having another but decided against it. Sitting alone in a pub always made him feel like his father. He would have headed back toward the apartment if it weren’t so early. Martin and David would have just gotten home.

  So Danny Boyle walked along Yonge Street as the city rushed home from work. But the cold got to him again and he stopped at the Duke of Gloucester. It was packed. They served beer in pints and you could stand along the bar—just like a real pub. He even got talking with a few people, a Brit and two Scots who had been over for a few years and acted like they owned the place. They spoke about Toronto and Canada in terms of them and us, them being all the non-Brits. And, after a few beers, implied that Danny was one of ‘us.’ His Irish might have bristled at that but he was happy to feel included. They assured him he’d be okay as long as he stuck to his own kind. “Canada, mate, is British,” the Brit explained. “And all these foreigners need to remember that.”

  “You’re right there,” one of the Scots agreed, burping beerily.

  “It’s really more Scottish when you think about it,” the other insisted, smiling as he said it.

  “Yeah,” the Brit agreed with both of them. “But the main thing, Paddy, is that we all stick together over here.”

  “My name is Danny, not Paddy.”

  “Danny, Paddy, Jock or Tommy. We’re all the same over here and we have to st
ick together.”

  *

  He left them after eleven and found his way home by twelve, sloshing around inside of himself all the way. David had gone to bed but Martin had waited up for him—to make sure he got in okay.

  “Thanks,” Danny slurred as he staggered through the doorway. He barely managed to relieve himself before going to bed, collapsing onto it as he struggled to take off his jeans. The room spun for a few moments before he passed out.

  So? Are you getting all settled in?

  Danny answered without waking up. “It’s okay.”

  It’s well for some. I’m stuck here waiting for some bollocks to decide what to do with me. It’s worse than before.

  “Before what?”

  Before you had me whacked, ya bollocks. Ya didn’t think I was going to let you get away with that.

  Danny finally recognized the voice. “Ah, for fucks sake. Not you?”

  Yes Danny fuckin’ Boyle, ya back-stabbing little rat’s twat.

  “Anto. How the fuck did you find me?”

  I followed you.

  “You can do that?”

  I can do anything I want. I’m a fuckin’ ghost, ya dopey little fuck.

  The room grew colder and colder as Anto Flanagan flickered in the shadows.

  He was wearing a dark suit and his dark-glasses, darker against the whiteness of his skin. Except around the hole in his forehead. It was still red and crusted. But there was something else that was different. He didn’t seem as menacing as he had been in life. He almost seemed like he was lost and unsure. “And what the fuck do you want with me?”

  We have unfinished business, Boyle. You and I are going to be bound to each other for a while yet.

  “Great, and I thought I was getting away from all of that.” Danny rolled over, pretending he was not afraid.

  Not by a long shot, Boyle. Not by a long shot.