All Roads

by Peter Murphy

  Mending the rents in their vesture.

  “Not far now, John. Perhaps you should save your breath until we get to the top.” Miriam was losing her patience.

  “It is not they who indulge impious curiosity,” John continued regardless, slowing their progress as he stopped again to speak,

  Or who are ever seeking the secrets of nature,

  And reckoning the courses of the stars.

  Observe whether they have been busy with the secret causes of things,

  Or if they have condoned the destruction of kingdoms,

  The dispersion of peoples, fires, blood, ruin or extermination;

  Whether they seek the destruction of the whole world that it may belong to them:

  In order that the poor soul may be saved, that an edifice may be raised in heaven,

  That treasure may be laid up in that blessed land,

  Caring naught for fame, profit or glory in this frail and uncertain life,

  But only for that other most certain and eternal life.

  Patrick reached the top and unfolded the chair, gasping as he did. Miriam and John were halfway up and he was conflicted between going back down to help or just waiting to catch his breath.

  John, however, was determined to continue, pausing again after taking just two steps.

  Pray, O pray to God, dear friends, if you are not already asses

  That he will cause you to become asses...

  There is none who praiseth not the golden age when men were asses:

  They knew not how to work the land.

  One knew not how to dominate another,

  One understood no more than another;

  Caves and caverns were their refuge;

  They were not so well covered nor so jealous nor were they confections of lust and of greed.

  Everything was held in common.

  “That’s enough now, John,” Miriam chided as she tucked him into his chair and draped the rug across his knees. “This beast of burden needs a bit of peace and quiet.”

  “Let me push for a while,” Patrick offered, but Miriam was stubborn. She was still teaching part-time but most of her days were taken up with John. She picked him up most mornings and pushed him around until the day grew too hot. Then she would return him to his home where he could nap the afternoon away. Patrick often joined her in the evenings as they took the old Jesuit somewhere for dinner—not that he ate much anymore, but was content to be spoon-fed some soup.

  “Oh holy asininity! Holy ignorance,” John went on regardless, blessing those who walked by.

  Holy foolishness and pious devotion!

  You who alone do more to advance and make souls good

  Than human ingenuity and study . . .

  *

  It was almost winter and it was a cold, numbing type of day, with a regular sprinkling of rain. Rome didn’t suit the rain. It brought out all that was old and mildewing and the faint smell of rot.

  “I heard from Deirdre the other day,” Miriam mentioned after they had taken John for his afternoon outing. He’d been brooding and muttering dark portents and, after they had dropped him off, they had walked in silence for a while. “She’s just had her third grandchild. It’s hard to believe she’s old enough.”

  “How old is she now?” Patrick asked, but Miriam could tell he wasn’t that interested. He was becoming more and more reticent about people as time went on. John had said that it was avoidance and Miriam was concerned.

  “She’s fifty-two.”

  He nodded but didn’t answer.

  “I don’t suppose you want to go for a coffee or something?” Miriam wanted to reach out to him. She couldn’t bear to see him like this.

  “Not tonight, Miriam, it has been too long a day.”

  “Patrick, what’s bothering you?”

  “Oh, it’s nothing, Miriam. I’m just feeling a bit down in the dumps.”

  “Anything in particular?” She should have let it go but she suspected there was something in John’s ramblings. He had, amid his other pronouncements, insisted that until Patrick dealt with the Danny Boyle issue, he would never have peace. He said that was why Patrick was retreating further and further into himself. “He feels he has failed Danny as a priest. Help him with that.”

  “It’s nothing for you to be concerned about,” Patrick finally answered with a hint of resignation. “It’s just something that old priests have to go through.”

  “Everyone has to look back and evaluate their lives, Patrick, not just priests.”

  “That’s true, but other people have families and accomplishments. Priests have so little to show for it all.”

  “Only if they ignore all the good they have done.”

  “But have we, Miriam? Have we done anything other than offer platitudes?”

  She might have argued but it wasn’t going to change his mood. She knew him far too well for that. Instead, she just stood as the rain misted and the whispering shadows of the past closed in around them. There would be better days ahead. Days when the sun shone and everything around them came back to life. That was when she would sit down and talk it out with him—on a fine sunny day. That was the best time to talk about things like that.

  Besides, what had she to offer? While Deirdre had filled her life with her career, her children, and now her grandchildren, Miriam was almost alone. She had tried with Karl, but now all she had to show was her friendship with John and Patrick. She wanted to be content with that but, as their days dwindled . . .

  *

  Patrick felt bad about not being able to respond more honestly and wandered aimlessly for a while. It was another of those evenings when the emptiness of his life billowed around him. Being with Miriam and John was having that effect on him lately. They had all given their lives in the service of a god that had nothing to give back.

  I tried to warn you, his uncle’s voiced whispered as he crossed the Campo.

  “You did indeed, Uncle, only it sounded like you were contradicting yourself.”

  How so?

  “Because you always said one thing and behaved completely differently. And you always had such confidence and assurance. You seemed like everything I wanted to become.”

  And do you regret it now?

  “Tonight I do, but it’s probably just the weather. I’m sure I’ll feel better about everything when the spring comes.”

  Chapter 15 – 2011

  Her eyes, they shone like the diamonds,” Danny sang in a phlegmy, hoarse rattle. He had difficulty reaching the lower notes and had to be careful not to start coughing.

  Ya’d think she was queen of the land.

  With her hair thrown over her shoulder,

  Tied up with a black velvet band.

  He tried to finish with a flourish but his chords were blurred and his strumming was erratic—not surprising, given that he hadn’t picked up a guitar in a few years. He was just happy that he even remembered how. He’d been promising himself he’d get back into it one of these days but his hands were far too shaky. Or at least they were until he got a few drinks into him. Only then, when he finally managed to keep them down, he’d be back on the merry-go-round and wouldn’t feel like it anymore.

  He drank alone in his apartment these days, right through the gloom of the afternoon until the night closed back in around him, hiding all that was defective or broken. He’d even stopped lighting candles because he kept seeing the ghosts of his past in the flicker of the flame. He’d tried to ignore them, but they’d just grow and sneer at him from the shadows on the wall. They’d stopped talking to him, too. Even his uncle Martin just stood there along with everyone else he’d ever let down. Billie was there, too, and now just looked at him with haughty disdain.

  He still tried talking to them. He’d start out with his polished rationales and hope that at least one
of them still had some sympathy for him, but they didn’t.

  It wasn’t all his fault—and they knew that. Yes, he had fucked up so many things on his own, but he was an alcoholic and everyone knew it was a disease. And, as he had learned in AA, he had been from the beginning, long before he’d even started to drink.

  That was the thing nobody could understand. He had a disorder that made the things that normal people dealt with impossible. He’d obsess over every little slight—real or imagined—until they grew like cancers inside him and blocked out everything else. He’d heard it a thousand times at meetings: alcoholics suffered from a spiritual, physical and mental disorder. He was just as much the victim as any of them. Probably more, given that he had all that guilt and shame to deal with too.

  Every time he thought about the way his life had gone, all the old feelings of worthlessness would rise within him as thick as fog, and the only way to dispel them was to have another drink and wait for the warming comfort that only alcohol brought.

  Only even that didn’t work the way it once did. Now any comfort just shriveled up in moments and he constantly needed to boost it. He mostly drank wine—cheap red wine in bottles, bags and boxes. The taste didn’t matter anymore. He just wanted the old reassurance it used to give him, and that was getting harder and harder to get back to.

  He still drank whiskey and beer when he was out and had to show them all he was just an ordinary man out having a few—that he’d finally got the monkey off his back. But home alone, with no one to impress, he could drink as much as he wanted. He wasn’t doing anyone else any harm. He’d just get himself to the point where he could pass out and not have to think about anything for a while. Only before he slipped back into the darkness inside himself, his last few thoughts were always about the morning and having to deal with it all again. Sometimes he’d almost pray to be taken out of his misery while he slept. Nothing painful or messy—just something quick and painless. Then they’d all see: he might have been a fuck-up but at least he had the decency to go in a quiet, dignified manner at the end. People remembered stuff like that.

  Some nights he even showered and changed his underwear in case it happened, but most nights he just collapsed on his bed in all his sweaty stench. If it did happen, he’d tell himself, somebody would clean him up before everybody got to see.

  Probably Grainne. She hadn’t given up on him. She still believed in him and encouraged him every time he promised to try to get his shit together. He could still convince himself that he really meant it. But every morning when he was trying to cure himself, he’d miss the tipping point and just get drunk again.

  Even then she wouldn’t cut him off, and right up to just before the new baby was born, still got together with him; but only for coffee in The Second Cup or Timothy’s.

  He didn’t mind. He always brought a mickey of vodka and could swig from it in the washroom if he had to. Most of the time he didn’t. She was always rushing off right after and couldn’t stay long.

  She always brought something for him; mostly socks and underwear, or jeans, or a fresh new shirt. She’d wanted to take him to buy shoes but now, with the new baby and all, she hadn’t been able to find the time.

  He didn’t mind. She always slipped him a few bucks, too, before she left. She was the only one who knew what he was really going through. He was in hell, only it wasn’t the way they’d all told him. His hell was inside him and instead of burning fires there were steaming piles of shit stinking up everything while the devils of his conscience poked and prodded him.

  “Fair play to ya, Boyle,” the crowd along the bar cheered him anyway. “Ya never lost it.”

  They were the hard core who had been drinking since noon. Refuges from all the other Irish bars in town, now overrun by hordes of wanna-bes who wore green and thronged to anything that was remotely connected to St. Patrick’s Day.

  Packed in crowds, the more brazen sipping Guinness while others settled for O’Keefe’s or Bailey’s, with a touch of green food coloring, they talked in what they thought was blarney and acted out every garish Irish caricature they could think of.

  No such foolishness was tolerated in McMurphy’s. There, the true sons and daughters of Eireann just carried on as if it were any other day, but with more than a hint of manic determination.

  “Give us another one, Danny Boy,” someone called.

  “Yeah, do something by the Pogues.”

  “Feck the Pogues—bunch of feckin’ punks. Do something by Luke Kelly.”

  Danny fingered the fret board. His fingers were beginning to throb. He’d just come in to get a few beers into him but someone had the guitar behind the bar and, as long as he played, he was getting his drinks for free.

  He needed the break. He was almost broke again but he couldn’t ask Deirdre for help—not for drinking money. He’d seen her when Grainne invited him to her house to meet her new child, before Martin got there.

  Danny had a few before he went—to settle his nerves—but he didn’t drink when he was there; not even when Doug and Grainne tried to tempt him into having a few beers. He knew Deirdre would be watching him so he said he didn’t feel like drinking when he was around the babies.

  It was a struggle, but he had to make the right impression. He wanted to have some part in his grandchildren’s lives. Grainne and Doug seemed happy with that and promised to invite him over at least once a month. He told them he’d be delighted, promising himself that when he went he’d be as clean and sober as he could manage.

  Martin arrived as he was leaving and, as far as Danny could tell, still wanted nothing to do with him, barely acknowledging him, even though Danny could sense that Rachael was working on him. She’d always been very nice and made a point of bringing her father over to talk with him. Danny didn’t care too much for him but went along with it. He liked Rachael and knew that she was his best hope of ever having any kind of relationship with his son.

  “I then put my head,” he sang on. “Peggy Gordon” was always one of his favorite songs.

  To a cask of brandy.

  It was my fancy, I do declare.

  For it’s when I’m drinking, I’m always thinking . . .

  The crowd at the bar pressed in all around, making him feel like a star. And when he finished and handed the guitar back, he saw Joel Brand standing near the door. He’d bugged Danny about getting together to celebrate the day. Danny had told him where he’d be but had never expected him to show up.

  Joel edged his way toward him as though he was afraid that any misstep might upset someone around him. Danny could have called out to put him at ease but he didn’t and just sat there and watched.

  The crowd was rambunctious but still in a good mood—though they were getting drunk and a little unpredictable. He could mooch a few more drinks from Joel but he would have to be careful and not mention the Holocaust. Grainne had said that Joel always reacted to that—and not the way normal Jews did. She said he went around calling people pro-Semitic and was always trying to explain why that was a bad thing.

  Personally, Danny didn’t give a fuck one way or the other. As far as he was concerned Israel was just like everywhere else. The whole world was following right-wing extremists down the same path that Hitler had dragged his people, and now it was the Palestinians turn to pay for someone else’s crimes.

  But he knew it was better to keep his opinions to himself. If you spoke out you were going to be labeled anti-Semitic or a terrorist. Nobody really discussed things anymore. Instead they just snapped and snarled at each other and recited sound bites and spin. Nobody gave a fuck about anybody else’s point of view—and they said he was the one with the problem.

  “Happy Saint Patrick’s Day, Danny.”

  “Ah, good man, Joel. Are you well? Sit down beside me and have a drink.”

  *

  By nine in the evening, Danny was far too drunk to continue.


  He was beginning to slobber and stagger and he didn’t want people seeing him like that. Joel had been trying to coax him to leave, but even though he should Danny resented that and could feel himself becoming belligerent.

  He couldn’t let Joel see that, so he joined in with the crowd at the bar, undulating like an ocean, arm-in-arm in heartfelt camaraderie, unified by drink against all the terrible things the world had done to their race. They’d been cast out from their own little place, painted as half-simian and called terrorists when they rose up against imperial savagery.

  “A Nation once again,” they all sang; discordantly, but it didn’t matter.

  A Nation once again.

  Ireland long a province be a Na-tion once again.

  “C’mon.” Joel tugged on Danny’s arm when the song was over. “Let’s go for something to eat.”

  “But why?” Danny asked more petulantly than he intended. “We’re just starting to enjoy ourselves.”

  “Because you’re getting drunk and Rachael would be upset if she found out I didn’t take care of you.”

  Just the mention of Rachael had a sobering effect on Danny. “I suppose you’re right.” He couldn’t afford any stories getting back to Rachael and Martin.

  He finished his drink and looked longingly around. Paddy’s Day was the only day he still fit in anymore. It was when everybody around him drank the way he did. It was the one day he didn’t have to hide what he’d really become; but he was getting a bit sick and tired of it all, too. And he was dreading what the morning would bring—another day of shivering and shaking until he could get the cure into him. He’d stashed a few cans of cider around his apartment in all the strategic places, but it was still going to be hell.

  “C’mon then.” He nudged Joel and followed him toward the door as everyone along the way stopped him to ask why he was leaving so early, their cross-eyed concern obvious through their clouds of boozy breath. “Jazus, Boyle, you’re not leaving? The craic is only getting started.”

  “You’re a lucky man, Danny,” Joel commented when they got outside and waited for a cab.