Breakfast on Pluto

by Patrick McCabe

  ‘I love Rosanno Brazzi,’ she said to herself as she walked past Mulvey’s pub. ‘I love him and I love his music.’

  The music she was singing as she fished around in the foaming suds of the presbytery kitchen wash-hand basin for her broken fingernail. ‘After all – we don’t want Father Bernard to get it in his breakfast!’ she laughed to herself. Just as she felt the tippy tips of his fingers brushing against ever so slightly as he went past, never for even a second thinking to herself: ‘I know what that means! It’s just a prelude to later on in the parlour, isn’t it, when he’s going to come after me with that great big screaming stalker of his!’

  As indeed – why should she? Which is a pity, all the same, for at least then it might have made some sense to her, being pinned up there against the wall – with a forty-year-old clergyman sliding his tootle in and out of her at a furious rate of knots. ‘Who is this girl?’ she kept asking herself as she looked down from a height at the creature whose head kept bumping off the table leg. It wasn’t her, that was for sure, for she kept pleading: ‘Stop! Stop!’ It was obviously someone else, someone else who looked like her. She hoped it wouldn’t upset her, that she might not regret it some day. Because Eily knew that was what it did, that sort of conduct. Her mother had told her. Not in so many words, of course. And especially – most especially with a priest – even if it was the priest’s fault. All Eily could think was: ‘I’m glad it’s not me!’ Because she was saving herself for marriage. She might dance at the hops and everything – but marriage to her was something pure and clean and wholesome. White as driven snow. Not at all like what Father Bernard was doing right now. That wasn’t it at all. Why was he doing it, though? she wondered. It made her cry to watch him as he continued.

  But not as much as it made her cry when she realized just who it was, i.e. that it had been her all along. You can imagine the shock she got. Crying: ‘Why! The girl is me!’ and then of course, the baby coming – the biggest shock of all!

  What it would have been like if her mammy’d known or somehow seen behind the big clothes, she could only imagine. Indeed, in her mind, already had done many times – seeing her mother’s face to the fore of the throng in the middle of Tyreelin Square, the faces twisted with a hatred she had never before seen. Her own mother joining in with them as they cried: ‘Hang her! Hang the bitch!’ and Eily Bergin dangled from a lamp-post. It was silly, of course. It could never happen! It was just her imagination working overtime! What was she going to do? Giddily she thought: ‘What should I do? Scoop it out with a wooden spoon perhaps?’ That made her laugh. ‘I might only get its eye,’ she said, spluttering mucus into her hand.

  In the end, the baba slid out nice and easy. On that very November evening when Mr and Mrs Bergin were sitting cosily by the nice log fire. Not exactly at that time, but a few hours later, in the early hours of the morning. What Eily could not get over was – one minute, there’s nothing there and the next – a whole human being! With little thin arms and little thin legs and soft browny hair and an oval face. And looking so yummy! ‘I want to keep him! I want to keep my baby!’ she wanted to howl. But she couldn’t do that!

  Anyway, Father Bernard had told her what must be done. He’d been so nice and kind in the end of it all. In the beginning he’d been nasty. ‘You’re not keeping it! Are you mad?’ he’d bellowed like a bull. She thought he was even going to hit her. Especially when she cried.

  ‘Stop it! You hear! Stop that crying now!’ Having to shake her until she stopped! Which was silly of her – she knew that now. After all, she was sixteen. It was time she saw sense.

  As she did now, once more strolling through the streets but this time with her Rinso box of baba tucked beneath her arm. Obviously, she was terrified she was going to meet someone – such as Sonny Macklin on his way to work, perhaps. ‘Where are you going with that box, Eily?’ Or even worse – who knew? ‘Let’s have a look at what you have inside there!’

  It was hard not to cry but she had brought lots of tissues and, in any case, by the time she reached Ma Braden’s, she wasn’t quite so bad. Most of her tears had dried away. So she just left baby in his box and then went off for ever. But where did she go? No one knows! Was she killed in an accident? Did the Holyhead ferry sink? Why – it’s a mystery!

  Poor old Mr Bergin – he went out of his mind, you know! You’d be out walking and you’d come across him talking to a cow. ‘I don’t know if I told you or not, but my Eily – she’s a divil for these pop records. God bless us and save us, to see her up in that room of hers, dancing – you’d have to ask: “What’s the world coming to?”’

  Mrs Bergin it didn’t bother for so long and when the stroke took her away, everyone said it was good, which in a way it was.

  So that morning, and in particular the part of it between 3.00 and 3.20 a.m., was not what you’d call a good one for anyone.

  Except Hairy Braden the Baby Farmer, of course – for whom it meant twenty pounds a month – sometimes twenty-five!

  Not that there’d be much chance of Hairy showing gratitude, pulling up the leg of her drawers, dragging on the cigarette-holed dressing gown and flinging the door open before sweeping up the cardboard box and standing there as she whistled through crevassed teeth: ‘Another hooring beggar’s get!’ as poor Puss went: ‘Miaow!’

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  The Life and Times of Pat Puss, Hooker

  As she did for all and sundry now, so sky-high giddy since she’d left Louise’s she seemed to work non-stop! ‘O please, please, buy me Biba!’ to some hunk she now would cry, as lashings of cash upon her were laid and her kohl-rimmed eyes misted over with desire as into hipster trouser suits she slipped, blouson tops and milkmaid maxis, enough to drive her poor man wild! ‘O miaow, my darling!’ she cried. ‘So kind to Pussy are you that I really, truly must adore you as no lady ever did!’

  And so each night, jangly-bangly, whiff of No. 5 (‘Gosh! You like your perfume!’ often he would say), in knee boots she’d come tripping, Aubrey-bob lacquered in place. So high was she, what pray is that so many miles below – ‘Why! The city of London it is, methinks!’ all winking with its signals trying to reach sweet Pussy and say: ‘Come back to earth!’ But no – ‘Methinks I’ve had enough of that!’ she cries – then when words with Charlie on the phone she did swop – it never quite dawned on her that Irwin was dead. Although she’d heard it many times, for Charlie couldn’t stop repeating it. As she’d been doing since he died, having really gone quite mad!

  ‘I’ll see you, darling!’ was all Puss said. ‘I’ve got to go – a client! Toodle-oo!’

  You would have to ask – was Puss gone too, to that nutty no-rule place? The question must be asked!

  As it was by dearest Terence (Bastard! Go on – leave me! No, I don’t mean that!) who said: ‘So to all intents and purposes you were living as a woman now?’

  ‘Well, I didn’t have any yucky briefs if that’s what you mean, my sweet!’ said Puss and chuckled in her chuckly way, her head as light as air.

  ‘Sometimes they’d ask me to do my Dusty.’ She’d smile and roll her eyes, wondering was it something Tersey too did fancy. ‘I’d dance for them and husky-coo until they could take no more. And other times—’

  ‘Other times?’

  ‘Why I’d be a right old whore!’

  As Tersey’s cheeks went pinky. Yes! They truly did!

  And gave me courage! I went over to him and stroked his cheek. Then dropped my eyelids and sexy-whispered: ‘Before I became a bomber, of course!’

  It was hard not to laugh – because he took it so serious! Which he had to – as indeed I ought to – after all, people lost their limbs and eyes!

  But I couldn’t. Pussy as a bomber – I simply had to clutch my sides!

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Detention In The School Of Dr Vernon, Late October 1974

  It is four o’clock in the afternoon in the Earl’s Court Hotel School and Dr Vernon is not pleased. ‘I distinctly tol
d you to be here at three forty-five!’ he says to Mandy – his pupil, of course – who now she hangs her head in shame.

  ‘Yes,’ she replies, ‘I know that. I know that Dr Vernon. But—’

  ‘No buts!’ he hisses and he looks so cross, it has to be for a split-second considered he might well be another Silky String. O no, please, no!

  Fortunately, however, not the case! As he peremptorily intones:

  ‘You are perfectly aware that punishment for tardiness at the Earl’s Court Academy is strangling by ligature, are you not . . .?’ O no! But not to be—

  *

  Dr Vernon is much nicer than old Silks could ever be! He just makes you do one hundred lines. And paces around as you write them:

  I Must Not be a Bad Mandy.

  I Must Not be a Bad Mandy.

  Then, what does he do? Brings you off to the restaurant for a great big yummy din dins!

  And then to Harrods to buy you hundreds of frou-frou fluffies – including an explosion of white fur with the shortest black dress ever – not to mention the fabbest Chanel-y suit, Saxone shoes and a delicious white satin shirt! Oh, how you exult! How one squeaks with pure delight!

  Then making a silly mistake – moving in with old silly Vernon! ‘I want to be your husband!’ The great old idiot! I couldn’t stand him after a while! ‘Shall we go to Sainsbury’s? That should be quite exciting! Or perhaps I ought to wash the car! Yes – that’s what I shall do!’

  O and did I become a broody bitch! Which was why I left! Went running out the door – again! – in fact, the minute I got the chance!

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Al Pacino Reveals All!

  O and why would I not be a happy girl walking around this glitter-night in London’s glorious West End – ‘Oh, Calcutta! Now in its fourth year!’, ‘The Exorcist! (Your mother cooks socks in hell – ha ha!’), ‘Carry On London – At Last! They’re carrying on – live on stage!’ (Ooh, matron! Distinctly said, ‘Prick his boils did you? I am sorry!’) – and I am not going back to my husband Vernon because you see I don’t love him any more and I don’t see why you should have to live with someone you don’t love. One day soon I will write him a letter and say, dear Vernon, darling, I am sorry I have not come home. You are a very sweet man and I love you dearly but not in the way that a wife should love her husband so I think it is only fair and honest to tell you this so that you can find someone to love and care for you the way you deserve. I want to thank you too for all the beautiful things you bought me, especially this lovely ice-cream pink mohair sweater and black pleated skirt which goes so well with my black suede knee boots. I am sure you can imagine how good I feel as I swing my Gucci shoulder bag (bought by you too, sweetness, I’m afraid!) and let myself be swallowed up by the flashing console colours of this most wondrous city. There are parties on tonight, my darling. As you might expect, considering it’s coming up to Christmas. If she looks into this restaurant, through this frosted glittering glass, what does Patrick Puss-divorced-from-dearest-Vernon now see? A sea of shining faces and glasses raised on high. ‘And I said to her, I said – if you expect me to – ’, as girls flick back their hair. Not really listening! Having too good a time!

  As merry crowds now surge through streets of white cut-stone that vibrate in the night, past Piccadilly railings opposite Eros and near the Wimpy where they expect to see young Puss tonight. Except, she isn’t selling! Too soft and frail, and fragile maybe too! Wants it all over, I’m afraid! Just wants to settle down, safe and snug beneath an arm so big and bearlike. Silly Puss-Puss, Max Factor Miss with lots of men who want yum yum! But not the way she does! The way they do in Loving magazine! O! she sighs, if it could only be!

  PUSSY – MY LIFELONG PARTNER

  AL PACINO REVEALS ALL!

  Sweet he is, but for Puss it cannot be. Rock stars catching planes will only make you weep. Her man to be loved for ever and ever but only by Pussy catkins Swing-the-Bag!

  —Only by me and no one else!

  Dear Cathy and Claire:

  I want to be married to a real man. A Rock. Can you help me?

  Dear Pussy Willow Poo Poos Searching for a Man:

  We thought YOU could help US!

  ‘Sigh!’ thinks Puss Puss, wondering aloud:

  —What can the future hold? What, what, what can the future hold, now my tootling days are at an end?

  Not knowing that right at that moment, that very second, somewhere deep in darkest Cricklewood, moves were already afoot to send her flying towards it, with some gusto!

  *

  (Terence said: ‘Did you imagine all this, Patrick? Or were you actually at some point involved with these bombers?’

  I ought to have played him along a little – it would have been fun just teasing him! Instead of saying, all coyly like I did: ‘Oh, Terence! Don’t start pretending my writing skills are that good!’)

  But you could still see him looking at me – Pussy! Mad Bomber! Could it be true?

  O Terence! Honestly – for heaven’s sake! Sometimes I wonder how I ever fell for you!

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Busy Men Prepare to Blow Up London and Get Pussy into Trouble

  It was six o’clock – 6th November, 1974 and Big Joe Kiernan from Offaly was smoking a Player’s No. 6 cigarette and simultaneously humming ‘My Ding A Ling’ by Chuck Berry as his nicotine-stained fingers doubled the end of a piece of copper wire from which he had removed the plastic coating and inserted it through the hole he had made in the glass of the pocket watch, flicking the cigarette away as he taped the wire into place. His companion, the man everyone called Mayo Jack, although it wasn’t his real name, was humming a tune too but was completely unaware of it, absorbed by the photo story which he was reading in a copy of True Detective magazine. Every so often he would read a little bit of it out and the third man, who had only recently arrived from Belfast, would say: ‘Och, you’re away in the head, Jack!’ and then go back to frying his chops on the pan. His name was Faigs – because he was always asking for cigarettes, of course, as in: ‘Have youse any faigs?’ and it was his job to plant all the bombs from now on because Tinker – who had been doing it up to now – had gone back to Dublin. Now that the six sticks of gelignite were taped down and the parcel more or less ready, there wasn’t very much else for Big Joe and Jack to do only play darts until Faigs was ready. They were in a hurry to get going and tried to chivvy him on a little bit but it was no use. Until he was good and ready, you just wouldn’t be getting Faigs McKeever going anywhere. ‘Away and give my head peace!’ was the only response their coaxings received from him. ‘Oh, go and fuck yourself then!’ Big Joe said as a green-feathered dart sailed expertly towards the measled corkboard. In all, they managed to have three games before Faigs actually declared himself ready. ‘Took your fucking time!’ said Jack as he picked up the leatherette holdall they’d just put the bomb in. ‘Don’t forget your magazine,’ Faigs chuckled as he winked at the femme deshabillée on the cover and grabbed his friend between the legs, Mayo Jack hitting him with two well-aimed jabs and laughing: ‘Fuck you!’ as Big Pat opened the door of the brown Mark 2 Ford Cortina and climbed inside.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Ooh, Bomber!

  Pie-eyed though she was (Camparis in Soho all day!) Pussy knew she was being very cheeky indeed when she got it into her head to pop into the disco-pub which was jam-packed full of soldiers. But she didn’t care – so what if she’d had a few drinkies and if anyone as much as said boo to her, why she would just laugh in their faces. ‘Oo! So I’m a man, am I? Full marks for observation, sweetie!’ she fully intended to say if that proved to be the case – big tough soldiers or no!

  Which it probably would, of course – as well in her heart she knew, for it seemed as if every squaddie in the country had decided to do some shaky-bootie in London town tonight! Perfectly fine by Puss! O but yes and more than fine! For, who knew – perhaps she might meet Sergeant Rock or Captain Yum Yum Be-My-Girl-For-Ever! And if the ris
k was not worth that, then life, she whispered to herself, it simply was not worth the living.

  In any case, there was a strong chance he might not know the truth. An hour in the hotel loo had seen to that, with her long brown hair now so gleamy and her glossy lips a-shining! Then, straight through the door to watch those swooning soldier boys!

  As the strobe lights swept across her, Barry White was smooching: ‘You’re The First, The Last, My Everything!’ and tingle-tingly went Puss down in the groin, the short-haired squaddie whispering in her ear: ‘You fancy a drink or summat?’ Puss coughing a little to summon up the courage to whisper, squeaky-voiced: ‘Oh, yes!’ and look into his eyes when one part of his head went to the left, the other part to the right and the brains which were inside to the floor pouring like scrambled egg – or so it seemed to Puss. The squaddie was definitely dead – I mean, there was blood all over his face, and he was lying on the floor. It was as if it never at any time occurred to Pussy to move. Standing there as if still waltzing with an invisible soldier, where she had been she compliantly remained.

  At least a minute had passed before it dawned on her that she wasn’t dead too. ‘I’m not dead,’ she said, and touched her lipstick with the tip of her tongue. She couldn’t taste anything. ‘Strange,’ she mused to herself, ‘I can’t taste anything at all.’ It was only then she noticed her Christian Dior tights were torn to ribbons. All around her, she slowly began to discern, lots of things were flying. There were particles of sawdust, grit and scraps of paper. If anyone had been observing Puss, they would surely have said: ‘Why is she laughing, for heaven’s sake? Doesn’t she realize she ought to be dead?’ Which, if they’d asked her, they would have soon found out that that was precisely the cause of her thin, protracted laugh – the fact that it was dawning on her that she must have been practically beside the point of detonation. What she was doing there – standing up, fingering her gold neck chain and thinking: ‘I must be practically beside the point of detonation and my tights are in ribbons. I must get a new pair! I really must!’ It was while Pussy was repeating this that there was another explosion nearby and a dazzling flash of blue light through which white faces rushed before being engulfed by a wave of intense heat. As she played with the necklace, Pussy continued to be oblivious of the proceedings – a motorcyclist blown off his machine as static spurted into the shattered night: ‘Priority! Priority!’ A strip of nylon from Puss’s tights had become detached and looked for all the world like a scorched piece of skin hanging from the cheek of one of the dead soldiers. It wasn’t the one Pussy had been dancing with. It was someone else. There were lots. Puss shouldn’t have laughed when the first policeman on the scene tugged at a woman’s leg only to find it coming away in his hand. But because she had gone sky-high giddy again, she couldn’t help it. She kept thinking of the bobby in the childhood comics and that at any moment he was going to scratch his head, then shake it and say: ‘Well, blow me, sarge! They’ve gone and scarpered again!’