Call Me the Breeze: A Novel

by Patrick McCabe

  There is an army helicopter overhead, but no one is expecting any trouble. It’s just there for observation. As a kindly woman observes, coming out of the butcher’s, ‘It would be a heartless soul indeed who would try to disrupt or do anything to spoil such a devout and tranquil gathering as this!’

  The Legion of Mary have all decided to dress in white today, and Austie’s wife has been chosen to bear the ‘Candle of Peace’. The band playing at the barbecue has been chosen by Fr Connolly himself, who heard them at a similar rally in Westport, County Mayo. They are called The Doves and they specialize in gospel and charismatic-style songs. Their lead singer is a big fan of the Peace People and has put in a special request with Fr Connolly for a private audience with Betty Williams and Mairead Corrigan afterwards. ‘After the ceremonies and when the festivities are over,’ he explains to Fr Connolly. ‘I just want to tell them how good a job I think they are doing.’

  Fr Connolly understands perfectly and assures him he will do his best. Then, standing in the middle of Scotsfield’s main street, he joins his hands behind his back and emits a long, luxurious sigh of contentment, for never, after what must be nearly thirty years in this one place, has he ever, he reflects, seen as much activity ‘up the town’.

  Approximately two miles away, in a mobile home on the edge of a former itinerant settlement, there is a certain person who is not at this point exhibiting any sign of wishing to engage in these noble and uplifting community affairs. No, Joey ‘Mohawk’ Tallon is not at this point ‘up the town’ involving himself in any of the preparations nor offering his services in order that things might proceed like clockwork and present the town at large in a good and favourable light to the greater world outside. Act as an example to them in a certain sense. Not that he isn’t pleased for them. He is. Absolutely delighted, in fact, that things are going according to plan. It suits his purpose perfectly. It’s just that, for the life of him, he cannot sit still. Look at him pacing up and down! A pie! he thinks. Then: No pies! A glass of sweat! No! No fucking sweat!

  Poor Joey is tired and can’t think straight. Not surprising, really. For once more he has been awake since early dawn and his mind is a wall of death, with thousands of thoughts careering around it on high-speed racers. How many times does he have to drive to that mountain before he can say to himself: ‘Look, the fucking place is ready! It’s OK!’ and just forget about it?

  He sits down to relax. Opens a book. Closes it again. Presses his forefingers against his temples. In days, he thinks, it will all be over. He is happy about that. So happy, in fact, he would like to celebrate it with a spliff. But that, he is not going to do. He is not going to do that because it belongs to a time that was. A time before ‘The Plan’. A time before ‘Total Organization’.

  A time before they set off for home, to that Karma Cave of dreams. Of course, he reflects, it will be like what he longed for all those years ago with Mona, a garden where you could surrender your all. Where dwelt all the ones you’d ever known — Bennett, The Seeker, the salesman. Your own father, Jamesy Tallon.

  Except that, with Jacy, it would be even more special than that. The ‘onions’ of their personalities methodically stripped, layer by layer just peeling away to reveal within the shimmering, unblemished light of one another’s souls. The very essence of each of those souls.

  Before donning his aviator shades, he stared at his reflection in their tinted glass. He looked fine. It was all worked out. He had it all worked out. There was nothing to worry about now. He had been over it fifty times. He knew Jacy was working as a steward at the rally. That had been established. He had watched them practise again and again. He felt proud of her that she had agreed to give her services to the community in this way. When she could, just as easily, with all her knowledge and experience, have poured scorn upon it. But that wasn’t Jacy’s way, was it? That wasn’t the way of The Jace. He knew that now, had seen it time and time again. Boyle Henry was working at it too. But he wasn’t a steward. He was to be positioned miles away from Jacy, looking after the car park on the other side of town, encouraging drivers to park there in order to reduce the volume of traffic in the centre, which, if half the numbers they were expecting arrived, was going to be absolutely crazy. But which suited Joey perfectly. There was a simple genius attached to his plan. He would park the Bedford in the alleyway, then wait until she —

  He pulled on his black balaclava — a simple woollen hat complete with two cut-out eyeholes — then leapt to his feet and stood in front of the mirror, barking: ‘There’s a van blocking the alley! That van has got to be shifted!’

  He practised it again.

  ‘I said, there’s a van over there and it’s blocking the alley! That van has got to be shifted! It’s got to be moved — right now!’

  He pulled off the balaclava and sat down, drawing a deep breath. Then he smiled. A gratified, assured smile. Pies? No thanks. ‘That van has got to be shifted!’ he began again in a voice that was strong and firm, and was in the process of taping the bags of sand to his midriff — if anyone gave them trouble he would threaten to blow both himself and her up if they weren’t guaranteed safe passage. A complete bluff, of course! He wouldn’t harm a hair on her head! Who did they think he was? Eddie Gallagher? Marion Coyle?

  Then the door started pounding.

  ‘Who’s that?’ he demanded, his heart beginning to beat furiously. This shouldn’t be happening, he thought. This was a time of Total Organization. He was on the verge of shouting: ‘Go away!’ when, almost in slow motion — he felt like exploding into laughter, for how could this possibly be happening when Total Organization was already well under way, when the regime at last was up and running, with every little detail worked out to the last — how could it possibly be —?

  ‘Hey!’ he heard Chico saying, as the door swung open. ‘You going up to the peace gig, Joey? Hey, what the fuck are you doing with them bags of sand? Let’s get going, Joey! Gonna be wild! The place is hopping! Let’s go!’

  He picked up one of the sandbags and chucked it against the wall. It burst.

  ‘No!’ cried out Joey. Anka stared at him and laughed. Then she picked up a bag and threw it at Chico. It hit him in the face. ‘You little bitch!’ cried Chico as he brushed the sand from his eyes. When their ‘sandfight’ was finished, the floor was covered in it. Sand, that is. There was only one sandbag remaining — the one that was duct-taped to Joey’s waist.

  ‘Look!’ squealed Chico. ‘Welcome to the beach!’

  ‘Come on, children, you must get your buckets and spades!’ yelped Anka as she went skidding across the floor.

  Joey was white. Abstractedly he tore off the last remaining plastic bag. He tried to fight off the gathering bitterness. ‘I’ve got to calm down,’ he told himself.

  He succeeded. He spoke to them with restrained and measured breaths. He said he didn’t want to go. ‘I can’t go,’ he said. Anka thought this was great fun. She chuckled. Then fell over, crawling on to the bed, as Chico climbed on top of her and cried: ‘Hey! Look at The Man!’ It was Robert De Niro he was talking about. His picture was tacked to the wall. He was looking at them. That made Chico laugh. He grabbed Anka by the ass and growled: ‘You lookin’ at me? ‘Cos if you ain’t lookin’ at me, who are you lookin’ at? I don’t see anyone else around!’

  Chico sat on the bed and opened a box. It was a little silver box. It should have contained little buttons or pins. But it didn’t. It didn’t contain buttons or pins. It contained tabs. Little tabs of acid in sellotaped strips. ‘Here, Joey, have a tab,’ said Chico as he slipped one on to his own tongue. Then he gave one to Anka, who swallowed it promptly. ‘I don’t want any tabs,’ said Joey. ‘I’ve had it with all that. Those days are done. This is a time of Total Organization.’

  Chico thought this hilarious. So did Anka. And do you know what she did then? Caught Joey unawares between the legs and pinned him to the bed. Then she stuck her finger in his mouth. And wiggled it around a little. Joey didn’t mind i
t at first for it felt quite nice, to be honest. It was only when he realized what she’d done that he lost it. Chico was dancing around like an Indian on the warpath, talking in all these garbled voices.

  ‘Those days are gone? Oh no, they’re not! Those days are gone? Oh no, they’re not!’, every so often falling on his knee and training a pistol on the mirror’s reflection, bawling: ‘Thank God for the rain which has helped wash the garbage and trash off the sidewalks! Pow! Pow! She appeared like an angel out of this open sewer. Out of this filthy mass. She is alone; they cannot touch her! My whole life is pointed in one directon! I see that now! There has never been any choice for me!’

  It was only when he felt the microdot slipping down the base of his throat that Joey began to realize for absolute certain that he was right. What he had feared had indeed happened, i.e. that Anka had spiked him. Then he lost it completely, which, as he should have realized by then, was an absolute waste of time, for Anka and Chico were clearly tripping their skulls off. Chico’s eyes in particular were like whirling frisbees.

  It was hopeless.

  The more Joey remonstrated, the less attention they paid him, before they eventually fell out the door and tore across the encampment, with the dogs howling after them and Mangan crouching fearfully by his caravan window. He was at a total loss now, Mohawk. He could feel the electric tingles starting already at the tips of his toes. ‘You stupid —!’ he began, but never managed to finish the sentence. Some of the sand had gotten into his mouth. In the crevices between his fingers. What was he going to do? Perhaps he could put it all back into the bags! How could he? What an idiotic thing to think! All the plastic bags were torn! If he didn’t think of something soon —

  He could feel the edgy shadows beginning to congregate at the corners of his eyes. Everything becoming that bit too sharp. What to do? He’d read about orange juice and vitamin C. That might do it.

  But it was too late! He realized that, yes, it already was much too late! He wanted, more than anything, for those tingles to stop. They had finished with his toes and were moving on through his feet and ankles and up then towards his shins and knees. Soon they would be marching on his stomach and giving him those cramps he hated. That was because of the strychnine which they sometimes used as a base, whoever made the fucking stuff. Presently, then, the tips of his fingers. Before the tingling became total. Before the total became tingling.

  He experienced an irrational urge to laugh and ask himself a really daft question. ‘What’s your name, Joseph? Yes, what is your name? It’s Joseph, is it? But what does that mean? What does having a name mean? Who are you? What is the you of you?’

  He cried out, and thumped the wall forcefully. ‘No!’ he bellowed again. He wouldn’t allow it. ‘Don’t start that!’ he demanded. ‘No questions! Or ideas swooshing around all over the place! Talking in different voices! Stay together, thoughts! Just stay in line!’

  But they wouldn’t. They went off again. Tingle totalling. Total tingling. What is the we of we? The you of you. I am The Gardener. You are the garden. He shook his head to try and dislodge them — these unbiddable, almost neon-lit philosophizings. He stuck his head into the sink and showered his face with water. The tap seemed like it was made out of rubber. Then a thought — ‘Oh, this is ridiculous!’ he cried — poked its head up out of the plughole. It looked like a worm with a swollen head, which it tilted just a little as it opened its mouth. Before closing it, then repeating once again: ‘Iowa.’ He slammed his hand down over that plughole. ‘Ha!’ he cried. ‘That soon got rid of it!’, but just as he was drying his face what did he hear? Only something moving over by the window, and when he looked over what was sitting on the sill? Only the same fucking worm like a happy children’s doodle, some cartoon from early morning telly just tilting that head, lips opening and closing as it said: ‘Joey, Iowa!’ Iowa Iowa Iowa.

  It was now or never. He ran off out the door. As soon as he was behind the wheel he felt himself once more. Everything — at last! — was on course again.

  All Aboard for the Cave of Dreams

  It’s great, thinks Joey, to be setting off now once and for all on the journey to the place you’d been longing for all your life. ‘What is this place?’ all of a sudden he heard someone say. ‘Why, the Cave of Dreams!’ he responded at once. And, for no reason he could think of, he found himself laughing. Which was bad enough in the circumstances — after all, he was off to complete ‘The Plan’ and erupting into laughter for no apparent purpose while you were doing it was hardly going to —

  Any more than allowing your eyes to well up with tears, which, he had to admit, he was doing now. Yes, permitting great gouts of tears — enormous, transparent golf balls — to appear in the middle of each eye before fragmenting right there and sprinkling all the way down his face. ‘Oh dear!’ he sighed. ‘I fear I am going to jeopardize “The Plan”!’

  But then, thank heavens, help was at hand in the form of a quiet soothing voice that seemed to emanate from somewhere beneath the leopardskin-covered seat. ‘Leopardskin?’

  ‘Hah!’ laughed Joey, swiping his arm right across his eyes to get rid of those fucking tears. ‘Leopardskin!’ he cried. ‘I wonder who shot that leopard!’

  The brown and black markings spun athletically in front of his eyes.

  ‘Poor leopard!’ he sighed then, trying not to feel sad but not being able to manage it, that silly old leopard rearing up at the glass — the glass of the windscreen — and growling at him with great big teeth. But then the voice told him to go easy. ‘Go easy there now, Joey Tallon! Slow down and take your time. It’s going to be fine. Things will work out fine, you’ll see!’

  He really hoped they would. More than anything he hoped that they would because after all you had to remember that he’d never longed for anything so much! ‘Ah, the Cave of Dreams!’ he murmured. ‘The opposite of the Big Fellow — that warm soft place where you know you’ll always be at peace!’

  And with Jacy he knew he’d find that place. Together they’d create a whole new world. They’d turn to the Big Fellow and laugh in his face. Take his stupid fedora off him and tramp it into the dirt. ‘How do you like that, buddy?’ they’d say. ‘You’re all washed up!’, before giving his cigar a wallop and knocking it out of his big fat mouth.

  Then, without warning, it was as if the flick of a whip had caught Joey across the face. ‘No!’ he cried out and skidded off the road. ‘Don’t ever,’ he heard the Big Fellow warn, ‘don’t ever dismiss me again like that!’

  Joey was trembling and he wanted to apologize. He wanted to call back the Big Fellow. But he was gone. Perhaps he had never been there!

  No, he had! He had definitely heard his —

  Such beautiful singing. He had never heard singing like it. Where on earth was it coming from? Why, it was coming from the town, of course. He was aproaching it now, with its wavering amber orchestra of lit candles. The music brought him close to tears again, but this time ones so joyful —

  He gave silent thanks that he was nearing the end of his quest. The end of his quest and the beginning of his —

  Now that a calm was at last descending, Joey began to realize that he had never quite experienced a sensation such as this. It was as though it were a preview of the tranquillity he was destined later to attain with the beloved, whose name was Jacy, the one who’d been put on this earth, who’d chosen to come to this town —

  When he had completed his prayer, he edged the Bedford slowly towards the alleyway and left the engine running. ‘It’s going to be so easy!’ the soft voice reassured him. ‘This is where your preparation counts. This is the payoff, Joey. What Total Organization actually means.’

  He pulled the van in directly behind the alley. Then he reached inside his jacket for the balaclava. It wasn’t there! He’d gone and forgotten that too!

  ‘What was that?’ he started suddenly —

  ‘It’s only a dog barking, asshole!’ he told himself, gingerly opening the door of the cab. H
e stood shivering by the van as the crowds swept in a wave towards the main altar in the centre of the square. The Legion of Mary were like ghosts dressed in white. A wave of formless spirits, floating half-people bathed in light. You had to hand it to Fr Connolly, for he had certainly demanded ‘Total Organization’ from his flock, with his bunting and flags and powerful lamps. It might just as well have been a scene, he thought, from some end-of-the-world science-fiction movie.

  Except that what it was, in fact, was a scene from the beginning of the world. A movie calling Jacy to the Cave of Dreams.

  He smiled now. ‘Talk about previews,’ he mused to himself. ‘Those days after school when I’d dream it all up with Mona, they might as well have been a preview for this. For this “Cave of Dreams” can be nothing but real. It’s the way it’s meant to be!’

  He laughed when he thought of the ‘leopard’.

  Imagine that! he thought. Getting it into your head that a jungle animal was loose in the Scots-field countryside! A jungle animal, I ask you!

  He could feel the presence of someone close by and he froze. Someone who knew, he thought. Who knew all the details of ‘The Plan’. He could feel his entire body going rigid and the gathering icy presence that seemed to be all around him now. ‘It’s the Big Fellow!’ he cried. ‘The Big Fellow!’, starting as he burnt his fingers with the cigarette.

  But it wasn’t. ‘No,’ he stammered, ‘it’s just the keys! That’s all it is! I’ve forgotten the keys of the cabin! How can I get into the Karma Cave? I’ve forgotten the keys of the fucking cabin as well!’

  But it turned out he hadn’t, great big silly. Went and found them in the pocket of his jeans, where they’d been nesting all along. ‘Dear, oh dear!’ he began to laugh as he reprimanded himself inwardly. ‘I really think I’d better get started and stop all this old —’

  It was only a matter of getting someone to draw her attention … probably best be a kid.