Liam O'Flaherty - Irish Portraits - 14 Short Stories

Nobody answered. A dog yawned. Mr. Mullally, for the first time, uttered an audible sound. Tight turned towards him. Mullally was laughing with tears flowing down his fat cheeks. Everybody began to titter.

“Hah!” yelled Tight. “There he is. The pug-nosed badger. It’s easy for him to laugh. He came here a few years ago from God knows where, with his few pounds o’ tay in a bag, leavin’ them at people’s door-steps. A tay man. Then he buys a little house an’ sets up a shop. Now he’s got ye all in his debt. He’s got money in the bank, He’s livin’ on ye. What’s he done for the town? Nothing. He ain’t a producer. Laugh away, dam ye. Foo!”

Tight was exhausted and he sat down. Nobody took any notice of him. Mullally just went on laughing. When Tight came to the town first after his return, people got vexed when he ranted like this. But a few daring fellows, who took umbrage at his words and fought him, got such a drubbing from the giant that now nobody dared to contradict him or answer him back. And, anyway, he was a gay, humorous fellow, industrious, clean-living, and the best of good companions, except on occasions like this, when a little indiscretion on the part of a thieving neighbour “got his goat.”

He sat down. He took out his pipe. He filled it with tobacco from his pouch. He noticed the row-boat, which was now moving hurriedly towards the pier, after having been motionless for at least four hours.

“Who’s that?” he grumbled, waving his tobacco pouch towards the boat.

“That’s Tameen Maloney,” murmured a listless voice.

“What’s he been doin’?” grumbled Tight.

“Fishin’,” said another listless voice.

Somebody cleared his throat. The dog yawned again and then snapped at a flea. A man who was sitting with wide open mouth suddenly shut his mouth and sat up. He began to cough violently. A fly had entered his wide open mouth.

“Fishin’!” cried Bartly Tight. “Ha! What’s he fishin’ for?”

“Mackerel,” said a fat man in a blue sweater, getting to his feet and stretching his hands above his head. “Give us a pipe-full, Bartly.”

“Go to hell,” said Tight, putting his tobacco in his pocket. “Go an’ earn it. Yer always cadging something. I don’t believe in charity. Tobacco is a luxury. I’ll give ye a meal if yer hungry, but tobacco -”

“Aw! For God’s sake …” grumbled the fat man as he shuffled along towards Mullally’s shop. “Hey! Mr. Mullally,” he cried to the shopkeeper in a sullen voice, “give us a chew.”

Bartly looked angrily at Mr. Mullally. Mr. Mullally glanced at Tight, as he took a knife and a square block of tobacco from his pocket. He cut off a piece of the tobacco and handed it to the fat man.

“There ye are!” cried Tight. “I suppose ye think now ye’re a decent fellah. Eh? But ye-know yer robbin’ that man of his sense of decency. He’s just a hanger-on. Bribery an’ corruption. That’s how ye get them in yer clutches. Put that down on the slate now, Mr. Mullally.”

Mullally giggled again. Suddenly Bartly Tight struck his thigh a violent blow and began to laugh himself.

“Well! I’ll be damned,” he cried. “We’re all fools. Eh? It’s a funny world. Search me if it ain’t. An’… after all… what were we put into this world for anyway?”

“To save our immortal souls,” said the dapper little man, who was leaning on the stick.

Tight looked at the man keenly, with a merry twinkle in his eyes. The others laughed, knowing that Tight was a bitter opponent of the Church, and expecting him to say something bitter. But Tight just laughed. The heat was overcoming him and with the heat, the laziness engendered by it and the peace of nature, his sense of humour was becoming acute.

“Well,” said another man, “they say Julius Caesar, God rest his soul if he had one, couldn’t whistle an’ chew meal at the same time. So …”

“So what?” said Tight.

“I forgot,” said the man, with a long yawn.

They lapsed into silence again, watching the incoming boat. After a while Bartly Tight spoke again.

“That fellah Tameen Maloney ud make his fortune in a civilized country. Out all mornin’ on a day like this. An’ all you bums loafin’. Social energy fellah. Eh? That man is a good citizen. Christ! I hope he catches something. I been eatin’ salt hash for a month. Not a bite o’ fresh stuff in the town, only rotten mutton. Give my two eyes for a roast mackerel off the tongs,”

“Foo!” said the dapper man, sucking his lips and moving towards the pier. “I can hear the salt cracklin’ off its back. My eyes are waterin’ for it already.”

“Lashins o’ butter on it,” said another man, getting to his feet, “an’ it’s food for a bishop.”

“To hell with the bishops,” said Tight, also getting to his feet. “They should be fed on bad poison.”

They all laughed. Everybody strolled down to the pier. Even Mullally got to his feet and ambled down to the pier. Now it was obvious that he had once been a policeman, because of the way he walked and his splendid black moustaches, that reached out like long thorns on either side of his mouth.

They hailed the boat while it was still a long way off. The boatman did not reply. They watched his bobbing poll, as it rose and fell with the movements of his measured rowing, flush, trup, r-rip, flush. Then he turned round his head and they saw Tameen Maloney’s drunken face, all yellow creases, with smuts of grease on the sallow cheeks and shaving scars on his thin jaws. He grounded his boat on the sand to the left of the pier and they saw fish in the boat.

“Bravo, Tameen!” they cried. “Ye got them.”

“Yuh,” grunted Tameen, getting to his feet in the boat, “I-I-uh-go-gogotalittle-a-uh-fe-fe-few.”

It was almost impossible to understand a word he said on account of the stoppage in his speech. He had the fish in a little basket, and without mooring the boat he slung the basket on his shoulder and walked up the sand with it hurriedly, on to the pier. Some small boys hauled up the boat for him.

On the pier he went up to Mr. Mullally with the fish.

“Uh-Uh-a-uh-hunerd,” he mumbled.

“Right,” said Mr. Mullally, curtly, “come along.”

Mr. Mullally had suddenly become a very energetic man. His face had hardened. He was twirling the tips of his moustaches with his fingers and watching the fish greedily.

“Hold on there now,” said Tight, gripping Maloney by the shoulder. “Lay down that basket. D’ye want to sell yer fish? Eh? If ye do we’ll buy it from ye. We don’t want any middleman to conduct a transaction.”

“Let him go,” cried Mullally, seizing Maloney by the other shoulder. “Who’s talking about a transaction? The fish is sold to me.”

Little Tameen Maloney began to stutter. The poor, dirty, ragged, little fellow, gripped by the two giants, was trembling and looked very pitiful. Tight loosed his hold with an oath. Then a very interesting state of affairs was disclosed to the crowd.

It appeared that Tameen Maloney had recently been receiving an occasional drink on credit from Mullally, on the understanding that whatever fish he caught would be handed over to Mullally and that Mullally was to pay whatever he thought fit. Maloney was a confirmed tippler, and he would sell his soul for money if he could find a buyer for it.

It was a very fraudulent arrangement, because Maloney was absolutely penniless, half-starved, and living in deplorable conditions. But the crowd looked upon it as a very trivial affair. They laughed.. Tight was the only one who became enraged.

“Well, what did I say?” he cried. “Look at this barefaced robbery. Christians! Oh! Lord! Ough!”

He spat and walked away, swinging his arms ferociously. Mr. Mullally walked up to his shop with Tameen Maloney. The crowd dispersed, in order to warn their wives that fresh mackerel were to be on sale at Mullally’s. The square became quite still.