Máirtín Ó Cadhain - Graveyard Clay - Cré na Cille

— The same crowd who were licking his eyebrows …

— … I don’t think, neighbour, the priest would hold his umbrella between the Road-End crowd and the rain, ever since the son was given a six months’ prison sentence …

— Road-End’s son? …

— Road-End’s son, seriously! You’re spinning lies?

— And Road-End’s old lady nearly got another six months’ sentence, neighbour, for receiving stolen goods …

— My drift-weed for certain! …

— Not so, neighbour, but the contents of Lord Cockton’s car, including fishing gear, a gun and all that sort of thing. He went into the Earl’s at night and took dinner jackets, tennis trousers, gold watches and cigarette cases … And a few thousand cigarettes from Siúán the Shop’s daughter, and sold them for threepence each to the young women of Donagh’s Village. The clay pipes were killing them …

— It was good enough for Siúán the Shop’s daughter! …

— And for the Earl! …

— And for the young women of Donagh’s Village! …

— And for Road-End’s son, the little blackguard. By the docks, dear, I don’t begrudge him that much! He was a bit too ready with his boot …

— He stole the trousers from the priest’s sister too, but there was nothing said about that. Seáinín Liam’s son and some of the Woody Hillside young lads saw them on Road-End’s daughter on the bog, but she wore a frock over them …

— The straddle-bag my eldest son is keeping company with? … Yes! She’ll have her photograph taken in those trousers now, as more temptation for the eldest one …

— The priest’s sister was upset when Road-End’s son was sent to prison, Billyboy? …

— Arrah, don’t you know well she was, Bríd!

— Bríd, neighbour, it didn’t dampen her spirits in the least. “What use is a man in prison to me?” she said. “Road-End’s son is a useless impotent little fellow …”

— She’ll marry the Wood of the Lake Master now? …

— The Wood of the Lake Master is among her broken dolls for a good while now. At present she’s with a Scotsman who’s taking photographs in Woody Hillside. He wears short skirts …

— Now then! Short skirts. And tell me this, Billyboy, was she wearing the trousers when she was with him? …

— She wasn’t, Bríd Terry, but a frock. The best trousers she had — the striped ones — were the ones Road-End’s son stole …

— The trousers Tomás Inside spat on? …

— Now that you mention Tomás Inside, the Postmistress’s daughter told me that Pádraig Chaitríona got … Patience now, Master! Have patience, Master! … Hold on there, Master! I never opened a letter of yours, Master … Listen to me, Master. Two dogs …

— Have a little decency, Master. What did she say about my Pádraig, Billyboy?

— That he got the insurance money on Tomás Inside, and that Nell got a nice fat sum on Jack …

— The blessings of God on you, Billyboy my friend! According to Nóra Sheáinín’s mangy tongue, Pádraig didn’t keep up the payments after I died! Ever since I came into the graveyard she’s used me as a spittoon for every drool and dribble out of her lying mouth. Do you hear me, Seáinín’s daughter, you sponger? May God reward you, Billyboy, and tell her that — tell that mangy daughter of Seáinín’s — that Pádraig got …

6

— … God would punish us for saying a thing like that, Caitríona …

— But it’s the truth, Jack …

— It’s not, Caitríona. I had been ailing for years. She brought me to the best of doctors in Brightcity, every single one of them. I was told by an English doctor who used to come fishing up there to us eight years ago, how long I’d live, to the day. “You’ll live,” he said …

— … “Yes,” says I. “My guts are tangled up …”

— … “Your ankle is twisted again,” he said. “By Galen’s windy plexus …”

— … Musha, you wouldn’t believe, Caitríona, neighbour, how thankful I am to your Pádraig. Not a single Sunday passed but himself and his wife would come to look in on me …

— The Filthy-Feet breed …

— Musha, Caitríona, neighbour, there’s no soil without weeds. Look at how the Big Master has changed! You wouldn’t meet a nicer man on a pilgrimage to Knock Shrine …

— But don’t you see the way herself and that dishevelled Nell treated me, Billyboy. They got the St. John’s Gospel from the priest and bundled me down into this cupboard thirty years before my time. The same trick was played on poor Jack …

— God would punish us …

— Old wives’ tales, Caitríona. If I were you I wouldn’t believe it …

— You’d better believe it, Billyboy, even though it is an old wives’ tale. The priest is able to …

— I believed that once, Caitríona, neighbour. I did indeed, though you wouldn’t think it of me. But I asked a priest, Caitríona — a very learned priest — and do you know what he told me? He told me, Caitríona, what I should have known very well myself only for the old tale being rooted in my mind. “All the St. John’s Gospels in the world wouldn’t keep you alive, Billyboy the Post,” he said, “when God wishes to send for you.”

— I find it hard to believe, Billyboy …

— Another priest told my wife — the Schoolmistress — the same thing, Caitríona. A holy priest he was, Caitríona: a priest whose two eyes were aflame with holiness. The Schoolmistress had done every single pilgrimage in the whole of Ireland and Aran for me … Hold on there, Master dear! Hold on there! … Stop that commotion, now! What could I have done about what she did? … “It is right to make the pilgrimages,” he said, “but we don’t know when it’s God’s will to work a miracle …”

— But a pilgrimage is not the same thing as the St. John’s Gospel, Billyboy …

— I know that, Caitríona, but wouldn’t the St. John’s Gospel be a miracle? And if God wants to keep a person alive, why should He have to make another person die instead of him? You don’t think, Caitríona, neighbour, that He’s as full of red tape as the Post Office? …

— Bloody tear and ’ounds , didn’t Big Brian say …

— … Do you think it’s the War of the Two Foreigners? says I …

— It’s time you woke up, my friend!

— … It was my wife filled in the forms for Pádraig, Caitríona. Hold on, Master! Hold on! Very well, Master dear. She was your wife too … Have patience now, Master! Patience! Two dogs …

— … There was such a day, Peadar the Pub. Don’t deny it …

— … Forms about the house, Caitríona. Isn’t Pádraig building a slate-roofed house! … Yes, Caitríona, a two-storey house with bay windows, and a windmill on the hillock to supply the lighting … You should see the Government bull he bought, Caitríona! — ninety pounds. The cattle crowd are very thankful to him. All the bulls round the place were idlers.

— Bloody tear and ’ounds , didn’t Big Brian say: “Since England put a stop to de Valera’s cattle, and since the Slaughter of the Innocents, the bulls are so shy …”

— And he’s thinking of getting a lorry for carrying turf. It’s badly wanted in our area. There is no lorry since Peaidín’s was taken off him … Five or six hundred pounds, neighbour …

— Five or six hundred pounds! A sum like that would leave a hole in anybody’s pocket, Billyboy! Nearly as much as Nell got in the court case …

— It’s not a hole in Pádraig’s pocket, Caitríona, and especially since he got the legacy …

— But it was Nell got the fat notes all the same …

— Bloody tear and ’ounds , didn’t Big Brian say that Pádraig Chaitríona wouldn’t recognize a pound note any more than Tomás Inside would recognize the sweat of his own brow, or …