John McGahern - Creatures of the Earth - New and Selected Stories

‘They’re strange. They’re different. They’re not brought up the like of us. Those hot climates they get sent to does things to people.’

At first, the late night drinkers entering Charlie’s used to hurry past the car and woman, but later some could be seen to pause a moment before pushing open the door as if in reflection on the mystery of the woman sitting alone drinking gin in the darkness, the car radio on and the engine running wastefully, the way they might pause coming on the otter’s feeding place along the riverbank, its little private lawn and scattering of blue crayfish shells.

When they left for England after Christmas, the car was missed like any familiar absence, and when suddenly it reappeared in March, ‘They’re back,’ would be announced with relief as well as genuine gladness.

‘How long have we been here now? How long is it since we’ve left Wimbledon?’ the Sinclairs would sometimes ask one another as the years gathered above them. Now they found they had to count; it must be three, no four, five my God, using birthdays and the deaths of friends like tracks across the sky.

‘They’re flying now.’

‘Still, it must mean we’ve been happy.’

Company they seemed not to need. Occasionally, they ran into their own class, on Thursday in the Royal, after their shopping was done, the town full of the excitement of the market, bundles of cabbage plants knotted with straw on offer all along the Shambles; but as they never had more than the one drink, and evaded exploratory invitations to tea or bridge, they became in time just a matter of hostile curiosity. ‘How did you get through the winter?’ ‘Dreadful. Up to our hocks in mud, my dear.’ ‘But the Bishop is coming for Easter.’ Mostly, the Colonel was as alone in Charlie’s parlour as Mrs Sinclair was outside in the closed car, though sometimes Charlie joined him with a glass of whiskey if the bar wasn’t busy and Mrs Charlie wasn’t on the prowl. They’d sit at the table and talk of fruit trees and vegetables and whiskey until the bell rang or Mrs Charlie was heard surfacing. Sometimes the Colonel had the doubtful benefit of a local priest or doctor or vet or solicitor out on the razzle, but if they were very drunken he just finished his drink and left politely. ‘I never discuss religion because its base is faith — not reason.’ What brought them most into contact with people was the giving away of fruit and vegetables. They grew more than they could use. To some they gave in return for small favours, more usually by proximity and chance.

It was because of help the Sergeant had given with the renewal of a gun licence that they came with the large basket of apples to the barracks. The day had been eventful at the barracks, but only in the sense that anything at all had happened. An old donkey found abandoned on the roads had been brought in that morning. Every rib showed, the hooves hadn’t been pared in years, the knees were broken and twisted and cut, clusters of blue-black flies about the sores. He was too weak even to pluck at the clover on the lawn, and just lay between the two circles of flowerbeds while they waited for the Burnhouse lorry, an old shaky green lorry with a heavy metal box like the lorries that draw stones, too wide to get through the barrack gates.

‘It’d be better if we could get him alive on the lorry. That way it’d save having to winch him up,’ the driver said.

They had to lift the donkey from the lawn and push, shove, and carry the unresisting animal over the gravel and up a makeshift ramp on to the lorry.

‘Whatever you do keep a good hault of his tail.’

‘I have his head. He can’t fall.’

‘Christ rode into Jerusalem on an ass.’

‘He’d not ride far on this one.’

They expected the donkey to fall once they let go of him on the lorry, but he stayed on his feet without stirring while the driver got the humane killer out of the cab. When the back of the metal horn was tapped with the small hammer close to the skull, he crumpled more silently after the shot rang than a page thrust into flame. The tailboard was lifted up, the bar dropped in place. A docket had to be signed.

The Sergeant and two of the policemen signed themselves out on delayed patrol after the lorry had rattled across the bridge with its load. Guard Casey remained behind as barrack orderly and with him the Sergeant’s sixteen-year-old son, Johnny. As soon as the policemen had split out in different directions on their bicycles at the bridge, Casey turned to the boy. ‘What about a game?’

They were friends, and often played together on the gravel, dribbling the ball around one another, using the open gates as goal. The old policeman was the more skilled of the two. Before he’d joined the Force he’d been given a trial by Glasgow Celtic, but he would leave off the game at once if any stranger came to the barracks. What annoyed the boy most during the games was that he’d always try to detain people past the call of their business. He had an insatiable hunger for news.

‘I don’t feel like playing this evening,’ the boy said.

‘What’s biting you?’

‘What’d you do if you caught the owner of that donkey?’

‘Not to give you a short answer, we’d do nothing.’

‘Why?’

‘We’ve trouble enough without going looking for it. If we applied the law strictly in every case, we’d have half the people of the country in court, and you know how popular that would make us.’

‘It’s lousy. An old donkey who’s spent his whole life pulling and drawing for someone, and then when he’s no use any more is turned out on the road to starve. How can that be justified?’

‘That’s life,’ Casey replied cheerfully. He went in and took one of the yellow dayroom chairs and the Independent out on the gravel and started the crossword. Sometimes he lifted his head to ask about the words, and though the boy answered quickly and readily the answers did not lead to further conversation.

It was getting cold enough for both of them to think about going in when they heard the noise of a car approaching from the other side of the river. As soon as Casey looked at his watch he said, ‘I bet you it’s the Colonel and the wife on their way to Charlie’s. I told you,’ he said as soon as the black Jaguar appeared, but suddenly stiffened. Instead of continuing straight on for Charlie’s, the Jaguar turned down the hill and up the short avenue of sycamores to stop at the barrack gate. Casey left the newspaper on the chair to go forward to the gate. Mrs Sinclair was in the car, but it was the Colonel who got out, taking a large basket of apples from the back seat.

‘Good evening, Colonel.’ Casey saluted.

‘Good evening, Guard.’ The effortless sharp return of the salute made Casey’s effort seem more florid than it probably was. ‘Is the Sergeant about?’

‘He’s out on patrol, but his son is here.’

‘That will do just as well. Will you give these few apples to your father with our compliments and tell him the licence arrived?’

Big yellow apples in a bed of green leaves and twigs ringed the rim of the basket, and in the centre red Honeycombs and Beauty of Bath were arranged in a striking pattern.

‘Thank you, sir. They’re very beautiful.’

‘What is?’ The Colonel was taken by the remark.

‘The way the apples are arranged.’ He coloured.

‘Mrs Sinclair did the arranging but I doubt if she ever expected it to be noticed.’

‘Do you want your basket back, sir?’

‘No. Your father can drop it in some time he’s our way. Or it can be left in Charlie’s. But come. You must meet Mrs Sinclair,’ and the boy suddenly found himself before the open window.

‘This young man has been admiring your arrangement of the apples.’ The Colonel was smiling.