J. Donleavy - The Destinies of Darcy Dancer, Gentleman

For he

Discourses

Somewhere

The carriage lamps lit as darkness fell. I had Luke take me round the country roads beyond the village. To delay returning to Andromeda Park. Petunia knowing her unerring way over the winding lanes. Passing the graveyard and church where Foxy had committed his sacrilege. And then the entrance gates and the curve of the rhododendron lined drive up to my mother’s elegant clerical friend’s little grey Georgian house. Whose sallow freckled face I remembered so quietly serene when once he talked of his travels abroad before the war. To hear opera in the strange distant romantic cities of Europe. And faintly recall my mother leaning forward like a bird to pour him tea and before he would reach for his cup he would always press his handkerchief further up under his silk cuff.

The shadowy trees go by. And the looming hills and walls. A moon alight behind the clouds. Smoke rising from a cottage chimney and mists settling on the great rusty black bogs. Across which the train now takes her. So that I may never see her again. I looked up at the window of the pub where Mr Arland had stayed. A lace curtain there. Nearly discern him standing just beyond its secret whiteness. The loneliness he must have suffered all those months. Pining for a lady whose ample backside would readily bare itself to open up her legs for anyone rich and titled. And whose grey stone house we also passed. What are her activities now. Having so conspicuously degraded herself. With me to thank for her downfall. Or even triumph. If ever she becomes a marchioness.

Cold windy and pitch black as we came in the back farm gate of Andromeda Park. Went splashing through the puddles and pounding over the broken branches and leaves collected on the road. As the float stopped at the steps, Crooks was standing at the south east parlour window. Not used since my mother’s death. And full of damp sofas stacked with pillows and faded prints of the hunt all over the walls. Then Crooks was opening the door and looking extremely concerned judging by his frown.

‘Master Reginald, I’m glad to see you. The guards were here. Looking for you. Did you see them.’

‘No. We came in by the back road.’

‘Thank our merciful saviour for that. I said you’d gone by the train up to Dublin for a few days. Which I thought was as well. As something told me by their attitude that, and god forbid such a thing, that they wanted to take you into custody. I told them it was that cur Foxy who did whatever they thought you did.’

‘Where’s my father.’

‘He’s down below with the agent in the rent room. And if you will be preferring to dine alone, I’ll take you up some hot supper whenever you’re ready. I wouldn’t let it be known where you were to anybody calling.’

‘Thank you Crooks. I’ll dine in my room. And I do appreciate what you’ve done.’

‘Well master Reginald, I wouldn’t be much of a gentleman’s gentleman if I didn’t look after one’s master’s business as well as I would look after my own.’

I supped behind my locked door and waited till just before dawn. And the household still. My father retired to the north west corner of the house over the ballroom. I dressed with two big thick pairs of boot socks, two woolly vests, cricket shirt and dark blue sweater under my shooting coat. And got my boots from the front hall. To go out into the world. Starting in the darkness of the morning. To make my triumphant fortune. And come back again to be master of this house.

But I fell down the whole flight of stairs. To the stone paving of the servants’ corridor. Without breaking any bones and no one stirred. Edna Annie and Catherine still snoring asleep. Finding a candlestick, I lit it to go flickering tiptoe into the warm kitchen. Returning into the long cold hall with a bag full of cheese, butter and bread. Catherine now groaning nightmarishly asleep in her cell. Blow cut this candle. Go past the old rent room. Its maps and map table. The door with two bullet holes. And its outside hall and stairway sealed up with brick. Where years ago the tenantry formed a line out the door to pay their tithes. The agent still attending at the round green leather topped table with its index drawers and pedestal cupboard to pay the men. Sexton said it was a chamber of misery.

Go out now that door. Past the steps and stairway to the schoolroom up and down which I often rushed. To hungrily steal goodies from under Catherine’s very nose. And share these with Mr Arland who as he chewed so pleasantly told me not to be rude and thieving. Where would he be now. Happy I hope in full employ. Attending theatre and opera with his lovely actress.

Darcy Dancer pulling back the great bolt. Open quietly this scraping big old portal. Through which so many lives have come and gone to toil and live in these cavernous damp rooms. Close it. And leave behind sleeping. Those souls working towards the end of their days. Down beyond the sunlight shut out high up by the wet dripping stone wall holding back the earth from the rusty barred windows. Catherine maybe will retire to her farm. And Crooks find another situation. And then. Just as it was doing before Miss von B came, all above in this house will moulder and tumble in a heap.

The grass frosty under foot. Makes one shiver. But must go. Never turn back. Forward. Through this iron gate and climb up over where the farm tunnel goes under. Shrouded in the shrubbery there, the old jam house. Head out past the cemetery. Its ivy leaves and great yew tree. Out to these lands. Where I know every copse, hill, and pasture. If I say goodbye. Can the dead hear you. Or listen as I say I stinking well can’t stand it any more. To be told what to do. And I’m getting the stinking god damn hell out of here.

Darcy Dancer sliding sidewards down the steep side of an incline. Bending to squeeze under a giant bough of a tree. Sown by a great great grandfather. Who was friends with the curator of Kew Gardens in England. And who planted all these strange trees. And o my god, the cold cold air. Feel it in the cut on my face. Made bleed again by my fall. Each step now crushing the whiteness underfoot. Fog again out on the sky. Keep tripping over the lumps of frozen cow dung. As I follow. Poor Miss von B. If only she gave him a good clout in the face when he had her on the carpet this morning. Her breasts so swelling in her grey sweater. I wanted to throw myself on my knees and clasp her round the thighs and just hold her. And I must go on. And in the morning chase after her train. Could I lie up hidden in the old game larder till full light. But without any hay or straw it would be so cold. Head now in that direction. That will take me somewhere. Safe from guards and make my headway cross country. Find the fastest way to Dublin. But travelling, each time one looks up, there are always more fields, hedges and hills ahead. The nights running from school I kept the moon at my back. And still did not know where the hell I was going. Except now I go away from home. Running from everything. Come back in a few months, when my fortune is made. And even before next hunting season has arrived, be again the lord and master of Andromeda Park.

Darcy Dancer trudging up the hill. Past this monstrous branched tree. Upon which I did lie on its great extending bough in summertime just staring up into the leaves and hiding from my dear sister Beatrice Blossom. Who got so jealous when she saw me pee standing, when she had to squat. And beyond across the parkland shadows, there stands the grove of oaks. To be mutilated again I’m sure, any day. And through the copse on the other side of the sheltery field. And five more stone throws away. Against a wall, the old disused pump house. Abandoned now to cattle. Where in its cool shade they escape the flies in summer. And where was kept their stock of hay for winter foddering. Go in there. To sleep. Be nearly like a little house with its leaded windows. Rest cosy and warm till daylight.