J. Donleavy - The Beastly Beatitudes of Balthazar B

"Balthazar you cannot be left alone."

"I'm absolutely tops. Down for a moment. But up now.

Very tops."

"You're not tops. You're squiffy."

"I'm tops not squiffy."

"Dear you've no transport back."

"Never squiffy. Not that. Tops."

"I could put you up for the night."

"Miss Fitzdare I could never never impose. I mean Fm topping. You think it's shocking that I say I'm topping."

"No. But we should go back and find you a lift. Or I may be able to call a taxi out from Dublin. You'll catch your death on the road."

"Would you care Miss Fitzdare if I died."

"Of course I would."

"My uncle was a great explorer. At the drop of a barometer.

He went immediately to one of the poles. It's in my family. I will make it back safely to my rooms."

"I hope so."

"Miss Fitzdare do you really know me. How can you be certain I am not some mustachioed man, with the ends waxed and twirled. And that now I have cut off my mustache. You don't know that."

"I know you're squiffy."

"How do you know I'm not a dashy dandy."

"You're anything but."

"I'm just so so ordinary."

"Mr. B are you fishing for compliments."

"But do you know me from within. Miss Fitzdare. My little shortcomings, my little heartfelt troubles, my yearnings."

"No but I know you're a very nice person."

"How can you know that Miss Fitzdare."

"I do. From your eyes. You are a nice person."

"Where Miss Fitzdare have you been all these months.

Why haven't we spoken before."

"You never troubled to look at me I fear."

"You must not say that Miss—"

"My God don't fall."

"Ah I am down."

"O dear. I've got you. Up up you come."

"Down and down. I go. But I love you Miss Fitzdare. I have no friends in Ireland. Nowhere to go. Sit at my fireside night after night.' "But I thought you were so very popular Mr. B. I'm sorry I had no idea."

"No I am not popular. I am down for the count.' "Dear me. You must not fall again. The grass is wet. You'll catch cold."

"I want to catch you Miss Fitzdare."

Miss Fitzdare shyly turning away. Her black gloved hand reaching to tuck upon the silk at her throat. A wind casting a lock of her dark hair in gleaming stray strands across her so white temples. Somewhere behind the hurrying cloud a moon basks. And it feels that my fingers clutch and haul me on the sands from an eastern chilly sea.

"Is this where you live Miss Fitzdare."

"Yes. It's my uncle's house."

"It's very nice what I can see of it."

"You know I'm really worried to let you go."

"Can I tell you Miss Fitzdare that I don't know what I'm doing in this country at all. They wrote in such a friendly welcoming fashion. That I just packed up. Got on the train to be here by October first. They never told me I would be cold and lonely and friendless all these months."

"You know you say this. And each time I wonder if you're having me on. Dear you're sliding down again. You must get up. There's a couch you could sleep on over the stable."

"Ah once more you think I am your horse, Miss Fitzdare."

"Heavens. Really I don't."

"Ah Miss Fitzdare why not. Saddle me up. Hear me I'm munching the grass."

"Please get up."

"I have been too careful for too long. It is only this evening, the first time I have ever stepped forth from my rooms and went in public without my gloves. I make my servant laugh.

We have chats. Ah no Miss Fitzdare, I have been careful far too long. I will not take advantage of your extreme kindness.

By the stars I will find a way through these raging suburban jungles back to Dublin."

"There are no stars.'

"I will feel my way through the laurels. Please don't let me keep you from your bed you have already been far too kind to me. I am not popular. That is certain. Today I dined with a mother, her three daughters and a doctor guest in Rathgar. Refined members of society. I a poor Frenchman who does not know what it's all about. They sit and I sit. We make remarks about the weather, the races. I am asked will I have more trifle. I say that is most kind of you. But then I say whoops that perhaps my remark that it is most kind, is wrong, that I have trodden too heavily in the etiquette, should have just said please and thank you. And not that I should be too delighted to have more trifle. In such dilemmas I perspire heavily. Sometimes I am so nervous that I cannot take my leave till midnight, all of us sitting and beginning to shiver around a dying fire. I never know what to say to get myself out of the house. I never know how to refuse when they say do please, come next Sunday. I am to put it mildly Miss Fitzdare in an awful rut.'

"O but that's awful for you."

"Yes, I know."

"Can't you refuse."

"There is something wrong with me Miss Fitzdare. I do not know how to be unkind. I can suffer unkindnesses but I cannot be unkind. Again and again each Sunday I go back to Rathgar and we all sit on the settee. And the daughters change their frocks, one wears the frock the other wore the week before."

"How awful for you."

"But tonight. Beefy has taken me from all that. It is why I have had too much to drink. It is so kind of you to listen Miss Fitzdare to all my troubles like this. I must not keep you longer. I must take leave of you. I don't want to go. But already I've been far too much of an imposition."

"You mustn't feel that, please.' "What way do I go."

"If you proceed down to the end of this road and turn right it will take you straight to Dublin. But I really shouldn't let you go."

"Have faith in me Miss Fitzdare. I am really related to explorers. It's the absolute truth. Just give me some natural phenomenon to head for and my instincts will do the rest."

"Tell me you'll take every care."

"Yes."

"There's a river. Walk straight as far as you can go. The River Dodder. Then turn right along Donnybrook Road straight into Leeson Street and St. Stephen's Green."

Balthazar B bowing. Slowly stepping backwards. Miss Fitz-dare wore a silver jumping horse pinned to her coat. And she walks away between the high iron railings. Through a gate which creaks closed. A cement path to looming wide stone steps. A big shadowy house standing on dark lawns. Can see a stone porch and beyond looks like gardens. The fat upturned limbs of a monkey tree and others thick and tropical in the passing bits of moonlight. Door opening. She stands a silhouette. Her hand raised to wave goodbye.

My finger

Dips

Into the cold

Indelicacy

Of

Dublin.

Balthazar B raised his head from the wet grassy darkness. Moist patches of his clothes sticking to his skin. To remember forging bravely on some detour which seemed so quicker north west to Dublin town. Over a stone wall. To land in a ditch and field. Looking up at the sky for a guiding star. And then keeling over into empty darkness. And the steamy nostrils munching near. The ripping and tearing of grass. And sound of bone grinding jaws. To rise in terror as a cow reared and trotted away.

Miss Fitzdare's dancing blue eyes back there somewhere. In a white white skin and lips of redness that glowed. Must get up and back upon my strategic way. The bark of a dog. A cross. A convent. Nuns in nightgowns maybe. Fm utterly lost. Which way over these fields. Goodness, windows ahead with bars. And human anguished noises somewhere behind those walls. Civilization can not be far away. Must steer past this building of incarceration. Nothing now to do but flip a coin. Tell me which way is north. Uncle Edouard said always forge on. That way is north. Across there the faint shadows of a rooftop. In the wagging shrubberies and trees. Trudge muddily on.

Ah underfoot the firm feel of gravel. Will take me somewhere. A fence I see. And hear an owl hoot. Never had so much fresh air. Nor as much cold feet. Chilling me back to life. I am so lost any direction now will do. Should have stayed in her stable. Eating hay. Miss Fitzdare come out and give me a cube of sugar in the morning, and take me cantering round the lawn for exercise. Sitting up on me, moleskin riding breeches tightly clutched against my ribs. Could easily be an indecent thought. Good heavens, I'm wading through someone's flower beds, maybe azaleas ahead. Someone lives here quite comfortably. Beefy said an area of embassies, and bank directors, salubrious and subtropical.