J. Donleavy - The Beastly Beatitudes of Balthazar B

"I'll be alright."

"Ah God look at you. You won't be. You're shivering."

"I always do that."

"Ah don't cod me."

"No really."

"I don't know what to say. But. But I don't want you to get the wrong idea. That I'm being bold. It's two by now in the morning. I could be murthered for it."

"What's that."

"You would say in English now, murder. In Ireland we say murthered because it takes us so much longer to do it. And I could be murthered but I mustn't let you go."

"I'm fine."

"Ah I'm no good. No good at all."

"Why."

"I'm just not that's all. What I'm really trying to say to you is I don't want you to go back. But stay. Go ahead you can say no, it won't be then for lack of me trying. Goodnight. If you go out the alley now and be careful of the barrels it will take you into the road and you go left then and keep to the sea.' "I want to say yes."

"O."

"If you're asking me to stay, and it won't be any inconvenience to you."

"It's yes then."

"Yes."

"O."

"What's the matter."

"I don't know. I didn't think you would say yes and now I don't know what to do."

"Do you want me to say no."

"No."

"But if it's upset you."

"No. I'm glad you said yes."

"Yes I said yes."

"I'm scared out of my wits. I could use a bit of your friend Beefy's nerve. O but it's not to worry. That's my room up there."

"I don't want to cause you distress. It's no trouble for me to go. If it's difficult for you."

"You're the most beautiful man I've ever seen in my life. O God. Just give me a moment. I'll collect myself now. I'll be giving you an awful swell head. And mine I may get knocked off me. Now I have got to go in and when I get up to my room. I only have to open the window and you get on that barrel and step to the roof of the gents and it's easy to pull you in off there. You won't mind, my quarters are not grand."

Balthazar B stood in the yard, a cold shadow under the eaves. Fat raindrops landing to flow down between the roots of hair and drip from eyebrows, ear lobes and nose. Water gushing from a broken gutter pipe. Shadows of crates stacked. My wet silk shirt sticking to my ribs. A smell of hay. Somewhere warm and dry. In the sheltered opening of this old cow shed. An unending night. If Miss Fitzdare ever hears. I'll never see her again. Mid fingerbowls, linen and lace. Here now in mud, manure and rain.

"Hey there."

"Hello."

"Mind now very quiet as you go. On to the barrel first. That's it. Put a foot there and I will catch holt of your hand. Grand, there now. Don't be worried, get one hand on the sill. O God hold it there. Hold it."

"I'm sorry I'm not awfully good at this."

"You're doing fine, it's only some old pebbles and bits of cement. Ah now, a little more. This way. There. In you come now."

Balthazar B scrambling across the sill. The sound of pebbles and lumps of cement falling to the yard below. Clattering above the whistling wind. Years since one was in out of inclemency. Or not pulling plaster out of walls. Safe a moment. Up here in this tiny room. Her narrow little bed along the wall under a crazy quilt. In the red electric fire light. Shadows of a tall cupboard, varnished brown. A light green plastic handle to pull it open. Two suitcases bound with belts stacked on top. A dressing table with a dish and broken brush and comb. Two jars of sea shells and a bottle of perfume throw shadows across a cloth in the candle light.

"It won't be long to heat the room. With a bit of the electric fire. Landlords raise a holy terror. Watching the electricity get to me with a microscope over the wire. God love you you're wet through you poor man, a raindrop on your nose. You're the most beautiful man I've ever seen. What kind of mother and father did you have at all. Take this jacket off you now. Put it here over the back of the chair and let the fire shine on it."

Balthazar B sneezing. Bending double as he held hands up to his face. Hair wet. Head dizzy and tight. The room goes round in circles under a naked bulb hanging from the ceiling. Now black and red and light. All those voices are calling me. Locked away in this room. I'm going down now and down.

Balthazar B swayed in his wet shirt sleeves and slumped with a sigh unconscious into Breda's arms. Catching him under the shoulders and lugging him onto the bed. She kissed him on the eyes and lips and put her ear over his heart. To hear. Who goes there with footsteps. Where are you in the world. Walked here through bracken along a little path of slippery clay. Her hair is black. Combed with a broken comb. I saw a movie magazine. An issue I'd read cover to cover. It lay on her bedside box. We've the same taste for stars. Who come and go. As surely as trustees are not supposed to die. London streets turning upside down through all these recent hours. Where I walked swinging with a lightfooted stride. Out my little house. Along Brompton Road. Past the Hyde Park Hotel. Turreted, red bricked and tall. To make down the incline of Piccadilly and up again. A light breeze in the air passing the Ritz. To tea with lemon, squeezed under my tip of spoon. Feel so faint and feverish. Cold moments in school chapel so many years ago. To keel over and wake in bed. And just hear the distant singing. White owls fluttering overhead. A little girl friend looked at me on a Paris street and smiled in her white high shoes and gloves. She told me later in dancing class as I stepped on her toes. You should be ugly and I should be beautiful. My eyes are open. Fm not in Knights-bridge. It hardly matters now. A black head of hair on the pillow. Right by my side.

"You're alright now. You're here."

"What happened."

"You just went down in a heap. I caught you falling. You feel any better."

"O God."

"You're alright now. You've got a bad chill. You won't think it's a liberty I took of removing off your suit. I hope you don't mind my boldness. I left the socks on you."

"I'm sorry to be of so much trouble."

"Sure it's nothing. No trouble. As easy as handling a child. I don't mean like now you were a child. Undressing a gentleman in decency is a funny enough thing. Your ribs show. You don't mind being in bed with me. My ribs show too. But tell me. Is your will power sapped."

"What."

"O God I don't know what I'm asking you at all now you're awake. But would you kiss me."

Take this black haired head. Rolling over on top of me. My own head throbbing. Wind whining around the window. Her mouth strangely sweet. On the eve, the end of my university career. Rain like pebbles against the window. Her breasts round and hard. Sinewy muscles in her arms lock tight in tiny bulges. All these weeks and months dreaming of a naked female body. Staring out silent from my evening rooms. Down on a college street glistening always glistening in the rain.

"Ah God you kiss like a demon. I have to pinch myself I've got you here in bed. It wasn't to save you dying out on the road. That I brought you in. It was to save me dying of loneliness. Your shirt is real silk. And here you are with the likes of me."

"You mustn't say things like that."

"Sure the contrast is fun. I know where I'm at. I'm from Cavan originally. Where I should have stayed. Well out of the allurements of the world. They tell you to keep your tabernacle of purity. The fearful toll you can pay for a moment's thrill. And I can tell you one I paid. In holidays I went back to Cavan. I used to sit thinking at the cottage door looking out to the road. It was my uncle's was the farm. Ah God I'd do chores, sitting on the milking stool pulling away on the teats. When the neighbour's son comes in and says give this here thing a yank. I thought what harm can it be. An innocent lass in my poor flowered shift. Only frock I had from age twelve to sixteen. I yanked it for him like I'd milk any of the cows. And wasn't I later reported to this priest. Up there in the pulpit every Sunday. Shovelling his loads of misery out on the heads of the poor parishioners. Ah God I thought, listen to him and dropping his bits of flattery to the shop keepers before the collection is taken. They washed my mouth out for weeks with soap. Beat me black and blue. Sure this is all Greek to you. It must be a wonderful thing to be an atheist. Or like your friend combining lechery and religion. Do I seem a stranger. I wanted to get you into bed. From the moment I clapped eyes on you back there in Dublin. Standing you were, so nervous. With your long blond silky hair just visible in the light. Then I thought you'd never speak to me walking along the street. I was itching just to put my arms around you. Like this. Listen to the wind. It's getting up a gale."