J. Donleavy - The Beastly Beatitudes of Balthazar B

"They're really cooking aren't they. I think you're wonderful."

The tiny kettle placed to boil. A pot of tea was served. Light yellow little cups and saucers. Stirred with silver spoons. We were covered in great linen napkins, swallowing down slices of quince and orange chunks of Leicester cheese. Patches of light in the southern sky. Westwards there must sink a redless sun. And I remembered a strange moment which seems so long ago. In the chemistry laboratory. Fitzdare working at a titration. Turning the glass stirrer in her solution. As she does now the spoon in her tea. And I watched spellbound as she took a spatulate of sulfur and melted it on an iron ladle over her bunsen flame. While I stood blank minded and bemused with my own haphazard group of substances, staring at her beauty and I nearly died when I thought she glanced and winked at me.

The afternoon passing away. Adrift. As the tiny tints of darknesses push west out of the east. We sit on these boggy bunches of grass. With the warm mellow taste of tea. Chewing chunks of cucumber and these brown little spicy meats. Moved back from the fire's exploding stones in the heat. Watching the fading glow. Two great black ravens. Feather fingers of their wings squawking as they squeezed down against the air and passed overhead. To dive and sideslip over the water and disappear into a meadow ringed with trees. Their low deep throated calls. And Miss Fitzdare lies staring at me as my eyes turn to hers.

"Balthazar."

"Yes."

"Would you marry me."

She sits propped up on her elbows near enough to touch her hand. And smells all heathery and milky fresh. As I smell of smoke and burning sausage fat. Daisy flowers peeking white and yellow from the grass. I race a thousand miles away. Over oceans and up through glaciered valleys sliding on the ice, shouting out questions against the snowy mountains and cold blue sky. Give me back an answer. From all the centuries of thinking. And a voice whispers, my dear man the world was never different and all hearts love the same. And now I can't get my mouth to speak.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked you that. I guess it's taken you very much by surprise. And I suppose there's someone else in your life."

"No. There isn't anyone else."

"Please. I didn't mean to say what I did, I just blurted it out, I don't know why. I was saying it before I knew what I was saying. And I don't mean to pry."

"And you want to take it back."

"No not really I don't."

A blade of grass squashing green, rubbed back and forth between Fitzdare's fingers. Little splashing waves falling against the shore. To come very close to her. Put my arm out under her shoulders. For the first time. Waited all these months. I kiss her. Lips stretched hard across her teeth. Her hesitating hand on the back of my neck. My nose goes buried under her hair. Nudging against a soft tender lobe of ear with nothing I can say. Unbuckle her belt, open her coat, four horn buttons undone and feel her breasts under lamb's wool. Nipples hardening there. The muscles of her arms go soft. And now her mouth under my lips. Opens tasting sweet. Despite the scandal which raged through college. Would you marry me she said. Under a deep deep blue above. Where stars come out amany across a great hushed canopy. When wisps of wind veer in off the lough. Be a little family here. Away from all the rest of the world. Singled out and now embrace this strange Fitzdare. Far from the grasping hands of the ruffian. Who could threaten me with bloody noses and black eyes. And now she will marry me. Both of us so lonely to say come please. Just the one of you to be with the one of me. Not through duty or because you must. But come because there is a breeze sprinkled with butterflies. And something in your heart says something to mine that neither can hear. But we know we must. We must. Stay close together. While cattle go mooing by. O God Fitzdare. My pole is shivering stiff between my legs. And my breath won't stay still. How can I tell you now. O God as the sperm spurts down my leg. A pearly liquid my Bella once held in her hand. And sown in her made a son. Wrap me tightly please as I hold you and softly cry. To tell you this. Love may be all the things you never know. As who sits beneath those slanting beams of sun. With little hammers under the rainbows counting crocks of gold. That's why I softly cry. And tell you. I have a son. I've not been married but I want you to know. It was with a woman when I was very young. And will it mean you don't want me now. And her arms squeezed me tight. She said. Nothing you say could make a difference but how sad for you. How very very sad. That it makes me cry too. Strange anyone would ever think you fast. And I know you're not. In spite of all the stories one can't help hearing at college. I want to say something to you now. That I'm happy you told me this. And I only want to hold you. And say your name. Balthazar. A fish jumped and splashed out on the silvered water. In all the silence around us here. Lying tightly held in each other's arms. The fire glows out its last heat. A curlew goes high whistling from its long curved beak. Over evening deeps. Sleeping. A little boy. Some little fellow. His heart a brother's heart. Gone away too.

Where

Flowers

Live.

The days gently flew. Like all the birds passing over the rolling low hills and island dotted loughs of Fermanagh. When rain wet Miss Fitzdare's hair and made little white holly blossoms of moisture there.

On that picnic afternoon we kissed as we walked and walked and kissed again. Up and down meadows to go deep among the haunted trees. To see the gravestones of her mother and little brother. And nannie of nine years faithful service. Under thick yew branches. Where the chiseled words said their names. And here on this hillock and small walled clearing in the wood, her father would be buried. And if never she married she might rest too.

That evening we stood out under the sky when dinner port and billiards were done. A moonlight on the lough. And Miss Fitzdare cupped her hands to her mouth and blew hoots. Which came back answered by owls for miles around. And I watched her go down a candle lit hall, waving back and blowing kisses as I stood at my door. Would she ever tell me where she lived. In all this big house. What turning would I take in the night. In what wing and up what stair would I find her. Which door to open. And step in.

I lay awake for hours. Had brushed my teeth. Looked in the mirror. To see what love had done. It made my eyeballs the purest white. And when we walked by a clear little brook. She reached down and pulled up the green leaves, the trailing roots and stems of watercress. And gave me eat from her hand. As she ate. Without fear of tiny specks of dead leaves or bark debris.

I fell at last to sleep. Passing in a dream into a college dance. At the door a chaperoning member of the faculty asked me where I was going. I said to the college hop. He said are you a member of this university. I was shattered, taken aback and angered by this aspersion. I grabbed him by his black gown. Gathering the cloth tightly in my fist and slamming him back against the wall. He was such an absolutely tiny person, no bigger than a rather small midget. And I was immensely much encouraged. To wrap him up in his great long scarf around his neck and juggle him nicely in my hand. But I might break his very white thin little wrists. And that wouldn't do. I was so amazed when he remained calm. Can't even scare people in dreams. And so I put my fingers in his collar and turned my knuckles in against his throat. Still this professor remained unflappable. And indeed was uppish. So I clouted him a medium blow on the cheek. Really only a finger flick. For the first time a little fear came into his eyes. I was so pleased. I said if you breathe a word of this to anyone and I am sent down from this university I will come back and kill you. By a resounding blow by truncheon across the mandible. And if you're not here I will search you out over the ends of the earth. Including the tourist depths of Killarney. And jump upon you from the dark. I left him there quite a bit disturbed. And I proceeded back from the dance to my college rooms. I had a great white throne for a crapper with frilly tassels about the seat. And a bath steaming with scents shielded with a Chinese lacquered screen. Horace stood in red raiment and white leather gaitors sprinkling perfumed salts from a crystal ladle and then suddenly there stood someone in the rising steam. Seemed a father of some girl I had wronged. Then the figure turned white and faded again till the wronged daughter was standing there. Where her father stood. And the whole wall was moving. And I was sure now I was awake and sitting up. In the streaming moonlight. And there God help me was Fitzdare. Coming right out of the wall. And said across the darkness as I reared in fear. It's me. And that was before I knew it was anything at all. And the wall behind her closed again. And tip toeing now to turn the key and lock my door. Returning smiling to my bed in a black silk dressing gown opened over her lavender gentleman's pyjamas. Her teeth biting into her lower lip, eyes alight with mischief I'd never seen before. I was aghast that this was still a dream. And said tell me is it true. And she came out with a purring laughter.