J. Donleavy - The Beastly Beatitudes of Balthazar B

The night full of flashing light, twisted grey pipes of fac-326 tories. By biscuit makers and piggeries and the shimmer of the canal. We pulled into Liverpool utterly late. Between the black sweating sooty walls. And missed the boat to Dublin. I felt everyone must know I carry all the French letters I do. Millicent looking up from her magazine in our first class compartment. As I looked at my watch. And she turned without a smile and said, you clot.

The grim bleak black station. The train emptying. Carts stacked high with mail. The smoking sighing locomotives and sulphurous smells. Liverpool covered in mist. A soft droplet rain staining footpaths with black sooty prints. Millicent in her all pale blue and pink. The great wide shady hat on her head. Sitting with teeth clenched on our stack of luggage. I phoned the Adelphi Hotel, sorry sir, all booked up. I phoned and phoned and the answer always the same. The strong midget professorial porter finally said he knew of a place. And a propos of nothing at all Millicent said that the announcement of the wedding in the paper had brought an avalanche of filthy literature and contraceptive advice. With my religious and gentlemanly feelings I was desperate to please. I said Fd get a taxi.

Up the dark grim cobble stone street. A wasteland of blackened rooftops and crazy chimney pots. In the shadows a dying plant in its flowerpot on a square foot of front garden before this house with a green door. Bed and breakfast, clean and select. In view of my wedding night I was glad it was both of these things. At the end of this long narrow hall a balding man eyes me rather suspiciously. Forge on, chilled hungry and begrimed, it hardly matters. Yes I have a double room for two. I said would he mind I would just go back and ask my wife. Just outside the door.

"I'm not going in there."

"Millicent everywhere is booked."

"You're such a clot, my God."

"Please it's just for tonight."

"Do you think I'm going to go into that place."

After much tugging. Embroidery and sheer fatigue. She moved. Up the steps, one by one. Standing tall, her elegant legs silhouetted against the wet glimmering street. The man standing ahead of me in this barren green walled hall. His grey cardigan buttoned. A blueish cloth knotted at his throat. Raising his hand and putting his head to the side as he peered at Millicent. Her heels clicking on the floor, her head rearing with disdain. Outside the taxi pulled away. The landlord leaning forward, putting his hands on his hips.

"Ere ere now, there'll be none of that now. None of that in this ere house. I keeps a respectable premises and there'll be none of that ere."

"I beg your pardon."

"Don't you beg my pardon. There'll be none of that kind of goings on in my hotel. Plenty of them kind of places down on the docks the bottom of the hill for that kind of caper."

"I beg your pardon."

"O yeah, sure you do. You'll beg my pardon too when I lose my licence for keeping a disorderly house."

"This lady here is my wife."

"I've heard that one before."

"And I have a marriage licence to prove it. Furthermore I would have thought you'd take more care than to risk slandering callers at your guesthouse."

This grey skinned man retreating silently for a key. I couldn't believe my own ears at my forceful say. Just as one wanted to run. Millicent's eyes wide with fascination, when one would have thought it might have been umbrage. We climb up two flights of stairs. Into a square green walled room, two electric converted gas mantles on the wall. Yellow and blue triangles across the linoleum floor. To shut the door and put a chair up against the knob. Millicent standing in the middle of the room absolutely still. I say things to her and she refuses to speak. My bag with the two gross of French letters left behind checked in the station. I thought all the way up on the train that I might try one of those coloured black. Just for size.

The lights left burning. All the night. Millicent after two hours leaning against the wall condescended to sit on a chair, hat on, wrapped in her coat. I sat fully clothed, elbows resting on my knees and my head in my hands in the center of the bed. To finally lie backwards and fall asleep. To dream of the brown envelopes on the floor of Crescent Curve when first I came back there from Paris. And pink envelopes started to fall and cascade down the stairs. Building up around me as I stood. I had Fitzdare's photograph in my hands. Which shook as I said Elizabeth. To see her small smile across her lips and the soft waves flowing back from her hair. The beads of light in her eyes shining like the beads of her pearls. When the clouds were grey and blue. Across the morning breezy sky of Fermanagh. Stood there. Seeing. Racing along the green edge of the sparkling lough. In that morning crystal air, the earthly God forbidden splendour of Elizabeth Fitzdare. And the words I hear.

'Take me out of here."

Millicent in the same position on her chair. One long leg folded over the other squeezing out a curving mound of flesh. A long hacking coughing and upheaving coming through the wall of the next room. Sound of water draining and a toilet flushing. The lids droop on Millicent's eyes and she snaps awake again. I must go and take an urgent and desperate pee.

"Did you hear what I said. I said take me out of here."

"Yes. I will. Just excuse me. I must go to the water closet. I'm sorry."

Down this hall past a door. Inside the springs of a bed rustily squealing. Pushing the latch on this broken water closet I cut my finger. And held it coagulating between the open crack of window. The morning light and foggy air. Back ends of houses and garbage strewn yards. A window lit. A girl stands spreading something on a piece of bread with a knife. She is pretty and sharp bosomed in a moss green sweater. Takes up a kettle in her hand. My pee comes out. Lean further towards the crack to see. And she's seen me. Makes a rude gesture with her fingers. Pulls a tattered curtain across the window. Send her an apology on my calling card. Tell her about the whole horrid mess because of derailment and fog. You girl, buttering your bread. I was only standing peeing. The morning after my wedding night. My soul strewn with a simple little hope to please my wife. My prick in my hand. From which I shake the last drops. And they go, with my tears down my cheeks. Into the toilet bowl.

Among these breakfasting figures I pushed a tray along a self service rail. Had coffee, two sausages, bacon and egg. Gritty around my collar. Greasy round the egg. Face feeling stiff with sleeplessness and grime. Millicent sat across the table and refused to eat. And after silence through the morning she spoke as we sat amid hotel palms for tea,

"Who is Fitzdare."

"Fitzdare."

"Yes. You were shouting it out in your sleep. And you writhed. It was quite horrid to watch."

As the ship cut through the water. And at dawn Dublin loomed in the west. I never said who Fitzdare was. Ten o'clock last night rung high up on the Royal Liver Building shaking the great birds atop held against the wind. The dark heaving pier. I had two bottles of stout in the bar before I went to bed. Millicent in the top bunk. The ship hitting a bit of rough sea. I undressed falling about the cabin. I was trying to find the ladder up to her bunk. My pole so hard I thought it would break. Feeling exposed and awkward when it waves about. Apologise and explain that it did it when least I knew why and often when I was only counting money. To now take it with me wagging up step by step to kiss her on the cheek.

"Get your drunken hands off me."

She reached out and shoved me on the shoulder. I fell from the ladder with a crash. And lay in silent naked agony. A terrifying pain across my shoulder and down my arm. Waking in a cold sweat in the dawn of this lower berth. The path of death so well worn by the many gone before. The brown plastic ventilator in the ceiling. Lifebelts in racks over the top bunk. A brass vomit bowl and a white chamber pot. Catching my breath with pain. Struggling to look out the porthole. The sea calm. A dredger, grey and still. Dublin lies flat and ahead, hills rising out around her. The Sugarloaf beyond Dalkey. The sky all faint blues. A squat row of the little houses as the ship turns round. Down those alleys went Beefy in all his degrees of devilment. See a pair of great iron hooks and the cables winching in the bows. Ships. The Manta. Netta from Rotterdam. The Glenbridge from Dublin.