Gavin Corbett - This Is the Way

Really she says.

We will go no problem, no problem at all I says.

It was a peace and calm I was feeling in that room that library. I cannot describe it. I felt that lightness again in the head and the heart. It was wet out and I was warm looking out the window. Judith was telling me I would have to read the words of the play to Arthur and I says that is no problem, no problem, because he has a great memory for words as well as stories.

I went finding him after and he was in Saint Stephen’s Green Park. His arse was wet on a bench. I says you will get a cold and he says I will not. In my head I says he is worried that Judith does not want him for her plays and he does not care if he is dead of a cold now. That was his face, it was dead gone beyond, it was he did not care. You are ready for the worst I says to him and I was laughing.

I was laughing that evening, it was the mood I was in, and he was not.

I says you not excited about doing plays again.

He says I am but he did not look it.

I says let’s see this new play she wants you in and he gave it to me. It said on the front of it Barry Lyndon adapted by Judith Neill from the novel by William Makepeace Thackeray. I says what part are you in this.

He says a fella called Redmond.

I looked for some of the words said by Redmond. I read it loud I says that’s all the money my mother had in the world. Mightn’t I be allowed to keep it. I’m just one step ahead of the law myself. I killed an English officer in a duel and I’m on my way to Dublin until things cool down.

I laughed I says sure it’s not me that’s meant to be Redmond.

He was awful moody, I seen it, he would not talk.

I says what’s wrong with you.

There’s nothing wrong he says.

This is harder work for you than you thought I says. You will have to be learning all these words I says.

And I am cold he says.

He asked me about the day and I said it to him about the meeting in Judith’s house on the Sunday. I said it to him we were meeting people and being shown the ways now like we said we wanted. I said it to him about American visitors gathered outside the library. I knew by the voices of them I says to him. They were in yellow waterproof sheets and they were brightening the rain was the way.

We slept sound that night.

I says it to him last thing we will read through the script of the play and we will have it good and you will remember the words.

I lay on my bed Arthur snoring there in the camp bed, this was the way it was now weeks him being there. This time I did not think of it when will you go. I was not depressed these days, I was not down or afeard. I thought of how it came about Arthur being in my room in the city of Dublin. This Redmond came to Dublin after he killed an English officer in a duel until things cooled down and I was in Dublin until things cooled down and Arthur was in my room until things cooled down. I was not worried now the troubles might have been caused. In my head these were old troubles. They had a sweep to them, they were moved along. All them Gillaroos might have been standing sticks burning slash hooks dripping over the side of the world and I did not care what I done to them and what they said would be done to me. They were stories, they were part of stories. They were people with hanging mouths and crooked stovepipe hats put in my way. I looked at the light on the ceiling looking down on us. It moved across, left over to right, the same as reading. When it was gone there was a weaker green light left shaking, moving like water. There is a thing called fate, I said it loud. Arthur was sound asleep he did not say anything.

I thought of it like this. It was fate put Arthur in this room with me. It was fate brought me to the centre, it was fate made me see the notice about the theatre group. It was fate made it. It was written on my hand, it was written on Arthur’s hand. It was fate made stories of the things in the world.

I dreamed of the lady in blue and in green again. I did not know if it was Judith or the Blessed Mother or my own mother or the girl from Spain or no one in the dream. That is the thing about dreams. They are not stories and you cannot stop them.

Mister FX came to the house with the Spanish girl. The Spanish girl’s name was Conchita. She had red hair, yellow skin and black eyes and she was wearing a Mickey Mouse jumper. She smelt of parma water was what she said. Mister FX had his hand on her shoulder. He says this is the girl that’s going to be staying with you for the rest of the summer. My father put out his hand. He says how are you girl.

Mister FX said Conchita was up since the early hours. She had to get two planes to get to Ireland. He says Mister Sonaghan and Anthony here will look after you now. He looked in Conchita’s face. He says Mister Sonaghan and Anthony will look after you now okay.

Conchita says I understand.

Mister FX says to me and my father you’ll have to take it slowly with her. He says to Conchita this is a good house Conchita. It’s a house of God and Anthony is a good reader he says.

Me and my father brought Conchita to Margarita and Beggy’s room. I lifted Conchita’s case on to Beggy’s bed. My father patted Margarita’s bed. It was a high and soft bed. He says this is the bed you’ll be sleeping in Conchita. Conchita opened her case. She took out a cross and put it on the pillow of Margarita’s bed. My father says wait a minute and he went out the room. Conchita looked at me. She smiled at me. Her mouth was bursting with teeth. She says what is your name aaaa.

Anthony I says to her.

I pointed at her. Conchita I says.

She went to her case again and took something else out. It was a picture of a man with no hair and black glasses. The picture was Pope David of the Catholic Church of Utrera. She put it at the window. My father came in with a hammer and a nail and he hung the cross on the wall beside the picture of the Blessed Mother that he put there three days before.

Mister FX had said to my father that Conchita would need a big Irish dinner her first evening. My father got potatoes and carrots and a lump of ham and boiled them. When Conchita came down for dinner she was wearing a black skirt and a black jumper. She had black tights on her legs. She had a bottle of wine in a paper bag. We sat at the table and my father said his prayer in Latin. When he was finished he says to Conchita do you say that prayer at home in Spain.

She says yes.

Then she says I don’t understand Latin. She took the bottle of wine out the paper bag. This is from my parents for you she says.

My father got three cups and put them on the table. He poured wine for myself and himself. Do you drink wine he says to Conchita.

Yes says Conchita.

Your father would allow that he says.

In Spain we drink wine from when we are small she says.

When we were eating the food Conchita said she didn’t like ham, she liked fish. She came from a part of Spain there was a lot of fish. It was on the sea. She said that when she was leaving her house in the early hours that morning her father had to stop his car at the train tracks to let the train pass that was bringing the fish to the middle of Spain.

My father said to Conchita he wasn’t expecting her to have red hair. I thought a Spanish girl would have black hair he says.

Conchita said the part of Spain she was from was like Ireland the people said. It was green like Ireland because it rained and the people played the pipes. It wasn’t many had red hair though she said. She stuck out with her red hair. From when she was small people called her the word that was the Spanish word for red.

But it’s a red you wouldn’t be used to seeing my father says. He was right, her hair was a dark red, dark for dark skin.