John McGahern - The Barracks

“We have a fine reputation to uphold,” Quirke was lecturing, “and if we don’t uphold that reputation for ourselves nobody else will do it for us. In the years ahead we’ll be seeking professional status and if we look upon ourselves as a depressed section of the community how will others look upon us? We must have pride in ourselves and in our work. And it’s up to people like you and me, Sergeant, in posts of responsibility, to set the tone.

“At an inspection the other day I asked a certain member of the Force what he knew of The Dangerous Drugs Act.

“He looked at me in such a way as to suggest I had asked him the way to the moon. Then I inquired did he know any dangerous drugs, could he name me one? And you wouldn’t credit the answer I got, Sergeant!”

“No,” Reegan had to prompt.

“ Mrs Cullen’s Powders . He said Mrs Cullen’s Powders was a dangerous drug. Can you credit that, Sergeant! What kind of respect can a man like that have for himself or his work? And that man would be the first to have his hand out for an increase of salary! And, I say, unless we raise the efficiency and morale of the Force, how can we expect to raise its status?”

Reegan listened to the moral righteousness without feeling anything but his hatred. This bastard has associated himself with the Police Force, he thought shrewdly; his notion of himself is inseparable from it. Why should he go against him when the wind wasn’t blowing his way, he’d wait his chance, and then let him watch out; but why should he do the strongman when the wind wasn’t blowing right, now he’d throw the bait of flattery, and watch the egotism swallow and grow hungry for more.

“There’s not many men in the country realize that as you do, sir. They’re not modern enough in their approach,” he cast and watched Quirke blossom as he swallowed.

“I’ve seen saying it for years. We must raise our status first ourselves before we can hope to get anywhere, but none of them seem to realize it, Sergeant.”

“That’s right, sir,” Reegan agreed; the slow, hard smile deep in the eyes.

“By the way, I heard your wife is in hospital. How is she?” Quirke grew to feel that he had indulged himself, and tried to switch the centre of interest to the other person, far too consciously and quickly.

“She’s coming home next week, sir,” Reegan’s face was as inscrutable as a mask.

“I’m glad to hear that. I suppose it’s time I was on my way. You’ll want to finish your spraying. And don’t forget to put those books right.”

“No, sir,” Reegan said.

“Good-bye so, Sergeant.”

“Good-bye, sir,” Reegan answered.

He waited till the car went. The straps were hurting his shoulders, his whole body was sore from having stood stiff for so long, the leakage had seeped through his clothes. Brennan came out of the dayroom as soon as the noise of the car had died. Reegan cursed as he eased the can from his shoulders and stretched his body.

“He stayed a long time talkin’,” Brennan opened carefully.

“Aye. And me with the can on me back like any eejit.”

Then Reegan laughed, it was mocking and very harsh.

“Do you know, Brennan, that you’re my subordinate? Do you know that I have to give good example to you fellas?”

The small, thin policeman shifted on his feet, he went to say something but it was so confused that it didn’t even reach his lips; he was upset and didn’t know what to say, he looked terribly overcome beside the wire. He couldn’t decide whether Reegan was serious or not. He was relieved when Reegan asked, “Did he tell you that the sergeant hadn’t made his report in the book?”

“No. I saw him examine it but he said nothing.”

“That’s the stuff,” Reegan jeered savagely. “That’s the proper way to behave! Never undermine an officer’s position before his men, isn’t that it?”

“That’s it,” the puzzled and upset Brennan agreed as Reegan hooted, “We in authority must give the good example. We in posts of responsibility must set the tone. Ah, Jasus, it’s a gas world, Brennan! There can be no mistake!”

“It’s a gas world surely,” Brennan agreed.

The lights were on in the church and women going by on the road to the Sodality Confessions when Reegan had the barrel of spray out and the can and barrel and jug washed clean of the poisonous stuff. He was tired and frustrated when he came into the meal the children had prepared, not able to bear to think how he had behaved with Quirke that day.

“Only a fool acts when he’s caught out on the wrong foot,” he reasoned. “Play them at their own game, that’s the way! Wait easy for your chance. And, Jesus, when I get the chance that bastard’d want to watch out for himself. There’s goin’ to be more than the one day on this job.”

He ate with the children hovering about in attendance, chewing slowly and not speaking; when he finished he went down to fill the books in the dayroom, bringing the knapsack sprayer to leave for Brennan to take home.

Elizabeth had recovered, the course of exercises were completed, she had the use of her arms again, these days beginning to be full of rich happiness, the wonder of herself and the things about her astonishing her at each turn. The marvel of the row of poplar trees outside the windows, their leaves quivering in their silver and green light; these women in the beds fighting to live in spite of their cancer; marvel of the shining trolleys and instruments and the young nurse telling about the dance she’d been at the night before. It frightened her to think that her life and herself were such rich and shocking gifts and almost all of the time she wasn’t able to notice.

She had terror of change. Sometimes in the evenings cousins would come to visit her and she used dread the first sight of them in the corridor — they would come and destroy everything! And they wouldn’t be five minutes at the bedside when the time was flying; the little charms and ruses she’d then have to use to try to prolong the visit to the last, her panic when the bell went and she was taking their hands — soon they’d be gone and her happiness could not be the same again.

She had such ease and peace and sense of everything being cared for: no fears, no worries, no hours of indecision; the same things were done at the same times every day; her meals came without her lifting a hand; nurses changed the tired sheets and they felt light and cool as air. She was plagued by no gnawing to see some guiding purpose in her days, she had to suffer no remorse for these hours spent in total idleness and comfort; for had she not given up her body to be healed and with it responsibility, so that this blessed ease was both her duty and her enjoyment.

Much of her time was spent idly dreaming. Reegan and the children and the policemen and the river flowing past the barracks and the ash trees. London, and she was one of a covey of girls crossing Whitechapel Road to get a train to take them to a dance in Cricklewood. The long, happy evenings when she used first go out with Halliday. Those nights on the wards during the war, the air-raid sirens worse than the bombs, and walking past the smoking craters in the mornings. Farther away mornings when she was a country child and rising with the larks to go down to the sheep paddocks with a sweet can for mushrooms, the grilling of them on a red coal, and Jesus just to taste them once more with salt and butter. Faces, faces from all the places and all the years, faces passed without a glance in the street one day and at the living centre of her life the next, and later to be no more than another displaced memory, made to flare in the mind again by some stray word or sight. Strange, it was all strange, she pondered to herself for hours; it was all so mysterious and strange and unknowable; and it did not burden her, she confronting it as dispassionately as it confronted her.