An Irish Christmas Feast (36 page)

Christmas morning presented itself without hail, rain or snow. The parishioners of Cushnalicka trooped to the earliest of the three masses being celebrated on the sacred occasion. As always the canon was celebrant. Several years earlier he had resigned from a major parish in the south of the diocese. Unable for the heavy work-load and with an unprecedented shortage of priests he explained to the bishop that he would not retire. What he would like was a small parish, very small if possible, with just one curate to help him. The bishop had duly obliged with Cushnalicka which made everybody happy, especially Mrs Topp. Housekeeper to a priest was a fine thing but housekeeper to a canon with his tasselled hat and twenty or more scarlet buttons down the front of his soutane would make her the envy of the parish.

After mass the congregation gathered in groups outside the church. The subject of conversation was the buggery and, of course, the attempted rape of the night before. The canon had only half listened as the housekeeper informed him of the terrible events that happened in his absence. As he was wont to do he doubted the veracity of all such tales and came to the conclusion that the housekeeper had been experimenting with his whiskey again. He never minded. She never took more than a glass or two and being a truly charitable man he concluded that she was as much entitled to the whiskey as he was provided she knew where to stop.

Despite the outrageous contents of his housekeeper's story he nevertheless took it upon himself to ring his friend the vicar. After the exchange of Christmas greetings and a promise to share a drink later in the day the vicar enlightened the canon regarding the events of the night before. Apparently when Johnny Naile arrived at the vicarage he was somewhat inebriated and mistook the master bedroom for the pantry.

The canon expressed no surprise. ‘Johnny Naile,' he told the vicar, ‘wouldn't know a pantry from a pea-shooter.'

Despite the fact that he was alcoholically incapacitated Johnny Naile made no noise as he entered the vicarage by the rear door and climbed the stairs to the master bedroom. Had he been wearing boots he would most certainly have been heard. Add to this the fact that the children were fast asleep having been out and about all day and would have dutifully pretended to be asleep anyway with the expectation of a visit from Santa Claus. The vicar had been preoccupied with his typewriter as he endeavoured to piece together a sermon for the following morning.

When Johnny arrived at the master bedroom he found the door open and the lights ablaze. Never before in his existence had he beheld such a bright and beautiful place. For a few hallucinatory moments he thought he might be in heaven but then he remembered the presents. Mrs Trupple had said they would be in the pantry and was not this the pantry! He tried high and low without success and then he was overcome by the heat of the place and by his exertions as well as the influence of three glasses of unwatered whiskey on an empty stomach. he fell across the large double bed and in a moment was fast asleep.

Alas, the vicar's wife lay reclining in her bath next door to the bedroom. Finishing her ablutions she rose and, totally oblivious to the happenings in the bedroom, entered that hallowed spot dragging a towel behind her and wearing only her birthday suit. The screams that followed were of a variety and pitch never before heard in the village of Cushnalicka. They were heard in every house. Those who slept were awakened and those who were awake wished they had been asleep. Prowling tomcats scurried into dark corners and the canines of the parish excelled themselves. The howling and the yowling would put a banshee to shame. Donkeys brayed in nearby fields and the moon raced for cover among the tattered clouds.

Johnny was released from custody just in time for last mass on Christmas Day. He had no recall whatsoever of the previous night's events. The vicar had called earlier to the barracks and explained everything. George Cudd, having listened to his prisoner for most of the morning, had already deduced that he was holding an innocent man – if holding is the term, for the solitary cell where Johnny was incarcerated was without a bolt or lock.

When mass was over he was showered with offers of Christmas dinners for word had spread that he was innocent of all charges. The only offer he accepted was the one from Blossom O'Moone.

Aenias Mackson, amiable as ever, kind and considerate, gave up his comfortable seat on the train. There were others who might have done so but they closed their eyes rather than look at the old lady with the large suitcase who had just come aboard. Christmas or no Christmas they had decided after they paid for their tickets that they would not surrender their seats on this occasion. Many would have done so in the past and felt that they had made their contributions, paid their dues so to speak and should be allowed to travel undisturbed, especially those going as far as Trallock one hundred and fifty miles down the line. Other male passengers who might have given in to the fragile figure so patently overburdened had varying reasons. Some would say that it was no concern of theirs, that if the old lady really wanted a seat she might have arrived earlier or travelled on the morning train.

One middle-aged man made an attempt to rise when she deposited her bag on the corridor by his side. He would have risen to his feet eventually. He had an elderly mother who had grown feeble in recent years and he wouldn't like to see her standing or so his conscience prompted him. He knew Aenias, had seen him several times in hotels and public houses in the city and would have laid a pound to a penny that he would volunteer his seat without a second thought. Not only did Aenias give up his seat to the old lady but he also saw to her luggage which consisted of the aforementioned suitcase and some small packages. Finding room for the suitcase presented problems as the overhead racks were already full. By removing his own smaller suitcase he managed to place the larger one, somewhat precariously, atop all the other luggage. In order to accomplish this he managed to stand on some toes and succeeded in brushing a lady's hat from her head.

‘Do you mind!' she exclaimed in stentorian tones.

‘That's my foot you know,' said the man on whose toe he had stepped unwittingly.

Aenias apologised profusely which was the only way he knew how to apologise. Having secured the old lady's possessions he found himself faced with another problem, the safe disposal of his own suitcase. The man with the toe pushed it down the corridor with his good foot as far as it could go and then firmly closed his eyes and folded his arms signalling his annoyance with Aenias.

‘There's nothing in it,' this from the lady whose hat had fallen off. She lifted the suitcase and laughed as she announced its probable contents to her fellow passengers.

‘More than likely a toothbrush,' she jibed and as she shook the case, ‘a razor, possibly a bottle of hair oil or cream and a pair of sweaty socks I bet.'

Her remarks were greeted with laughter that was neither derisory nor hurtful. It was a Christmassy laughter. Aenias Mackson joined in while he rattled the suitcase good-naturedly as he made his way to the bar. He had promised himself earlier that day that he would avoid the bar on the journey down. He had drunk his fill the night before and had spent the morning in a pub adjacent to the station loading up against the hang-over which the night had bequeathed him. He had promised his mother on the last occasion he had visited home that he would never arrive drunk again.

‘I would rather,' she said tearfully, ‘that you didn't come home at all.'

Well he wouldn't arrive home drunk this Christmas Eve. He would go to the train bar and nurse a few bottles of stout until he reached Trallock. He was well into his second bottle when the lady who had commented on his bag's contents entered.

‘Are you going to buy me a drink?' she demanded.

‘What would you like?' he asked gently.

‘Gin and tonic,' she replied.

When he returned with the drink they located a place near the door-way.

‘That man,' she said, ‘on whose toe you stood made a pass at me.'

‘Oh dear!' was all Aenias could say.

‘Is that all you can say?' she asked. ‘Anyway,' she continued, ‘was I right about the contents of the bag?'

‘More or less,' he answered. He did not tell her that while in the pub that morning he had opened the suitcase and in the true spirit of Christmas, as he might say himself, had given away the seasonal presents within to a poor family who had been occupying a nearby table when he had come in earlier. The presents were for two younger sisters and a brother at home in his native town and, of course, there was the headscarf for his mother. His father had died when Aenias was eight years old. He told his friends that he had never been the same afterwards.

‘No matter what I do,' he confided to a friend, ‘I'll never be the same. He was my world, my whole world.'

‘A man who makes a pass at a girl he's never seen before this,' his new companion informed him, ‘should be thrown off the train.'

As they sped towards Limerick City and then to his native Trallock she held his hand.

‘The only reason I'm holding your hand,' she explained, ‘is that I feel sullied after that man's pass at me. Well I suppose you could also say that I'm a little drunk and alone and maybe afraid too if the truth was told.'

They sat silently for a while, neither anxious to shatter the repose their companionship had brought them.

‘I have to go,' she said, ‘Limerick's coming up.'

He rose when she did and walked with her to her seat where she recovered her bags and her coat. He took the bags in hand and made his way towards the exit.

‘Will I see you again?' she smiled embarrassed by her courage.

‘I hope so,' he answered.

‘Have you got a biro?' she asked.

As he wrote her Dublin phone number on a slip of paper he spoke without raising his head. ‘I hope you'll be in when I ring you,' he said.

‘If I'm not,' she said, ‘you must ring again and again.' Then she was gone.

He found a vacant seat and a place for his suitcase and drifted into an uneasy slumber from which he did not waken until he arrived in Trallock. He looked at his watch. ‘Time for another drink,' he said.

His mother never went to bed before midnight. His sisters and brother would be awake expecting him. Despite many lapses over several Christmases their faith in him never wavered.

In a downtown pub he joined with a party of friends from his boyhood. After midnight had passed he reminded himself that he should go home. He was fully aware of the pattern into which he was falling. It was exactly the same as the past several Christmases. He was forced to admit that while he had a shilling in his pocket he was a compulsive avoider of home and family. He knew that his relationship with his mother was on the line and yet when he was asked by his friends if he was having another drink he confirmed that he was. He often asked himself if he was an alcoholic but he would always provide himself with reassuring answers. He could, for instance, go off the juice any time he wanted. He was popular with his friends. He had a good job in the Department of Industry and Commerce. His superiors had no complaints to make about him. Okay, so he owed a few pounds. He owed money to his mother. Frantically he searched his pockets. The presents which he had purchased and given away had taken their toll on his finances; so had the drinks he purchased.

In recall he realised that nobody had brought him a single drink all day, not until now. His needless extravagance with total strangers had left him with no more than a few pounds. Thank God he had purchased a return ticket. He remembered one very large order for which he had paid that morning in the pub near the station. A group of friends had joined his poor people at the next table. Introductions followed and he found himself paying for their drinks. He had been shocked at the price but he had insisted despite the protestations of the recipients. Phrases like ‘ah you're too decent!' and ‘he has a heart o' gold' started to drift back to him through the alcoholic excitement of the morning. Now he was left with a single five-pound note. Aenias had had eighty pounds starting out. He might not be an alcoholic but he was without doubt a wanton spendthrift. It would have to stop. He recalled the previous Christmas when his mother discovered he was broke and that this was the reason he stayed in bed over the holiday.

‘I'm not being hard on you Aeney,' she told him, ‘there's no need when you're so hard on yourself. You're just like your father, spending all you have on strangers and no thought for your own. How nice it would be for your brother and sisters if you took them to the pictures. If you had a car you could take us all for a drive.'

He had laughed bitterly but inwardly at this. A car! That was rich when he couldn't even afford a bicycle. The man behind the bar counter was calling time. Aenias looked at his watch. Mother o' God! Five o'clock in the morning! Where did the hours go! All victims of the season he told himself, the same as his money. As he walked home with his suitcase rattling he insisted to the stars overhead that he was just a creep. He found the key of the front door and tiptoed upstairs to bed. There was no sound in the house.

Later when he woke it was still dark but his watch told him that it was the darkness of the afternoon of Christmas Day. Why had nobody alerted him! The least they might have done was to call him for the mass or for his Christmas dinner. Downstairs his brother and sisters assured him that they had called him repeatedly but that he had been in a stupor every time. They placed his Christmas dinner in front of him. It was still hot but the pain in his head saw off his appetite. He pecked at the food and asked about his mother. When he didn't wake she had rented a cab and gone to her sister in the country. She might not return for a few days. She had not been feeling well. They were careful to lay no blame on him.

He told them how he had agonised about their presents and that he had no money either. He was truly ashamed of himself but they gathered round him and told him they loved him. They still had their Christmas monies, presents from neighbours, from aunts, uncles and cousins, dollars from America and English pounds galore. They heaped it upon him and to give him his due he faithfully recorded every penny he borrowed. The fact that he already owed them never entered the picture. In a few weeks he assured them he would repay every penny. He would go off the drink and he would never embarrass anybody again, particularly at Christmas. They told him he never embarrassed anybody in his life and that the money they gave him was a gift and that he was to forget about it.

They went for a walk round the deserted town stopping at each of the three churches to visit the sacred cribs where the infant Jesus lay, serenely, in his cot. The sisters Rita and Fiona, fifteen and fourteen, linked arms to their older brother throughout while Tom, the younger brother, brought up the rear. After an hour they returned to the family home where Aenias managed to finish most of the turkey and stuffing he had been unable to stomach earlier. Afterwards the foursome played cards and still later Aenias regaled them with city tales, largely humorous but sometimes unbearably sad. As the night wore on Aenias began to look at his watch with increasing regularity. His listeners guessed that his anxiety for drink was getting to him.

‘Why don't you two go for a drink?' the older sister suggested to the brothers.

‘Well now,' said Aenias with a chuckle, ‘that would be the very last thought in my head.'

‘Me too,' Tom put in, ‘but if my mother finds out life won't be worth living for the rest of the year.'

‘There's nobody here going to tell her,' Fiona assured him, ‘provided of course ...' and she left the phrase hanging as Aenias looked speculatively from one sister to the other.

‘Provided what?' he asked.

‘Well,' Fiona explained reluctantly. ‘He puked into the kitchen sink the last time and never cleaned up.'

‘I promise I won't ever again do that,' tom assured her. ‘I was green then.'

‘Of course you were.' Aenias clapped him on the back. ‘I puked in the kitchen sink myself when I was seventeen and you can be sure that very few sinks have escaped a good puke at this time of the year.

‘What time will you be back?' the younger sister asked.

‘We'll be back in an hour at the outside,' Aenias promised.

‘We'll wait up then.' The older sister's tone carried a trace of uncertainty. As the brothers left Aenias kissed both sisters and promised he would be as good as his word but again the pattern remained unchanged except that Tom had more than enough by the time midnight came round. Aenias would follow much later. He fell in with his companions of the previous night. They were pleased to see him. Those in big groups who failed to buy their rounds eventually found themselves isolated. It had been an established fact for years that Aenias always saw to his round and generally bought more than his share. Aenias left the premises where he had spent seven consecutive hours at six o'clock on the morning of St Stephen's Day or the Wren's Day as they still called it in the locality.

Aenias did not rise on the following day. The same dull headache assailed him when he awakened at noon. He declined all offers of food or drink and fell into a deep sleep from which he did not wake until nine o'clock that night. He missed the colourful wrenboys' bands with their spotless white uniforms, their tinselly, peaked caps and their painted moustaches as well as all the traditional singing and dancing for which they were justly famous.

Aenias crept round the room on tiptoe and located his trousers. He searched the pockets and found only a handful of silver. The pockets of his coat were not nearly as productive. He went back to bed. He could not face the group, who would surely be in the public house by now, without the price of a round at least. He realised that his brother and the girls were waiting downstairs but he did not have the heart to face them. Filled with self-loathing he reminded himself for the umpteenth time since he came home that he was nothing more than a creep.

‘I'm gone beyond redemption,' he said in a whisper, ‘and that's a terrible thing to say at Christmas.'