An Irish Christmas Feast (4 page)

There are few snores with the depth and resonance of whiskey snores. They rebounded from the walls and filled the kitchen to overflowing. The only danger to the whiskey snorer is that, more often than not, his slumber is disrupted by one of his own creations. In this instance it was another sound which infiltrated Jacko Mulholland's malt-induced insensibility. At first he stirred irritably, grimaced and then groaned before opening bleary eyes. The first object to catch his eye was the mantelpiece clock. The hands indicated that he had slept for several hours. There was that annoying noise again. It sounded as if somebody was knocking at the front door but who could be knocking at twenty past one in the morning? He decided to ignore it.

From time to time over the years he would be roused from his slumbers early on the mornings of religious festivals and football matches by agricultural labourers who would have specially commissioned new pairs of trousers for such occasions. He never minded, provided payment was forthcoming, but this was different. Twenty minutes past one on the morning of Christmas was downright uncivil to say the least. He decided to ignore it, certain that the knocker would become discouraged after a while. He reached out his hand for the whiskey bottle. This time he dispensed with the glass and lifted the jowl to his lips. The whiskey bubbled and gurgled as he upended the bottle. Just at that moment the knocking started again. He lowered the bottle and placed it on the table. The knocking persisted. He had never been subjected to anything quite like it and yet it wasn't loud nor was it sharp and still it grated to such a degree that he was obliged to place a finger in either ear. Normally this would succeed in at least diminishing the sound but not in this instance for the harder he pressed his fingers into the well-waxed canals the more piercing the knocking became. Perplexed he withdrew his fingers. Reluctantly he moved towards the door. He did not open it at once. He peered through the curtains of the sitting-room window in the hope of catching a glimpse of the knocker. There was nothing to be seen.

He climbed the stairs and entered the front bedroom. He looked down on to the street but there was nothing. Indeed, from his vantage point which afforded an unrestricted view of the entire street, there wasn't a solitary soul to be seen. All the sounds of revelry had long since abated and nothing stirred. The roadway was still wet after a heavy shower which had fallen while Jacko slept. A blissful calm had followed. Then came another bout of the nerve-shattering knocking. Silently he opened the window and, leaning out, peered downward. There was nothing. He withdrew but no sooner had he closed the window than the knocking commenced once more. He rushed downstairs and opened the door. Standing before him was a small boy who could not have exceeded seven or eight years in age. The youngster was impeccably dressed, shining white shoes, a snow-white shirt and red vermilion necktie, a double-breasted navy blue suit and a cream-coloured felt hat which he lifted respectfully from his immaculately slicked head as soon as Jacko Mulholland opened the door. On the child's face was an angelic smile. He was about to speak when Jacko seized him round the throat with his right thumb and index finger.

‘Are you a lorgadawn or what!' Jacko roared as he tightened the grip on the pale, slender throat so easily encircled by the powerful fingers, stronger than any in the street from constant stitching, knotting and threading. The boy wriggled in his grasp, unable to answer.

‘Are you a lorgadawn!' Jacko shouted a second time.

All the boy could do was shake his head but even this proved difficult. The pressure from the long, thin fingers was overpowering. Coarse and calloused they cut into his neck. Then suddenly Jacko let go. The boy gingerly felt his throat where the fingers had lingered for so long.

‘Who in God's name are you?' Jacko asked gruffly but with none of the fury which accompanied his first question.

‘I'll tell you who I am if you promise to keep calm,' the boy replied.

‘You have my promise,' came the assurance from Jacko.

‘I am your grandson,' the boy informed him.

‘My what?' Jacko roared.

‘See,' said the boy, ‘you're breaking your promise already. You promised you'd keep calm,' the boy replied.

‘Is this some kind of joke boy?' Jacko asked fiercely and would have seized him again had not the visitor lifted his hand and announced solemnly that beyond any shadow of doubt he was indeed his grandson.

‘But how can that be?' Jack asked. ‘I am only thirty years of age and I was never married. In fact I was never with anyone but the one woman and I never put a hand above her knee.'

‘The fact remains,' the boy was adamant, ‘that I am your grandson John J. Mulholland.'

‘I am also John J. Mulholland,' Jacko informed him, ‘but they call me Jacko.'

‘I should, of course, have said,' the visitor was apologetic now, ‘that I will be your grandson in the course of time. Strictly speaking I am not your grandson right now. What you see before you is an unborn presence which will arrive into this world on a date yet to be decided.'

‘Oh,' said Jacko Mulholland impressed by the boy's forthrightness, ‘I see. I see. Would you like to step inside?'

‘I cannot do that,' came the polite reply, ‘but thank you all the same.'

Jacko suddenly knelt down and took the boy's hands gently in his.

‘And to think,' he chided himself tearfully, ‘I treated you so roughly and you my very own grandson, my flesh and blood.'

‘Don't blame yourself,' young John J. Mulholland's tone held a wealth of tenderness, ‘how could you know who I was until I told you?'

At this juncture he helped Jacko to his feet.

‘There are certain conditions to be fulfilled,' he warned, ‘before all this comes to pass.'

‘I'll play my part.' Jacko spoke fervently, the tears coursing down his dishevelled face.

‘Know one thing now for certain,' he said, ‘and that is your grandfather won't be found wanting no matter what the score.'

‘First you must marry,' young John J. insisted, ‘and, which is more, if all the heavenly calculations are to be accurately realised, you will go to the altar with your bride in six months' time to the very day.'

‘My bride!' Jacko asked. ‘Who is she to be?'

‘My grandmother, of course,' came the emphatic response.

‘Yes. Yes,' Jacko entreated, ‘but her name. Tell me her name.'

‘Her name,' said young John J., ‘is Mary Moles.'

‘Yes. Yes,' Jacko promised slobberingly. ‘I'll face her at first light and propose.'

‘Now,' said young John J., ‘I must leave you. I have a long journey and further delay could be fatal.'

‘Will I see you again?' Jacko Mulholland asked plaintively.

‘Of course you will,' came the positive response. ‘You will teach me how to fish and how to tie flies like a true grandfather.'

‘And,' Jacko paused before posing the next question, ‘will I have much time with you?'

‘Oh yes,' came the heart-lifting assurance, ‘you will see me to the very threshold of manhood and when your job is done you will depart this worldly scene for the happier climes of heaven at the great age of eighty-four years. Now I must bid you farewell.'

So saying young John J. took his future grandfather's hand and kissed it gently. Then he was gone.

The street was empty but it was no longer desolate. Lights were coming on in the houses and there was the sound of a baby crying for its morning milk. There were other sounds, laughter and song snatches and the crowing of roosters and there were odours, the tantalising aroma of frying rashers, the age-old smell of turf and timber smoke and the salty tang of the distant sea in the rising breeze.

Like all lonely men Jacko Mulholland adored the morning. He regarded it as the fairest of all the day's times, unsullied and pure, ever adorning and gilding. A whistling milkman cycled past, his gallons rattling from either handle-bar.

‘A happy Christmas to you Jacko,' he called and redoubled his pedalling.

‘And the same to you Eddie,' Jacko Mulholland shouted in his wake.

Later, after he had shaved and breakfasted, Jacko closed the front door behind him. The earliest of the Christmas morning mass-goers were abroad, mostly elderly, fearful of being without a seat in the crowded church. Their reactions were mixed when Jacko, taciturn for fourteen years, extended the compliments of the season. Some responded instantly while others were so overcome by shock and surprise that words failed them.

‘It's you is it?' Mary Moles valiantly strove to hide her surprise when she opened the door and saw him standing there. He followed her into the kitchen where her aged parent sat at the head of the table spooning porridge into a toothless mouth. Between spoonfuls he protested, in undertones, about the perfidy of humanity, indicting females in particular. His mouth opened wordlessly when he beheld Jacko Mulholland. It opened still wider when without warning of any kind Mary Moles found her upper body imprisoned in the arms of her one-time suitor. She protested not nor did she yield an inch of ground. Rather did she place her soft hands at the back of his neck and respond with all the vigour she could muster.

Six months later they were married and they lived happily ever after apart from a spirited row now and then which only served to enliven the relationship.

Thus ends John J. Mulholland's tale. It was told to him by his grandfather not long before the old man passed away at the ripe old age of eighty-four.

‘As for me,' John J. eased himself from his stool and handed his empty glass to Mikey Joe, ‘I don't remember having hand, act or part in the proceedings.'

He moved to the life-sized mirror near the doorway, examined his reflection carefully and at length. He gingerly traced the finger-thin red weal, the origins of which, according to John J. Mulholland, had baffled the world's leading dermatologists since he was first referred to them by the family doctor at the tender age of eight!

Fred Spellacy would always remember the Christmas he spent as a pariah, not for the gloom and isolation it brought him nor for the abuse. He would remember it as a period of unprecedented decision-making which had improved his lot in the long term.

Fred Spellacy believed in Christmas. Man and boy it had fulfilled him and for this he was truly grateful. Of late his Christmases had been less happy but he would persevere with his belief, safe in the knowledge that Christmas would never really let him down.

‘Auxiliary Postman Required'. The advertisement, not so prominently displayed on the window of the sub post office, captured Dolly Hallon's attention. Postmen are nice, Dolly thought, and they're kind and, more importantly, everybody respects them. In her mind's eye she saw her father with his postbag slung behind him, his postman's cap tilted rakishly at the side of his head, a smile on his face as he saluted all and sundry on his way down the street.

If ever a postmaster, sub or otherwise, belied his imperious title that man was Fred Spellacy. It could be fairly said that he was the very essence of deferentiality. He was also an abuse-absorber. When things went wrong his superiors made him into a scapegoat, his customers rounded on him, his wife upbraided him, his in-laws chided him. His assistant Miss Finnerty clocked reproachfully as though she were a hen whose egg-laying had been precipitately disrupted. She reserved all her clocking for Fred. She never clocked at Fred's wife but then nobody did.

‘Yes child?' Fred Spellacy asked gently.

‘It's the postman's job sir.'

Fred Spellacy nodded, noted the pale, ingenuous face, the threadbare clothes.

‘What age are you?' he asked gently.

‘Eleven,' came the reply, ‘but it's not for me. It's for my father.'

‘Oh!' said Fred Spellacy.

Dolly Hallon thought she detected a smile. Just in case, she forced one in return.

‘What's his name, age and address child?'

‘His name is Tom Hallon,' Dolly Hallon replied. ‘His age is thirty-seven and his address is Hog Lane.'

Fred Spellacy scribbled the information onto a jotter which hung by a cord from the counter. He knew Tom Hallon well enough. Not a ne'er-do-well by any means, used to work in the mill before it closed. He recalled having heard somewhere that the Hallons were honest. Honest! Some people had no choice but to be honest while others didn't have the opportunity to be dishonest.

‘Can he read and write?'

‘Oh yes,' Dolly assured him. ‘He reads the paper every day when Mister Draper next door is done with it. He can write too! He writes to his sister in America.'

‘And Irish? Has he Irish?'

‘Oh yes,' came the assured response from the eleven year old. ‘He reads my school books. He has nothing else to do!'

‘Well Miss Hallon here's what you must get your father to do. Get him to apply for the job and enclose a reference from someone in authority such as the parish priest or one of the teachers. I don't suppose he has a curriculum vitae!'

‘What's that?' Dolly Hallon asked, her aspirations unexpectedly imperilled.

‘The jobs he's had, his qualifications ...'

Fred Spellacy paused as he endeavoured to find words which might simplify the vacant position's requirements.

‘Just get him to put down the things he's good at and don't delay. The position must be filled by noon tomorrow. Christmas is on top of us and the letters are mounting up.'

Dolly Hallon nodded her understanding and hurried homewards.

Fred Spellacy was weary. It was a weariness imposed, not by the demands of his job but by the demands of his wife and by the countless recommendations made to him on behalf of the applicants for the vacant position. Fred Spellacy's was a childless family but there was never a dull moment with Fred's wife Alannah always on the offensive and Fred the opposite.

Earlier that day he had unwittingly made a promise to one of the two local TDs that he would do all within his power for the fellow's nominee. Moments later the phone rang. It was the other TD. Fred had no choice but to make the same promise.

‘Don't forget who put you there in the first place!' the latter had reminded him.

Worse was to follow. The reverend mother from the local convent had called, earnestly beseeching him not to forget her nominee, a genuine vessel of immaculacy who was, she assured him, the most devout Catholic in the parish. Hot on her heels came others of influence, shopkeepers, teachers and even a member of the civic guards, all pressed into service by desperate job-seekers who would resort to anything to secure the position. Even the pub next door, which had always been a
sanctum sanctorum,
was out of bounds. The proprietor, none more convivial or more generous, had poured him a double dollop of Power's Gold Label before entreating him to remember one of his regulars, a man of impeccable character, unparalleled integrity, unbelievable scholarship and, to crown all, one of the lads as well!

‘Come in here!' There was no mistaking the irritation in his wife's voice. She pointed to a chair in the tiny kitchen.

‘Sit down there boy!' She turned her back on him while she lit a cigarette. Contemptuously she exhaled, revelling in the dragonish jets issuing from both nostrils.

Fred sat with bent head, a submissive figure. He dared not even cross his legs. He did not dare to tell her that there were customers waiting, that the queue at the counter was lengthening. He knew that a single word could result in a blistering barrage.

‘Melody O'Dea,' she opened, ‘is one of my dearest friends.'

Her tone suggested that the meek man who sat facing her would grievously mutilate the woman in question given the slightest opportunity.

Again she drew upon the cigarette. A spasm of coughing followed. She looked at Fred as though he had brought it about.

‘Her char's husband Mick hasn't worked for three years.'

Alannah Spellacy proceeded in a tone unused to interference, ‘so you'll see to it that he gets the job!'

She rose, cigarette in mouth, and drew her coat about her.

‘I'll go down now,' she announced triumphantly, ‘and tell Melody the good news!'

When Tom Hallon reported for work at the sub post office at noon the following day Alannah Spellacy was so overcome with shock that she was unable to register a single protest. When Tom Hallon donned the postman's cap, at least a size too large, she disintegrated altogether and had to be helped upstairs, still speechless, by her husband and Miss Finnerty. There she would remain throughout the Christmas, her voice fully restored and to be heard reverberating all over the house until she surprisingly changed her tune shortly after Christmas when it occurred to her that the meek were no longer meek and must needs be cossetted.

Alannah had come to the conclusion that she had pushed her husband as far as he would be pushed. Others would come to the same realisation in due course. Late in his days, but not too late, Fred Spellacy the puppet would be replaced by a resolute, more independent Fred.

Fred had agonised all through the previous night over the appointment. In the beginning he had formed the opinion that it would be in his best interest to appoint the applicant with the most powerful patron but unknown to him the seeds of revolt had been stirring in his subconscious for years. Dolly Hallon had merely been the catalyst.

Fred had grown weary of being told what to do and what not to do. The crisis had been reached shortly after Dolly had walked out the door of the post office.

That night, as he pondered the merits of the score or so applicants, he eventually settled on a shortlist of four. These were the nominees of the two TDs, his wife's nominee and the rank outsider, Tom Hallon, of Hog Lane.

He had once read that the ancient Persians never made a major judgement without a second trial. They judged first when they were drunk and they judged secondly when they were sober. As he left the post office Fred had already made up his mind. He by-passed his local and opted instead for the privacy of a secluded snug in a quiet pub which had seen better days. After his third whiskey and chaser of bottled stout he was assumed into that piquant if temporary state which only immoderate consumption of alcohol can induce.

From his inside pocket he withdrew Tom Hallon's curriculum vitae and read it for the second time. Written on a lined page neatly extracted from a school exercise book it was clearly the work of his daughter Dolly. The spelling was correct but the accomplishments were few. He had worked in the mill but nowhere else. He had lost his job through no fault of his own. Thus far it could have been the story of any unemployed man within a radius of three miles but then the similarities ended for it was revealed that Tom Hallon had successfully played the role of Santa Claus for as long as Dolly could remember. While the gifts he delivered were home-made and lacking in craftsmanship his arrival had brought happiness unbounded to the Hallon family and to the several other poverty-stricken families in Hog Lane.

‘Surely,' Fred addressed himself in the privacy of the snug, ‘if this man can play the role of Santa Claus then so can I. If he can bear gifts I can bear gifts.'

He rose and buttoned his coat. He pulled up his socks and finished his stout before proceeding unsteadily but resolutely towards the abode of Dolly Hallon in Hog Lane.

He had been prepared, although not fully, for the repercussions. The unsuccessful applicants, their families, friends and handlers, all made their dissatisfaction clear in the run-up to Christmas. They had cast doubts upon his integrity and ancestry in language so malevolent and scurrilous that he was beyond blushing by the time all had had their say.

One man had to be physically restrained and the wife of another had spat into his face. He might not have endured the sustained barrage at all but for one redeeming incident. It wanted but three days for Christmas. A long queue had formed at the post office counter, many of its participants hostile, the remainder impatient.

From upstairs came the woebegone cronawning of his obstructive spouse and when the cronawning ceased there came, down the stairs, shower after shower of the most bitter recriminations, sharper and more piercing than driving hail. He was very nearly at the end of his tether.

‘Yes!' he asked of the beaming face which now stood at the head of the ever-lengthening queue. There was no request for stamps nor was there a parcel to be posted. Dolly Hallon just stood there, her pale face transformed by the most angelic and pleasing of smiles. She uttered not a single word but her gratitude beamed from her radiant countenance.

Fred Spellacy felt as though he had been included in the communion of saints. His cares vanished. His heart soared. Then, impassively, she winked at him. Fred Spellacy produced a handkerchief and loudly blew his nose.