Beatlebone (3 page)

That'll put hairs on me chest, he says.

Okay, the kid says.

Peat and smoke—it tastes of the past and uncles, sip by the beaded sip. He doesn't really drink anymore. No booze, no junk, no blow. These are the fucking rules. He is macrobiotic. He is brown-rice-and-vegetables. The stations of the fucking cross. A read—that would be an idea. The room has grown sombre as the night finds its depth. What's the fucking word? Crepuscular. He flicks a lamp switch against it. The amber light of the lamp as it warms weakly on the old flock wallpaper brings the waft or flavour—you can't miss it—of Edwardian time. Oh and here's a word—Edwardiana. Very nice. The word gives dapperness, and tapered strides, and teddy boys. He looks around his tiny room beneath the eaves and laughs—the West of Ireland by night. Oh just taking the fucking air, really. I'll have a stroll in a bit. Try not to fuck myself in the briney. Fathomless depths, et cetera. Oh Christ, a read—fill up this sour brain with words. He slides a drawer on the tiny dresser—the dresser is so tiny it might be for the fittings of elves—and there is no Gideon's, not as such, but there is an old book there:

The Anatomy of Melancholy
by Richard Burton

Richard fucking Burton? What kind of establishment is this? Now the melodious syllables come to shape his lips—hammy, taffy, lispy, vaguely faggy? How did it go? In
Under Milk Wood
? He looks in the dull silver of the dresser's mirror and mouths the words—

I know there are

Towns lovelier than ours,

And fairer hills and loftier far,

And groves more full of flowers

And boskier woods more blithe with spring…

Boskier? Fuck me. He flicks through the pages. Okay. It's a different Richard. And there are all sorts herein. He falls onto the bed. He unknits his long, cold limbs. He falls into the drugged pages. He reads for hours and every now and then

Thou canst not think worse of me than I do of myself.

he speaks aloud but

Melancholy can be overcome only by melancholy.

just the two words, repeated

He that increaseth wisdom, increaseth sorrow.

over and over again

If you like not my writing, go read something else.

fuck me,

fuck me,

fuck me.

At last he gives in to the night or at least makes an arrangement with it. He sleeps a long, unquiet sleep disturbed by quick dreams of woodland places. These come as no great surprise. He meets elves and sprites and clowning devils. Anxiety? He wakes at last to a new world and to a morning lost in a heavy mist. Sorely his bones ache—he traces the length of the soreness with a long, dull, luxurious sighing. Which is very pleasant, as it happens. Though also he feels about ninety fucking six. The grey buildings outside have softened in the mist and in places have all but disappeared. The hills across the river are entirely wiped out. He feels oddly at home, as though he's woken to this place every day of his life: a sentimentalist. Maybe as the grocer or as the farmer or as the priest. Now his calm is broken by a set of angry steps come along the passage and a mad rapping on the door and the door is nearly off its bloody hinges—

You'd better come in!

It's Hatchet-Face, his favourite crone, and she's on the warpath—

Great spouts of steam gush from her hairy ears.

Her pinned eyes are livid and searching.

Her mouth contorts to a twisted O.

Who's dead? he says.

She runs a filthy look around the room.

She sniffs the air as if he's pissed the bed.

Do you realise, she says, that it's hapist ten in the morning?

Hapist? he says. Already?

There are people, she says, with half a day put down.

Best thing you can do with days.

She eyes him—an owl for a mouse—and sucks her teeth. There is dark auntly suspicion in the glance, as if he's been having a sneaky one off the handle. A clamminess, as of families. He has been drawn back into something here. The clock runs backwards. He holds the covers boyishly against his chest.

Had I better make a move, love?

You'd better, she says. There's a woman down there has a home to go to.

A woman?

That does the breakfasts.

Oh, he says. Her with the brass band.

She has the mother bad. The mother is left with half a lung to her name. The other half is not viable. Or so they're saying. All I know is she'd want to be gone home to the mother an hour since or the mother'll be gone out the blasted window. Again.

To be honest, love, I'm not big on brekkie. A Pepsi and a fag'll do me. Mothers out windows?

That wouldn't be the worst of it, she says. But you'd want to come down anyway—I have a Mr. O'Grady waiting on you.

As she says his name, she fixes her hair and works her lips to an unseemly fullness.

He says you've a man here called McCarthy? I says, well! I says I think I have anyhow.

Mother Mary of Jesus is sat up the dining room wall, blue and weeping, her long glance so loving—a tear of blood rolls.

Cornelius O'Grady is sat just beneath—his hair is greased and fixed like a ducktail joint.

Would you mind sitting down, John, he says. You're making me dizzy.

Daylight shows Cornelius in high fettle. There is vim and spark and big vitality. He considers John at length and silently; he shakes his head in amused suffering.

The problem, he says, is they'd probably know you alright.

He returns woefully to his breakfasts. He has two fried breakfasts laid out on the white linen. He moves the great boulder of a head in slow swoops over the plates as though by the arm of a crane. He slices daintily into the meats and chews and smiles grimly.

But all we can do is fucken try, he says.

A powerful chewer: the way his massive chin swings side to side and churns—they are handing out the chins around here. He mops a hunk of bread across the yellow of the egg yolks, and there is the smell of burnt fat and greasy cloy.

Have you not et? he says.

I'm fine, Cornelius. I'll have a fag in a bit.

Humorous eyes; a shaking of the head. He zips from plate to plate and back again. He is very neat about his work, slicing a rasher here, a sausage there, having a chew and half a grilled tomato, a soft chuckling, a little sigh of thanks.

Black pudding? John says.

Yes?

Congealed blood is what it is.

You wouldn't eat a bit?

Me? I'm macrobiotic.

Which means you ate what, fleas?

Hatchet-Face comes to work around the edges of the room, tidying and settling away, but really just the better to observe Cornelius and his great handsome bull's head: we are in the presence of legend.

About my situation, Mr. O'Grady?

Yes?

I really don't need a fucking circus right now. The most important thing is no one knows I'm out here.

Cornelius fills his mug from a silver pot and runs his eyes about the room.

John, he says, half the newspapermen in Dublin are after piling onto the Westport train.

Oh for fucksake!

But we aren't beat yet. The train's an hour till it's in. We'll throw a shape lively.

He's bigger sat down than he is stood up. Short-legged, squat, the giant head rolls cockily as they move, and Cornelius aims a wave for Hatchet-Face—she flutters as though for a sexy saint.

All I want is to get to my island.

Which is it is yours?

It's called Dorinish.

You'd say it Durn-ish.

You know the one?

There are maps but I'd pay no mind to them. Wait for me at the back door and I'll swing the van around.

The van?

Is right.

What's happened our Merc?

That wasn't my car at all, John.

And where are we headed exactly?

Cornelius sends up his sighs. He looks at his pale charge sadly, as though at a tiny injured bird, and he jerks a black thumb over his shoulder.

West, he says.

The van's a bone-rattler, a money-shaker, all rust and lung disease, and it screeches for death as it revs up pace for the sudden turns and the gut-heaving drops: see now how the land falls away. There is mist on the hills; he can see reaching for the crags and granite tops the wispy fingers of the mist on the hills, and Cornelius's blue eyes are set to a high murderous burn—his hilarity—and John is on the lam and loves it although he has a sad stretch, about home, but just for a half-mile or so—it passes—and the van screams and barks and it smells of the other Monday's fish: John's stomach lurches and his soul groans. He lights another fag, an evil Gitane.

There's one day I'd be after mackerel, Cornelius says. There's another day I'd be dosing sheep. Another again? I'd be playing the chauffeur. And only last Thursday gone? I dug a grave for a man that took a sudden stroke…Sixty-two years of age and he only trying to watch a bit of television. God rest him.

Cornelius quickens the van for a blind turn. He accelerates again to come out of the bend. He plays at full volume a vile country music all twangy hoedowns and cry-it-to-the-moon laments but in awful, reaching, sobbing, spud-Irish voices.

John eyeballs the fucker hard—

Cornelius?

—but he is paid no mind.

He slaps eject to pop the cassette but Cornelius slaps it back to play again.

Ray Lynam, he says. That's one powerful fucken singer.

Keep the dogs at bay. This is the most important thing. Keep the hissing pack at bay and get me to my fucking island. His new friend whistles jauntily as he steers the van.

Cornelius?

Yes, John?

You do realise it's extremely fucking important that no one knows I'm out here?

I do of course.

Because it would ruin everything, Cornelius. It would defeat the whole fucking purpose.

I understand, John. But I've a feeling the fuckers aren't far off our trail.

How can you tell?

From the way the air is settling around us.

His eyes shoot to the rearview, to the wings.

Do you understand what I mean by that?

I've no fucking idea.

The ground can be kind of thin around here, John.

Thin?

Which means all you've to do is listen.

The van spins into the mist. Cornelius taps time on the wheel. John is not used to the company of males anymore. All the musk and hilarity and contest. Slate-grey to sea-green, the hills fall away. Melancholy, too, can gleam, jewel-like—as in the rain's sheen that blackens stone—and Cornelius steers blithely, and he beats time with his thumbs, and he turns happily—

Tell me just the one thing, John.

Yes?

Why's it you want to go to this little island?

Because I want to be that fucking lonely I'll want to fucking die.

Cornelius jaws on this for a bit and winces, and he nods it through—he is at length satisfied.

I have you now, he says.

The blue-bleak hills. The veiling of the fog.

This is just what I'm after, John says.

He is all business now—

About a boat and supplies?

Do I look like the fucken boy scouts, John?

The tape chews and a country song sticks hard on a high note and yodels; Cornelius pops the tape free and slaps in another; he throws a dark look seaward.

I'd doubt we'll be putting out in that.

Bit choppy?

He whistles through his nose; he sucks his teeth.

We'll keep you hid till the pressmen clear, John. We'll wait out the assault.

I haven't got all bloody year!

They'll want for patience. If they don't get the smell of you in a day or two, they'll be gone.

Just hole me up at a different hotel then.

Hotels no good. Too easy follow you out from a hotel. How'd you think they got wind of you in the first place?

You don't mean our woman in Newport?

Well.

Fucking Hatchet-Face!

The same woman has two husbands buried in the one plot, John. A small bit of respect would be no harm.

He massages the bridge of his nose—the painful place.

So where do I go, Cornelius?

I'm thinking the best thing for now would be my own house.

Super.

The van climbs and on a sudden turn, at a height above them, a silver horse in full mantle—its eyes shaded—is formed from the motes of air and mist and rises on its hind legs and makes a great silent scream—something Hispanic here—and its teeth are yellowish, foam-flecked, pointed, and it evaporates again, just so and as quickly, this image or vision, into time and the sodden air.

Cornelius?

Yes, John?

They climb into the sky. There are woeful songs about lost sweethearts, lonesome moonlight, dead fucking dogs.

It's coming between us, Cornelius.

The which?

The fucking music.

Cornelius slaps eject and the cassette pops—he flings it to the dash.

Thank you very fucking much.

You're very fucken welcome.

They climb some more—the country falls away.

As a matter of fact the van knows the road, Cornelius says.

A street gang of sheep appear—like teddy boys bedraggled in rain, dequiffed in mist—and Cornelius bamps the hooter—like teddy boys on a forlorn Saturday in the north of England, 1957—and the sheep explode in all directions and John can see the fat pinks of their tongues.

Mutton army, he says.

They climb the hills inside a cloud. Crags poke through; knuckles show. They come on a patch of clear blue for a stretch and he can see for the first time Clew Bay entirely and the way its tiny islands are flung out by the dozens and the hundreds.

It's been nine fucking years…How the hell are we going to find my island, Cornelius?

With enormous difficulty, John.