Venetia Kelly's Traveling Show (42 page)

Drying her hair, preparing her face, getting dressed—that day I witnessed a sight to which I became addicted. In galleries around Europe, where any such painting exists, I look for portraits of ladies at their toilette.
What is its enchantment? The absorption? The concentration?
With Venetia I didn’t speak—I watched.

Part of my silence—our silence—may have been recovery from the fracas downstairs, that combination of menace and bullying that so came to identify King Kelly for me. Part too, however, came from Venetia’s simple wish to complete her preparations, and my simple wish to watch.

Mrs. Haas arrived with a sandwich for Venetia. We learned that Sarah had disappeared with King Kelly and the hair-oiled man. I now had so
many things whizzing around in my head that I needed help, and I asked the simple question of Venetia and Mrs. Haas, “What’s going on?”

“Not yet to tell,” said Mrs. Haas.

“We’re not quite sure,” said Venetia.

“His father,” said Mrs. Haas, pointing to me. “He knows.”

Now, at last, the real world came in. Venetia knew it too, and stood up.

“Then we need—I need—to do something.”

I said, “I’m about to take him to a funeral.”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Haas.

“How do you know?” asked Venetia.

“He’s downstairs waiting,” said Mrs. Haas.

Venetia made for the door and I stepped across to block her way.

She persisted. “I have to do it. Then you come down.”

Mrs. Haas, the unlikely champion, went with her. I heard Venetia say, “Harry?”

My father replied, but I couldn’t hear it. I stepped out onto the landing, and kept out of sight; then I heard everything.

“Is-is-is it true? That’s all I want to know. Is it true?”

Venetia said, “It is true, Harry. It’s true.”

“But he’s my son.”

“That’s probably why.”

My father then repeated himself. “Is it true? Is it?”

“Yes, Harry. Yes.”

“But—he’s my son, my lovely son.”

“As I say—that’s probably why.”

“How could you?”

Venetia said, “I have no idea.”

My father’s speech hesitation now disappeared—as it did when he was under extreme pressure; I’ve often wondered why the precise opposite wasn’t the case. His voice rose.

“Where is he?”

“He’s upstairs. About to take you to a funeral.”

“To my own funeral, that’s where he’ll be taking me. To my own funeral.”

“Shhh, Harry, easy now.” She handled him beautifully. “I will always love you.”

“You can’t! How can you? Oh, my God, my own son!”

“You mean a lot to me.”

“My own son. My son. You can’t love two people.”

“Yes, you can, Harry. You can love any number of people.”

I moved. They heard me. I walked down the stairs.

“Oh, Jesus God!” said my father and lowered his face.

Perhaps the light did it, a dull sunlight through the glass of the hall windows in that old house. Perhaps my mind exaggerated it—but I had never thought of my father as old before. Now he looked not merely old but haggard.

“What time is the funeral?” I asked, and walked past him.

I’m bound to say that I felt myself swagger, even if—as I hope—I didn’t show it.

We drove to a place called Kilcoran, to a little graveyard up on the hillside. In the car neither of us said a word.
Will Mother be there?
I wondered.

Venetia had patted us both good-bye. In the car my father sat on his hands, he retrieved them, he bit his knuckles, he bit his nails, he sat on his hands again. He opened his window, put out his head, inhaled huge gobbets of air, closed the window, opened it again.

As we were leaving, Venetia had murmured to me, “Say not a word. It will be difficult—but don’t say a single word.”

“Difficult”? Oh, yes it was. He tried to open the conversation in a number of ways and I, who had never disrespected or disobeyed my father in my life, had to keep my mouth shut.

He began with “This is a foul thing you’ve done. You must really hate me.” When I said nothing, “You must hate me. Do you hate me, Ben? I’ve always been good to you. Do you? Do you hate me?”

I couldn’t put together this man with the farmer I saw astride his harvest stacks of straw and hay, directing his workers, the dust smoky in his red eyebrows.

When he received no answer he lapsed into a kind of muttering. “Yes, that’s it, you hate me. This is an act of hate, I know that. This is hateful. Hate. Full. That’s what it is.”

Then he fell silent. And then opened up again.

“What was it? That you wanted what I had? The very thing that’s so
dear to me? Is that it? Is that it, Ben? Just because I had it you wanted it, is that it? The young bull jealous of the old bull? She’ll drop you anyway, I know that, you’re too young for her, she’ll drop you like a stone.”

For some time after that outburst he sat silently, except for the shifting of the hands here, there, and everywhere. He opened the window again, stuck his head out, and whoozed in mouthfuls of exaggerated air. Then he attacked once more.

“I know what it is,” he said, triumph ringing from him. “I-I-I know what it is. You decided to usurp me so that I’d go back home. That’s it. A ploy. That’s it. Your mother put you up to this.”

By great good mercy we had arrived at the graveyard when he came out with this. Amid five other cars, myriad bicycles, and a long chain of pony traps and horse-and-cart rigs, I drew to a halt, got out, and breathed.

I knew Mother wouldn’t face it. She couldn’t. Others made up for her—cousins consumed with interest, who looked at my father and me as though at a zoo. My father greeted his sister, the widow, with great kindness—and as though his own life were as smooth as a lake. To my delight I saw James Clare across the little hilly burial plots.

I shall keep this brief; it’s unpleasant. With prayers and the thoughts of his family, his close relatives, and a wide variety of friends and acquaintances, my uncle Denny went dust-to-dust. About three hundred people attended, their presence a compliment to the man’s decency. The prayers went by quickly and we began to disperse, picking our way through the graves.

I wanted to speak to James Clare—but he made a sign that he’d be outside, and I thought I’d better wait for my father. In our part of the country (this was about twenty miles from my home), the gravediggers often don’t fill in the graves until the funeral drinking has ended. My father lingered until everybody had gone—and I waited for him, down the path, fifty or sixty yards away.

He left the graveside slowly. Deep in thought he made his way to where I stood. By now everybody else had gone from the little cemetery, and we were masked from the road by trees and shrubs. He wore a coat that I’d never seen until that day, a gray coat, somewhat military in appearance,
with epaulets and a belt. In no hurry he took slow steps through the green mounds until he found himself on the level pathway, much nearer now to me. He walked head down, still deep in thought.

As he reached me, and just as I was beginning to walk beside him to the road, he grabbed my arm.

“Come on. I’ll fight you for her. Come on.”

I stood back, still determined to say nothing.

“Come on! Put up your fists.”

I shook my head and again tried to walk. He hopped ahead of me, like a comical rabbit, and blocked my way.

“Fight-fight-fight for her. Settle it now. Fight for her.”

In the distance, over my father’s shoulder, I saw James Clare walking back into the graveyard. He had attended to whomsoever he’d needed to see and had come back to find me. As I looked, he stopped, watching.

I tried to get past, through, or around my father, but he stopped me—and this time he swung a punch. I got my head back out of the way—barely; his fist grazed me. He swung again—I evaded again. This time he held my sleeve and landed a heavy punch on the side of my head.

Never had I intended that anything like this should happen. He hit me again, this time a stinging blow that made me reel. When I looked past him, James Clare had come closer but seemed to have no intention of stopping us.

“Don’t tell me you haven’t the guts to fight for her. That’s-that’s-that’s why you won’t get her and I will.”

The brawl began; I broke all the taboos in the world and fought back. In school nobody ever fought me because I was the biggest in my class. Outside of that, my life had been so sheltered that I hadn’t been exposed to violence. The only fight that I’d ever seen had been the Prizefight between my father and Mr. Kane, and that had perturbed me for months.

Its memory came back now, vivid, sharp, and frightening, and I said to him, “I’m not Mr. Kane. You’ve no reason to hit me.”

My father said nothing but he grew more violent, his punches stronger, harder, and delivered with more venom. How could this ever be repaired?

I too have red hair—not unrelievedly so, more a deep, dark red, close to black. If red hair causes ignition—that can also help to explain how
the brawl progressed. I began to defend myself, and then I fought back. My first punch landed on my father’s right cheekbone and hurt my hand—but not enough to stop me. I saw the surprise in his eyes—he hadn’t truly expected me to respond. He saw the shock in my eyes, I think, at the fact that I had struck my own father, and he retaliated—with his fiercest punch so far.

Now we went at it like two sailors in a bar. It became a savage and dirty fight, much worse than could ever have been anticipated. He bit my ear. He tried to gouge my eyes. I kicked him, I stamped on his ankle, I kicked his knee. We breathed heavily, each of us, we muttered at each other; the main sound, though, was a series of grunts and scuffles. I grappled for his arms to stop him, he kneed me close to the groin—in fact, I remember that he had avoided a kick by twisting, and I did the same, by instinct, I think.

Under Heaven how can it have looked? Two otherwise decent men, father and son, locked in an ugly brawl of filthy intent in a sacred place. The fight ended when my father fell and I stamped on his neck and throat and kept my boot there. In that moment I aged twenty years, and I had my first taste of that bitter thing called remorse. Awful, truly awful.

I removed my foot, stepped away, and sank to my haunches, in dreadful anguish. My father scarcely moved, but he talked to himself and that is how I knew that he hadn’t been injured. When he rose he had bruises across his throat, and on his face, livid red patches that began to turn blue. I had no idea how I looked but my face felt hot and sore—like my spirit.

He walked away, brushing past the watching, waiting James Clare. I continued to squat; the pain in my heart had spread to my stomach and I felt that my bowels would split apart. No urge to weep, strangely—though I fancied that my father had begun to as he walked off. My abiding feelings can be summed up by words such as “ugliness” and “disgraceful” and “appalling.” I felt lower than low—my beloved father, my own beloved father—the disappointment, the shame, the loss.

The footsteps that I heard approaching on the gravel path belonged to James Clare, and I stood up. My mouth had the salt taste of blood; I had a lip that was split on the inside, nothing serious. Small, watery blood came from my nose; my upper jaw hurt, as did both cheekbones, one eye, and the side of my head. But my soul hurt most of all.

“Stand back here for a minute,” said James. “Rest yourself against the wall.”

“Do you know who that was?” My voice had that snuffle you get as a child half an hour after you’ve been crying at the injustice of the world. “That was my father.”

I found the wall and put my hands behind me at hip height to steady myself.

“I know,” said James Clare. And then, this earnest, wise man said with great approval, “Do you know what you’ve done?”

“Fought my own father.”

“As the gods did.”

N
ow I’m exhausted by that memory, so I’m going to digress a little into the politics of the day again. I had managed somehow to keep abreast of all that had been happening in the first days after the historic vote. Mr. de Valera had taken power, or was about to—he would become the prime minister or taoiseach (pronounced
tee-shock
, meaning “chieftain”) early in March, when the new Parliament assembled.

I still think it was the most important moment in modern Irish history. It showed in more ways than one that we had come to maturity. Indeed, you could argue—and many did—that the government changed because we (a) were now a nation unto ourselves, and (b) therefore got buffeted by the harsh economic winds blowing across the Atlantic from the Depression in the United States.

Certainly Mr. Cosgrave’s outgoing government had been the victim of the hard times, but at the same time he hadn’t managed to come up with anything that would inspire the electorate to keep him in power. So the feared Mr. de Valera had triumphed; the Risen People had risen further.

I knew that it was going to be a fascinating year. When it became clear that a decisive parliamentary majority hadn’t been elected, many politicians
continued to campaign. They held if not rallies, meetings; they roamed their constituencies if not exactly canvassing, pressing the flesh, as it’s now called.