A Pocketful of Rye (6 page)

Oh, cut it out, Carroll. Be your age. You gave up all that truck years ago. And nowadays who gives it a thought? And if you want to argue, hasn't the recent Commission of Christian Churches practically sanctified all forms of premarital sex, throwing in a few self-service practices as extra jam, with three hearty Christian cheers for
Lady Chatterley's Lover!

With an effort I turned my thoughts towards the approaching meeting, which disagreeable though it might be, was not without a certain mild expectation. Interesting, in a minor way, to see Cathy again and to know if anything of that juvenile regard for me remained. The probability stirred faint memories and, encouraged by another Kirsch and a sustaining club sandwich, I drifted back to Levenford, to that eventful day, and the events leading to it, when I had last seen Cathy Considine and Francis Ennis, the day of Frank's ordination.

The summer that year had been exceptionally fine, and on that late August morning as I set out from Winton station the sun beamed benignly in a cloudless sky.

The train was a ‘local' and as the slow journey wore on with stops at several stations, I had ample time to reflect on the event that was bringing me to Levenford. Actually it was an inconvenience for me to make the trip since, having graduated M.B. at the University during the month before, I had signed on as ship's surgeon in the s.s.
Tasman
, a cargo-cum-passenger liner plying between Liverpool and Sydney, due to sail on the evening of the day after the ceremony. But I had promised Frank to be there on his big day, although since leaving Levenford to attend the University, my communication with him, to say nothing of my visits, had been infrequent. Frank's sudden decision to enter the priesthood, so logical in one sense, had taken me by surprise. He had never spoken to me of a vocation although I had long suspected it. I had already surmised that a subconscious aversion to his father's way of life, while never admitted, perhaps never recognized, had deterred him from continuing the Ennis general practice. But he had meant to be a teacher, and had set out to take his M.A. degree at Edinburgh. And beyond all other considerations his future had been centred on Cathy, their marriage was an understood thing, practically preordained. What could have upset the apple cart? A sudden call to give himself to God? Perhaps there had been pressure from the everlasting Dingwall. This I was inclined to doubt, recollecting an incident when the Canon, detaining me after one of our Friday sessions, had caught me by the collar and shaken me till my teeth rattled.

‘It's you I want, with your good Protestant blood. What use would Frank be on the parish milk round? Put a rosary in one hand and a lily in the other and you're done with him.'

Had some deeper psychological reason inclined him towards celibacy? There was the occasion when, during one of our conversations – I was then a three-year medical student – Frank suddenly exclaimed:

‘Isn't it disgusting, Laurence, that the organ of procreation should be the very sewer through which half the impurities of the body are discharged?' And how his expression had frozen when I laughed.

‘You'll have to blame that one on the Creator, Frank.'

‘Not blame, Laurie,' he said severely. ‘ It was meant. By omniscient design.'

He was an interesting conundrum, still open to speculation! For reasons that were unrevealed, and remained inexplicable, Frank had suddenly slipped out of his commitment to Cathy and taken off for the seminary.

The train was late in arriving and although I put on speed from the railway station to St Patrick's, the service had already begun as I slid into an inconspicuous seat beside a pillar. From this retreat I had a clear view of the altar and of the two front rows, where I made out amongst a number of others, Mrs Ennis, Cathy, and what looked like the entire extensive range of the Davigan family.

This ceremony is always impressive and I admit it gave me a bit of a turn. The sight of Frank, all in white, prostrate in an attitude of supreme subjection, made me feel a bit of a sickening character. Since I'd cut loose from Levenford I had not infrequently been in the same position for altogether different reasons.

After the final blessing I waited outside, the emerging congregation, which was large, milling round me. Aware that I should not immediately see Frank, I hoped that Mrs Ennis or Cathy might give me some idea of his arrangements for the day. However, it was Dan Davigan who found me, pumping my hand and patting me on the back with the insufferable presumption of a lifelong boon companion.

‘Well met, man. I saw you, had my eye on you, as you slipped in. Why didn't you come forward, proper like, to the place I'd reserved for you? I'm a St Pat's sidesman now, y'understand, and I throw my weight around. Anyhow, here we are, and I've an invite for you. Celebration repast at the Ennis's home for six o'clock. You'll be there?'

‘I'll try.'

‘Oh, but you must, or Frank'll never forgive you. Sure, your name's never off his lips.'

Restively, I looked about me. I still hoped to have a word with Cathy, but she was lost in the crowd or had already gone. I had begun to move away when Davigan exclaimed:

‘And now I've a message from the Canon. He wants to see you. In the sacristy. Poor suffering soul, he's a done man, due for retirement to the sisters next month. In you go, I'll wait for you.'

There was nothing else for it. I had to go. The old autocrat was in a wheeled chair, but still erect, with a book on his knee. His eyes, sunken, but still burning in their sockets, unmistakably alive, took me all in.

‘So,' he said, when he'd finished looking me over. ‘ I'd a notion to see you before they sent me to the scrap heap.' Without taking his eyes off me, he felt for his snuff box from under his soutane, using his good left hand and, still adeptly, inhaled a pinch. ‘ I perceive that you have slipped, Carroll. Badly. It's written all over you.'

I felt the blood rush into my face and neck.

‘At least you've still the grace to be ashamed of yourself. I needn't remind you it was you I wanted in there. I worked hard on you too. All those Friday afternoons.' He nodded sideways. ‘ But, with that slippery Irish side to you, you got away. However, don't think you'll ever escape. The seed is in you and you'll never get rid of it.'

There was a pause. I was grateful that he spared me a cross-examination of my faults, and somehow sad and shamed that I had disappointed him.

‘I hope you're feeling better, Canon,' I mumbled.

‘I'm as well as ever I was, except for the use of one flipper, and good for another ten years. I'll have my eye on you, Carroll.'

‘I've always appreciated your interest in me, Canon, and all that you did for me.'

‘Drop the blarney, Carroll. Just let some of our Fridays stick.'

Another pause. He took up the book. ‘As a quasi literary character, notably an essayist, do you ever read poems?'

I shook my head.

‘Well, take this. It's a prize they gave me at Blairs many a year ago. I've marked one poem. It might have been written specially for you.'

When I took the book he snapped the snuff box shut.

‘Kneel down, sinner.' I had to obey. ‘I'm going to bless you, Carroll, and it's not only the Lord's will, but mighty appropriate in your case that I have to do so with the wrong hand. For before God, if ever you achieve salvation it'll be the wrong way – by falling in backwards through the side door.'

As I left the sacristy, horribly discomposed, I realized I had barely uttered a single coherent word. To recover myself I sat down in the now empty church and opened the book he had given me. ‘The Poems of Francis Thompson'. I had never heard of him. His photograph was the frontispiece, an emaciated, self-tortured face with a faint straggle of moustache.

A bookmark indicated the poem towards which my attention had been directed. I looked at the opening lines, I began to read. My mind, full of the recent interview, and the puzzle of Frank and Cathy, was not on the words, but I wanted to get rid of Davigan, so I sat there reading on, without real comprehension; until I came to the end. Absently, I put the book in my pocket, got up slowly, and left the church. And there outside, still waiting for me, was Davigan.

‘I never thought you'd be that long. But maybe he wanted to
hear
you. Where are you off to?'

‘To visit my grandparents.'

‘That's my way also. I'll give you a butty along Renton Road.'

In subsequent encounters since that memorable interruption in the Longcrags Wood, my dislike for Davigan had not been mitigated, a feeling which, under his habitual ingratiating effusiveness, I sensed he returned with interest. And now, armed with a greater confidence, an exudation of affluence, and cherishing some secret satisfaction that imparted a smirk to his heavy, pallid features, he struck me as even more objectionable. He was got up in a stiff white choker, spongebag trousers and a cutaway coat, the sidesman's outfit, in which he showed people to their places and shovelled up the two collections, but this sartorial elegance was now brought to the verge of the ridiculous by a bowler hat which sat down on his ears, causing them to protrude. Prejudice, no doubt, made me liken him to a stage butler in a second-rate farce. I avoided the gesture with which he attempted to take my arm as we set off towards Renton Road.

‘A heavenly affair,' he began. ‘And what a fine turn out. You were a shade late in getting in, Laurence.'

Being first named by Davigan did not lessen my resentment, but I made no protest, except to maintain silence.

‘I noticed you didn't join us all at the altar rails. You'd see we all took Communion. Oh, I don't doubt you're in a state of grace all right. I daresay you weren't fasting. Of course, Dr Ennis was an absentee. No use to pretend he was out on a case. He's not really one of us now, Laurence. No, no, sadly fallen away. Ah, what a sorrow for the young priest. But the mother, ah, there was a joyful face, even though the tears were running down her cheeks. A saint. That's where Francis, I beg his pardon, Father Francis, gets it. His holiness I mean. They say the Canon hasn't bespoke him for St Pat's, but the mother will press for it, I'll be bound. Though they tell me the young Father's not too glib with the sermons.'

A further silence followed, then with a sly side glance he said:

‘And what did you think of Miss Considine, Laurence?'

‘Cathy? I thought she looked extremely sad.'

‘Ah, didn't we all now, more or less. A fine young man giving up the world for God. But she looked well, you thought? She's come on, like, in her looks?'

During the Mass I had found myself watching Cathy, thinking that she had altered in some way but that the change, whatever it might be, had given her something that was not there before.

‘She's an extremely attractive young woman,' I said shortly. ‘And an interesting one.'

‘She's all that, and more,' he agreed fervently. ‘Of course, being all in the black for her mother's decease hardly gives her a chance.'

‘What!' I exclaimed. ‘Is Mrs Considine dead?'

‘She is that, none the less. This couple of months past. And after a long and painful illness, God help the poor soul. May she rest in Peace.' He tipped the bowler and made the sign of the Cross. ‘It's hard on Cathy, for you understand …' he gave me a look, ‘the pension died with her, the mother I mean. Still anon, the dear girl has friends, that fine Spanish lace mantilla she had on came from my own mother, just to show you an example.'

He had my attention now.

‘But what'll Cathy do with herself? Has she a job? She'll have to give up that big house.'

‘Well, no.' He assumed a considering manner which widened his smirk. ‘She'll not be given notice to quit. You see, Laurence, being in the building trade like, my old man has bought the house. It's a desirable property and may come in handy in the not too distant future.'

‘Why so?' I asked sharply.

He let the smirk go. Instead he faced me with a defiant yet triumphant grin.

‘As a matter of fact, Carroll, you may as well hear it now, sooner nor later. It's not out yet because of the other attraction, the ordination. But when you speak of Miss Considine you're speaking of the future Mrs Davigan. Cathy and yours truly are engaged to wed.'

I stopped short.

‘You're joking, Davigan.'

‘Devil the joke, Carroll.' The grin had become a sneer. ‘ We've come up the in world since you and your stuck-up Prot relations looked down your long noses at us. Take a peep up there.'

We had reached the end of Renton Road where it branched to Craig Crescent and Woodside Drive. He was pointing to the lower slope of the Longcrags, visible now beyond the Crescent, that wooded hill where the thrushes nested and wild flowers grew, the choice beauty spot of the town, that same wood where Cathy and I had almost found our Eden. Now the wood was razed, and amidst the stumps a rash of jerry bungalows was in process of eruption.

‘Oh, God, what a bloody mess!'

‘That's what you think! Let me tell you, it's the Davigan Building Estate. Our own financial empire! And it's going to make our pile. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, you half-baked snob!'

He left me with that parting shot and after a long speechless inspection of that shameful, hideous vista I made my way slowly to my grandparents' at Woodside Avenue.

Here was a different atmosphere. They were quietly pleased to see me, finally qualified as a doctor, a result atoning in their eyes for my indifferent start in life. They gave me a simple lunch, a kindness I was able to repay by prescribing for the old lady's rheumatoid arthritis. Bruce himself had slowed down but, still haunting the field of Bannockburn in spirit, spent a good hour showing me marked passages in an old Parish Register he had recently uncovered from a barrow in the Levenford Vennel. My present mood was tolerant of his obsession – it seemed less a prideful mania than an old man's pathetic delusion – yet while I bore with him my mind kept grappling with that incredible situation not half a mile away, in Craig Crescent Cathy and Davigan … it simply couldn't be! I had to get to the bottom of it. Although I was not due at Frank's until six, towards five o'clock I said goodbye to the Bruces and started off by the back road towards the Crescent.