At Swim, Two Boys Part 3

"Papa," said Jim.

"Better put some juldy in it so. Chop-chop."

He watched his son as he loafed through the scullery. Keen as mustard a moment since, now he's hanging dogs. Would want to catch on to himself.

"What use is a chair to me?" Aunt Sawney complained as she came in from the shop. "I'm beckoned hither and beckoned thither like a common shop-miss."

"Now now, I'm only thinking of your health. You're only over the bronchitis and you needs your rest."

When she drew level with him, she abruptly jutted her chin in his face. "I'm still the name on the lease of this shop. And while there's saints in heaven, 'tis stopping that way."

When his son had fetched the bike, Mr. Mack muttered, discreetly closing the inside door, "Crumbi rumpit.i.ta. Latin for cabbage warmed up. Save that wasn't warmed up even." He thought a moment, recollected himself. "There's plenty would walk to Dublin for a plate of cold cabbage."

"What do I need the bike for, Da?"

Mr. Mack said Aha! with his eyes, and from under the shelves pulled out an onion box. He lifted it on the counter. "I want you to deliver some advertising-bills round the local populace. What do you think? They're hot off the printer's press." He showed one to his son, running his finger along the words at the expected rate of reading. "It's the modern way of drumming up trade."

The boy gazed into the box, his face growing longer and plainer. Makes a comical sketch, thought Mr. Mack. Eyebrows straight and nose the length of the Shannon. Has a face like a capital T. He thought-did he think that?-the box held his birthday present. All in a rush, he spluttered, "I've a cake for you after out of Findlater's."

"What, Da?"

"Deliveries first." His son flicked through the pile and Mr. Mack had to check himself from cautioning against creasing the sheets. "Don't crease them now," he said, defeated by the boy's shiftlessness.

"You want me to distribute these?"

"Deliver them." Though in point of fact, distribute was probably the more appropriate sentiment in this particular instance. Fair dues. Comes from having a scholarship boy for a son. "Distribute them if you choose. But you needn't do it all the one go. Do a couple of streets now, the bulk after your school."

The Capital T was for Tragic on his face, till the boy shrugged. "All right."

"Hold your horses, do your b.u.t.tons up first. Don't you want to know where to deliver them?"

"You said the local populace."

"But which local populace? Have you not the horse-sense to ask?"

"Which local populace, Da?"

"Well, up Glasthule Road towards Ballygihen. Do you know where I mean?"

"The posh houses."

"Quality Street," said Mr. Mack. "We're on the up, Jim, never forget it. Juldy on now. And don't be late for school. And remember, that bicycle is shop property, not something to hare up and down with."

He had ushered his son to the door, but at the door his son said, "Papa, do I have to?"

Incomprehension creased Mr. Mack's rotund face. "What does it mean, do I have to?"

"It's just that, some of the boys at school, that's where they live."

"Some of your schoolfellows?"

"Yes."

Mr. Mack stroked the end of his mustache. "That tops it," he said. "You can ask your schoolfellows to put in a good word for the shop." He tapped his nose. "Word of mouth, a personal recommendation. But see they gets the bills first."

A sudden notion and he jabbed his hand into a jar of Lemon's sweets. He emptied the handful into Jim's jacket pocket. "Distribute these to your schoolfellows. They'll think the more of you for it."

"Yes, Da."

"Papa," said Mr. Mack. "That's three times, four times you've called me Da." But Jim was already out of tongueshot, pushing down the road.

Peculiar case, thought Mr. Mack. He's not sullen, nor yet very gamesome. Is he cheerfuller in the street? Hangs up his fiddle when he's home, that's for sure. Sixteen: hobbledehoy, neither man nor boy. Might have perhaps wished him a happy birthday. But he'd be looking for his present then, and we'd be Christmas Day in the morning before them bills got delivered.

Now what's this the commotion is up the hill? Something going off whatever it is. And that whiff. Recognize that whiff.

A woman in dark bombazine walked by holding a clean child by the hand. Mr. Mack mimed a tweak of his peak, then patted the child's head. "Open till late," he said.

Way up Adelaide Road, over the railway bridge, undriven came a low cart. That smell, thought Mr. Mack. Then: "Herrings above! Aunt Sawney, where are you? Get up out of your chair, Aunt Sawney! The dungcart is coming. They'll be here in the hour and we've nothing prepared."

Jim propped the bike against a garden wall, took a handful of bills and went to the first door of a terrace of villas. He was sliding the handbill inside the box when the door opened and a boy stepped out. He wore the same cap as Jim, with the same badge: Dirige nos Domine. Dirige nos Domine.

"Who is it?" called a voice within.

"It's a billing-boy from the Glasthule huckster's."

"What does he want at the front door? Tell him to mind his manners."

"Mind your manners," said the boy who was Jim's schoolfellow, and the door closed in his face.

Some words you could really hate, and one of those was fellow. They used it all the time at college. His first day at Presentation, a boy had approached: "The fellows wanted to know, is it true you live in a corner-huckster's?" Jim had said no, it was the Adelaide General Stores and some of these fellows sn.i.g.g.e.red. "Do you sleep at night in a bed?" Jim slept on a settle-bed made up in the kitchen, so he said yes, but they were up to that dodge. "In a bedroom?" He shook his head. Then, decisively: "The fellows wanted to know what name do you call your father?"

"Da," Jim answered.

Sometimes the jibes spilt over into rough stuff, like shoving when he queued for the water-fountain or hard scragging at football. In the end he claimed a fight with the ugliest fellow, a bullocky lad named Fahy. He could still feel the shock of the chatterer to his chin, the dizzy sway round the circle of honor as gra.s.sward he fell. But they left out the physicality after that. Whenever his hand went up in cla.s.s, they chaffed him for the Grand Exhibit. When for lack of his own he shared a schoolbook, they goosed him, chiming, "For the scholarship boy is a needy boy."

He mentioned it once to his father, and his father said, "What is it they call their own fathers?"

Jim shrugged. "Papa, I think."

"That's easy fixed so. You call me Papa in future, then you'll be equal with your fellows."

It might have pa.s.sed but for his father's interfering. He couldn't keep away from the college, but was ever at the gates, offering his services for field days and bazaars. The school wouldn't play a match but his cart rolled up with pop and sweets. Save the souls of piccaninnies! A shilling per guinea to the Presentation Missions.

Ballygihen Avenue ended at the sea and when Jim came there he rested on the sea-wall and stared out across Dublin Bay. The city lay under a haze, but Howth was sunny and clear, a sleeveless, sinewy arm thrown out while Dublin dozed.

For years he had believed that Howth was England until finally his father took him there, him and his brother, on the two tram journeys across Dublin. They made a scratch tea in a heathery field and his father had him speak to a poor fisherwoman to ask was this still Ireland. He remembered the surprise of her answer. "Not since the Chief pa.s.sed over, nor yet till he come again."

"Curious old harp," his father had said. "Did you mark how and she grabbed the boy? Would frighten a boy that way."

"She was a witch," said Gordie. "The old woman of the sea."

"Queer old harp she was."

But she wasn't old, Jim didn't think. If she loosed her shawl she was young and beautiful, like the photograph-portrait of his mother at home.

The tide was half-way down and he listened to the lazy rush of its waves. Straggling rocks creamed in the sun, melting to tan, to umber in the sea. Dark weeds chained them. He smelt the breezy air that was like ozone through the school latrine. Farther along, towards Kingstown, urchinous boys were sc.r.a.ping for bait. Their cries mingled with the calls of gulls that hungrily wailed above. The sea glistened in the bay, a blue sheet that was hardly blue so sharply it shone, nor yet a sheet so spangled its surface. A calm upset by light alone.

You carry your weather with you, his father was fond of saying. Yet the day was glorious.

Sandycove's beached harbor, the Martello tower on its cliff, its cliff improbably landward. Two figures strolled from the Point, towels slung over their shoulders. Bathers out of the Forty Foot, gentlemen's bathing-place. There was a loneliness in watching them, for they were actors in the day's glory, like the gabbling boys and the boisterous gulls.

His father had a story about that Martello that when the Government decommissioned the towers, after the French scares, its garrison had been overlooked. "Twenty year and more," he told, "they remained at their post, when all this land was back of G.o.d speed. They were the lost troop, a sergeant and two swaddies. And yet, at long last when the authorities caught up with themself, it was discovered from the books in all those years not one guardmount, not one sentry-go had been shirked. There's soldiering for you. That's the spirit of the British Army." And indeed it was not difficult to see his father there, reveille to Last Post, at spit and polish, jankers and Queen's Regulations, counting in his quartermaster-sergeant's English: boots, leather, pairs of, three.

Forlorn hope is from the Dutch for lost troop. How sad the words and beautiful. All love does ever rightly show humanity our tenderness.

Bills, two gross, local populace, delivery thereto. When he watched the h.o.r.n.y hands with veins like rhizomes in the flesh carry up the onion box, he had believed it was his birthday present. His father would often confound surprise with suspense so that, even when faced with the bills, Jim had needed to rummage through to the bottom to be sure there was no mistake. Whatever else, there was no long trousers. Last in his form to be still in breeches with a cake from Findlater's for after. Acme of swell.

The breeze brushed the sweat on his forehead. It would be good to take off his cap, feel wind in his hair. There were other actions he could envisage performing: loosening his tie, slipping out of his boots and stockings, unb.u.t.toning the knees of his breeches. He imagined padding out to the edge, toes bunched against the jag of rocks. The way the weed would slither beside you, sea-lace and thong-weed. The water grew chiller as it climbed. Or he might venture as far as the Forty Foot itself, strip off and plunge headlong to the deep. He had never swum in the Forty Foot, he had never swum in the sea, but he could conjure the charge of the waves all over. Like those two bathers strolling down, he too would have acted. Involvement, not witness, would mark the day.

If you carry the weather with you, then character is determined by the prevailing wind.

In his pocket he found some sweets; Lemon's, he remembered. The crinolined lady on the wrapper looked light and gay with her parasol, very much like Nancy would look if she wore Aunt Sawney's drapes. Nancy made him blush and he believed she always would now. His brother had rarely mentioned her before he left for England, but on the last night at home he said, Nancy's a bit of-jam, he called her. When Jim remonstrated, he grew coa.r.s.er still. Don't come the green with me. I know the sniff of the glue-pot. Then-Is it Nancy you think of when you fetch yourself off? How could his brother say such a thing? How dared he utter those words. Jim couldn't look at Nancy since without the blood rising, and the blood rose now to his ears as he thought of it.

He crushed the wrapper and let it fall behind.

The breeze died and the heat was suddenly material, like a cloak that dropped on his back. The wall made him conspicuous. What might a watcher suppose was his purpose? He counted the clues to his ident.i.ty: school cap, shop name on bike, bills in the pannier. His availability to interpretation intimidated him. He saw that his arms were hugged round his knees. He sniffed the muggy flocculent smell, then let go his legs. In his mind a formula impersonally repeated: he has never swum in the Forty Foot, he has never swum in the sea. Of a sudden he leant forward to check for the Muglins, but the rock of course was obscured by the Point.

It was time to be gone, but a murmur of voices cautioned him. The bathers from the Forty Foot had rounded the bend and were nearing the promenade below. The younger was a shock-headed black-haired lad, Jim's age, though bigger-built. He tossed his cap in the air as he walked and as he walked he lurched slightly, weak of one leg. For all he had been swimming, he had a filthy look about him and his towel was a rag of threads. The other, by his tweeds and tone, was of the quality.

Jim believed he recognized the lad. He was not sure but, delaying to see, he left it too late to leave. Movement now would draw their attention.

They halted at the private steps that led to Ballygihen House. The toney man, who had his back to Jim, said, "I might show you still, if you'd a mind."

The lad shook his head. "Due back for work. Already late as it is."

"Another time, perhaps. I believe you'd take to it. Don't think about the leg. You're quick enough off the mark."

"Another day maybe." He had the usual Dublin drawl, but with an open edge, like a kick, at the end of it. Breath of the west, Jim thought.

The man made a sudden motion-"Here," he said-and silver spun in the air. A fist shot out and nimbly the lad caught the coin.

"For your trouble," said the man.

Ivory flashed between thick dirty lips. "No trouble at all." The smile, like the face, was familiar. Then the lad's gaze lifted and he saw Jim watching from above. His eyes were dark as night, not dull, but gemmily shining. The smile broadened as though in invitation, as though the rocky sh.o.r.e and the birds and the blue were his to share.

"What cheer, eh?" he called.

Jim found himself smiling back. And long after, while he scorched down Glasthule Road, well late for school, he was smiling still. What curious cheer.

Mr. Mack kept a keen eye on the young lad shoveling out his midden. Vile job that. Vile smell. Murder on the lungs, day in day out. Never grow accustomed to a smell like that.

St.u.r.dy fellow, though, beef to the heels. And would want to be. That job won't last long. Way behind the times. Sewers will be here any day soon and no need of all this foostering. Funny that. The modern way means this fellow's out of an employment.

Sucked cheeks dimpled to a smirk. They'll always want a general stores.

Hair as black as the devil's waistcoat. Could do with a scissors while we're about it. Jaunty as muck and in muck he's covered. Only white is in his eyes. Disease, all sorts you get with a job like that. "Careful with that bucket, now. Don't be swamping it. Can't have slops all over the shop."

That's a good one. That's a good motto for the contractors. Your business is our business. Might send that in. Bit on the flowery side, all the same. Second thoughts, steer clear.

All the same, why wouldn't they stick to the stated times? Sending the dungcart a day early, the commotion it causes. Poor Aunt Sawney, she's on her last legs without the vexation of middens. Dung-dodgers, she calls them. Do they dodge the dung or what? Goo-wallahs it was in India. Shifting furniture, clearing a gangway, rolling up the oilcloth. Deal of commotion, up and down the street.

Up he weighs now, great brute of a bucket on his shoulder. Fancies himself a taste. Likes to show his brawn. "Careful now, we don't want any mess." Is that a limp I see? Bit of a hop there. Tries to bury it, but can't dish an old sergeant. Wait now, that face. Great big grin on him, width of Cheshire. Don't I know that face?

He tramped back into the house after the dungman's lad. Now would you look at that. Heap of mess on the floor, right below the Georgius Rex. Told him about loading that bucket. Straight up to the brim he filled it.

"Here you, young hopeful, I want a word with you."

"Yes, Mr. Mack?"

Mr. Mack peered. "It's young Doyler, isn't it? You're Doyle's eldest."

"That's right."

"Well, I'm glad to see you back in the parish. In work and all. Yes, I'm very glad." Mr. Mack stroked the bush of his mustache. "I was only talking this morning with your father."

"Is that right, Mr. Mack. Mr. Mack, could I trouble you for a drink of water?"

How germs are spread. Could risk an old jam pot? Uncharitable. In the end he brought water in his own special cup. The boy turned back the cuff of his sleeve and wiped his mouth on the inside. Mr. Mack was touched by the gesture, a courtesy he was sure addressed to him and his cup. "Thirsty work," he said.

"A bit all right."

"How long are you back?"

"Not long yet."