The Tay Is Wet (6 page)

Sonny returned at mid-day for his dinner and listened intently while Timmy and Henrietta related the events of the morning.

‘Strange,’ he murmured. ‘Are you sure it was blood?’

‘Sure what else could it be? It was red and there was a bucket of it.’

‘I have me doubts, but I’ll go over and have a word with the McKay’s. They’re quiet hard-working people. There is probably a simple explanation for all this.’

After he had eaten Sonny made his way to the McKay household. Mrs McKay was in her kitchen clearing up the dinner dishes and she greeted him warmly as she usually did.

‘The tay is still wet, sure you’ll have a cup.’

‘Aye, sure I might as well.’

She was always in good humour and today was no different. After they had exchanged pleasantries and discussed the weather and Mrs McKay enquired after Henrietta she then asked how Timmy
was and this gave Sonny the opening he was looking for.

‘Well, it’s funny you should ask about Timmy because a peculiar thing occurred this morning. He was driving the cattle to the top field and one wild one happened to break into your garden. I hope he didn’t do any damage to your fruit trees.’

‘Ah, not at all, sure the garden is wild. I’ll get that fence fixed right away.’

‘Mrs McKay, you didn’t have a bucket of red liquid like fruit juice in the garden?’

‘No, why?’

‘Well, Timmy came home with his boots covered in red liquid and he said it happened in your garden. Do you mind if I have a look around the garden? It’s probably nothing at all.’

‘Oh, go right ahead, Sonny, let me know if you find anything.’

Sonny was not long in finding the bucket of red dye which Timmy had stepped in. The green dress which Una was tie-dyeing looked a sorry sight. Timmy had squashed it with his size eleven boots and most of the dye had ended up on the ground. ‘That’s definitely red dye for colouring clothes,’ Sonny said to himself, ’probably one of the McKay geshehs and Timmy has
made a right mess of it. I’ll let Mrs McKay know that it’s not blood anyway.’

Sonny told Mrs McKay about the dye and said he would send Timmy over to apologise and also to fix the fence which the bullock had broken through. ‘That’s the last we’ll hear of that episode,’ he said to himself as he headed for home. But it was not quite the end.

Three months later a headline appeared in the local newspaper, The Roggart News, “Servant Girl Wore Her Employer’s Frock to Dance.” Sonny carefully read over the case. The young girl, Una McKay, said she was desperate to go to the Carnival Queen dance. Her own dress had been ruined by a man with cattle trampling on it. She had given in to temptation. The dress fitted her perfectly. She had laundered and ironed it afterwards and returned it to its wardrobe but she had been caught in the act by Lady Babington and this had resulted in her appearance in court. She also lost her job. District Justice Raymer took a
lenient view of the incident and Una McKay was let off with a
warning as to her future conduct. There was laughter in court when the judge said he could not understand why some ladies held on to clothes that they wore as teenagers. Did they hope that one day scientists would discover a magic potion to reduce the middle-age spread? Perhaps Lady Babington might consider donating her old clothes to charity!

On his bench sat the judge looking fat

His white wig changed its hue as he sat

Like King Midas of old

Turned a bright shade of gold

There’ll be wigs on the green, fancy that.

The District Justice for this area of Meath was Mr Edward Raymer. He lived in a rather unkempt large house reached by a long avenue. The old two story house had yellow-washed walls and wooden fencing. The locals tended to keep clear of him. For a few this was because they had appeared before his court on some minor charge, but for most it was because they wrongly assumed that a judge was someone whose revered station was beyond the ambit of ordinary people. He loved horses and followed the Ward Union Stag-hounds during the hunting season. He had never married and the most obvious signs of this were un-ironed shirts and untidy court robes. He also had the habit of over-powdering his wig as he felt that this covered up any imperfections. The court sat in Roggart on one day per month.

The Deery family frequently had visits from relations or neighbours in the evening time. The children would be sent to their room and told to do their school homework, or if school was out, they would be told to read or at least to keep quiet.
Their reward the next morning would be any goodies left over from the meal which Mrs Deery provided. She always made sure that something sweet was left over, usually a bit of jelly and custard. The children were especially fond of this when it was cold and set overnight.

One evening the Deerys had a surprise visitor. A large dark green car chugged into the yard and pulled up beside the water pump. Steam was gushing out from under the bonnet. The lone occupant switched off the engine and staggered out and away from the steaming car. It was the District Justice, himself. The family were all at home and rallied to his aid.

‘Don’t go near it until it cools down,’ Sonny shouted.

‘Come in and rest, Mr Raymer, while you’re waiting, the tay is wet,’ said Henrietta.

The judge had got a bit of a shock and was glad to get out of the scalding vehicle.

‘Ow thank you sow mach,’ he said in his loud posh accent, ‘I
thought the old jalopy was gowing tow explode.’

‘It’ll take a half hour or so to cool down and then maybe we’ll see what caused the problem,’ said Sonny. ‘You have a cardboard box on the back seat, I think we’ll take it out in case it gets water damage.’

Sonny took out the box, which was very light, and told the children to bring it into the house for safe-keeping.

‘Ow good gells,’ said the judge, ‘it’s ownly the jolly old wig which I wear in court, pwobably requires powdering.’

Eventually the engine cooled and when Timmy started refilling it, they all saw where the problem was. The water went in at the top and straight out again at the bottom. In those days there was a safety valve which blew out if the water pressure got too high. This usually happened if the radiator was not topped up regularly. There happened to be a spare valve in Deery’s shed and this fitted the judge’s car. The relieved man departed with much loud thanks-giving and shaking of hands. It was about an hour later that Henrietta noticed the cardboard box sitting behind the armchair in the parlour. Sonny and Timmy were both gone to the pictures in Roggart. The children wanted to open it
just to have a close-up peek at a real judge’s wig.

‘Well, just a quick look and don’t handle it at all.’

The box was not sealed so Henrietta gently lifted the lid.

‘Yuk, is it alive?’ The children twisted their faces and made squealing noises.

‘It’s horrible, if Towser sees it he’ll think it’s a rabbit and eat it.’

‘That’s enough now,’ said Henrietta as she closed the box.

‘I’d better telephone Judge Raymer and tell him.’

The judge told her not to worry and he would collect the box the following morning on his way to court. Henrietta put on her coat and scarf.

‘That’s grand, now I have to go over to Mullards for a game of cards so, hopefully, there’ll be no more emergencies for an hour or two.’

She was gone about fifteen minutes when the telephone rang. Rose, the oldest girl, went to the hall and took the call. She came back a minute later looking flustered.

‘That was Mr Raymer and do you know what he wants me
to do?’

‘Wants you to do,’ the other two replied.

‘Yes, me, myself. He asked if I could dust off his wig and shake some white powder on it so that it would be ready for wearing in court tomorrow. He said there’s a small squeeze container of powder in the box.’

Rose gingerly opened the box and found the powder, or rather the powder container and this was quite empty.

‘What do we do now?’ Rose wondered aloud.

Her brother, Sean, piped up, ‘Look, it’s only white powder. You could use flour or anything like that. That oul wig will look better no matter what powder you put on it.’

‘Well, we’ll try it and see. Margaret will you get out the whitest flour from Mammy’s cupboard?’

She came back with two large glass jars.

‘We’ll take a little out of each jar, that way no one will miss it.’

They shook the white powder liberally over the old wig.

‘And there’s a bit for luck,’ said Sean as he sprinkled on an extra handful.

The judge collected the cardboard box early next morning and after thanking everyone again and refusing to sit down for more tay he left for his court. The weather had turned very showery and it was raining heavily as he drove into his parking space which was about thirty yards from the door. He waited for a few minutes to see if the rain might stop. As he waited he opened the wig box and smiled.

‘Aha, it never looked so white,’ he mused.

He put on the wig and decided to make a dash for the door. By the time he locked the car and got inside the building his robes and wig were fairly wet. He was already late because of his diversion to collect the wig. He marched quickly to his bench so that the court proceedings could begin. Those of us who were present never forgot that day in court.

Back at the Deery farmhouse Rose told her mother about powdering the wig.

‘Show me the powder you used,’ Henrietta asked.

‘Those two jars there, Mammy.’

‘They’re not flour, dear, they’re custard powder. The flour is in the back cupboard.’

‘Well, the powder is white.’

‘Yes, and it will stay white until it gets wet.’

As the morning in court gathered momentum everybody found themselves staring at District Justice Raymer’s head. The wig began changing colour. First of all blotches of yellow became visible. After a while the whole wig turned a deep golden yellow. The honourable judge carried on oblivious to this strange happening. Nobody dared say anything for fear of offending him. The phenomenon was causing everyone, from senior legal practitioners to simple witnesses, to lose concentration and they were unable to answer questions properly. The judge began to lose patience. Several times he admonished a speaker for dithering and being incoherent. Finally, an applicant for a bookmaker’s licence was asked a question about betting odds and he kept repeating:

‘I never seen the like, the odds must be a billion to one.’

Justice Raymer called a recess for half an hour. He swept into
his chamber and as he passed a mirror he stopped and stared in amazement. He whipped off the wig, put it down on a chair and hurried off to get his fellow court staff. Just as he went out the door, a small pet dog belonging to the court cleaning lady spotted the wig. The little dog sniffed it and promptly began licking off the custard and in a few minutes the wig was back to its normal off-white hue. The dog’s owner then appeared.

‘Hm, that looks like Judge Raymer’s wig.’

She picked it up, sprayed a little white talc on it and left it on the dressing table. A few minutes later the judge and half the court participants entered in a noisy throng.

‘There you are,’ shouted the judge, pointing at the chair, ‘what do you think of that?’

They all stared at the empty chair.

‘Well, it looks like a chair.’ Someone proffered.

‘Where’s my wig gone?’

‘Is this it, here on your dressing table?’

They all felt bemused. They wondered if they had imagined
the wig had changed colour. The judge wondered if he was going mad. The court was due to resume. The judge then took a small whisky from a secret hiding place within his dressing table and put it to his lips. Then he stopped.

‘No, maybe I’d better lay off.’

It was noticed at a parish meeting the following week that there was an unusual increase in people enquiring about taking “the pledge.”

His song for the master had charm

But the missioner jumped with alarm

When Tim sang “Doris Day”

He said “stop right away

Or you’ll end in a place hellish warm.”

The headmaster from Timmy’s old school had retired twenty years ago and had spent many happy and contented years since then in pursuit of his great hobby which was oil-painting. He often met Timmy while he was on his travels along the laneways and fields where he would select landscape scenes to paint. His wife had passed away five years after his retirement and they did not have any children. When he met Timmy he would raise his hat and say ‘Deery, I spent the best years of my life trying to make you an academic; but look at you now; mullocking up to your arse in hay and straw.’

Timmy would look blankly at the headmaster’s old hat and respond by singing:

‘What is that upon your head, where did you get that bonnet?