Walk the Blue Fields (4 page)

Now, she is married. Tonight, Jackson will lead her to a room and take her dress off. The priest can still see the brother’s cock, the size of it, how he couldn’t get it back into his trousers. He leans over the bank of the river, pulls the heads off a few tall weeds. He should go back to town, get into his bed, but he is unwilling to let the day end. Instead, he walks in the opposite direction, crossing the stiles between the fields. The land changes from coarse stubble ground to bright shoots of wheat. Such a dry
winter
as they had. Further on, there’s smooth pasture and, all about him, sheep are grazing. So, this is Redmond’s land. He looks up towards the road, sees the roof of the big hayshed. Beside it, sheltered, with blades of light around the blinds, stands a caravan.

As soon as he sees it, he tells himself he did not come down here for this. The last thing he wants is company but his feet seem, of their own accord, to take him through the pasture. In a sheltered place, beyond currant bushes, a patch of ground is neatly fenced with wooden posts and sheep wire. Drills are set in neat rows, fresh clay on a rake. When he pushes the plain timber gate, it squeals. The priest stands there in the garden for a while, listening. He hears nothing from inside and, feeling confident that
nobody is home, knocks on the door. As soon as he knocks, he turns to leave but the door opens and a Chinaman, wearing flip-flops and a loose track-suit is standing there.

‘Yes,’ he smiles. ‘Come.’

The priest backs away. ‘Good evening.’

‘Yes,’ says the Chinaman.

He should not have come but it would be an insult now not to enter the man’s home. Inside, the caravan is shining: a polished floor, a mattress with a stiff, white quilt. There’s the pungent smell of boiled tea, steam from a kettle. A bright light is covered by a shade. Almost everything is white, the plywood painted. There’s a big indented
cushion
and an open book.

The Chinaman looks at the priest’s feet. The dirty shoes are an insult here. The priest takes them off and leaves them outside the door, realising, as he does so, that his feet are sore. A stool is taken out. The Chinaman’s hands are quick. He is a lithe man, handsome, moving freely about his home. The priest looks through a perfectly clear pane at the river and feels a fresh stab of envy.

‘Yes,’ says the Chinaman. ‘You trouble.’

‘My trouble?’

The Chinaman nods.

‘I have no trouble,’ the priest says.

The Chinaman laughs; he understands this is what
people
who are in trouble say. He takes a glass from a shelf, pinches dried leaves from a canister, pours boiling water. He fills a glass to the brim, hands it to the priest. It is almost too hot to hold. The leaves float at first then fall slowly and expand. It tastes bitter and burns his tongue.

The Chinaman stares at him. His eyes are wide open, focused. He folds his sleeves up neatly to the elbow and reaches out to touch the priest. It is three years since
anyone
one touched him and the tenderness in the stranger’s hands alarms him. Why is tenderness so much more
disabling
than injury? The hands are dry and warm. When they reach down from his jaw and encircle his throat, the priest swallows hard and stares at a print on the wall. The print depicts a plain, alabaster bowl and its shadow.

‘Yes.’ The Chinaman goes to the mattress and slaps it.

‘What?’ says the priest.

‘Good,’ says the Chinaman. ‘Yes.’

The priest takes off his jacket and lies on the mattress. He lies on his back but the hands turn him over. His socks are taken off. Thumbs press his toes, his heels and move deep into the soles of his feet. The Chinaman lets out a grunt of comprehension, shifts to the priest’s side and begins, with his hands, to strike him. He starts at his ankles and moves, with infinite patience, up to the back of his thigh. When he reaches his buttocks, he pushes his fists deep into the flesh. The priest feels an urge to cry out but the hands move to the other leg pushing whatever is in his legs into his torso, as though his contents could tip from one side of his body to the other. The priest slowly feels his resistance giving in; it is the old, cherished feeling of his will subsiding. Let the man strike him. It is a strange
feeling
but it is new. He turns his head and stares at the alabaster bowl.

Fragments of his time with Lawlor’s daughter cross his mind. How lovely it was to know her intimately. She said self-knowledge lay at the far side of speech. The purpose of conversation was to find out what, to some extent, you already knew. She believed that in every conversation, an invisible bowl existed. Talk was the art of placing decent words into the bowl and taking others out. In a loving
conversation
, you discovered yourself in the kindest possible
way, and at the end the bowl was, once again, empty. She said a man could not know himself and live alone. She believed physical knowledge lay at the far side of
love-making
. Her opinions sometimes galled him but he could never prove her wrong. He remembers that night in the parlour, her smooth, freckled arms. How she sat on the edge of the bed in Newry town and sewed the button back onto his shirt. The next morning, their last, they had lain in bed with the window open and he’d dreamt the wind had blown the freckles off her body. Later that morning, when she turned her head and looked at him, he said he could not leave the priesthood.

Now, the Chinaman is manipulating his hands, pulling them back from his wrists until the priest feels certain they will snap. His head is lifted, brought round in circles that get wider. Knees are placed at either side of his head. The Chinaman is dragging something from the base of his spine, from his tailbone, up through his body. There’s something hard that does not want to budge but the hands don’t care. Before he is ready, the priest feels something inside him folding back, the way water folds back from the shore to form another wave – and it crashes from his mouth, a terrible cry that is her name and then it’s over.

After a time he cannot measure, he slowly sits up and looks about the room. He stares at the Chinaman, at his bare feet, the floor. It is hotter now and he feels hungry. The man is filling the kettle again, striking a match, as though this happens every day.

‘Thank you,’ the priest says at last. ‘Thank you.’

The Chinaman squats beside him with a fresh glass of tea. Here is a man living happily in a clean place on his own. A man who believes in what he does and takes
pleasure
in the work. The priest must give him something. He
puts his hand into his pocket and feels there, Lawlor’s money. The Chinaman bows when he takes it but he does not count the notes. He simply drops it into a brown jar on the kitchen table.

The priest points at the print on the wall.

‘What is this?’ he asks.

‘Old,’ the Chinaman says.

‘It’s empty,’ the priest laughs.

The Chinaman does not understand.

‘Empty,’ says the priest. ‘Not full.’

‘Yes,’ the Chinaman says. ‘You trouble.’

The priest finds his socks and goes outside for his shoes. The blue night has spread itself darkly over the fields. He pushes the timber gate and listens to the sound it makes closing behind him. He stands there and looks at the world. The spring has come, dry and promising. The alder is shooting out, her pale limbs brazen. Everything seems sharper now. The night has braced itself against the fence posts. The rake is a shining thing, well loved and worn.

Where is God? he has asked, and tonight God is
answering
back. All around the air is sharp with the tang of wild currant bushes. A lamb climbs out of a deep sleep and walks across the blue field. Overhead, the stars have rolled into place. God is nature.

He remembers lying naked with Lawlor’s daughter in a bed outside of Newry town. He remembers all those
dandelions
gone to seed and how he said he would always love her. He remembers these things, in full, and feels no shame. How strange it is to be alive. Soon, it will be Easter. There is work to be done, a sermon to be written for Palm Sunday. He climbs the fields back towards the road,
thinking
about his life tomorrow, as a priest, deciphering, as best he can, the Roman language of the trees.

In the night, Brady dreams the woman back into his life again. She’s out the yard with the big hunter, laughing, praising her dark horse. She reaches up, loosens the girth and takes the saddle off. The hunter shakes himself and snorts. She leads him to the trough and pumps fresh water. The handle shrieks when pressed but the hunter doesn’t shy: he simply drops his head and drinks his fill. Further off, the cry of hounds moves across the fields. In his dream these hounds are Brady’s own and he knows it will take a long time to gather them in and get them home.

Waking, he finds he’s clothed from the waist down: black jeans and his working boots. He gropes for the clock, holds the glass close, reads the hands. It isn’t late. Overhead, the light is still burning. He gets to his feet and finds the rest of his clothes. Outside, the October rain goes shuddering through the bamboo. That was planted years ago to stake her shrubs and beans but when she left he took no mind, and the garden turned wild. On McQuaid’s hill, through cloud, he makes out the figure of a man
walking
through fields greener than his own. McQuaid himself, herding, counting all the bullocks once again.

In the kitchen he boils the kettle, scalds the pot. The tea makes him feel human again. He stands over the toaster and warms his hands. His aunt brought up marmalade last week but there’s hardly a lick in the jar. With a knife he scrapes what’s left off the glass and goes out, in his jacket, to the fields. The two heifers need to be brought in and
dosed. He must clear the drains, fell the ash in the lower field – and there’s a good day’s welding in the sheds before winter comes on strong. He throws what’s left of the sliced pan on the street and starts the van. One part of him is glad the day is wet.

In Belturbet, he buys drenching fluid, welding rods, oil for the saw. There’s hardly any money left. He hesitates before he rings Leyden from the phone box, knowing he’ll be home.

‘Come up to the house,’ Leyden says. ‘I’m in need of a hand.’

It is a fine house on a hill, which his wife, a school
teacher
, keeps immaculate. Two storeys painted white look out over the river. In the yard a pair of chestnut trees, the horse lorry, heads over every stable door. When Brady lands, Leyden waves from the hayshed. He’s a tight man, bony, with great big hands.

‘Ah, Brady! The man himself!’

‘There’s a bad day.’

‘’Tis raw,’ Leyden agrees. ‘Throw the halter on the mare there, would you? I’ve a feeling she’ll give trouble.’

Brady stands at the mare’s head while Leyden shoes. The big hands are skilled: the hoof is measured, pared, the toe culled for the clip. On the anvil the shoe is held,
hammered
to size. Steel nails are driven home, and clenched. Then the rasp comes round, the shavings falling like sawdust at their feet. All the while it’s coming down, gasps of sudden rain whipping the galvanised roof. Brady feels strange pleasure standing there, sheltered, with the mare.

When Leyden rasps the last hoof, he throws the tools down and looks out at the rain.

‘It’s a day for the high stool.’

‘It’s early,’ Brady says uneasily.

‘If we don’t soon go, it’s late it will be.’ Leyden laughs, his eyes searching the ground for nails.

‘I’ve to get me finger out; there’s jobs at home,’ says Brady. He puts the mare back in the stable, bolts the door.

‘You’ll come, any road,’ Leyden says. ‘I’ll get Sean to change a cheque and we’ll settle up.’

‘It’ll do another day.’

‘Not a hate about it. I might not have it another day.’

As Brady follows Leyden back to town, a burning in his stomach surges. Leyden turns down the slip road past the chemist and parks behind The Arms. It looks closed but Leyden pushes the back door open. The bulb is dark over the pool table. On
Northern Sound
, a woman is reading out the news. Long Kearns is there with his Powers, staring into the ornamental fishing net behind the bar. Norris and McPhillips are picking horses for the next race. Big Sean stands behind the counter, buttering bread.

‘Is that bread fresh or is it yesterday’s?’ Leyden asks.

‘Mother’s Pride,’ Sean smiles, looking up. ‘Today’s bread today.’

‘But if we ate it tomorrow wouldn’t it still be today’s?’ says Norris, who has drunk two farms. Except for the slight shake in his hand, no one would ever know.

‘Put up two of your finest there, Sean,’ says Leyden, ‘and pay no mind to that blackguard.’

‘He’s been minding me for years,’ says Norris. ‘He’ll hardly stop now.’

Sean puts the lip of a pint glass to the tap. Leyden hands him the cheque and tells him to give Brady the change. The stout is left to settle, the dark falling slowly away from the cream.

‘We got the mare shod, any road.’

‘Did she stand?’

‘It was terror,’ Leyden says. ‘I’d still be at it only for this man here.’

‘It’s a job for a younger man,’ McPhillips says. ‘I did it myself when I was a garsún.’

‘After three pints there’s nothing you’ve not done,’ says Norris.

‘And after two there’s nothing you won’t do!’ says Leyden, raising the bar. ‘Isn’t that right, Sean?’

‘Leave Sean out of it,’ the barman says affectionately.

Norris looks at Brady. ‘Is it my imagination or have you lost weight?’

Brady shakes his head but his hand reaches for his belt.

‘It’s put it on I have.’

Big Sean wraps the sandwiches in clear plastic and puts them in the fridge. Brady reaches out and his hand closes on the glass. The glass feels cold in his hand. It isn’t right to be drinking at this hour, and the stout is bitter.

‘Have you a drop of blackcurrant there, Sean?’

‘What are you doing with that poison?’ Leyden asks. ‘Destroying a good pint.’

Brady swallows a long draught. ‘At least I didn’t destroy four good hoofs,’ he says, finding his voice at last.

Everybody laughs.

‘Is that so?’ says Leyden, smiling. ‘And what would you know? There’s nothing but cart horses in Monaghan.’

‘Every good cart horse needs shoes,’ says Brady.

‘They wear around the Cavan potholes,’ says McPhillips, a Newbliss man.

‘Now we have it!’ Norris cries.

When the banter subsides, McPhillips goes out to place the bets. Sean turns off the radio now that the news is over. The silence is like every silence; each man is glad of it and glad, too, that it won’t last.

As they sit there, Leyden’s nostril flares.

‘Which one of ye dug up Elvis?’

‘Lord God!’ Long Kearns cries, coming suddenly to life. ‘That would knock a blackbird off its pad.’

Leyden swallows half his pint. The shoeing has put a thirst on him so Brady, not liking to leave with the money, orders another round.

Out in the street, schoolchildren are eating chips from brown paper bags. There’s the smell of fried onions, hot oil and vinegar. It is darker now and the rain is still falling. When Brady walks into the diner, the girl at the counter looks up: ‘Fresh cod and chips?’

‘Ay.’ Brady nods. ‘And tay.’

He sits at the window and looks out at the day. Black clouds are sliding over the bungalows. He thinks again of that night in Cootehill. There was a Northern band in The White Horse. They sat at a distance from the stage and talked. She had a thoroughbred yearling and a three-
year-old
she thought would make an honest hunter. As she talked, a green spotlight shone through her hair. They danced a little and she drank a glass of wine. Afterwards, she asked him back to the house.
If you bring the chips, I’ll light the fire and put the kettle on
. They ate supper in the
firelight
. A yellow cloth was spread over the table. She put down wicker placemats, pepper and salt, warm plates. The cutlery flashed silver. Smell of deodorant lingered in her bedroom, a wee candle burning, and headlights were passing through the curtains. When he woke, at dawn, she was asleep, her hand on his chest. He was working then, full time, for Leyden. That morning, walking down
the main street, buying milk and rashers, he felt like a man.

The girl comes with his order. Brady eats what’s placed before him, pays up, and faces down the street. He has to think for a moment before he can remember where he parked the van. He passes a stand of fruit and vegetables, a bucket of tired flowers, boxes of Christmas cards, ropes of trembling red and yellow tinsel. When he is walking past the hotel, he recognises a tune he cannot name. He stops to listen, then finds himself at the counter ordering a pint. The day is no longer his own. Afew more tunes are played. At some point he looks up and realises McQuaid is there, in a dark suit of clothes, with his wife. Sensing him, McQuaid looks over, nods. Soon after, a pint’s sent down. On Brady’s lips the stout tastes colder than the last.

‘The bowld man himself! Have you no home to go to?’ It’s Leyden. He takes one look at Brady, and changes. ‘What’s ailing you at all, man?’

Brady shakes his head.

Leyden looks over at McQuaid. The waitress is bringing serviettes, knives for the steak.

‘Pay no mind,’ he says. ‘Not a hate about it. The land’ll be here long after we’re dead and gone. Haven’t we only the lend of it?’

Brady nods and orders the drink. Leyden pulls his stool up close and waits for the pint to settle. Brady is almost sorry he came in. When the pint is ready, Leyden puts it on the beer mat, turns it round.

‘Never mind the land. It’s the woman that’s your loss,’ he says unhelpfully. ‘That was the finest woman ever came around these parts.’

‘Ay,’ Brady says.

‘There’s men’d give their right arms to have a woman like that.’ Leyden says, coming in tight and taking hold of his arm.

‘They would, surely.’

The waitress passes with two sizzling plates.

‘What happened at all?’ asks Leyden.

Brady feels rooted to the stool. Back then some days were hard but not one of them was wasted. He looks away. The silence rises. He lifts his glass but he cannot swallow.

‘It was over the horse,’ he says finally.

‘The horse?’

Leyden looks at him but Brady does not want to go on. Even the mention of the horse is too much.

‘What about the horse?’ Leyden persists but then he looks away to leave Brady some room.

‘I came home one night and she told me I’d have to buy food, pay bills. She told me I’d have to take her out for
dinner
.’

‘And what did you say?’

‘I told her to go fuck herself!’ Brady says. ‘I told her I’d put her horses out on the road.’

‘That’s terror,’ Leyden says. ‘Did you have drink on you?’

Brady hesitates. ‘A wee drop.’

‘Sure we all say things –’

‘I went out and opened the gate and put her horses out on the road,’ Brady says. ‘She gave me a second chance but it was never the same. Nothing was ever the same.’

‘Christ,’ says Leyden, pulling away. ‘I didn’t think you had it in you.’

It is well past closing time when Brady finds the van. He gets behind the wheel and takes the back roads home. It will be all right; the sergeant knows him, he knows the sergeant. He will not be stopped. There are big, wet trees at either side of these roads, telephone poles, wires dangling. He drives on through falling leaves, keeping to his own side. When he reaches the front door, the bread is still on the step. The dog hasn’t come home but he knows the birds will have it gone by morning. He looks at the kitchen table, the knife in the empty jar, and climbs the stairs.

He gets into the wisp and takes his jumper off. He wants to take his boots off but he is afraid. If he takes his boots off he knows he will never get them back on in the morning. He crouches under the bedclothes and looks at the bare window. It is winter now. What is it doing out there? The wind is piping terrible notes in the garden and,
somewhere
, a beast is roaring. He hopes it is McQuaid’s. He lies in his bed and closes his eyes, thinking only of her. He can feel his own heart, beating. Soon, she will come back and forgive him. The bridle will be back on the coat stand, the cloth on the table. In his mind there is the flash of silver. As sleep is claiming him, she is already there, her pale hand on his chest and her dark horse is back grazing his fields.