Winter Song (10 page)

‘Yes, yes.'

‘I've never been an ambitious man—that's one of the things Maureen hated about me, because I was contented. I remember one evening when I came home from work, I was dead tired, all I wanted was to sit down in the chair and be quiet, and I said to her “It's a wonderful thing to be able to come home of an evening, shut your door, sit down in a chair by the fire and read your newspaper in peace.” She laughed at that—I know she was angry. I know she hated me for saying it, but that's the kind of man I am, I'm afraid. I have a job and do my work as best I can, and I look forward to coming home in the evening.'

Mr Delaney looked at him but said nothing.

After a while he asked ‘You've lived alone here a year. You have a woman to come in and do for you?'

‘Yes, she's very good. When Dermod's home from sea, we do it together. But enough about me.'

He crossed the floor, picked up the collecting box and gave it to Mr Delaney.

‘You might just check the amount,' he said.

‘I will.'

Mr Delaney took a key from his pocket, opened the box, tossed the coins out and counted.

‘Nearly four pounds. That's your best effort yet,' and he tossed the heap of coins into a capacious pocket. ‘Tell me, have you seen the man yet?'

‘Denny, you mean? No, not yet. But I may see him in the morning. I hear Desmond came down from London yesterday—Father Moynihan wired him. I didn't think he'd come.…'

‘Under such circumstances,' said Mr Delaney.

‘Anyway, he's come. And he stayed all night with his father. The poor man has been very ill, they say. It's a miracle, really, they had given him up for dead.'

‘His wife has a room at St Stephen's Hospice, hasn't she?'

‘Yes, she went in there that terrible day—ah, it was a day. I'll never forget it. It was like something exploded in poor Fanny's head.'

‘Mrs Fury?' said Mr Delaney.

‘She left her home that day and never went back. An extraordinary thing to do. I begged her to come and make a home with me, but I'm afraid she'd made up her mind. She wasn't making any more homes for anybody.…'

‘Poor creature. And now, thank God, her husband is restored to her. I agree with you, Kilkey, a miracle. I wonder what they'll do.'

‘I don't really know. But I don't think the family will ever come together again.'

‘I have been trying for some time now to get some remission of sentence for her son, so far, without success. But now that this has happened, something may be done.'

‘She certainly idolized that son, though he broke her heart, and turned the others against her.'

‘I'll try again. I'll do my best.'

‘Would you like to see Mrs Fury?' asked Kilkey. ‘I know she would be pleased to see you.'

‘Not at the moment, definitely not. But I shall remember the boy.'

‘I've written him regular since he was taken away.'

‘Do the others write to him?' asked Delaney.

‘I don't know. I think Anthony would. I know he corresponds regularly with his mother. He was really angry with her when he heard she had broken up the home. It's a big thing, Mr Delaney, to break up a home after all them years.'

‘It is indeed.'

Mr Delaney got up. ‘Now I must go. Miss Francis will be waiting for me.'

‘I hope Miss Francis is well.'

‘Miss Francis, thanks be to God, is never ill.'

Mr Delaney shook his huge frame like a dog. He picked up his hat.

‘I'll walk with you as far as the tram stop,' and Mr Kilkey put on coat and cap. They left the house.

‘The Hospice won't keep two people,' said Mr Delaney, ‘I wonder what they'll do.'

‘As a matter of fact, I'm hoping they'll do what they always wanted to—go back to Ireland.'

‘That would be a very good thing. The woman ought to see the sense of it. I do hope she'll be sensible and go. They have blood relatives there, I'm sure.'

‘She has, I know. I feel it would make them very happy,' Kilkey said.

They had reached the end of the road, and stood waiting for the tram.

‘Don't wait, Joseph, you shouldn't be out really. Get home to bed now. If there should be any news, I'll not fail to report immediately, but don't hope too much, will you?' He looked earnestly at the man, ‘People are quite incalculable. I've got a temperature chart of humanity on my desk, Kilkey, and you ought to see it, up and down it goes, up and down. And here's the tram. Goodbye now, look after yourself. And let me know
any
time if there's anything I can do.'

‘There's one thing, Mr Delaney, I'd like
you
to persuade these old people to go back.'

‘I'll think about that,' he called back, then waved a hand as the tram moved off.

Kilkey watched it go. Then he walked slowly home. It was eleven o'clock. He ought to be in bed, ‘Should have turned in long ago,' he told himself; ‘fancy that man coming out to see me, all that way. My, that was a very good collection.'

Returned home, he banked up the fire, he scribbled a note for the woman next door, left it on the table. Then he went upstairs, undressed and climbed into bed. He was soon asleep. At five o'clock that evening he would be up again, out, treading northwards, dockwards.

‘You have seen your father,' she said, and he said, ‘Yes, I have seen him, mother.'

‘Alive,' she said and he nodded his head; he sat there watching her, she cried quietly, he watched her old hands shake, her shoulders heave—the light from the window fell upon her face—he could not bear this, this looking; he got up and went to the window, ‘The sun is so strong this morning,' he said out of a dry mouth; slowly he drew the curtains, shut out sight of the river, the sea.

‘Glory be to God,' she said, he caught her arm, he said ‘Be brave, mother.'

‘He is coming—here?'

‘They are bringing him.'

He felt himself caught and held, his arms pinioned by her own, felt her eyes never leave, they seemed to burn his face, ‘Tell me about your father. What is he like? Has the sea broken him much? Oh, your poor father. Tell me, did he speak to you—did he smile, did he know you …?' She cried suddenly—‘I wonder if he could laugh.'

Desmond Fury did not answer, he could not answer. Instead he stared stupidly into his mother's face—it made him remember the older times—he saw endless roads stretching, feet stamping them, tall buildings, swinging doors, inside of which sat, high up, walled in—silent, the sea's agents. In her face he saw himself as a boy, swinging the incense in the silver censer. He saw his brother's face, his sister's. He saw them all stamped on this one face, whose hard bent mouth was turned now as though biting upon the impossible words. He thought at one moment she would shout, shout loud and long, shattering the silence of this room.

‘You
did
see him?'

‘I saw him.'

‘He's coming here?'

‘Yes. I said so, mother.'

‘He's alive—Denny's alive.'

‘Yes, mother.'

‘Alive in my arms—oh, God, I can't believe it.'

He turned his back on her, he let her continue, quietly sobbing.

‘So this is how it is,' he thought, ‘this is what can happen to people.'

He went over to the window again, he gently moved aside the curtain and looked out. He watched a mad, swirling flight of gulls. Their very movements gave him a feeling of inertia, he came away and took his seat by his mother.

‘What do you think you'll do now?' he asked. He thought: ‘I have to say something, even in these awful moments, tongue-tied, a feeling of utter dumbness,' but it was better than nothing. ‘What will you do now, mother?' he asked, imagining her answer, ‘Why should what I do interest you, who have always been so indifferent to us?'

Then he heard her say quietly, ‘We shall leave Gelton, as soon as you father's better, God spare him, and will
never
come back again.'

There was something fierce in her utterance. She got up from the chair, she went to the window and looked out, ‘
Never
' she said, and into this single word she seemed to put all her hatred, all her bitter anger against what the eye saw, what the heart remembered.

‘Gelton,' she said, ‘I've had enough of it to last a lifetime.'

Desmond was only half listening, his mind wandered, he suddenly thought of how she had received him. He had gone off to London—he had written his mother, but nothing could force him to see her. Her reception had been what he expected.

‘Oh!' she said, ‘so it's you.'

He had smiled.

‘You felt you had to come, I expect.'

She had not said ‘sit down.' She had not said ‘how is your wife?' She had not asked him if he would like to share tea with her. This had come and gone. She had drunk a little tea by herself, but somehow it had choked her. She watched him all the while, this first son, this huge, healthy, arrogant, determined person. He had smashed his way upwards. The thrusting Union leader, the potential member of Parliament stood by the little bed, and after a few minutes he saw his mother return and sit down.

‘Desmond.'

The exclamation surprised him, he swung round.

She was seated, her hands in her lap, looking up at her son. ‘Have I been very hard?'

‘You did your best, what you thought was your best. That's all,' he said, which meant in effect ‘that's enough.' No crawling over old ground. This really is the
end
of something and the beginning of something. There's to-morrow. Yesterday is dead and done with.

‘What time are they bringing him to me?'

‘He will come within the hour. The priests are seeing to that,' and the tone of his voice made her say, ‘They're still as bad as that then, are they?' and he said, measuring his words, ‘They're as bad as that. I like them no better for it. I'm sorry for you, though, mother. I've always been sorry for you.'

‘That was very kind of you.'

‘Do you wish me to go?'

‘I'm not asking you and again I'm not stopping you. I know you are the only one of my sons who ever feels uncomfortable in a holy place. May God look down on you kindly one day, that's all I have to say. Their goodness makes you feel awkward, I know, it always did—it would never shame you—you haven't that in you.'

‘Oh God,' he thought, ‘so it's come to this, in the worst moment of her life, when she must dread the shock of seeing that smashed old man, that all she can remember, is the old time.'

‘Mother! I came down here last night. I came to see dad. I was so pleased to hear the news. Pleased for you both. You can believe that, or you can do the reverse. I told you a year ago that though we could never be happy together—for we don't see eye to eye—I would see that you never wanted. I still mean that. I really do. I am sorry for dad and you, that, at the end of your days, you should find yourselves only where you had started. Please believe, mother, that I am sincere in that, and I am honest. I've said I hate the Church, and I hate it.'

He stared down at the clean scrubbed floor, at the coloured rug. When he looked up, the room was empty. She had gone. ‘She must have crept out,' he told himself. ‘I never heard her go. Poor mother. Christ! Why should it have come down to wrangling. She's shaken, the creature's fair torn indeed—I saw it—it was sad.'

He rose quickly as the door opened. A Sister came in. She came up to him and as she did so, he was conscious of two things, her apple-red cheeks, the shining frankness in her eyes. She was very young, he saw that at once. But she was very grave.

‘Mr Fury, would you please go. Your mother will not return here until you have gone.'

‘Very well … Sister,' he stuttered, ‘very well. You'll see to her. She's frailer to-day than I have ever known her.'

‘And you don't understand,' the nun said, and followed him out of the room.

‘Goodbye,' she said, showing him out.

‘Goodbye, goodbye,' he replied thickly, and she saw him striding down the path, kicking up gravel as he went.

‘A terribly impudent man,' said the nun and closed the door.

‘He is gone now,' she said, and taking the woman's arm, led her back to the room.

‘It's always the same. I wish he had never come. We upset each other,' she said.

‘You mustn't speak of him like that, my dear. Besides, you must think of the other. You must get yourself ready. You said yourself that you wanted to look nice to see your husband, lost for so long, and now coming home to you.'

‘I'm frightened,' Mrs Fury said, ‘I don't know why. I am frightened.'

She stood in the centre of the room, undecided, and the young nun said, ‘Sit down.' They sat down together.

‘In half an hour he will be here. Think of that and nothing else.'

‘I've been so foolish.'

‘How so?'

‘I have, that's all. I shouldn't have done it. I shouldn't have been so hasty. I'll have to tell him everything. But he'll never know how sick I was of it all. All them things happening and all them nights after, I could hear that old sea washing about in my head. What'll I say to him now, except there's nothing.'

The Sister sat up. ‘Now you're beginning to feel sorry for yourself and that is bad. Thank God this very hour he is restored to you, alive. Given back to you by the sea that's taken many a man down.'

‘Oh! I'm ashamed of myself.'

‘Come now, we'll look for that nice blue dress you wear. You must look nice when he comes. And think how much he must be longing to see you.'

She put her two hands on the woman's face, ‘Smile mother,' she said, ‘smile now.'

And the woman smiled.

‘I couldn't settle this whole day. The Mother Superior stayed with me last night. I couldn't sleep at all. She says too many of them pills is bad for my heart.'