The Collar (14 page)

‘And is that what you're doing to us, father?' asked Norton in a trembling voice. ‘After all the years, and all we done for you, is it you're going to show us up before the whole country as a lot of robbers?'

‘Ah, ye idiots, I'm not showing ye up.'

‘You are then, father, and you're showing up every man, woman and child in the parish,' said Norton. ‘And mark my words, 'twon't be forgotten for you.'

The following Sunday Father Crowley spoke of the matter from the altar. He spoke for a full half hour without a trace of emotion on his grim old face, but his sermon was one long, venomous denunciation of the ‘long-tailed families' who, according to him, were the ruination of the country and made a mockery of truth, justice, and charity. He was, as his congregation agreed, a shockingly obstinate old man who never knew when he was in the wrong.

After Mass he was visited in his sacristy by the committee. He gave Norton a terrible look from under his shaggy eyebrows, which made that respectable farmer flinch.

‘Father,' Norton said appealingly, ‘we only want one word with you. One word and then we'll go. You're a hard character, and you said some bitter things to us this morning; things we never deserved from you. But we're quiet, peaceable poor men and we don't want to cross you.'

Father Crowley made a sound like a snort.

‘We came to make a bargain with you, father,' said Norton, beginning to smile.

‘A bargain?'

‘We'll say no more about the whole business if you'll do one little thing – just one little thing – to oblige us.'

‘The bargain!' the priest said impatiently. ‘What's the bargain?'

‘We'll leave the matter drop for good and all if you'll give the boy a character.'

‘Yes, father,' cried the committee in chorus. ‘Give him a character! Give him a character!'

‘Give him a what?' cried the priest.

‘Give him a character, father, for the love of God,' said Norton emotionally. ‘If you speak up for him, the judge will leave him off and there'll be no stain on the parish.'

‘Is it out of your minds you are, you halfwitted angashores?' asked Father Crowley, his face suffused with blood, his head trembling. ‘Here am I all these years preaching to ye about decency and justice and truth and ye no more understand me than that wall there. Is it the way ye want me to perjure myself? Is it the way ye want me to tell a damned lie with the name of Almighty God on my lips? Answer me, is it?'

‘Ah, what perjure!' Norton replied wearily. ‘Sure, can't you say a few words for the boy? No one is asking you to say much. What harm will it do you to tell the judge he's an honest, good-living, upright lad, and that he took the money without meaning any harm?'

‘My God!' muttered the priest, running his hands distractedly through his grey hair. ‘There's no talking to ye, no talking to ye, ye lot of sheep.'

When he was gone the committeemen turned and looked at one another in bewilderment.

‘That man is a terrible trial,' said one.

‘He's a tyrant,' said Daly vindictively.

‘He is, indeed,' sighed Norton, scratching his head. ‘But in God's holy name, boys, before we do anything, we'll give him one more chance.'

That evening when he was at his tea the committeemen called again. This time they looked very spruce, businesslike, and independent. Father Crowley glared at them.

‘Are ye back?' he asked bitterly. ‘I was thinking ye would be. I declare to my goodness, I'm sick of ye and yeer old committee.'

‘Oh, we're not the committee, father,' said Norton stiffly.

‘Ye're not?'

‘We're not.'

‘All I can say is, ye look mighty like it. And, if I'm not being impertinent, who the deuce are ye?'

‘We're a deputation, father.'

‘Oh, a deputation! Fancy that, now. And a deputation from what?'

‘A deputation from the parish, father. Now, maybe you'll listen to us.'

‘Oh, go on! I'm listening, I'm listening.'

‘Well, now, 'tis like this, father,' said Norton, dropping his airs and graces and leaning against the table. ‘'Tis about that little business this morning. Now, father, maybe you don't understand us and we don't understand you. There's a lot of misunderstanding in the world today, father. But we're quiet simple poor men that want to do the best we can for everybody, and a few words or a few pounds wouldn't stand in our way. Now, do you follow me?'

‘I declare,' said Father Crowley, resting his elbows on the table, ‘I don't know whether I do or not.'

‘Well, 'tis like this, father. We don't want any blame on the parish or on the Cronins, and you're the one that can save us. Now all we ask of you is to give the boy a character –'

‘Yes, father,' interrupted the chorus, ‘give him a character! Give him a character!'

‘Give him a character, father, and you won't be troubled by him again. Don't say no to me now till you hear what I have to say. We won't ask you to go next, nigh or near the court. You have pen and ink beside you and one couple of lines is all you need write. When 'tis over you can hand Michael John his ticket to America and tell him not to show his face in Carricknabreena again. There's the price of his ticket, father,' he added, clapping a bundle of notes on the table. ‘The Cronins themselves made it up, and we have his mother's word and his own word that he'll clear out the minute 'tis all over.'

‘He can go to pot!' retorted the priest. ‘What is it to me where he goes?'

‘Now, father, can't you be patient?' Norton asked reproachfully. ‘Can't you let me finish what I'm saying? We know 'tis no advantage to you, and that's the very thing we came to talk about. Now, supposing – just supposing for the sake of argument – that you do what we say, there's a few of us here, and between us, we'd raise whatever little contribution to the parish fund you'd think would be reasonable to cover the expense and trouble to yourself. Now do you follow me?'

‘Con Norton,' said Father Crowley, rising and holding the edge of the table, ‘I follow you. This morning it was perjury, and now 'tis bribery, and the Lord knows what ‘twill be next. I see I've been wasting my breath … And I see too,' he added savagely, leaning across the table towards them, ‘a pedigree bull would be more use to ye than a priest.'

‘What do you mean by that, father?' asked Norton in a low voice.

‘What I say.'

‘And that's a saying that will be remembered for you the longest day you live,' hissed Norton, leaning towards him till they were glaring at one another over the table.

‘A bull,' gasped Father Crowley. ‘Not a priest.'

‘'Twill be remembered.'

‘Will it? Then remember this too. I'm an old man now. I'm forty years a priest, and I'm not a priest for the money or power or glory of it, like others I know. I gave the best that was in me – maybe 'twasn't much but 'twas more than many a better man would give, and at the end of my days …' lowering his voice to a whisper he searched them with his terrible eyes, ‘… at the end of my days, if I did a wrong thing, or a bad thing, or an unjust thing, there isn't a man or woman in this parish that would brave me to my face and call me a villain. And isn't that a poor story for an old man that tried to be a good priest?' His voice changed again and he raised his head defiantly. ‘Now get out before I kick you out!'

And true to his word and character not one word did he say in Michael John's favour the day of the trial, no more than if he was a black. Three months Michael John got and by all accounts he got off light.

He was a changed man when he came out of jail, downcast and dark in himself. Everyone was sorry for him, and people who had never spoken to him before spoke to him then. To all of them he said modestly: ‘I'm very grateful to you, friend, for overlooking my misfortune.' As he wouldn't go to America, the committee made another whip-round and between what they had collected before and what the Cronins had made up to send him to America, he found himself with enough to open a small shop. Then he got a job in the County Council, and an agency for some shipping company, till at last he was able to buy a public-house.

As for Father Crowley, till he was shifted twelve months later, he never did a day's good in the parish. The dues went down and the presents went down, and people with money to spend on Masses took it fifty miles away sooner than leave it to him. They said it broke his heart.

He has left unpleasant memories behind him. Only for him, people say, Michael John would be in America now. Only for him he would never have married a girl with money, or had it to lend to poor people in the hard times, or ever sucked the blood of Christians. For, as an old man said to me of him: ‘A robber he is and was, and a grabber like his grandfather before him, and an enemy of the people like his uncle, the policeman; and though some say he'll dip his hand where he dipped it before, for myself I have no hope unless the mercy of God would send us another Moses or Brian Boru to cast him down and hammer him in the dust.'

S
ONG WITHOUT
W
ORDS

E
VEN IF THERE WERE ONLY
two men left in the world and both of them saints they wouldn't be happy. One of them would be bound to try and improve the other. That is the nature of things.

I am not, of course, suggesting that either Brother Arnold or Brother Michael was a saint. In private life Brother Arnold was a postman, but as he had a great name as a cattle doctor they had put him in charge of the monastery cows. He had the sort of face you would expect to see advertising somebody's tobacco: a big, innocent, contented face with a pair of blue eyes that were always twinkling. According to the Rule he was supposed to look sedate and go about in a composed and measured way, but he could not keep his eyes downcast for any length of time and wherever his eyes glanced they twinkled, and his hands slipped out of his long white sleeves and dropped some remark in sign language. Most of the monks were good at the deaf and dumb language; it was their way of getting round the Rule of Silence, and it was remarkable how much information they managed to pick up and pass on.

Now, one day it happened that Brother Arnold was looking for a bottle of castor oil and he remembered that he had lent it to Brother Michael, who was in charge of the stables. Brother Michael was a man he did not get on too well with; a dour, dull sort of man who kept to himself. He was a man of no great appearance, with a mournful wizened little face and a pair of weak red-rimmed eyes – for all the world the sort of man who, if you clapped a bowler hat on his head and a cigarette in his mouth, would need no other reference to get a job in a stable.

There was no sign of him about the stable yard, but this was only natural because he would not be wanted till the other monks returned from the fields, so Brother Arnold pushed in the stable door to look for the bottle himself. He did not see the bottle, but he saw something which made him wish he had not come. Brother Michael was hiding in one of the horseboxes; standing against the partition with something hidden behind his back and wearing the look of a little boy who has been caught at the jam. Something told Brother Arnold that at that moment he was the most unwelcome man in the world. He grew red, waved his hand to indicate that he did not wish to be involved, and returned to his own quarters.

It came as a shock to him. It was plain enough that Brother Michael was up to some shady business, and Brother Arnold could not help wondering what it was. It was funny, he had noticed the same thing when he was in the world, it was always the quiet, sneaky fellows who were up to mischief. In chapel he looked at Brother Michael and got the impression that Brother Michael was looking at him, a furtive look to make sure he would not be noticed. Next day when they met in the yard he caught Brother Michael glancing at him and gave back a cold look and a nod.

The following day Brother Michael beckoned him to come over to the stables as though one of the horses was sick. Brother Arnold knew it wasn't that; he knew he was about to be given some sort of explanation and was curious to know what it would be. He was an inquisitive man; he knew it, and blamed himself a lot for it.

Brother Michael closed the door carefully after him and then leaned back against the jamb of the door with his legs crossed and his hands behind his back, a foxy pose. Then he nodded in the direction of the horse-box where Brother Arnold had almost caught him in the act, and raised his brows inquiringly. Brother Arnold nodded gravely. It was not an occasion he was likely to forget. Then Brother Michael put his hand up his sleeve and held out a folded newspaper. Brother Arnold shrugged his shoulders as though to say the matter had nothing to do with him, but the other man nodded and continued to press the newspaper on him.

He opened it without any great curiosity, thinking it might be some local paper Brother Michael smuggled in for the sake of the news from home and was now offering as the explanation of his own furtive behaviour. He glanced at the name and then a great light broke on him. His whole face lit up as though an electric torch had been switched on behind, and finally he burst out laughing. He couldn't help himself. Brother Michael did not laugh but gave a dry little cackle which was as near as he ever got to laughing. The name of the paper was the
Irish Racing News.

Now that the worst was over Brother Michael grew more relaxed. He pointed to a heading about the Curragh and then at himself. Brother Arnold shook his head, glancing at him expectantly as though he were hoping for another laugh. Brother Michael scratched his head for some indication of what he meant. He was a slow-witted man and had never been good at the sign talk. Then he picked up the sweeping brush and straddled it. He pulled up his skirts, stretched out his left hand holding the handle of the brush, and with his right began flogging the air behind him, a grim look on his leather little face. Inquiringly he looked again and Brother Arnold nodded excitedly and put his thumbs up to show he understood. He saw now that the real reason Brother Michael had behaved so queerly was that he read racing papers on the sly and he did so because in private life he had been a jockey on the Curragh.