The Wake (And What Jeremiah Did Next) (3 page)

“Thanks for coming Father,” I said mustering semblance of gratitude.

“Not at all Jeremiah. Sure what would you expect me to do when one of my parishioners dies? Eh?”

Not many people can make you feel foolish for thanking them but this boy can. And what’s this about
my
parishioners? He’s only a curate for Christ sake. But he’s the school chaplain and that makes him feel important. Charlie Chaplin the weans call him. He was hardly away when Susan and Mairead went too. I saw them to the front door and when I came back Willie Henry was standing uncertainly at the coffin. I went over to him and joined him staring down at the corpse. The way you do.

“God she’s far shook Master. She was a fine looking woman so she was too.”

“She was”.

“A fine looking woman. Sure I used to see you out the town with her all the time.”

I didn’t take in what he was saying right. This is what comes of being on autopilot. But now he was gawking over my shoulder and his face was whiter than Maud’s. I heard Mammy’s voice behind me.

“How are yous all doing?” she was saying and ones were getting up out of their seats to sympathise with her. Willie Henry gripped me by the arm.

“Who’s that there in the coffin Master?” he croaked.

“Oh I’m sorry Willie Henry. Did you not know? I thought you knew. That’s Maud Harrigan from next door. We’re waking her. She doesn’t have anybody.”

“Jesus Master, you gave me the wile scare there. Sure I thought it was your moller was dead.”

“Would you like to sit down?”

“I’ll do that,” he said and then whispered in my ear: “You couldn’t give me a wee nip of something Master could you? I’m just feeling a bit weak. I’ll be all right if I get a wee nip to bring me round.”

“I will surely.” I said. “Paddy all right?”

“The very thing Master. Just a nip now,” demonstrating with finger and thumb wide apart.

When I came back from the scullery Jim Loughery and Seamus White were sitting beside Willie Henry and he was telling them about what happened. They shook hands with me and I smelt the drink off them too. They were laughing and trying to keep straight faces at the same time. Seeing I’d the whiskey in my hand I offered them a drink too.

“I wouldn’t say no,” said Jim. Plump and happy by nature, eyes like a friendly ferret, looking a bit guilty now because he hadn’t even gone to the coffin I’d say.

“Thanks Jeremiah. I’ll have a wee one,” said Seamus. Always well-cut suit, good tweed too. Some people are like that. Sunday best the seven days. Must be a family thing. Goes back to childhood probably. We used to always wear our best clothes to mass and then change out of them after our breakfast. I looked to see who else was there now. Just Margie McConville. The other women had gone out to the hall with Mammy. I was embarrassed nobody got tea. I was never at a wake where there was no tea. Probably about ten people sitting there in the front room with their tongues hanging out and not one to see to them.

“Margie,” I said, “would you fancy a drink? Orange or anything?”

Margie nodded. “I’ll have what yous are having. Whiskey’ll do fine. I hope it’s not watered Jeremiah.”

She was smiling away, big rosy face on her. Always up for a bit of crack Margie. Looks like it’s the hard core out here in the kitchen.

“Naw, I only bought it the day there so my mother never got at it yet.”

She gave a big man’s laugh. “Do you mean to tell me she drinks your whiskey and then waters it down to cover her tracks?”

“Naw,” I said. “I mean she’s the next thing to a prohibitionist.”

“Not a dilutionist then?” she said.

“Or illusionist,” said Jim.

We were all drinking the whiskey when Mammy came in again and took one look and reversed out. The first two or three sips loosened me. I could feel the tension come off my shoulders and was starting to see on a different level from before the stupidity of the whole thing I was implicated in. For no reason then I thought of Aisling coming to plead with me and her shock when she saw the bow on the door. Or somebody telling her about the blinds being down and her thinking it was Mammy was dead and landing up hoping it might mean a new start for us.

“Somebody told me Maud died intestate,” Seamus was saying.

“Where’s that?” said Willie Henry.

Margie had her lips tight together to stop the laughing. Her glass was well down already and she was rocking back and forward nearly spilling the rest.

“Aw there’s money there,” said Seamus. “Straight up. You know she was the daughter of Hoof Hogan.”

“Hoof Hogan?” Willie Henry was frowning, eyes half closed as if in deep thought. “I never heard of him now.”

“God you must have heard of Hoof Hogan,” said Seamus. He left his glass carefully on the empty chair beside him and loosened the top button of his shirt. “Made big money in England so he did and then came home and bought a pub down in Carndonagh. They lived in Troy Park. Hoof had a wile drouth on him from when he came back.”

Margie nodded, recovered. “Aye sure he drank most of what he had but he still managed to leave a fair whack behind,” she said. “Didn’t he marry that Prod from the Waterside whatdidyoucallher? From some English or Welsh family away back wasn’t she?”

“Who?” I asked, hearing but not taking it in right. She stood submissively in a gymslip when I strapped her to the cross that time. Soft linen faded to a thread nearly.

“Aw gee,” she said screwing up her face, “it’s on the tip of me tongue. English I think they were. Their name began with a t and hold on a minute till I think — the first vowel was u or maybe i. Naw, wait a second, wait till I try and remember, I think it started with an m — I’m not sure — but I’m definitely right about the vowel. U it was. Muggeridge … Murrick… Mulder … Hold on, I’ve got it. Jenkins.”

Margie looked round at us all, pleased with herself. “Never turned,” she went on. “Let on she did so’s she could get her man but then never darkened the door of the chapel after the day of the wedding. She turned queer remember. Do you not remember?”

“You mean …” said Willie Henry, eyewater shining with the scandal of it. “You’re not telling me a woman —”

“Ended up sweeping the grass out her front before they put her in the mental. She used to get up in the morning and go out and sweep the grass before even she got her breakfast.”

“Howard Hughes is supposed to be like that,” said Jim.

“That’s the film man,” said Willie Henry. “I didn’t know he swept the grass now.”

I thought of Aisling again and brought the bottle in and poured out a bit more for everybody.

“Good on you Master,” said Willie Henry. “God save Ireland.”

“Hoof left school with nothing,” said Seamus. “Could hardly write his own name so he couldn’t. And then after he got married to your woman they went across the water and he worked as a brickie in London. Never spent a penny if he could help it and ended up a millionaire. This is the nineteen thirties I’m talking about now.”

Jim shook his head. “That’s a goodun. You’d think I’d have heard of him. Hoof Hogan you say?”

“Hoof Hogan. Rough as a bag of spanners. Dressed like a tramp. He bought a bit of waste ground in London for next to nothing thinking you know it might come in useful sometime and it turned out years after it was wanted for an extra part of a runway for some airport. So one day this boy in a three piece suit comes to the door and offers him half a million for the land. Quarter an acre it was,
less
than quarter an acre. So your man Hoof tells him to go and get lost and he comes back the next week and offers him over a million.”

“Handy money,” said Jim.

“Handy money all right. This was the nineteen thirties now.” Seamus began to smile broadly. He took a sip from his Paddy, looked curiously into the glass and loosened his tie till it hung like a scarf. “But wait till you hear anyway. You won’t believe this so you won’t. He bought a Bentley.”

“That’s the car you’re talking about?” asked Margie.

“Aye, he bought a new Bentley. Three and a half liter job, Rolls Royce engine, one of the dearest cars going at the time, like a car royalty would have.”

“Christ,” said Willie Henry scratching at his fork with his free hand. “God forgive me for using the holy name but was that not the car Sean Connery drove in From Russia with Love was it not?”

“Not the same car,” said Seamus, “but wait till you hear now what I’m going to tell you. In them days Bentley always did an after sales kind of service where they’d send some top mechanic out to check how the car was performing. So about three months or something after Hoof buys it this Bentley boy arrives at the building site because that’s the address he was given you see. So Hoof brings him over to it sitting beside a cement mixer that’s churning away. The Bentley’s half covered in mud and bits of cement and God knows what else and your man’s sort of thrown by all this but anyway he shouts over the noise of the mixer
Tell me, how’s she behaving?
And Hoof shouts back at him
Tiptop, tiptop, I’m very pleased with her now. She’s a powerful yoke so she is. I was thinking I might put a tow bar on her next week.”

Seamus laughed with his head away back. “I was thinking I might put a tow bar on her next week,” he said again. That was in case we hadn’t heard it the first time. We all laughed along with him and I was thinking maybe he was going to say it again because I could tell to look at him he wasn’t finished but what he said was : “Were you ever in the bar Hoof had in Carndonagh, what’s this you call it?”

“I’m not sure. Which one was that?” asked Jim.

“Aw Jesus I’m trying to think. Sure there’s so many pubs in the place. There’s supposed to be one for every county in Ireland you know.”

Margie stifled a shriek, big chest wobbling. “You’re not telling me there’s thirty-two pubs in Carndonagh.”

“At last count,” Seamus answered. “I’m just remembering now. The Bore’s Head, spelt B-O-R-E.”

“He was trying to be funny then?” said Jim.

“He was not. He couldn’t spell. He couldn’t even write sure, except he learned to write his name on checks. Naw, the boy that painted the name up, this boy from out the Moville Road I think, wasn’t that great of a speller himself. But wait till you hear. Do you know what Hoof said to this crowd of teachers came into the Bore’s Head one time the day they got their summer holidays. They were mob happy, is that what you call it?”

“Demob happy?” I offered.

“Demob happy,” said Seamus, hitting himself on the forehead with the palm of his hand. “They were demob happy and one or two of them struck up a song you see after they were in the place about an hour and a half and Hoof comes over to them with a face on him as long as the day and the marra and says
What in under Christ do yous think it is anyway? Are yous in here to have a good time or are yous in here to drink?”

Willie Henry tried to wipe the tears from his eyes. “God that’s a quare wan,” he said.

“Are yous in here to have a good time or are yous in here to drink?” Seamus said. He pulled at his tie and it came away and he folded it neatly and put it in his jacket pocket.

I got myself into a state that day and beat her sore and she cried and I unstrapped her and took her in my arms. What’s wrong with her now with this one Audrey anyway? Didn’t she say she was unstable? Okay, let her go and get treatment then.

“Your mother won’t mind us drinking?” said Jim.

“Not at all,” I told him. She would but I didn’t care. To hell with her, her and her phony show. All the neighbors know she’d no time for Maud. She knows they know but she goes through with it anyway. Would somebody please explain that one.

“Naw but I was saying,” said Seamus. “About Maud. I’d say there was money there. There’s no surviving relatives is there Jerry?”

“Not that I know of,” I said. “My mother always told me there was nobody. I wouldn’t be surprised if she left the whole lot to the church you know.” Neither I would. She spent that much time in the cathedral the sacristan nearly had to put her out every night when he was locking up. And didn’t spend a penny if she could help it, wouldn’t even buy a newspaper.
Vera you wouldn’t lend me yesterday’s Derry Journal would you. There’s a death I wanted to see in it.
And you never saw it again. I heard of ones before like that. There was the old doll went about like a pauper down in Wicklow, no, Wexford it was I think, left tens of thousands she’d stashed away under the stairs to the church, relatives up in arms. It’s like those people Luther went on about that bought indulgences and paid for a new stained glass window in the chapel as long as their name was put on it. How could I burn in hell if my name’s up there in lights behind the altar?