STRUMPET CITY

All day the high wind from the sea raked the streets of Kingstown. It slackened in the late afternoon, but as dusk came it began to freshen again. After dinner, while Father O’Connor played the piano for them and Mr. and Mrs. Bradshaw listened attentively, Yearling noticed that the oil lamp beside him was flickering from time to time. Taking care not to disturb his guests he searched quietly with his eyes for the source of the draught. The heavy curtains of the windows were stirring slightly. He sighed. All that was left to him of yet another of his diminishing store of summers was a warped window pane. He would have it seen to. In common with the rest of Kingstown he must take stock and prepare for the rigours of winter. He disliked doing that. It was always sad to bury a season.

The music was hypnotic but not inspiring. Ralph Bradshaw, he suspected, was in a torpor; Mrs. Bradshaw less so. He secretly appraised the comfort of the room. Soon he would have to surrender to fashion and science by abandoning his beloved paraffin lamps. He admired their soft light, the patterns of their beaded shades on floor and walls, their luminiferous elegance. But Progress had outmoded them. Soon they must go.

A gust of wind carried the sound of an ambulance bell into the room. It lifted to a peak, compelling their momentary attention, then the wind bore it away again and they returned to the music, the Bradshaws automatically, Yearling with an effort of will and only nominally.

He was so restless. His trip to London had been no help at all, except for the relief of stepping off the mailboat again at Kingstown Harbour. Should he have married? Not as things had happened. Now youth had gone; manhood almost. And the old order he had been expensively brought up in was being bitterly assailed. It too would go. In London a great meeting of locked-out dockers had gathered about the platform of Ben Tillett and chanted over and over again in thunderous chorus: ‘O God, strike Lord Davenport dead.’ In Dublin Larkin flung his terrible phrase at the employers. ‘You’ll crucify Christ no longer in this town.’ The streets were shaking with the sound of his voice, the burden bearers were straightening their backs. They were multitude. There would be no escape from them. In Moore Street he had watched the ragged urchins crawling beneath the barrows of the vendors in search of rotten fruit.

The music ended. Mr. and Mrs. Bradshaw said it was very nice. Father O’Connor apologised for the inadequacy of his technique. The music of Mozart was always more difficult than it looked. Yearling said the performance had been very accomplished and asked if anyone had noticed a draught. Mrs. Bradshaw and Father O’Connor assured him they had not. Bradshaw said he thought he had felt something.

‘I think the window-frame had become warped,’ Yearling said. ‘It seems to happen every summer.’

‘It’s the sun,’ Bradshaw pronounced. ‘I have the same problem myself. And there isn’t a competent carpenter in the country.’

‘The windows opening on the garden give constant trouble,’ Mrs. Bradshaw supplied.

‘That’s what I said,’ Bradshaw told her impatiently. With the shortening of the days he always went over them, carefully sealing them with sticky paper which never failed to become unstuck again after a couple of weeks.

‘Someone else,’ he suggested. His tone was dispirited. His own performance had disappointed him. Sensing this, Yearling became jocular and went to the piano.

‘There’s a new music-hall song in London,’ he announced, ‘which amused me. It goes like this.’

He was not a pianist but he could vamp a bass to a melody in the right hand. He did so now, discordantly at times but with infectious enjoyment, half turning to the company as he sang to them:

‘Joshua, gosh you are

Sweeter than lemon squash you are.’

His imitation of a music-hall artiste made even Bradshaw smile. The atmosphere became more alive. When he had finished they applauded and he said:

‘There were quite a few new songs. “Who were you with last night?” “Hold your hand out, you naughty boy.” “Hitchy Koo.” “It’s a long way to Tipperary.” I went a lot to music-hall.’

‘Can you remember any of the others?’ Mrs. Bradshaw prompted. But her husband, alarmed at some of the titles, cut in quickly.

‘I went to gape at some suffragettes who had chained themselves to railings. They’re burning empty houses now and setting fire to letter boxes.’

‘Tory hostesses are refusing to entertain members of the Government,’ Yearling continued. ‘And in the House someone flung his copy of Standing Orders at Winston Churchill’s head.’

Another ambulance bell rang furiously outside, rising and fading as the wind caught it and carried it away. The conversation stopped.

‘That’s strange,’ Yearling said eventually. ‘I thought I heard one earlier—while Father O’Connor was playing.’

He and Bradshaw went to the hall door. They had to hold it against the wind as they opened it. Outside it was dark. Trees in the garden tossed wildly. They searched the sky. When they returned they could report nothing unusual.

‘I’ve been wondering if it could be a baton charge,’ Father O’Connor said.

‘Kingstown has its blackguards too,’ her husband said, ‘make no mistake about it.’ He looked very grim. Father O’Connor agreed with him.

‘Violence is everywhere,’ he said, raising his hands a moment to deplore it.

‘As Father O’Connor has good reason to know,’ Bradshaw reminded the company.

‘Quite recovered.’ Father O’Connor’s tone acknowledged their solicitude, begged them modestly not to be reminded.

‘We live in terrible times,’ Mrs. Bradshaw said. The ambulance bells, the gusting wind, filled her with foreboding. Outside the cosy circle of lamplight lay all the uncertainty and hardship of the world.

‘I went shopping in town last week,’ she told them. ‘It was terrifying. There were little children everywhere and they were begging for pennies.’

‘I hope you kept your purse closed,’ he said. She did not reply, but looked hopefully at Father O’Connor. He wore a sad look.

‘What has religion to say to that?’ he asked. He was smiling and conversational in manner, but his eyes were cold. Father O’Connor became uncomfortable.

‘We must all have compassion for those who are hungry,’ he said at last, ‘but this is not by any means a simple matter. It is the duty of the parents to feed their children. If through misfortune they are unable to do so, then it is our obligation in charity to help them. But in the present instance their hunger is not due to misfortune. It is the result of a deliberate decision not to work. If we help them we are doing at least two things that are unjust; we are encouraging them to defy their employers and we are prolonging a most distressing situation.’

Father O’Connor continued. ‘If Larkin and his colleagues win their fight it will be a victory for socialism. And socialism, as a very eminent Jesuit has clearly shown, is the worst enemy of the working man. It uproots his confidence in hierarchical order. It preaches discontent. It makes him covetous of the property of his social superiors, and impatient with the trials and obligations of his own station in life. If it does not destroy altogether his belief in God’s Fatherhood, it certainly cuts him off from the graces and spiritual fruits which are the rewards of poverty cheerfully borne and which flow from humble resignation to God’s Will.’

‘For these reasons,’ he concluded, speaking directly to Mrs. Bradshaw, ‘and I know how cold and even cruel it must all sound to a nature that is tender and maternal, we must harden our hearts.’

He had read Father O’Connor’s arguments in newspaper reports and leaders on countless occasions since the lock-out had begun. He probably preached that way too. Now they had an extraordinary effect on him. He found his sympathy to be completely on Larkin’s side. The discovery filled him with good humour. In future he would help them whenever he could. He would not be the only one of his class to do so. George Bernard Shaw had spoken for them. George Russell, the mad mystic, had written a scathing letter against the employers. William Orpen, the painter, and several highly respectable intellectuals were denouncing William Martin Murphy and his policy of starvation.

‘Now, Mrs. Bradshaw, ma’am—something from yourself first—and then both of us will oblige.’

She smiled and went to the piano. His ’cello lay in the corner with new music he had bought in London in readiness beside it. It included a selection from Il Trovatore, arranged for ’cello and piano, which he looked forward to trying with her. As though she had guessed his thought, she said:

She began a selection for piano from The Merry Widow. She had only started when a servant entered. After a moment of uncertainty he crossed and whispered in Yearling’s ear.

‘There is a sergeant of police at the door, sir—he says he must see you at once.’

Yearling nodded. He signalled to the others to excuse him and left quietly as Mrs. Bradshaw continued to play. In the hall a policeman whom he knew quite well saluted him.

‘We’ve been searching everywhere for Mr. Bradshaw, sir. I understand he may be here.’

‘Something has happened?’ Yearling asked. Then he said: ‘Step in here a moment.’

He opened the door to a waiting room and turned up the flame of its low-burning lamp.

‘No—not a fire, sir. We enquired at his house and were told he was here. Two of them collapsed about an hour ago. We don’t know how many of the poor creatures is dead.’

As he spoke another ambulance bell beat violently above the roar of the wind and receded. From the room Yearling had left The Merry Widow waltz tinkled remotely. Yearling sat down for a moment to consider the news. Then he said:

‘He is below with his wife. We mustn’t shock her more than is necessary. If you give me just a moment I’ll send one of the servants to fetch him here to us.’

He waited while Yearling composed himself. He saw him rise and go to a tasselled rope woven of red and yellow threads. He saw him pull it.

They left Mrs. Bradshaw home and then went to the harbour side. Bradshaw was unable to say how many inhabitants the two houses had held, but his agent reckoned between forty and fifty. The death roll was seven when they arrived; within twenty minutes it had risen to nine.

‘It seems there was,’ the sergeant said. ‘A man in the first house saw the wallpaper suddenly tearing across. He rushed around knocking at doors and warning people. They left as fast as they could.’

Rescue workers were everywhere among the pile of rubble. Above them, in the light of the acetylene lamps, Yearling saw the skeletons of the two houses, their rooms and stairways laid naked by the collapse of the wall. Twisted beams and broken floors and masonry hung at dangerous angles. From time to time pieces of brick and wood were wrenched loose by the wind and raised a cloud of dust as they fell. Among the ambulances and fire brigade engines were vans from the Gas Company and the Waterworks. Firemen had rigged the hoses in readiness against an outbreak.

‘But not fast enough, it seems,’ Yearling said, when two more bodies were released from the debris.

‘Old people,’ the sergeant said, ‘or a mother trying to save her children.’

Father O’Connor had gone in among the injured. Two other clergymen were already busy. They said to him:

‘The dead have been attended to.’ He went down the line to a young woman whose dark hair was matted with blood. He gave her absolution. But she was barely conscious and kept saying over and over again: ‘The children . . . the children.’ As the rescuers worked, a guard with each party kept watch for signs of a further collapse. Bradshaw shuddered and touched Yearling’s arm.

‘They were passed as safe only a month ago. I have the inspector’s letter.’

‘There’s nothing further you can do. When they want you they’ll call on you.’

‘It’s the railway being so close,’ Bradshaw said. ‘I’ve written several times to them. The vibration affected the foundations.’

They brought him home. Yearling insisted on driving Father O’Connor back to town.

‘They were condemned long ago—and then reprieved because Ralph knew the right people.’

‘I refuse to believe it,’ Father O’Connor said. He thought of the young woman who had been calling without cease for her children. Would they be found?

‘If there’s an investigation and the truth comes out,’ Yearling said, ‘Bradshaw and certain other gentlemen will be in trouble.’

Father O’Connor said nothing, his mind still occupied with the badly injured woman. He had ministered to her impulsively, without his usual horror of suffering. Pity and compassion and his priestly office had filled his thoughts. For the first time in his life the sight of blood had not frightened him.

‘Appalling Disaster

Tenements Collapse

Families Buried in Debris

Several Killed and Injured

Ruins in Flames’

The fire, Yearling gathered, had broken out after midnight when a tunnel made by the rescuers let air into the smouldering ruins, but the fire brigade kept it under control. A boy of seventeen, Eugene Salmon, who had rescued several children, was killed himself while trying to carry his little sister to safety. A reporter of Freeman’s Journal wrote: ‘The two houses numbered 66 and 67 were owned by Mr. Ralph Bradshaw who is also the owner of extensive property elsewhere in the city. His agent, Mr. H. Nichols, informed me yesterday that about two months ago, an official inspection of house No. 66 had been made and he had been directed to carry out certain repairs. This he had done and he states that the improvements were effected to the satisfaction of the inspector.’

At the inquest, the inspector confirmed the agent’s statement. Yearling, reading it, knew that the collapse had been so complete that there could be no evidence left to prove or disprove the inspector’s assertion. Later he received a letter from Bradshaw. He had been too shocked to attend the inquest, he said. He was taking Mrs. Bradshaw abroad for an indefinite period. His agent would handle all that was necessary. He would write soon.

‘Freeman-Telegraph

Shilling Fund

For Relief of Sufferers

Homeless Families

Destitute Orphans

An Urgent Appeal’

Yearling put Bradshaw’s letter aside and subscribed a thousand shillings. Then he thought again and sent on another thousand shillings, this time with the specific request that it should go to the family of the boy Eugene Salmon. After that he took a walk by the harbour, passing the ruins of the collapsed houses, about which the workmen were building a hoarding. It was a grey day, cold, with a mist blowing in from the sea. He walked towards Sandycove, remembering an October sunset of an earlier year, when the sea had drawn his thoughts towards England and a remote past and Father O’Connor had offered him God as a consolation, as though Christ could be passed around like a plate of sandwiches. The sea again compelled his attention, pounding in now through its grey mist and breaking on its grey rocks, an age old motion, dragging the pebbles after it in its backwash, full of terrible strength but not a brain in its vast bulk, a slave played on by every wind. The wind too was a slave, compounded out of combinations of hotness and coldness. What was there left now of school or university? No wisdom, little companionship, and memories only of an odd escapade. Two sentences ran in his head without relevance, mnemonics taught him by his music teacher when he was a child of about twelve.

On his return journey he made a slight detour in order to pass the Bradshaws’ house. It was boarded up and he stood to look at it. He regretted the piano inside, now silent, and the absence of the gentle woman who had played it. There was no longer anyone to bring flowers to.

Mary saw it boarded up too. She came to it, unsuspecting, at dusk on a Sunday afternoon. The gate creaked as she opened it, the carriage way was littered with leaves that had been left to rot. In places the wind had piled them into black hillocks. The window that had once framed a view of the splendours of Edward VII was shuttered. She knocked at the side entrance as a matter of form, knowing there was no one at all to answer and knowing too that its clamouring would fill her with terror. There were ghosts inside, ghosts of the Dead, left-behind ghosts of the Living. She forced herself to wait a little while, feeling a shutter might jerk open and that Mr. Bradshaw would glare at her from a curtainless window. She did not dare knock again at the basement door. She feared Miss Gilchrist’s face.

Lamplight and candles showed in the windows of Chandlers Court when she returned home. Rashers limped into the hallway just a little ahead of her, his sandwich boards laid aside because it was Sunday.

Fitz was reading by lamplight. He had the kettle boiling for her on the fire. When he saw her face he left down his book.

She began to prepare the tea. For the first time since the lockout had begun she had returned empty-handed. The consequences troubled her.

He knew that. The furniture, the flooring even, all had come from Mrs. Bradshaw. Food too and at times, he suspected, money. She took down the mugs the children used and put them on the table. Then she sat down suddenly and began to cry. He went to her.

‘I know,’ he said, ‘but we’ll weather that. Others have gone through it already.’

She meant that now the furniture would begin to go, piece by piece, the pictures off the wall, the ornaments she prized because they gave the room an air of comfort and sufficiency.

When he had gone she paused for some time to measure their new situation. She turned down the lamp a little to husband the oil. Then she resumed her work.

When it became necessary Mrs. Hennessy conducted her to the pawnshop. They packed the pram with two chairs and a small selection of ornaments. Rashers was ringing his bell and entertaining the queue. His sandwich boards announced to the world that the value obtainable at The Erin’s Isle Pawnbroking Establishment was superior to any other in the city. He had a rigmarole which he repeated over and over again. As Mary and Mrs. Hennessy joined the queue he rang his bell and called out to them.

‘Now ladies step along lively with no shovin’ and no pushin’. First come first served. Don’t give the polis the impression that The Erin’s Isle Pawnbroking Establishment is the scene of an illegal assembly.’ Then he rang his bell louder and bawled out generally. ‘Hay foot straw foot, Step along and see a live lion stuffed with straw, Eating boiled potatoes raw. Have yiz e’er a blanket to pawn or sell—e’er a table or e’er a chair? Best prices in town for pairs of ornamental pieces.’

‘But I’ll not take issue on it,’ Rashers told the queue, ‘because her husband did his bit in Sackville Street on Bloody Sunday.’

‘Which is not half as sore as being walked on be an elephant,’ Rashers said generally. He went off, ringing his bell in triumph.

They queued for over two hours. The women discussed the food kitchens and the arrival of scabs from England. They talked about the health of each other’s children and the way to drive a good bargain with Mr. Silverwater and his assistants. ‘Don’t go near the son if you can avoid it,’ they advised Mary, ‘he’s worse than the oul fella.’ She waited and listened and tried to forget the two chairs and the other articles that were lying in the pram. In bits and pieces from week to week her home would be eaten away. She was standing in line for the first time with the half starved.

Rashers limped his way through the poorer streets of the city, ringing his bell and giving out his rigmarole to keep his spirits up and fight the fatigue and the monotony.

‘Step up and see a live lion stuffed with straw, Eating boiled potatoes raw. Have yiz e’er a blanket to pawn or sell, e’er a table or e’er a chair? Best prices in town for pairs of ornamental pieces.’

A policeman threatened to take him in for disturbing the peace. For a while a gang of children followed him, attentive and curious. When he got back to Chandlers Court it was dark. He met Hennessy and sat down wearily on the steps.

‘I can’t,’ Hennessy said. ‘I’ve got to go out to do a bit of a job.’

‘This is only a casual class of a thing,’ Hennessy said uneasily, ‘a watchman’s job.’

‘I’d be careful, all the same,’ Rashers warned him. ‘You don’t want to be dumped into the Liffey for being a scab.’

‘That’s an ill-omened brood, the same polis,’ Rashers said. ‘One of them threatened to run me in today.’

‘For ringing my bell in the pursuit of me juties. He asked me did I think I was a bloody fire brigade.’

‘A smart alec,’ Hennessy said with sympathy. ‘I’ve met that kind myself.’

‘In this kip of a city it’s regarded as a crime for a poor man to go about his lawful occasions. The rich can blow factory hooters and sirens and motor horns and the whole shooting gallery. But when a poor man rings a bell for his livelihood it’s regarded as illegal.’

‘I’d a brush with one of them myself some weeks ago,’ Hennessy said. ‘A fella in plain clothes that was watching the food ships arriving. Asked for my name and address.’

‘I hope you gave him his answer.’ Rashers spat from the steps into the basement and peered into the darkness as the glob of mucous made its silent descent. It relieved his hatred of policemen. Hennessy decided it was not the moment for the whole truth.

‘I took him very cool,’ he told Rashers. ‘“Who are you?” I asked him—“and may I see your credentials, if you have any?”’

‘He produced them for inspection right enough,’ Hennessy lied. ‘He was a superintendent.’

‘That’s where the public’s money goes,’ Rashers complained, ‘paying thick-looking gougers from the country for spying on native-born Dublinmen. Did he try to interfere with you?’

‘He was objecting to me cheering,’ Hennessy said, ‘but I took him up on it. “So far as my knowledge of the matter goes, and correct me if I’m wrong, Superintendent,” I said to him—“but I’m not aware of anything on the statute books that makes it a crime for a man to cheer.”’

‘That was right,’ Rashers approved, ‘the nerve of the bloody rozzers in this city is appalling. Did he take it any further?’

‘Jaysus,’ Rashers said, ‘it bates Banagher. First they open your skull with a cowardly blow. And then they want to know your name, address and antecedents.’

He tried another spit, which sailed in a graceful arc between the railings. It pleased him.

‘Once or twice for curiosity’s sake only,’ Hennessy answered. ‘I’ve no union card.’

‘Did you ever see the Right Reverend Father Vincent Holy B. O’Connor down there?’

‘It’s no charitable thought that moves him—that’s a certainty; a long cool drink of holy water is the most you’d ever get off that fella.’ Rashers screwed up his eyes. ‘It often struck me he might be a spy for the archbishop.’

‘They’re all the wan in this city,’ Rashers said, ‘condemning the poor and doing the unsuspecting Pope out of his Peter’s Pence. I suppose you wouldn’t have a cigarette to spare?’

‘The same as myself.’ He rose from the steps. It cost him so much effort that Hennessy had to help him.

‘Don’t get into any trouble over that job,’ Rashers warned him. ‘Watch yourself now. And make sure it’s above board.’

But he was worried and decided to say as little about it as he could. Crampton’s men were locked out. But there was no picket and he was not replacing anybody. He brooded over it as he walked along the quays, the river keeping him company for almost a mile. When he turned eventually into the back streets they were dark and unusually quiet. They oppressed him with their air of misery and hunger. His own children were sleeping on the floor and his wife had only an upturned box to sit on because the last of their few chairs had now been sold. The stump of a candle that guttered in the centre of the table could not be replaced until payday.

In the foundry Carrington, with the help of the clerical and supervisory staffs, was still managing to keep the furnaces on slow heat. An unanticipated problem was rust. It attacked idle machinery with a persistence that defeated all his efforts. Where he discovered it, he got the staff to treat it with sandpaper and oily rags, yet it threatened always to gain the upper hand. The overhead wires that fed the Telpher became slack after a stormy night and had to be left that way. A faulty gutter caused a patch of dampness to disfigure the wallpaper in the boardroom. He could do nothing about it despite Mr. Bullman’s repeated instructions. There were ladders, but nobody who could be trusted to work at such a height.

Doggett, for the first time in his life as managing director, saw grass springing up between the cobbles in the loading yard. Winter would now arrest its growth, but its presence convinced him that, so far as he was concerned, things had gone far enough. The financial assistance he was getting from employers’ organisations in England helped him with the cost of keeping his staff locked out; it could not protect his premises and equipment from the ravages of disuse. He spoke about it at a meeting and framed a resolution calling for a determined plan to recruit free labour from England. There was no lack of support. He had the satisfaction of seeing his proposal adopted without having to stick his neck out by moving it himself. In the matter of militancy Doggett’s philosophy was to let others have the credit.