Evening was drawing in and already the table by the window was in shadow. Beyond the dark headland the sky was awash with a deep purplish mauve. Tinged with touches of pale peach and backlit by the golden light of sunset, it was surreal in its beauty. A car passed along the road, the headlights sweeping the ceiling and walls. The two women sipped tea and were silent for a moment until the hum of the engine faded away.
“Years ago, Nora, people expected life to go on as usual. On the island, soon as a youngster was old enough, it was expected that he’d go in the boats with his father. I don’t know how it was in Ireland then, but according to Matt, it was pretty much that way for him. He had one plan for his life but his mother had another.”
“You’re cut out for the priests, son, hand-picked by God Almighty.” His mother gripped his arm tightly. “What else would you be doing, with all those brains God gave you? Shovelling cow dung below in the byre for the rest of your life? Anyone who flies in the face of God,” she whispered urgently, “will have no luck. You mark my words.”
“There’s other ways to use brains.” He wished she’d let go of his arm so he could leave. Instead he said tentatively, “I could be a teacher or maybe work with The Gaelic League.”
“Ah, catch on to yerself.”
He heard the first note of irritation in her voice.
“The Gaelic League, now there’s a bunch of dreamers if there ever was one, just what you need, the poet fella, Yeats, and her ladyship from Sligo. What’s her name? Gregory, Lady Gregory. Thinkin’ they can solve the problems of the poor people of Ireland by writin’ poetry and puttin’ on plays above in Dublin. Makin’ us the laughin’ stock of the world, that’s all they’re doin’. Yes, Lady Muck herself, grand company for a young fella like you. Don’t you go lettin’ anyone in the town hear you sayin’ the like of that.”
“But Doctor Sommerton tells me there’s talk now of expanding the university above in Dublin, to make more spaces for Catholic young fellas like me. He says I should apply.”
“I might have known.”The grip tightened on his arm. “He’s the one has been puttin’ them daft notions in your head again. Where, in the name of God, does the doctor think the money is comin’ from for them grand ideas? The pair of you, dreamin’ just like the rest of them oul’ eejits up in Dublin! If you listen to the likes of them, you’ll be runnin’ around with the backside out of yer pants for the rest of yer life and not a penny in your pocket.”
“But there are the scholarships.”
“But nothin’.” She shook his arm, her bright, terrified eyes burrowing right into his brain. “Here’s reality, son. I’m here workin’ my back off day and night tryin’ to keep our end up, to give you a chance, and your father, six feet under, watchin’ and waitin’ of me to slip up. There was another dreamer. Out day and night with the Fenians, and got himself killed for his trouble: another smart one!”
“We did all right, Mammy.” He didn’t want her to be angry. Talk about his father always took her down that road.
“Yes, and no thanks to you,” she shot back, “with your head stuck in them books all day.”
“I thought you wanted me at the books, that you wanted me top of the class. That’s why I tried–”
“Look, Mattie.” Her tone softened again. “Think of your mammy for a change. Don’t I need you up there puttin’ in the good word for me with Almighty God, prayin’ for me immortal soul? You could have your own parish one day, like Father Walsh. Who knows? Ye might even become a bishop! That would make them all sit up. I’d be able to hold me head high in the town for a change. The bishop’s mother, they’d call me. Now, Mattie, I want you to put together all those oul’ books of poetry and plays and the like the doctor’s been feedin’ you and take them back to him this very day, and I want no more talk about scholarships and the Gaelic League. Get along with you now, there’s a good lad. And Matt, that oul’ book he gave you for getting the exams, put that right on the top so he knows once and for all, we want no more interfering in our business.”
A single tea leaf drifted around in Nora’s mug. She watched its progress for a while. It was going nowhere; it had reached the end of its useful life. She picked it out with a spoon and set it aside. “His situation wasn’t that unusual,” she said casually. “In fact, his son, my father, followed a similar route. Many did.”
“Yes, girl, I know and it was the same here in Newfoundland. Our smartest young fellas were picked out by the bishop and coaxed away to the priests. Just like where you come from; it was a way to get an education, and for some it worked out grand, but, my dear, there’s a lot of them young men should never have darkened the door of a seminary.”
She waited to see if Nora would respond, realized it was not coming but decided to continue anyway.
“Your grandfather was one of them. That place got right in his head, it did, and he couldn’t get clear of it. Finally one night, the torment just flowed out of him like a lanced boil.”
Matthew shifted uncomfortably in his chair, not able to find the words to say what was in his mind. Finally he spoke, his voice barely audible. “It was a sad, empty place, Peg, like a prison in some ways.” He leaned forward in his chair, staring into the heart of the fire, the memories coming in bits and pieces. “Long corridors lined with doors that led to bare cells. There was a wall with massive iron gates all around the grounds but the strange thing was that the wall was low enough to be climbed and the gates and doors to the outside never locked, not even at night. Even so the word was, ‘It’s very easy to get in but very difficult to get out.’ The penalty for leaving was shame, abject shame, not only for the man who left, but even worse, shame for his family. It was like a trap, a mind trap that bound us to the place with invisible ties. Nobody wanted to be labelled ‘Spoiled Priest.’”
The fire collapsed in a spray of bright sparks. He reached for a log and poked it into the firebox and watched until it caught fire and flamed.
“Frank Roche was from a place called Ballina in County Mayo. He was a grand man. Every night around eleven o’clock or so, when he thought we were all asleep, I’d hear Frank’s door across the hall open and close quietly, and he’d disappear down the corridor into the dark with his blanket rolled tightly under his arm. One night, I followed him. He went over the wall with his bundle and disappeared into the night. He’s a priest now in Boston. I met him a couple of times, but to this day I don’t know where he went every night, or if he knew that I knew.”
Peg paused at her knitting. She observed the change that had come over his face: his teeth biting down hard on a tense, rigid jawline, eyes bulging against the rim of their sockets. She wanted so badly to lay down her knitting, to reach out and take his hand into the warmth of her own.
“Tom Murphy was another fellow,” he continued, as if to himself. “He was from Mallow in County Cork. He had the room next to me. Every night was the same. After lights out, I’d listen to him turn and twist in the iron bed and every night he’d cry himself to sleep… like a child. One night I went to him, creeping along the corridor like a thief, speaking his name softly as I entered the room. I sat on the side of his bed in the freezing cold, staring at the putty walls, drenched with condensation. Someone had written with a finger on the wet surface in large uneven capitals A M E N. Heavy drops of water ran down from each crooked letter, making a shiny path all the way to the floor. I shook him then. ‘Tom,’ I said, ‘you have to go. For God’s sake, go now, before it’s too late!’ I was whispering in his ear, shaking his shoulder gently. Under the grey blanket the tight ball uncurled slightly and a dark terrified eye appeared above the rim. ‘I can’t,’ he said, the words hanging in a fog of breath. ‘I could never go home.’ He curled up again into a tight bundle.”
The fire shifted and spat a chip of burning wood onto the floor at his feet. He crushed it with the toe of his boot. “Six o’clock every morning, in single file, carrying a jug, we’d walk to the well at the end of the garden to collect water for washing. One frosty morning a few days later, we found Tom, in the well, face down.”
He began to rub one palm against the other, back and forth, back and forth. “The church forbids Christian burial to those who take their own life. The official word was that Tom had accidentally fallen down the well and drowned.” He became very still. “I was tormented by Tom’s memory. I cried for him. I cried because I hadn’t done enough to help him and I cried over the whole rotten mess.”
Peg set aside her knitting, aware suddenly that the kitchen was unusually quiet. Anxious, she looked towards the window. The wind had dropped, and the snow, just a flurry earlier on, was coming down in thick, heavy flakes and had packed in along the narrow window ledges and against the door frame, cutting out the drafts and quieting the rattle of loose boards and hinges. She turned back to where Matt still sat, transfixed. Tentatively she reached out and touched his arm, but he remained perfectly still, the muscles rigid under her fingers. “Matt,” she began, hoping to say the right thing. “Maybe–”
“Others began to notice the change in me,” he said, ignoring her and at the same time picking up where he’d left off. “Secretly they’d whisper, ‘You’re not thinking of waxing now, are you,Molloy?’ ‘No, no,’ I’d say. ‘If I leave this place, I’ll first tell them what I think of them and then I’ll walk out the door, in broad daylight, my own man.’” He crossed his legs, locking his fingers tightly about his knee. “‘That’s the spirit,’ they’d say, ‘no slippin’ away in the middle of the night. Face up to it.’Those nights, there were times I never undressed for bed.”
He turned to face her, as if suddenly realizing she was there. “I’d take off my shoes and get in under the blanket still fully clothed in the black cassock and try to pass the time until daylight. In some strange way, I missed the sounds of Tom crying from the next room. The silence seemed to haunt me more than the sobbing.” He paused, took a deep breath and turned again to stare into the flames. “One night I woke with a start. I could make out the outline of the small wardrobe in the corner, the wooden table by the window. I thought for sure someone had called my name. I got out of bed, groped about in the dark and finally moved towards the window. He was there, Tom, right outside the window, dripping wet, his face so white. ‘Go, go now,’ he was saying, ‘before it’s too late.’ I wanted to tell him I was sorry… but he was gone. I flung open the window. All that was there was the night. I remember thinking, I’m going mad, but then the realization came to me. Tom had come back to warn me with my own words. Right there and then, I made the decision to go. I undid the buttons of my cassock and let it fall to the ground. One step and I was out. I picked up the garment, did up the buttons and laid it out on the bed with the arms neatly crossed in front. I went to the wardrobe, removed the plain black suit, my only temporal clothing, and when I was ready I sat down to wait for morning.”
Peg waited, expectant. Finally she said, “You did speak up, Matt, in the morning, before you left?”
“No, I was gone before daybreak.”