His Father's Son: To save the son he loves, a desparate father must confront the ghosts of his past (25 page)

“You just wanted to hurt me, didn’t you? You wanted to bring me back here to shame me, didn’t you? Well, you’ve done that. I feel shame for what happened here. I feel the eyes on me in the street, feel them pointing – whether they are or not, I feel them, pointing and saying, ‘There goes Joey Driscol. Get a good look at a man whose eternal soul is damned straight to Hell.’ I feel it, Shauna, does that make ye happy now? Do you think I’m suffering as much as you now?”

“No. No. No. Joey, that wasn’t it.” Her eyes were a mass of tiny red veins, tears spilling down her face. “Why does it have to be me? Always me. It was you … you made me come here.”

“I never did. I didn’t. How could you think I would ever do that?” Joey pushed the suggestion back at her. He was having no part in her plan to put blame on him. It was like when he had read her diary all over again – the hurt, the shame and the anger, all rolled into one. She wasn’t right. He had tried so hard to be a good man, to fix things after what they had done, to mend the mistake they made in Kilmora all those years ago.

“I killed the child inside of me, Joey … It was our child and I carried all the shame.” Shauna had never spoken of her abortion. Never in more than a decade. It was ancient history, and there was no point dredging up ancient history, thought Joey. They had made the decision together but it was Shauna crossed the water to England herself. It was Shauna bore the most pain and Joey knew it. Nothing could erase the pain she had felt. He had his pain too – hadn’t she done it for him, to save the dream he had for their life together – but how could his pain compare to hers?

Joey remembered the night Shauna told him she was to cross the water. “Will be best,” she said. They were on the pier end, huddled together from a storm out at sea, rain lashing the tin roof over their heads. They held each other tight and cried for what she was about to do.

“I won’t let ye go,” said Joey.

“No, I must,” said Shauna. She had taken the notion and there was no stopping her, no turning her back. The thought of what they were about to do frightened Joey but she seemed so sure. She seemed the strong one.

“You cannot.”

“Joey, I must. Wasn’t it for the best only … You will have the Trinity soon and we will be together after. Now is no time for the likes of this.”

“But, Shauna, it’s our child.”

“Joey, we have our whole life to face. A child now would destroy everything, your only dream. What would you be then if you gave it up? What would you think of me then?” She was so firm, so sure. She knew Joey would waver and she took to the boat alone.

When the boat pulled out to sea with Shauna and the child she was carrying, Joey watched with tears streaming. The boat’s lights were fading into the distance, the course was set, but he wanted it to be different. If they stayed there would be no Trinity and no future other than Gleesons and the pair of them forever under Emmet’s roof. What life would it be, for them and for any child born of sin raised under his father’s roof? Shauna knew it; she saw Joey’s hopes for them wasted and she would have none of it. She put herself through it for them.

Whilst she was gone, Joey prayed to God for forgiveness, begged absolution for the grand sin committed by them both, but nothing would cleanse his guilt. How could he imagine how Shauna must have felt, especially later on? The way people reacted when they knew she had committed a sin worse than any other sealed their fate. And when the Bishop said no to Trinity, everything had been for nothing.

“I did it all for nothing. I killed our child for nothing, Joey,” she said. “By God, Joey, what have we done?” Shauna was so young, too young to carry a burden like it, and it broke her. She was never the same girl again; nobody in Kilmora let her be.

Joey felt the rage fly into him when he remembered the people who spat in front of them in the street, the foolish old women who blessed themselves and kissed the beads and crosses round their necks at the sight of them. They were like lepers, pariahs they were.

Australia was supposed to mend it all – wasn’t it supposed to be a fresh start, a chance to put it all behind them, forget about it. Wasn’t that the plan, thought Joey. It had worked for a while, then the Black Dog appeared and Shauna became like a crazy woman, picking up babies in the street and bringing them home, breaking down worse than their own mothers when the children were returned. It all changed again when Marti was born. They were happy then, sure they were … until she started with the babies again, bringing them home again. But there could be no more babies after Marti, wasn’t that what the doctors told her. Why couldn’t she see Marti was special? He was her child as well. They could do nothing about the child lost, but, God above, didn’t Marti need a mother.

“Marti is your child, Shauna. How could you do this to him?”

He looked at Shauna. She had dried her eyes. She was lucid like she hadn’t been in ages, like she was unburdening herself. “I did this for him, Joey. Don’t you see that? I did it
for
Marti.”

None of it made any sense to Joey. “What are you saying?” he said.

“Open your eyes for once, please. Try and see, for once. I took Marti away from you so he would be happy.”

“He was happy.”

“No, Joey. He wasn’t, none of us were. Raising the boy in an unhappy home with a father who had given up on himself wasn’t what I wanted for him.”

The words lunged into Joey. He had only ever done his best for Marti. He loved the boy, loved him in more ways than he could count, loved him a million times more than his own father had ever loved him. “How can you say these things to me, Shauna, how can you? I am a better father than I ever knew.”

“That’s it, Joey, suffocating Marti with affection doesn’t make up for the love ye never got from Emmet. Shutting out our past and abandoning your dreams, somehow hoping your son will fill the gap is wrong … The boy learns from example and you’re not the example I want for him.”

It was wrong; it couldn’t be right, thought Joey. Even though she meant it, it was all wrong. How could she say these things to him? Had they been stored up? Had she blamed him for it all – for everything – all this time and said nothing, hoping somehow that he would stumble on the answers by himself? None of it made any sense. Joey didn’t recognise the person she was talking about. It wasn’t him, it just couldn’t be him, because if it was then he was the problem surely.

“Shauna, do ye think I am to blame for everything?”

“No, Joey, I don’t think that.”

“But you’ve just said so.”

“Joey, I haven’t. If you don’t understand what I have said to you, then you’ve had a wasted journey.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“I don’t want you to see Marti.”

“You can’t mean it.”

“Can’t I? I think you should leave now, Joey.”

All morning Mam was at the bubbling with the tears. Marti had said he wanted his dad, that he wanted to see him and didn’t want to go to school, but Aunt Catrin said there would be school this day as sure as there’s a hole in yeer arse. Aunt Catrin had to make the signs that were the cross when she said arse, and Marti thought she must be very angry to be saying a bad word when she was the very image of piety like everybody said. Marti knew the image of piety meant believing in God and he thought God was great like Aunt Catrin said, because now Dad was back and hadn’t the Mass and the confession and the visit to the little wooden box just done the trick.

When he set off with Pat for school there was a cold chill in the air that sometimes turned to mist and sometimes turned to little bursts of rain that were like icy needles. It was Miss Glynn, the music teacher, who was taking Marti and Pat’s first class and Marti knew there would be the singing. Nobody liked the singing, apart from Colm Casey who was soft in the head and would clap and dribble along with the others’ singing and would tap his foot to the tune when Miss Glynn played the piano. All the boys in the class would laugh and nudge each other and say, “Lookit, Casey’s foot tapping away.”

Pat said Miss Glynn had a mighty backside on her and wasn’t it like looking at two eggs in a handkerchief when she bent over in the corduroy trousers, but Marti had never really noticed Miss Glynn’s lovely backside before. He thought it was the diddies you were supposed to be looking out for and he thought it must have been Pat’s brothers, Brendan and Kenny, who had spotted it and told Pat it was mighty and worth the looking at.

Miss Glynn’s class was always very noisy before she got there in the morning, with the boys clanging on the cymbals and making the chopsticks on the piano keys. Colm Casey sat with his feet up on the rim of the chair and his hands up over his ears and dribbled and then a boy went over and said, “Casey, Casey, there’s the firebell!” He went mad and ran around, screaming and wailing like a wild thing. There was laughter at him running around, and when Miss Glynn came in the door with her long red coat all wet and an umbrella dripping with rain she had a look of meanness in her eye.

Miss Glynn threw the umbrella down on her desk and there was water flown everywhere and the boys nearest said, “
Ah, Miss. Ah, Miss
,” and lifted their arms over their heads like it was a downpour.

“I will have no more of this,” said Miss Glynn. “Do ye hear me? No more of this.” The class was silent when Miss Glynn spoke and when her rust-coloured hair fell down over her face she threw back her head for all to see this was not a day to be trying her patience.

“You, the books,” she said, and Ciaran O’Dwyer jumped out of his seat and ran to the press to fetch the books with the songs printed in them. There was to be no talking and no acting the maggot, said Miss Glynn, and the first one to step out of line would feel the sharp end of her tongue. Pat looked at Marti when she spoke, and when Marti looked back at Pat he thought he would run out of the classroom or climb down the drainpipe at any second to get away from Miss Glynn and the singing.

“Now, tis the ‘Bunch of Thyme’ we’re singing, so after me,” said Miss Glynn, and she started, “
Come all ye maidens young and fair
.” She played the notes out on the piano and the class joined in. “
All ye that are blooming in your prime
.”

Marti heard Pat singing, and when he turned to look at him he saw him making the words of the “Bunch of Thyme”.

            
Always beware, and keep your garden fair,

            
Let no man steal away your thyme.

            
For time it is a precious thing,

            
And time brings all things to my mind
.

Marti watched Pat at the singing and he felt himself start to giggle at the sight of it.

            
Time with all its flavours, along with all its joys,

            
Time brings all things to my mind
.

It was really hard to watch Pat at the singing, he thought, and then Pat started to poke him in the ribs with his elbow and make the rolling movement with his eyes that he knew meant
go away
. The poking only made Marti worse, though, and then it was too late to stop the laughter coming out and Miss Glynn stopped playing the piano and shouted, “You boys, get out here this instant.” The look of meanness in Miss Glynn’s eye was all for Marti and Pat when she spoke, and Marti wondered what would be said or done when they walked out to the front of the class.

“Is it a joke ye have, Driscol?” she said.

“No,” said Marti.

“Oh, there’s no joke, so it is disrupting the class and depriving these boys of an education the pair of ye are at, is it?”

“It wasn’t,” said Pat, and then he was quiet and bowed down his head.

“No, I didn’t think that was it – sure isn’t it always the empty vessels make the most noise,” said Miss Glynn, and she wrapped on their heads with a ruler to try and make the noise of an empty vessel. Miss Glynn said it was casting pearls before swine she was and there was not one boy who could afford to act the maggot in the music class. Wasn’t the Driscol boy and Pat Kelly a fine pair to be coming in looking for a laugh and a joke when it’s on their knees praying for the miracle of enough voice to hold a tune they should be.

“Is it rivals to Christy Moore yees think ye are?” said Miss Glynn, and there was more laughing in the class.

“No,” said Marti.

Christy Moore was a true artist and a lovely and blessed man into the bargain, said Miss Glynn, and if she found another voice like Christy Moore’s for Ireland she would gladly meet her redeemer a happy woman. She said there were no Christy Moores to be found in this class, but as sure as God made the birds sing in the trees she would hear the “Bunch of Thyme” sang properly this day and Marti and Pat would be doing the singing.

She made them sing the song all the way through by themselves and it was so bad that not even Colm Casey was after tapping his foot. There was laughter in the class by some of the boys and others sat with their mouths open when Marti and Pat were at the singing. Miss Glynn said if she had heard a worse pair carry a tune in her lifetime then she must have blocked it out of her memory, because that was truly woeful and worse entirely than hearing any heathen curse or malediction make its way to your ear. If this was the level of singing these two boys had attained after all these years of schooling then she was ashamed of her profession and ashamed for them. They would face life unable to utter a note in tune and spend their days confined to humming and whistling their way through parties and weddings and many other social occasions. Wasn’t it just the limit and more than she could bear entirely to think of these two boys giving praise in Our Lord’s house when it was like two wounded cats they were.