This Human Season Read online

  The father gave a dry laugh, felt for his handkerchief. ‘I sometimes feel like I’ve not a clue how to be a priest any more. Mrs Mulhern gave me a talking to the other day when I put my head in the door. She called me a rebel priest. This and that about not following the Church. They want the priests to come out against the ’Ra.’

  The afternoon light flooded in through the back window. There was a small birthmark on Father Pearse’s forehead that looked like a sickle. He looked lonely there in the living room, not a part of her family nor of anyone else’s.

  ‘You’ve got to stay a little bit apart, Father. In your line.’

  ‘I’d have to be hard-hearted to do that. We live and breathe it, don’t we? I can’t help loving, no more can I help hating. That’s the cross. Well now I meant to bring you comfort and I don’t know if I have.’

  ‘It’s good to know that Sean’s all right, Father.’ She stood surveying the mess. ‘Well as far as he can be. We’ll all have to get used to it anyhow. There’s no use sitting here doing nothing, waiting for news, worrying and fretting. You wait and do nothing thinking it won’t be your son and then one day it is. Even if you just stop in and turn up the television it still comes right into your house. You’re already involved, aren’t you, just by living here; so you might as well try and do something about it all. That’s what I think.’

  She tried to get him to take the cigarettes. He refused them.

  ‘Well thanks for stopping by with news of Sean, you know how much it means to me.’ She swept up the mugs and took them out. He waited there for her to come back, but when he heard the edge of sobs and short breaths from the kitchen he let himself out.

  The priest took the side path by the Moran house to cut across to another parishioner whose mother was dying of cancer. It seemed incredible to him that cancer could still happen here with so much else going on. Across the playing fields he saw a group of boys gathering stones for the evening’s rioting. He trod unwittingly into some broken glass. Laying in the curved remnants of a jar were little pools of yellow liquid. ‘Jesus Christ,’ he said, shaking his shoe.

  Chapter 4

  A handful of prison officers followed Shandy and Dunn into the circle to assemble. Principal Officer Bolton opened the door of his office and looked out at them as if they were guests arrived early. He was a tall, balding man with over-sized spectacles, his top half clad in a pale yellow, silk pyjama top and his bottom half in regulation trousers and socks. He had a newspaper under his arm and a pen behind his ear.

  ‘Work detail, Sir,’ said Campbell.

  ‘Carry on,’ said Bolton.

  ‘Fella name of Dunn come in on the white sheet, Sir.’

  Bolton nodded without much interest and went back into his office.

  ‘Principal Officer Bolton will have a word with you in his office after unlock, Johnno.’

  Baxter brushed past them to get to Campbell. ‘Should I give the wing a quick going over before you go down it? They’ll have slopped out by now.’

  ‘Aye, save my shoes from going white. The piss ruins good shoe leather, Dunn.’ Campbell assigned their duties, man by man, and dismissed them. Shandy went ahead, using his shoulders to lever the furniture of his jacket into the right place. Frig and Dunn followed him to the wings. The stench was such that Dunn swallowed, bit his lip, held his breath.

  ‘You’re wondering why you’re here, Johnno,’ said Frig, putting a hand on Dunn’s shoulder as they waited to go into the airlock. ‘Money, mate. Money. That’s why we’re here. I’m going to bugger off to the

  Costa Brava with mine.’ The first grille was locked again and they stood in the airlock while the second was being opened. ‘But our friend Shandy he’s a family man, he’s going to buy one of those nice houses you pass coming down the A1, you know, all new brickwork, set up on a hill, with a tree and a field of its own. Are you a family man, Johnno?’

  ‘No.’

  Frig gave him a little push as the second grille was locked behind them and they were on the wing. ‘You’ve got nothing to worry about then. Take a lungful of that. You can smell the countryside, Shandy.’

  ‘“A” wing,’ said Shandy, pointing left and then right. ‘“B” wing.’ They went left. A long hallway with a black floor and a white ceiling

  stretched before them, cell doors at two or three feet apart, each one white-grey with a shielded slit at eye level. The floor was sticky underfoot, grasping the soles of their shoes with the ferocity of wood glue. Before the cells, to the left, was the recreation room, to the right a light blue bathroom with urinals, hand basins, showers and a bathroom; all of these pristine.

  It was cold enough to see your own breath. After an initial warning cry that went up when the first grille was opened, the place was quiet, apart from a few low noises, the sound of cattle in stalls waiting out the winter.

  The three of them went forwards, Shandy with the keys and Frig taking pantomime steps, finger to lips.

  ‘Don’t want to wake the sleeping beauties,’ said Shandy. He had pulled his cap down across his brow. ‘Ready?’ he asked in a stage whisper, outside the first cell on the left, feeling for his keys, scrutinizing them, one hand tenderly on the door while he put the key in the lock.

  Dunn nodded, motionless, expressionless as the door opened and Shandy filled the narrow open space. Dunn took a look inside. He had to be careful not to knock his head on the low doorframe. Inside the cell was empty apart from two men in their own shit. It was a small space, there was just room for two men to lie side by side on the floor. The temperature was that of the cold room of a butcher’s.

  The two prisoners looked like brothers. One got up, dirty-handed, levering himself, sinews and hair, bare apart from a thin grey blanket around his waist. A long strand of hair was caught in the corner of his mouth and he pulled it out and squinted at them, arms ready. The other prisoner was at the back of the cell by the window, holding his forearms in the weak light.

  ‘Any requests?’

  The prisoner nearest to them sucked in his cheeks, but otherwise he was still, apart from his eyes, which were working fast, going from one officer to the other. His cellmate had a blanket around his shoulders as well as his waist and he pulled it about him as he turned to watch the yard. The near one said something in low tones in Irish and the other replied with a single word. The light changed. The sun reared up at the prison window with a flash of light, then subsided, cowed and done.

  ‘Don’t speak Irish I’m afraid. All right lock them up. On to the next.’ Frig swung the door back and Dunn saw that the tall man continued to look directly at him as the door was closing. Moving off, Dunn nearly tripped as the congealed urine tugged on one of his shoes.

  In the next cell a boy was in the process of spreading shit on the wall with a small piece of sponge. His thickset cellmate started to laugh when the door was opened. Around the room were spread in brown the artefacts of the home, a fireplace, a picture above it, a pelmet over the window. The boy was adding curtains.

  ‘Handy he had a touch of diarrhoea,’ said Frig as they ducked out and closed the door again. ‘Would you call that satin or gloss?’

  Thus they went on to the end of the block with the prisoners alike in their appearance and disinterest. Only once did a prisoner begin to say something, but the sharp reproof of his cellmate made him reconsider.

  ‘They look like Jesus Christ, I always think,’ said Frig, with shy pride. When they reached the second-to-last cell on the right, Frig nodded

  significantly at Dunn. ‘O’Malley,’ he said. ‘OC.’

  ‘I want to see the PO,’ said the man, when the door opened. This was Kevin O’Malley, a full beard, bare torso, the officer commanding for the Republican prisoners there. He was big jawed, built like a builder, yet with the long hair they all had. He had eyes that looked like they’d got drink in them, and the set of his mouth was ugly, Dunn thought. He was the least imprisoned. His cellmate had two blankets around his shoulders and was looking down at th
e ground, apparently in concentration. This side of the block was the coldest; the wind seemed to whistle through the wire fences, build up speed across the tarmac and launch an assault on the open window spaces.

  ‘Anything I can help you with 2350 O’Malley?’

  ‘I want to see your principal officer.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah.’ Shandy got behind the door. ‘Away and fuck. My family’s been here for generations. It’s our country too.’

  * * *

  With the grilles secured behind them, Shandy went over to Campbell who was seated at the desk in the circle, made a note in the book there and gave his verbal report. Campbell beckoned Dunn to follow him over to the PO’s office. Just then, Bolton rounded the corner from the officers’ toilets dabbing at his face with a towel. He was now fully dressed, though his jacket was open.

  ‘All present and correct, Sir. One request from O’Malley to see you.’

  ‘Aye, well there’s no rush. See you get on with their breakfasts now, while I have a wee chat with Mr . . . what’s your name?’

  ‘He’s Dunn, Sir.’

  Probing his ears with the corner of the towel, Bolton invited Dunn into his office and shut the door. There was a camp-bed folded untidily by the back wall. Bolton offered Dunn a chair and remained standing, looking out the barred window.

  ‘First impressions?’

  ‘Smells like shit, Sir.’ Dunn attempted an easy and dependable expression.

  Bolton’s taut face broke loose, he seemed pleased. ‘Yes,’ he laughed.

  ‘Fair enough Mr Dunn. Look, I say just a few things to new men on my block, though you’ll find each block is a law unto itself. I’m a man who joined the service because I believe a State has to be upheld. When I read the prison rule book I bought it lock, stock and barrel. It made sense to me. It is wise.’ He stressed the word with an almost savoury pleasure. ‘I don’t have trouble here. Not from the men, not from the officers. Because I go by the book and I’m very careful. I know who I can trust with what. There are things we have to do we don’t like very much. The mirror-searches for instance. We do them minimally. We go by the book but we do not go above and beyond. You do what you have to do because you’re told to, not because you like to. Do you follow? Whatever you might hear about other blocks, whatever you might see on other blocks, you just remember that on my block we play it my way. Easy does it, Mr Dunn. I know there are some officers here who can be inclined to make it personal, or should I say political. As you probably know, it’s all much the same here. Are you a political man, Dunn?’

  ‘No Sir, I’m not.’

  ‘Well, good for you. All I’ll say to you,’ he put his hands into his pockets, ‘is not to get personally involved. Do the job and go home, do your time, if you like, because this is a prison for all of us in some ways, do your hours and go easy. Remember, the punishment is being here, we’re not here to give it, merely to close the doors.’ Bolton looked Dunn in the eyes and smiled and frowned at the same time. ‘So, that’s it. Any observations or thoughts on the conditions in the wings over there, beyond the smell?’

  ‘Not really, Sir. Just here to do the job.’

  ‘Aye, well, if you want my opinion, the whole thing is bloody disgraceful, it shouldn’t have come about,’ said Bolton, smile gone. ‘But my job is to uphold whatever orders I’m given. We’ve got to believe they know what they’re doing. In the long run.’

  ‘Sir, can I ask, why are there no windows in the cells? It’s bloody freezing down the wings.’

  ‘They broke them when we started to clean the cells the summer of ’77. The disinfectant was that bloody strong. One of them gave the order and they started breaking their furniture up to smash the windows through, to get air. They shouldn’t have used a chemical like that but well, with the shite and piss everywhere . . . Last winter the temperatures fell to minus eleven because the pipes weren’t working. We had heaters and we were cold. I don’t know whether they could sleep at nights, I doubt it. So I went to see O’Malley to talk about the windows being put back in. He more or less laughed in my face, Dunn. It’s a waste of time trying to help them, they won’t have any dealings with us . . .’ His voice tailed off and his eyes narrowed. He appeared to be looking at the chart on the wall opposite. ‘They consider it a weakness.’

  ‘“It is not those who can inflict the most, but those that can suffer the most who will conquer,”’ said Dunn.

  Bolton looked at him. ‘Aye, as indeed Mr MacSwiney put it. These boys are good at suffering, it’s a religion. Fuck Catholicism, fuck Republicanism, fuck Marxism, I think they’re good at being oppressed, that’s what I think. You know what happened to MacSwiney, Dunn?’

  ‘He died on a hunger strike.’

  ‘That’s right.’ Bolton reached into a fruit bowl on his desk and tossed what appeared to be a brown hairy egg at Dunn. ‘Do you like kiwi fruit, Dunn?’

  ‘I’ve never tried one,’ he said.

  ‘Eat it with a teaspoon, full of goodness. I try to eat one every day. The taste of far away places.’ Bolton started to look at some papers on his desk.

  Dunn brought the kiwi fruit to his nose. It didn’t smell of anything.

  ‘Send Baxter in will you. My day off tomorrow. About bloody time.’ He looked up from his papers, caught Dunn’s eyes for a second and gave a flicker of an uneasy smile, half apology, half guilt. Dunn closed the door behind him and stood leaning against it, his hands staying the handle, holding it down a moment before he let the locking mechanism click into its proper place.

  Chapter 5

  Andersonstown Leisure Centre was all the talk; it had a big indoor pool. On Saturday Kathleen let Aine and Liam go down there with the two Purcell boys. Her husband was going off to work; Saturday dinnertime seemed to be a weekend-long shift. She saw how he ducked his head as walked underneath the hole in the ceiling, spilling more dust, grinding it under his bare feet. He made an attempt to embrace her in the kitchen and before she could fail to respond he started going on about ‘normal wives, normal human beings’.

  ‘No wonder I take a drop from time to time.’ He was pacing about behind her, socks and shoes in hand. ‘Living in the Arctic circle here.’

  His breath was animal, like a dog’s behind, she thought, his lips were thick and gluey. She chose his cheek if they kissed. In bed she avoided his mouth.

  ‘You’re stuck with me. So go drink yourself into an early grave.’

  ‘Ah, fuck away with you!’

  She threw a mug at the kitchen wall, looked at where it fell, heard him trying to slam the front door.

  She was crouching, her hair a curtain over her face, using the dustpan and brush when her husband came back in a few minutes later, looking both bitter and remorseful. ‘I’ve not come back to say I’m sorry, I just forgot my cigarettes,’ he said, spotting the mug handle on one of her fingers. He sat to put his shoes and socks on. ‘Sure, why don’t you come up for a drink later, it’ll cheer you up,’ he said, going out the back door before she could answer.

  ‘Mummy was late, love, that’s why I’m a wee bit after three.’ Collette Heaney put her head in the kitchen. She usually popped in on a Saturday afternoon. Her husband was in the Kesh, but he was in ‘the Cages’, the prisoner-of-war side, as he’d gone in before political status was revoked. Her son was the one shot in the face by a rubber bullet that summer. He’d been with the Purcell boys himself that day, they didn’t tend to get involved like the other boys, they were a bit soft. A car had come down the street, crashed into the barricades and a man had got out and ran off just before the army arrived. In seconds there were soldiers jumping out the back of an armoured vehicle, shooting up the place. When the boy came home from hospital after a few weeks, they all went round to see him, and it was a wake that wasn’t a wake, the boy on the settee, head in bandages, the mother fussing at him with rice pudding.

  ‘We’ll have a cup before we go down the road, if I can find one. I’ve fired that many of them at the wall.’

 
Collette leant against the back door. She wore smart little court shoes.

  ‘I’ve not seen the new leisure centre yet.’ She pronounced the word ‘leeshure’. ‘We could go up the Green Briar one night. Would you like to go up? It would do you good. Does everyone a bit of good, a drink and a bit of chat,’ she said, arranging her coat lapels and shirt collar.

  ‘Och. I might as well stop in. Sean does the drinking for both of us and

  I get plenty of chat.’

  ‘From someone else though, for a change. I get lonely, even though he’s not bad company, Gerry. Well he’s a good listener,’ she gave a short dark laugh. ‘There’s only so many people I can talk to round here. If I don’t talk about my Gerry they think I’m a heartless bitch and if I do you see people’s faces go like you’ve just shown them your glass eye.’

  ‘I know love.’ Kathleen felt along the wet ridge behind the sink, in and out of the pan scrubbers and knick-knacks to find her watch. She was going to meet the kids when they came out of their swim. Collette had agreed to go with her.

  ‘You won’t come to the Green Briar,’ said Collette, heading for the mirror in the hallway, her shoes bouncing on the carpet. ‘You should though. They have some lovely music. People come from all around to hear it.’

  ‘Go with Bernadette.’

  ‘I’d not get a look in with Bernie Curran about.’

  ‘Well now I know where I stand.’

  ‘You know how she is.’

  They went out, pulling their coats about them. There was rubble at the sides of the streets, and the fences were broken down or burnt. The semi-detached houses were small and white, each had three windows, two down, one up. They were huddled, with barely any front yard, on the narrow curving roadway. As you walked along the pavement, you had to step over debris and broken glass. One or two of the houses had Christmas decorations up already and Christmas trees in the window. Some of them had palm trees out the front, ragged things. Coconuts in Belfast! One or two of the houses had a car parked outside.