Читать книгу The Hard Life: An Exegesis of Squalor - Brian O'Nolan - Страница 6

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And still the years kept rolling on, and uneventfully enough, thank God. I was now about eleven, the brother sixteen and convinced he was a fully grown man.

One day in spring about half-three I was trudging wearily home from school at Synge Street. I was on the remote, or canal side of the roadway near home. I happened to glance up at the house when about fifty yards away and, turned to cold stone, stopped dead in my tracks. My heart thumped wildly against my ribs and my eyes fell to the ground. I blessed myself. Timidly I looked up again. Yes!

To the left of the house entrance and perhaps fifteen yards from it a tallish tree stood in the front garden. Head and shoulders above the tree but not quite near it was the brother. I stared at the apparition in the manner fascinated animals are reputed to stare at deadly snakes about to strike. He began waving his arms in a sickening way, and the next prospect I had of him was his back. He was returning towards the house and he was walking on air! Now thoroughly scared, I thought of Another who had walked on water. I again looked away helplessly, and after a little time painfully stumbled into the house. I must have looked very pale but went in and said nothing.

Mr Collopy was not in his usual chair at the range. Annie—we had now learned to drop the ‘Miss’—placed potatoes and big plate of stew before me. I thought it would be well to affect a casual manner.

–Where’s Mr Collopy? I asked.

She nodded towards the back room.

–He’s inside, she said. I don’t know what father’s at. He’s in there with a tape taking measurements. I’m afraid poor Mrs Crotty’s getting worse. She had Dr Blennerhassett again this morning. God look down on us all!

Mrs Crotty was certainly sick. She had taken to the bed two months before and insisted that the door between her bedroom and the kitchen should be always left slightly ajar so that her cries, often faint, could be heard either by Mr Collopy or Annie. Neither myself nor the brother ever entered the room but all the same I had accidentally seen her on several occasions. This was when she was coming down the stairs leaning on Mr Collopy and clutching the banister with one frail hand, her robe or nightdress of fantastic shape and colour and a frightening pallor on her spent face.

–I’m afraid she is pretty sick, I said.

–Seemingly.

I finished with a cup of tea, then casually left the kitchen and went upstairs, my heart again making its excitement known. I entered the bedroom.

The brother, his back to me, was bending over a table examining some small metal objects. He looked up and nodded abstractedly.

–Do you mind, I said nervously, do you mind answering a question?

–What question? I have got a great bit of gear here.

–Listen to the question. When I was coming in a while back, did I see you walking on the air?

He turned again to stare at me and then laughed loudly.

–Well, by damn, he chuckled, I suppose you did, in a manner of speaking.

–What do you mean?

–Your question is interesting. Did it look well?

–If you want to know, it looked unnatural and if you are taking advantage of a power not of God, if you are dealing in godless things of darkness, I would strongly advise you to see Father Fahrt, because these things will lead to no good.

Here he sniggered.

–Have a look out of the window, he said.

I went and did so very gingerly. Between the sill and a stout branch near the top of the tree stretched a very taut wire, which I now saw came in at the base of the closed window and was anchored with some tightening device to the leg of the bed, which was in against the wall.

–My God Almighty! I exclaimed.

–Isn’t it good?

–A bloody wire-walker, by cripes!

–I got the stuff from Jem out of the Queen’s. There’s nothing at all to it. If I rigged the wire across this room tomorrow and only a foot from the floor, you’d walk it yourself with very little practice. What’s the difference? What’s the difference if you’re an inch or a mile up? The only trouble is what they call psychological. It’s a new word but I know what it means. The balancing part of it is child’s play, and the trick is to put all idea of height out of your mind. It looks dangerous, of course, but there’s money in that sort of danger. Safe danger.

–What happens if you fall and break your neck?

–Did you ever hear of Blondin? He died in his bed at the age of seventy-three, and fifty years ago he walked on a wire across Niagara Falls, one hundred and sixty feet above the roaring water. And several times—carrying a man on his back, stopping to fry eggs, a great man altogether. And didn’t he appear once in Belfast?

–I think you are going off your head.

–I’m going to make money, for I have ... certain schemes, certain very important schemes. Look what I have here. A printing machine. I got it from one of the lads at Westland Row, who stole it from his uncle. It’s simple to operate, though it’s old.

But I could not detach my mind from that wire.

–So you’re to be the Blondin of Dublin?

–Well, why not?

–Niagara is too far away, of course. I suppose you’ll sling a wire over the Liffey?

He started, threw down some metal thing, and turned to me wide-eyed.

–Well, sweet God, he said, you have certainly said something. You have certainly said something. Sling a wire over the Liffey? The Masked Daredevil from Mount Street! There’s a fortune there—a fortune! Lord save us, why didn’t I think of it?

–I was only joking, for goodness’ sake.

–Joking? I hope you’ll keep on joking like that. I’ll see Father Fahrt about this.

–To bless you before you risk your life?

–Balls! I’ll need an organizer, a manager. Father Fahrt knows a lot of those young teachers and I’ll get him to put me on to one of them. They’re a sporty crowd. Do you remember Frank Corkey, N.T.? He was in this house once, a spoilt Jesuit. That man would blow up the walls of Jerusalem for two quid. He’d be the very man.

–And get sacked from his school for helping a young madman to kill himself?

–I’ll get him. You wait and see.

That ended that day’s surprising disputation. I was secretly amused at the idea of the brother getting on to Father Fahrt about organizing a walk across the Liffey on a tight-wire, with Mr Collopy sprawled in his cane armchair a few feet away listening to the appeal. I had heard of earthquakes and the devastation attending them. Here surely would be a terrible upheaval.

But once more I reckoned without the brother. Without saying a word he slipped off one day up to 35, Lower Leeson Street and saw Father Fahrt privately. He said so when he returned that evening, looking slightly daunted.

–The holy friar, he said, won’t hear of it. Asked did I think I was a cornerboy or had I no respect for my family. Public pranks is what he called walking the high wire. Threatened to tell ould Collopy if I didn’t put the idea out of my head. Asked me to promise. I promised, of course. But I’ll find Corkey on my own and we’ll make a damn fine day of it, believe you me. Had I no respect for my family, ah? What family?

–No Jesuit likes being mistaken for a Barnum, I pointed out.

Rather bitterly he said: You’ll hear more about this.

I felt sure I would.