Читать книгу Green Shadows, White Whales - Рэй Брэдбери, Ray Bradbury, Ray Bradbury Philip K. Dick Isaac Asimov - Страница 8
ОглавлениеTen minutes later, I stopped at the top of a rise, listening.
Someone was whistling and singing “Molly Malone.” Up the hill, wobbling badly, pedaled an old man on a bike no better than mine. At the top he fell off and let it lie at his feet.
“Old man, you’re not what you once was!” he cried, and kicked the tires. “Ah, lay there, beast that you are!”
Ignoring me, he took out a bottle. He downed it philosophically, then held it up to let the last drop fall on his tongue.
I spoke at last. “We both seem to be having trouble. Is anything wrong?”
The old man blinked. “Is that an American voice I hear?”
“Yes. May I be of assistance …?”
The old man showed his empty bottle.
“Well, there’s assistance and assistance. It came over me as I pumped up the hill, me and the damned vehicle”—here he kicked the bike gently—“is both seventy years old.”
“Congratulations.”
“For what? Breathing? That’s a habit, not a virtue. Why, may I ask, are you staring at me like that?”
I pulled back. “Well … do you have a relative in customs down at the docks?”
“Which of us hasn’t?” Gasping, he reached for his bike. “Ah, well, a moment’s rest, and me and the brute will be on our way. We don’t know where we’re going, Sally and me—that’s the damn bike’s name, ya see—but we pick a road each day and give it a try.”
I tried a small joke.
“Does your mother know you’re out?”
The old man seemed stunned.
“Strange you say that! She does! Ninety-five she is, back there in the cot! Mother, I said, I’ll be gone the day; leave the whiskey alone. I never married, you know.”
“I’m sorry.
“First you congratulate me for being old, and now you’re sorry I’ve no wife. It’s sure you don’t know Ireland. Being old and having no wives is one of our principal industries! You see, a man can’t marry without property. You bide your time till your mother and father are called Beyond. Then, when their property’s yours, you look for a wife. It’s a waiting game. I’ll marry yet.”
“At seventy!”
The old man stiffened.
“I’d get twenty good years of marriage out of a fine woman even this late—do you doubt it?!” He glared.
“I do not.”
The old man relaxed.
“Well, then. What are you up to in Ireland?”
I was suddenly all flame and fire.
“I’ve been advised at customs to look sharp at this poverty-stricken, priest-ridden, rain-filled, sleet-worn country, this—”
“Good God,” the old man interjected. “You’re a writer!”
“How did you guess?”
The old man snorted, gesturing.
“The country’s overrun. There’s writers turning over rocks in Cork and writers trudging through bogs at Killashandra. The day will come, mark me, when there will be five writers for every human being in the world!”
“Well, writer I am. I’ve been here only a few hours now and it feels like a thousand years of no sun, only rain, cold, and getting lost on roads. My director will be waiting for me somewhere if I can find the place, but my legs are dead.”
The old man leaned at me.
“Have you begun to dislike your visit? Look down on?”
“Well …”
The old man patted the air.
“Why not? Every man needs to look down on someone. You look down on the Irish, the Irish look down on the English, and the English look down on everyone else in the world. It all comes right in the end. Do you think I’m bothered by the look on your face, you’ve come to weigh our breath and find it sour, measure our shadows and find us short? No! In fact, I’ll help you solve this dreadful place. Come along where you can witness an awful event. A dread scene. A meeting of Fates, that’s it. The true birth-place of the Irish … Ah, God, how you’ll hate it! And yet …”
“Yet?”
“Before you leave us, you’ll love us all. We’re irresistible. And we know it, More’s the pity. For knowing it makes us all the more deplorable, which means we must work harder to become irresistible again. So we chase our own behinds about the country, never winning and never quite losing. There! Do you see that parade of unemployed men marching on the road in holes and tatters?”
“Yes!”
“That’s the First Ring of Hell! Do you see them young fellows on bikes with flat tires and no spokes, pumping barefoot in the rain?”
“Yes!”
“That’s the Second Ring of Hell!”
The old man stopped. “And here … can you read? The Third Ring!”
I read the sign. “ ‘Heeber Finn’s’ … why, it’s a pub.”
The old man pretended surprise. “By God, now, I think you’re right. Come meet my … family!”
“Family? You said you weren’t married!”
“I’m not. But—in we go!”
The old man gave a great knock on the backside of the door. And there was the bar, all bright spigots and alarmed faces as the dozen or so customers whirled.
“It’s me, boys!” the old man cried.
“Mike! Ya gave us a start!” said one.
“We thought it was—a crisis!” said another.
“Well, maybe it is … for him anyway.” He jabbed my elbow. “What’ll ya have, lad?”
I scanned the lot, tried to say wine, but quit.
“A whiskey, please,” I said.
“Make mine a Guinness,” said Mike. “Now, introductions all around. That there is Heeber Finn, who owns the pub.”
Finn handed over the whiskey. “The third and fourth mortgage, that is.”
Mike moved on, pointing.
“This is O’Gavin, who has the finest bogs in all Kilcock and cuts peat turf out of it to stoke the hearths of Ireland. Also a fine hunter and fisher, in or out of season!”
O’Gavin nodded. “I poach game and steal fish.”
“You’re an honest man, Mr. O’Gavin,” I said.
“No. As soon as I find a job,” said O’Gavin, “I’ll deny the whole thing.”
Mike led me along. “This next is Casey, who will fix the hoof of your horse.”
“Blacksmith,” said Casey.
“The spokes of your bike.”
“Velocipede repair,” said Casey.
“Or the spark plugs on any damn car.”
“Auto-moe-beel renovation,” said Casey.
Mike moved again. “Now, this is Kelly, our turf accountant!”
“Mr. Kelly,” I said, “do you count the turf that Mr. O’Gavin cuts out of his bog?”
As everyone laughed, Kelly said: “That is a common tourist’s error. I am an expert on the races. I breed a few horses—”
“He sells Irish Sweepstakes tickets,” said someone.
“A bookie,” said Finn.
“But ‘turf accountant’ has a gentler air, does it not?” said Kelly.
“It does!” I said.
“And here’s Timulty, our art connoisseur.”
I shook hands with Timulty. “Art connoisseur?”
“It’s from looking at the stamps I have the eye for paintings,” Timulty explained. “If it goes at all, I run the post office.”
“And this is Carmichael, who took over the village telephone exchange last year.”
Carmichael, who knitted as he spoke, replied: “My wife got the uneasies and she ain’t come right since, God help her. I’m on duty next door.”
“But now tell us, lad,” said Finn, “what’s your crisis?”
“A whale. And … ” I paused. “Ireland!”
“Ireland?!” everyone cried.
Mike explained. “He’s a writer who’s trapped in Ireland and misunderstands the Irish.”
After a beat of silence someone said: “Don’t we all!”
To much laughter, Mr. O’Gavin leaned forward. “What do you misunderstand, specific like?”
Mike intervened to prevent chaos. “Underestimates is more the word. Confused might be the sum! So I’m taking him on a Grand Tour of the Worst Sights and the Most Dreadful Truths.” He stopped and turned. “Well, that’s the lot, lad.”
“Mike, there’s one you missed.” I nodded to a partition at the far end of the bar. “You didn’t introduce me to … him.”
Mike peered and said, “O’Gavin, Timulty, Kelly, do you see someone there?”
Kelly glanced down the line. “We do not.”
I pointed. “Why, it’s plain as my nose! A man—”
Timulty cut in. “Now, Yank, don’t go upsetting the order of the universe. Do you see that partition? It is an irrevocable law that any man seeking a bit of peace and quiet is automatically gone, invisible, null and void when he steps into that cubby.”
“Is that a fact?”
“Or as close as you’ll ever get to one in Ireland. That area, no more than two feet wide by one deep, is more private than the confessional. It’s where a man can duck, in need of feeding his soul without converse or commotion. So for all intents and purposes, that space, until he breaks the spell of silence himself, is uninhabited and no one’s there!”
Everyone nodded, proud of Timulty.
“Fine, Timulty, and now—drink your drink, lad, stand alert, be ready, watch!” said Mike.
I looked at the mist curling through the door. “Alert for what?”
“Why, there’s always Great Events preparing themselves out in that fog.” Mike became mysterious. “As a student of Ireland, let nothing pass unquestioned.” He peered out at the night. “Anything can happen … and always does.” He inhaled the fog, then froze. “Ssst! Did you hear?”
Beyond, there was a blind stagger of feet, heavy panting coming near, near, near!
“What …?” I said.
Mike shut his eyes. “Sssst! Listen! … Yes!”
