Ecstasy
from Ecstasy and other stories, by Ré Ó Laighléis
[Published by MÓINÍN, 2005; ISBN 0-9532777-9-8; Price €10; www.moinin.ie]
“I’m sorry to interrupt, Miss Naughton, but would you mind sending Úna Fitzgerald to
the office, please? Úna Fitzgerald to the office, please. Thank you.”
And, with that, the intercom cackled its way to silence once again.
“Oooooh!” came the taunt from the other girls in the class, some doing so out of pure
malice, others simply because they didn’t have the strength of character not to do so. And
Úna reddened to the gills.
“Down you go, Úna,” said Miss Naughton, the French teacher. Úna rose and left the
classroom.
“Come in,” said Mrs. McDonogh, hearing Úna’s faint knock on the office door. Úna
suspected that this call to the office had something to do with the new books for which
she had not yet paid. Either that or the fact that, as of yet, three weeks into the new term,
she still hadn’t got the navy gymslip which they were obliged to wear. She had already
concocted some excuse in her mind in the event of that being the issue. She opened the
door and entered.
“Ah, Úna,” said Mrs. McDonogh, with that authority which seems peculiar to school
principals. She was seated at her desk. Alongside her stood the Vice-Principal, John
O’Neill, with whom Úna had always had a good relationship. He had taught her
mathematics in both first and second year and she had always found him fair and friendly.
But, more recently he had been made Vice-Principal and his number of teaching hours
had dropped considerably.
“Úna,” he said, and nodded by way of saying hello.
“Mr. O’Neill,” said Úna.
“Sit down, please, Úna,” invited the Principal.
And, as Úna sat, Mrs. McDonogh stood and moved away from her seat. She moved to
the coat stand, which stood in the corner of the office, and removed a navy-coloured
overcoat from it. It was one of the school uniform coats. Then she approached the desk
again and extended the overcoat towards Úna.
“I believe that this is your overcoat, Úna. You seem to have left it by the basketball
court yesterday afternoon. The caretaker noticed it when he was crossing the schoolyard.”
Úna took it from her and looked at the lining inside the collar where she had written
her name.
“Yes, Mrs. McDonogh, it is. Thank you very much.” She was very courteous in her
speech, but also very nervous. At this point she had no idea what this summons to the
Principal’s office was all about and even less of an idea as to what her overcoat had to do
with anything.
“Would you mind emptying the contents of the pockets out on to the table, Úna?”
asked Mr. O’Neill.
Úna’s mind busily tried to recall what, if anything, she might have in her pockets. A
paper hankie, she suspected, some money for the bus, she thought, and keys. That would
1
be about it, she figured. She stood now and began to do as he had requested. Her memory
had served her well: hankie, money, keys and, along with them, a slide for her hair and a
library ticket. Once emptied, she looked at the two teachers.
“And now the inside pocket, Úna, if you please,” said Mrs. McDonogh.
“Inside pocket …” repeated Úna.
“Yes, Úna, the pocket in the lining.”
Úna was bemused at this. In the lining! She had never even realised that there was a
pocket there. She rooted a little in the lining and, sure enough, there it was, a pocket as
obvious as any other pocket in the coat. She looked at the teachers and smiled a smile that
was a mixture of surprise and nervousness. But neither of the teachers showed even the
slightest hint of a smile. In fact, if anything, their looks were looks of seriousness, cold
and stoic. Úna slipped her hand into the pocket and felt one or two things inside. She took
them out: two sweets, it seemed, wrapped in that greasy type of white paper that’s often
used for lozenges. They were like Rennies in texture, really, but they were rounded and
fatter.
“Now, if you would, please,” said the Principal, extending her open hand towards Úna
and gesturing to her to put the contents of the pocket in her palm. Úna did so.
“Now, Úna, where did you get these?”
“In my pocket, Mrs. McDonogh,” said Úna unthinkingly.
The Principal’s face reddened in anger at the apparent cheekiness of this response, but
Mr. O’Neill made a timely intervention.
“Now, Úna, there’s no call to be smart.”
As soon as he said this, Úna realised that what she had said did actually have the
appearance of being smart or cheeky. But that was not at all her intention – quite the
opposite, in fact. It was nothing more than an innocence on her part that had led her to say
so.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said quite anxiously, “I didn’t mean it that way. I wasn’t
thinking, Mrs. McDonogh.”
“Well then,” said the Principal, “where did you get them?” Her face was stern, as
rigid as it had been when first she had asked the question.
“I don’t know, Mrs. McDonogh. I’d never seen them until now. I didn’t even know
that there was a pocket in the lining until you mentioned it.”
The teachers really couldn’t determine whether what they were witnessing was the
height of innocence or whether Úna was conducting one major bluff. And, if it was a
bluff, she was certainly doing it in the most convincing fashion. Certainly there was no
evidence of her having given even the slightest iota of trouble since coming to the school
some three years ago; but the teachers were all too aware that, given large classes and the
pressures of work, trouble could often slip by unnoticed for a time. And this particular
problem had been one of major concern to all of the city’s principals in the last few years
and, despite their best efforts to nip it in the bud, things seemed to be growing steadily
worse.
“But they’re only Rennies or something like that, Mrs. McDonogh,” said Úna.
The teachers looked across at each other and, in their silence, both decided that, yes,
this demonstrated extreme innocence on the part of Úna Fitzgerald.
2
Mrs. McDonogh looked at Úna. “Yes, Rennies, or something like that,” she said, and
then looked over at Mr. O’Neill once again.
“Sorry, Úna, to have taken you away from your French lesson,” he said, picking up
the conversation and dispelling a little more of the awkwardness that had surrounded the
discussion. “Now, if you don’t mind all the same, we’d like to hold on to your coat for a
wee while yet.” And he turned back towards the Principal. “There are a few spare coats in
the storeroom, Mrs. McDonogh. I’m sure Úna could borrow one of them for the time
being.”
“Oh, certainly, no problem whatsoever. Pick one for yourself on the way back to
class, Úna,” the Principal said, and she led the youngster towards the office door.
Outside, at the notice board, three of the fifth-year girls were huddled together,
whispering. Hilda Bergin, one of the heavies of the school, was among them. All three
stared at Úna as she left the office, then huddled together again to continue their
whispering.
Meanwhile, in the office, the two teachers were weighing up the conversation.
“I really don’t think she has anything to do with it,” said John O’Neill.
“Well, I have to say that I agree with you, John, particularly in light of what we’ve
just heard. And, given her naivety and innocence, I think we did the right thing in not
bringing up the question of the note.”
“Oh, definitely. It’s a good job that we had removed it from the pocket altogether. It’s
quite obvious that drugs are the last thing on her mind.”
Both teachers then drew close to peruse the note again. In bold block letters it read:
‘THIS FIX FOR FREE – €7 IN FUTURE’.
Back upstairs, Úna’s mind was in a state of flux. She couldn’t focus her attention on
the French lesson. It was a double session and Miss Naughton couldn’t help but notice
how much at sea Úna was throughout. Fortunately, the teacher had enough cop-on and
tact to realise that whatever had gone on below in the office was still on the young girl’s
mind. It was best to leave her to her thoughts for now, she figured.
And that, pretty much, was how it was throughout the day. Even by the time Biology
came around, the last class of the afternoon, Úna wasn’t up to much in the attention
stakes. The sense of relief she felt was great when, at last, the bell rang at the end of the
day. Freedom! Thank goodness for that. It was the longest day at school that Úna could
ever remember.
She was crossing the schoolyard when she heard her name being called. She turned in
the direction of the call and there, down by the entrance to the toilets, stood Hilda Bergin.
“Me?” said Úna, quite obviously surprised. Now, even the dogs in the street knew
that Hilda wasn’t exactly what you might call ‘a saint’ and Úna, no less than anybody
else, was wary of her.
“Yeah, you,” said Bergin. “Aren’t you Úna Fitzgerald?”
“Yes,” replied Úna, nervously. Her apprehension was very evident to Hilda.
“Come here a second,” said Hilda.
Úna was scared. In fact, if anything, she was more scared not to do as Hilda said than
otherwise. She inched her way down towards her, filled with apprehension, and suddenly,
just as she finally reached her, four other fifth- years popped out from behind the little
porch into the jacks. Bergin grabbed Úna by the hair and pulled her head down, while, at
3
the same time, she came up hard with a knee straight into the poor girl’s face. Úna hadn’t
a clue what had hit her; all she knew was that her nose was spouting blood and she had
heard a crack when Hilda’s knee had made contact with it. Before she knew it, she was
bundled into the foyer of the jacks and was being dragged in the direction of one of the
sinks. The fact that the sink was already filled with water hardly registered with Úna until
her head was ducked down into it. She could feel hands digging into the back of her neck
and head, forcing her to stay beneath the water. All she could really do was to prance
frantically and hope that somehow this would help the situation. But if ever she had made
a mistake, that was it. One of the gang lashed out with a kick and caught Úna straight
across the back of the calves. The pain went right through her; the only reason she was
still standing was that they were holding her up. They yanked her back out of the
washbasin and dragged her across the foyer to where Hilda was. Bergin then grabbed her
by the hair again.
“Now get this, you little bitch you,” she said, “one word out of you about that E and
you won’t know what day of the week it is – comprende, huh?”
But Úna was totally out of it. Not only did she not get the drift of what Bergin was
bellowing at her but, even if she did, she would still have been far too weak to muster up
an answer.
“Comprende?” said Hilda again, and this time she unleashed a vicious puck into
Úna’s stomach, causing her to double up in pain.
“And if there’s as much as a squeak out of you about any of what went on here today
you’ll be getting another little taste of it before too long.”
And with that Hilda finished off the job by driving another of her haymakers hard into
Úna’s stomach, leaving her writhing in pain on the floor.
***
It was later that evening that the school maintenance man found Úna. She was lucky,
really. A broken nose, a few loose teeth and a badly swollen right eye. Then there was the
usual procedure: the Principal’s office, a battery of questions and then, when the gardaí
were brought into it, there was even more questioning again. The fear of a lawsuit against
the school was foremost in Mrs. McDonogh’s mind. She knew the Fitzgeralds to be
reasonable people and, when Úna’s parents were drawn into the proceedings, the
Principal was very much relieved to find that the notion of taking legal action did not
figure in their thinking. Úna stayed tight-lipped throughout, claiming all the time that she
knew nothing, that she didn’t have the foggiest notion as to who might have been
responsible for the beating.
Mrs. McDonogh told Úna’s parents and the gardaí about the tablets incident. She was
virtually certain that the beating was related to that. But what could she do if Úna herself
wasn’t prepared to be more forthcoming about it?
“Nothing, really,” the Garda sergeant told her. “We’re perfectly happy to visit the
school and to talk about any of these matters. Bullying, theft, drugs – we’ve specially
standardised talks on all of these issues, if that’s what you want,” he told the Principal.
“But, as I’ve said already, unless someone is prepared to bring charges or unless we catch
4
the perpetrators red-handed, there’s very little we can do about it. Our hands are tied. As
it is at the moment, it is purely an internal matter.”
***
Of course, having someone running scared is food and drink to any bully, and Hilda
Bergin was no different in that regard. When she realised how scared Úna was to tell the
gardaí even the slightest detail, she knew that she could lean on her all the more. In no
time at all she had Úna roped into distributing the stuff. It didn’t take too many smarts for
Úna to figure out how the two E tablets had first been planted on her. She knew that what
she was doing was wrong, but it was one of those ugly vicious circles one falls into: the
more she planted, the stronger the hold Hilda had on her and the greater her fear of her. A
real Catch 22. Úna doing what she was doing because she was afraid not to do it. It was
fear of fear that kept her at it, really. One of those “damned if you do and damned if you
don’t” situations.
One day, shortly after the Christmas holidays, the Principal and Vice-Principal visited
all the classes and gave a talk. Just the day before, another girl had been beaten in the
school, but this time the beating had been far more severe than was the case with Úna.
This girl had been hospitalised and was likely to be there for quite some time. Even the
tiniest piece of information would be most welcome and could be crucial in resolving the
matter.
Úna could feel her face reddening as she listened to Mrs. McDonogh speaking. She
knew deep down that it was the handiwork of Hilda and her cronies again. She knew it all
right, but she didn’t have the courage required to say so. Fear pitted hard against courage
and courage was vanquished. She knew what was right, but doing what was right was as
difficult a task as trying to catch the wind.
Úna was out of sorts for the rest of that day. She couldn’t get the thought of the girl
who had been beaten out of her mind. Rekindled thoughts of her own beating didn’t help
matters any either. And, even when she went home from school, her mind was still
tortured by such thoughts – prodding, gnawing, pestering. She didn’t sleep a wink and
another day at school loomed ominously ahead.
The following morning Hilda and her crew gathered outside the school gates, as they
often did. They appeared to be dispersing as Úna approached the entrance, but then closed
in fast again, trapping Úna in the middle of their circle.
“Listen here, you little bitch,” said Hilda, while at the same time sinking her closed
fist deep in beneath Úna’s ribs, “if there’s as much as a word out of you about any of this,
you’re a goner – is that clear?”
“Yes,” said Úna sheepishly.
“I don’t think I heard you clearly enough,” said Hilda. “Did any of you hear her
clearly, girls?” she asked, looking around at the others.
“Naw, Hilda, didn’t hear anything,” they said in unison, then tittered to themselves.
Hilda grabbed Úna by the front of her coat collar and pulled her towards her.
“Did you hear that, Fitzer? The girls here don’t appear to have heard you,” and once
again the fist went hard and low into Úna’s ribcage. “Do you understand that now, do
you?”
5
“Yes, yes,” said Úna, half-crying, half-speaking, but trying, above all else, to make
sure that anything she said was sufficiently audible to satisfy Hilda.
It was the timely ringing of the school bell that spared Úna any further suffering.
Later that morning, midway through the Maths session, when angles and
hypothenuses were among the furthest things from Úna’s mind, she touched the area
beneath her ribs gingerly. The pain. It was quite bad. It was possible that a couple of her
ribs were broken, she thought. Her mind was tortured wondering what she would do.
What she should do was quite apparent to her, but should and would were miles apart.
The ‘should’ was, she told herself, to go to the Principal and spill the whole lot out
from start to finish. Otherwise things would simply continue to go from bad to worse. If
only she had the courage to do it. Then it dawned on her that maybe someone else would
come up front about it all. But, in her heart, she knew that there wasn’t really anybody
else. It was just another of her efforts to escape the situation and, already, there had been
more than enough of that.
“Do it now,” said the teacher at the top of the class. The reference was, of course, to
the mathematics in hand, but somehow the words registered in Úna’s mind as an
illumination of sorts, an intervention by fate to steel her nerve and steer her in the right
direction. Yes, she would do what she knew to be right. She would do it. Up she got and
headed out the classroom door, down the passageway, down the stairs and finally she
found herself at the door of the Principal’s office.
She stood at the door, her hand aloft, ready to knock, when a voice interrupted her:
“Ah, ah, Úna!”
Úna turned. It was Hilda and two of her sidekicks, standing at the cloakroom door
straight across from the Principal’s office. Úna’s and Hilda’s eyes locked hard on one
another, Hilda’s cold, grey eyes seeking to control Úna’s weaker stare. A little palpitation
crept across the lower rim of Úna’s right eye and Hilda Bergin smiled cunningly at the
younger girl.
“Úna,” said Hilda once again, and she hardened her stare all the more. Then the
memory of Bergin’s fist driving itself in hard beneath her ribs came to Úna’s mind again.
She steeled her stare at Hilda. This time it was Úna who tightened her mouth and now she
noticed that Hilda’s smile had grown less confident. Hilda, the toughie of the school,
smile waning now. Úna held her stare, then turned away and knocked three times, loudly
and deliberately on the office door.
Published by MÓINÍN, Loch Reasca, Ballyvaughan, Co. Clare, Ireland
Tel: (065) 707 7256; E-mail: moinin@eircom.net
Reviews of this work can be seen on the MÓINÍN website, www.moinin.ie
6
Hooked — Chapter 4
from Hooked, by Ré Ó Laighléis
[Published by MÓINÍN, 1999 (New edition, 2007); ISBN 978-0-9554079-3-2; Price €12.50; www.moinin.ie]
“This is a family problem and it is important that it be accepted and viewed in that light.
That has to be taken as a starting point to the process of rehabilitation.”
There is no effort whatsoever on Brendan’s part to conceal his impatience as he
listens to the counsellor. Sandra, on the contrary, has all the signs of seriousness and is
very attentive to what Marian Johnson is saying. As for Alan, his demeanour seems much
more akin to Brendan’s than to the concern Sandra displays.
“It is always an essential ingredient in assisting the user to come off the stuff that
there be cooperation between the various parties involved. There is no overnight solution
and it is important to realise that,” she tells them. “Bear in mind that it is quite possible
that Alan may be feeding this habit for the past two or three years, maybe more. Isn’t that
so, Alan?”
Brendan emits a little grunt when the counsellor says this. It is hard for her to tell
whether it is a sign of approval or otherwise. But Sandra knows. Alan himself says
nothing, simply contorts his face and looks away. Then Sandra, as though to compensate
for the apparent disinterest being shown by the other two, is at pains to impress her own
concern and appreciation on the counsellor. She is worried that the devil-may-care
attitude of the other two may ultimately render futile the whole notion of having sought
counselling.
Devil-may-care attitude is right, thinks Sandra. That in itself is almost as big a part of
the problem as Alan’s addiction, which had just been confirmed two weeks earlier.
They’re lucky, really, that what has been advised is a series of counselling sessions rather
than the possibility of legal proceedings of one sort or another. And Sandra, in her
wisdom, decided to skip the waiting list and make an appointment with a private
counsellor. They could be waiting two or three months on the public system – even
longer, maybe. But now, given Brendan’s inability to accept that his son is a drug addict,
Sandra is hoping that this hasn’t all been just a case of money down the drain. She finds it
incredible that, despite Alan’s five days’ hospitalisation after the event, Brendan’s
attitude could be so closed. And, even worse again, Alan is capitalising on his father’s
attitude and making out that Brendan has it right.
Of course, what Sandra doesn’t realise is that Alan has his father by the short and
curlies, that Brendan had been no more down the country with his brother when the
incident happened than with the man in the moon. What Alan knows, and Sandra doesn’t,
is that those few days were spent with Amy, Brendan’s bit-on-the-side this past two years.
It was by chance entirely that Alan had found out about them. In he goes to a night club in
Dublin city centre one night a couple of months back and there they were, all lovey-dovey
over in a corner, like a couple of silly teenagers. Alan couldn’t believe it when he saw
them there, but little did he think at the time that he might turn the whole situation around
in his favour. And, by God, did he ever make the most of it.
7
“Oh! Alan … son,” says Brendan, almost falling over himself in shock, “what are you
doing here?”
“Me, Dad! What am I doing here!” And he looked at his father and then, very
deliberately, at the dolly-bird blonde hanging on to him. He recognised her straight off –
the secretary from his Dad’s school. She was a good-looker all right, about twenty-five,
he figured. But, Jesus, her and his old man. If anything, she’d be more suitable for him
than for his father.
“Oh … er, this is Amy, the secretary from the school, you know. I think you may have
met her before. We were … er …”
“Yes, Dad, I know. You were discussing business, right? Yeah! Teaching matters and
the likes.”
God, who would have believed it? The middle-aged gobshite and the dolly bird, just
like you see in the films. But who would ever think that it would happen in one’s own
family? It was always someone else’s old man. But then, talk about capitalising on a
situation …
It was only a couple of days later that Brendan came up with a proposition that he
hoped would keep things under wraps. Alan had seen enough and was himself already
sufficiently wayward that the attraction of the money was too much to turn down. Little
did Brendan know, however, that the two hundred and fifty euro a week he agreed to put
in Alan’s Post Office Savings Account would partly go to feed a drug habit. He’d have to
up the number of German grinds he was giving to earn the money, but still, it would mean
his secret would be safe. It was simply buying silence as far as Brendan was concerned,
not buying something that could ultimately endanger his son’s well-being. His own wellbeing too, if he stopped to think of it, and that of his marriage into the bargain.
“Two or three years, Alan. Isn’t that so?” repeats the counsellor.
“Two or three years! Never. I only took it a couple of times, for Christ sake,” says
Alan in response. “Jesus, you’d think from the way you’re going on about it that I was
hooked or something.”
“It’s quite common for the user to reject counselling. Essentially, it is a denial of the
habit. Indeed, sometimes you’ll even get a parent who may go into denial also,” Marian
Johnson says. “I’m always inclined to think that that in itself is some form of selfprotection.”
An alertness now in Brendan’s eyes. He is stung a little by this last comment. The
counsellor can discern his discomfort but, in her own mind, she puts it down to her being
too direct.
“What I mean is that it can be extremely difficult for someone to acknowledge that a
family member could possibly have a problem of that sort, especially where heroin is
concerned,” she adds. She is silent then, affording them an opportunity – particularly
Brendan – to see that there was nothing malicious intended by her earlier comments. But
Brendan is his heedless self again and neither he nor Sandra say anything.
“And the element of manipulation, of course,” resumes the counsellor, “especially
where the user is concerned.” Now it is mainly Alan who shows signs of being ill at ease,
though Brendan also looks a little flustered.
“Manipulation? What would you mean by that in a case like this?” Sandra asks.
8
The counsellor looks at Sandra, then shifts her gaze to Alan and then to Brendan.
Their discomfort now is very obvious. Then she turns to Sandra again.
“Well, I am not suggesting that it is a factor in this case – that is to say, in Alan’s case
– but manipulation is often one of the prime strategies of the user in perpetuating his
habit. It is a type of playing on the sensitivities of those around him, particularly where
other family members are concerned.” She glances again now at Alan, then at Brendan,
and somehow senses that it is wiser to wind up the session.
“But, I think, that’s best left for the next meeting, okay,” she says.
Sandra looks towards Brendan and is trying to gauge his reaction to all of this. She
can see the stubbornness in his face. Though she realises the extent to which the
counsellor is exercising tact in her deliberations, it is obvious to Sandra that Brendan isn’t
buying any of what the woman has been saying. She is relieved to hear Marian Johnson
draw the session to a close and an arrangement is made for next week.
***
Silence. Nothing but silence since leaving the counsellor’s office over ten minutes earlier.
Not one single syllable from any of them. The redness of the traffic light reflects itself
across the windscreen of the car and casts mysterious shadows onto their faces, distorting
their features. Sandra is fuming with Brendan. Yet again, he has given her no support.
And there is Alan, sitting smugly on the back seat, gloating at how things went in the
counselling session. Unexpectedly, it is Brendan who breaks the silence.
“Anyhow, as you said, Alan, you only had a couple of gos at it. Isn’t that right, son?”
Sandra cannot believe she is hearing this.
“Yeah, Dad, two or three times at the most, I’d say. Certainly no more than four.”
Sandra can sense the lie in everything he says. That’s bad enough, but now, on top of
that, Brendan is there parading himself as the ultimate gobshite, making one stupid
utterance after another. She tightens her mouth and re-affirms herself in her resolve not to
contribute anything to this stupidity.
“There you are, then, and that’s an end to it, isn’t that right, son?”
No response from Alan this time. Brendan looks in the rear-view mirror and his and
Alan’s eyes fix on one another. The threat, the deceitfulness, the secrecy. And Sandra can
feel the darkness of the night conspire with Alan’s silence to conceal the dishonesty of the
situation. She is increasingly hard-put to keep her silence. All she can see now in her
mind’s eye are the needle marks in the veins of Alan’s arm.
“Sure, when you think back, Sandra, to when we were that age, we were all trying that
stuff at the time.”
Sandra is fit to be tied as she listens to her husband. She cannot decide whether he is
more naive than he is stupid.
“Sure, God, there’s hardly anyone of our generation who didn’t try a little bit of
marijuana or a –”
“Oh, shut it, Brendan. For Christ’s sake, just shut it. I never heard such stupidity in all
my life. Anyway, we’re not talking about marijuana or any other soft drug in this case.
And what’s more, me boyo,” she says now, swinging back towards Alan, “we’re talking a
9
hell of a lot more than the two or three times that you’ve been going on about, aren’t
we?”
Brendan is rocked back by the vehemence of Sandra’s attack. He looks into the mirror
and, once again, his and Alan’s eyes meet. Then Brendan puts his foot down harder on
the accelerator.
Published by MÓINÍN, Loch Reasca, Ballyvaughan, Co. Clare, Ireland
Tel: (065) 707 7256; E-mail: moinin@eircom.net
Reviews of this work can be seen on the MÓINÍN website, www.moinin.ie
10
The Mangle
from Heart of Burren Stone: A collection of short stories
by Ré Ó Laighléis
[Published by MÓINÍN, 2002; ISBN 0-9532777-2-0; Price €10; www.moinin.ie]
To Pete
It stood boldly, the height of a man and more, in the back yard of the old house, now
shared by its last inhabitants. Since the deaths of the spinster aunts, Essie and Kate,
neither of the men had cared enough to keep it in its state of one time splendour. Ned,
Da’s uncle, was too old now to bother much with anything that did not in some way relate
to his impending death and, of course, his subsequent salvation. Ando, the younger, saw
in it an object belonging to the world of women’s work – a stubborn and uncomfortable
reminder of the one-time feverish industry of this house in the heart of Bray.
For us, my brother Peter and I, the mangle was not of this world either, though, unlike
the uncles, it mattered greatly to us. Always, on our Sunday visits with my Da, we’d head
out back, hoping somehow that we could learn the secret of its magic. We knew that later
in the day, in the presence of the adults, it would exercise that magic and yield the now
expected fruit.
How high up was twenty feet? I didn’t know. I only knew from adult talk I’d often
heard that twenty feet must have been awfully high. I stood in at the base of the mangle
and looked up. Its iron frame arched inwards on both sides as it reached to its top and
came together in a sort of upward pointing tail, which always reminded me of the tip of
the ice cream in a cone. From my vantage point, I couldn’t be altogether sure, but it
seemed to touch the sky. I wondered would that be twenty feet?
“Hey, Pete, would you say that’s twenty feet?”
Pete, who had been busying himself with the impossible task of trying to turn the
handle – that later, in the hands of adults, would make the mighty wooden rollers grind
their angry faces one against the other – stood back in expert judgement.
“Not at all, that’s not twenty feet.”
“I betcha it is.”
Pete inclined his head. If it wasn’t for the spoiling effect of his neck, his ear would
have been perfectly parallel to his shoulderline. He narrowed his eyes, stared at the tip of
the mangle, eyed it most astutely, straightened his posture again and delivered his
considered opinion in the most definitive fashion.
“Nope! Nineteen and a half.”
“No it’s not. It’s twenty. Come in here where I am and look up at it. It’s twenty from
here.”
Pete came in to the base of the mangle, edging me further to the side of the mighty
structure. He rested his chin on the top roller and turned his eyes into his forehead, as he
focused on the upper tip of the frame.
“No, nineteen and a half.”
11
Without my saying so, he could see in my face that I still did not agree with this
assessment of its size. It was at this point that the danger of a growing ability to
rationalise first revealed itself in him.
“Look,” he said, “Da is nineteen feet tall. Right?”
“Right,” I responded. This was something we both knew for sure.
“And Joe Hoare is twenty feet tall. Right?”
“Right.”
“Well then, that mangle is taller than Da, but smaller than Joe Hoare. Right?”
“Right.”
“So, it must be nineteen and a half feet.”
He was right. It must be nineteen and a half feet.
Pete was clever. I was clever too, but somehow, it would seem, not quite as clever as
Pete. For some years after this event, it always lingered in my mind that God had given
Pete one half foot more intelligence than He gave me. I watched him as he went back to
the handle of the mangle and wondered if ever I might grow to be as intelligent as he was.
Inside, amid the clouds of pipe and cigarette smoke, the men discussed their horses: a
mixture of detailed knowledge of animal and man, of jockeying and form, dotted with a
rich and varied range of necessary expletives. We’d linger now and then on the periphery
of these horsey conversations, hoping that our presence would serve to prod these adult
minds, reminding them that there was, as yet, a more important business to be attended
to. We’d leave again, returning to our world out back, returning to the mangle.
After some time, my Uncle Ando would come out to tell us there was tea and
sandwiches ready and to come quickly before they were all gone. He’d never tell us there
were cakes and biscuits too, and yet, there always were. We’d know that after this they
would come out to the mangle, and so, despite our earlier eagerness and impatience, we
would, with this assurance, sit quietly, eating and drinking. Finally, Ned would dip his
fingers into his black waistcoat pocket, pluck out the silver-cased watch at the end of the
chain, pop it open and say, “Bejay, is it that time! I suppose we’d better have a gawk at
this ould mangle. See if it’s still there and all.”
Then, we’d all file out, always keeping the same order. Ned first, followed by Da,
then Pete, then me, and Ando bringing up the rear.
“I wonder is there anything in it today,” my Da would say, as we’d enter the small
backyard.
Ned would look around the back of the mangle before offering any response.
“Jay, I don’t know! This time of year she can often run dry, you know.”
Pete and I would look wide-eyed at each other, knowing in our heart of hearts that the
running dry of the Bray mangle would be the worst disaster conceivable – for us at any
rate.
Da would take up his position on the handle, while Ned stood straight across from
him at the other leg of the frame. Ando would stand at the back of the mangle – “to watch
for anything happening”, as they would say – while Pete and I would be told to stand
together some feet away to the front. Then the magic would be set in motion.
“Are you right there, Ando?”
“Yes, I’m alright, Kevin. Ready to go.”
“How are you there, Ned?” Da would ask.
12
“Rarin’ like a brood mare, Kevin, rarin’.”
Ned would look over at myself and Pete then, and we could see in his eye a vestigial
glint of devilment, the memory of which has oft times since suggested to me that he must
have had a lot of spark in him before Time began to debit his account.
“I don’t know if these young lads are up to it, though,” he’d add, knowing that his
wizardry could topple us over the edge and into the deep vat of wild excitement.
“We are, we are!”
“Are you sure now you don’t want to go back inside?”
“No, no! Turn the handle, turn the handle.” And we danced up and down, giving extra
substance to our demand that there be no further delay.
Ned would give the nod and, slowly, Da would turn the handle. Ando, whose head
was visible through the upper part of the old green cast-iron frame, stood quite still at the
back of the mangle. Our whole attention was set on the ground to the rear, where now we
could see the sandled, sockless feet of our uncle, Ando. Gradually Da’s turning of the
handle gathered momentum, trying to catch the racing of our hearts. And soon he did.
And then our hearts responded to the challenge in a nip and tuck affair, which to the
adults, must have seemed just like the many close finishes they always seemed to be
describing in their inside conversations. The tension mounted in our hearts and soon
approached discomfort, and just when it would seem the wiser option to give up, out
they’d fall, from the back of the mangle – two glistening, silver sixpenny pieces. They’d
hop out on the ground, making a sweet, rich tinkling sound, much sweeter than a penny.
And there they’d lie, shining like the stars at night. And somehow, finding extra reserves
of energy when we had almost given up, Pete and I danced up and down and cheered and
hugged each other in our excitement.
“And I was sure she was gone dry. Oh, there’ll be milk in the Noggin for the tea
tonight anyway,” Ned would say, as we’d pick up our half shillings at the back of the
mangle. We’d hold them in our hands, marvelling at this wondrous machine, knowing
that the reason we were poor was that we didn’t have a mangle at home in our back
garden.
It was bus time then. Off we’d go, back home to the Noggin – Pete, my Da and I …
and the two silver sixpenny pieces.
Most Sundays were like that. Da would go to Bray in the afternoon and, more often
than not, he would take us with him. In Bray, the format was always the same: the adult
talk inside, the child’s world outside and, of course, the mangle.
By the time another summer came around, all the important elements in my life
seemed to be measured in halves. I was nearly eight and a half years old and was still
quite removed from the whys and wheres of things. Peter, who was almost eighteen
months my senior, and was officially one full half foot more intelligent, had a mind far
more enquiring than mine. Somehow, somewhere, he seemed to latch onto a cause-andeffect rule of life, which now applied itself in every sphere, widening, I suspected, the
intelligence gap between us by several half feet at least. He could also, in the secrecy of
our non-adult world, turn the mangle wheel one half a turn, failing still to make any
headway on the upper half.
It was on one of that summer’s Sundays that it happened. We had arrived at the house
about half past two and, having sat with the uncles for the obligatory two minutes, the
13
company eased itself away from us, then lost us both entirely in the smoke and horsefilled banter of adult conversation. Pete and I removed ourselves, unnoticed as always,
and adjourned to the more inspiring world of the backyard and the mangle.
Once outside, we concerned ourselves, unhindered, with the realities of the world. I,
with locating the spot on the mangle frame where I had scraped my height mark just the
week before, then standing up against it in the hope of bettering my one-week-old record.
Pete was tinkering with the wheel and scrutinising the minuteness of the space between
the rollers. From his pocket, he took a piece of paper which he had purposely brought
with him and tried to pass it through the narrowness of the opening. It folded as he tried
to pass it through, eventually making a little accordion of itself. Disgruntled, Pete stepped
back in anger and frustration.
“How the hell does it come out?”
“What?” I asked, being jolted from my counting of how many times it took my hands
to make up my height mark on the mangle frame.
“How the hell does the money get out?”
“Holy God sends it,” I proffered, with the same certainty that only a few days earlier
had enabled me inform my best friend, Tom, of the origin of babies.
Pete leered at me, a look of incredulity that seemed tainted with the smugness of one
who knew that, definitely, the difference now was much more than half a foot. The stare,
if it could be verbalised, had in it all the signs of ‘gobshite’. He looked back at the
mangle, his mind ticking over feverishly, then finally deciding.
“That’s it. It must be in the roller.”
“What?”
“The money. All those sixpences. They must be inside in the roller.”
“No. I told you – Holy God sends them.”
This time Pete did not even consider acknowledging my foolishness with a dirty look.
He reached out for his jacket, which he had hung on the end of the mangle handle, and,
pulling it towards him, he produced from the inside pocket, the small red-handled
screwdriver that belonged back home in the kitchen drawer. Raising his right arm to its
highest, he eyed the upper roller, then came down hard, driving the shaft of the
screwdriver into the wood of the upper roller. He seemed surprised at how easily it had
pierced the wood. And then, in apparent shock, he stopped, realising what he had done.
He looked at me, his eyes begging for forgiveness, and all I had to offer him was a hand
raised to my mouth and a look of shock equal to his own. He stepped back from the
mangle, his head hanging downwards, knowing that, in yielding to his insatiable
inquisitiveness, he had dealt a blow as injurious to himself as to anybody else. He moved
forward again and placed his hand upon the redness of the screwdriver’s handle, and,
with one short, sharp, upward movement, removed it from the wood. Then, suddenly –
“There’s tea and sandwiches inside, lads. If you don’t hurry up, they’ll be all gone.”
Ando, having delivered his message, disappeared from the doorway of the scullery.
Pete and I looked at each other, knowing, though we did not speak, that our thoughts were
as to whether or not Ando had witnessed the transgression.
“These gentlemen are awfully quiet today,” said Ned, as we guiltily sipped our tea and
declined Ando’s frequent offerings from the biscuit plate. We were hoping, I suppose,
that this act of self-denial would serve as secret retribution for the foulness of the deed
14
done out the back. In a way, it did and, coupled with the wisdom of Ned’s effort to cheer
us up with his ‘Whatever it is, it can’t be so important that it shouldn’t be forgotten
about’, it served to bring us back to our usual selves by the time going out to the mangle
came around.
Ned dipped the fingers into the waistcoat pocket.
“Bejay, is it that time! I suppose we’d better have a gawk at this ould mangle. See if
it’s still there and all.”
Outside, the menfolk of this clan took up positions. Three generations and a mangle.
Da stood ready at the handle, Ned facing him on the other side, and Ando behind. Pete
and I, as was our custom, stood to the front.
My heart was thumping, as always it would do when near to magic. I don’t know
how, but this day I could sense that it thumped alone, somehow knowing that the oneness
that was Pete and I in tasting of this magic was no more. My brother stood calmly,
carefully watching the initial turning of the wheel. Slow, slow, and my heart thumped,
and Pete watched, and faster and thump and Pete watched, and faster and faster, thumpthump, Pete watched, and faster and faster ’n faster ’n faster and THERE … out they
popped. And I jumped and danced and …
“I saw you throwing the money, Uncle Ned,” Pete said. “I saw you, I saw you.”
The old man’s eyes met Pete’s gaze, then he looked over at my father and grimaced
sadly. Then, nodding his head, he smiled a smile of resignation and, saying nothing,
turned slowly and re-entered the house through the scullery door and was lost to us in the
darkness.
Published by MÓINÍN, Loch Reasca, Ballyvaughan, Co. Clare, Ireland
Tel: (065) 707 7256; E-mail: moinin@eircom.net
Reviews of this work can be seen on the MÓINÍN website, www.moinin.ie
15
Battle for the Burren — Chapter 8
from Battle for the Burren, by Ré Ó Laighléis
[Published by MÓINÍN, 2007; ISBN 978-0-9554079-1-8; Price €14; www.moinin.ie]
Mist enshrouds the soldiers of Dermot O’Brien’s scouting party as they near the rugged
crag at Oughtmama, a little to the southeast of the abbey at Corcomroe. They have been
led from the Glen of Clab by Cian MacClancy, a kinsman of Iarla’s, and his orders are to
ensure free passage for the youthful chieftain and his band of three-score select men who
follow and who later hope to make their way to the northern side of Abbey Hill.
The parties have found the terrain less than kind to them, neither being used to the
cragginess from which the land of Burren has taken its very name. For them the smooth
lush greenness of south Thomond’s gentler slopes is far more inviting. Worse still,
though they do not know it, is the fact that the every move of Cian and his men has been
tracked by a similar scouting party of the Roe O’Briens, sent out earlier by Feardorcha at
a time when darkness had no thought of ever yielding to the light of morning. These are
select troops in the ranks of Prince Donough, trained especially in the art of swoop and
plunder, and totally uncompromising and merciless in their ways. Feardorcha has
instructed them that, should they come on any of Dermot’s men, none is to pass. “Spare
nothing. Slay them as you would the briar that stands in your path or the cur that dares to
cross the way of a steed when he is in gallop,” were his very words to them as he oversaw
the party’s earlier leaving of the monastery. “And,” he added, “if there is a tree from
which to hang their blood-dripping bodies, then do not fail to make use of it for that very
purpose.”
Fortunately for Iarla and his soldiers, they have varied their itinerary from the due
north course taken by Cian. The young O’Brien has veered to the northeast at that point
along the route known to those who are of these lands as Bearna na Mallacht – The Gap
of Curses. This will take his band of men through the hazel groves just south of Turlough
Hill and, from there, into the western part of the townland of Funshin Mór. Once there,
already a good one thousand paces east of Cian’s projected location, he and his troops can
head in relative seclusion northwestwards for Abbey Hill, hopefully avoiding all and any
danger of encountering the Roe O’Brien forces. All going well, Iarla and his men will
later meet up again with Cian and his party at Pluais na Leannán, the little enclave just
north of Abbey Hill, known more commonly, since the coming of the Cistercian brothers
to the land of Burren, as Tobar Phádraic – the well of waters, said to have been blessed by
none other than Saint Patrick in his time.
Cian and his companions are nearing that point in the crag where the half-stone, halffertile lands of Oughtmama and Coranroo pass one into the other when, unexpectedly,
they hear the clanking of metal against rock not far behind them. Instinctively, all in the
advance party crouch and seek the shelter of a nearby copse. Secluded in the bushes now,
Cian scans the mass of moon-washed limestone out beyond the shrubbery. The landscape
spreads itself in black and silver-speckled wetness. There are suggestions of shadow here
and there, but none so certain as to make any of Cian’s soldiers think that Feardorcha’s
men are anywhere as nearby as they really are.
16
“A goat negotiating the rock,” says Cian, easing himself into a standing position again
and causing his companions to do likewise. His announcement is followed by the
nervousness of laughter from the others and then the all too ill-advised dissipation of that
tension. Relieved at hearing Cian’s pronouncement, they turn to banter amongst
themselves when, suddenly, as does a flock of hooded crows descend upon the carcass of
an errant sheep or goat, the Roe O’Brien scouting party sweeps mercilessly in from all
sides. The swoop is clinical and swift, so swift, indeed, that it is difficult to discern
between its onset and its end.
Within minutes, the many acts of stab and swipe are done and the party that was Cian
and his men seems to be no more. And before even the sharpest watching eye among the
Roe O’Brien raiders takes notice of a movement amidst the fallen bodies, a hand stills
itself a while and waits for all to settle. It is the hand of Caltra of the Clan of MacNamara,
a boy no more than twelve summers of age, who has travelled as a runner with the Cian
MacClancy party. He makes one of his face and the rock that lies beneath him and none
but he knows of the air that still fills his lungs. And the only suggestion to the outer world
that anything has happened in this place is the shrieking cry of Cian himself as an enemy
dagger is driven in hard beneath his ribcage. The cry pierces the thinness of the night air
and is carried in all directions. Its last echo, climbing well beyond the low-set saddle of
rock that makes one of Turlough Hill and its lower limestone neighbour, Greim Chaillí,
reaches the ears of Iarla and his men.
“What was that?” asks Iarla. He stoops as he speaks, and instinctively indicates to his
soldiers to do likewise. There is, however, little need for him to do so. Already they have
been crouched low on the bareness of the crag, hoping that their human forms will be
engulfed in the irregular shadows cast by larger rock on lesser. There is little else where
they find themselves now – no trees, no bushes, not even a low-walled pen where some
unknown subject of the realm might tend his goats.
“It is the night-sound of an animal, Master Iarla,” says Riordan, drawing himself up
closely to the young leader. His comment sounds rough and raucous, the chords that give
him voice most probably raw and torn from years of roaring war cries as he has gone into
battle. Iarla looks at his lieutenant in the half-light. Riordan is a man more than twice his
years. He is of old Gaelic stock from Deasmhumhan, the noble kingdom of Desmond, to
the south again of Thomond. His were the kinsmen who peopled the hills and valleys of
every tuath in the ancient region long before the Norman Geraldines gained foothold in
the place. And he has served loyally and truly on previous campaigns with Dermot and,
before that again, as a noted mercenary in the armies of several others of the native kings,
whether tuath or province.
It is years in Riordan’s blood to stand with the O’Brien. Long spoken in his clan are
the heroic deeds of his kinsman Garbhán, who, on the dark day that was Good Friday in
the year of Our Lord 1014, at that place in the east where the soft lands of Cluain Tairbh
stretch north from the coastal settlement of Dubhlinn, stood shoulder to shoulder with Dál
Cais’ mighty Brian Boru to defeat the marauding Dane. And in his loyalty, the brave and
gallant Garbhán threw himself onto a Viking sword rather than see his lord and king slain
before his eyes. And such is the seed of which Riordan has been born. His years have
given him a wisdom that cannot be within the gift of one so young as is his master, Iarla,
17
and it is said of him that, like well-famed Garbhán, the only element in his make-up to
surpass that very wisdom is his courage.
Iarla stares hard into Riordan’s green eyes. In the night-light that is cast upon them,
they are eyes that could as easily be grey or brown or black. But such is not of import
beyond the fact that these are eyes that have seen far more of battle than Iarla could ever
contemplate seeing. Even the scars of war that skirt Riordan’s red and ragged beard, and
the many more that lie unseen beneath it are testament to knowledge and experience
gained.
“An animal?” the young man says.
“An animal, Master Iarla,” repeats Riordan, “and only that. For if it is not an animal,
then it is best that we remain not knowing what else it may be.”
It is now he who stares into Iarla’s eyes. A stare of firmness, stare of resolve, but not a
stare in any way defiant of his leader. “Now, Abbey Hill. It is time for you to lead us on,
my master. Time to be as great a leader as is your father and as was your father’s father
for many years before him.”
Iarla’s eyes hold firm on Riordan’s gaze, and as they do so, a strange collage of
imagery races across his mind. First, his father’s face, then that of his grandfather, called
up by memory of a drawn charcoal likeness he had one time seen of him, and then the
smiling image of the lovely Sorcha – all people of his ken. But after these, most curiously
to him, a face he does not know, a face he cannot know. It is that of a blind old man,
benign and strong. The vision then is concentrated so that it is only the whiteness of the
old man’s eyes that now wins Iarla’s attention. And in the eyes the image-within-image of
a boat departing the water’s edge, and hand reaching for hand – one from the parting
vessel, the other from dry land.
“Time to lead, Master Iarla.” It is as much the firmness of Riordan’s left hand
squeezing the chieftain’s shoulder as the words he issues with the gesture that takes the
young man from his reverie. All that has been seen within his mind’s eye has happened in
a small few seconds and, as Iarla focuses again on Riordan’s stare, the mental image of
the whiteness of the old man’s eyes melts weakly into those of his loyal lieutenant.
“Time to show yourself a man true to the name O’Brien,” says Riordan, and now he
tightens his grip on Iarla’s shoulder and gently shakes his master. Then the young man
extends his own left arm and places his hand on Riordan’s shoulder. “Aye, Riordan,” he
says, “in the name of the O’Brien.”
“In the name of the O’Brien,” repeats Riordan, intuitively sensing that this son of
Dermot is at least – and maybe more – the man his father is.
“Airigí a fheara,” snaps Iarla in that native way of his of drawing his men’s
immediate attention to him. “Single file and crouch. We make for the Corker Pass, then
on to Abbey Hill.” Then he pauses and looks again at his staunch lieutenant. “I will take
the lead, Riordan to the rear.” And as they begin to skirt the scree on the footslopes of
Greim Chaillí, Riordan smiles in satisfaction.
***
Père François has prayed the matins in the company of the brethren in Corcomroe.
Though he is strictly Benedictine, he is very much at one with the Cistercian brothers in
18
celebrating a common Lord. Not since leaving the Abbey at Mont St. Michel in coastal
Brittany to go serve de Clare, and now the Roe O’Briens, has he had the comfort of a
brotherhood in making morning prayer. In most respects, life has been much easier for
him in recent times and yet, something in his make-up – or, more particularly, perhaps, in
his priestly training – makes him yearn for the unworldliness of monastic life again. His
senses have been filled by all that he has found around him since entering the portals of
this hallowed place in the dark of night. The general intrusion by Prince Donough’s men
has occasioned the announcement by Abbot Nilus that the brothers’ rule of silence will be
eased and speech is permitted between the times of matins and vespers for this day only.
The brothers’ attempted display of composure on hearing Nilus’ decree is belied by an
inner and welling sense of adventure. Their feeling is not unlike that of the excitement of
the farrier’s young apprentice who is told one morning that he may return home, that his
master on this day will have neither wood nor reddened embers for the softening of metal,
that the belly of the bellows will not again be winded until the morrow. And for the toiler,
disappointment? Well, perhaps not.
Père François is fortunate that his companion at the table as the community breaks
fast is the affable Benignus. Their talk in the last few minutes has been made in a
peppering of Anglo-Saxon, French and Gaelic, neither man finding himself to be fully at
ease in using any two of these. An undeclared compromise has been reached and Père
François’ command of the Anglo-Saxon tongue, being better than his comrade’s use of
French, has seen the conversation being conducted in the Englishman’s language.
Besides, thinks Benignus to himself, François is not as old as he, so it is not unreasonable
that any inconvenience should be the Frenchman’s. Whatsmore, the old man somewhat
uncharacteristically thinks it will, in a small way, be an experience in character-building
for François to suffer the discomfort.
“It is an ugly business, this,” François says. His speech is made in tempered tones that
will allow his comrade hear his words, yet keep them from the ears of others.
“Yes, Père, as is any business that finds its cause in greed and the relentless pursuit of
power.” Benignus has been less discreet in the nature and the loudness of his comment.
“It is as old as the very hills which surround us,” he continues. “One has, another takes;
one needs, another wants. Greed, my Gallic friend, cannot of its very nature know any
lines within the realm of confinement. Its roots seek no way other than to draw
incessantly and insatiably from the avaricious font of strangle-mangle.”
“What you say, Brother Benignus, is undoubtedly true and yet one cannot but feel that
were wisdom to prevail –”
“Wisdom, François, if you will pardon my interruption, is a commodity not common
amongst those of whom we speak. Neither too is kindness, nor gentleness, nor any of
those virtues that one ordinarily trusts to set the minds of fair men at odds with avarice.”
The Frenchman meekly inclines his head, then smiles a smile that is more pressed
than open. His gesture is as revering of the old man as it is noble, and is made in
acknowledgement of the truth of all that Benignus has said.
“We are not at odds, Père François,” continues Benignus. “I have my thoughts, you
have your duty. Your’s is by far the more weighty task, for while we both serve the Lord
as common master, you, by virtue of your position, are also compelled to serve mere
19
mortals who seem neither wheat nor chaff. Lean on your oars, my friend, and pray that the
battle which lies ahead may not bear the seriousness that all the omens seem to suggest.”
“But already, Brother, I have failed in my duty.”
“Failed?”
“Yes, Brother. When earlier we had camped by the lake that is Loughrask, Prince
Donough bound me to my duty that I should go north from Béalaclugga with his niece,
the young Lady Sorcha of the Clan of Mahon, taking her this night to a safe house of the
Skerretts in the area of Finavarra. Then, in the morrow’s early hours, we are to proceed on
to the safety of the homestead of the Norman lord, Richard le Blake of Galway.”
“Well then,” advises Benignus, “you must do as your master bids.”
“But you yourself, Benignus, have spoken of our greater master, Our Lord Saviour
Jesus Christ, and of our primacy of duty to do His will beyond all other.” He looks
searchingly at the stoic and pallid face of the old man, sensing that there is much going on
within Benignus’ mind of which he can know but less than little. “I feel,” continues
François, “that the larger role to which I’m called is to be with Prince Donough’s soldiers
as they fall in battle. What greater service to our Divine Master than to absolve the sins of
His flock as these men issue their last breaths before departing the world to meet their
Maker?”
“Your thoughts are noble, Père, but ill-conceived, I fear. You know already that, as
we speak these very words, your earthly master is within this abbey’s walls. What of the
consequences should he come to know that you have not done as he has ordered? What is
not known to you or any other is that which has come to me in a vision in the dark of
night.”
“A vision!” François’ reaction is occasioned more by surprise than incredulity. Unlike
the brethren at the abbey of Corcomroe, the Frenchman has no way of knowing of the gift
that is sometimes blessing, sometimes curse, which the blind monk has been compelled to
carry.
“Yes, François.” Benignus pauses, pondering the wisdom of imparting the full detail
of all that he has seen. Should he tell his comrade in religion of the young lovers’ tryst
which had come to him in that vision? Quickly, he decides that there is little sense in
doing so. It is, he feels, sufficient that enough be said to ensure that François’ decision is
that he should do the bidding of Prince Donough and take young Sorcha north to the
safety of the Blakes.
“There are times, mon ami …” again he pauses, his endearing use of François’ native
tongue being much more an act of the intuitive than the calculated, “when, in this land
where the pagan and the Christian worlds are at times still one, our better judgement must
subjugate itself to the power of omens.”
François is somewhat jolted by this latter utterance. Not so many hours earlier, by the
lakeshore at Loughrask, he had occasion to react to what he perceived to be Prince
Donough’s over-reverence to the world of darkness. And now this from the holiest of
holy men. But there is much in Benignus’ demeanour that commands François’ continued
attention.
“My gift is not one of joy, but one of duty, my dear friend,” continues Benignus.
“What I see is not of my choice but of the choice of He who has given me the power of
20
vision. It is not for me to question or reject, simply to accept that which is imparted to my
blind, yet seeing eyes.”
Silence. For François, it is a silence born of the necessity of time required to absorb
all that he is hearing. For Benignus, it is of the wisdom of knowing that it cannot be easy
for one so fervent in his faith as is the Frenchman to accommodate what is being said. It
is silence’s own time that tells Benignus that he should continue. The blind man faces
straight ahead of him as he recommences speech.
“Dismal of the Burren is to be feared and to be heeded. And yet, she is not of this
world. Similarly, in His own strange way, our Maker. Both have revealed to me in the one
and selfsame vision that less than half of those who go into battle will rise and walk from
the field of combat when this day is done. And of those who do survive, it would be
better for them that they were even fewer still, for their greater number will carry with
them marks of sword and fire that will make their lives a living hell for as ever long
hereafter that they are cursed to live within their mortal states.”
The pronouncement seems more issued from Benignus than his having spoken it of
his own volition. And now he turns his head towards the Benedictine father. “You,
François, unless you live true to your duty and to your word, as given to Prince Donough,
will be of one or other number.”
The ominousness of the presage has not even fully registered with François when
Benignus resumes his speech. “And even worse again, so too will be the Lady Sorcha of
one or other number.”
Again a silence. François’ mind is doubly taxed, firstly with a coming to terms with
all that Benignus has spoken, and secondly with the weight of the decision which only he
can make. Time seems of little consequence to him as he tries to comb his thoughts and
yet, were he outside his mind, nothing but time could possibly show itself to be of
greatest import. Unbeknownst to him, his decision is made considerably more quickly
than many noted men might make.
“Thank you, Benignus,” he says. “All you say is right. I will take the Lady Sorcha and
make north out of the kingdom of Dál Cais.” And with that, he rises from the table, takes
the old monk’s hand, kisses it and is gone.
“God speed, Père François,” says Benignus to the air, sensing that his visitor is no
longer in his presence. And then the blind man conceals both hands within the sleeves of
his cassock and makes to bow his head in prayer.
As the old monk nears the end of prayer, a vision cold and ugly forces itself upon his
mind, interrupting this holy time which he has chosen for his Maker. At first, it is nothing
more than moving shrouds of blackness across the back of his eyes. But then the image of
a face which, though in his blindness he has never seen before, he intuitively knows to be
that of Père François. The Benedictine’s countenance is wan and agitated, his eyes as
filled with fear as ever were those of any who had witnessed living evil.
And then, as though through François’ own eyes, the image of a four-legged heaving
mass, black and hideous, cumbersomely easing itself off of its prey. Now the seeing and
unseeing eyes of the Frenchman and Benignus are as one, as they behold the dark and
leering Feardorcha step aside, revealing to them the torn and ravaged Lady Sorcha.
Feardorcha throws back his head in triumph and emits a cry that is of the wild.
“Non!” exclaims François, in disbelief at what he sees.
21
“No!” cries Benignus, now rising from the table at which he has been seated since the
end of matins. His cry is elongated and is still issuing from his lungs as he moves quickly
from the dining hall, along the arch-lined cloister and to the open door of the very cell
which has been revealed to him in vision.
“Feardorcha,” Benignus says, steering the whiteness of his eyes in the direction of the
dark one. There is an authority that is arresting in the holy man’s rebuke. A radiance
issues from the monk and the soldier that is mighty dog backs away, pressing his body
hard against the end wall of the cell. He is rigid, transfixed by the old man’s stare.
“Père François,” says Benignus, not shifting his focus of attention from Feardorcha,
“take the Lady Sorcha and go, as earlier we’d discussed.”
Sorcha has already eased herself up off the stone sleeping-slab on which Feardorcha
had pinned her. She is shaken, her limbs and face bloodied from the struggle, her
garments torn and dishevelled. And yet she has the wisdom and what little composure
may be necessary to move away from Feardorcha and towards the open doorway.
“Go now, François,” orders Benignus, still not shifting his attention from the Roe
O’Brien lieutenant.
“But, Brother,” begins François, thinking to protest the very idea that he should leave
the old man alone in the company of one so dangerous.
“Allez! Allez deux!” barks Benignus, ending any further resistance on the
Frenchman’s part. His very deliberate use of François’ native tongue impresses on the
priest that, at this moment, there is no room for compromise in Benignus’ heart.
“Immédiatement!” the blind one rasps, driving home his desire that he should be obeyed.
François bows his head, removes his heavy cloak and spreads it across the Lady
Sorcha’s shoulders.
“Mm’selle,” he says, then escorts her gently from the darkened place, and they are
gone.
A closing of the door and now there are but two. Then a sound that is more whimper
than it is cry comes from the crouching figure at the end wall of the cell. Benignus knows
that the power that has consumed him and is now issuing through his eyes has reduced
the erstwhile tyrant to a feeble thing. The monk’s face is grey and stoic, nearer in its make
to marble than it is to flesh. And suddenly, a renewed surge of energy sweeps through the
old man’s body, concentrating its one and only escape route through his eyes. The cell is
lighted as though in daytime – even brighter – and the crouched Feardorcha frenetically
works his legs rat-like against the earthen floor, frantically in search of a darkened corner.
Benignus now is outside himself. Control of all that he may or may not do is long
beyond him. His white unseeing eyes involuntarily focus on the ball of black that is the
cowering soldier, cowering dog. And then the smell of burning. It is the smell of flesh,
not anything of wood or foliage. The whimper that earlier was not even cry is now a
scream. And Benignus is relentless, driven ever harder by the force that has overtaken
him. Feardorcha, as though misguided in his seeking of relief from the intensity of heat,
momentarily raises his head and looks towards the old man. The image is horrific. The
creature’s face, already almost totally devoid of features, runs as though of molten metal.
And at that instant when his eyes regard the human beacon that is the monk, a further
surge of energy sweeps through Benignus’ frame, causing him initially to gyrate, then
filling him with light from top to toe. Feardorcha screams despairingly in anticipation of
22
what is yet to come. And just as the darkened figure braces himself in readiness for
further suffering, the cell door is broken through and Abbot Nilus and two younger
members of the brethren stand boldly between the jambs.
“Enough, Benignus, enough,” barks Nilus, almost perfectly repeating Prince
Donough’s rebuke to Feardorcha earlier in the night. “I command you, brother,” asserts
Nilus.
And suddenly the light is gone from the blind monk’s eyes, his shoulders drop and he
is listless. Nilus nods to one of the fraternity who has accompanied him, indicating to him
to take Benignus from the cell. And once gone, the Abbot closes the door, indicates to the
remaining brother to stay back, and then approaches the huddled mound that is
Feardorcha. He crouches alongside the creature, placing the fingers of his right hand
beneath his chin and raising the disfigured head to catch the strands of moonlight that
creep between the window bars. He gasps at what he sees. The face is featureless and
black. A mass of charred and one-time melted flesh that, incredibly, has already hardened
and is set and crusted, as though it has been so for many years. Nothing but the eyes
remain intact. Deep and dark and sinister. And from amidst the ugliness, they look out in
their alertness and do not augur well.
“A blanket and some water, Brother, quickly,” says Nilus, barely turning towards the
monk who stands to the rear. The younger man turns and is just about to draw back the
heavy oaken door to make his exit when his going is arrested by a noise. It is a rumbling
sound from some quarter deep, that seems much more animal than human. The departing
monk looks back again and there, in the very corner where only seconds earlier the
seemingly defeated Feardorcha had crouched, now on all fours stands an animal much
larger than a dog. It stands bold and black – blacker than the clouds of night – and seems
now to have swollen to the height of any man. And its distorted face is now more
obviously that of the soldier who had earlier done battle with the holy man Benignus.
Again a noise, this time much more discernedly a growl of evil and ominous
foreboding, and the baring of fang-like teeth that are long and sharp and threatening. The
light thrown by the moon now favours the teeth above all else, making of them something
larger than they already are. The young monk, eyes forced wide in fear, makes to move
away.
“Don’t stir, Brother,” Abbot Nilus cautions, his voice carrying in it a mixture of the
knowing and unknowing. “It is better that –”
And the Abbot’s words are interrupted by another growl, one more fearsome, more
foreboding than before. Now, both Nilus and his comrade back away a little. Then
curiously, the creature that is-and-is-not dog inclines its head in a way akin to kindness.
And now a purr of sorts, far distant in its nature from the threatening sounds that have
gone before it. A second purr, and the animal lowers the forepart of its body, stretches its
legs to the front and rests its head upon them. No longer the baring of teeth, no longer the
apparent threat. Yet another purr, and then the turning of its eyes towards Nilus. There is
a kindliness in its eyes that was not there before. And the Abbot, in his wisdom, knows
that if this kindliness be truth, then there is little danger. And if it be lie, then there is no
greater or no lesser peril than was earlier the case.
Slowly, gently, Nilus approaches the being and, to the rear, the young monk watches.
The animal purrs again, then turns in semi-submission on its side as Nilus continues his
23
approach, and the young monk watches. Some steps on and the Abbot reaches the
animal’s side and it rolls onto its back, inviting the leader of the monastery to stroke its
underbelly, and the young monk watches. And then, somehow, as though in a flash, the
acts of approach and roll and watch seem suddenly to become as one and, in a speed that
defies the capability of the human eye, the creature rolls onto its feet again, parts its jaws
and snaps viciously and lethally at the Abbot’s outstretched arm. The limb is caught right
at the point where its lower part meets wrist and, in the very blink of an eye, the hand is
severed clean from the rest of the arm and the Abbot roars his pain out to the world. Nilus
writhes in agony and, in his excruciation, his screaming is unconfined. His legs are driven
by a frenzy then and he moves at speed across the floor of the cell, lambasting himself
hard against one stone wall and then against another, while all the time the creature, now
drawn up to a height greater than any seen before, looks on … and the young monk
watches.
Nilus, now at a point between two walls, stops suddenly, stands rigid in the centre of
the cell for several seconds and proceeds to violently and convulsively gyrate for a time
not measured. Then he stands rigid once again. And finally, after several seconds without
movement, the Abbot emits a long releasing cry of pain and falls dead onto the floor. And
the black creature, now drawing forward, stands over the prostrate corpse, arches its back,
then paws the silver hair of the leader of this holy house in Corcomroe … and the young
monk watches …
And the young monk watches. And the creature slowly turns its head, allowing its
eyes find those of the fear-filled brother who now has backed against the closed door of
the cell. Again the dark being inclines its head to one side, almost as though in
curiousness, and the monk feels a shudder pass through his every bone and then depart
his body. The creature parts its jaws, baring fangs again, and elongated talons extend
themselves from the paws of its sturdy forelegs. The transformation seems more cat-like
than it is canine. And in an ever-growing sense of terror, the young monk watches … the
young monk waits … the young monk wilts in fear of what it is that is yet to come.
An arching of its back and the animal has drawn itself to an even greater height, and
the Cistercian brother senses a sudden rush that is a mixture of heat and wetness coursing
down his leg. And then the pounce. Pounce and laceration. Laceration upon many
lacerations. And it is quick … and it is vicious … and it is lethal. And now the young
monk’s wait is done and he will watch no longer.
The creature backs away a little and looks for some time at the blood-splattered wall.
Then it comes forward once again, stepping on the torn remains of its prey, and it licks
the wall. It licks voraciously, relishing the act until, in little time at all, one would never
know that this stone had ever borne the gory evidence of what had passed just some
moments earlier. And all that had been reddened has been rendered grey again.
The animal moves to the middle of the cell and slowly lowers itself into a lying
position midway between the slain bodies of the monks. For a time, it licks its
outstretched forepaws, working the muscles of its tongue hard to release the torn slivers
of flesh that have remained entrapped between its claws. It then lies over to one side and
emits a sound that is neither purr nor growl, but is something in between. And now it
stretches to full length, forelegs and hindlimbs reaching as far away from each other as is
possible, and, as the creature does so, a change most sinister begins to happen. Respective
24
limbs are seen to alter their appearance. And gradually, that which has been animal now
slowly turns into human arms and legs, and, in that same slowness, the body that has been
dog now reassumes the form that is the dark and menacing Feardorcha, lieutenant of
Prince Donough of the Roe O’Briens. The eyes flit from one to other corner in their
sockets and only the face remains disfigured as evidence of what has happened within the
confines of the cell. And now exhaustion forces sleep and those very eyes begin to close
…
In a suddenness, in another quarter within the monastery walls, Benignus’ eyes open.
All that has passed since his eviction by Nilus has played itself most vividly in his mind.
He knows already of the Abbot’s fate and of that of the younger monk. Equally, he
realises that Feardorcha’s heart still beats strongly in his breast and that that which has
passed this night is nothing to the battle yet to be fought between the elements of light
and darkness. His eyelids draw themselves to closure once again, concealing all that lies
behind them from the outside world.
Published by MÓINÍN, Loch Reasca, Ballyvaughan, Co. Clare, Ireland
Tel: (065) 707 7256; E-mail: moinin@eircom.net
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25
Terror on the Burren — Chapter 1
from Terror on the Burren, by Ré Ó Laighléis
[Published by MÓINÍN, 1998; ISBN 0-9532777-0-4; Price €12.50; www.moinin.ie]
The Coming
It is the year 200 BC. The ocean, not yet named, is angry. For days now, it has rolled and
swollen, stirring the depths of its blackness and churning the currents upwards to catch
the silver of the sun. There is no rest for waters such as these, for, to the east there is little
and to the west there is even less. These are the waters that go far and yet go nowhere.
These are the waters of Time and of Timelessness.
A boat, no, a raft of sorts, is thrown up on the wave. Clinging to its mast, the ravaged
figures of five, six maybe – yes, six – submit their being to the hands of Manannán, the
Merciful and the Merciless, God of all the Seas. His will will be done.
A crack! And suddenly, the mast is broken, crashing down on to Relco’s leg.
Immediately, his eldest son, Emlik, is at his father’s side, shielding him from the searing
winds that have, for weeks now, made gritty redness of their faces. The flittered,
windblown ribbons of their sail, desperately clinging to the half-mast and working hard to
bolster Manannán’s ferocity against them, tear hard into Emlik’s face, as he tries to ease
his father’s pain. The upper half of the broken mast has not fully detached itself and
Emlik finds it impossible to remove the stubborn beam without help.
“Break off the mast, break off the mast,” Emlik frantically shouts to his brother,
Darkon. His words, taken on the wind’s wings, are hastened to some far and long-lost
corner of the world. Darkon has not heard and still he huddles to his mother, Alyana, and
his younger sisters, Raithnika and Frayika. The quartet has formed a strong, defensive
chain against the elements, each fixing their right arm around another’s waist, and using
the left to hold firmly on to what has now become a half-mast.
“Get up, Darkon, get up and release the broken mast.”
Though Emlik’s words are again whipped afar to quarters never known, there is no
mistaking the gestures which accompany them. Raithnika, the older of the sisters, has
seen these gestures and knows, as does Darkon, the message that Emlik is imparting.
Darkon still does not move until Raithnika breaks the chain and gestures to him to do
likewise. With obvious reluctance, Darkon does as he is bade, and Raithnika, standing
now and clinging single-handedly to the upright part of the mast, ensures the safety of her
mother and of Frayika by indicating to them to place both hands on the mast.
The two halves of the mast are held together only by a sliver, a sinew of wood. Emlik,
with his left arm around his father, uses the right to lever the wooden beam off the broken
leg, while Darkon and Raithnika push outwards at their end. With little effort, the broken
upright comes away, hurtles out onto the rolling swell and, in a matter of seconds, is as
far away from them as is their memory of the last time they have eaten.
Emlik looks towards the two, still standing in the centre of the raft. Raithnika smiles,
a caring smile. She is tall, blue-eyed and blonde, just like Emlik. Their bond is one of
constance. She sits, and Emlik’s gaze shifts to the eyes of his younger brother. Darkon
26
stands, looking hard with his black eyes into his brother’s face, knowing that only a few
short minutes earlier, the darkness of his nature had revealed itself. He slithers down the
half-mast and the huddle that had been their shield against the storm reforms itself. And
the will of Manannán, Lord of the Open Seas, persists.
***
The sun burns hard in the blueness of the sky. Nothing that endures its gaze for long can
speak of comfort. As his eyes slowly, painfully open, Emlik does not realise that it is his
own hand that rests across his forehead, shielding him from the blazing sun. Time in such
matters cannot be gauged. It may be a night, or many nights, or even the space of one full
moon that he is lying here. There is no way to tell, and so, it matters little. For some
moments, he remains still, making sense of the itching that he feels against his skin.
Then, as if grasping at a nettle, he clenches his left hand, which has been resting palmdown by his side, and tightly seizes some of the irritants. He raises the hand to his eyes
and sees that it is filled with sandy coral. He is on dry land.
Emlik rolls on to his side and slowly, gently, raises himself, feeling throughout his
efforts the pain that speaks of doing battle with one far greater than himself. He looks
then to the ocean. White gulls now sit on the serenity of its greenness, undulating softly
with the waves. It has fought and won, and now it rests, for forever there will be battle to
be done, and only the warrior who knows the art of peace can fully know the art of war.
Where are the others, Emlik wonders. He looks to both sides, along the huge expanse
of sand on to which he has been thrown. To the south the sun is blinding, negating his
best efforts to make sense of what he is observing. It is better when he looks north. In the
distance, he sees a small and huddled mound that is neither earth nor rock. He moves
quickly towards it and, as he moves, he fights his understanding of what this mound may
be. His heart and feet quicken with each other and soon he is near enough to see the white
fleece clothing that is Relco’s mark. He moves now, even more quickly, and reaches the
point where his father lies. Emlik turns the body on its back; in his chest, two holes, five
or six inches apart, have been made, draining life’s blood from him.
Frantically, he shakes his father, telling him they have survived the wrath of
Manannán; there are other battles to fight. Then, knowing that all fights to come will be
watched over only by the spirit of Relco, the tears of this first son, Emlik, fall from his
face on to his father’s. Emlik rubs the wetness into his father’s cheeks and knows within
that for all the years to come, he must bear his father’s honour. He feels his heart tighten
and he knows the pain of loss.
“Emlik, Emlik!” The voice is far off. Emlik turns back towards the sun again, but it
blinds him as before.
“Emlik, Emlik!” It is coming from the hill beyond the sand. He turns to face the
dunes, which dare, in times of anger, to stem great Manannán’s huge tides.
“Emlik! Over here, Emlik!” The forms of Raithnika and Frayika dance and wave to
him from the level land that tops the dunes.
Emlik is suddenly fired with energy and excitement. He scales the dune with an
alacrity defiant of all they have gone through, reaches his sisters and his mother (whom
27
he had not seen when at the level of the sea). They stand in conclave, arms tightly around
one another, braced against the world.
After some moments like this Emlik speaks, quite soberly.
“Father is dead,” he says.
They hang their heads, wanting to cry, but finding that even the energy to release their
pain has been stolen from them. Their sorrow flows inwards and is of silence; the most
painful of the sorrows, for its journey to rest is then doubled.
“He has been gored by some wild creature,” Emlik says. His directness is intended to
tear the others from their grieving.
“We must do what is demanded of us.”
“What of Darkon?” asks Alyana.
“I have seen nothing of him. And you?”
“No, he has not been with us,” answers Frayika. “Perhaps he has been swept further to
the north.”
“Perhaps. We will see in time,” says Emlik.
There was no love of son or brother when they spoke of Darkon. He was different to
the others. He was older than the girls and second only to Emlik. It was said that when he
was born, a black cloud crossed the path of the sun and all was cold and dark for a time
not measured. This, it was said, was the cause of blackness in his hair and in his eyes.
And it was much in their belief that the eyes, above all else, reflected the inner self.
Darkon seemed pained when he looked upon his brother, Emlik. They were not at
one. As a boy, Emlik had trained his younger brother in the art of hunting, of shooting
arrows, of spearing fish, and these, he told him, were the greater elements of the Art of
Caring. There was a reason to this art and it was in the reason, not in the act itself, that the
nobility of Caring did abide. Darkon had no need of reason and neither had he need of
caring. All things, for him, were of the act, and so, the arts of hunting, of shooting arrows
and of spearing fish were of the kill, and that was all.
By the time darkness had chased the sun below the waves and to another world, they
were ready. Frayika and her mother, Alyana, had spent much time heaping stones that
were, just like themselves, swept in on the waves. They had made a cairn, a mound of
stones, and now all four were topping it with wood, which earlier Raithnika and Emlik
had gathered for the burning. It was good that much of the wood that was gathered was of
themselves and of their father, Relco, for it happened in their search that they came upon
many of the wooden beams from which their raft had been constructed.
When this was done, Alyana and her daughters put sand into the wounds in Relco’s
chest. It was important that, when leaving this world, he would be whole, just as he had
been whole when he came into it. Emlik then took his father’s body, mounted the cairn
and laid it out, face upwards, on the wood, spreading the arms and legs so that they
pointed to the corners of the earth. Then, each taking a lighted torch from the blaze that
Emlik had made earlier, they inserted them into the ends and sides of the wooden pyre.
The fire burned with great ferocity, casting its light far into the night, making little of the
darkness. Behind the pyre, far off on the dune where earlier the women had been found,
Emlik could see a figure shimmer in the waves of heat. He moved away from the pyre,
dismissing the distortion that the dancing heatwaves made and saw, in the light of Relco’s
28
fire, a big black poc goat. The goat stood bold and daring and bent its head to show its
horns, the tips of which glistened when the light of the fire caught their redness.
Emlik looked hard; despite the distance, their eyes met, and the poc goat bleated a
message of foreboding, then turned and disappeared into the darkness of the night.
Shaken within by a sense of evil, Emlik kept his peace and bent his head at his father’s
burning.
Published by MÓINÍN, Loch Reasca, Ballyvaughan, Co. Clare, Ireland
Tel: (065) 707 7256; E-mail: moinin@eircom.net
Reviews of this work can be seen on the MÓINÍN website, www.moinin.ie
29
Bolgchaint
from Bolgchaint agus scéalta eile, by Ré Ó Laighléis
[Published by MÓINÍN, 2004 (New edition, 2007); ISBN 0-9532777-3-9; Price €8; www.moinin.ie]
Breis agus triocha cúig bliain a bhí caite ag Bobby ag taisteal na tíre lena phuipéad
láimhe, Jillie. Ní raibh sráidbhaile in Éirinn nár chuir an sean-Sasanach taispeántas ar siúl
ann in imeacht an ama sin. Ba mhinic nach raibh mar lucht féachana acu ach beirt nó
triúr, ach ba mhinic eile ins na céadta iad. Ach ba chuma cúigear nó cúig chéad, ba é an
dúthracht chéanna i gcónaí a chaith Bobby Benson leis an iarracht. Agus, by daid, nárbh
iad na mílte a rinne idir gháire agus chaoineadh agus iad ag éisteacht leo thar na blianta.
Ach bhí a fhios ag an seanfhear go raibh a ré ag druidim chun deiridh. Chuir sé a lámh
lena mhuiníl agus d’airigh an áit ina raibh an phian. Thart ar thrí mhí roimhe sin a
d’airigh sé míchompord ina mhuiníl den chéad uair. Gan ann ach sin ag an am –
míchompord. Ansin roinnt focail nach raibh ag teacht amach i gceart, nó – níos measa fós
ar uaireanta – nach raibh ag teacht amach ar chor ar bith.
“Coinneoimid súil air, a Bhobby,” a dúirt an dochtúir leis nuair a thug sé cuairt air.
“Blianta fada ag cur tuin mhná ar do ghlór, ní féidir leis aon mhaith a dhéanamh.
Straidhn, an dtuigeann tú! Tá sin uafásach dian ar an laraing, bíodh a fhios agat, go
háirithe nuair is bolgchaint atá i gceist. Ach, idir an dá linn, déan iarracht ar gan do ghlór
a úsáid an oiread sin.”
Gan a ghlór a úsáid an oiread sin! Dia dá réiteach! Ab é an chaoi gur shíl an dochtúir
go ndéanfadh Jillie féin an chaint gan Bobby a bheith ann!? Gan a ghlór a úsáid, huth!
B’fhuiriste a dhéanfadh duine snámh gan é féin a fhliuchadh.
Ach chuaigh seó na hoíche áirithe seo níos déine ar Bhobby ná seó ar bith eile riamh.
Pian bhinbeach i bpíobán an mhuiníl air ar feadh an ama. Focail ag sciorradh uaidh ’s gan
an lucht féachana in ann iad a chloisteáil i gceart, fiú. Bobby míshásta leis mar iarracht,
ach ba mhó b’ábhar buartha dó é gur fhág sé an lucht féachana míshásta chomh maith.
Bunriail aige thar aon riail eile riamh an custaiméir a shásamh.
Ach bhí idir chroí agus anam tugtha ag Bobby do Jillie thar tréimhse fhada na
mblianta. Agus, cé go gceapfaí é a bheith aisteach mar ráiteas, d’fhéadfaí a rá, ar
bhealach, go raibh idir chroí agus anam tugtha ag Jillie do Bhobby chomh maith céanna.
B’aonad iad ar feadh an ama, cé nach raibh i Jillie, dar leis an duine nach dtuigfeadh a
mhalairt, ach bréagán adhmaid.
Ba leor sin uile, shílfeá, ach, chun cur leis an donas, nach raibh an scannánaíocht le
tosú lá arna mhárach. Blianta fada den bhfulaingt, blianta fada ar an ngannchuid agus, gan
aon choinne leis, aitheantas ar deireadh. Tuiscint nach amháin gur máistir é Bobby
Benson ach gurb é rí na mbolgchainteoirí é. Tuiscint go mbeadh sé tábhachtach cuntas ar
shaol an tseanfhir seo a chur os comhair lucht féachana teilifíse.
Bhí iontas ar Bhobby nuair a tháinig Eoin Mac Domhnaill, léiritheoir an chláir chuige
ar dtús. Shíl sé gur bob é a bhí á bhualadh ag duine dá chairde air, duine de na
bolgchainteoirí eile a chasfaí air go rialta ’gus é ag taisteal na tíre. Ach níorbh ea. Níorbh
ea ar chor ar bith. Clár faisnéise ar shaol Bhobby Benson agus a phuipéad cáiliúil, Jillie.
Agus, mar bharr ar fad air, 100,000 euro á íoc le Bobby as é a cheadú agus as a bheith
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páirteach ann. Dóthain agus a dhéanfadh é don chuid eile dá shaol ’s gan air a bheith ag
taisteal ó bhaile go baile san uile chineál aimsire.
Ach Bobby a bheith páirteach ann! Caolsheans. Seans ar bith, go deimhin. Bhí a fhios
aige nach raibh sé in ann aige. Fios aige, murach míorúilt de shaghas éigin, go raibh an
píobán ró-amh, ró-stróicthe chun oiread agus lá amháin eile oibre a dhéanamh.
Shuigh Bobby ar chiumhais na leapa agus é ina sheomra sa teach ósta an oíche sin.
Jillie sínte ar an leaba in aice leis agus a bosca adhmaid ar oscailt taobh léi. An fheilt
fhíondearg a bhí mar líneáil ar an mbosca á cuimilt ag Bobby. Ba chuimhin leis an siopa
beag i Macclesfield Shasana inar cheannaigh sé an fheilt sin. Ba chuimhin leis mar a
rinne sé an fheilt a ghearradh agus í a ghreamú de dhromchla an adhmaid istigh. Agus
mar a leag sé Jillie isteach ann an chéad uair riamh agus dhún doras an bhosca anuas
uirthi. Hmm, cuimhní! Agus bheartaigh sé iad a ruaigeadh as a cheann’ s gan ligean dóibh
é a chorraíl a thuilleadh. Chas sé i dtreo Jillie athuair.
“Anois, a chailín, am dul isteach sa bhosca,” ar sé, agus d’ardaigh sé an puipéad den
leaba. Ar éigean a chuala sé na focail as a bhéal féin, bhí a ghlór chomh fannlag sin.
Rinne sé a mhéara a shníomhadh trí ghruaig chatach Jillie. Ba chosúil le mapa urláir é, i
ndáiríre, é sreangach liathbhán achrannach. Dhruid sé an puipéad chuige agus phóg i
gceartlár an chláréadain é agus thit deoir dá shúil anuas ar bhaithis Jillie. Ansin, leag sé
go cúramach isteach sa bhosca í agus dhún an doras uirthi. Í á cur sa bhosca den uair
dheireanach, shíl sé – cá bhfios. Cá bhfios!
Ba bhréag a rá gur bheag é an codladh a rinne Bobby an oíche sin. Ba bhréag é mar,
chun an fhírinne a rá, ní dhearna sé codladh ar bith. Oiread agus míogarnach ní dhearna.
Ní fhéadfadh sé cuimhní na mblianta iontacha a bhí aige le Jillie a ruaigeadh as a cheann.
Tháinig siad ina dtonnta chuige. An lá úd sa Mhuileann gCearr, triocha bliain ó shin,
nuair a theastaigh ó fhear í a cheannach uaidh ar airgead mór. Ach, ar ndóigh, níor dhíol
sé í. Lá eile, fiche bliain siar, nuair a d’fhág sé ina dhiaidh í i stáisiún traenach Chaisleán
a’ Bharraigh. Agus mar a tháinig máistir an stáisiúin ag rith ina dhiaidh ’gus é ag béicíl
air in ard a ghutha: ‘ná h-imigh gan do Jillie’. Agus uair eile fós, i gCathair mhór Bhaile
Átha Cliath, nuair a rinne stócach iarracht ar Jillie a ghoid uaidh. Murach garda óg
géarchúiseach an lá sin cá bhfios cá mbeadh Jillie ag an bpointe seo.
Ach lá arna mhárach céard a dhéanfadh sé ar chor ar bith? Bhí sé socraithe ag Eoin
Mac Domhnaill go mbaileodh tiománaí é agus go dtabharfaí Bobby agus Jillie chun an
stiúidió, díreach mar a dhéantar leis na réaltaí móra. Airgead an phinsin dó é an 100,000
euro sin, ach céard d’fhéadfaí a dhéanamh dá mbeadh Bobby féin gan ghlór. Ní fhéadfadh
sé é a cheilt. Chaithfeadh sé é a rá le hEoin sula dtosófaí ar an obair ar chor ar bith. Ach
tháinig glór éigin chun na hintinne chuige á rá leis a bheith dóchasach, á rá leis trust a
bheith aige as cumhacht éigin lasmuigh dó féin. Níor thuig sé an glór seo chuige agus ba
mheasa ná sin é, ní raibh a fhios aige cén chaoi a mbeadh trust aige as rud nár thuig sé.
Bhuel tháinig an mhaidin, díreach mar a rinne gach maidin eile roimhe ó thús ama.
Agus, má tháinig, tháinig an carr agus an tiománaí mar a gheall Eoin Mac Domhnaill go
dtiocfadh. B’fhada ag Bobby an t-aistear go dtí an stiúidió. Nuair a shrois sé é agus chas
ar Eoin, shíl Eoin gurbh í an neirbhíseacht a bhí ag cur gaid ar bhéal Bhobby.
“Ná bí buartha faoi a bheith neirbhíseach, a Bhobby. Tarlaíonn sin do na réaltaí móra,
fiú. Beidh tú togha, fan go bhfeice tú,” arsa an fear óg leis. “Tiocfaidh sruth cainte chugat
31
nuair a chuirtear ceist ort. Is minic a chonaic mé seo cheana. Tiocfaidh sé, bí cinnte de
sin. Anois, beidh mé ar ais chugat ar ball beag, tar éis dóibh smidiú a chur ort.”
Huth, bí cinnte de sin, a shíl Bobby dó féin! A Dhia, ní fhéadfadh an fear bocht a
bheith cinnte de rud ar bith. Bhí a fhios aige nach raibh gíog de ghlór sna píobáin aige,
gan trácht ar aon sruth cainte teacht chuige. Ach fós, ar chúl a chinn i gcónaí, bhí an cogar
anaithnid seo á rá leis trust a bheith aige.
In imeacht ama d’fhill Eoin air agus é réidh chun oibre. Bhí Bobby ina shuí ar bhord
agus Jillie ar leathghlúin leis, ’s gan a fhios ag Dia ag an gcréatúr cén chaoi ó thalamh an
domhain a thiocfadh sé tríd seo.
“Go breá, go breá ar fad,” arsa Eoin, agus é ag breathnú ar an smidiú a bhí déanta ar
éadan Bhobby. “Ar ndóigh, ní gá smidiú ar bith ar an gceann seo,” arsa Eoin, agus leag sé
leathlámh ar chloigeann Jillie, agus rinne gáire beag. “Togha, más ea,” ar sé ansin, agus
chas sé i dtreo an chriú. “Soilse,” ar sé, agus lasadh soilse an stiúidió. “Fuaim,” ar sé
ansin, “agus ceamaraí.” Agus, leis sin, sheas cúntóir amach os comhair Ceamara a hAon
agus clár beag adhmaid aige a raibh uimhreacha cailce scríofa air.
“A chúig, a cheathair, a trí, a dó, a haon – aicsean,” ar sé. Agus láithreach bonn
caitheadh an chéad cheist le Bobby.
“A Bhobby Benson, tá tú blianta fada ar an mbóthar le do leathbhádóir, Jillie. Inis
dúinn mar a thosaigh tú amach ar dtús.”
An scaoll go hard ar shúile Bhobby. Scaoll ar a chroí, scaoll ar a anam. Scaoll ar an
uile bhall dá dhéanamh.
“Inis dúinn mar a thosaigh tú amach ar dtús, a Bhobby,” arsa an t-agallamhóir den
dara huair.
D’oscail Bobby a bhéal agus, cé gur bhog na beola air, ní raibh oiread agus an focal
amháin féin le cloisteáil uaidh. Thrasnaigh íomhá an 100,000 euro úd a intinn, thrasnaigh
blianta fada na bochtaineachta a intinn, thrasnaigh gach cruatan dar samhlaíodh riamh a
intinn. Ach, má thrasnaigh féin, níor thrasnaigh aon fhocal a bhéal fós.
Ansin, den tríú huair, cuireadh an agallamhóra: “Bhí sé an-dian ort nuair a thosaigh tú
amach, a Bhobby. Inis dúinn faoi sin.”
“Dian! Dian, a deir tú,” arsa an glór, agus é díreach mar a bhí gnáthghlór cainte
Bhobby. Ach ní raibh liopaí Bhobby ná an leathliopa féin ag bogadh agus na focail á rá.
Iontas ar aghaidh Bhobby féin ar chloisteáil na cainte dó. A ghlór féin! ’S gan tuairim
aige ó thalamh an domhain cad as a raibh an chaint ag teacht.
“Ceamara a Dó, Ceamara a Dó, druid isteach ar Jillie,” arsa Eoin le práinn. Agus
ghluais an ceamaradóir go sciobtha ar chloisteáil an ordú dó.
“Soilse uirthi, soilse,” arsa Eoin, agus an phráinn chéanna arís eile sa chaint aige.
Agus b’in Jillie agus í in ard a réime. Jillie, agus í ag cur di i nglór Bhobby Benson
faoi na blianta fada a bhí caite aici in éindí leis an bhfear uasal céanna. A béal ag bogadh
ar a conlán féin an uair seo agus Bobby taobh léi agus é sínte le hiontas. Ba chinnte nárbh
é bréag-ghlór Jillie é, ach gnáthghlór Bhobby féin. Ach, ba chinnte leis nach raibh baint
ná páirt ag Bobby le hoiread agus an focal amháin féin den méid a labhraíodh. Agus lean
an puipéad uirthi ag freagairt ceist i ndiaidh ceiste nó go raibh gach a raibh le rá ráite.
Sea, go deimhin, agus thuig Bobby Benson agus Jillie féin go raibh idir chroí agus
anam tugtha acu dá chéile in imeacht na mblianta. Agus thuig siad leis, an lá cinniúnach
32
seo, go raibh rud éigin neamhghnách tarlaithe dóibh ar mhó i bhfad é ná an tuiscint a bhí
eatarthu go dtí sin.
Published by MÓINÍN, Loch Reasca, Ballyvaughan, Co. Clare, Ireland
Tel: (065) 707 7256; E-mail: moinin@eircom.net
Reviews of this work can be seen on the MÓINÍN website, www.moinin.ie
33
Goimh
from Goimh agus scéalta eile, by Ré Ó Laighléis
[Published by MÓINÍN, 2004; ISBN 0-9532777-4-7; Price €7; www.moinin.ie]
Í gleoite seachas an ghoin úd ar a haghaidh. Dath a cnis ar dhath na buí-olóige, nó níos
dorcha ná sin. Sea, níos dorcha. Níos gaire don bhuí-dhonn, i ndáiríre. Agus maidir le
dathúlacht, cá bhfágfá í! Ní chasfá chun breathnú ar an spéirbhean b’iomráití ar domhan
agus Yolana ar an láthair. Yolana – ‘Fís na hAilgéire’, mar a thugann a leannán Eoin
uirthi. Eoin! ’S gan focal den bhréag sa chur síos céanna aige. Í ard caol deachumtha. A
déada geala glioscarnacha mar lóchrann i lár doircheacht a haghaidhe. A súile donna
mealltacha, iad mór bíogúil beo. Spéirbhean, gan aon agó. ’S gan í ach seacht mbliana
déag d’aois. Ardaíonn sí a lámh leis na scríoba ar a leiceann agus í ina suí anois go
gruama i gceann de sheomraí ceistiúcháin na ngardaí. Seomra a trí. Í ina haonar.
Seomra a dó. “Agus cá raibh tú nuair a thug tú faoi deara go raibh an bráisléad
imithe?” An Garda Caoimhe Ní Chionnaith a chuireann an cheist ar Naomi, iar-leannán
Eoin.
“Dúirt mé leat faoi dhó cheana cá raibh mé.”
“Tuigim sin, a Naomi, ach mura mhiste leat, tá mé ag cur na ceiste arís ort. Cá raibh
tú?”
“Seo agat más ea, den trí huair – agus den uair dheireanach, bíodh a fhios agat – bhí
mé ar urlár an damhsa.”
“Urlár an damhsa! Sa dioscó?”
“Bhuel, céard eile ach sa friggin’ dioscó! Ní dóigh leat gur sa tséipéal a bhí mé ag
damhsa, an dóigh?”
Breathnaíonn Caoimhe Ní Chionnaith go géar ar Naomi. Fonn uirthi bos a tharraingt
ar an éadan uirthi, ach tá a fhios aici nach féidir sin a dhéanamh. Rialacha agus mar sin
de.
Tuairim ag Caoimhe Ní Chionnaith céard í fírinne an scéil seo ach a fhios aici óna
traenáil agus ón gcúig bliana atá curtha di mar bhall den Gharda Síochána nach ann
d’fhírinne ar bith gan chruthú. É cruthaithe cheana féin go raibh bráisléad Naomi i mála
láimhe Yolana. É cruthaithe gur thíos in íochtar an mhála a bhí sé – é fillte i naipcín
páipéir a raibh lógó an chlub oíche air. É cruthaithe gur shiúil an tAilgéireach óg agus
Eoin as an dioscó agus an mála faoina hascaill ag Yolana. Ach, ar fáth éigin ina hintinn
istigh, ní ghéilleann Caoimhe Ní Chionnaith don fhianaise sin uile mar chruthú ar rud ar
bith. Amharcann sí arís ar Naomi.
“Agus ceapann tusa, a Naomi, gurb í Yolana a ghoid uait é?” arsa an garda.
“Níl aon cheap faoi. Nach bhfuil fianaise do shúile agat ach an oiread liom féin. Is
cinnte gurb í an goirmín beag lofa a thóg é, díreach mar a thóg sí na nithe eile roimhe
seo.”
“Anois, caithfidh mé fainic a chur ort faoi úsáid an chineál sin teangachais,” arsa an
garda, agus tuin láidir uirthi i gcur na fainice céanna. “Níl sé inghlactha – de réir dlíthe na
tíre, gan trácht go fiú ar ghnáth-chúirtéis shibhialta – go gcuirfí síos ar dhuine ar bith sna
34
téarmaí sin.” Pus ar Naomi, ansin ciúnas roinnt soicindí. “Anois, a Naomi, luann tú ‘nithe
eile’ a bheith imithe. Cén nithe eile atá i gceist agat?”
“Sea, nithe eile. Fáinne, oíche éigin tamall roimhe seo, agus slabhra airgid le cros air
oíche eile fós.”
“Fáinne agus slabhra le cros air, a deir tú! Agus cén fáth nár tháinig tú chugainn fúthu
sin cheana?”
“Níor thuig mé cé a rinne an ghoid go dtí anocht, sin é an fáth. Níor thuig mé é go dtí
go ndúirt Siobhán liom go bhfaca sí Yolana ag cur an bhráisléid isteach ina mála.”
“Siobhán?”
“Sea, Siobhán, mo chara. Labhair an Garda Ó Ceallaigh léi ar ball beag. Ghlac sé
ráiteas uaithi i dtaobh eachtra na hoíche anocht.”
“Ó sea, ghlac. Ach ní cuimhin liom an cúiseamh sin a fheiceáil sa ráiteas aici, a
Naomi.”
“Bhuel, cuirigí ceist arís uirthi, más ea, agus deimhneoidh sí go bhfuil sé fíor.”
“Bhuel, níl sí anseo faoi láthair. Scaoil muid abhaile í i ndiaidh di an ráiteas a
thabhairt, tá uair a’ chloig ó shin.”
“Tá sí imithe!” arsa Naomi, mórán léi féin, é soiléir uirthi go mbaineann sé siar aisti
go bhfágfadh a cara ansin í ina haonar gan slán a rá léi.
“Sea, imithe. Ach inis seo dom,” arsa an garda óg, agus í ag aireachtáil go bhfuil snáth
fianaise á fhorbairt aici, “nach n-aireofá na seoda á mbaint díot dá mbeadh duine á ngoid
uait?” Caoimhe cinnte de go nochtóidh freagra na ceiste sin go leor den mhímhacántacht
a chreideann sí a bheith taobh thiar de chladhaireacht Naomi.
“Sea, d’aireoinn, ach amháin nach gcaithim iad agus mé ag damhsa. Baol ann go
dtitfidis díom agus go gcaillfinn ar fad iad ar an dóigh sin. Bainim díom iad, mar a
dhéanann go leor de na cailíní eile, agus fágaim le cara ag an mbord iad. Agus sin é go
díreach a rinne mé leis an mbráisléad an babhta seo.”
“Mmm! Agus glacaim leis gurb í Siobhán an cara sin sa gcás seo?”
“Sin é é go díreach. Bhí Siobhán i bhfeighil an bhráisléid go dtí gur éirigh sí chun dul
amach go dtí an leithreas.”
“Aha! Agus d’fhág sí ina diaidh ar an mbord é?”
“Bhuel, nach tú an garda beag cliste anois!”
Searbhas agus sotal an ráitis sin ag cur le fearg Chaoimhe Uí Chionnaith agus í ar a
dearg-dhícheall guaim a choinneáil uirthi féin.
Seomra a trí. 3.30a.m. Yolana ina haonar i gcónaí. Díomá an domhain uirthi nár fhan
Eoin ina cuideachta. Leithscéal aige a shíl sise a bheith suarach faoi go bhfuil air freastal
ar léacht san ollscoil ar a naoi ar maidin. É deacair uirthi a chreidiúint gur tábhachtaí
léacht ar réimeas Adolf Hitler ná an cruachás ina bhfuil sise. Ach ní fhéadfadh sé é a
chailliúint agus na scrúduithe ag druidim leis, a dúirt sé. Sea, é lag suarach mar leithscéal
i dtuairim Yolana. É imithe le trí cheathrú d’uair, nó níos faide, b’fhéidir, ag an bpointe
seo. Sea, mórán ag an am céanna le himeacht Siobhán.
Imní mhór ar Yolana faoi mar a rachaidh an tarlúint seo i bhfeidhm ar a stadas mar
eachtrannach sa tír. Í féin agus a tuismitheoirí in Éirinn le breis agus bliain anuas agus
breith le tabhairt go luath ar a n-iarratas ar stadas buan. Fonn chaoineadh ar Yolana. Í
spíonta i ndiaidh chruatan an cheistiúcháin a cuireadh uirthi ar ball beag. Dá mhéid a
35
chuimhníonn sí ar easpa tacaíochta Eoin is ea is mó nach gcreideann sí gurb amhlaidh atá.
Í ag déanamh iontais de nár aithin sí mianach úd na mídhílseachta ann go dtí seo.
3.40a.m. An teilifís ar siúl in árasán Eoin. Nó video, chun a bheith iomlán cruinn faoi.
Éadan Oscar Schindler á theilgean ar an scáileán. Eoin féin agus comrádaí leis ag
breathnú air. Iad ag ól beorach. Canna Heineken eatarthu beirt. Iad á shíneadh dá chéile
gach anois is arís.
Atmaisféar drochthuarach sa seomra céanna. Na ballaí clúdaithe le postaeirí. Iad
aisteach mar phostaeirí – an-aisteach ar fad. Trom, dorcha, gránna. Ceann mór den Ku
Klux Klan ar an mballa díreach taobh thiar den teilifíseán. Agus, ar dheis air sin, íomhá
mór d’Adolf Hitler agus cros cham an Swastika sa chúlra air. Agus, thíos faoi íomhá
Hitler, na focail ‘Ich liebe dich, mein Fuhrer’. Agus, ar bhalla eile fós, manglam de
phictiúirí de Ceaucescu agus Milosovich agus Stalin, agus tíoránaigh eile nach iad. ’S
ansin an tríú balla: é go hiomlán tugtha do na focail atá scríofa air. Na focail chéanna
péinteáilte go dána i ndubh agus i ndearg, sileadh péinte ag bun gach litir mar a bheadh
fuil ag drithliú leis. ‘Cosc ar eachtrannaigh’ in áit amháin, ‘Darkies Out’ in áit eile,
‘Nigger-hands off our jobs’ in áit eile fós. Agus, ar deireadh, an ceathrú balla. Éiríonn
Eoin agus tagann a fhad leis sin.
3.45a.m. Stáisiún na nGardaí. An bheirt bhan óg á gcoinneáil sna seomraí ceistiúcháin
go fóill. Caoimhe Ní Chionnaith ag a deasc. Í ag leath-bhrionglóideach agus í ag méiseáil
leis an bpeann ar an leathanach atá os a comhair. Yolana, Naomi, Siobhán agus Eoin
scríofa air. Ainm amháin ag gach coirnéal den chearnóg atá tarraingthe ar an bpáipéar
aici. A peann á rith arís agus arís eile ar línte na cearnóige, í ag stopadh soicind nó dhó ag
gach coirnéal chun breathnú ar an ainm, ansin leanann uirthi ar líne eile fós go sroiseann
sí an chéad ainm eile. Snáth ceangailteach éigin sa bhfráma á chuardach aici.
Sracfhéachaint aici ó am go chéile ar ráitis Naomi agus Yolana. Ansin ar dhá ráiteas
Shiobhán agus Eoin. ’S as sin, ar ais arís chun na cearnóige.
Tamall den chleachtas sin ag an ngarda óg nuair a luíonn a súil tamaillín beag níos
faide ná an gnás ar ainm Eoin. ’S ansin tamaillín beag níos faide ná an gnás ar ainm
Shiobhán leis. Rud éigin fúthu beirt ag dó na geirbe ar Chaoimhe Ní Chionnaith. Gob a
pinn fanta anois ar choirnéal Shiobhán agus, leis sin, ar fáth éigin nach bhfuil iomlán
soiléir di féin, fiú, tarraingíonn sí traslíne dhána throm ó ainm Shiobhán go hainm Eoin.
“Sin é an ceangal,” ar sí faoina hanáil. Bonn láithreach ardaíonn an garda ráiteas Eoin
athuair, aimsíonn an uimhir theileafóin air, ansin éiríonn agus téann go deifreach chun
cainte leis an nGarda Ó Ceallaigh.
3.50a.m. Árasán Eoin. Eoin féin ina sheasamh os comhair an cheathrú bhalla anois. A
thuilleadh postaeirí den chineál céanna greamaithe den bhalla ach ina láir tá scrín de
shórt. Boirdín beag adhmaid brúite in aghaidh an bhalla san áit a bhfuil an scrín, agus
coinnle ar lasadh air. Solas na gcoinnle á theilgean féin ar thaispeántas an bhalla, é á
scairdeadh féin go heitleach neamhréidh. Scáthanna diamhra dorcha á gcruthú ag an solas
agus é ag damhsa go pramsach neamhchinnte ar an uile ní idir phostaeirí agus
ghrianghraif.
Grianghraif! Is i dtreo na ngrianghraf a dhruideann Eoin anois. Meangadh maol
mailíseach de chineál ar a bhéal. Dhá ghrianghraf. Agus, leis sin, sánn sé biorán díreach
trí leiceann Yolana sa chéad ghrianghraf díobh. É sáite díreach san áit ar scríobadh í sa
scliúchas a bhí ann níos luaithe sa dioscó. Ansin díríonn sé a shúile ar an dara pictiúr:
36
Naomi ag breathnú amach air agus miongháire aici leis. Agus ar a leiceann-sa cheana féin
tá dhá bhiorán sáite ag Eoin: ceann acu a bhfuil fáinne óir crochta air, agus slabhra airgid
le cros air ar crochadh ar an dara biorán. Briseann meangadh Eoin amach ina gháire
oscailte agus caitheann sé siar a chloigeann. Leis sin, tagann a chomrádaí chuige, síneann
a dá lámh suas faoi na hascaillí air agus pógann sí ar chúl an mhuiníl é.
“Féach iad, a Shiobhán, a chroí,” arsa Eoin, “níl tuairim ar domhan acu. Nach iad na
hóinseacha iad. Yolana, an goirmín galánta, agus an bobarún eile úd de bhaothbhean,
Naomi.” Agus druideann sé amach ó Shiobhán. Casann sé anois i dtreo phostaeir an
Fuhrer, síneann amach a lámh go hard caoldíreach agus buaileann dhá chúl a bhróga ar a
chéile. “Heil Hitler,” ar sé, agus scairteann siad beirt amach ag gáire. Leis sin, buaileann
an fón go láidir bagrach agus, de gheit, breathnaíonn an bheirt chneamhairí ar a chéile.
Published by MÓINÍN, Loch Reasca, Ballyvaughan, Co. Clare, Ireland
Tel: (065) 707 7256; E-mail: moinin@eircom.net
Reviews of this work can be seen on the MÓINÍN website, www.moinin.ie
37
Gafa — Chapter 1
from Gafa, by Ré Ó Laighléis
[Published by MÓINÍN, 2004; ISBN 0-9532777-5-5; Price €10; www.moinin.ie]
Leathnaíonn súile Eithne i logaill a cinn nuair a fheiceann sí na giuirléidí atá istigh faoin
leaba ag Eoin. Sean-stoca atá ann, a shíleann sí, nuair a tharraingíonn sí amach ar dtús é.
Ní hé, go deimhin, go gcuirfeadh sin féin aon iontas uirthi, ná baol air. Tá a fhios ag Dia
nach bhfuil insint ar an taithí atá aici ar stocaí bréana an mhic chéanna a aimsiú lá i
ndiaidh lae, seachtain i ndiaidh seachtaine thar na blianta. Ach, iontas na n-iontas, é seo.
Nuair a osclaíonn sí an t-éadach, a cheapann sí ar dtús a bheith ina shean-stoca, ní
thuigeann sí go baileach céard tá ann, i ndáiríre. Sean-tiúb ruibéir, is cosúil, agus dath
donn na meirge air – é scoilteach go maith nuair a dhéanann sí é a shíneadh. Tá cinnte
uirthi aon chiall a bhaint as sin ar chor ar bith.
Céard sa diabhal a bheadh á dhéanamh aige lena leithéid, a shíleann sí. Agus an púdar
bán seo sa mhála glé plaisteach atá in aon charn leis – is ait léi sin chomh maith. Is aistí
fós é, áfach, nach ritheann sé léi iontas ar bith a dhéanamh den spúnóg bheag airgid a
bheith ann ná de na strácaí de pháipéar tinsil atá fillte go deismíneach in aon bheart léi.
Ach a bhfuil sa sparáinín beag seamaí – sin é a bhaineann siar aisti, i ndáiríre.
Steallaire beag liath-phlaisteach, a bhfuil 2.5ml greanta go dubh ar an dromchla air. Agus,
ar bhealach, cé go mbaineann sin siar aisti ceart go leor, is measa fós é nuair a fheiceann
sí cúl an tsaicín bhig páipéir agus séala briste air. Snáthaid! Ardaíonn sí os comhair a súl
é – í faiteach amhrasach – ansin casann ina láimh é. Dá mba trína croí féin a thiománfaí í
níor bhinbí a dhath í. Snáthaid fhada ghéar a bhfuil truaill ghlé agus stoca gairéadach de
dhath an oráiste uirthi. Dá mba dhóithín féin í, ní fhéadfadh sí gan an cás a thuiscint ag an
bpointe seo.
Oscailt an dorais thosaigh thíos a chuireann uirthi an fearas a shluaisteáil isteach faoin
leaba athuair agus tosaíonn sí ar ghothaí na hoibre a chur uirthi féin arís.
“Haigh, a Mham,” a chloiseann sí thíos.
A Mhuire Mháthair, Eoin féin atá ann. Breathnaíonn sí ar an gclog le hais leaba a
haonmhic. 3.30pm. Tá sé luath ón scoil.
“Heileo, a Eoin. Tá mé anseo thuas,” ar sí, agus deifríonn sí amach as an seomra agus
seasann ar léibheann an staighre. Idir chiontacht agus neirbhíseacht i ngleic le chéile a
chuireann uirthi í féin a fhógairt. “Tá tú luath, a stóirín,” ar sí.
“Tá. Bhí Froggy as láthair inniu. Mar sin, bhí seisiún deiridh an tráthnóna saor
againn.” Agus Eoin á rá sin, bogann sé leis amach as an seomra suí arís agus tagann go
bun an staighre. A Mham thuas, é féin thíos. Breathnaíonn siad ar a chéile agus aithníonn
Eoin míshuaimhneas éigin i súile na máthar.
“An tUasal Ó Riagáin, a dúirt mé leat cheana, a Eoin. Tá sé drochbhéasach Froggy a
thabhairt air.”
“Ó, a Mham, ná bí i do chráiteoir seanfhaiseanta, in ainm dílis Dé. Is múinteoir
Fraincise é i ndeireadh an lae! ’S céard eile a thabharfá air, mar sin, ach Froggy?”
“Bhuel, céard faoin Uasal Ó Riagáin, mar a dúirt mé. Níor mhaith leat go dtabharfaí
Hitler ar do Dhaid toisc gur múinteoir Gearmáinise é, ar mhaith?”
38
“Huth, ba chuma liom. Kraut a thugaimidne ar an bhfear s’againne agus is ríchuma
leis faoi, is cosúil.”
Cuma mhíshásta ar Eithne lena bhfuil á chloisteáil óna mac aici. Cúlú sa cheangal idir
í agus Eoin le deireanas toisc praiseach a bheith déanta aige den bhliain scoile atá thart. É
anois ag déanamh atriail ar an mbliain chéanna agus, de réir mar a mheasann Eithne é, ní
mórán d’iarracht atá á déanamh aige. Ar ndóigh, ní cuidiú ar bith inniu di é go bhfuil
aimsiú na ngiuirléidí úd faoin leaba ar a hintinn fós. Í ag breathnú anuas ar a mac ó bharr
an staighre agus í mar a bheadh sí ag iarraidh rud éigin a ríomh ina aghaidh – rud beag
éigin, b’fhéidir, nár thug sí faoi deara cheana. Go fiú an dímheas seo uaidh i dtaobh na
múinteoirí – Kraut agus Froggy, agus a fhios ag Dia féin amháin céard eile a thugann sé
ar chuid acu – is léir di anois gur géire ná riamh an nós seo aige. Ach ní hin is measa,
mura mbeadh ann ach é – ach ní hea.
“Beidh mé ar ais ar ball,” arsa Eoin, agus déanann sé ar an doras.
“Ach, céard faoi do dhinnéar, a Eoin? Tá sé sa –”
“Beidh sé agam ar ball. In éindí le Daid nuair a thagann sé abhaile,” agus cuireann
plabadh an dorais ina dhiaidh deireadh leis an idirphlé. Seasann Eithne ina dealbh ar
léibheann an staighre agus í ag breathnú fós ar an spota inar sheas Eoin roimh imeacht dó.
A colainn faoi ghreim éinirt aisteach éigin. Fonn uirthi éalú as a hintinn féin le nach
mbeidh uirthi aghaidh a thabhairt ar an bhfírinne. Agus, leis sin, caoineann sí …
***
Iad ciúin ag an mbord an oíche sin. Breandán – an t-athair – ag léamh an Irish
Independent agus corrghreim á bhaint den bpláta aige ó am go chéile. Sinéad taobh lena
Daid agus leathshúil aici ar ‘Home and Away’ ’gus í ag ithe léi. Eoin féin ag tabhairt
faoin ngreim go halpach agus an chuma air go bhfuil bunús éigin leis an deifir. Agus
Mam – Eithne bhocht – í ag faire orthu uile. Í ina príosún beag féin agus a bhfuil aimsithe
faoi leaba Eoin aici tráthnóna ag cur scamaill ar a croí.
“Cén chaoi a raibh cúrsaí scoile inniu, a Eoin?” arsa Breandán.
“Fuist!” arsa Sinéad, agus í ag éileamh ciúnais le go gcloisfí an clár teilifíse.
Breathnaíonn Breandán go géar uirthi. Murach na trí bliana déag a bheith díreach
slánaithe aici agus murach gur cailín í, dhéanfadh sé an leathlámh a tharraingt uirthi. Ach
gan de rogha aige ach amharc fada bagrach a thabhairt uirthi.
“Ná déan tusa do chuid fuisteáil liomsa, a Mhissy, nó is duitse is measa. An
gcloiseann tú mé? An é nach bhfuil sé de chead agam labhairt i mo theach féin, huth?”
Breathnaíonn Sinéad air soicind, ’s ansin cromann sí a ceann le teann náire.
“Anois, múch an diabhal bosca sin agus bíodh ruainne éigin béasa agat feasta.”
“Ach, a Dhaid –”
“Múch, a dúirt mé, agus ná bíodh a thuilleadh faoi.” Agus, an babhta seo, níl aon chur
ina choinne.
Sinéad ina suí ag an mbord arís agus pus caillí uirthi. Gan de radharc a thuilleadh aici
ar ‘Home and Away’ ach a bhfuil ina cuimhne aici. An triúr eile ciúin chomh maith agus
teannas éigin le brath.
“Anois, a Eoin, cén chaoi a raibh cúrsaí ar scoil inniu?” a fhiafraíonn Breandán
athuair.
39
“Maith go leor.”
Borradh na feirge le sonrú ar éadan Bhreandáin arís eile.
“Maith go leor! Céard tá i gceist agat ‘maith go leor’? Ní neosann sin a dhath dom.
Cén diabhal atá ortsa le deireanas ar chor ar bith nach féidir leat freagra ceart a thabhairt
ar rud ar bith?” ar sé, de phléasc, agus deargann sé san aghaidh. Droch-spin ceart air fós i
ndiaidh na heachtra le Sinéad.
Ach tá Eoin sách géar ann féin. Tuigeann sé gur fearr gan a thuilleadh oilc a chur ar a
Dhaid.
“ ’Mo leithscéal, a Dhaid. Gnáthlá, is dócha, ach amháin go raibh Fro …” agus
stopann sé soicind nó dhó agus breathnaíonn i dtreo Eithne … “ach amháin go raibh An
tUasal Ó Riagáin as láthair.”
“An tUasal Ó Riagáin!” arsa Breandán. “Riagáin, Riagáin! Sin é an múinteoir
Matamaitice, an ea?”
“Ní hea, a Dhaid, Fraincis. An Cinnéideach a mhúineann Mata dúinn.”
“Ó sea, sea, Ó Riagáin. Sea, is cuimhin liom é, ceart go leor. Fear beag téagartha. Sea,
stuimpín de dhuine. Go deimhin, chas mé air ag ceann éigin de na cruinnithe
ceardchumainn, más buan mo chuimhne. É ag geabaireacht leis gan srian. Muise, tá’s
agam é, ceart go leor. Froggy a thugtar air, nach ea?”
Agus leis sin, pléascann Eoin amach ag gáire agus déanann a bhfuil de thae ina bhéal
a spré amach.
“A Bhreandáin!” arsa Eithne, agus í ag aireachtáil go bhfuil bunús an tseasaimh a
rinne sí tráthnóna i dtaobh easpa cúirtéise Eoin i leith an Uasail Uí Riagáin scuabtha sna
ceithre hairde ag a fear céile. Tá Eoin sna trithí ar fad faoi seo, rud a chuireann níos mó
fós leis an olc atá ar Eithne.
“Agus maidir leatsa, a bhuachaill,” ar sí go lom borb lena mac, “tá na soithí seo le
glanadh sula n-imíonn tusa áit ar bith anocht.”
“Á, a Mham.”
“Glan,” ar sí, agus, ach an oiread le cás Shinéid lena hathair, is léir uirthi nach cóir cur
ina coinne.
“Déan mar a deir do mháthair leat, a Eoin,” arsa Breandán, “agus tig leat an leabhar
teileafóin a fháil domsa ar an mbealach tríd an halla duit.”
Breathnaíonn Eoin go géar ar Bhreandán soicind. Leathsmaoineamh aige dúshlán an
athar a thabhairt ach gan ann ach sin. D’fhéadfadh sé an seanleaid a scrios lena bhfuil ar
eolas aige faoi, dá roghnódh sé sin a dhéanamh. Tá a fhios aige sin. Tá a fhios ag
Breandán féin é chomh maith. Ach b’fhearr gan sin a dhéanamh ag an bpointe seo. An
uile ní ina am cuí féin, a shíleann Eoin dó féin. Ina intinn istigh deireann Eoin eascaine nó
dhó agus is leor sin dó mar fhaoiseamh ar an bhfrustrachas. Brúnn sé siar a chathaoir, é ag
déanamh cinnte de go scríobann cosa an tsuíocháin go géar in aghaidh chláracha an urláir.
Ansin bailíonn sé leis i dtreo na cistine.
Published by MÓINÍN, Loch Reasca, Ballyvaughan, Co. Clare, Ireland
Tel: (065) 707 7256; E-mail: moinin@eircom.net
Reviews of this work can be seen on the MÓINÍN website, www.moinin.ie
40
Sceoin sa Bhoireann — Chapter 1
from Sceoin sa Bhoireann, by Ré Ó Laighléis
[Published by MÓINÍN, 2005; ISBN 0-9532777-6-3; Price €10; www.moinin.ie]
An Ghabháil
An bhliain 200 Roimh Chríost. An t-aigéan ina rabharta. Aigéan nár ainmníodh fós. Leis
na laethanta anuas, tá sé á thiontú féin – ionathair dhorcha a bhoilg á gcíoradh agus á
dtarraingt aníos le go mbéarfaí orthu faoi ghile na gréine. Beag é faoiseamh na farraige
nuair is mar seo a bhíonn, óir is beag atá thoir mar bhac uirthi agus is lú fós atá thiar.
Téann an fharraige seo i bhfad, cé nach eol di dílseacht d’áit ar bith. Is í a dhéanann am a
bhualadh nuair nach eol di an t-am a bheith ann fiú.
Caitear bád, nó rafta de chineál, aníos ar dhroim toinne. Tá cúigear nó seisear – sea
seisear – agus greim an fhir bháite ar chrann an árthaigh ag gach aon duine díobh, iad
lasctha ag an tsíon. Iad á ngéilleadh féin do thoil thrócaireach Mhanannáin – dá thoil
mhíthrócaireach, b’fhéidir. Manannán! Dia mór na Farraige! Déanfar a thoil.
Scoilt! Agus, den ala sin, bristear crann an rafta, é ag titim anuas le teann feirge,
shílfeá, ar chos Relco. Deifríonn an mac is sine leis, Emlik, chuige, agus é ar a dhícheall
an t-athair a chosaint ar na gaotha nimhneacha, a bhfuil dó loiscneach déanta acu ar an
gcomhluadar le seachtainí anuas. Tá ribíní stróicthe scáinte an tseoil ag cloí go millteach
leis an leathchrann, agus iad faoi shéideadh fíochmhar Mhanannáin. Réabann siad isteach
in éadan Emlik, iad ag cur i gcoinne na hiarrachta atá á déanamh aige cuidiú lena athair.
Níor tháinig an chuid uachtarach den chrann go hiomlán glan den leath eile de agus tá
cinnte ar Emlik é a scaoileadh chun bealaigh gan chúnamh.
“An leathchrann a scoitheadh,” a bhéiceann Emlik lena dheartháir, Darkon. Titeann
na focail ar mhuin na gaoithe agus scuabtar a gciall go fánach sna ceithre hairde. Tá na
focail caillte ar Dharkon agus teannann sé go fóill dá mháthair, Alyana, agus dá bheirt
deirfiúracha, Raithnika agus Frayika. Tá slabhra daonna déanta ag an gceathrar in aghaidh
na síne, trína lámha deasa a chur fá choim a chéile agus trí ghreim daingean a bhreith ar a
bhfuil fágtha den chrann leis an lámh chlé.
“Éirigh, Darkon. Éirigh agus scaoil an leathchrann chun siúil.”
Cé go scuabtar focail Emlik ar an ngaoth arís, is léir do chách óna chuid geáitsíochta
an teachtaireacht a theastaíonn uaidh a chur in iúl. Is í Raithnika an duine is sine den
bheirt chailíní. Feiceann sise comhartha Emlik ach an oiread le Darkon, agus tuigeann sí
an chiall atá leis. D’ainneoin uile, ní bhogann Darkon. Fágann Raithnika an slabhra
daonna agus tugann leid do Dharkon an rud céanna a dhéanamh. Is in aghaidh a thola féin
a dhéanann sé amhlaidh. Agus Raithnika ina seasamh anois, gan ach leathlámh aici ar an
gcuid sin den chrann atá fós ina sheasamh, féachann sí chuige go bhfuil a máthair agus a
deirfiúr sábháilte trí threorú dóibh a ndá lámha a chur go daingean ar íochtar an chrainn.
Níl de cheangal idir dhá leath an chrainn ach an tslis féin, féitheog aonair adhmaid.
Agus a lámh chlé thart ar a athair aige, oibríonn Emlik a dheasóg chun an tsail a ardú de
chos bhriste Relco a fhad is atá an bheirt eile á brú amach uathu. Géilleann an crann dá n-
41
iarrachtaí, gan friotaíocht ar fiú trácht air, agus scuabann leis amach i mbéal Mhanannáin.
In imeacht chúpla soicind is faide uathu é ná cuimhne ar an mbéile deireanach a bhí acu.
Breathnaíonn Emlik ar a chuiditheoirí, iad beirt ina seasamh fós i lár an rafta.
Amharcann Raithnika air agus déanann miongháire ceanúil leis. Tá sí ard, gormshúileach,
fionn, mórán mar atá Emlik féin. Tá snaidhm dhaingean chairdis eatarthu. Ar shuí do
Raithnika caitheann Emlik súil fhiata ar a dheartháir. Tá Darkon ina sheasamh i gcónaí,
súile dubha géara a chinn dírithe aige ar Emlik – iad á dhó, á chreimeadh. Tuigeann
Darkon féin go bhfuil mianach drochthuarach a nádúir sceite aige le cúpla nóiméad anuas.
Streachlaíonn sé go sleamhain an leathchrann síos agus ceanglaíonn é féin arís leis an
slabhra daonna a bhí acu ar ball.
Agus déantar toil Mhanannáin, Rí na bhFarraigí Uile, nó go dtoilíonn sé gan a thoil a
dhéanamh.
***
Nimhneach é dó na gréine i ngorm na spéire. Níl neach ann a sheasfadh tréine a solais gan
cor na míshocrachta a aireachtáil. Osclaíonn súile Emlik go mall pianmhar. Ní thuigeann
sé gurb é a lámh féin atá trasna ar a éadan aige, á chosaint ar an ngrian. Ní áirítear an t-am
ar uaireanta dá leithéid. Lá, seachtain, b’fhéidir, nó mí go fiú ó caitheadh anseo é. Ní
féidir a rá. Luíonn sé socair ar feadh roinnt nóiméad, é ag iarraidh ciall a dhéanamh den
ghreadfach ar a chraiceann. Ansin, díreach mar a dhéanfadh duine neantóg a thachtadh,
déanann sé dorn dá lámh agus beireann ar lán na laidhre de na cráiteoirí creimneacha.
Ardaíonn sé an lámh os comhair a dhá shúile agus feiceann lán de choiréal gainmheach é.
Terra firma!
Casann Emlik ar a chliathán agus éiríonn sé go mall cúramach. Tugann pian na
hiarrachta chun chuimhne dó go bhfuil briste air ag trasnálaí nach eol dó aon srian nirt.
Amharcann sé ar an aigéan. Tá na faoileáin bhána ina suí ar ghlaise shámh na bóchna, iad
ag bogadach go soineanta ar bharr na dtonntracha. Rug Manannán an lá leis – am scíthe
anois dó, óir beidh cathanna eile le troid aige amach anseo. Agus is rímhaith is eol dó
gurb é an laoch is fearr a thuigeann an tsíocháin is fearr a thuigeann dul an chomhraic
chomh maith.
Cá bhfuil an chuid eile acu? arsa Emlik leis féin. Breathnaíonn sé uaidh ar dhá thaobh
an mhachaire mhóir ghainimh ar ar caitheadh é. Ó dheas tá an ghrian á dhalladh, agus níl
sa tírdhreach ach meall éagruthach. Léargas níos fearr ó thuaidh. Píosa maith uaidh
feiceann sé carnán cuachta nach cré ná carraig é. Déanann sé air láithreach agus, de réir
mar atá sé ag druidim leis, bréagnaíonn an intinn fianaise na súl. Tá sé ina rás idir
phreabarnach a chroí agus luas na gcos faoi. Ní fada nó go n-aithníonn sé éadach lomrach
Relco. Deifríonn sé anois thar mar a bhí de ghluaiseacht faoi cheana agus, i bhfaiteadh na
súl, tá sé taobh le corp a athar. Casann sé ar a dhroim é. Tá dhá pholl, leithead cúig nó sé
d’orlaí eatarthu, i gceartlár a chliabhraigh, as ar éalaigh fuil na beatha uaidh.
Tagann mire de chineál ar Emlik. Croitheann sé an t-athair, é ag béicíl leis go bhfuil
tagtha slán ar fhiúnach Mhanannáin acu, go bhfuil cathanna agus dúshláin eile rompu
anois. Ansin géilleann sé don tuiscint nach é Relco féin a bheidh mar leathbhádóir i dtroid
ar bith feasta aige, ach go mbeidh a spiorad ag breathnú anuas orthu sa chaismirt, á
dtreorú, á gcaomhnú. Caoineann an fear óg. Titeann na deora uaidh anuas ar leicne an
42
athar agus déanann sé an fliuchras a chuimilt ar éadan an fhir mhairbh. Is é oidhre an
chorpáin uasail seo é agus tá dualgas airsean feasta onóir na treibhe a iompar. Airíonn sé
a chroí á fháisceadh féin ina chliabhrach istigh agus, den chéad uair riamh, is eol dó pian
bhristeach an bháis.
“Emlik, Emlik.” Tá an bhéic i bhfad uaidh.
Casann sé i dtreo na gréine, ach tá an ghile inti chomh nimhneach agus a bhí riamh.
“Emlik, Emlik.” Is as an ard taobh thoir den trá atá an scairt ag teacht. Casann sé i
dtreo na ndumhcha – dumhcha a bhfuil de dhánacht iontu aghaidh a thabhairt ar
fhíochmhaire fhraochta Mhanannáin san uair a thoilíonn sé feannadh feirge a chur de.
“Emlik, Emlik – anseo, ar an ard!”
Soir uaidh, ar bharr an aird, tá cruthanna Raithnika agus Frayika le feiceáil, iad beirt
ag léim suas síos agus ag croitheadh a lámh san aer.
Tagann borradh fuinnimh in Emlik i ndiaidh buille thragóid a athar. Tugann sé faoin
dumhach a dhreapadh agus, le casadh boise, shílfeá, tá sé in éineacht lena dheirfiúracha
agus lena mháthair – duine nach bhfaca sé ar chor ar bith agus é ar leibhéal na farraige.
Seasann siad go dlúth le chéile, a lámha fáiscthe timpeall ar a chéile acu agus iad ina naonad in aghaidh chruálacht an domhain. Roinnt nóiméad mar seo dóibh agus labhraíonn
Emlik. Caint ghiorraisc stuama staidéartha:
“Tá ár n-athair, Relco, ar lár.”
Íslítear cloigne. Fonn caointe ar gach duine díobh. Ach tá an fuinneamh chuige sin,
fiú, goidte uathu ag an slad a rinne barbarthacht bhóchnach Mhanannáin orthu. Is den
chiúnas é an méala mór seo orthu. Crá coscrach léanmhar ag sruthlú trí gach ball dá
gcorp, mar thanú spioraid iontu. Is pianmhaire méala seo an chiúnais ná cineál ar bith
eile, óir is faide faoi dhó é a aistear chun an tsuaimhnis.
“Sádh sa chliabhrach é ag ainmhí allta éigin,” arsa Emlik.
Is d’aonghnó é loime seo na cainte uaidh. Tá faoi an chuid eile díobh a stoitheadh as
an mbrón.
“Caithimid ár ndualgas a chomhlíonadh.”
“Céard faoi Darkon?” arsa Alyana.
“Ní fhaca mé a dhath de. Céard fúibhse?”
“Ní fhaca, ná muide ach an oiread,” arsa Frayika.
“Seans gur scuabadh níos faide ó thuaidh é,” a dúirt Raithnika.
“Seans! Feicfimid in imeacht ama,” arsa Emlik.
Ní raibh bráthairse ar bith le haithint ar a gcuid cainte nuair a labhradar ar Darkon. Ba
dhuine áirithe é seachas an chuid eile. Bhí na cailíní níos óige ná é agus ní raibh níos
sinsearaí ná é ach Emlik féin. Dúradh faoi, san am ar rugadh é, go ndearna scamall dubh
aghaidh na gréine a thrasnú agus go raibh an uile ní fuar, dubh, dorcha ar feadh achair
dhothomhaiste. Ba é seo, deirtí, ba bhunús le dubh na gruaige agus na súl air. Agus deirtí
i gcónaí gur sa tsúil a fheictear fírinne an anama.
Rinne sé Darkon a chiapadh go fiú amharc ar Emlik. Níor réitigh siad lena chéile. Gan
in Emlik é féin ach gasúr ag an am, rinne sé a dheartháir a oiliúint sa tseilg, i gcúrsaí
aimsitheoireachta, in úsáid clipe éisc agus i mórán eile. Agus bhí siad sin go léir mar
bhunús le scil eile – suáilce – suáilce a bhí níba uaisle fós: Suáilce an Chúraim. Bhí bunús
leis na cleasa sin, agus ba sa bhunús sin, ní sa ghníomh féin, a bhí uaisleacht agus suáilce
úd an chúraim le feiceáil. Bhí Darkon beag beann ar chleasa nó ar bhunús de chineál ar
43
bith, agus, dá réir sin, ba lú spéis fós a bhí aige i Suáilce an Chúraim. Ba den ghníomh,
agus den ghníomh amháin dósan é gach aon ní a dhéanfaí, agus ba don ghníomh amháin a
thug Darkon dílseacht idir sheilg agus aimsitheoireacht.
Faoin am go raibh cosa curtha faoin ngrian ag an dorchadas bhíodar réidh chun a
ndualgas a chomhlíonadh. Bhí mórán ama caite ag Frayika agus ag a máthair, Alyana, ag
carnadh cloch – clocha, ach an oiread leo féin, a scuabadh chun talún ag fórsa na
dtonntracha. Bhí carn cumtha, moll maol cloch, agus bhíodar ceathrar anois ag ualú an
adhmaid a bhí bailithe ag Raithnika agus Frayika ar an mbarr. B’ábhar sásaimh dóibh é
gur díobh féin agus dá n-athair iad go leor de na bíomaí agus de na maidí a bhí bailithe,
arae, ba de smionagar a rafta féin é cuid mhaith den adhmad.
Nuair a bhí sin déanta, rinne Alyana agus a hiníonacha na gonta i gcliabhrach Relco a
líonadh le gaineamh. Ba thábhachtaí ná aon cheo eile é go mbeadh sé iomlán agus an
domhan saolta seo a fhágáil aige, díreach mar a bhí sé iomlán nuair a tugadh isteach ann
é. D’ardaigh Emlik corpán a athar, chuaigh in airde ar an gcarn agus leag amach ar bharr
an adhmaid é. Bhí súile an mharbháin ar lánoscailt, iad ag breathnú trí na spéartha agus
isteach i ndomhan a bhí cosctha orthu siúd a bhí ina thimpeall. Rinne Emlik lámha agus
cosa Relco a leathadh nó gur shínigh siad amach i dtreo na gceithre hairde. Ansin ghlac
gach aon duine díobh tóirse lasta as an tine agus shádar isteach faoi adhmad an
bhreochairn iad. Bhí fíochmhaire sa dó. Rinne méid an tsolais ar chaith sé uaidh ceap
magaidh d’iarrachtaí na hoíche. Bhí na lasracha ag ealaín leis an dorchadas, á mhealladh,
á ghriogadh, á dhíspeagadh.
Taobh thiar den bhreocharn, i bhfad uathu, ar bharr na duimhche ar ar sheas na mná ar
ball, sheas neach ag breathnú anuas ar a raibh ag tarlú. Chonaic Emlik an t-anchruth, é ag
crithlonrú leis tríd an mbrothall teasa a bhí á scairdeadh ag an tine. Sheas sé amach ón
mbreocharn píosa agus, i ndíbirt seo an teasa, rinne cruth den anchruth. B’fhacthas dó
ansin é, faoi ghile bhreocharn Relco, an pocán mór dubh. Sheas an t-ainmhí go dána
dásachtach agus chrom a chloigeann chun méid na n-adharca a bhí air a mhaíomh. Bhí
fliuchras bharr na n-adharc go dearg-dhrithleach sa solas a chaith an tine orthu. Dhírigh
Emlik a shúile go tréan ar an bpocán agus, d’ainneoin iad a bheith píosa fada óna chéile,
dhaingnigh a súile dá chéile agus rinne an pocán méileach mhailíseach a scaoileadh
uaidh. Chas sé ansin agus d’imigh. Choinnigh Emlik a chomhairle féin agus chrom a
chloigeann go sollúnta ag sochraid seo a athar.
Published by MÓINÍN, Loch Reasca, Ballyvaughan, Co. Clare, Ireland
Tel: (065) 707 7256; E-mail: moinin@eircom.net
Reviews of this work can be seen on the MÓINÍN website, www.moinin.ie
44
Ár i gCor Chomrua — Chapter 1
from Ár i gCor Chomrua, by Ré Ó Laighléis
[Published by MÓINÍN, 2007; ISBN 978-0-9554079-2-5; Price €14; www.moinin.ie]
Lá go luath i bhFómhar na bliana 1317 AD. Tá aghaidh an Bhráthar Benignus casta i dtreo
an tsléibhe chreagaigh a thuilleann ainm dó féin ón mainistir atá lonnaithe i gCor
Chomrua. Tá cuma lonrach ar Chnoc na Mainistreach an mhaidin seo. An dromchla
carraigeach chomh glan glé sin faoin solas gur furasta béil na bpluaiseanna diamhra
doimhne in ionathar an tsléibhe a aithint. Beidh cineáltacht sa lá, seans, síleann Benignus.
Go deimhin, má sháraíonn gus na gréine na scamaill fhuadracha fhiúranta atá á scuabadh
isteach ón bhfarraige le roinnt laethanta anuas, beidh an lá ina sheoid ar fad, dar leis.
Tochas ar bhog na cluaise air, é ag ealaín leis nó go ndéanann sé dinglis de féin. A
fhios aige láithreach gur bídeog de dhamhán alla é. Cuimhníonn sé gur airigh sé líon an
fheithidín ag greamú dá éadan agus é ag seilmidiú leis trí ghairdín an Bhráthar Germanus
ar ball beag nuair a bhí sé ag déanamh ar an aireagal le haghaidh phaidreacha na
hiarmhéirí. Agus cuireann sé ciotóg le bog na cluaise céanna, barra na méar á n-oibriú go
cáiréiseach aige nó go n-aimsíonn sé an créatúr, ansin ritheann míorúiltín ochtchosach an
Nádúir go fánóideach ar dhromchla chúl na láimhe air. Leis sin, íslíonn an manach an
leathlámh leis an mballa íseal a scagann cosán agus fásra óna chéile agus ceadaíonn don
neach beag éalú leis isteach san fhéar drúchtach.
Is den tadhall é saol Benignus – é den tadhall, den fhuaim, den bholtanas, den bhlas.
Titim de chairrín asail agus é ina bhuachaill óg ag fás aníos i sráidbhaile beag Trowbridge
i Wiltshire Shasana ba chúis le radharc na súl a sciobadh uaidh. Ach, d’ainneoin a óige,
chuir sé air féin na céadfaí eile a ghéarú mar chúiteamh ar an gcailliúint. É minic ina
gcaint ag na bráithre eile sa chomhluadar, toisc grinneas na gcéadfaí eile ag Benignus, gur
géire i bhfad é ná iad sa mhéid a mhothaíonn sé trí chéadfaí ar bith, bíodh radharc na súl i
gceist nó ná bíodh.
“Cén chailliúint dom é?” ar sé lá leis an gcomhluadar, agus iad á cheistiú faoi é a
bheith dall. “Is trí’n gcroí agus trí’n anam a fheictear rud ar bith go fírinneach, a bhráithre.
Cá hann don Dia a chruthódh Neamh agus Talamh a dhéanfadh bua ar bith a sciobadh de
dhuine gan é a chúiteamh dó ar bhealach éigin eile?”
Agus tháinig gaois le haois chuig Benignus, agus mhéadaigh siadsan beirt tréith na
foighne sa seanóir. Agus is i ngeall ar an bhfoighne sin agus an grá a léiríonn sé don uile
ní cruthaithe go bhfuil an oiread sin ceana ag a chomhbhráithreacha Cistéirseacha air. Tá
sé blianta maithe ó tháinig siad chun a bpréamhacha a chur fúthu agus an mhainistir i
gCor Chomrua a bhunú ar shleasa na Boirne – ceantar creagach na háilleachta i nDál
Cais. Is í an fhoighne agus uas-úsáid na mbuanna eile úd a d’fhág Dia aige a thugann
léargas do Bhenignus ar an domhan máguaird. Díreach mar is eol dó Cnoc na
Mainistreach a bheith soir ó thuaidh air, tá a fhios aige leis gurb ann atá Cuan Eachinis
agus Cuan an Chorráin Rua – na góilíní beaga úd ina ndéantar neamhní d’fhearg na
farraige i dtráth an rabharta. Tuigeann sé chomh maith go bhfuil Cnoc an Torlaigh ó
dheas ar an áit ina bhfuil sé agus, ina dhiaidh sin arís, Sliabh an Chairn agus, níos faide
45
fós ó dheas ná iad sin beirt, draíochtsheoid chlaonta shraitheach na Boirne – An Mullach
Mór féin – an sliabh ar shéid an Cruthaitheoir an anáil bhreise air lá úd a dhéanta.
Siar ar Ghleann an Mhóinín, siar ar an áit a bhfuil an mhainistir, tá Sliabh an Mhóinín
féin, agus siar air sin arís tá an talamh mhéith, áit a bhfuil ceantair Chill Eochaille agus
Loch Reasca agus mórán eile nach bhfuil a n-ainmneacha fiú ar a n-eolas ag Benignus
agus na bráithre. Agus ina bhfoisceacht sin uile tá Muc Inis, áit a bhfuil a gcaisleán ag
Clann Lochlainn.
Tugann Benignus cúl le grian agus casann a shúile i dtreo Shliabh an Mhóinín. Tá
aduaine inbhraite éigin ar an leoithne a sheoltar chuige. Rud corraitheach, dar leis. Gairge
de chineál. Is meascán é den aer, den allas, den dó, cé nach féidir aon cheann ar leith
díobh sin a bholú ann féin. Manglam. Manglam an mhíshuaimhnis. Agus cuirtear lena
mhíshuaimhneas nuair a chuimhníonn Benignus go bhfuil na céadfaí géaraithe ann thar
mar atá ag an ngnáthdhuine – go bhfuil bua breise aige ar a dtugann na manaigh eile ‘bua
an chúitimh’, nuair is cás leo a bheith ag spochadh as. Ach cuma céard iad eilimintí na
gairge seo ar an aer chuige, tá sé cinnte ina intinn gur drochthuar de chineál éigin é. Atann
polláirí na sróine air agus é á análú go tréan le go ndéana sé ciall den bholadh, agus
cuirtear leis an míshocracht a airíonn sé istigh. Agus, de thobainne, roptar as an
smaoineamh é nuair a theagmhann eite choirre éisc dá chloigeann agus é ag faoileoireacht
go híseal os a chionn. Agus séidtear gaoth úr in eitiltshruth an éin.
“Níor chuala tú an clog á bhualadh, a Bhenignus?”
Siar eile bainte as ag caint seo an Bhráthar Placidus nuair nach raibh aon choinne aige
leis.
“Céard a deir tú, a Bhráthair?” arsa an dall.
“An clog, a chara liom. An é nár chuala tú é? Tar uait, am bricfeasta. Brisimis an
troscadh i gcomhluadar a chéile.” Agus bogann Placidus leis ar shála na cainte sin agus
imíonn ar ais faoin áirse chloiche faoinár tháinig sé ar ball. Leanann Benignus é, lámh á
cur leis an mballa aige, ansin leis an sconsa adhmaid ar chiumhais an ghairdín agus á
leanacht sin mar threoir chun an phroinntí. Nuair a thagann sé faoin áirse féin, airíonn sé
fuaire an scáthbhaic chloiche ar a bhaithis agus tagann íomhá fhéinchumtha den chorréisc
úd ina intinn. Tá sé in amhras an bhfaca sé éan mar é riamh le linn an achair ghearr a
raibh radharc na súl aige. Agus má chonaic, is cinnte nach bhfuil aon chuimhne léir aige
ar a leithéid a fheiceáil.
Stadann Benignus den tsiúl soicind. Braitheann sé fuaire eile seachas díbirt na gréine
ag an gcloch. Fós eile súnn sé a bhfuil ar an aer isteach ina scámhóga agus líonann
leathan luchtaithe iad. É trína chéile i gcónaí faoina mbolaíonn sé. Ansin meallann
cantaireacht Ora pro nobis san áit istigh ar aghaidh i dtreo an phroinntí é.
“Et pro cibo novo, Deo gratia.”
“Áiméan,” arsa na manaigh, iad ag freagairt don tabhairt buíochais do Dhia atá á ghuí
ag an Ab, an Bráthar Nilus.
Suíonn Benignus taobh le Placidus ag an mbord. Seanchairde iad a d’fhás aníos le
chéile i Trowbridge agus, in aois a chúig déag, a tháinig go hÉirinn chun cur le
comhluadar na manach in Inis Leamhnachta i gceantar álainn Chluain Meala na
hUrmhumhan. Seanbhráthair taistealach as mainistir na Cistéirseach san áit sin a thug an
deis dóibh teacht ann. Ba iontach an seans acu é éalú ó bhochtaineacht na cosmhuintire
ina dtír dhúchais féin agus eolas a chur ar an Laidin, an scríobh agus léamh. Ní
46
fhéadfaidis blas díobh sin a fháil dá leanfaidis den rud suarach a bhí leagtha amach dóibh
i Sasana. Go deimhin, cén seans ar chor ar bith a bheadh ag Benignus dá bhfanfadh sé sa
bhaile agus é chomh dall le cloch? Cruatan agus dearóile a bheadh i ndán dó agus gan a
dhath eile ach iad. Ba é an rud ab uaisle a d’fhéadfadh tarlú do ghasúir mar iad, i dtuairim
a dtuismitheoirí, ná go bhfreagróidis do chuireadh Dé féin. Níor bheag ach an oiread é, ar
ndóigh, ualach a dtógála agus a mbeathaithe a bheith bainte dá gclanna ar an dóigh sin.
Scór go leith de bhlianta a chuir an bheirt chairde díobh i mainistir Inis Leamhnachta
agus, d’ainneoin gur chuir ab an mháthair-thigh i bhFurness Shasana in aghaidh a nimeacht as Tiobraid Árann, d’imigh siad leo in éineacht le ceathrar eile de mhanaigh
Mhainistir Mhór Mellifont an Laighin, chun cur le líon na manach a bhí i gCor Chomrua
cheana féin. Agus nárbh iad na blianta céanna a d’imigh leo ar luas lasrach …
“Tá tart ort, a Bhenignus?”
“Go deimhin, tá, a Phlacidus, agus tart an domhain mhóir. Bhain míchompord éigin
an mhaith de chodladh na hoíche díom agus nuair a dhúisigh mé i gceart bhí mé cíocrach
i ndiaidh uisce. Bhí mo scornach á dó an oiread sin i ndiaidh phaidreacha na hiarmhéirí
go ndeachaigh sé dian orm mo mheon a dhíriú ar an urnaí féin.” Agus blaiseann Benignus
uair nó dhó d’uisce an eascra chré atá ina dheasóg aige agus é á insint sin dá chara.
Fear simplí é Placidus nach cás leis dul le mór-fhealsúnacht de chineál ar bith.
Aithníonn sé ar an dall go bhfuil sé buartha ar fháth éigin le tamall de laethanta anuas. Is
é Placidus, thar dhuine ar bith eile de na bráithre, a thuigeann nach amháin go bhfuil
cúiteamh Dé déanta i leith Bhenignus maidir le géarú na gcéadfaí ach, anuas air sin, go
bhfuil sé de bhua aige nithe a thuiscint ar bhealach nach dtugtar do dhaoine eile. Tá a
fhios aige gur mó i bhfad a fheiceann Benignus ná an suarachas fisiceach. Bua na fáistine
aige. Bua a cheadaíonn dó breathnú uaidh thar limistéir an domhain saolta seo.
“Is é an t-achrann seo leis an Normannach de Clare, nach é, a Bhenignus?” ar sé.
“A dhath eile ach é, a chara liom,” arsa Benignus, aguis cuireann sé stop ar a bhéal
soicind nó dhó. “An diabhal ceangal gránna seo idir é agus lucht Rua Uí Bhriain in
aghaidh shliocht Thoirdhealaigh. A bhfuil le teacht léirithe dom i ndubh na hoíche, nuair
is beoga bruidearnaigh mo mheon ná tráth ar bith eile den lá a thug an Cruthaitheoir
dúinn uile.”
Breathnaíonn Placidus go cineálta ar a chara. Go ró-mhaith a thuigeann sé gur ualach
mór ar Bhenignus é bua seo na fáistine.
“Sea, faraor géar! Léiríodh bás agus dó agus scrios ar measa iad ná rud ar bith a
fhacthas ón uair úd míle cúig chéad bliain ó shin, nuair a réab lasracha loiscneacha go
raspanta trí’n spéir agus rinneadh feannadh fearbach os cionn Shliabh Cheapán an
Bhaile.”
Tá leithead gheata ar shúile Phlacidus agus é ag éisteacht le caint seo a chomrádaí.
Airíonn sé drithlín fuachta ag dul tríd ó bhonn go baithis. De ríog a ghearrann sé
Comhartha na Croise air féin, amhail is go dtuigeann sé nach bhfuil tuiscint ar na nithe
seo i ndán dá leithéid agus nach mbeidh de chosaint aige orthu ach trócaire Dé féin.
“Ach cogar seo liom, a chara mo chléibh,” arsa Placidus, “shílfeá, agus tú á fheiceáil
seo roimh ré, go bhfuil bealach ann len é a chealú sula dtarlaíonn sé ar chor ar bith.”
“Ba dheas é dá mba amhlaidh a bheadh,” arsa Benignus. “Is iomaí rud a fheicimse
agus a dhéanaim fáistine air, ach ní hann don fhísí ar domhan a bhfuil sé de chumhacht
aige toil Rí na nUile a athrú.”
47
Sruthlaíonn cuimhní ar scéalta Boirneacha atá cloiste thar na blianta ag Placidus
isteach ina intinn. An scéal úd faoin scrios coscrach a rinneadh i gceantar Loch Reasca i
bhfad roimh aimsir Chríost a ghlacann tús áite ina smaointe. Ba thráth é nuair a bhí an
ceart á riar ag neart. Dá mba fhíor an méid a bhí feicthe ag Benignus san fháistine, ba
bheag a d’fhéadfaí a dhéanamh len é a chosc, seachas sin a bhí déanta cheana féin ag
Placidus ar ball beag. Gearrann sé Comhartha na Croise air féin athuair agus luíonn
isteach ar an arán coirce atá ar an trinsiúr os a chomhair. Ní bhlaisfidh sé a dhath eile i
ndiaidh bhonnóg seo na maidine nó go mbeidh an lá fada oibre sna garraithe curtha de. Is
ansin a thiocfaidh an comhluadar le chéile athuair le proinn na hoíche a ithe.
Breathnaíonn sé ar Bhenignus arís agus airíonn an dall súile a chara air.
“Ná luíodh sé seo ina bhuairt ort, a Phlacidus. Ní dheonaítear tuiscint ar na cúrsaí seo
orainn agus is é atá dlite dúinn an tuiscint sin a fhágáil ag an Uilechumhacht.”
Cling aonar chlog na mainistreach a leathann riail an tosta orthu agus iad fós ag ithe.
Cromann siad beirt a gcloigne agus tugann lán a n-aird do na bonnóga atá faoina mbéil
acu. É ina mhaidin, agus beidh ina oíche nuair a thagann sin agus, más é toil an Té a
riarann a leithéidí, súfar grian aníos thar íor na spéire arís lá arna mhárach.
Published by MÓINÍN, Loch Reasca, Ballyvaughan, Co. Clare, Ireland
Tel: (065) 707 7256; E-mail: moinin@eircom.net
Reviews of this work can be seen on the MÓINÍN website, www.moinin.ie
48