An Irish Christmas Feast (25 page)

‘Surely,' Miss Clottie was at it again, ‘you're not trying to tell us that you have a process for us!'

‘Yes for you, you pompous oul' jade,' Wally was tempted to reply. Instead he kept his mouth shut and awaited the same old response which his unexpected arrival always elicited.

‘The very idea,' Miss Clottie was saying, ‘a process indeed for the MacMullys of Cloontubber House! Did you ever hear the bate of it!' She turned to her brother who had grown strangely silent as she stood before him, hands on hips. This, Wally told himself, is the part of the business I enjoy the best. This job is distasteful to be sure but it has its moments and these are they. The power of authority surged through him. He could let them know what lay in store for them right away by handing over the process or he could play them the way a cat plays a mouse.

He could see, however, that while Master Bob was visibly affected by his arrival he had made no dent whatsoever on the uppishness of his sister. She was a snob from head to toe so she was and wasn't it always the same with those infected by the disease of grandeur. They believed they were so high and mighty, so much above the ordinary, so perfect in every way that even if there was a process in the offing nobody would have the gall to serve it. She placed a plate of steaming soup on the table before her brother but all he did was to stir it indifferently and after a while listlessly swallow the spoonfuls as though they were doses of unpleasant medicine. Suddenly Miss Clottie turned on Wally, this time with arms folded.

‘No Missie, no, no, no thank you.' Wally let the words run mischievously out of his mouth before she could open hers.

‘No thank you for what?' she asked, genuinely confused.

‘For the soup you might be about to offer me.'

If she bridled under this most unacceptable jibe from a townie and a cheap townie at that she kept it to herself. She turned instead and removed the half-emptied soup plate from the table. She placed it in the kitchen sink never taking her eyes off the obnoxious creature by the range. She knew him well enough. She had seen him frequently in the town, mostly coming and going from pubs or standing in bookies' doorways when he wasn't searching for returns in bookies' windows.

‘You can be on your way now,' she informed him. ‘You seem to be dry enough for the road.'

‘Just another minute,' he pleaded.

‘Gather yourself my buck,' she threatened, ‘or I'll give you a second dose of the dogs.'

‘Oh dear! Oh dear!' Wally Pooley addressed himself silently once more. ‘They think it will never happen to them but happen it will. Processes are there to be served and they stare everybody in the face just like the hereafter. There's no escape and just because you think you're a cut above your neighbour won't excuse you. I am your local process server and like your local undertaker I will have you sooner or later.'

Wally spoke the last part aloud.

‘What's he talking about?' Puzzled, she turned to her brother for an explanation. Master Bob shrugged his shoulders while his sister's perplexity grew. Approaching the range she pushed the process server to one side and lifted one of the largest plates Wally had ever seen from the top of a pot of steaming water where she had earlier placed it so that it would be properly heated for her brother's dinner.

Intrigued, the visitor watched while she placed the items hereafter listed, on the plate: two peeled boiled potatoes, not too floury and not too soggy but precisely of the texture which had always endeared itself to the famished Wally; two medium-sized mouth-watering fillet steaks; one mound of boiled mashed parsnips; several fried onion rings, the size of small necklaces; and, finally, to cover it all, a pouring of the richest, brownest gravy ever seen by Wally . Smartly she turned and placed the plate in front of her brother. She raised a hand to forestall him lest he start the course in the presence of such a lowly creature as he who had returned his bottom to the glow of the range.

‘Off with you now,' she commanded.

‘I'll go when my business is done,' Wally Pooley informed her.

‘Then state your business now,' she demanded.

‘My business is with your brother,' Wally returned.

‘Then I'll go,' she said, ‘but I'll be back in fifteen minutes.'

After his sister had left, Master Bob, for all his listlessness up until that time, directed his full attention to his dinner. Wally looked on helplessly, his mouth watering, his tongue licking his lips as the head of the house lifted a forkful of choice fillet to his drooling lips. Watching him chew the juicy steak was as much as Wally could bear. Master Bob closed his eyes and raised his head the better to savour the fare. He was a slow eater. His mastications were thoughtful and deliberate. He seemed determined to extract the very last juices, the ultimate essence from everything that entered his mouth.

He should be on exhibition, Wally thought, if only to show people how much pleasure there is to be found in simple chewing. To an unobservant onlooker it might seem that he was teasing the less fortunate process server but this was not the case. Always when he masticated savoury chunks of fillet he became oblivious to all external activities. Swallowing the first forkful after what seemed, in Wally's eyes, to be an eternity, Master Bob refocused his eyes on the contents of the plate. Using both knife and fork he probed and prodded and finally settled for a gravy-enriched mouthful of mashed parsnips. He held it aloft on his fork for several seconds, first cherishing and then totally admiring this contrasting titbit before slowly opening his generous mouth and lovingly depositing the parsnip therein.

There followed such a sucking and a savouring that the gathering saliva shot forth unbidden from Wally's mouth. He decided that a time for action had come and without a by-your-leave sat on a chair next to the merrily masticating Master Bob. If the latter was aware of Wally's presence he failed to show it. He sat with his head slightly aloft, his jaws gently salivating the parsnip, his eyes closed, in a world of his own.

After the parsnip had departed to the same destination as the fillet Master Bob heaved a great sigh of satisfaction and burped appreciatively without a word of apology to the visitor. Burping secondly he reached out for a glass of milk which his sister had earlier poured for him. He swallowed noisily while the ravenous onlooker swallowed an imaginary mouthful in tandem. After the second invasion of his plate Master Bob decided the time had come for a break in the proceedings. He placed knife and fork on top of the appetising array yet to be devoured and rubbed his hands together, sighing ecstatically as he did. Then and not till then did he become aware of Wally's presence at the table. He was momentarily shocked by this outrageous breach of agricultural protocol but his annoyance slowly disappeared as he contemplated his next move.

Wally watched helplessly as the greedy eyes of his tormentor swept over the contents of the plate. Wally guessed that he would opt for an onion ring and was agreeably surprised when Master Bob decided to indulge in a second mouthful of the fillet. Carefully and lovingly he chose the section he desired, severing it neatly from the whole before impaling it on the fork prongs. Wally guessed rightly that he would wait until doomsday before Master Bob would proffer a solitary morsel from the plate where, in Wally's estimation, there was easily enough for two.

Normally Wally would not resort to the ploy which he had devised shortly before taking his place at the table but the pangs of hunger had multiplied since Master Bob had begun his meal.

Firstly he opened the safety pin which had secured his breast pocket. Secondly he withdrew the envelope which contained the process and thirdly he lifted it aloft the better to behold it and to contemplate its real value. It would also, undoubtedly, attract the attention of Master Bob but that very person was now looking out the window, having risen from his seat. He gave no indication that he had noticed the envelope. He was, therefore, in Wally's opinion, relishing the food he had consumed so far. Wally had done the same thing on the rare occasions when he had been presented with high-quality meals. Master Bob, he felt, would now be enjoying the interval between mastication and resumption. He would recall every bite he had eaten and would, no doubt, be considering an amalgamation of parsnip and potato or onion rings and fillet or even a medley of all four. After all, he had only barely begun and needed time to chew the cud as it were before resuming acquaintance with the constituents of his plate.

Again there was the irritating rubbing together of the hands and the even more irritating burps. When he sat again he took his implements in hand and, screwing his head this way and that, viewed his meal from every angle. The lull seemed to have sharpened his appetite for at once he uplifted a large lump of potato and parsnips, browned with an abundance of gravy.

Alas for Master Bob, the sapid composition would never reach his mouth. A polite coughing of the best drawing-room variety was sufficient to distract him. With a perplexed look he lay the top-heavy fork on the plate. Then with a quizzical look he turned his attention to the source of the coughing. It was, indeed, his unwelcome guest the process server, the very creature he thought he had browbeaten into respectful silence. The ominous epistle was still held aloft.

‘Can't it wait,' Master Bob pleaded.

‘Duty calls,' came back the firm reply.

‘All right, hand it over then!' There was resignation in the once haughty tone. Slowly he opened the envelope and extracted its contents. There was only one sheet of paper but on that sheet were tidings that would drain the blood from its reader's face. As he read his hands trembled and, having read, he lifted the process secondly and reread. The second reading did nothing to restore his earlier sense of well-being.

The face was now ashen and the lips which had recently worked so feverishly and industriously were tightly drawn. Master Bob pushed his plate away and by good chance it ended nearer the hands of the process server than those of its rightful owner.

Wally's hands gently circled the plate without touching it.

‘Have you finished with this?' he asked. No answer came from the sealed lips.

‘You sure now!' Wally asked in a barely audible tone and yet no answer came. In that part of the world, as elsewhere, there were large numbers of people who believed that silence gives consent. Acting on this dictum Wally reached forward and seized the knife and fork which now lay idle at the head of the table. He made the sign of the Cross with the knife as he lifted the heavily laden fork and intook its cargo so that it might be free to fulfil its role as accomplice of the knife which by now was also free to mark out a choice square of tender fillet.

As the process server stuffed himself Master Bob lifted his head in alarm from time to time. He thought he heard barking or it could have been slobbering. Another time he was convinced that he heard a pig grunting but there was no pig only Wally, who was making mighty inroads into the surprise repast. As he neared the end Wally could not help but notice that Master Bob had buried his head in his hands. He availed of the opportunity to pour himself a full tumbler of milk. He wiped the plate clean at precisely the same time Miss Clottie returned with the cowardly dogs. She was shocked by what she saw at the table. She could scarcely bring herself to speak. Hurrying forward she lifted the process and started to read. In a matter of seconds her already grim visage underwent a grievous change for the worse.

Wally Pooley felt that his time for departure had come. He was already acquainted with the contents of the letter but nobody would ever hear it from him. Indeed the whole country knew that Master Bob would be contesting a paternity suit at the next sitting of the Circuit Court. Rising as graciously as he knew how, Wally succeeded in containing the belch which would have forced its way upward and outward without apology.

‘Best meal I ever ate Missie.' He directed his thanks towards Miss Clottie but that unfortunate creature was incapable of acknowledgement. Wally gently laid the knife, fork, plate and glass in the sink and backed himself out through the kitchen door, nodding his head with maximum deference as he did.

Time, as only time could, would resolve Master Bob's dilemma. He would duly acknowledge the son which was undoubtedly his and he would marry the child's mother while Miss Clottie would marry a local farmer during the fall of the year and she would present her ageing husband with a son and heir nine months to the day after the knot was tied. Wally Pooley would always say that the dinner he had eaten on that eleventh of the twelve days of Christmas was the best fare ever to cross his lips. He took the full credit himself: ‘For,' as he would confide to his drunken cronies many a time, ‘I took my chance when it came and I delivered my process not a minute too early or a minute too late.'

Long Jason Lattally was not alone tall as a telephone pole but also thin as a lath, so thin, in fact, that it was a wonder he did not topple over altogether. He had a narrow jaw and he had a pointed nose and he had no lips to speak of. Consequently his eyes seemed outrageously large, as did his ears and his cheek bones. People who saw him for the first time announced that he had the boniest face they ever saw. Canon Coodle, the parish priest, put it another way.

‘He has a very refined face,' the canon told his housekeeper, ‘maybe a little bit too refined and we must remember that refinement is a quality sought after by many but acquired by few.'

Jason Lattally was well off by parochial standards. There was a time when he shared the family business with a brother but the poor fellow was whipped away one night by a storm as he walked along the banks of the estuary below the town. At least people presumed that he had been whipped away. In appearance there was little difference between himself and his brother Jason. If anything he was a trifle thinner and a trifle taller and a trifle hungrier-looking and maybe a trifle more lathy but for all that he was a likeable chap and when he was being transported to the graveyard on the day of his burial many notable utterances went the rounds in his favour.

Some months after his departure from the land of the living his brother Jason bought a new suit, a new shirt and a new pair of shoes and went here, there and everywhere looking for a wife. When he started out he believed that his task would be an easy one. He was now the sole proprietor of a small but successful grocery shop. The business was free of debt and contained modest living quarters as well as a back entrance which was regarded as vital to the running of a successful business in the main street of the town. Goods, for instance, might be delivered through the rear and so might fuel and it was through this rear egress that Jason exited every night to consume the few pints of stout which helped him unwind and contributed in no small way to the deep slumber which saw him wake up eager and refreshed each morning of his working week.

At first in his quest for a partner he enjoyed no luck at all. He was tempted to engage the services of a matchmaker but told himself that if he could not secure a woman through his own devices he did not deserve one. How wrong was Long Jason Lattally! Wiser men than he would testify with their hands across their hearts that a man needed all the help he could get in the isolating and securing of a suitable wife.

Time went by and at the end of a year Jason was as far from acquiring a partner as he had been when he set out. Then he was informed by a female neighbour who was aware of his plight that there was no need for him to search afar when he might pick and choose from the selection under his very nose. He had many female customers who were of the marrying age and, more importantly, of the marrying bent.

When Madame Lucia Palugi the famous Dublin fortune-teller came to town and set up shop for a week in the front room of a small house, several doors down the street from the premises of Long Jason Lattally, Jason decided to pay her a visit. She was a somewhat obese lady of indeterminate age but she had earned for herself an unrivalled reputation as a clairvoyant. After she had carefully read Jason's palm she informed him that he had a lifeline which suggested that he would reach the ripe old age of one hundred and two. She also informed him that he was unmarried and when he asked her how she could tell she merely pointed at the crystal ball which dominated the top of the table at which they sat. Peer though he did with all his might, Jason saw nothing in the crystal. The opposite was the case with the noted prophetess. She saw two women, one tall, thin and rangy and the other short and stocky. Jason informed her with mounting astonishment that he knew both women, that both were in fact regular customers of his, although he had never seriously contemplated either.

‘That may be,' he was told amiably, and Madame Palugi went on to tell him that while he might not be enamoured of them they were most certainly enamoured of him, ‘and,' she continued without a tremor in her tone, ‘one or other of the pair will be the mistress of your abode before Christmas for I see before me in my crystal ball a pair of legs which are definitely not yours and these legs happen to be in position under your kitchen table. I cannot say whether the legs are long or short and I cannot see a trace of a face because my crystal is somewhat clouded but it is a fact that the owner of the legs will be your wife before Christmas.'

Madame Palugi had seen nothing in her crystal ball but she was well informed nevertheless. The lady who owned the house where Madame Palugi foretold the future had filled her in as soon as Long Jason entered and, as he sat in the tiny ante-room awaiting his turn to be divined, much was revealed about his background and romantic aspirations. At the end of the session he was prepared to accept the fact that he would have a wife before Christmas and that she would be one of the two women mentioned by the fortune-teller. He decided after a sleepless night that his future wife would be the tall, thin woman and not the short, stocky one. The tall, thin candidate, by name Alicia Mullally, was less plain than the stocky candidate and besides that she was possessed of a considerable fortune, had already acquired some business acumen and had the reputation of being an excellent housekeeper.

The shorter woman, whose name was Elsie Bawnie, could fairly be described as being sober and industrious and had plenty too by way of worldly goods. She had a certain charm and came from a family renowned for its honesty although in that particular place at that particular time people hid their money and stowed away their valuables at the mere mention of the word honesty.

‘I have never met an honest man with the exception of Canon Coodle,' Big Bob the Traveller was fond of saying, ‘and I'm pretty sure that I never will. Even if a man is honest,' Big Bob would continue, ‘he has already given a hostage to fortune because of his physical attachments and may not be trusted altogether.'

When Jason Lattally approached Alicia Mullally as she left the local greengrocers with a packet of birdseed she was quite taken aback and did not know whether to laugh or cry. She leaned her long frame forward like a heron about to snatch a sprat and would have flapped homewards straight off had not Jason seized her gently by the sleeve of her calico blouse and restrained her.

‘Will you?' he asked.

‘Will I what?' she responded as though she had not heard the first time.

‘Will you marry me?'

When she remained tight-lipped he repeated the question and still she would not commit herself. It was not the first time that such a question had been put to Alicia Mullally. She had always answered in the negative in the past and had regretted her decision at least twice. At the time she had convinced herself that they would ask again and indeed they had asked again but not Alicia. What a strange place, she told herself, for a man to propose and was it, she asked herself, an indication of other strangenesses? Strangenesses were the last thing she wanted. Like all women she wanted a man she could depend on. She did not, however, say no. She tried to draw away but she did not try very hard. He still held her firmly by the sleeve.

‘Will you or won't you?' he said and she deduced that if the answer was not in the affirmative there might not be a second offer. Their eyes met and she could see that he was deadly serious. He had paled almost beyond recognition and she guessed that he had built up his courage for some time before approaching her. When she spoke again her voice had softened and there was sympathy in her eyes. She laid a hand on the hand that held her by the sleeve.

‘Why don't you call to the house sometime?' she whispered invitingly. ‘This is no place to talk about marriage.'

Jason released his hold and assured her that she could expect him that very night when he would be hoping for a positive answer.

News of the proposal spread quickly. In the space of one hour the whole street was fully informed. In the space of two the town knew that Long Jason Lattally would be calling to the abode of Alicia Mullally that very night. It was believed that she would accept but not before she hummed and hawed her fill. She was of the breed of hummers and hawers and breeding will out.

‘You will find breeding in turnips,' Big Bob the Travelling Man would say. ‘Why man,' he would continue in his homely way, ‘you will find breeding in the poll of a hatchet, in the handle of a scythe, in the straw of your thatch, in the spokes of your wagon.' He would go on and on until his audience drifted away.

The first thing Big Bob did when he heard of the proposal was to trim his flowing white mohal. The second thing he did was to visit his friend Bertie Bawnie, the father of the town's smallest woman but not so small as not to be marriageable. It was Elsie herself who opened the door.

‘Small yes!' Big Bob silently said to himself, ‘but ugly no.'

The travelling man was greeted warmly. It would not be in her breeding to do otherwise. Big Bob recalled her late mother who had been renowned for her generosity and courtesy. It was, therefore, inbred into Elsie. She ushered him through the small pork shop to an even smaller kitchen where her father sat snoozing by a bright peat fire. Bertie Bawnie had a round pink face atop a small chunky body. He rose at once to his feet when he saw who his visitor was. Expansively he indicated a chair and with a well-rehearsed motion of wrists and fingers indicated to his daughter that she was to fetch glasses and whiskey. Not until a glass of whiskey had been consumed in the most leisurely fashion by each of the elders was a word spoken.

‘What brings you friend?' Bertie Bawnie asked as he replenished both glasses.

‘I have come matchmaking,' came the solemn reply. The traveller was quick to elaborate.

‘It has come to my attention,' he said, ‘that Long Jason Lattally is about to propose to Alicia Mullally and it has further come to my attention,' he went on, ‘that the daughter of this house would be far better suited to Lattally but I need that daughter's permission and I need her father's permission before I can make a case.'

An uncomfortable silence greeted the traveller's announcement. Big Bob had made a match or two in the past but mostly among the travelling people. If the truth were told he would be more of a consultant than a matchmaker. He would be fully versed in the lore of the countryside and would be aware of the failings and virtues of marriageable men and women along the roads which he travelled regularly. He would be cognisant of the background and breeding of likely partners and he always made himself available whenever vital information was required by professional matchmakers. He had a priceless stock of valuable knowledge and he was easy to deal with as far as consultancy fees were concerned.

The Bawnies, father and daughter, replied to his proposal in their individual ways and in their own time; the daughter by refilling the glasses as soon as they were drained and the father by asking if Big Bob would be interested in acting on his daughter's behalf. A considerable amount of whiskey was consumed before the deliberations came to an end. The chief worry entertained by Bertie Bawnie was that Long Jason Lattally might have already proposed.

‘I think not,' Big Bob reassured him, ‘for it has come to my attention that Alicia Mullally is a dawdler who finds it difficult to make up her mind. She should and could have been married years ago but she kept putting the matter on the long finger.'

Bertie Bawnie countered by saying that it was his belief there would be a Mullally/Lattally marriage before Christmas and that Christmas was almost down on the door.

‘You may have made your move too late,' he concluded unhappily.

‘Not so,' Big Bob answered. ‘Now is the time to make the move for it has come to my attention that Long Jason is due to propose at nine o'clock tonight.'

‘It is now eight.' Elsie Bawnie spoke for the first time and it occurred to Big Bob that she had the demurest way and the most subtle way of making a point.

‘I'll go now,' he said in dramatic tones, ‘and I'll state my case to Long Jason Lattally.'

Elsie followed him to the door and, taking him by the hand, thrust a ten-pound note therein.

‘There will be ninety more,' she promised, ‘if you succeed in your mission for if I can't have Long Jason I won't have anybody. He is all that's left of the Lattallys and I am all that's left of the Bawnies, barring my Da.'

As he drew his coat about him preparatory to crossing the street for his proposed confrontation with Long Jason, Big Bob was forestalled by the distant but resonant tones of the last remaining male Bawnie.

‘There's another hundred from me,' the voice said, ‘if the news is joyful.'

There was no question but that the Bawnies had great faith in the travelling man. There were few others who were possessed of the same faith and, surprisingly, one of these was Canon Coodle although it would have to be said that his faith was limited. Still faith was faith regardless of its consistency. Big Bob was fully aware that father and daughter trusted him fully and he was quite moved as a result. The expression ‘faith can move mountains' was familiar to him. He had heard it often enough in church and had come to set great store by the ancient proverb. There had been an occasion of celebration around the campfire when the travellers would philosophise at length about religion and about the world at large. The happy group had just run out of liquor and the tragedy was that the combined finances of the travellers were not sufficient to purchase a single bottle of stout. Big Bob had volunteered to approach one of the town's public houses, where he would request credit.

While most of the publicans did not encourage the travelling folk to drink on their premises there were occasions when they could be depended upon to extend a small amount of credit. He had been a young man then and his listeners had scoffed at the very thought of his demanding credit from a publican.