Of Irish Blood (17 page)

“That’s nice of you,” I say. “And I am glad George Washington and the others didn’t cut off anyone’s head.”

“Did your relatives fight the British?” the boy asks.

“My relatives were probably living next door to yours, in a manner of speaking,” I say. “I’m Irish.”

“And where are your people from?” the professor asks.

“Galway,” I say.

“That’s my county,” he says. “What town land?”

“Town land?

“Your home place,” he says.

“All I know is my granny said she was born on the shores of Galway Bay.”

“As was mine,” he says. “Out in Connemara. What was your granny called?”

“The same as me, Honora Kelly. Though I’m Nora.”

“Lots of Kellys in Galway. And her people?”

“Keeley. She was born Honora Keeley.”

He laughs. “My own mother’s name. Now you must join us. It’s not every day I stumble on a cousin from Amerikay.”

“Amerikay,” I repeat. “She always said Amerikay.”

“Closer to the Irish language,” he says. “Come along.”

Well, what could I say? That I’m a fallen woman on my way to hell and don’t have time for a tour through French history? But those faces looking at me are so like those of my own young cousins. Like my own, really, and that familiar swirl of teasing and laughing pulls me in. I’m sure none of these young girls worry about being
irréguliers
or courtesans or grisettes. More like Rose and Mame and me at St. Xavier’s when we were sure of ourselves and ready for anything. Can I go back? Be who I was before Tim McShane? Line up with these students, hear Professor Keeley’s discourse? Back in school and able to start again? Even if the hounds of hell are slobbering after me, they’re outside in the rain and I am in the Panthéon.

And so I stay, moving with them from painting to painting as Professor Keeley talks about Danton and Robespierre and points out how even the most laudable movements fall into violence and disorder, “until the cure is worse than the disease.”

The red-haired boy speaks up, continuing an argument it seems. “But we’re not the ones threatening violence,” he said. “It’s the unionists.”

Professor Keeley speaks to me. “Not sure if you follow Irish politics, but this young man…”

“James McCarthy,” the boy says.

“… makes a very valid point. Ireland’s very close to achieving Home Rule with our own parliament in control of all our domestic affairs but those who wish to keep Ireland united to England, many in the north of our country, say they will take up arms in opposition.”

“Which is why we must defend ourselves,” James McCarthy says. “Armed Irish volunteers will do more to achieve Home Rule than a hundred speeches in Parliament.”

“With the help of the Irish Republican Brotherhood.” Another voice speaks up.

“And the Irish Citizen Army,” a third says.

Professor Keeley replies, “I’m sure our American cousin is not interested in our military multiplicities.”

“Oh, but I am,” I say. “My father, his brothers, and his uncle were all part of the Fenian Brotherhood. They even invaded Canada.”

“Now that’s a tale I’d like to hear,” Professor Keeley says. “We’re having tea at the Irish College around the corner. Would you care to join us?”

So. I accept. I follow the students down a small diagonal street behind the Panthéon to a honey-colored building.

As I walk with Professor Keeley he tells me the story of the place.

“The college is on rue des Irlandais, but when Lawrence Kelly, a kinsman of yours perhaps, managed to purchase this property in 1769 it was rue du Cheval Vert—green, even then.”

“Old,” I say.

“The college itself started nearly two hundred years before that in 1578. During the two hundred years of the penal laws—” He stops. Looks at me to see if I know what he’s talking about.

“That bastard Cromwell,” I say. Always safe to blame Cromwell.

Professor Keeley nods. “No Catholic could own land, vote, serve in the army or the professions. Couldn’t be educated. Catholicism itself was outlawed. Mass forbidden, priests executed,” he says.

“Right,” I say. A memory pops up in my head. “A price on their heads. Bring in the head of a priest, and you’d be paid twenty pounds.”

A bit of history from Uncle Patrick and the vivid picture had stayed with me.

“Correct,” the professor says. “So the Irish Church established colleges like this all over Europe. It was Father John Lee who brought six students to study at the University of Paris. The king gave us a building that the Italians had abandoned just around the corner. College of the Lombards, it was called. There are Irish chieftains buried in a chapel there.”

I nod. The students are quite a bit ahead of us.

“Sorry. I do go on,” Professor Keeley says. He opens two big wooden doors and leads me across the threshold into the courtyard. As happens often in Paris, the rain stops just as the sun begins to set. A last ribbon of light filters through a line of pink clouds and falls onto the stone-flagged floor and the garden beyond.

“Lovely,” I say.

“It is,” he says, and points to the colonnade. “See, above each arch is the name of a diocese in Ireland. Our seminarians come from all over the country.”

“Seminarians?” I say. Understanding. “So this is a college for priests?”

“Of course,” he says.

“And you are a priest?” I ask, dreading the answer. Something very likable about this fellow but, Jesus Christ, I am not about to start fancying a priest.

“I’m not,” he says. “The rector kindly offers me rooms here. I’m sorting out the library for them.”

“But the others?” I say, pointing over at the students who followed us into the courtyard.

“Students at the Sorbonne. Some have government scholarships, others have parents with the money to send them away to school. A long and strong relationship between Ireland and France. Have you much Irish history, Madame Kelly?”

“Not as much as I should.”

An Irish college in Paris for hundreds of years? I’d never imagined such a thing. This wasn’t Auld Ireland, the white-haired sorrowful mother. Who were these people? I smile and say, “It’s ‘mademoiselle’ and I’d like to learn more.”

“Ah,” he says. “Well, let me just say that in very dire times in Ireland, places like this provided refuge. King James himself and his followers lodged with Irish priests at the College of the Lombards. Many officers of the Irish Brigade…” He stopped. “Sorry. This means nothing to you.”

“Faugh a Ballagh. Clear the Way and Remember Fontenoy.”

“Amazing,” he says. “You know about the Irish who fought with the French and defeated the British at the Battle of Fontenoy!”

“I know about the Irish Brigade James Mulligan started in Chicago to fight for the Union. I couldn’t forget their motto. My father and my uncles all served in the Brigade or in the Irish Legion.”

“Remarkable,” he says.

“Yes, well, there were Irish on the other side too. In fact, my cousin married one of the Rebel Sons of Erin, the Tenth Tennessee regiment.” I stop. “Which probably means nothing to you.”

“Please continue,” he says. “But first, our tea.”

We go into a parlor—small fireplace, lots of wooden chairs. A young woman student brings out a tray of mugs—crockery, not the delicate china even the Hôtel Jeanne d’Arc offers. No pastries here, but thick slices of brown bread covered with butter and jam. A good feed, like Granny Honora and Mam would’ve given us after school.

And all that English! I didn’t realize how I miss back-and-forth conversation in my own language. Wonderful not to have to strain for meaning, just let myself go along, pulling in the words, no translation needed. I could be sitting with Mam and her friends around the stove in Piper’s grocery store, listening to them batting pieces of history at each other, running through the litany of who’s got work and who’s expecting a baby and who’s getting ready to die. How I’d dismissed all their chatter and how good this version sounds to me now. I meet Antoinette from Dublin and Sheila from Limerick. Professor Keeley acts as a kind of ringmaster, bringing in the quiet ones.

“May,” he says to a girl, “how is the translation going?” Then to me, “Miss Kelly, meet May Quinlivan from County Tyrone, Carrickmore—the Big Rock. She’s putting Victor Hugo’s
Les Misérables
into Irish.”

“Not the whole thing,” May says. “Only passages.”

“Well,” I say, “I live next door to Victor Hugo’s old house. It’s a museum now. You could visit it. Get some inspiration from standing in his study. Come by and we’ll have tea in my room afterwards.” The words jump out of my mouth. I’ve never asked anyone to my place.

May hesitates, but says, “Thank you. I’d like that.”

And then I say, “You’d be very welcome too, Professor.”

“Thank you,” he says.

And the slobbering hounds pursuing me slope away—for now.

*   *   *

So. They come. May, James McCarthy, and Professor Keeley, who says I should call him Peter. He knows more about Victor Hugo than the woman running the museum.

“A fussy fellow,” Professor Keeley says. “Designed and carved all the furniture himself. Imagine!”

Amazed that anyone could care that much about his surroundings.

Not sure if he can come to my room for tea. Shy. James McCarthy whispers to me, “Ask the professor again.” I do—twice more. He finally says he’ll join us.

“See,” James says. “We Irish need multiple invitations. Politeness dictates.”

“One room?” Professor Keeley says as he follows the students into my place.

And I very much wish my bed isn’t stuck in the alcove. Not quite respectable. But James McCarthy walks right over to the fire, where I’ve set out a selection of sweets on a small table. I’m ready. Spent two weeks’ worth of tips on the pastries and new cups and saucers. A bit worried about the tea.

“I could only find Lipton’s,” I say as I pour from my new teapot.

“We’ll have to get you a supply of Barry’s Gold Blend,” Peter says.

“My granny’s favorite,” I say.

He smiles. Relaxing. Good.

“Milk? Sugar?” I ask him.

I spoon a generous mound into his cup but then splash too much milk in and tea overflows, filling the saucer and spilling onto the table.

“Sorry,” I say, setting down the milk jug, looking for a cloth.

Now Tim McShane would’ve yelled “you clumsy” whatever at me and even my brother Mike might’ve harrumphed but Peter says “No bother,” and mops up the mess with his handkerchief.

We laugh.

“Er, I’ll have milk and sugar too,” James McCarthy says.

“Oh, yes,” I say, and pass him the jug. I see James look at May and then back at Peter and me.

“And which is your favorite of Hugo’s works?” Peter asks me.

“The Hunchback
,
”
I say. “Though
Les Misérables
is very good too.” Get the titles in fast. Learned that in Sister Veronica’s English class. I did read the novels. Well, almost. Turned to the end to see what happened. A lot of dying, just like in the stories of Auld Ireland. But Hugo’s famous and lives on my block so I say, “Great writer.”

“Interesting how he began as a devout Catholic royalist and ended up an anticlerical republican,” Peter says.

“My type of fellow,” James McCarthy says.

“You might want to join us for a tour of the Hôtel de Cluny in two weeks,” Peter says. “Only a few students with summer coming. But there’s a Tudor connection and of course Hugo’s play
Marie Tudor
gave a more sympathetic picture of her than the ‘Bloody Mary’ of Protestant propaganda,” Peter says.

“Of course,” I say, though I’ve no idea what he’s talking about. But he’s invited me. Yippee.

“All the Tudors were pretty bloody to us Irish,” James McCarthy is saying.

“The point of my lecture,” Peter says.

“The Hôtel de Cluny,” I repeat. At least I know enough not to ask if it’s a five-star, though why the French want to confuse tourists by calling mansions and public buildings hotels, I don’t know.

So. Paris looking well for herself on this June morning as I follow the professor and his students down boulevard Saint-Michel to Hôtel de Cluny. A palace built on Roman ruins, Peter tells us, and now a museum of medieval art. We start in the basement, where Peter shows us the ruins of the Roman baths. He reminds the group that Ireland’s name, Hibernia, came from Julius Caesar’s plan to use Ireland as winter quarters for soldiers. “Hibernation.”

“The Romans never came,” Peter says, “but the name stuck.”

Peter tells us that Henry VIII’s sister Mary Tudor lived here after her husband King Louis XII died. Only a three-month marriage. She was eighteen. He was in his fifties. Henry planned to get hold of the throne of France. But no heir and Mary Tudor defied Henry and married an English soldier in the chapel Peter shows us. He tells us both Boleyn sisters were at the French court. “Having affairs,” May whispers to me. It was the Tudors who did Ireland in, I learn. The other invaders—Vikings, Normans—became Irish, but when Henry set up his own Church all Catholics were rebels. Destroyed them and Elizabeth was even worse.

We leave Hôtel de Cluny and start down the boulevard Saint-Michel—the “Boul Mich,” as the students call it—heading back toward the college. The students drift off, and I walk with Peter.

But I don’t notice until we circle the Panthéon that we are alone.

On the corner of rue des Irlandais, the proprietor of a small restaurant is just opening the doors for lunch.

“Would you have time for a meal?” I ask Peter.

He doesn’t answer.

The sign says
L’ESTRAPADE
, the same name as the street, then
CUISINE TRADITIONNEL BASCO BEARNAISE
written underneath.

“‘Basco’?”
I ask.

“Basque,” Peter explains. “A section between France and Spain in the Pyrenees with its own very distinct language. Looking for independence, like Ireland.”

I steer him inside before he can object.

“Bonjour, Professeur,”
the owner says as he sits us down at one of just five or six tables.

“Nice fellow,” Peter says, “and the prix fixe is very reasonable.”

I nod but am already planning how to slip money to the owner to pay for lunch. I begin to tell Peter how grateful I am for the tour and how I realize I’ve barely scratched the surface of Paris.