The Empire Trilogy (50 page)

“We were too frightened to go down.”

Unable for a moment to recall the events of the past few hours, the Major waited with instinctive dread for consciousness to start the first few rolling pebbles that would generate an avalanche of remembered disasters. Then, as one memory after another hurtled down on him, he heaved his drugged limbs over the side of the bed and massaged his face wearily. He stood up and for a while looked in vain for his dressing-gown. Then he realized that he was still wearing it.

“I'll go down and see. You'd better wait here and lock the door if you hear anyone coming. Get into my bed or you'll catch cold.”

It seemed to him that there would never be an end to this blundering through the darkened, empty corridors of the Majestic. What time was it? Surely it should be light by now! But the black windows he passed were lit only by the reflected flame of his candle.

After the darkness of the corridor the study seemed glaringly bright. Still holding the candle and oblivious of the drips of hot wax that spilled over his clenched fingers, the Major stood in the doorway and looked about with shocked eyes at the bizarre scene of destruction that greeted him. At his feet the floor was littered with broken glass and tarnished silver cups. A framed cartoon by Spy which had once hung over the desk lay on the floor, its glass cobwebbed; the desk itself had been swept clean except for an upturned ink-well which was still leaking a steady black drip on to the dusty carpet. Even the air showed traces of the room's chaos—hazy with white powder, turf-ash scattered half across the floor from the embers of the fire, in which, moreover, a man's shoe lay smouldering. Beyond the fireplace a Welsh dresser had tilted forward to unload a shelf of books and half a row of dusty upturned brandy glasses on to the floor. As he watched, another glass crept forward, slithered off the topmost shelf, turned slowly in the air and dissolved in a bright puff as it struck the edge of the dresser.

In the middle of all this confusion Sarah was sitting, alone. She said calmly: “Go away, Brendan. Things are difficult enough already.” And then, as the Major neither moved nor spoke, she added impatiently: “Edward is a fool, an absurd and pitiful creature. Mother of God! And as for my father... He seemed to think that he was actually going to kill Edward...Of course he couldn't even do that successfully.”

Sarah was sitting with her legs drawn up beneath her in a deep leather armchair. Around her shoulders she had swirled a vast khaki blanket which hung to the floor in an irregular cone. One naked arm clasped the blanket to her chin. The Major's eye, stung by the nakedness of this arm, travelled away and was promptly stung again, more severely: this time by a door beside the desk that stood open to an adjoining room. He had never seen this door open before. Within he could glimpse an iron bed and a tangle of dirty sheets.

“Was anyone hurt?”

“Hurt?” cried Sarah gaily. “If they had managed to hurt each other perhaps they wouldn't have looked so ridiculous...Why is everyone here so ridiculous? Yes, you're ridiculous too, goggling at me with your sheep's eyes...Can you guess what happened? Did he cut Edward's throat? At least that would have made some sense...but no, not even that! He kept shouting that his honour was besmirched...as if he had any honour to begin with! He said that Edward had bought me with thirty pieces of silver...Naturally Edward couldn't find a word to say to all this. Oh, they make me sick, both of them. ‘Now look here, Mr Devlin, can't we be sensible about this?' Ah, and my father was drunk, of course, or else it would never have occurred to him to assault one of the gentry, a member of the quality, mind you, a Protestant gentleman...one of his own customers at the bank. My God! Can you imagine his daring? Oh yes, and Edward... don't think that he was any better. He was worse...he was ready to grovel too...and I used to think he was a man with dignity, shows what a poor little fool I am. You should have seen them fighting, you'd have died laughing. They make me sick!”

Sarah's face had turned white and against this pallor her eyes seemed black and very large. As if to give substance to her words, she leaned forward, hanging her head over the arm of the chair as if she were, in fact, about to be sick. The Major took a step forward to comfort her, but stopped again. Lying folded on the arm of the sofa his eyes encountered an oblong of grey silk that might have been a woman's dress. He stood there, painfully absorbing every detail; when he turned his head away every tiniest thread was stitched into his memory. He was certain that Sarah was naked under her blanket. On her naked arm, near the shoulder, he noticed the blue mark of a bruise and in his mind's eye he saw Bolton standing beside her chair at the ball, his finger and thumb whitening around her soft skin.

“Where are they now?”

Sarah lifted her white face and stared at him without comprehension. Eventually she said: “Edward took him home when they'd finished fighting. I wouldn't go with them. What d'you think? They're probably the best of friends by now. Even before he left he was beginning to apologize. ‘You'll understand my position, Mr Spencer...' and Edward was saying that he, my father, had every right, that he understood what it was to have daughters...Edward was terrified of him... I've never seen anyone look so shaken and guilty and wretched. It was disgusting!”

The Major stepped forward and knelt by the fire to pick the shoe out of the ashes; the leather sole was blackened and charred. He blew a blizzard of white ash off it and set it down indecisively in the hearth. A deluge of hot wax scalded his fingers, reminding him that he was still holding the candle. He threw it into the fire and picked the wax off his knuckles with a dull resentment, staring at his fingers. Sarah was weeping bitterly by now, but the Major continued to pick at his waxed knuckles. Then, when at last he had finished, he went to stand over Sarah's chair and took hold of her naked arm and tried to kiss her wet face. As she resisted he began to struggle with her, wrenching at the blanket that covered her: “You dirty whore!” He was certain that she was naked beneath the blanket. She struck him heavily in the face. He stepped back surprised, and after a moment said: “I'm terribly sorry, Sarah.”

But Sarah did not seem annoyed. She merely said with indifference: “That's all right, Brendan. But now leave for heaven's sake. I couldn't stand another scene tonight.”

“Can't I take you home?”

“No. I telephoned a friend to come for me. He'll be here in a minute.”

His room was in darkness and he no longer had the candle he had taken downstairs. It was not until he had reached his bed and groped for the bedclothes that he remembered the twins.

“Are you awake?”

“Yes.”

“It was nothing serious. You can go back to bed now. A bookcase fell over in your father's study.”

“Can't we stay? It's almost morning and our beds will be freezing.”

“Certainly not.”

“Just for a little while?”

“No, of course not. Go back to your rooms.”

But the twins made no move and the Major was too weary to argue. For a while he stood in the darkness thinking of nothing, then he took off his dressing-gown and got into bed. “Well, just for a little while.”

It was comforting, he had to admit, to have a warm body beside him. Presently he had two warm bodies beside him, for one of the twins had slipped out of bed, around it, and in at the other side. He formulated in his mind the words of rebuke that would send them both back to their cold beds but his vocal chords seemed to be paralysed by weariness and despair—and so it was in the middle of this chaste, warm, heavenly sandwich that the broken-hearted Major finally fell asleep. A faint smell of wine and perspiration presently began to perfume the air around this peacefully sleeping bed, for not only had the twins forgotten to say their prayers, they had also forgotten to wash themselves.

By now, at last, it was beginning to get light at the Majestic. The breeze from the sea which had chilled the few remaining guests during the early hours had dropped again and all was still. In a few minutes it would be daybreak: the rising sun would warm the weather-beaten stone that faced the sea.

Presently Mr O'Flaherty arrived in his trap with the three lads who worked for him. He was the local caterer who had been commissioned to provide breakfast in the ballroom (the other firm of caterers having returned to Dublin after supper). He had retired early the previous evening in order to have his wits about him at breakfast-time and thus no news of the outcome of the ball had yet reached him. Certainly he was surprised to find everything so quiet—but that was hardly any of his business. By now the guests would have been sporting and dancing all night. Doubtless they were rather tired.

Laden with baskets of eggs and trays of bacon, the boys staggered after him as he made his dignified way round to the kitchens—which had been left in a shocking state (he clicked his tongue in disapproval). Mr O'Flaherty was a portly man, very red-faced, a Sinn Feiner by conviction but disapproving of violence (indeed, of any kind of excess). He disapproved of a good many things—at least, in general terms; in particular cases he was inclined to be tolerant. He disapproved of the Anglo-Irish “quality,” who seemed to him idle, luxurious, and very often slow-witted into the bargain. He disapproved of Hunt Balls and similar shenanigans. But he had nevertheless a job to do and he intended to do it.

“Look at the filth of it...That's Dubliners for ye!”

While the lads were cleaning up the kitchens he went upstairs to fetch the silver. For it seemed that ordinary china was not good enough for these people: they must eat out of silver dishes and drink their coffee from silver pots. Edward had shown him where to find this glistening treasure and handed him the key to the cupboard where it lay. Mr O'Flaherty could not resist a momentary feeling of pride at being trusted in this manner, and perhaps this did a little to palliate the unpleasant thought that while Mr Spencer and his guests were eating off silver there were people in the West of Ireland with hardly a bite to eat of any sort.

The eggs were broken into cups ready for the pan, the rashers spread out in leaves beside the mounds of kidneys, the cauldrons of water brought to the boil for the silver pots of coffee or tea. When everything was ready Mr O'Flaherty took two of the lads upstairs with him, warm plates stacked up to their eyes, leaving the third to start the frying and toasting.

With a clean chef's hat set firmly on his head he advanced on the ballroom with short dignified steps. He was disturbed, however, by the unnatural quiet of the place. There was no sound in the corridor except, once, the distant scream of a cat. The walls gave back that special echo that one only seems to hear in deserted rooms. Still, rather than lose face in front of the lads by showing that he was perturbed, he made no comment. His face remained as grave and impassive as if everything had been perfectly normal. Besides, with these people one never knew how they would behave. Even if (and the possibility had occurred to him) he found them lying scattered all over the floor “stiff with the drink” his job was not to pass comments but to serve breakfast to those who could revive themselves sufficiently to partake of it—and this was what he intended to do. But in the ballroom there wasn't a soul.

Mr. O'Flaherty advanced into the middle of the floor with measured steps, his face still studiously impassive. Behind him the eyes that peered over the stacks of plates were positively bulging with surprise and wonderment. Ah, but now he had to look down at his feet for he was crunching through a litter of broken glass; in fact, there was broken glass everywhere and wilted flowers and cigar ends and heaven only knew what else! “What a rabble, did ye ever see the like?” he thought.

“Tell Christy to stop the frying till we see how much we'll be needing...Then bring up the dishes, toast, tea and coffee, as much as he's done.”

He took a cautious look outside on the terrace, which was also littered with broken glass. “What were they doing at all?” he wondered. “Was it a battle they had, or what?” The sun had risen by now. It was going to be a lovely day. The smell of the countryside in the spring...he took a deep, contented breath, but then remembered his duty and, shaking his head regretfully, stepped inside once more to organize the boys at the buffet tables and tell them where to stand.

By seven o'clock there was still no sign of anyone wanting breakfast. The first dishes, though kept warm for a while with hot water, had had to be discarded and replenished, though it was a shame to waste good food.

“Stand up straight, Paddy, and stop your fidgeting or you'll get what's what.”

Of the three of them only he was permitted to move. But still, it was hard on them standing there with nothing to do.

Presently, however, a peahen came in through the French windows with nervous steps, looking for the long-tailed blue-green magnificence that had been her mate. She picked around for a while amid the broken glass, watched by the three silent men in white hats and aprons. At length Mr O'Flaherty tore off a corner of buttered toast and, bending with a sigh, offered it to her in the palm of his plump hand. She took it and ate it distractedly, a faint breeze ruffling the biscuit-coloured feathers of her breast. Then she hurried fretfully back to the terrace to continue her search. She was Mr O'Flaherty's only customer that morning.

It was almost noon when the Major awoke. The maid was opening the curtains to let in a cascade of golden sunshine and the twins were still in bed with him, giggling fit to burst. For an instant he and the maid stared at each other in silent horror; then he had rolled the girls out of bed in a flash and with as much bravado as he could manage sent them on their way with a ringing slap on their fat bottoms. A furtive glance at the maid, however, was enough to tell him that this playfulness had, if anything, made the situation worse.