The Rebels of Ireland (58 page)

It seemed to be a satire on the popular travel books—a curious
tale of a man named Gulliver, who would make a series of voyages to imaginary lands—one island inhabited by tiny folk, another by giants, yet another ruled by rational horses; he even had a series of sketches about a visit to a flying island.

“We were choosing names for some of the curious places and creatures encountered in these travels,” Sheridan explained. “For names are important. We already have, for instance, Lilliput as the island where the little people dwell; and our rational horses are called Houyhnhnms—doesn't that sound just like a horse's neigh? But come, Jonathan, set us some more challenges.”

Encouraged by his friend's enthusiasm, Swift obligingly read out a few passages, and the company set their minds to work.

“We should ransack every corner of our imaginations,” Sheridan declared. “Words from English and French, Latin or Greek, onomatopoeia, even Irish. Did you know that Dean Swift has some Gaelic, Garret? He does not speak it so well as you or I, but he has studied our native tongue, to his credit.”

The flying island Walsh and Swift thought should be Laputa. They also prevailed when, for the loutish creatures who annoy the rational horses, they chose the name of Yahoo. Sheridan, however, came into his own when a name was required for the small, mouse-like creatures that the Yahoos like to eat.”

“The Latin for mouse is
mus
, and the Irish word is
luc
. Therefore, I propose that these unfortunate little fellows be called
luhimuhs
. Can't you just see the poor things?”

Swift was delighted with this. But the most ingenious choice was made a little while later.

“There is a land which Gulliver visits,” he explained, “where all those who wish to be received by the king must not only, in an oriental fashion, prostrate themselves, but must crawl towards him as he sits upon his throne, licking the dirt from the floor as they do so. What are we to call that?”

This was followed by a profound silence. Walsh knitted his
brows; Sheridan gazed into space, lost in thought. Finally, Garret Smith spoke.

“The Irish for slave—and any man who does such a thing is a slave—is
triall
, and the Irish for evil and dirt is
droch
and
drib
. So you could call it Trildrogdrib.”

They all looked at each other. It was brilliant.

Then, at the far end of the room, a sudden chuckle came from the table by the wall, and the corpse sat up. “Excellent!” said the corpse.

“By God,” cried Sheridan, “you've woken O'Toole.”

When Sheridan had told Garret that he was in the very heart and soul of ancient Ireland, he had not entirely misspoken. It was a genial party that sat down to eat that evening. The talk, admittedly, was carried on mainly in English, but if O'Toole, for instance, quoted some Irish verses, Sheridan would like as not join in, with Dean Swift and Walsh nodding approval; and for a few minutes thereafter, the conversation of the whole table might transfer into Gaelic, during which the two women who had appeared with the meal from the kitchen would like as not join in. Only Tidy, who had been deputed to act as butler, would remain silent, as he himself had never wished to speak the Irish language and could never understand why the Dean troubled to do so. He also managed to give Garret a few contemptuous looks, which clearly conveyed his opinion that the young man should be waiting at the table, not sitting at it—and which nobody noticed except Garret himself.

The centre of attention was O'Toole.

Fortunatus had not encountered Art O'Toole before. The man was quite young, still in his early thirties. A fair, rangy fellow, eyes like pools of blue water, a long, thin face with a wide mouth and high, protruding cheekbones: in Walsh's imagination, he took shape as a fair-haired violin. During much of the year, he lived with his
family up in the Wicklow Mountains, but in the summer and early autumn he would take to the roads, as the poet bards of Ireland had done since ancient times, and be welcomed with respect wherever he went. Usually, in modest farms and hamlets, he would perform his art for the native Irish, who could only provide him with food and shelter for the night—and he surely only did what he did for the love of the thing. Sometimes at such
ceili
gatherings, he would sing, tapping his foot to the rhythm while a fiddler or two accompanied him. Or often he would tell stories from the old Irish folk tales. But best of all, if he was in the mood, accompanying himself on a small harp he carried with him, he would quietly sing verses of his own composition.

There were a number of poets of this kind on the island. The greatest of them was Turlough Carolan, a poet musician who had been blind from his birth. “Blind as mighty Homer,” Sheridan had once described him to Fortunatus, “and with the most phenomenal memory I have ever encountered. As for his verses, as one who is familiar with all the classical Greeks, I should rank some of them with Pindar himself.” Carolan lived in the region and had been to Quilca several times. O'Toole was his junior by twenty years, but in the opinion of many, might one day be his equal.

During the meal, the poet talked sparingly, reserving himself for his performance afterwards; but when he did speak, it was in a pleasant, easy manner, and it was clear to Fortunatus that, as well as an encyclopaedic knowledge of Irish poetry, he was well acquainted with classical literature and even some recent English authors. He drank a little aqua vitae. “I offer you wine, Art,” Sheridan said, “but I know you prefer usquebaugh.”

“I do,” confessed the poet, “for I find that if I drink wine, my brain becomes clouded, whereas the water of life has little effect upon me, except somewhat to sharpen the faculties.”

“That,” Sheridan responded happily, “is exactly what claret does for me.”

O'Toole spoke to Swift with a marked respect, and to Walsh in
a courteous manner, saying that he had heard much good of his brother Terence. He also spoke a few words to young Garret, who only replied in monosyllables, and Walsh supposed that the young man might be shy. But at one point, he did address the poet directly.

“What part of Wicklow do you come from?” he asked.

“From up in the hills. On the road to Glendalough. Rathconan is the name of the place.”

“Would you know the Brennans there?”

A faint cloud seemed to pass across O'Toole's face.

“There is a family of that name there.” He looked at Garret carefully. “Have you a connection with Rathconan?”

Garret stared at him.

“You could say so.”

“Ah.” O'Toole nodded thoughtfully. “The green eyes. That would explain it.” But he made no further comment.

When the meal was done, he moved to a chair apart and took up his harp.

“First,” he announced, “some music.”

First he played a short jig, then a soft old Irish tune, so that Fortunatus assumed this was a prelude to an Irish tale. But then, to his surprise, O'Toole suddenly began to play a lively Italian piece which, to his even greater astonishment, he recognised as an adaptation of a violin concerto by Vivaldi. Seeing his amazement, Swift leant over to him.

“I have heard blind Carolan make an Italian composition of his own in just the same style,” he whispered. “Your Irish musicians could be the equal of any in Europe.”

Having proved a point, O'Toole skilfully returned to some Irish airs, and after three or four of these, he paused, while Sheridan brought him some usquebaugh. By this time, the women from the kitchen had also come back into the room, together with the boy from the stable and the men from the farm, so the whole household was present. “Now,” the poet said quietly, “a tale or two.” And sometimes singing, sometimes reciting, he wove the magical tales of
old Ireland, of Cuchulainn, and Finn Mac Cumhaill, of ancient kings, and saints, and mysterious happenings. Most of the time he spoke in Irish, but once or twice in English, and always with the greatest ease. Apart from the occasional sip of his drink, he did not pause for over an hour.

“You will be celebrated, Art, long after we are forgotten,” said Sheridan warmly when he paused at last. For several minutes, the company drank quietly, the conversation little more than a murmur. Then O'Toole ran his fingers lightly over his harp again. “A composition,” he announced, “of my own. I call it, ‘The River Boyne.'”

For if the Irish Catholic cause had been utterly lost at the Battle of the Boyne, it had certainly not been forgotten. How could it be, when Protestant landlords occupied all the stolen Catholic land, and the law added insult to injury every day of a Catholic's life? Small wonder, then, that the poets sang haunting, mournful songs to the Ireland that was lost, conjured visions of Ireland restored to its ancient glory, and dreamed dreams of the day when that should be. Above all, however, it was the sadness, the tender yearning for the Jacobite cause, that the harpers like Carolan expressed. And it was just such a lovely lament—for the bloodshed by the magical River Boyne, for the loss of Limerick, and the Wild Geese long since fled—that Art O'Toole sang now.

And it touched them all, Irish and English alike. Fortunatus looked around him and saw the serving women with tears in their eyes; Swift, silent but clearly moved; Sheridan, eyes half closed, half smiling, like an angel; even Tidy seemed thoughtful, aware, perhaps, of the beauty of the music. But it was Garret Smith's face that Walsh's eyes rested upon.

The transformation was remarkable. Gone was the self-absorbed, sulky look that he had mostly worn before. His face had relaxed; he was gazing at the poet with shining eyes, his mouth half open, rapt.

Whatever the young man's faults, thought Fortunatus, young Garret had genius: there was no question. He really belongs at Trinity, he thought, and Terence and I could send him there if only he
weren't a Catholic. But as a Catholic he can't go, nor enter the learned professions for which nature so obviously intended him. Instead, he must be a frustrated and discontented grocer's apprentice. He shook his head at the terrible waste of it all. He thought of the conversation he'd had with the worthy priest and wondered what Garret's feelings might be for the servant girl, illiterate no doubt, that he'd been busy seducing. At this very moment, very possibly, the poor girl was being taken back to her family up in the Wicklow Mountains. To the very place, it now turned out, where O'Toole himself lived. What strange coincidences. Was there some hidden meaning here? What did it all mean?

Nobody rose early the next day. In the middle of the morning, Fortunatus came down to find Garret sitting on a bench outside, reading
Macbeth,
and eating an oatcake. Sheridan and Swift were talking quietly down by the water.

At noon, O'Toole appeared, took a little light refreshment, and said that he must be on his way as he had ten miles to walk to the village where he was next expected. Sheridan and he had a brief talk together at which, Fortunatus had no doubt, a guinea or two had been bestowed. Then all the party said their farewells and gave the thanks that the poet rightly took as his due. Garret murmured something to him in Irish, which Walsh did not catch, and the poet answered with a calm nod. Then, with a long, loping stride, he was gone.

They were not to dine until late in the afternoon. Sheridan and Swift clearly wished to continue their conversation alone, so when Garret had finished his reading, Walsh took him off for a short walk. He tried to draw the young man out about his reactions to O'Toole the night before. Garret said little, but it seemed to Fortunatus that there was a suppressed excitement in his manner, as though he had made some secret discovery or made a great decision. What that might be, however, Walsh could not guess.

It was later, during the meal, when Fortunatus brought up the other matter that had been on his mind.

“I need your advice,” he told Swift and Sheridan.

“And why is that?” his host asked amiably.