When Daddy Comes Home (25 page)

T
he sun shone on the day of my father’s funeral.

My friend’s phone had been constantly ringing with calls from the local town people with sincere commiserations and my friends in England with quite different comments. One had arranged to fly over to give me support and I was relieved that there would be someone there who would understand how I felt.

My uncle, whom I had not seen since I was fourteen, was due to make an appearance along with his sons. I had rung them the day after his death and spoken to my uncle for the first time in over thirty years.

It was obvious that this was the funeral of a popular man – ‘Good old Joe’, a man still possessed of good looks and charm right up into his eighties; a man whom the town would turn out in droves for; a man they wanted to honour as they paid their last respects.

Joe’s photograph had appeared in local newspapers alongside an article praising his triumph at yet another amateur golf tournament and his legendary skill with the snooker cue. My father’s unpredictable temper, which had been shown in flashes when he had lost a game of snooker, missed a stroke at golf or received some imagined slight, was to be forgotten.
It was Joe Maguire, with his infectious smile and silver-tongued charm, that they would all remember.

How did his younger brother recall him, I wondered. What stories had he told his sons – my father’s nephews and my cousins?

I dressed carefully, not as a sign of respect for him but as protective armour for me. A black suit was donned, matching shoes and bag had been chosen, make-up carefully applied and my now blonde highlighted hair washed and blow dried. Would they recognize me? After all, there was little sign of Antoinette, the child who had once been me.

No longer did she haunt me; no longer did I see her face, feel her fears and share her nightmares. It was three years since I had looked in the mirror and seen her eyes looking back at me. But I knew that deep in my mind in that corner we keep hidden even from ourselves, she was still there and had never left. That day I sensed her presence beside me. I felt her desire to be remembered and understood her anger at her inability to hate the man who had destroyed her.

Once, many years ago, my father’s relatives had been Antoinette’s too, but she had been banished from their hearts when they had chosen to stand by her father. For them I felt nothing. The pain of missing them was healed and the scars left by their rejection were well hidden. Now for the first time since I had been a child I was going to have to confront them.

The mirror showed the reflection of Toni, the successful businesswoman. On her face was a determined expression showing that she was the only person they were going to see.

The minister who was to take the service was the same one who had buried my mother and the one I had talked to when my memories had threatened to overwhelm me three years
ago when my mother had died. He had not wanted to take this service, giving the fact that my father had moved outside his parish as an excuse but I had pleaded with him to do so. I knew he recalled those days when I had stayed with my mother at the hospice during her final weeks of her life. I had sat at her bedside when the cancer that she had been fighting for nearly two years finally won. It was there that my father’s daily visits had almost shattered the protective barrier I had built against Antoinette, the ghost of my childhood. The minister knew only too well how I had come to him distraught, thinking that I was regressing into that frightened child again. Through me, he knew the man my father had been, the harm he had done, the lives he had destroyed and his lack of remorse.

I needed his presence, I told him. His strength and essential goodness would give me the support I needed to act out the role of dutiful daughter for the last time. He knew without my telling him that with this funeral service I wanted the past buried. And we both recalled my mother’s cheerless funeral when my father had refused to invite anyone back to the house after the service and would not allow refreshments to be arranged anywhere else. That day the mourners who had turned out to support me had returned home after the funeral service without even being offered a cup of tea. My father had gone to the pub. It was a bleakness of a farewell unheard of in hospitable Ireland. Not for my isolated mother the offer from the British Legion to host a reception. It was as though the years she had lived in Ireland had never existed.

‘Good old Joe’ walked away from such an act of disloyalty with his reputation intact. For wasn’t he the poor widower who had nursed his wife through years of illness? And hadn’t
he done that with little help from a daughter seemingly well off? A daughter who seldom left England and had only arrived to help with her mother once she was safely in the hospice?

The town was determined that his funeral would be a very different affair. Some of the town’s folk were already gathered outside the funeral parlour when I arrived. Out of respect for the woman they believed to be the chief mourner, they stood aside allowing me to enter first. They would, I knew give me several minutes before they followed, time to say a last farewell and compose myself.

I climbed the steps of the funeral parlour as I had three years ago and entered the small room where its rows of seats had prayer books placed on each chair. I looked at my father lying in his open coffin and felt nothing except a bleak sadness at the end of this era.

He lay as though asleep; thick hair was swept back from a face tinged with colour and his teeth now replaced showed through lips that were creased into a slight smile. Once again his face was handsome, for the mortician had worked with skilful hands. I had a chilling feeling that he was still there, dreaming of happy times with no troubled thoughts to disturb him. Somehow I felt that his spirit still lingered, scorning me for the last time.

The day before I had given the keys of my father’s house to one of his friends with the request that he choose appropriate clothes to bury him in. I could not bring myself to go into his bedroom, open his cupboards and touch his belongings. Not before I knew he had finally gone.

His friend had chosen well. My father wore a grey worsted suit complete with freshly laundered handkerchief tucked into breast pocket while an army tie was firmly
knotted under the collar of his carefully ironed cream shirt. His medals, won during the war, were proudly displayed as a reminder that he had been one of the brave thousands of Northern Irish men who had volunteered to fight for their country.

In death, ‘Good old Joe’ was a dignified man, ready to receive his visitors for the last time and I, his daughter, stood at my expected place by his side.

My father’s relatives, led in by my uncle. For the first time since I was fourteen we were in the same room. Although my uncle was shorter and slighter than my father, he bore such an uncanny resemblance to him that I found it unnerving. The same luxuriant white hair was swept back from an unreadable face, in the style of his brother and their father before them. He stared into the coffin and whatever emotion he felt as he looked at the brother that once he had admired and loved was hidden.

As he turned to walk away I placed myself firmly in front of him.

‘Hello, Uncle,’ I said. ‘Thank you for coming.’ Then I stretched my hand out to receive his.

His eyes refused to meet mine as our hands limply touched in a simulation of a handshake. Still not looking directly at me he muttered, ‘Hello.’

Without comment or commiseration he continued walking to the opposite side of the funeral parlour. His son and nephews followed and I knew that nothing had changed.

Had I hoped for a family reconciliation? Maybe in my subconscious I had. Instead I placed a neutral smile on my face and greeted the next mourner who was waiting to come to the coffin. One by one they came, bent over it and looked at my father’s face before taking their seats. The room was full
of hushed voices and the odd handkerchief could be seen wiping away a tear.

The funeral director, a tall well-built man who had shown kindness when he had arranged my mother’s funeral, sensed that something was wrong and went to inform my father’s relatives that there were refreshments arranged for after the funeral and he hoped to see them there. Politely but firmly they made their excuses. They had come for one reason only – to see Joe, their brother, uncle, and cousin, buried. His daughter was to remain the outsider.

Separated from them not just by the aisle but by a gulf that the years had not breached, I felt the momentary loss of what could have been. Standing alone, I looked forward at my father’s coffin. His face seemed to look up at me and in my imagination his smile now mocked me. I heard the words he had uttered so many times.

‘People won’t love you, Antoinette, if you tell. Everyone will blame you.’

And there, a few feet away from me, was the family who did.

My friend, seeing I was not going to be joined by my family, came to my side, smiled gently at me to show love and support, and my courage returned. I shut out that voice from the past, stilled the regrets I had not allowed myself to feel for thirty years, and began the process of greeting the rest of the many locals who had turned up to show their respect for my father and their support for me, his daughter.

My attention was caught by a woman who stood alone as though wanting privacy for her thoughts. In her early seventies with short grey blonde hair styled into the nape of her neck and a well-cut dark suit showing off her slim figure, she had an air of elegance about her which made her stand out in the small funeral parlour. She had an upright stance; age had
not made her spine hunch with the onset of years. The fine cobweb of lines on her face on another day I knew would reflect humour and character but now only sadness showed as her gaze lingered on the coffin.

Her grief touched me but when she caught my eye I saw apprehension mix with her sorrow. I smiled as reassuringly as I could and she summoned up her courage to approach. I touched her hand briefly for I knew that speech had temporarily deserted her. She, thinking I was distressed as well, quietly sat nearby and picked up a prayer book.

Words could wait until later, I thought, and remained standing until the minister walked in. A hush fell on the room as he took his place and turned to face the gathering and the service began.

When it finally came to the end, the coffin was sealed and I knew that I had looked at my father’s face for the last time. The voice that had tormented me over the decades was finally silenced and now I could go to the graveyard to see his coffin lowered into the ground.

That day might have been the day of his funeral to everyone there, but for me it was my goodbye to Ireland. That was the last day I would go to the cemetery and that was the day that I smiled at my father’s friends, who had liked his act but never known the man, for the final time. That was a grave that I would never visit and never attend to; the grass would grow over it and my parents lying together for eternity would finally be forgotten.

My father had left instructions which my mother had signed before her death that he was to share her grave. Her coffin had been dug up, covered by a mound of imitation grass to hide it from the mourners’ eyes and laid by the side of the open grave. During the short ceremony at the cemetery when
the coffin was lowered into the ground, I defied convention and stood beside it. My father’s relatives with bowed heads took their place on the side opposite.

Only I knew that the flowers I had placed on the coffin that day, the last ones I would ever place, were for my mother. For I still mourned the woman that he had corrupted, still missed the person she could have been and still grieved for the relationship we had never had.

That day his coffin would be placed into the ground first and to my satisfaction hers would cover it. Now she would have the upper hand for eternity I thought wryly.

The short interment ceremony came to an end and the coffin was ready to be covered by the soil. My uncle had already scattered a handful on the wooden box. The following morning, the women would arrive to admire the flowers that covered the grave, testament to the popularity of the dead man.

I would not be with them.

I watched my relatives drive away and knew I would never see them again. I climbed back into the black limousine which led the convoy to the British Legion Club.

The town of Larne had done my father proud. In death he had the admiration and respect of the local people. The British Legion Club had tactfully asked for my permission to take care of all the arrangements for the after-funeral refreshments. Gratefully I had given it and, with true Irish generosity, they had laid out a magnificent spread. The wooden trestle tables which had been set up were almost groaning with the weight. The women of Larne must have worked from early morning for all the food laid out before me was, I could see, home made.
There were piles of sandwiches, small sausages, slices of pork pies in rich flaky pastry, portions of grilled chicken and bowls of fresh salads at one end, while at the other sat an assortment of homemade cakes from the lightest sponges to the rich fruit cakes so popular in my childhood. Brightly coloured hundreds and thousands were liberally dotted on the thick yellow custard which topped the sherry flavoured trifles whilst jugs of cream were placed to the side for extra cholesterol comfort. And of course there were the numerous obligatory pots of strong tea which were poured into white pottery cups by the many willing helpers.

My father’s relatives were conspicuous by their absence. They had made no excuses to the local people before they left and I knew that their departure had aroused curiosity but I offered no explanation.

I felt that knowing what my father really was stopped his family mixing with people who saw him in such a different light. Maybe their wish to distance themselves from me, the last living memory, was uppermost in their minds. Whichever it was, I felt the throb of remembered pain from scars long healed and a momentary flash of that old feeling of isolation. Pushing it to one side, I went to mingle with his friends.