The December afternoon was growing dark when the weary car-horse
surmounted the last hill on the road from Clifden and broke into a
shambling trot down the long straight stretch into Carrowkeel. Soon, as
the distance dwindled, the lights which twinkled here and there in the
village became distinguishable. This--Hyacinth recognised it--was the
great hanging lamp in the window of Rafferty’s shop. That, a softer
glow, came from the forge of Killeen, the smith. That, and that, fainter
and more uncertain lights, were from fires seen through the open upper
section of cottage doors. He could almost tell whose the cabins were
where they shone. The scene inside rose to the imagination. A man with
ragged clothes and a half-empty pipe is squeezed into the stone nook
beside the blazing turf. The kettle, hanging from its hook, swings
steaming beside him. The woman of the house, barefooted, sluttish, in
torn crimson petticoat and gray bodice pinned across her breast, moves
the red cinders from the lid of the pot-oven and peers at the browning
cake within. Babies toddle or crawl over the greasy floor. The car
rattled into the village street. Men whom he knew stopped it to speak to
him. Children playing the last of their games in the fading light paused
to stare at him. Father Moran, returning to his presbytery, waved his
hand and shouted a greeting. He passed the last house of the village,
and could see the fishing-boats, dim and naked-looking, riding at their
anchors in the bay. Out beyond them, grim and terrible in the twilight,
lay the hulk where the ice for fish-packing was stored. The thick stump
of her one remaining mast made a blacker bar against the black sky. The
pier was deserted, but he could see the bulky stacks of fish-boxes piled
on it, and hear the water lapping against it. Along its utmost edge lay
a belt of gray white, where the waves broke as they surged round it. He
passed the pier, and there lay before him the long hill that led home.
The church and the ruined school stood out clearly on the skyline. Below
them, less clearly seen, was the rectory, and Hyacinth noted that the
lamp in the kitchen was lit. Then the door was opened, and he saw, plain
against the light, a man’s figure, his father’s. No doubt the old man
was watching and listening. Perhaps the sound of the wheels reached him
through the evening air, for in a few minutes he came out and walked
down the drive. Hyacinth saw him fumble with the fastening of the
rickety gate, and at last open it slowly and with difficulty. The car
reached a gap in the loose stone wall, a familiar gap, for across it lay
a short cut up a steeper part of the hill, which the road went round.
Hyacinth jumped down and ran up the path. In another minute the
greeting of father and son was accomplished, and the two were walking
hand-in-hand towards the house. Hyacinth noticed that his father
trembled, and that his feet stumbled uncertainly among the loose stones
and stiff weeds.
When they entered the lighted room he saw that his father seemed
older--many years older--than when he had said good-bye to him two
months before. His skin was very transparent, his lips were tremulous,
his eyes, after the first long look at his son, shifted feebly to the
fire, the table, and the floor.
‘My dear son,’ he said, ‘I thank God that I have got you safe home
again. Indeed, it is good to see you again, Hyacinth, for it has been
very lonely while you were away. I have not been able to do very much
lately or to go out to the seashore, as I used to. Perhaps it is only
that I have not cared to. But I have tried hard to get everything ready
for your coming.’
He looked round the room with evident pride as he spoke. Hyacinth
followed his gaze, and it was with a sense of deep shame that he found
himself noticing the squalor of his home. The table was stained, and the
books which littered half of it were thick with dust and grease-spotted.
The earthen floor was damp and pitted here and there, so that the chairs
stood perilously among its inequalities. The fine white powder of turf
ashes lay thick upon the dresser. The whitewash above the fireplace was
blackened by the track of the smoke that had blown out of the chimney
and climbed up to the still blacker rafters of the roof. Hyacinth
remembered how he, and not his father, had been accustomed to clean the
room and wash the cups and plates. He wondered how such matters had been
managed in his absence, and a great sense of compassion filled his eyes
with tears as he thought of the painful struggle which the details
of life must have brought upon his father. He noted the evident
preparations for his coming. There were two eggs lying in a saucer ready
to be boiled, a fresh loaf--and this was not the day they got their
bread--and a small tin of cocoa beside his cup. The hearth was piled
with glowing turf, and the iron tripod with a saucepan on it stood
surrounded with red coals. Some sense of what Hyacinth was feeling
passed into his father’s mind.
‘Isn’t it all right, my son? I tried to make it very nice for you. I
wanted to get Maggie Cassidy up from the village for the day, but her
baby had the chin-cough, and she couldn’t come.’
He took Hyacinth’s hand and held it while he spoke.
‘Perhaps it looks poor to you,’ he went on, ‘after your college rooms
and the houses your friends live in; but it’s your own home, son, isn’t
it?’
Hyacinth made a gulp at the emotion which had brought him near to tears.
‘It’s splendid, father--simply splendid. And now I’m going to boil those
two eggs and make the cocoa, and we’ll have a feast. Hallo! you’ve got
some jam--jam and butter and eggs, and this is the month of December,
when there’s hardly a hen laying or a cow milking in the whole parish!’
He held up the jam-pot as he spoke. It was wrapped in dingy red paper,
and had a mouldy damp stain on one side. Hyacinth recognised the mark,
and remembered that he had seen the identical pot on the upper shelf of
Rafferty’s shop for years. Its label bore an inscription only vaguely
prophetic of the contents--‘Irish Household Jam.’
‘That’s right, father, you are supporting home manufacture. I declare
I wouldn’t have tasted it if it had come from England. You see, I’m a
greater patriot than ever.’
Old Mr. Conneally smiled in a feeble, wavering way. He seemed scarcely
to understand what was being said to him, but he found a quiet pleasure
in the sound of his son’s voice. He settled himself in a chair by the
fireside and watched contentedly while Hyacinth put the eggs into the
saucepan, hung the kettle on its hook, and cut slices of bread. Then the
meal was eaten, Hyacinth after his long drive finding a relish even in
the household jam. He plied his father with questions, and heard what
the old man knew of the gossip of the village--how Thady Durkan had
broken his arm, and talked of giving up the fishing; how the police from
Letter-frack had found, or said they found, a whisky-still behind the
old castle; how a Gaelic League organizer had come round persuading the
people to sing and dance at the Galway Féis.
After supper Hyacinth nerved himself to tell the story of his term in
college, and his determination to leave the divinity school. More than
once he made an effort to begin, but the old man, who brightened a
little during their meal, relapsed again into dreaminess, and did not
seem to be listening to him. They pulled their chairs near to the fire,
and Mr. Conneally sat holding his son’s hand fast. Sometimes he stroked
or patted it gently, but otherwise he seemed scarcely to recognise
that he was not alone. His eyes were fixed on the fire, but they stared
strangely, as if they saw something afar off, something not in the
room at all. There was no response in them when Hyacinth spoke, and no
intelligence. From time to time his lips moved slightly as if they were
forming words, but he said nothing. After awhile Hyacinth gave up the
attempt to tell his story, and sat silent for so long that in the end he
was startled when his father spoke.
‘Hyacinth, my son, I have somewhat to say unto you.’ Before Hyacinth
could reply to him he continued: ‘And the young man answered and said
unto him, “Say on.” And the old man lifted up his voice and said unto
his son, “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.”’
He spoke as if he were reading out of a book some narrative from the
Bible. Hyacinth realized suddenly that the communication which was to
be made to him had been rehearsed by his father alone, again and again,
that statement, question and reply, would follow each other in
due sequence from the same lips. He felt that his father was still
rehearsing, and had forgotten the real presence of his son. He grasped
the hand that held him and shook it, saying sharply:
‘Father, father, I am here. Don’t you know me?’
‘Yes, yes, my son. Surely I know you. There is something I want to tell
you. I have wanted to tell it to you for many days. I am glad that you
are here now to listen to it.’
He paused, and Hyacinth feared that he would relapse again into dreamy
insensibility; but he did not.
‘I think,’ he said, ‘that I should like to pray before I speak to you.’
He knelt down as Hyacinth had seen him kneel a thousand times before,
facing the eastward-looking window, now a black, uncurtained square in
the whitewashed wall. What he said was almost unintelligible. There was
no petition nor even any sequence of ideas which could be traced.
He poured forth a series of ejaculations expressive of intense and
rapturous delight, very strange to listen to in such a place and from
an old man’s lips. Then the language he spoke changed from English
into Gaelic, and there came a kind of hymn of adoration. His sentences
followed each other in metrical balance like the Latin of the old
liturgies, and suited themselves naturally to a subdued melody, half
chant, half cry, like the mourning of the keeners round a grave. At
last, rising from his knees, he spoke, and his voice became wholly
unemotional, devoid of fervour or excitement. He told his story as a man
might relate some quite commonplace incident of daily life.
‘One evening I was sitting here by the fire, just as I always sit. I
remember that the lamp was not lit, and that the fire was low, so that
there was not much light in the room. It came into my mind that it was
just out of such gloom that the Lord called “Samuel, Samuel,” and I
wished that I was like Samuel, so innocent that I could hear the voice
of the Lord. I do not remember what I thought of after that. Perhaps for
a time I did not think at all. Then I felt that there were arms about my
neck; but not like your arms, Hyacinth, when you were a child and clung
to me. These were arms which held me lovingly, strongly, protectingly,
like--do you remember, Hyacinth?--“His right hand is under my head; His
left hand doth embrace me.” I sat quite still, and did not move or speak
or even breathe, lest He should go away from me. Then, after a long
time--I knew afterwards that the time was long, though then it seemed
only a minute for the joy that I had in it--He told me--I do not mean
that I heard a voice or any words; I did not hear, I _felt_ Him tell
me--the things that are to be. The last great fight, the Armageddon,
draweth very near. All that is good is on one side in the fight, and the
Captain over all. What is bad is on the other side--all kinds of tyranny
and greed and lust. I did not hear these words, but I felt the things,
only without any fear, for round me were the everlasting arms. And
the battlefield is Ireland, our dear Ireland which we love. All these
centuries since the great saints died He has kept Ireland to be His
battlefield. I understood then how our people have been saved from
riches and from power and from the opportunities of lust, that our soil
out of all the world might be fit for the feet of the great Captain, for
the marching of His horsemen and His chariots. Not even when I knew all
this did I desire to share in the conflict. I am old and feeble, but
that is not the reason why there was no desire on me, for strength is in
His power to give to whom He wills. I did not desire it, because I was
quite happy, being safe with Him.’
For a long time after he ceased speaking there was silence, for Hyacinth
had no comment to offer. At last the old man spoke again.
‘That is all. I have no other word of revelation. But I have wondered
since how men are to be disentangled from their parties and their
churches and their nations, and gathered simply into good and bad. Will
all men who are good just know the Captain when they see Him and range
themselves with Him? But why should we think about such things as these?
Doubtless He can order them. But you, Hyacinth--will you be sure to know
the good side from the bad, the Captain from the enemy?’
For a long time after he had gone to bed Hyacinth lay awake haunted by
his father’s prophecy of an Armageddon. There was that in his nature
which responded eagerly to such a call to battle. In the presence of
enthusiasm like his father’s or like Augusta Goold’s, Hyacinth
caught fire. His mind flamed with the idea of an Independent Ireland
resplendent with her ancient glories. He embraced no less eagerly the
thought of his father’s battle and his own part in it. Groping for
points of contact between the two enthusiasms, he caught at the
conception of the Roman Church as the Antichrist and her power in
Ireland as the point round which the fight must rage. Then with a sudden
flash he saw, not Rome, but the British Empire, as the embodiment of
the power of darkness. He had learned to think of it as a force, greedy,
materialistic, tyrannous, grossly hypocritical. What more was required
to satisfy the conception of evil that he sought for? He remembered
all that he had ever heard from Augusta Goold and her friends about the
shameless trickery of English statesmen, about the insatiable greed of
the merchants, about the degraded sensuality of the workers. He recalled
the blatant boastfulness with which English demagogues claimed to be
the sole possessors of enlightened consciences, and the tales of
native races exploited, gin-poisoned, and annihilated by pioneers of
civilization advancing with Bibles in their hands.
But with all his capacity for enthusiasm there was a strain of weakness
in Hyacinth. More than once after the glories of an Independent Ireland
had been preached to him he had found himself growing suddenly cold and
dejected, smitten by an east wind of common-sense. At the time when he
first recognised the loftiness of his father’s religion he had revolted
against being called upon to adopt so fantastic a creed. So now, when
his mind grew weary with the endeavour to set an Armageddon in array, he
began to wish for a life of peaceful monotony, a place to be quiet in,
where no high calls or imperious demands would come to threaten him.
He ceased to toss to and fro, and gradually sank into a half-conscious
sleep. It seemed to him at the time that he was still awake, held back
from slumber by the great stillness of the country, that silence which
disturbs ears long accustomed to the continuous roar of towns. Suddenly
he started into perfect wakefulness, and felt that he was in possession
of all his faculties. The room where he lay was quite dark, but he
strained his eyes to see something in it. He listened intently, although
no sound whatever met his ears. A great overmastering fear laid hold on
him. He tried to reason with himself, insisting that there was nothing,
and could be nothing, to be afraid of. Still the fear remained. His
lips grew stiff and painfully hot, and when he tried to moisten them his
tongue was dry and moved across them raspingly. He struggled with the
terror that paralyzed him, and by a great effort raised his hand to his
forehead. It was damp and cold, and the hair above it was damp. He had
no way of knowing how much of the night had passed, or even how long he
lay rigid, unable to breathe without a kind of pain; but suddenly as it
had come the terror left him, left him without any effort on his part or
any reason that he recognised. Then the window of his room shook, and he
heard outside the low moan of the rising wind. Some heavy drops of rain
struck audibly on the roof, and the first gust of the storm carried to
his ears the sound of waves beating on the rocks. His senses strained no
more. His eyes closed, and he sank quietly into a long dreamless sleep.
It was late when he woke, so late that the winter sky was fully lit. The
wind, whose first gusts had lulled him to sleep, had risen to a gale,
and the rain, mixed with salt spray, beat fiercely against his window
and on the roof. He listened, expecting to hear his father moving in the
room below, but within the house there was no sound. He rose, vaguely
anxious, and without waiting to dress went into the kitchen. Everything
lay untouched, just as he had left it the night before. The lamp and
the remnants of the meal were on the table. The two chairs stood side
by side before the hearth, where the fire which he had covered up
smouldered feebly. He turned and went to his father’s room. He could
not have explained how it was, but when he opened the door he was not
surprised to see the old man lying quite still, dead, upon the bed. His
face was turned upwards, and on it was that strange look of emotionless
peace which rests very often on the faces of the dead. It seemed
to Hyacinth quite natural that the soul as it departed into unknown
beatitude should have printed this for the last expression on the
earthly habitation which it left behind. He neither wondered nor, at
first, sorrowed very much to see his father dead. His sight was undimmed
and his hands steady when he closed the eyes and composed the limbs of
the body on the bed. Afterwards it seemed strange to him that he should
have dressed quietly, arranged the furniture in the kitchen, and blown
the fire into a blaze before he went down into the village to tell his
news and seek for help.
They buried Æneas Conneally beside his wife in the wind-swept
churchyard. The fishermen carried his coffin into the church and out
again to the grave. Father Moran himself stood by bareheaded while the
clergyman from Clifden read the prayers and sprinkled the coffin-lid
with the clay which symbolized the return of earth to earth and dust to
dust. In the presence of death, and, with the recollection of the simple
goodness of the man who was gone, priest and people alike forgot for an
hour the endless strife between his creed and theirs.