The Call


Paddy Verchoyle was a man with a hand in half a dozen businesses, most
of which brought him in a satisfactory return and would get better with
time. Paddy was that sort of man. A bit of a craftsman himself, he
didn’t like to have anything to do with inferior goods, and would kick
up hell with the manufacturer if there was anything wrong with what he
sold. He could have been richer, but he might very well have been
poorer, and it wasn’t poorer he was getting. He had married a nice
gentle girl whose brother was an accountant, and after his
mother-in-law’s death he had suggested himself that Declan should come
and live with them. Like most of Paddy’s deals, this one had turned out
well. Declan seemed to have no inclination to get married. Though Kate
raked Dublin for a suitable wife for him, each prettier than the last,
Declan seemed to prefer the company of his nephew and niece.

Though Paddy approved of Declan he thought him a queer fish, and no
wonder. At home he seemed sociable enough, though a bit touchy, and
was very fond of a drink, but every few months he would take a couple
of days’ leave and go off to a Cistercian monastery in the mountains,
and most mornings he was up first and slipped round the corner to hear
Mass. Now, Paddy was a good-living man, and he made no secret of it,
but this sometimes struck him as going to the fair. Sometimes he
twitted Declan about it, but Declan, a tall, thin man, only grinned
sadly and said slyly, ‘I suppose it keeps me out of harm’s way,
Paddy.’  Which, as Paddy damn well knew, was only casuistry. Sometimes
he grew curious about the guest master of the monastery, of whom
Declan talked a good deal, and wondered if he hadn’t an undue
influence, but to answer that question he would have had to accompany
Declan on one of his retreats, and he knew he wouldn’t be able to
stand all that chanting. It made him melancholy even to think of
it. When he had a day off he preferred to dig himself into his
workshop at the end of the garden and make something.

In the monastery Declan made another friend, who made Paddy think even
more of his brother-in-law’s strangeness. This fellow, Mick Ring, had
the religion too, apparently, but of a quite different kind. He was a
small man with an eager, over-boisterous manner—a senior civil
servant, who was connected with a number of charities, though he didn’t
speak too well of the charities. Ring was very popular with the
children, though Paddy noticed that he never really played with
them. Instead, he put on a performance, but this was intended as much
for their mother as themselves. Even the performance he put on for Kate
personally, though consistent and flattering, didn’t seem right to
Paddy. He had a feeling that if he were dealing with Ring in the way of
business he would keep his eyes skinned. It was only when he was
talking religion or politics that he seemed to Paddy to be altogether
sincere, and then it was with the sincerity of a fanatic. On either of
these subjects he might prove an ugly character to get into an argument
with, and Paddy didn’t like arguments that turned out that way. As he
had so often said to Kate, what was an argument for except to enjoy
yourself.

Kate didn’t care much for arguments, one way or another, but she had
begun to give up hope of Declan’s marrying. Her great friend Nora
Hynes, who was a raving beauty, had fallen in love with him and told
Kate that she’d marry him at the drop of a hat, but when Kate hinted
at this to Declan, he only gave his sad smile and said, ‘Nora is a
very enthusiastic girl, Kate,’ which was true enough, though not to
the point. And instead of going walking with Nora, Declan went on long
hikes through the hills with Ring, and they ended up in a restaurant
in Enniskerry and drank whiskey and ate bacon and eggs.

Then one night, Ring came round, fuller of bounce than ever, and when
they were all seated he leaned forward in his chair, his hands joined
and a wide grin on his face.

‘I’ll give ye six guesses what I did today,’ he said.

‘Tell us, Mick,’ Declan said, humouring him.

‘I handed in my resignation. God, you should have seen old George
Thompson’s face when I told him.’

‘For goodness sake!’ said Declan. ‘What did you do that for?’

‘That is the occasion for the next six questions,’ said Ring. “But I
won’t keep ye in pain. I resigned because I’m going to join the
Cistercians.’

It was a bombshell, and he knew it. Paddy grinned amiably, not knowing
quite what to say, but he watched his wife and brother-in-law
closely. Kate was the first to recover.

‘Oh, Mick!’ she said gently. ‘Isn’t that wonderful?’

But Paddy saw that it was Declan who was really thunderstruck. His
mouth worked for a few moments as though he were trying to frame words
that would not emerge, and his face was dead white. Finally he rose and
reached to the mantelpiece for his pipe.

‘You’re not taking anyone?’ he asked with his gentle smile.

‘It’s not a matter for committee action,’ Ring said with a slight touch
of resentment that even Paddy found unwarranted. But Declan didn’t seem
to take it in bad spirits.

‘It might come under the heading of good example,’ he replied.

For the next couple of weeks he was like a man in a dream. He had
never been very obtrusive about the house, but now it was almost as
though he weren’t there at all. In the mornings he got up and went to
Mass, then had his breakfast and went to work. After supper he got up
and went out walking somewhere about the city and returned late,
closing the door gently behind him and tiptoeing upstairs.

‘Don’t be too surprised if Declan does the same thing as Mick Ring.’
Paddy said darkly to his wife.

‘Oh, dear, Paddy, I hope he doesn’t,’ Kate said with a worried air. ‘I
suppose I shouldn’t say it, if it’s the best thing for him, but Mother
always did want him to get married.’

‘Well, I’d be very much surprised if he got married now,’ replied
Paddy.

It must be admitted in his favour that when Declan did break the news
three weeks later, Paddy gave no indication that he had been expecting
it, Kate of course just broke into tears, and Declan had to comfort
her. Then, with considerable humour he described how his employers had
taken the news. They too had been taken aback. Paddy had suspected for
some time that they had been considering giving Declan a partnership,
and now his resignation opened an abyss at their feet. Could it
possibly be that someone really thought as little as that of a
promising career?

‘We’ll keep your job open for you, Declan,’ the senior partner had
said, trying to delude himself into the belief that Declan was not
himself or was suffering a disappointment in love. Declan’s reply, too,
had been characteristic.

‘You’ll be doing me a great favour if you don’t, Jerry,’ he had
replied. ‘It might be too much of a temptation.’ And the senior
partner hadn’t even seen the joke.

‘Oh, if that’s the way you feel about it, Declan,’ he had said. Of
course, he made no difficulty about notice, and now Declan was able to
tell Ring that he was going with him.

Paddy took the day off from the office to drive them. He was as glad he
did, because he wouldn’t have been able to concentrate anyway. Kate
broke down completely, and the two kids, seeing the signs of tears on
her face, bawled as well. Declan and himself were both in the stage of
bearing up when they drove off to collect Ring, who came out, carrying his
suitcase as though he were going away for the weekend. It was Declan
who asked apologetically, ‘Paddy, could we take the road over the
hills?’ Paddy, with a lump in his throat replied, ‘Surely, Declan,’ and
they drove off through Rathfarnham. Paddy knew that Declan wanted to
take his leave of places he had liked in the mountains, so he drove
straight to Glendalough, where they had a drink and wandered for a few
minutes round the early medieval monastery. Declan, looking at the
round tower and the wall of mountain behind it, said tentatively,
‘You’d hardly say there was much credit due to Saint Kevin and the rest
of them, would you?’

Ring looked at him in surprise. ‘That’s because you never spent a
winter here,’ he said. ‘Even so,’ Declan said with his mournful smile,
‘you’d have something to see when the sun came out.’

‘Begod, you would not,’ Ring said stoutly. ‘Half the people round here
are mad—with melancholia. No city man can ever size up a place.’

Declan only smiled faintly. They had a drink in Glendalough and then
drove on to another favourite haunt of his, Kilkenny, where first he
showed them the old churches and then took them to a pub kept by a
friend who bottled his own whiskey, and kept a collection of antiques.

‘I suppose you’d say this was a better place than Glendalough, Mick?’
he asked.

‘A man could have a damn good life in a town like this,’ said Ring.

‘_Better_ than Kerry?’ Declan asked, almost with malice.

‘No,’ Ring said, his eyes beginning to sparkle. ‘Because here you’d
have gentry and shopkeepers and working-class people. In Kerry you have
a chance of discovering that there’s only people.’

‘I don’t see what you have against Dublin so,’ said Declan.

‘I never said I had anything against Dublin,’ said Ring, ‘but if you
want to know, in Dublin it’s nearly impossible to see anything. You
never saw anything.’

‘I didn’t?’

‘No, you were too damn concerned with your old books and your old
job. You should have come to the hostel and seen the way a man can be
driven to Hell by three pounds he borrowed from an old woman in Mabbot
Street at seventy-five per cent per annum. And mind you, when you
borrow money at that rate it’s no use going to a lawyer. I didn’t go to
a lawyer.’

‘What did you do?’

‘I went down to the old woman herself. She said, “I’ll put my son on
you,” and I said, “I’ll put my big brother on your son, and he’ll know
what it means to meet a man that’s not scared of a knuckle-duster.”
She was a nice old lady as a matter of fact,’ Ring continued
philosophically. ‘Before I left she gave me tea and told me she
wished she had a son like me.’

‘But tell me, Mick,’ said Paddy, who loved a good argument and didn’t
see at all where this one was tending, ‘if Kerry is all that fine, why
are the boys and girls getting out of it as fast as they can?’

‘Because they’re too simple, Paddy,’ replied Ring. ‘They don’t know the
value of what they have.’

‘I don’t agree, Mick,’ Paddy said sadly. Paddy regarded himself as a
good Catholic but a Catholic with a business head on him, and this was
a matter he had thought a great deal about. ‘They leave it because the
priests won’t let them enjoy themselves. A boy and girl—damn it, what
else is life for?’

‘And that’s only more of the romancing,’ Ring said violently, ‘That’s
like saying they have to have television. A countryman has no use for a
woman only to make his breakfast and keep his bed warm.’

Declan suddenly began to get irritated. It wasn’t often he got
irritated, and Paddy had never seen him angry, but he felt that at this
moment Declan was as cross as he’d ever been.

‘And what does a Kerryman want if he doesn’t want women?’ he asked.

‘He wants neighbours,’ cried Ring.

‘Mick, a man wants more than neighbours,’ said Declan.

‘What does he want according to you?’

‘He wants someone to devote his life to,’ said Declan.

‘Television!’ snapped Ring.

‘Now, Mick, it’s not television,’ Declan said with his sad smile.

‘Och, what the hell else is it?’ Ring asked explosively. ‘What woman is
worth devoting your life to? Did you ever meet one?’

Then Declan really surprised his brother-in-law.

‘I did. I met several.’

‘Never mind the several. Did you meet one?’

‘Yes, Nora Hynes.’

There was shocked silence for a moment. Each of them knew that it was
one of those occasions when intimacy goes a little too far, and nothing
can ever retrieve the situation. Paddy felt that this was a case for
Kate. He gave a broad, uncomfortable grin.

‘Then why the blazes didn’t you marry her?’

‘I’m not too sure she’d have had me.’

‘Oh, begod, she would,’ said Paddy stoutly.

‘Then she’d be making a great mistake,’ Declan said.

‘And that’s only more of the damn television,’ Ring said with sudden
violence. ‘Give me another drink, I need it when I hear people talking
like that.’

‘Ah, why do you go on saying things like that, Mick?’ Declan asked
reproachfully, ‘Every man is entitled to his views.’

‘He is not,’ said Ring with his eyes popping. ‘That’s what’s wrong
with the whole world today, people thinking they’re entitled to give
their views on anything, whether they understand it or not. That’s not
a sensible view, man. That’s something you saw on the movies
somewhere. To a countryman all that sort of thing is no more than
hunger or thirst or the want of a home or a pain in the gut.’

‘That might be what keeps him a countryman, Mick,’ Declan said with as
close an approach to indignation as Paddy had ever seen. He
intervened, not because he wanted to get into an argument with Ring,
but because he feared what might happen if himself and Declan got
really serious. A nice situation he would be in, bringing two novices
to a Cistercian monastery, and having them arrested on the way for
drunkenness and disorderly conduct.

‘Now, Mick, I think you’re taking it to the fair,’ he said. ‘I know
what you mean, and there’s a lot of truth in it, but you’re taking it
to the fair.’

‘It’s all fairy tales. The trouble with townies like you and Declan is
that you have so much time on your hands for thinking up nonsense.’

‘Nor it’s not nonsense either, Mick,’ said Paddy. ‘Not altogether. It
depends on what you want from life. What a man like me wants is
principally company.’

‘What a man wants is neighbourliness,’ snapped Ring. ‘Someone to give
him the cup of tea when he’s dying.’

‘What a man wants is inspiration,’ Declan said slowly and clearly, and
immediately the other two knew he was drunk. It was a rare enough
occurrence, for Declan was a steady, quiet, determined drinker with a
great knowledge of his own capacity.

He steadied up in the car, and they had a look at Cashel and then a
meal in Thurles. They were close to their destination now, and suddenly
they all began drinking hard, assuring themselves that each drink was
the last. But because it really could be the last they let themselves
be tempted further. The situation was on top of them now, and they
couldn’t evade it in any other way. Paddy put it into a nutshell.

‘Well, boys,’ he said, ‘this time tomorrow ye’ll have it all behind ye,
but I have to go on with the old job just the same. To tell the truth,
I often wonder why. Sometimes when I’m shaving in the morning, I look
at myself in the bathroom mirror and I say to myself, “Paddy Verchoyle,
that’s about the ten thousandth time you’re after doing that. And why
the hell do you have to do it?” First, it’s the mother, then it’s the
wife, and then it’s the kids, one thing after another. And yet, you
wouldn’t like leaving it.’

‘Oh, it’s a wrench all right,’ Declan said. ‘I think what I’ll miss most
is the kids.’

‘Oh, begod, they’ll miss you a damn sight more,’ said Paddy with a
laugh. ‘A bob a week a man is big money. I suppose I’ll have to
contribute that.’

‘And I’ll regret old Mike Hanrahan that used to wait for me outside
the office on Friday nights for his half-dollar,’ Ring said with moody
humour. ‘Mike is so old and dotty he’s even forgotten my name, but he
knows that if he turns up at five on Friday there’ll be a bone for
him.’

‘I’ll see that he gets his bone, Mick,’ Paddy said quietly, and they
knew he would. A great man for little responsibilities was Paddy. But
he suddenly realised that he had now a bigger responsibility than that.

When he got the two men out to the car they were very drunk. He knew it
wasn’t so much the drink as the excitement, but how was he going to
explain that late at night to a priest? The rest of the drive on the
mountain road completed his panic. He got safely into the front
yard. There was only a faint light in the chapel on his left, and one
in the building before him. ‘Come on!’ he shouted, shaking the
sleepers, ‘tell me where I’m to go,’ but they only grunted. For a few
moments he wondered whether it wouldn’t be better to bring them back to
a hotel for the night, but he was filled with a wild longing to be back
with Kate and the kids before morning. He mounted the steps to the
lighted building and rang the bell. Then he heard feet slip-slopping on
the floors inside and an old priest opened the door.

‘It’s Father Cormac I’m looking for, Father,’ Paddy explained.

‘I’m the very man,’ said the old priest. ‘Come in. What can I do for
you?’

‘Well,’ Paddy said, laughing in an embarrassed way, ‘I have two novices
here for you.’

‘Two novices?’ the old priest said, coming out on the steps. ‘Is it
Mick and Declan? Where are they?’

‘Well, the way it is, Father,’ said Paddy, ‘they’re not in a state to
come in.’

‘I see,’ said Father Cormac in a tone that indicated he didn’t, and
then he immediately added another ‘I see’ that indicated he
did. ‘Brother Michael!’ he called and a young monk came out the hall
to them with a wide grin and a straggly beard. ‘It seems there are a
couple of new recruits here I’ll want a hand with. We’ll put them in
bed in the guesthouse for the present. I don’t think Father Kevin
would appreciate them with the other novices.’

Declan allowed himself to be steered into the front room of the
guesthouse and recovered sufficiently to say, ‘Father Cormac, I don’t
know how to apologize...’ before he collapsed into a chair. ‘Declan was
always a perfect gentleman,’ Cormac said dryly. Ring didn’t say
anything at all. He was out. ‘I think maybe we’ll keep them here
tomorrow as well, Michael,’ said Father Cormac.

‘Father,’ Paddy said desperately, ‘I feel very much ashamed of this.’

‘Ah, well,’ Cormac said professionally, ‘the Lord works even through
Irish whiskey. I used to be very fond of it myself. As a matter of
fact, I still am,’ he added. ‘Look, couldn’t we make up a bed for you?’

But this was too much for Paddy.

‘Not making you a saucy answer, Father,’ he said, ‘I want to wake up in
my wife’s bed tomorrow.’

‘Yes,’ said the priest, ‘I understand that has great attractions. I was
only wondering could you drive.’

‘After what I went through today I could drive there blindfold,’ said
Paddy.

And he did. He was glad of the experience, though he hadn’t understood
it. Maybe those are the experiences we are best pleased to have had. He
understood it even less after a few months when Declan came out. To
Paddy he seemed just the same but more of a man. That night he asked
Kate if she would ask Nora Hayes whether she would still accept a
proposal from him, and Kate very sensibly packed him off to ask for
himself. Ring was made of tougher stuff, and he stuck it for more than
a year before he too came out and married a widow with a public house.

Paddy still tells the story at length, but he hasn’t reached any
conclusion about it. This may be the reason he still tells
it. Somewhere during that day, he feels, something happened that
changed everything. It was not the drink; it was not the last glimpse
of spots that had been loved, but somewhere along the way each man had
glanced back for a moment on the lighted room of life, and something
he saw there had pierced him to the heart.


(1971)