The Callaghans: Chapter 7.

 

Chapter 7

Doctor Dennis was a very nice English man who worked at The Rotunda Hospital; he was a friend of Theresa and Joe reckoned they were more than friends, in their younger days. Carmel had an appointment with him, and Patrick walked with her along O'Connell Street, until they came to Parnell Street where the hospital is situated.

He waited outside and let Carmel deal with women's matters, as he thought of it. She got on well with Dennis and they discussed marriage and the threat of the Magdalene Laundries.

Lots of young girls rushed into marriage, in those days, as they risked being sent to work – over work in fact – with other girls who had, in the mind of the Catholic Church, fallen by the wayside.

Mary Magdalene was a follower of Jesus and is mentioned by name in three of the four gospels. Some say she was very rich and it is intimated that she had 'the devil' driven out of her and in the sixth century she was considered a prostitute. Maybe the name of the laundries came from her dubious history.

Who knows?

When Carmel came out from the doctor, Patrick hugged her and asked if she was all right. Doctor Dennis waved at him from behind the door and as it was early evening, it was an unofficial consultation with the doctor, they decided on a walk to Lower Baggot Street to see Mateus and Calista. The news there wasn't good as their lease on the premises was running out and they had decided to move from Ireland altogether and locate to England. They were interested in Carmel's diagnosis but were planning to leave as there was very little likelihood of opening an Indian restaurant in Dublin at that time. They had no idea of what part of England they would be going to, in fact it might even be Wales or Scotland.

The Da Costas were about to eat and, as always, they cooked enough food to feed the four of them. Carmel commented that there was enough to feed the whole street. Everybody seemed to be short of money, in those days, the war was recently over and people were feeling the pinch.

Soldiers, returning home were frequently seen in the streets and Patrick remarked that more of them were able bodied unlike the times, during the war, he saw otherwise.

Carmel and Patrick were sorry they were losing friends and Carmel knew there would be a good chance that she and Patrick might be making the same journey. Her parents were due back soon and she dreaded the reception her pregnancy would cause.

They produced a bottle of Guinness on the table for Carmel and the other three drank the light Indian ale. It wasn't a time when pregnant women abstained from alcohol.

Carmel called her parents on the phone, when they returned from what can only be called, their missionary work. They were busy noting the results of their trip which was mainly to interview and help soldiers who were suffering from stress after being in danger, deadly danger for years. Some of them experienced flashbacks of the worst days and the things which triggered them were a variety of reasons.

Some could not sleep at all, others would never go outside and even though that was a common symptom of agoraphobia it wasn't the only symptom they had. It can also produce the fear of travelling in or on a certain form of transport, for example.

Some could not explain why as they had no reason but the flashbacks from the soldiers was a reason not to go outside as they were sure the enemy was there. This was called shell shock, which was a reaction to the experiences the soldiers went through, and eventually called  post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) which is a far cry from cowardice which was coined by the officers of the day. 

The whole experience shocked Carmel's parents, in a different way as they were trying to get over the reaction from the soldiers they were trying to introduce to Christianity. Every time Carmel called them she had made up he mind to tell them she was pregnant but didn't.

One day when Patrick was waiting outside Trinity College, Carmel's mother turned up. He didn't see her at first and when he did he hardly recognised her and was taken aback when she said hello to him.

'I guessed you'd be here' she said.

He remembered the smart woman who took and encouraged Carmel away from him and couldn't believe the state of her as she had lost a lot of weight and was looking very drawn.

He knew the inevitable was about to happen and in the distance, when he saw Carmel approaching, her belly looked really big. Some days it didn't and she might have been able to get away with it but not this day.

Her mother gave her a great big hug and they stood together hugging for at least a minute; but it didn't look sincere. When they broke from the hug, nobody said anything; she obviously didn't notice the bump even though it was quite obvious that Carmel was pregnant. In fact everybody who knew her reckoned she was having twins.

'Where shall we go?' Nora Wilde said to both of them, particularly including Patrick in the question.

'Bewley's.' said Carmel, and that's where they went.

There were quite a few people in the coffee shop and Carmel told her mother to sit down with Patrick.

'You wouldn't believe' she said 'that this was once a very famous school – Whyte's Academy.'

'I didn't know that' said Patrick.

'Yes Oscar Wilde was educated here . . '

'Are you . . . ?'

'No – no relation – but who knows: my maiden name was Casey, in any case.'

'Of course.' said Patrick.

He knew her husband with his northern accent couldn't be related to Oscar Wilde.

Carmel looked over at them and could see they were in conversation. She collected a tray and joined them at the table. 'They actually have some tea' she said, as she put the tray down. There was a pot of tea, three cups and saucers and a small plate of cakes.

'I paid up front for the cakes' she said.

Some catering establishments served a number of cakes, on a cake stand, in the middle of the table, and only charged for those eaten.

They had a fine talk and Mrs Wilde told Carmel what she and her father had witnessed and been introduced to many British and Indian soldiers who were psychologically and physically affected by battle.

Her father was affected more than she and she asked Carmel if she was able to look after herself for a little while as they were physically and mentally, exhausted.

After they bade her farewell, they couldn't believe that she didn't notice the pregnancy but Carmel knew that she had noticed – 'In that case, why wouldn't she say so?'

'If she had said so' said Carmel, 'she would have to deal with it; she kind of put it in a bottom drawer till she had been through everything else; but it does tell me something.'

'What's that?'

'There's something else going on – exhausted? My arse – there's something wrong with my father.'

'You think so?'

'I do.' said Carmel 'I'd better go and see him – and you can come too.'

A few days later they were both on the train to Dún Laoghaire. When they walked out of the station, Carmel knew a different way to her house. It was a beautiful mansion and Patrick remembered the granite steps up to the front door and it was a bit like a house children drew with the door in the middle, a window to either side, then a window above each of those and another over the door.

Mrs. Wilde opened the front door and she surprised Carmel and Patrick as it was plain to see they were not welcome.

'You can't come in now.' she said 'We're . . . we're . .'

'What's the matter?' said Carmel.

'At the moment, we are . . '

Then a huge shout.

'What's going on?' from Carmel's father, somewhere in the house.

'Nothing.' said Mrs. Wilde 'Just a couple of . . .'

With that there was a loud bang from the top of the staircase, to their right and the appearance of the Reverend Wilde, standing at the top shocked them all. He was unshaven, his shirt was striped, dirty and wide open and he was wearing pyjama trousers with nothing on his feet.

'What's going on?' I said – then he saw them.

'Hello Daddy.' said Carmel, not quite believing what she saw.

'What's that I see?' he shouted as he endeavoured to come down the spiral stairs, holding very tightly to the bannister.

'Mind yourself!' screamed Mrs Wilde, which didn't bother the intoxicated reverend as he faltered onwards and downwards.

When he reached the bottom he fell back on the steps when he let go of the bannister. Mrs Wilde went to him and tried to lift him up but he pushed her violently away as he grabbed the bannister. She came away in tears. Patrick and Carmel didn't know what to say or do.

'Get out of my house' he shouted at Patrick 'before I knock you down those steps.'

Wilde was a big man, but he was old and drunk. He didn't scare Patrick but he didn't want to make matters worse so he went towards the door.

'And take that harlot with ye' he screamed.

'You'd better go' said Nora Wilde 'he's not right.'

'I'm as right as you' screamed the reverend.

Patrick guided Carmel outside and down the dozen or so steps and onto Haigh Terrace. As they looked back they saw Wilde come to the door and slam it. Carmel started to go up the steps but Patrick stopped her.

'It's my mother – my . . . . I hope she's okay.'

'Let's go' said Patrick 'come on.'

He was speaking very quietly and gentle.

'You can call her' he said 'just to make sure she's all right.'

The aftermath of the Dún Laoghaire visit was very upsetting for Carmel. She called her mother from one of the telephone kiosks in the General Post Office and it was as she suspected.

Her mother told her that the reason she turned up outside the college was to try and keep her away from her father as she didn't want to worry her with his crisis. She had, obviously, noticed Carmel's pregnancy and even though she didn't identify her condition by name, she used the phrase 'by the way, I'm not blind.'

Over the next few weeks Carmel called her mother most days. Each time she called she was worried in case her father answered, and was prepared to hang up before speaking if he did. Her mother explained that the state of the soldiers affected her father who, as a pacifist, couldn't cope or find any reason for the injuries and the mental torture a lot of the men and women were suffering. Children who had experienced bombing, restrictions and poverty for all of their tender years were equally suffering. Her father, who, unbeknown to Carmel, had a history of dipsomania had taken back to drink one day for some kind of relief and that started his dependence on alcohol again.

Earlier in his life he had to be locked away from it as there were no organisation such as Alcoholics Anonymous in those days, in fact it wasn't started in Ireland till a little later in 1946. Mrs. Wilde was trying the same tactics as when he, or they, had fought the disease before; that word, disease, was never used as he was known as a drunkard or, what was usual in Ireland, a spunker.

Carmel was very worried as, even though he wasn't a loving father, in fact neither of her parents were loving, she had a certain kind of respect for them, it wasn't love. Love was new experience for her with Patrick and Joe.

Calista and Mateus were making arrangements to leave Ireland as they were running out of money and as Carmel had, more or less, lost contact with her school friends, Aisling and Hazel, she would miss Calista. It seemed that there might be more promise in England for them, maybe in Manchester or London. Patrick mentioned his brother, Brendan, in Manchester, who may be able to give them pointers as to where to live. He wrote to Brendan but didn't receive a reply.

One day Nora Wilde met Carmel at the college and they walked into St Stephen's Green. It was a beautiful Spring day and they found the little water fall very relaxing and the sight of the herbaceous borders something to see. 'I love the Spring' said Carmel's mother 'It always seems to be the start of something new.'

Carmel felt the same and each time the baby moved in her belly it gave her the same feeling of anticipation.

'I felt I had to talk to you' said Nora Wilde, 'it's been a long time since we had a chat.'

Carmel couldn't remember the last time they had a chat and she noticed her mother wasn't as lively or as fit looking as she used to be. Even Patrick noticed that she wasn't the strident woman he met that day in O'Connell Street.

'It wasn't the way I had envisaged you growing up but it's no good crying over spilt milk.'

She squeezed Carmel's hand; Carmel looked into her eyes and held onto her mother's hand.

'But I wondered what you are going to do?' she seemed sad but resigned and noticed that there were a lot of young couples walking around the green. 'Look at them.' she said 'Young innocents.'

Carmel saw and agreed for she was as young and innocent as they, even though she was with child. She lived in an Ireland which was a theocracy with no means of birth control even for married couples – even for Protestants.

'Young innocence be blowed.' she said ' They are wandering around looking for a place to lie down together – look at them!'

This was a change, instantly recognised by Carmel.

A young couple, after walking around, laughing and strolling came to a stop and sat down some way from them and the boy laid back. The girl was sitting beside him looking down and stroking the young boy's hair. The young boy? Yes but a boy in a man's military uniform, fresh back from the war where he had, probably, been shot at and returned fire; probably . . .

There they were in the first buds of love being watched by a wicked frustrated woman; a woman just being recognised for what she was, by her beautiful pregnant daughter. Any love Carmel had for her was slowly floating away into the Georgian garden squares. Carmel slowly withdrew her hand from her mother's gloved grip and saw her mother for the first time.

'Your father wants me to get in touch with the Magdalene Laundries.' she suddenly said.

'What do you mean?'

'Are you going to marry this fellow?'

Carmel didn't move an inch; she could not believe what she just heard.

Silence.

'Well are you?'

'Thank you for warning me about the Magdalene Laundries, whatever they are' said Carmel 'but I will be marrying this fellow as you call him.'

'What church will marry you – they don't like non-taigs, and if you find a Catholic church you will have to stand half way up the aisle.'

'What?'

'He won't want to marry you in our church – you'll see.'

Patrick always imagined that they could get married at Fairview Church where his father, Joe, knew a priest with whom he was at school. He had never mentioned it to Joe but planned to.

'I don't know what you are going to do with your life, Carmel; are you going to live with the pigs?'

This shocked Carmel again.

'Yes I know.' said her mother 'I know about the house where you stay. A little bird told me – filthy little place, I heard: what do you do? All sleep in the one room?'

Carmel remained silent.

'What do you have to say to that?'

Silence.

'The cheek o'ye – ignoring me. It might be good if you went to the laundries, at least you might be able to find a home for your little bastard.'

That was it!

Carmel very quietly stood up, tapped her mother on the shoulder and walked away without another word. As she walked a sob was felt in her throat. She didn't turn back not wanting to show the hurt she undoubtedly experienced.

She wouldn't be staying with Patrick and Joe any more, nor would she be staying in her room at the college; she and Patrick went there and cleared away her personal things. She didn't want people calling on her. She was seventeen years of age, too young to marry without parental permission and she didn't know what to do.

There were lots of things Carmel and Patrick had to consider and being reported to the Magdalene Laundries was an extra worry; not that she believed it. Patrick told her she'd better believe it and that a lot of the so called fallen women, even though they were very rarely older than teenagers, were nicknamed The Maggies.

Everybody knew about the Magdalene Laundries, but nobody seemed to know where they got the information from about so called 'fallen women' and when they got it how did they go about it?

Did parents or school teachers report them?

Where were the headquarters in any case?

The whole business frightened Carmel and Patrick, they lived in fear of Carmel being kidnapped and taken to a laundry, Catholic or Protestant.

Maybe Carmel could claim she was a Methodist, even though she dismissed the teaching of the movement, even though she didn't know anything else. She felt like the Jews in pre war Germany must have felt, seeing people looking at her or thinking she was being followed.

They played a little game, with Patrick standing at a distance, on the other side of the street, for instance, looking for suspicious people following and figuring if she was actually being pursued.

She knew her mother knew Patrick and Joe's address, somehow so she couldn't stay there but when Calista and Mateus were preparing to move they told her that there was a month left on their lease if she wanted to move to Lower Baggott Street.

There was a tearful farewell at Dún Laoghaire when Calista and Mateus boarded the ship to Holyhead. Addresses were exchanged, promises to keep in touch and both Carmel and Patrick kind of knew they would go to England too; one day.

Close to the dock was the home of Carmel and her parents; so near yet so far. It might have been a risk in case they were seen by friends of the family but her parents didn't mix too much with the locals.

Lower Baggott Street was an easy walk for Carmel from Trinity College but one thing for sure was that Patrick would not be living with her in 1940s Dublin; it just wasn't all right, especially with his father, as they might have been open minded about Carmel being of a different religion, - both Christians, in fact – but they were regular church goers, rarely missing mass.

Patrick didn't like the idea of Carmel staying in Lower Baggott Street by herself and suggested she get in touch with one of her friends to see if one of them might like to share with her. To her delight both Hazel and Aisling loved the idea. The three girls were older now and a bit more independent with Aisling's parents spending nearly all the time away as her father worked for a large American Computing-Tabulating Company in New York and they only kept the house in Ireland on for Aisling.

She suggested that Carmel move in with her but Carmel thought it too near Dún Laoghaire for her comfort. She regularly called her mother but each time the telephone was answered her mother hung up. She was getting used to it but she was a bit worried about her father not knowing his alcoholic history.

Hazel had a job in the Natural History Museum which was just around the corner from the place in Lower Baggott Street and she jumped at the idea to save the travel from home every day even though it was only for a month.

The three girls managed to set up a little place to live. There was a huge bed in the bedroom which the three of them shared. Two at the top and one at the bottom. People in large families will be familiar with this arrangement and when three young girls, full of the joys of youth got together in the same bed high jinx was bound to happen. Sometimes the first one to bed found the top sheet folded underneath stopping her getting into bed proper. However, the second time it was tried, when Carmel poked her feet down the bed, she tore through the sheet. That shenanigan was stopped in its tracks.

When the light went out the girls talked and talked and when one of them stopped speaking the other two knew she was asleep and they didn't always leave her alone.

Patrick met Carmel from the college every evening. He waited across the street to try and see if anybody strange was lurking around. They didn't know how the laundries approached victims, for that is what they were, victims. Patrick stood in a spot where he could see both sides of the street, with the college in the background.

A few times he saw the same man standing. He didn't seem to meet anybody and when he and the girls went home they didn't know how long he stayed.

Patrick told his father to come along and see what the man looked like. 'He's wearing a big coat – an overcoat or a mac.'

Joe went early and saw Patrick from the inside of the college and when Carmel came out she didn't acknowledge him. Joe saw the fella with the overcoat in the background; an ugly looking galoot wearing a pair of red sandals with an overcoat. Joe took no notice.

'Do you think the laundries would have sent an old spunker like that, heh?'

'He seems to be here every night.'

'Well for God sake don't start talking to him' said Joe.

'Why, do you know him?'

'Everybody knows him' said Joe 'He's a member of the vagrant train – a bleedin' gurrier; I mean it: don't start talking about him or he'll end up as one of those strange, semi-fictitious characters that haunt the streets.'

We reach a certain time in our lives when we start to find ourselves; only start. This is usually in our late teens when we go to university, college: complete an apprenticeship or find we are a bit of a romantic and go to Paris and write poetry, meet other poets, and change the world. Sometimes the late teenager will take a year off and go around the world. Sometimes not as far as that, maybe across a continent and others just around the back yard but whatever it is, we do something, even if it's just settling into middle age.

And then its gone.

Before the mid twentieth century there was no such thing as a teenager. Then 1940s advertising executives, who were looking for a new audience for their products, realised that seventeen year olds were earning money and had a lot more disposable income than before.

Later in the fifties the first American teenagers came on the scene and the actor and film star, James Dean, is usually described as the first American teenager. He was also a rebel and the cause was against the older stuck in the mud middle aged generation; their parents and in particular their fathers; their fathers who had fought in the war.

They had to face up to something no previous father had to. Previous generations looked up to, and respected, their elders for advice and leadership.

The female teenager adored the rebel. Not everybody; but it sold tickets.

The teenager had more spending power in the mid twentieth century and it has gone on from there.

In mid forties Dublin, well to do teenage girls had ideas of their own, which kind of matched with what was aforesaid.

Traditional Irish music was always popular in Ireland and the various troubles and wars, rebellions and insurrections, triggered the writing of rebel songs and the rebel singer came along.

A lot of the grown up audiences didn't recognise this as singing but it grew into a fabulous art notwithstanding.

Aisling's father was a music lover who discovered American Delta Blues, and the many times he visited Chicago he saw blues men such as Muddy Waters, Big Bill Broonzy and Willie Dixon. Blues was supposed to be sad but Muddy Waters gave it life which Aisling's father loved. He bought a lot of their records and brought them home and when the three girls, not quite women, moved into Old Baggott Street, Aisling brought her father's blues collection and a gramophone.

They dressed the place up and in the first few weeks students from Trinity College visited and by the end of their four week stay the place became quite popular.

One of the party goers was Nick Armstrong who enquired about the lease and, even though it was supposed to be business premises only, he managed to wangle it with some of the contacts he had with local civil servants and the like to extend the lease for a further eighteen months.

Patrick liked the place and the arrangements but he didn't like the music much but it was more comfortable for him to deal with a lot of people as this twenty year old found three girls too much for him by himself. He told Joe about the music and one evening he brought his banjo along.

The kids were gathered around, music was playing on the gramophone when Joe walked in with his banjo in its case. The long strip of Nick Armstrong said 'hello sir: what can we do for you?'

The bemused Joe gave him a wily old look, then laughed 'what can and Englishman do for me? As if you didn't know.'

Carmel came down the steps 'Joe' she said 'you've got your banjo!'

'I sure have – and you know what, I might even play it.'

He loved the music and when he sat down he took the banjo out of its case and joined in. It seemed he had tried it before and he played a five stringed banjo with the extra drone 'G' string. He didn't use a plectrum but his fingers. After the first time he came he was asked to visit lots of times and the revellers saved a space for him to come along to play and sing.

It wasn't a public place, more like private parties and those who attended knew a password which went around the college which was banjo such as 'banjo tonight' which meant that there would be a party. Some students would come and relax in an easy chair the girls had acquired, read or revised. In fact the premises was used like a green room or a free downgraded version of Bewleys.

There was no piano so Carmel wasn't able to accompany Joe but they got together back at the Callaghan house. Joe often said it would a great thing if they could transport the piano to the Lower Baggott Street premises.

Joe also took his banjo to 'Mother Red Cap's' once in a while, maybe after mass on Sundays mornings. Patrick was never drawn to playing any instrument but he liked listening to traditional Irish music and rebel songs.

He wasn't earning much money, but he had a good reputation around The Liberties and he would help people, as a kind of odd job man at which he excelled. When he walked around he was always on the look out for somebody from the 'laundries' which he became obsessed with. He told Joe he saw the galoot in the overcoat on Stonybatter, which wasn't that far away and Joe told him to forget about him 'Maybe he's visiting the graves of his comrades around there' he said.

Some of the leaders of the 1916 insurrection were buried at the back of Arbour Prison, near there.

Joe was more concerned as to when Carmel and Patrick were going to be married as she was getting very big. None of them knew how many months pregnant she was as the doctor she saw at The Rotunda, was a bit vague about it, or didn't make it clear or Carmel might have missed it but all she said, when asked when the baby was due answered 'not yet.'

On the evenings when there was no 'banjo' party the girls sat around sometimes listening to the wireless other times studying or even playing drafts. Aisling called the game 'checkers' as she had heard it mentioned in a film.

One of the Sundays, Joe brought Carmel and Patrick to Mother Red Cap's Tavern and Carmel sang a song Barbara Allen. She sung it with no accompaniment and it went on for a long time, and when she finished the whole place was silent.

The silence followed the last verse:

And so this maid she then did dye,

And desired to be buried by him,

She repented herself before she d'ed,

That ever she did deny him.

She sang the air which she knew, which wasn't the one the 'audience' knew, but it was beautiful and plaintive, and as she sang she looked at Patrick with such love and affection in her voice, and expression on her face, that even though the room was very large, with a mixture of families, old men, old women – a lot of them carrying musical instruments, ready to play, everybody saw it.

Silence.

Then a huge uproar of applause, like a bomb had exploded, with a lot of tears streaming down people's faces.

©2024 Chris Sullivan