We are off on Monday to the UK where I do my show at the Edinburgh Festival and instead of flying we are going on the Queen Mary from New York to Southampton; it seems more civilised and we may arrive without any jet lag; the journey take seven days and I will try and post on this blog at least once.
I have sent my guitar, by the way, via fed-ex to New York as United Airlines, in their wisdom wanted to charge $200. So I sent it fed-ex to their Brooklyn office for me to pick up when I am there in Monday and I did everything they told me and when it got to Brooklyn the office there refused delivery and returned it.
So now it is on its way to Phoenix. I have put an order in for them to intercept it and send it to an address in the UK but watch this space – isn't it amazing how incompetent most things are these days?
Anyway part three of my novel; this is called Gertie:
Gertie
Eddie's mother didn’t like the fact that he lived in the flats; she told Eddie they were for the common people, and she never stopped telling him that even after he had taken up residence there with his bride. The phrase ‘the common people’ amused Eddie as he had always thought that they were all common people; they didn’t live too far from the centre of the city and their neighbours were working class so they were all common people.
They had very thick north Dublin working class accents and some of the so called common people, who lived in the flats, spoke a lot posher than his parents did; but to be fair to his parents at that time the prospect of living in a flat was new to the people of Dublin; it was new to the people of most places away from London and other world capitals.
Nuala’s mother left the west of Ireland and ended up in Dublin; the first person she met when she walked along the street, that day, was Eddie. He was standing outside Mulligan’s pub in Poolbeg Street having a cigarette. He took a huge pull of his Woodbine and sucked the smoke deep into his lungs and stared into space as he enjoyed the sensation. Then he leaned against the pub wall and blew smoke rings across the narrow street.
“Excuse me” she said.
He almost jumped to attention as she spoke: “What?”
“I need to get passed.”
“You need to get passed?”
“Yes.”
She looked at him.
He looked at her.
“It’s only a little pavement.” she continued.
Of course it was a narrow pavement, just there, but she could easily have stepped into the road to get passed but as she had approached she saw his lovely black wavy hair, his beautiful blue eyes and his long black eye lashes so she decided to speak.
“Do you mind?”
“And what’s the matter with walking around?” he said.
“I don’t want to get walk around; I want to walk on the pavement where it’s safer.”
“Oh!” he said and stood up from the wall “Don’t want you to be getting run over.”
“Thank you” she said as she started to walk.
“Don’t want you to getting run over by the streams of bleedin’ cars that are rushing passed here all hours of the day and night.”
He squinted at her for some kind of response as there hadn’t been a car in Poolbeg Street for as long as he’d been standing there.
“You never know” she said then she turned and looked at him “are you waiting for the holy hour?”
“It is the holy hour so why would I be waiting for it?”
“Funny wonder” she said and she walked off.
In those days the Dublin pubs would close at two thirty for an hour; that hour was called the holy hour; it was also the hour when everybody wanted a drink; even though the licensing hours in Dublin were very generous, and the pubs seemed to be open all day, the hour between two thirty and three thirty was so much more attractive and dangerous, somehow, if you were drinking a pint of porter in a pub.
Nuala’s mother, or to be more precise, the future mother of Nuala, walked away from Eddie and Eddie looked at her and the way she walked; he loved the way she had given him a smart answer and the way she nearly glanced back at him, almost looking over her shoulder, and he was interested; interested in knowing what was going on in that mind.
She was dressed very differently from the other young girls of the day; she was wearing buttoned up shoes and a three quarters coat over a frilly dress, which showed below the hem of the coat, as she walked. Her hair was also quite short and she reminded him of a pixie.
He followed her up Corn Exchange Place; she could see him peripherally now and again, so she knew he was there, and she led him into George's Quay; she didn’t lead him there on purpose, as she didn’t know Dublin at all, and when she could see the River Liffey she stopped by the wall and gazed across.
He stopped and looked at her; she seemed like something from another age; a beautiful creature that had dropped out of the sky like an angel.
“It’s called the Liffey” he said stopping beside her.
“Aren’t you the clever one?” she said.
It was a nice day for March and Eddie leaned against the wall.
“Smoke?”
“I don’t mind.”
He opened his packet of Craven-A and offered it to her; she found it difficult to take one as she was wearing white gloves.
“Take one out for me” she said.
He handed her a cigarette then put the packet back into his pocket and pulled out the packet of Woodbines for himself.
“Prefer these” he said lighting her smoke “Don’t like the cork tips.”
“You carry the Craven-A for the girls?”
He winked and she leaned forward and took the light then took a deep drag of the cork tipped Craven A and went into a fit of coughing: “First one?” he said.
She nodded and he patted her back lightly.
“You’ll get used to it” he said.
After a few minutes her eyes stopped watering and she managed to clear her throat.
“Thanks very much” she said.
He took a deep pull on the Woodbine and said “Are you going to try another pull?”
“I don't think so” she said and put her foot on it.
“Where did you get the Craven A?” she said.
“England.”
“You in the British Army?”
“Go way” he said.
They talked till the end of the holy hour then Eddie had to go; he had to go back to his job at Mulligan’s and he told her all about it and how he was an apprentice barman; it was a trade to be proud of in Dublin where the Irish barmen led the world; by the time he had finished his time as an apprentice he would know everything from a Black Velvet to a Pink Gin and she was impressed by that; not that she knew what a pink gin was but it sounded interesting.
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Eddie arranged to meet the new girl the following day; he was to meet her at Nelson’s Pillar at two thirty, the holy hour, and he spent the entire morning trying to remember her name.
Was it Kitty or Grace? Something beginning with a ‘G’ maybe or was it Betty? It wasn’t Grace, he came to accept, and got to thinking about other names; he didn’t think it was Mary as he would have remembered that one easily enough.
He stood at the Pillar feeling as smart as he’d ever felt when he saw her approaching along O’Connell Street; she looked as beautiful as she had the previous day; he hadn’t noticed how blue her eyes were or how the sun reflected off her soft chestnut coloured hair and as soon as she got there he remembered her name – Gertie.
“Why did your mother call you Gertie?” was the first thing he said to her.
“How do you know it was my mother?”
“Well who was it?”
“I don’t know” she said.
A moment of silence; he didn’t know what to say to that so took the cigarettes out and offered her one.
“No thanks” she said “I just passed a shop near Parnell Street where they sell those.”
“You did?”
“Yes” she said – “it is Parnell Street with the big statue at the end?”
“It is” said Eddie lighting his cigarette.
“England!” she said.
“What?”
“England my arse! Where you ever there?”
He skulked a bit and turned to look towards the GPO.
“Here” he said “I brought you something.”
He took a palm from his pocket and gave it to her.
“Thanks; were you at mass?”
“Yes” he said “were you?”
She shook her head and put the palm into her pocket.
“Don't you have a bag?”
“No” she said.
“Well I'll get you one.”
She smiled.
“I'd like to go to England.”
“I'd like to live there” she said.
“Oh I don't know about that; I'd like to visit. I was reading about the Olympic Games there; I'd like to see them.”
“I never heard of it” she said.
“You never heard of the Olympic Games?”
“No.”
“Where have you been hiding?”
“I just dropped out of the sky” she said “what are they – the Olympic Games?”
“In the summer in London – they sound great; would you like to come across with me and see them?”
She laughed.
“I meet you one day and then next you want me to run away with you?”
“We don't have to run away – we just get in that bus and we're at the airport in no time.”
He took a deep drag on his cigarette as the bus to the airport went passed; they both watched it disappear.
“Were you ever up in a plane?” he said.
“I wasn't even on a bus.”
They both laughed.
“You really did fall out of the sky - where do you want to go?”
“When?”
“Now.”
“Up the Pillar” she said “I used to have a post card of it.”
He looked up at the height of the pillar and back at her ‘Are you sure?’
“Sure I’m sure.” she said.
“All right.” he said “If it's open.”
He’d lived in Dublin all his life but had never been up the pillar.
He took a deep pull of his woodbine, scratched his chin and they walked over; it didn’t cost very much and he paid for both of them as they went inside the archway entrance; somebody had once told him that the place stunk but he didn’t smell anything.
As they walked through the arch they had to go down a few steps then they had to climb a stone spiral staircase.
He wasn’t sure whether he should walk in front or not; if she walked first he might be accused of looking up at her arse and if he went first he might lose her; so he walked beside her.
It was a steady climb but not very hard; another thing he had heard was that it was exhausting which was also untrue; then about half way up he saw a woman who was exhausted so he gave that another thought.
The woman was with three young children; she was totally out of breath and one of the children was frightened to go any further; “I’ve had it” she said “I’m not going any higher.”
Gertie and Eddie walked passed them on the narrow staircase.
When they got to the top they could both feel the coolness of the air as it hit them and he could see Gertie shiver slightly.
He had a yearning to put his arm around her but it was too early; he wasn’t sure how she would take it so he stood there and put his hands in his pockets.
Gertie went to the edge and looked over the side at Dublin: first of all she looked down to the street down below where she had been standing a few minutes earlier; she thought she could see the cigarette he had put out on the pavement but it was her imagination; at around one hundred and twenty feet it was the highest building in Ireland and the highest she would ever be.
She looked ahead of her and could see a few cars in O'Connell Street below, parked in the middle of the street, a bus was below too and various people crossing over.
“There he is” said Eddie, looking up at the statue of Nelson, “the old bastard.”
A pigeon shit on the head of Nelson and she laughed.
In the distance she could see a church “What church is that?”
“That one . . now . .” said Eddie “that will be . .er Christchurch – a bleedin' good walk.”
“One little step” she said “and all my problems would disappear.”
She turned to him and smiled but there was no smile in her eyes; then she softened, twinkled and held on to his arm.
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