At Swim, Two Boys - Jamie O'Neill [0]
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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Copyright © 2001 by Jamie O’Neill
All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.
First Scribner edition 2002
Originally published in Great Britain in 2001 by Simon & Schuster UK Ltd
SCRIBNERand design are trademarks of Macmillan Library Reference USA, Inc., used under license by Simon & Schuster, the publisher of this work.
ISBN-10: 0-7432-4187-8
ISBN-13: 978-0-7432-4187-8
à Julien
mon ami, mon amour
PART ONE
1915
I will make inseparable cities with their arms about each other’s necks;
By the love of comrades.
—WALT WHITMAN
CHAPTER ONE
At the corner of Adelaide Road, where the paving sparkled in the morning sun, Mr. Mack waited by the newspaper stand. A grand day it was, rare and fine. Puff-clouds sailed through a sky of blue. Fairweather cumulus to give the correct designation: on account they cumulate, so Mr. Mack believed. High above the houses a seagull glinted, gliding on a breeze that carried from the sea. Wait now, was it cumulate or accumulate he meant? The breeze sniffed of salt and tide. Make a donkey of yourself, inwardly he cautioned, using words you don’t know their meaning. And where’s this paper chappie after getting to?
In delicate clutch an Irish Times he held. A thruppenny piece, waiting to pay, rolled in his fingers. Every so often his hand queried his elbow—Parcel safe? Under me arm, his hand-pat assured him.
Glasthule, homy old parish, on the lip of Dublin Bay. You could see the bay, a wedge of it, between the walls of a lane, with Howth lying out beyond. The bay was blue as the sky, a tinge deeper, and curiously raised-looking when viewed dead on. The way the sea would be sloping to the land. If this paper chappie don’t show up quick, bang goes his sale. Cheek of him leaving customers wait in the street.
A happy dosser was nosing along the lane and Mr. Mack watched with lenient disdain. Any old bone. Lick of something out of a can. Dog’s life really. When he came to the street Mr. Mack touched a finger to his hat, but the happy dosser paid him no regard. He slouched along and Mr. Mack saw it puddling after, something he had spilt in the road, his wasted civility. Lips pursed with comment, he pulled, squeezing, one droop of his bush mustache.
“Oh hello, Mrs. Conway, grand day it is, grand to be sure, tiptop and yourself keeping dandy?”
Nice class of lady, left foot, but without the airs. Saw me waiting with an Irish Times, twice the price of any other paper. They remark such things, the quality do. Glory be, I hope she didn’t think—his Irish Times dropped by his side—Would she ever have mistook me for the paperman, do you think?
Pages fluttered on the newspaper piles, newsboards creaked in the breeze. Out-of-the-way spot for a paper stand. Had supposed to be above by the railway station. But this thoolamawn has it currently, what does he do only creeps it down, little by little, till now he has it smack outside of Fennelly’s—
Mr. Mack swivelled on his heels. Fennelly’s public house. The corner doors were propped wide where the boy was mopping the steps. Late in the morning to be still at his steps. The gloom inside gave out a hum of amusement, low mouths of male companionship, gathered by the amber glow of the bar. Mr. Mack said Aha! with his eyes. He thrust his head inside the door, waved his paper in the dark. “’Scuse now, gents.” He hadn’t his hat back on his head before a roar of hilarity, erupting at the bar, hunted him away, likely to shove him back out in the street.
Well, by the holy. He gave a hard nod to the young bucko leaning on his mop and grinning. What was that about?
Presently, a jerky streak of anatomy distinguished itself