At Swim, Two Boys - Jamie O'Neill [166]
“I don’t believe I know,” the priest remarked, “any patriot associated with Merrion Square. Though in course of time our new cathedral will rise here, and what truer monument to our country and her faith could a true-born patriot look for?”
Westland Row now and Trinity Fields to their left. “The foreign college,” said Father Taylor.
A jam of jarveys toward the railway station slowed their pace to a crawl. MacMurrough leant forward again. “There was one Irishman associated with Merrion Square,” he said. “Yes, the English put him on trial.”
“It is ever the way,” the priest complacently affirmed.
“Three trials, in fact. On the first he had the wit to proclaim, I am the prosecutor in this case!”
“I see, yes, very good. For all his country’s wrongs.”
“I need hardly tell you, Father Taylor, of the desertion by his friends, of witnesses bullied and corrupted, of the agitation against him got up by the newspapers.”
“It was ever the Saxon sneaking way.”
“They say the evening he was arrested the packet to France was filled to overflowing with like-minded gentlemen, fearing for their liberty.”
“Flight of the Earls,” said Father Taylor. “The Wild Geese who chose to serve in exile than suffer the alien yoke at home. It is history in a nutshell. But you have not told me this gentleman’s name?”
“His conviction was inevitable. But from the dock he gave a celebrated speech that defied to the heavens the traductions of his adversaries.”
“A speech from the dock! I have heard it said, and have said it myself, the speech from the dock is the only truly Irish drama. Three patriots may not gather but a rendition of Emmett or of Tone will edify the occasion. It is a form peculiarly suited to the Irish temperament. And what did this speech from the dock say?”
“The jury was unmoved, the judge called for order, but still the gallery cheered.”
“They may purchase however many juries, at whatever cost to their exchequer, but the honest man of the street they cannot touch. But I am surprised I have not guessed the gentleman’s name. You must remind me now.”
Eveline interrupted. “I fear, Father, I may come no closer to the station.”
“Madame, forgive me, I was talking with your nephew. This is fine for me now. Go raibh míle maith agat.”
“Irritating man,” she said, when MacMurrough had climbed to the front and she was turning the car. “He let the boys find their own way into town, just so he might have a motor ride.”
She made for St. Stephen’s Green and gave the car at the RIAC garage. They walked to the Shelbourne, where she had a day sitting-room arranged. MacMurrough watched out the window while she sat to repair her toilet.
“Are you really so lunatic,” she inquired, once the maid had left them, “that you were about to give Oscar Wilde’s name to the parish curate?”
“So you heard our little parlance?”
“I’m sure you think yourself most ingenious.”
“Well,” said MacMurrough, “and was he not an Irishman? And did his speech not bring the gallery to its feet?”
“You refer to the eulogium on illicit love.”
“The love that dare not speak its name.”
“Its name,” she said, “is buggery. As any soul in the three kingdoms might have told him.”
MacMurrough turned from the window and he looked with smiling admiration on his aunt. “Do you know, at home we couldn’t say Stomach to my mother without the vapors coming on. And here we are, discussing Wilde and buggery. You are a breath of air, Aunt Eva.”
Her lips narrowed, refusing the compliment. She said, “The English behaved unforgivably with that man.” She saw him in her glass and said, “Raise your eyebrows all you will, but it is true. They forgot what the Continent is for, and thought to replace it with Reading. They have attached a cachet to his name which to this day attracts the idle and dissolute. But then the English have always favored punishment over sense. The man was a buffoon and ought to have been treated