Galore - Michael Crummey [16]
Couples disappeared into the alders and berry bushes beyond the field as the night wore on, shifting clothes to accommodate the drunken love they had to offer one another. Shouting and singing and petty arguments flared among the congregation as they staggered toward the collective hangover awaiting them. They were never more content with their lot in life, never happier to consent to it.
Lizzie left for home with young Lazarus right after Mass and Mary Tryphena spent the evening in the company of Devine’s Widow. Her first communion was a disappointment, the ceremony tarnished by the sullenness of the Toucher boys who swore under their breath and picked at one another through the service. But the night on the Commons that followed was more to her liking, the firelight and fierce release of it. She walked down to Kerrivan’s Tree to hide when her grandmother announced it was time to go home. She took off her bonnet so the white of it wouldn’t give her away and she climbed into the branches, clear of the old woman’s meddling. King-me’s grandson had settled into the upper branches earlier in the night for the same reasons, but he was invisible in the pitch and Mary Tryphena sang to herself as she often did when she was alone. She almost fell from her perch when he spoke to say he liked her voice. —I wasn’t singing for you, she told him.
—Still, he said.
Absalom, his name was. He said hardly a word in company, and opinion was divided on whether this was due to his stutter or to losing his parents so early or simply a mark of Sellers’ airs at work in the youngster. He was introverted and queer and seemed much younger than others his age, sheltered as he was by living in Selina’s House. Absalom reached to pick one of the young apples, handing it to Mary Tryphena after taking a bite himself, and the unexpected intimacy of the gesture made her stomach quiver like a hive of bees. She watched the featureless outline of him in the dark awhile. She said, Do you know who I am, Absalom?
—Mary Tryphena Devine, he answered, stuttering on the D.
She thought he was making fun of her in some obscure way, but his manner was all innocence. Somehow he didn’t know her mother was King-me’s daughter and Absalom’s aunt, that he and Mary Tryphena were cousins. It was a laughable ignorance in a boy his age and she felt a rush of maternal affection for him. The smell of the apple was surprisingly sweet and she bit into the hard fruit before passing it back. They finished the apple together and Absalom climbed past her to the ground then, his hands traveling her arms and hips and legs as he went. From the base of the tree he said, You’ve the loveliest hair, and she answered good night without looking down.
The bonfire went on burning till the small hours of the night, Father Phelan the last to leave the dregs. He was pleased with himself and with the evening, the children brought to the faith and his homily on the jealousy of angels, the gathering on the Commons and the more intimate gatherings in the bushes at the edge of the field. Life insisting on itself out there in the dark, though times had been mean and uncertain. He found the dirt path near Kerrivan’s Tree and followed it through the village, drunkenly blessing each dwelling he passed. He walked the steep ascent of the Tolt Road and stood on the headland awhile to catch his wind before descending into Paradise Deep. The coastline bereft of light for a thousand miles in either direction, the ocean festering below him. While he stood at the cliff’s edge he blessed the fish of the sea and the dull coin of the moon sailing behind clouds.
Legal strictures against Catholicism had been lifted decades past and a vicar appointed to govern all ecclesiastical matters from St. John’s. But Father Phelan continued to operate outside the bounds of state and Church hierarchy. He lived among his parishioners like a refugee, dependent on the charity of the communities he served. He claimed it was only in the