The Empire Trilogy - J. G. Farrell [211]
At last, after a long silence which the doctor had found agreeable but which his guests had found disturbing, Mrs O’Neill said: “Viola would like you to recommend a diet for her, Doctor. She finds she’s getting rather plump and needs to lose a bit of weight.”
With an effort the doctor got to his feet and shuffled off down the corridor to his study followed by Mrs O’Neill and Viola, both of whom wrinkled their noses when they saw the state the place was in. But still, one had to make allowances. He was elderly, and the only doctor in Kilnalough.
When Viola had partially undressed, the doctor looked briefly at her breasts and at her stomach and then motioned her to get dressed again.
“Well, Doctor?”
“She doesn’t need a diet.”
“But she’s getting fat, Doctor!”
There was another long silence. The old man stood there wool-gathering, eyes half closed. Mrs O’Neill and Viola exchanged a significant glance. “Impossible,” Mrs O’Neill was thinking, “impossible for him to keep his mind on anything for more than two seconds!”
“A diet, Doctor,” she reminded him. But the doctor merely sighed and it looked as if they were not ever going to get any sense out of him. At last, however, his trembling, wrinkled lips parted and he said: “Your daughter doesn’t need a diet because she’s pregnant, Mrs O’Neill.”
“Pregnant! But that’s impossible. Viola is only a child. She doesn’t even know any young men, do you, Viola?”
“No, Mummy.”
“There, you see...It’s absurd. And what a thing to say! Really, it’s disgusting!”
“None the less, Mrs O’Neill, she’s pregnant.”
“But how many times do I have to tell you...?” And again Mrs O’Neill patiently explained (nothing was achieved by losing one’s temper) that what Viola wanted was a diet, nothing more complicated than that. But the old doctor persisted in being obstinate and senile. Gradually it became clear to Mrs O’Neill that it did no good to explain anything to him, however patiently. The old boy was beyond it. His mind was made up and there was no hope of making him see reason. Dr Ryan, who had served Kilnalough so well for so many years (and this was true, he had done a splendid job, one must give him his due), had at last reached the end of his career in medicine. In some ways it was rather sad. But it was no use complaining.
Dr Ryan shuffled as far as the gate with his visitors and watched them walk away towards the main street. Then with a sigh he made his slow and laborious way round the house to the back garden, where the Major was sitting in a deck-chair reading a newspaper.
On his last day in Kilnalough the Major paid a melancholy visit to the charred rubble which was now all that remained of the Majestic. He did not linger there, however, because he had a train to catch. Besides, there was very little to see except that great collection of wash-basins and lavatory bowls which had crashed from one burning floor to another until they reached the ground. He inspected the drips of molten glass which had collected like candle-grease beneath the windows. He noted the large number of delicate little skeletons (the charred and roasted demons had been picked clean by the rats). He stepped from one blackened compartment to another trying to orientate himself and saying: “I’m standing in the residents’ lounge, in the corridor, in the writing-room.” Now that these rooms were open to the mild Irish sky they all seemed much smaller—in fact, quite insignificant. As he was carefully stepping over a large pile of wood-ash (which he suspected must have once been the massive front door) he looked back and happened to notice something white, half concealed by rubble. It was the statue of Venus, strangely undamaged. It was much too heavy for him to lift by himself, but when he got back to Kilnalough he made arrangements for it to be packed and shipped to London.
As it turned out, this lady of white marble was the only bride the Major succeeded in bringing back with him from Ireland in that