The Empire Trilogy - J. G. Farrell [58]
Little by little, as they moved back towards each other, Edward’s thoughts turned to the main and unbridgeable chasm, the Roman Catholicism of the Noonans: the unhealthy smell of incense, the stupefying and bizarre dogmatic precepts, the enormous families generated by ignorance and a doctrine of “the more souls the better” (no matter whether their corporeal envelopes went barefoot or not), the absurd squadron of saints buzzing overhead like chaps in the Flying Corps supposedly ever ready to lend a hand to the blokes on the ground (and each with his own speciality), the Pope with all his unhealthy finery, the services in a gibberish of Latin that no one understood, least of all the ignorant, narrow-minded and hypocritical priests. Well, such thoughts do not actually have to occur by a process of thinking; they run in the blood of the Protestant Irish.
At this point he found himself at the foot of the staircase leading to the servants’ quarters and remembered that the maids had been complaining about a supposed colony of rats. There was no shortage of them in the cellars, of course, but who ever heard of rats in the upper storeys? The whole thing was plainly nonsense; all the same, since he was there on the spot he might as well have a look round.
The inspection did not take long and it came as no surprise to him that no rodent crossed his path. He peered with distaste into the cramped little rooms with their sloping ceilings. They had a curious and alien smell which he could not quite identify; perhaps it came from a lingering of cheap perfume on Sunday clothes (seeing the maids out of uniform in Kilnalough, he very often failed to recognize them and stared in surprise if they acknowledged him). Wherever it came from, he associated it with the distressingly vulgar holy pictures on the wall, with the chocolate-coloured rosary beads on the table, with the crucifix above the bed.
“Education is what these people need. And they think they’re fit to govern a country!”
Satisfied that the rats were imaginary, Edward resumed his languid search for the telegraph boy.
Mr Noonan had just had a curious experience. He had met a maidservant hurrying down a corridor carrying a tray of teacups and toasted scones together with a large and (it must be admitted) desirable seed-cake. He had beckoned her, summoned her to his side. “Come here to me now,” he had said to her. But, to his surprise, hardly had the girl seen him when she turned and fled back the way she had come. Not knowing what a business it was to get afternoon tea at the Majestic, the bribes and cajolery that had to be administered, the deadly feuds that could be sponsored by one guest spotting another settling down to a clandestine sup of tea and bite of toast in a remote corner, Mr Noonan was astonished at this behaviour.
“Where is the master?” he called after her. But she had scurried away and he was left listening to the fading clatter of her shoes on the tiles. A little later, however, he realized that there was a person following him, though very slowly, along the corridor. It turned out to be an old lady, a gentlewoman to judge by her clothing, moving forward with two sticks which she planted firmly in front of her one after the other in the manner of an Alpine guide. He halted and allowed her to catch up, her eyes on the ground, her breathing stertorous.
“Where is Mr Spencer?” he demanded.
The lady lifted her watery eyes and surveyed him; then she raised one of her sticks in a trembling, arthritic hand. The brass ferrule that tipped it performed a wavering figure-eight a little above his head. He took her to be indicating that his way led upwards.
He was not a young man himself. His chest had been giving him trouble. His blood-pressure was too high. He’d started with nothing, d’ye see, and done it all himself. Self-raising, like his own flour, was what they said in Kilnalough.
“Now what I’d better be doing is...