Troubles - James Gordon Farrell [203]
The Major did write back immediately, sending a cheque for fifty pounds together with the news that Edward would be setting out for London in two days’ time. He himself would follow when he had made final arrangements with an estate agent in Dublin. By now it was the end of June and almost everything had been settled. The dogs had been sent to a kennel while preparations were made for their new home. The ladies’ trunks had been packed and delivered to the station, labelled for various destinations (those of Miss Bagley, Miss Porteous, Miss Archer, Mrs Rice and Miss Staveley all bore the address of a boarding-house on the Isle of Wight purchased expressly by Miss Staveley to give shelter to her friends, a most satisfactory conclusion). Old Mrs Rappaport had been dispatched to London, still armed to the teeth and the wonder of her fellow-passengers, carrying the marmalade cat in a wicker basket. She was accompanied on her journey by an indigent cousin of Edward’s, specially hired for the purpose.
In the course of Edward’s last afternoon at the Majestic he and the Major took sledge-hammers and rained blows on Queen Victoria and her horse in an attempt to restore her to a more vertical position. For half an hour they hammered away at her shoulders, her head, even her bosom, the sound of their blows ringing cheerfully over the countryside. As they worked, her delicate green metal became pocked with brown marks... but little else was achieved. She was still leaning drunkenly sideways. At most they had managed to correct her position a few inches by the time they retired, perspiring, to drink some tea (in plentiful supply now that the old ladies commanded the kitchen). After tea they returned to hammer down her ruffled skirts. That was all they could do for her.
“I shan’t be leaving tomorrow, Edward. There are still a number of things I have to do here.” The Major had delayed informing Edward of his decision to stay for fear that Edward too might change his mind. This fear had been illusory, he decided, seeing the stricken, anxious expression that appeared on Edward’s face.
“But you must leave! It’s dangerous here.” Calmly, but feeling that he hated Edward, the Major said: “I don’t intend just to walk off and leave the place to the bloody Shinners.”
“But Brendan, you must face reality. You’ve read the newspapers. You know as well as I do that it’s all over here. It’s finished. Any day now that blighter Lloyd George is going to throw in the sponge and then there’ll be hell to pay for people like you and me who’ve been loyal.”
“I’m damned if I’m going to take to my heels, Edward, just because there’s a possibility of trouble. If I go at all I shall go in my own good time.”
“But good God, Brendan! Things are bad enough already. When they send the army home it’ll be the law of the jungle. Every Unionist in the South will have his throat cut. Go to Ulster if you want to stay in Ireland.”
“I’ve made up my mind that I’m staying, Edward. At least for a while.”
“But you can’t stay here. The old place is falling to pieces. It’s dangerous. You’ve been telling me for months how dangerous it is...Think of the writing-room ceiling! That could happen anywhere at all in the building, anywhere.”
“I’ll stay in the rooms that have the fewest cracks in them,” said the Major smiling.
“Without servants?”
“Oh well, there’s always Murphy.”
“Murphy! Besides, just look at the size of the place, it’s absurd. You can’t live here all by yourself. And you just told me the place is up for sale.”
“I’ll wait until it’s sold, then. But I refuse to be hounded out of the place by a handful of labourers with guns in their hands.”
“Well, I shall stay with you, of course,” Edward murmured unhappily. “But I must say I think it’s most unwise.”
“There’s absolutely no question of you staying, Edward. You have the twins to think of.”
Edward had dropped his sledge-hammer and was sitting on the stone steps facing the shattered statue, watching the jagged, freshly torn edges of metal glimmer in the sunshine.