'Home to Derry' by Tomá Ó Canainn

Search the site:

Extracted from Home to Derry by Tomás Ó Canainn, published by Appletree Press

Chapter Two - part 1

Sean and Brid sat on the stairs, waiting for the postman. It was a fine place to sit and enjoy the soft comfort of carpet under you: the only other part of the house with that sort of luxury was the parlour, but they only went in there on Sundays, or when very special visitors arrived.
Sean could see through the coloured glass panels in the vestibule door, because the double front door was open to let in the light. It cast a lovely pattern of green and red on the tiled floor of the hall and continued on to the hallstand. Only the family’s best coats hung there: ordinary coats were kept under the stairs and you entered the dark den through a little door in the scullery.
Brid and himself had kept their postman’s vigil these last three mornings, hoping to be the first in the house to get Mrs McAloon’s answer to their mother’s letter. It was a full week since his mother had written to Mrs McAloon, who owned a boarding-house in Portstewart. The strain of not knowing whether she could take the family for its annual holiday or not was becoming unbearable.
The hall darkened as the postman’s bulk shut off the light from the vestibule door. Brid was on her feet before Sean realised what was happening, but he caught her as she put her hand on the door-handle.
‘Mammy, he took the letter, after me bein’ there first. Tell him to give it back to me at once.’
It was too late and Sean was already reading the envelope: ‘Mrs Bridie Kane, 9 Barry Street, Derry.’
‘Let me read the postmark,’ Brid appealed to her mother. ‘Mammy, tell him to let me read the postmark.’
His mother took the letter sharply from his hand, but not before he had got a clear picture of the stamp and the printed writing beside it.
Brid turned the letter sideways in her hand, trying to decipher the smudged postmark. ‘P-O-R-T-S-T-E… Portstewart, Co. Derry. It’s from Mrs McAloon, Mammy: will I open it?’
‘Give it to Mammy,’ Jenny interrupted, ‘Sure you can’t read big people’s writing.’
‘I can so – can’t I Mammy?’ Brid needed the reassurance and got it from her mother, but she was glad enough to hand over the short note from Mrs McAloon.
‘Dear Bridie,’ her mother read aloud, but then lapsed into silence: only her lips moved as she concentrated on Mrs McAloon’s handwriting.
As she continued to read it to herself, Jenny spoke out for them all: ‘What does she say?’
‘Shh!’ Her mother quietened her without looking up, folded the letter, put it into the envelope and slipped it in behind the clock on the mantelpiece. Only then did she break her silence.
‘She’ll have our room ready by teatime on Monday.’
Jenny turned to Eamonn and Mary: ‘We’re goin’ to Portstewart on wur holidays.’ Her face was bright with the excitement of it all.
‘Are we goin’ as well?’ Sean felt a bit sorry that Eamonn had to put the question. The weans couldn’t assume they were included in the plan, since they were so often excluded from pleasure trips to town or even to the shops at the bottom of the street. It was always either too late or too early, too dark or too cold for the weans to be let out with the older three children.
‘Of course you’re goin’. We’re all off on wur holidays to the Port,’ said Sean. ‘An’ we’ll get sweets an’ ice-cream every day a’ we can sail my wee boat in the swimming-pool an’ fish off the rocks an’ everything.’
His mother interrupted Sean’s dream with harsh reality: ‘There’ll be no goin’ anywhere till this house is red up and shinin’ like a new pin. You take that wee brush, Sean, and do the stairs. Jenny can scrub the front step and the weans can do the dishes, for I have to finish them skirts for Brid and Jenny, not to mention that heap of darnin’ over there. Brid, you can black-lead the range, but put an apron on you!’
If there was one job Sean did not like, it was brushing down the stairs. His mother insisted on brisk strokes with the stiff handbrush and you’d feel the dust in your mouth and nose and see it on the backs of your hands. Even after all that you’d still have to go back with a duster to clean and polish the painted wood on both sides of the narrow stair-carpet. You couldn’t cut corners on the job either, for she’d be there to inspect it before there was any question of being allowed out to play. But it was all worthwhile if it meant getting to Portstewart on Monday.
The long Friday finished at last and a lazy Saturday dragged itself towards Sunday.
The whole Kane family was seated in a row in the seventh seat from the front of the church. They always sat there, with Mrs Kane at the end to make sure that none of them could stray on to the aisle.
Sean thought he was a bit too old for a white sailor’s suit – a present from his Uncle Joe in America. It had come in a parcel full of dresses for the girls. Brid was wearing one of them now, all red and frilly and not the sort of thing you would get in the Derry shops. She was the serious one of the family, and performed the same containing function at the other end of the family group as her mother did at the aisle.
‘Mammy said to kneel up straight and say your prayers.’ It was Jenny who gave him the message: he knew it was genuine, as his mother was looking sternly in his direction and indicating that he should straighten up. He pulled himself forward unwillingly, regretting the absence of support from the seat. His mother sometimes judged Catholics by how they knelt in church and actively discouraged lapses in her own family. He opened the prayer-book again and tried to read the Memorare: ‘Remember O most gracious Virgin Mary that never was it known that anyone who fled to thy protection, implored thy aid or sought thy intercession was left unaided by thee…’
The prayer-book had been his father’s and contained a prayer for seamen, as well as a prayer for the King. He thought a king shouldn’t need his prayers, but you couldn’t be sure. He turned the page and saw the picture of the crucifix… ‘Behold O kind and most sweet Jesus, I cast myself upon my knees in thy sight…’ He liked the ‘En Ego’: it was more valuable than some of the other prayers which merited a mere three hundred days indulgence. A plenary indulgence was always worth having, but you had to do everything just right to qualify: they said at school that one Our Father, one Hail Mary and one Gloria after it would do the job, but his mother insisted that it had to be six of each, which was not so easy.
He wondered about the thirty days prayer: it might solve his problem. He scanned the conditions: ‘…by the devout recital of which, for the above space of time, we may hope to obtain any lawful request.’ The word ‘lawful’ was the snag. Would God think that his prayers for Sue Mackey’s conversion were lawful? Praying for a red-haired Protestant girl with freckles to become a Catholic so that she could marry him didn’t seem quite right, particularly when she appeared happy enough in her Protestant state. A terrible thought came into his mind: why shouldn’t he become a Protestant and marry her? It would certainly be a more practical solution. Protestants seemed to get on a lot better than Catholics in Derry. He was shocked at his own daring in toying with such thoughts. He looked guiltily across at his mother, in case she had somehow divined what was in his head. But it was nice to be thinking of Sue Mackey: the way she ran – as fast as any of the lads – or her speed off the mark in rounders. They said she was good at school, too: he liked that about her.

Find out what happened next: here

[ Back to Top ]

[ Home | Features | Culture | History | Travel ]