Blasket Spirit Page 15

  ‘Nothing, he just didn’t stop laughing, and then he nearly cracked up altogether when he saw that the £1.50 price tag was still on it. Anyway, when he eventually drew breath, he sent me off to retrieve the empty bottles and corks. Then I got my first lesson on wine, as we sat on the old box in the sunshine. All I know about wine Charlie Haughey has taught me, and since then, I have a healthy respect for the grape. If there’s any trace of it still in my bloodstream, I’m worth a fortune.’

  I didn’t know anything about fine wines, but even I could appreciate the travesty of a treasured case of rare wine meeting its end, swilled down in a chipped tin mug with nothing but a tin of ham for company.

  ‘You know that story has gone around the world like a boomerang. Charlie told it to President Mitterrand at a state dinner the following weekend, and it was told back to him in the States a couple of weeks after that.

  ‘When the house was finished, he invited me, along with half the population of Dingle and Dún Chaoin, into the Inis, for the party. He’s like that you know… but let me tell you, I brought a bottle with a real cork that time.’

  The Black Calf

  According to Larry, Maria Simonds-Gooding would be in to visit the island the following morning. I watched the ferry arrivals carefully. I looked out for an easel or other such give-away. There was none. A homogenised crowd seeped through the lower ruins. Then a tall striking lady set off alone, up to the top of the hill. She radiated an enthusiasm and energy that set her apart. Near the brow of the hill she stopped, framing vast views with her hands. Like a fairy godmother, with one wave of her magic brush, she could immortalise all before her. That had to be her. I locked the door and set off in hot pursuit.

  When I greeted her, she turned, smiling broadly, and introduced herself as Maria Simonds-Gooding. After chatting for a while, I asked her if she would tell me her ghost story of the Inis.

  ‘My goodness, I’m surprised you’ve heard about that. Not many people know about the calf on the Inis. It was a long time ago, but I remember it clearly, every bit of it. It was July 1968 and was one of the hottest summers I can remember. There wasn’t a breath of wind. I wanted to get out, onto one of the islands, to do some painting. One day, in Kruger’s pub, I met the skin-divers who were searching for the Spanish Armada shipwreck. They promised to take me out to whatever island I wanted. I organised my things and met them, as arranged, down at the Cusheen, at three o’clock. I had a sack with food and a bottle of Kruger’s port. My cousin Marie-Claire was with me. We decided on Inis Mhic Uibhleain, but the problem was how to land. The wreck of a small German plane was visible as we approached the pebble beach, on the east side of the island. We made several unsuccessful attempts to land, until eventually we took the dinghy in and managed to tie it to a rock while we climbed the steep cliff onto the island. My sack was hauled up the rocks on the end of a rope.’

  Maria paused as she closed her eyes, remembering. ‘You know, I can still smell that port. The bottle had smashed and it had soaked into everything. The skin-divers left us alone on the island, saying they would come back for us in a week. We walked the island and decided to put up our tent in the field that was walled in for a blind sheep. It had been another very hot day and now it was an utterly still night. It was difficult to sleep, with the heat, and the noise of all the birds.

  ‘It was on the third night that it happened. We had the weeniest of tents and I remember that I had three beetles in my sleeping bag that night. At eleven o’clock every night, like clockwork, the storm petrels came in from the sea. The noise was deafening. The storm petrels were all flying in from as far as forty miles away, back to their nests in the stone walls around the field. They were everywhere. Then there were the chilling wails of the manx shearwater. There was no hope of any sleep. We had to shout at each other to be heard over the racket. We had a plan to divert them, so we got up and lit the lantern.

  ‘Marie-Claire set off with the lantern, down to the end of the field, in the hope that the birds would be attracted to the light. I stood by the tent watching. She was walking with all these birds and bats flying around. Suddenly, the next thing I saw and heard was a black calf, pounding down the field behind her. He was pounding, rather than running, and with great force, as though he was driving her on.’

  Maria crossed her arms protectively, in front of her, as she took a deep breath and continued. ‘I roared and roared and roared at her. I roared so much, I was hoarse for days. The calf had a driving force that caused absolute terror in me. Marie-Claire came rushing back. She was quite cross with me and wanted to know what I was shouting at. I couldn’t believe it. She hadn’t seen a thing – nothing. How she failed to hear the calf behind her, I really couldn’t understand.

  ‘I was shocked and upset, but I’m not one to give up. I got over it, and a week later, after the skin-divers had come in and collected Marie-Claire, I remained on the island alone. They promised to come back for me in a few weeks, weather permitting.’

  ‘Did she leave because of what had happened?’

  ‘No, nothing to do with that. She was only just married, and was keen to be with her husband – that was always the plan. I never saw the calf again, although I stayed on another couple of weeks.

  ‘After I returned to the mainland with the skin-divers, things began to happen very quickly. Within three weeks, I had bought the cottage that I now live in, in Dún Chaoin. It was the nearest thing to living on the Great Blasket. An islander who left the island before the evacuation in 1953 owned it. He had nothing when he came across. He even brought the roof off his island house and put it on the cottage. It had no electricity or running water. He then moved to Dingle with his sister.

  ‘Lisa Mitchell was my neighbour. She’s dead now, God rest her. Her people were from the Inis. “Do you know the story of the calf?” She asked me this as we sat by her fire. I was shocked, because I had not told her about my experience. She told me the following:“a black calf appeared on the Inis, it came into Tigh na hInise. Nobody had any idea where it had come from, or how it could possibly have got there. At that time, there were only four cows and four calves on the island. There are two versions of the story. One is that they took the calf in and gave it milk. The other is that they did not give it milk. Whichever way it was, the calf walked down the island with the four calves and cows after it, and they all followed it straight over the cliff to their deaths.”

  ‘That was no ordinary calf – of that I am sure.’

  I was baffled. It was such a bizarre story. I could understand the relevance of my ghostly encounter on the Great Blasket Island, but Maria’s experience with the black calf was inexplicable. We wondered at the thin veil between worlds as we shared stories.

  Naturally she wondered how I had heard about her and the black calf. Once I admitted that it had been Charlie Haughey who had set me on her trail, she insisted that I tell her my Skellig story before I had a chance to tell him.

  ‘Fair trade,’ I agreed.

  Skellig Reunion

  The road to the top of Sceilg Mhichíl was paved with many steps… 206, 207, 208… I thought I was going to have a heart attack… 209, 210… according to Des Lavelle’s Skeillig Story: Ancient Monastic Outpost, there are at least 500 steps… 211, 212… a group of young French students filed past me…213, 214…One boy was dizzy from the height, but they still did not slacken their pace. They formed a human chain and he was swept along… 215, 216… A German couple bounded ahead of me like two spring lambs. If it weren’t for pride, I would have crawled on my hands and knees… 217, 218… The first time I had been on Sceilg Mhichíl, I had been ten years younger, and I had met only the two resident lighthouse keepers… 219…The second time, I carried a decade of arthritic rust and seemed to have met the Berlin Busman’s Holiday… 220.

  Still, pride comes before a fall. I decided to take a break. I flopped onto a step, gulping down my water. Was 220 the one I was sitting on or the one my feet were on? Each step was at least a metre across and
15 centimetres deep. How a cold, hungry monk could have hand-carved each stone, over 1,500 years ago, I could not fathom. Either he was sent out there for penance, cursing like a trooper, or he did it as a misguided act of love for us future pilgrims. He could never, however, have envisaged that pilgrim trail of American baseball caps and Japanese cameras that would follow in his wake.

  At last two locals approached. ‘Me legs just isn’t able,’ the old man panted as he stopped, head bowed, below me. He did not move for some time. Páid was seventy-five and from Ventry. Kathleen, his sister, was overweight and under severe pressure.

  ‘Páid, we’ll miss the boat if we don’t start back down. Come on let you!’

  Immediately, the frail man set off, climbing painfully upwards again. He was very unsteady.

  ‘You go on down. I’ll be grand.’ He stooped forward, lifting one leg up onto the next step. Then he rested, leaning both hands on that knee, before dragging up the other leg. The old man seemed oblivious to the 150-metre drop to his right, as tourists swept past him, on the left. It was clear that he was not going to take a blind bit of notice of anything that Kathleen might say.

  ‘Stubborn old fool’ were her parting words, as she began sidestepping heavily back down. Páid was anything but that. Amid the trail of hiking boots, trendy fleece jackets and zoom lenses, Páid’s old-fashioned wool suit and cap battled courageously on.

  I introduced myself, assuring him that I was as tired as he was, which was not far from the truth. During his next ten painful steps, we had to sit twice. As he laboured to catch his breath, I chatted about my first visit to the Skelligs back in 1986. Only the lighthouse keepers were on the rock then. Mick Fitzpatrick had given me a tour around his rock. He was passionate about the monastic site, the sea and the solitude. He was enthralled, protective and reverent towards the place. I told Páid that it had been one of the most special places I had ever been.

  ‘We said that too. It is forty-four years since we were here. That was back in 1954. Mary and I were married that week.’ He was quiet with his memories for a time and then continued. ‘We had two nights in Killarney, and then a friend of the cousin took us out to Sceilg Mhichíl. In them days, I was up to the top like a goat, and Mary was as quick. There was no such thing as visitors on the island back then, just Mary and me, on the top of the world till evening. We had the best of times.’ Seeing his rheumy eyes glisten, I knew that was true. ‘We always said we’d come back, but sure, then the boys were born and the years just disappeared on us.’

  As he fell silent, we watched the tiny ferries bobbing like toys over 150 metres below. They disgorged their passengers and waves of coloured fleeces flowed by us. Páid made no move to get up.

  ‘How many children have you?’ I asked.

  ‘We’ve three boys. John and Pat are married in Boston, and Stephen is working on the buildings in London.’ As he brushed the cap back off his face, I could see the beads of sweat shining on his forehead. ‘It’s just meself now. Mary passed on in April.’ He looked as if he would continue, but no words came out. I looked away, pretending to make out Pat Murphy’s boat in the flotilla. I made some clichéd comment about the comfort of having three wonderful sons, as I watched microscopic kittiwakes criss-crossing over the silken waves below us.

  ‘Well, to give her her due, she never missed a Sunday writing to them. Had to be Sunday. She’d get three parish newsletters after mass, and each one was wrapped up tight as a rolling pin in The Kerryman, and then it was off to the post office on the Monday morning. Even after the radiotherapy, she kept wrapping up those parcels.’

  After a few moments, he struggled to his feet with renewed determination. I was terrified that he would stumble over the edge; one gust of wind would have carried him off the rock. I held him gently by the elbow.

  ‘Páid, the view is beautiful from here. Would you not like to sit here, and I’ll go ahead, and take a photo for you at the top?’ For another three steps, he struggled on. Maybe he had not heard me.

  Suddenly he collapsed onto his hands and knees. ‘Me legs just isn’t able,’ he panted. He kept repeating it in frustration. I sat down beside him, feeling at a total loss.

  ‘I’ll go back down with you, Páid. It’ll be like the January sales at the top with that lot.’ He sat on the step, leaning his elbows on his knees, bony wrists and hands cradling his forehead. It took all his willpower to catch his breath.

  ‘This is the last time I’ll be on the Skellig. I have to leave something back on the top of the rock while I’m here. I promised Mary I’d do it.’

  ‘Could I do it for you, Páid?’ I asked him.

  He took something from his coat pocket. It was an old white linen handkerchief, wrapped carefully around two pieces of white quartz. Originally they had been one piece. He slotted them together perfectly, holding them so tightly, that his knuckles went white. Then, without a word, he rewrapped them in the handkerchief, and hurriedly placed the parcel in my hands.

  ‘Promise me you’ll put them back together in the shrine, under the high cross.’ I knew exactly where he meant.

  ‘I promise. I know the quartz mound. It’s right next to the oratory.’

  He nodded. ‘You’ll be sure to put them there?’

  ‘Páid, on my life, I promise. I’ll put them there, and I’ll say a prayer for you and Mary. You start making your way down slowly, and I’ll meet you below, and tell you when I have it done.’

  He said nothing, just cupped his hand over mine.

  My last image of Páid was of his frail thin back, bent over the steep steps of Sceilg Mhichíl. I placed the quartz in my small backpack and set off with renewed determination. I imagined the moment that I would tell him the twin stones were safely installed. I would take a photo for him too, as proof.

  I began overtaking people, anxious to get to the top and back down before Páid left. I forced my screaming knees up the last 300 steps without resting. Close to the top, I had to stop. There was a queue of people, headed by a huge crowd, near where I remembered the entrance should have been. It seemed an eternity before I was anywhere near the front. I kept looking at my watch, trying to gauge Páid’s progress down.

  A young guide, with reflective blue sunglasses, recited the Skellig pamphlet, with as much speed as a corpse at a christening. At this rate, I knew that I’d never make it back down for Pat Murphy’s last boat, never mind Páid’s. After shuffling from foot to foot for another ten minutes, I boldly left the crowd of tourists, heading for the stone tunnel that led into the monastic site.

  ‘Excuse me, madam. Get back in line and wait your turn.’ I blushed to the tips of my earlobes, under the censure of twenty German frowns and the blue reflective shades. I attempted to say something about not needing the tour, just having a message to drop off. ‘Get down, madam!’ The guide ignored what I had said. I stood at the wall like a bold child. There were wire barriers everywhere. Workmen in yellow and blue hats wandered by.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen, a helicopter is coming in. Please stay where you are and cover your eyes!’

  A blonde female guide herded a group out through the tunnel, as the noise of the chopper got louder. Suddenly it appeared over the edge of the rock, a line suspended from its belly, trailing a sling of concrete cargo. The grit swirled, the pebbles scattered, and the blades roared.

  ‘Now, ladies and gentlemen, you may re-enter for five minutes for photographs,’ she announced. I was getting desperate. It seemed an age before they emerged.

  Blue Shades spoke. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, you may now enter. Sit on the two ledges. You may not wander around the cells during the lecture. You will be given some time for photographs later.’

  I felt none of the wonder and reverence I had felt with the lighthouse keeper ten years before. The yellow Men At Work signs and red Danger signs were everywhere. A mobile phone suddenly rang from inside Cell B. Cells A, B and C! The lighthouse keepers had had a saint’s name for every cell, and a story to go with it. Blue Shades had th
e dimensions and statistics. We sat obediently on the two ledges and listened to his recitation. His mobile phone rang.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen, you must leave immediately. Back out through the tunnel quickly! The helicopter is coming in for another drop.’

  I looked over to the standing stone cross, outside the oratory. The bed of quartz was at its foot, exactly as Páid had described. Between my destination and me flashed the trendy sunglasses. All I could see was my reflection clutching the handkerchief. ‘May I just drop this here before –’

  ‘You heard me, madam. Leave the area!’

  The sound of the helicopter approached. Day-Glo jackets and cameras jostled through the tunnel. I had no option. I followed at the rear under the glare of the blue shades. Outside the grit swirled, the crowd huddled into itself, and my eyes streamed. It was more like a scene from wartime Vietnam than from a peaceful monastic settlement.

  ‘Now, ladies and gentlemen, would the next group please enter the site?’

  ‘Vot about our votografen?’ one of the Germans in my group protested.

  ‘Sorry, sir, you had your time inside. It’s another group’s turn now.’

  The next group began to file in, as my group was ushered brusquely back towards the steps. The guide guarded the entrance but I managed to duck in. I dodged behind an Italian couple. The new group was settling obediently on the ledge. I darted over towards the quartz shrine. Before I was 3 metres from the shrine he was on to me. ‘No wandering around during my talk. You’ll have plenty of time to take photos later,’ he announced at the top of his voice to the group, as he barred my way.

  ‘Excuse me.’ I was definitely going to miss Páid. ‘I’ve actually heard the talk, I just need to –’

  ‘Madam, sit down!’ Taken aback, I turned away from my reflection and sat on the ledge. I was distraught at this stage. Páid would be gone. He would never know that I had returned the honeymoon stones but, worse than that, I was beginning to think I would not manage to return them at all. The guide and his blonde companion had me under surveillance. They would have me up for interfering with a National Monument next. His talk seemed to take an eternity again.