The Village by Alice Taylor Page B

drawing trays of food to him and keeping a big fire in the bedroom for his comfort. One day when she thought that he was going to die, she summoned Fr Mick to anoint him. When he turned up the bedclothes at the end of the bed to anoint old Johnny’s feet, the terrier who was asleep on the bed went for Fr Mick and would not leave his post until Johnny – who was supposed to be dying – caught him by the scruff of the neck and threw him out the window.
    Also on his calling list were two old brothers who had a problem with rats in their remote farmhouse. They solved it with iron traps called “back-breakers”, which snapped shut on their victims with a loud bang. One day Fr Mick sat hearing the confession of one of the old men, who was not feeling too well and lay in bed upstairs. In the middle of the confession the penitent heard a loud crash and promptly suspended operations to shout down to his brother: “Dan, we have the bastard!” before continuing his confession. Even confessions in the church could take an unusual turn. One night when he had his misdemeanours disposed of one old man announced, “Father, I have a turnip here for you,” and, slipping out of his side of the confession box, he opened Fr Mick’s section and landed a big purple turnip in his lap where it oozed mud onto his black soutane.
    A popular song at the time recalled, “It takes so long to say goodbye, goodbye is a long long time,” and I always thought it could have been written with Fr Mick in mind. When leavingafter any visit it took him at least half an hour from the time he got up off the chair until he closed the door behind him. He stood up first, and then remembered something he should have told you. Then he took a few steps and thought of something else. A few more steps brought another story until finally he reached the door. There he spent five minutes talking before he opened the door, and when he had it open he stood for another session, which was unfortunate if it happened to be a cold night. All in all it took him a long time to say goodbye.
    One night he sat in our kitchen as I prepared breakfast trays for the morning when an imperious guest knocked on the kitchen door and demanded, “Could I have a carafe of water in my room?”
    I explained that the water from the kitchen was exactly the same as the water in his bedroom and that all the house water was perfect for drinking. He was not satisfied, however, and because the customer is always right, though some are less right than others, I assured him that I would bring his carafe of water up to him. When he had gone, Fr Mick sat there with a faraway look on his face.
    â€œAlice, the last time I saw a craft of water,” he said, “was when my mother turned a jam-pot upside down into a saucer for the chickens.”
    Shortly after that I saw another side to Fr Mick. One day Margaret and I went to Cork shopping for her trousseau where we had a great day and came home in high spirits. We had tea in her house across the road while her father, Jimmy, sat by the fire and chatted with us. Late that night a loud knocking came to our door. It was Margaret. She stood there, white-faced and in shock: Jimmy had just had a heart attack. We rushed across the road to find him obviously near to death. Fr Mick and the doctor came, but it was all over in a few minutes. We were all shattered by his sudden death. It was one o’clock and a long sadnight stretched ahead, yet Fr Mick sat there all night, chatting and comforting the family, until it was time for him to leave to say his early morning Mass. He was a tower of strength when he was needed.
    While Fr Mick would admit that some men could be a bad lot, he deemed nothing to equal the havoc that could be wrought by a completely selfish woman. Rare though they were, they could be, as he put it, “a terrification”. Yet, though he understood men very well, he loved women. His only