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There’s a pub in Balham that’s exclusively for the insane. About a hundred yards from the bingo hall, which is appropriate. Even the staff are seriously deranged. When I was hurting, which was often, I’d go there and blend. You always met someone who knew hell from the inside. Shortly after my marriage, I’d gone there, ordered a pint and a whiskey, considered my future. A guy next to me was dropping soluble aspirin into a pint of mild.
I didn’t ask.
He said,
“You’re dying to ask.”
Took a look at him. A tattoo on his neck that was either an anchor or a swastika, a scar that ran from his left eyebrow to his upper lip. As often is, he had gentle eyes. Sure, there was lunacy, but you can’t preserve that gentleness with sanity. I said,
“If you want to tell me.”
Nice neutral territory. He savoured my answer, then,
“Stops the hangover.”
“Right.”
Then, oh so very carefully, he slid the glass to his left and shouted up a pint of bitter. He said,
“The trick is not to drink it.”
For that day and precious few others, I was wearing the wedding band. Bright and glowing, in that place it reeked of another country. He fastened on the glow, said,
“You’re married.”
“Yeah.”
“You know the best thing ’bout that.”
“No.”
“They can’t call you queer.”
I had recently got my customary letter from
THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE
A Chara,
It has come to our notice that you have failed to return an item of equipment.
We draw your attention to Article 59347A of Uniform and Equipment on page 25 of the manual. Said Item No. 8234, a garda all-weather coat, remains the property of the Department.
We anticipate the speedy return of said item.
Mise le meas,
B. Cosgrove
I did what I always did.
Crumpled it and lobbed it fast across the room. I’d been receiving variations of the same letter for years. No matter where I lived, by the canal, in Bailey’s Hotel, London or Hidden Valley, these missives eventually found me.
I’d been a guard, and if not the finest years of my life, they were certainly the ones that made the most sense. I’d trained at Templemore and had the makings of a fine career. It seems odd now but I truly cared then. The first time I walked down the street in my uniform with the buttons gleaming, my cap at a firm angle, the baton to hand, I thought I could make a difference. The first wake-up call came about a month into my duty. I was on night patrol, an older sergeant walking point. We got a call to a domestic and arrived to find a drunken husband locked outside his house. The sergeant said,
“If we have to arrest him, stand to his rear.”
I thought he doubted my courage, and sure enough, after we tried to talk to the man, he became abusive and we cautioned him. He told us to go f**k ourselves, and the sergeant said to arrest him, winking at me. Full of youth and bravado, I went face to face with the guy, and he vomited all over me. I can still hear the sergeant laughing. The next few years were good till I grew overfond of the jar and it became a cause of concern to my superiors, and I was eventually slung out. I kept the all-weather coat, and it was a reminder of the one chance of meaning I could have given my life.
That garment was my sole link to my career. If not validation, at least it was proof.
My previous case had provided accommodation, a house in Hidden Valley. To coin a London phrase, I’d been living it large. It ended in disaster. I’d moved back to Bailey’s Hotel.
Mrs Bailey, you felt she’d known the signatories of 1916. She had that fresh flawless skin almost patented by nuns. Her eyes were a blend of wisdom and mischief. Can there be a better combination? Once, she’d told me,
“There’ll always be a room for you here.”
Now that may not count as wealth, but it’s a richness of rare elevation. A retired judge had taken my old room. He was old Galway, too, so that’s all the reference he needed. I was given the attic. I liked it. The skylight gave a false sense of light. All the essentials: shower, kettle, phone, TV.
Didn’t take me long to unpack. Yet again, I was down to the basics – Age Concern suit, leather jacket, item 8234, three jeans, bally boots, sneakers.
And, of course, my books.
Music too. All of Johnny Duhan, the Cowboy Junkies, John Stewart, Van Morrison.
- Writer
