Death on the Holy Mountain (10 page)

‘Heard you had visitors,’ Uncle Peter went on. ‘Educated men. Cambridge, one of them. Young James told me.’

The old man nodded firmly at this point, looking with even greater interest at the glasses and the bottle. ‘Thought they’d like to hear some of my book.’ He patted the volume
in front of him.

‘Uncle Peter’s been writing a history of Ireland,’ Richard Butler said loudly in the tone he might have used when talking to a small child. ‘He’s been working at it
for the past fifteen years.’

‘Really?’ said Powerscourt, wondering what was to follow. Johnny was eyeing their visitor with a look of fellow feeling for a man who so obviously liked a glass of something every
now and then to ease the pain of the day.

‘Parnell’s funeral,’ said Uncle Peter, rummaging about in his book. ‘That’s the end of my story. That’s the bit I thought the gentlemen would like to
hear.’

Butler filled four glasses and handed them round. ‘Moore,’ he said, laying down the lines for his escape, ‘I want to ask your advice about a piece of land that’s up for
sale over at Carryduff. I think it’s quite promising. Did I tell you, by the way, that the bloody man Mulcahy down in the square tried to buy some of my land? Bloody cheek!’ Land,
Powerscourt remembered, a subject almost as dear to these people as horses. Powerscourt was to learn later that William Moore was said to have the sharpest eye for a piece of land in the four
provinces of Ireland. With that, and a slight bow, Richard Butler led his neighbour from the room.

‘Why did you finish your book with Parnell’s funeral?’ asked Johnny Fitzgerald. ‘That’s nearly fifteen years ago now.’

‘Will you tell me,’ the old man said, downing most of his glass in a single gulp, ‘what’s happened in Ireland since? I’ll tell you now, so I will. Power, real
power, flowing away from the landlord class like an ebb tide. More priests, more bloody nuns, more schools, more of the young playing those stupid games of Irish football and that ridiculous
hurling they go in for. Who’s ever going to give them a proper international match in hurling, will you tell me that now?’

‘We’d be most interested to hear about Parnell’s funeral,’ said Powerscourt politely. ‘You see, we were both there, Johnny and I.’

‘Maybe you’ll be able to give me some advice then,’ said Uncle Peter. ‘You’d be amazed at how hard it is to find accurate information in this country. It’s
the newspapers, you see. They can’t even agree on the date the great Charles Stewart Parnell was buried. I’m sure the man from the London
Times
was there on the spot, and the man
from the
Irish Times
and the fellow from the
Freeman’s Journal
, but I don’t think the chap from the
Cork Examiner
was there at all, or the man from the
Mayo
News
. Some of them have got the funeral on a different day. One of them, can’t remember which one now, memory’s going like a clock winding down, said Parnell died on a Tuesday and
was buried the next day, on the Wednesday. Would you believe it? As if they could put his body in a coffin, transport it from Brighton to Holyhead and then get it on a boat from there to Kingstown
inside twenty-four hours. The thing’s not possible. Do you think they make it up, the newspapermen, I mean?’ During this speech Uncle Peter had extracted a pair of battered spectacles
from a dragon’s pocket in his dressing gown and was ferreting about in his book, looking for the right place to start.

‘Sunday it was,’ said Powerscourt, ‘the day they buried him.’

‘Friday, I’m sure it was Friday,’ said Johnny.

‘There you are,’ said the old man triumphantly, ‘and you’re not even newspapermen. Young James would have told me if you were newspapermen.’

Richard Butler made a brief reappearance in his dining room. He was carrying a large tray with three further bottles of port and an enormous jug of iced lemonade.

‘I thought it might be a long evening, boys,’ he said, depositing his precious cargo directly in front of Uncle Peter. ‘This should keep the vocal cords in working
order.’

‘The commissariat has arrived,’ said Uncle Peter thankfully to the departing Butler. ‘Supplies.’ He had the air of a man who has just found the Ark of the Covenant. As he
looked again in his book for the right place to start, his eyes peering down at the pages, his right hand, guided by apparently unseen forces, reached out for the port bottle and refilled his
glass. Not a drop was spilt. Even Johnny Fitzgerald, a man with some experience in these areas, nodded his appreciation.

‘Excuse me, Uncle Peter,’ said Powerscourt apologetically, ‘don’t you think it would be helpful if you gave us a brief biography of Parnell before we start? You and
Johnny and I have lived through it, after all, but Young James here was only a child when the man died.’ Powerscourt watched as the old man’s mouth opened and closed several times.

Then Powerscourt understood. This was a change of plan. Old men didn’t like changes of plan. In his mind Uncle Peter was already lost in the details of Parnell’s funeral. Now he was
asked for the view from the mountain top.

‘Let me try,’ said Powerscourt, ‘it won’t be very good but it might help.’ He paused briefly, marshalling his thoughts. ‘Born in famine times. Protestant
landowner from County Wicklow. Elected to Westminster Parliament mid-1870s. By the end of that decade two bad harvests in a row filled the island with the terror of another famine. With Michael
Davitt Parnell founded the Land League. Farmers asked their landlords for reduction or cancellation of their rents. Widespread agrarian violence. Landlords who refused were sometimes boycotted. Two
results. Gladstone passed a law that made it easier for the tenants to purchase their land. And he imprisoned Parnell in Kilmainham Jail for inciting violence, which guaranteed Parnell immortality
in Ireland. Became Leader of Irish Parliamentary Party in 1880. Turned it from undisciplined rabble into formidable fighting force. Parnell and his MPs fought for Home Rule for Ireland. Gladstone
was converted to Home Rule, a form of devolution. Through the ’80s Parnell carried on a passionate affair with Katherine O’Shea, wife of another Irish MP. Cited as co-respondent in 1889
divorce case. Savaged by hostile publicity when details of the adultery came out in court. A few MPs stayed loyal, remainder fought him tooth and nail. Pro- and anti-Parnellites contested three
by-elections in Ireland through 1891. Parnell lost them all. Married Katherine O’Shea June 1891.’

‘Admirable,’ said Uncle Peter. ‘Now then,’ he went on, wiping his mouth quickly with the sleeve of his jacket, ‘let us begin.’ He read in a light tenor voice
that gradually filled the dining room. ‘“Chapter Twenty-Seven,”’ he said. ‘“Charles Stewart Parnell died at a quarter to midnight on 6th October 1891 in Mrs
Parnell, formerly Mrs O’Shea’s house at Number 10 Walsingham Terrace in Brighton. He had been ill for some days. The months of strain as he campaigned unsuccessfully to hold on to his
political base at those three by-elections in Ireland, the Irish Parliamentary split into bitter faction fighting after the shock of his divorce case, must have taken their toll. He had endured
levels of abuse and hostility unparalleled even in Ireland. Lime had been thrown in his face. On another occasion eggs had been hurled at him and his trousers were torn in a scuffle in a hotel, the
waiter repairing his breeches under the table while Parnell ate the remains of his supper. Everywhere he went he was pursued by the national anthem of his opponents, ‘Three Cheers for Kitty
O’Shea’. Sometimes his enemies would shake battered clothes on poles at him, proclaiming to all and sundry that these were Kitty O’Shea’s knickers.

‘“On his last evening he asked his wife to lie down on the bed beside him. His old dog Grouse, at his request, was also present in the bedroom. He had not slept for two days and a
local doctor had given him some medicine. Throughout his life Parnell was a superstitious man – the colour green had always been anathema to him – and he believed that his lack of rest
was a bad omen. And it was October, a month he always said was his unlucky time of year. During the evening he dozed and Mrs Parnell thought she heard him mutter ‘Conservative Party’ as
if he were planning some further political manoeuvre. If she touched him, he smiled. Later he said, ‘Kiss me, sweet wifie, and I will try to sleep a little.’ Those were the last words
on earth of the man who changed the face of Irish politics. Just before midnight he was gone. He was only forty-five years old.”’

Uncle Peter’s voice began to crack towards the end, whether due to lack of refreshment or emotion unclear. As he topped up his glass he turned to his little audience of three.

‘What do you think of it so far?’ he asked. ‘Do you like it well enough?’

‘Excellent start,’ said Powerscourt.

‘Splendid,’ said Johnny.

‘Let’s have some more, Uncle Peter,’ said Young James in an uncharacteristically long speech.

‘Short sentences wherever possible,’ the historian declared, ‘nothing too ornate in the prose style department. Gibbon. Always liked Gibbon. Never got to the end of that
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
, mind you. Don’t suppose many people did.’

He peered down at his black book once more, checking on the way that there were still plentiful supplies of port to hand. ‘“The news of his death travelled round the world. In New
York’s fourth ward, heavily populated with Irish immigrants, portraits of the dead leader appeared in the windows, draped in black. About twelve o’clock on the morning of Saturday 10th
October Parnell’s body set out on the long journey back to Dublin for his funeral and burial. A number of Irish MPs accompanied him on his journey. Mrs Parnell was too upset to travel, but
her wreath went with him every step of the way: ‘My true love, my darling, my husband.’ Rain was falling heavily as his coffin, almost covered with wreaths of large white flowers, was
carried out to an open-sided funeral carriage drawn by four black horses. The umbrellas of the small crowd were useless in the violent squalls of rain. They took shelter in the doorways and in the
rooms of houses being redecorated close by, saluting the coffin respectfully as it passed. The route went along the King’s Road on the sea front, past Regency Square and the West Pier whose
great girders were being pounded by the waves, its promenades totally deserted, and up West Street to Brighton station. The coffin was lifted into a van attached to a special saloon on the 1.45 to
Victoria station in London. En route to the capital it was decoupled at Croydon and diverted to Willesden where many Irish men and women came to pay their last respects. Another wreath bore the
message, ‘Charles Stewart Parnell, Salutation. He died fighting for freedom.’ Shortly before seven o’ clock the train set off from Willesden on its melancholy eight-hour journey
through the dark heart of England to Holyhead and the Irish boat. Sixteen men carried Parnell’s coffin on to the steamer, the
Ireland
, where it was wheeled on a trolley into the
smoking saloon on the lower deck, an appropriate, if temporary, resting place for a man so devoted to cigars. A black cloth was laid over it, covered in its turn by a green flag. Twenty-eight more
wreaths, which had travelled north with the coffin, were placed alongside it. ‘Died fighting for Ireland’. ‘In fond memory of one of Ireland’s greatest chieftains who was
martyred in the struggle for her independence.’ At two forty-five in the morning, nearly fifteen hours after the corpse left the house in Brighton, the
Ireland
set off to carry Charles
Stewart Parnell on his very last crossing of the Irish Sea to Dublin.”’

‘Still awake, are ye?’ croaked the old man, pouring himself a tumbler of iced lemonade. ‘Plenty more to go.’

Johnny Fitzgerald rose and took one of the bottles of port from in front of the old man. ‘Thought we’d better keep you company,’ he said cheerfully.

Powerscourt was thinking that the political questions raised by Parnell in his lifetime, the land question, the precise relationships to exist between England and Ireland, the thorny conundrum
of Home Rule, had not been answered yet. Gladstone had promised that it would be his life’s mission to bring peace to Ireland or perish in the attempt. It had been one of the chief political
objectives of his long career. Well, Gladstone had perished. Ireland still did not have peace. Maybe another act in the long drama was being played out in these Irish rooms with the great holes on
the walls where ancestors from centuries before had rested in their great houses. Maybe the theft of these paintings was the start of another chapter. Maybe they were all part of a story that went
back eight hundred years.

‘“The
Ireland
was late arriving in Kingstown,”’ Uncle Peter continued, staring down at his book, ‘still battered by the storm, angry waves lashing at the
harbour walls. Great crowds had often welcomed Parnell home from his Parliamentary triumphs here in the past, bands playing ‘The Wearing of the Green’ or ‘A Nation Once
Again’. They were silent this morning except for a low moan as the coffin came into view. Among the crowd in Kingstown early that morning was the young Irish poet W.B. Yeats, come to greet
his friend Maud Gonne who had met Parnell in Ireland in the days before his death.”’

‘Bitch goddess!’ said James, with sudden and unexpected force.

Uncle Peter looked up at him like an elderly bishop whose sermon has just been interrupted by a junior member of the choir. ‘I beg your pardon, Young James? What did you say?’

‘Bitch goddess!’ James repeated with the same vigour as before. ‘Maud Gonne is Yeats’s bitch goddess. She wouldn’t marry him and she wouldn’t leave him alone.
She’s tormented him for years, the cow!’

‘Maybe,’ said Uncle Peter, ‘but perhaps it’s just as well the poet man met his bitch goddess. Answer me this, Young James, would we have had Homer’s
Iliad
without Helen of Troy? She was somebody’s bitch goddess, though I’m damned if I can remember whose just at this moment. Would your man Shakespeare have written
Antony and
Cleopatra
without Cleopatra and her snake, best thing that ever happened to her in my view? Or John Donne written his verses without all those mistresses of his? What would have happened if
they had married anyway, Yeats and Maud Gonne? Maybe they’d have lived happily ever after, taking out the tarot cards under the fruit trees in the garden in the afternoon and writing obscure
papers for the Theosophical Society in London in the evening. No pain, no poem. I’ve never had much to do with the women myself,’ he admitted, ‘too temperamental for me, but
I’ve always understood that the one thing they’re good for is a bit for inspiration for the poetry writing classes when the normal things like drink have failed.’