The Dead School (11 page)

It was like the city had risen up out of the sea. As far as the eye could see – banners that would dazzle your eyes with their fluttering colours. Everywhere you looked
– a flag. The Papal Keys in yellow and white flying in the breeze. ‘Get your Congress badges here! Get your Congress badges here!’ the old women shouted. It was like the country
was about to burst with pride. Out of all the Catholic nations of Europe, Ireland had been chosen to host this, the thirty-first International Eucharistic Congress, when once again the Church of
Rome had chosen to summon the Catholic nations together to celebrate and proclaim their faith to the world.

Already, houses that hadn’t seen paint for over twenty years were every bit as bright-looking as Duffy’s circus. No matter where you went, the smell of flowers followed you. And
children. Little girls in flowing lace veils, little boys with starched white shirts and red ties. Hands joined, heads lowered, rosaries laced through fingers. Raphael overhead one woman say,
‘They’re walking saints’, and it was true. Nearly every child in Ireland was expected to turn up. The colonnade which had been erected in the Phoenix Park would take the sight
from your eyes.

But there was just so much to be done, and so little time to do it! Where would all the faithful stay? Would there be enough accommodation in the city for them all? Upwards of a million people
were going to attend for heaven’s sake!

The people of Ireland knew that the good Lord would not let them down however, and that all would be well in the end, as indeed it was, and more, a triumph perhaps, with thousands sleeping in
the open air, or in their cars along the quays, those who were fortunate enough to have cars, as out in the bay the lights of the pilgrim ships twinkled and powerful searchlights beamed their
sacred messages across the night sky through massive lettered screens: Laudamus! Glorificamus! Adoramus!

For Raphael and Paschal, the highpoint was the Children’s Mass, for in those eager eyes, so innocent and unblemished, they saw their whole lives reflected back at them. And as they sang
‘Jesus Thou Art Coming’ with one voice, there were many present who wept openly and saw no shame at all in doing so.

As Raphael did not when, on the final day, after the consecration at the High Mass, Count John McCormack, the world famous tenor, stood up and, as the host was elevated, began to sing, in a
voice that no angel could ever hope to emulate, Cesar Franck’s ‘Panis Angelicus’.

Raphael neither knew nor cared about the moistening of his eyes, for already his mind had been taken away by the sound of a military command which snapped out as the troops on the altar steps
whipped out their swords to present arms, followed almost immediately by the tinkle of the fifteen-hundred year-old bell of St Patrick, now sounding once again throughout the land, as the multitude
there gathered in the Phoenix Park, with a mesmeric hush, fell devoutly to its knees.

When, that night, exhausted, his eyelids at last closed over and he saw them again with their holy rosaries and white shirts and red ties, Raphael knew that he had indeed made the right decision
in coming to St Patrick’s so that he might serve them, and what he wanted to do more than anything else in the world was to put his arms around them, each and every one, and pray to God that
he might die there on the spot and bear them all to heaven with him.

It was sad saying goodbye to Paschal, but, as he said, ‘It’s not as if we’re off to opposite corners of the earth, Raphael. I’m only going to Athlone
for God’s sake!’

Raphael nodded. Then Paschal smiled that mischievous smile and said, ‘I’ve something for you.’

‘Glory be to God but you’re an awful man!’ replied Raphael, reddening a little.

Raphael was deeply touched as he read the title on the beautifully illustrated songsheet – ‘She Lived Beside the Anner’. The charcoal drawing was of a young girl with flowing
hair standing at the water’s edge as she stared out across the sea towards her home in Ireland and the little brothers and sisters she would never see again.

‘Spending your good money on me,’ said Raphael.

‘I thought you might like it. Anytime I hear it sung now, it will remind me of the nights we had in the assembly rooms,’ smiled Paschal as he lifted his belted suitcases.

‘I’ll treasure it all the days of my life,’ said Raphael as he embraced his friend and said goodbye.

Raphael’s first position was as assistant teacher in St Anne’s in Fairview. He was, as the headmaster said, ‘a credit’. His classroom was immaculate.
Every evening, the blackboard wiped clean, the floors swept. Not a peep out of his boys. ‘How does he do it?’ his colleagues often wondered. There was of course nothing to it. Not as
far as Raphael was concerned. Once they knew you meant business, your boys would respect you. That was all you had to remember. If you remembered that, you would have no problem in a classroom. But
there could be no half-measures. Children could be very easily unsettled. And that was where bad behaviour and poor schoolwork came from – insecurity and uncertainty. Of that there was no
doubt. No doubt whatsoever in the wide world.

Every morning at exactly 8.55 a.m., his boys filed in one by one without so much as a word, with their white shirts and red ties, which was a strict stipulation made clear by Raphael to the
mammies and daddies at the beginning of each school year, with their little heads held high and their fingers to their lips. Then they would stand in their desks, ramrod stiff and not move a muscle
until their Master was finished speaking. Then they would be allowed to sit and at 9.05 on the dot begin the lessons of the day.

‘Today we are doing the Battle of Kinsale and the subsequent Flight of the Earls,’ Raphael would say as he paced the room like a colossus. ‘Would you like to begin reading,
Michael Noonan?’

‘Yes, sir,’ the boy would reply and take up his book. ‘Chin up, chest out!’ Raphael would caution and young Noonan would smile and redden just a little, then continue
reading as the Master paced and the boys listened and through the windows the sun streamed in and everything seemed possible.

The days passed into months and the months into years and Raphael might well have remained in St Anne’s until the day he died, so contented was he with both pupils and
colleagues, and most likely would have done had not a knock come upon his door in the month of September 1937 and the principal of the school, apologizing profusely for the intrusion as he
introduced him to the clergyman who accompanied him, said, ‘Raphael – I’d like you to meet Monsignor Cassidy. The Monsignor is in charge of things below in St Anthony’s. Do
you think maybe we could have a word?’

Raphel nodded and silenced the class with a click of his fingers.

‘The first boy who talks while I am out of the room . . .’ he intoned darkly. He had to say no more.

The door closed behind him and he stood in the corridor facing the two older men, saying, ‘So then, gentlemen – what can I do for you?’

Raphael could not believe his ears. He stared at the three men sitting before him and wondered was he hearing things. But he wasn’t. What he had indeed heard Monsignor
say was, ‘I am prepared to offer you the position of principal here at St Anthony’s, Mr Bell.’ This seemed ridiculous. He had of course been flattered to be invited along for the
interview at all and had been glad to attend because it would give him experience. But he had never seriously considered the possibility that he might actually be offered the position. To begin
with he was much too young for such an offer. An older man, perhaps an existing member of staff, must surely be in line for the job. Directly above the Monsignor’s head was a picture of the
Holy Family. On the wall opposite, the framed proclamation of Irish independence. Beside that a St Bridget’s cross fashioned from bullrushes. Raphael was so taken aback by the offer which had
just been made to him that he spent a ludicrously long time staring at it. The cross had long since turned yellow thanks to the sunlight and the passing of the years. He realized that he ought not
to be giving all his attention to it for such abstraction was hardly appropriate in the circumstances considering he had just been offered the principalship but try as he might he simply could not
help himself, oscillating as he was between euphoria and utter disbelief and would probably have meekly accepted it if the Monsignor had lost his temper and slapped the desk crying, ‘What are
you staring at, boy? You’ve wasted enough of my time! Now get out of my office before I take the strap to you and really give you something to think about!’

What he did instead was clear his throat and say again, ‘Well, Raphael – do you think you might be prepared to accept the position? I can’t tell you what it would mean to have
you as head of our staff. I have heard so much about you and your excellent work in St Anne’s from Father Curran. I have no doubt whatsoever in my mind that you are the man for us. Well,
Raphael – what do you say?’

For no explicable reason, a ball went sailing high over a bar in his mind. There were cheers from vague, unformed crowds. A tall-hatted cardinal in full livery extended a solemn hand. A little
boy whispered, ‘That’s our Master.’ Raphael felt himself flush with pride and embarrassment. The words shrunk in his dried-up throat. Only with a great struggle did he manage to
free them at all. ‘Yes, Monsignor,’ he replied. ‘May I say how grateful I am.’

‘No,’ said the Monsignor, as he rose from his desk, ‘May I say how grateful I am’, a warm smile illuminating his face. ‘Am I right, gentlemen?’

‘Yes,’ said Mr Cunningham, the outgoing principal, and, ‘Yes,’ said the young fresh-faced priest whose name was Desmond Stokes, and who would one day be almost insanely
loathed by the man whose hand he now shook, and whose heart would eventually also break.

Not that it seemed like that back in those days of course, oh no. Back then there was nobody like good old Father Stokes who in a couple of years would be taking over from the
Monsignor as boss of the school and who just could not do enough for Raphael to help him get settled in. ‘Have you enough of this?’ and ‘Have you enough of that?’ was all
you ever heard out of old Stokes, tearing up and down the corridors like a blue-arsed fly with boxes of chalk and maps and kettles to make Raphael cups of tea during his break. Raphael of course
was as bad. If you didn’t know better you’d have said the pair of them were having an affair. But of course they weren’t. They were just the best of pals, that was all. In fact
they were more than that. It would be more accurate in fact to say they were like brothers. There simply was nothing Raphael wouldn’t do for Father Des and nothing Father Des wouldn’t
do for Raphael.

Rarely a day went by but the classroom door would open and in the young priest would come – ‘Ah howareye Raphael and how are things, did you see where Cork won again yesterday by God
do you know I think they’re going to take the Munster Final!’ or some similar observation.

Pacing the playground together each and every lunchtime, if there was a subject they didn’t get around to discussing then you could be sure it wasn’t worth wasting your breath on.
One minute it would be the horrific events in war-torn Europe and the next it would be the latest antics of the Gurrier Clarke, the rapscallion in fourth class who had poor Mrs Galligan driven
astray in the head. Raphael shook his head and chuckled softly.

Boys, she says to them, why did St Peter say Thou shalt never wash thy feet? Why did he say that now, boys, do you think? And what does the Gurrier do, sticks the hand up and nothing will do him
but he gets to answer it. Well, Clarke, says Mrs Galligan, why do you think now St Peter might have said that? Because, Mrs, because he says – his feet were clane!

Tears came into Raphael’s eyes – ‘Because, he says, his feet were clane!’

It took them nearly five minutes to get over that and was it any wonder the young lads in third class were looking at them and whispering, ‘Look – the Master and Father Stokes is
laughing!’

Raphael shook his head as he handed the brass bell to the young Kelly boy from fifth class – ‘Well, I swear to God, Father,’ he said, ‘if I hear any more of that Clarke
fellow’s spakes I’ll be carted off. I’ll be carted off now and that’s a fact!’, then went off smiling across the playground to his boys who were already lining up in
single file, straightening their red ties and fixing up their white shirts after the boisterousness of their play just in case the Master might decide to do an on-the-spot inspection. Which he
didn’t. Not today. He was just too busy thinking about that bloody rascal Clarke and the carry-on of him!

Nearly every Sunday Raphael would call to the presbytery and together they would listen to the wireless. There was nearly always a good match on and afterwards, a bit of a play
or something to keep you amused. Father Stokes was a great man for the plays. His room was filled with books and plays. One day he handed Raphael a copy of Charles Kickham’s novel
Knocknagow – The Homes of Tipperary
.

‘Do you know Kickham?’ the priest asked.

‘Know him?’ replied Raphael with a tinge of sadness in his voice. ‘Wasn’t his masterpiece “She Lived Beside the Anner” my father’s favourite song, God
rest him?’

‘Do you know,’ said Father Stokes, ‘there’s songs would break your heart.’

Songs like ‘Panis Angelicus’ and ‘Macushla’ to which they listened sometimes in the evenings and Raphael would recall fondly the day he had heard that very same Count
John McCormack sing it in the Phoenix Park, the pure notes trembling in the air as the Sacred Host was elevated and you thought you would faint such was the love you felt for Jesus Christ the Son
of God and for all those about you.

‘As long as I live I will never forget that day, Raphael,’ said Father Stokes, ‘for I was there too.’

The cries of children echoed in the failing light of a Sunday evening as the haunting strains of ‘Macushla’ filled the parlour and Raphael cradled a small Jameson whiskey in his lap
and said, not realizing that Father Stokes was out of the room, ‘I wonder will I ever see him again – Paschal. My old friend Paschal O’Dowd.’