there my pen pauses, for one at least of Cooper’s feet rests upon the bog. And when my thoughts move from him to the native Irish, to O’Dowd and to MacDonnell, to MacCarthy and above all to Ferdy O’Donnell, I feel them slipping towards the unknown, towards men whose actions and passions issue from that fearsome world of hillside and bog, choked with the petrified roots of the past. And beyond such men lies the multitudinous world of the peasantry, the dark sea which swept up upon us so suddenly that we were almost covered by its waves.
I shall nonetheless strive to present those events with such understanding of them as I have come to possess, and with an attempt at a strict impartiality. I fear in advance that I shall fail, for my knowledge of events is not matched by an understanding of their causes. But yet I hold it almost sinful not to seek after causes, the black roots of flowering passions. The rain has ceased to fall, and beneath a sky suddenly bright and almost cloudless, fields of a most intense green stretch northwards towards the bay.
2
Mount Pleasant, June 16
It was a long letter, closely filling three sheets of excellent paper. Copies had been nailed by night to Cooper’s door and to the door of the Killala market house. Cooper held the pages flat beneath one hand, while the other, elbow propped on breakfast table, supported a head within which brandy seemed to roll as in a half-filled jug. Across from him sat his wife, Kate, and at his side, perched on the chair’s edge, sat Fogarty, his steward.
“It’s hard to believe,” he said, temporising, while studying the wild blur of words.
“Not all of them, by no means all or even most,” Fogarty assured him. He was a jovial man, and could not help but bring an air of buoyancy to the least appropriate circumstances. “Only the cows we turned onto O’Malley’s acres. Squint O’Malley. Do you remember the way he kept bobbing his head when he talked to you? It was the shut eye that did it.” He imitated the gesture, and Cooper closed his eyes against the sight.
“These are terrible times for Mayo,” Kate said, “when a man cannot use his land as he sees fit.”
“Sees fit, be damned,” Cooper said. “Uses it as some bloody mortgage broker in Capel Street sees fit. I think I might be able to take some tea.” He sucked it in red and strong, heavily sugared. He pressed small, square hands on plump knees which strained against buff breeches, a short-legged man with a head round and compact as a cannonball. “As if the country wasn’t in bad enough trouble. The Whiteboys of Killala. O Jesus, what have I ever done to deserve my troubles.”
“Troubled times, Captain,” Fogarty said. “Troubled times.”
“I’ll trouble them,” Cooper said. “I’ll trouble them to dance on a rope’s end in Castlebar.”
“To be sure you will, Captain. To be sure you will. No better man. Once we know who they are.”
“My own tenants is who they are, and I haven’t so many of them that their ways are mystery. And if the law can’t give me satisfaction, I will take out after them with a pack of the MacCaffertys.”
“Oh, to be sure, Captain.”
“This isn’t Dublin, you know. This is Mayo, and we settle matters in our own way here. We’re Irishmen here, and Irishmen by God who stand on their own two feet.”
“If you are over that now,” Kate said, “maybe you will tell us what you intend to do.” She was a handsome, coarse-featured woman, with a broad, humourous mouth and eyes like green agates.
He looked towards her and then away. “Fogarty, there is no need for you to sit there with an empty belly. Kate, ring the bell for Brid, and while the man is waiting pour him some tea.”
“Tea would be grand,” Fogarty said. “I have had my breakfast in me for two hours. I put Paddy Joe and his son to work on the fence that was knocked down.”
“Well, aren’t you the thoughtful hoor,” Cooper said, but then said quickly, “Ach,
I shall nonetheless strive to present those events with such understanding of them as I have come to possess, and with an attempt at a strict impartiality. I fear in advance that I shall fail, for my knowledge of events is not matched by an understanding of their causes. But yet I hold it almost sinful not to seek after causes, the black roots of flowering passions. The rain has ceased to fall, and beneath a sky suddenly bright and almost cloudless, fields of a most intense green stretch northwards towards the bay.
2
Mount Pleasant, June 16
It was a long letter, closely filling three sheets of excellent paper. Copies had been nailed by night to Cooper’s door and to the door of the Killala market house. Cooper held the pages flat beneath one hand, while the other, elbow propped on breakfast table, supported a head within which brandy seemed to roll as in a half-filled jug. Across from him sat his wife, Kate, and at his side, perched on the chair’s edge, sat Fogarty, his steward.
“It’s hard to believe,” he said, temporising, while studying the wild blur of words.
“Not all of them, by no means all or even most,” Fogarty assured him. He was a jovial man, and could not help but bring an air of buoyancy to the least appropriate circumstances. “Only the cows we turned onto O’Malley’s acres. Squint O’Malley. Do you remember the way he kept bobbing his head when he talked to you? It was the shut eye that did it.” He imitated the gesture, and Cooper closed his eyes against the sight.
“These are terrible times for Mayo,” Kate said, “when a man cannot use his land as he sees fit.”
“Sees fit, be damned,” Cooper said. “Uses it as some bloody mortgage broker in Capel Street sees fit. I think I might be able to take some tea.” He sucked it in red and strong, heavily sugared. He pressed small, square hands on plump knees which strained against buff breeches, a short-legged man with a head round and compact as a cannonball. “As if the country wasn’t in bad enough trouble. The Whiteboys of Killala. O Jesus, what have I ever done to deserve my troubles.”
“Troubled times, Captain,” Fogarty said. “Troubled times.”
“I’ll trouble them,” Cooper said. “I’ll trouble them to dance on a rope’s end in Castlebar.”
“To be sure you will, Captain. To be sure you will. No better man. Once we know who they are.”
“My own tenants is who they are, and I haven’t so many of them that their ways are mystery. And if the law can’t give me satisfaction, I will take out after them with a pack of the MacCaffertys.”
“Oh, to be sure, Captain.”
“This isn’t Dublin, you know. This is Mayo, and we settle matters in our own way here. We’re Irishmen here, and Irishmen by God who stand on their own two feet.”
“If you are over that now,” Kate said, “maybe you will tell us what you intend to do.” She was a handsome, coarse-featured woman, with a broad, humourous mouth and eyes like green agates.
He looked towards her and then away. “Fogarty, there is no need for you to sit there with an empty belly. Kate, ring the bell for Brid, and while the man is waiting pour him some tea.”
“Tea would be grand,” Fogarty said. “I have had my breakfast in me for two hours. I put Paddy Joe and his son to work on the fence that was knocked down.”
“Well, aren’t you the thoughtful hoor,” Cooper said, but then said quickly, “Ach,
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