Strumpet City

CHAPTER TWO

The bustle was familiar—and yet there was something odd about it, something that made it seem not quite the same as in previous years. It puzzled Yearling, this strange difference in an annual event he had looked at year after year since his childhood days. The ingredients were the same; the stream of hackneys and motor cars on their way to the grounds of the Royal Dublin Society, the foreign visitors, the military, the strings of horses, the riders in black caps and scarlet coats and tightly cut breeches. The ladies as usual engaged his special interest. Most of them were at their best; fashionable and feminine and agreeably pretty. A hefty and horselike few displeased him. That was as usual too. He had once described the ladies of the Dublin Horse Show as a mixture of Sweeties and Tweedies. The remark came back to him from his remote student days. Perhaps youth was the missing ingredient. He was getting old. He sighed and consulted his pocket watch again. Father O’Connor was now half an hour late. It was uncharacteristic and puzzling.

His interest in the traffic flagged. Yearling returned his watch to his pocket and walked as far as the bridge, in the hope that the name on the parapet would restore his good spirits:

‘Balls Bridge

Erected 1791

Rebuilt 1835

Widened and improved

1904’

Henry Grattan, he remembered, had fought a duel here when Ireland still had a parliament of her own. Self-government had been sold in return for place and pension. Pitt’s fear then had been a French invasion. Now England’s anxiety was that the same old Home Rule question would cause a civil war between the Redmondites and the Carsonites with weapons supplied to both sides by courtesy of the Kaiser. A distressful country. Napper Tandy was right.

It was an August morning of bright sunshine. When he lifted his eyes to the water and then upstream towards Herbert Park its beauty filled him with pleasure. The trees crowding over the river from either bank broke the sunshine into gleaming shafts; the water was a living floor of black and gold in a tunnel of green. At a point where the bank sloped gently into the water a little girl was washing a handkerchief. The sight put him in mind of a street rhyme which he was trying hard to recall when Bradshaw tapped him on the shoulder and said urgently:

‘Where on earth is Father O’Connor. Hasn’t he arrived?’

‘I can’t understand it,’ Yearling said.

‘But you were to meet him on the corner. What are you doing on the bridge?’

‘Trying to remember a street rhyme,’ Yearling admitted.

‘I wouldn’t be surprised if you’ve missed him.’

‘I missed something,’ Yearling confessed, ‘but not Father O’Connor. Youth, probably.’

Bradshaw stared at him.

‘Yearling,’ he said seriously, ‘you are becoming distinctly odd. Florence and I sometimes worry about you. Do you realise that you’re talking a lot of incomprehensible nonsense?’

‘Is it incomprehensible that a man should mourn over his youth?’

Bradshaw fumbled impatiently for his watch.

‘It’s half past eleven,’ Yearling informed him, ‘I’ve just looked at mine.’

Bradshaw pushed his watch back again.

‘I am anxious about Father O’Connor. And you take it all so lightly.’

‘I can see the corner perfectly well from here. Besides, I like the name of this bridge. It amuses me.’

Bradshaw hesitated, saw what he meant and said:

‘I am not entertained by undergraduate bawdiness.’

‘I remember now that you never were.’

‘Some day,’ Bradshaw added, ‘it will land you in trouble. It comes out sometimes in the wrong company.’ Yearling turned again to the parapet, sorry to have roused the other to ill temper. It was an easy thing to do. Bradshaw did not mean it. Blood pressure was responsible. Or some abiding anxiety about society and the world.

The child was still gravely at play.

‘Look at the little girl.’

‘What’s she up to?’ Bradshaw asked, peering.

‘She’s washing her handkerchief.’

‘That’s an odd thing.’

‘She’s playing at being a mother, I imagine. The instinct comes out, even at that age. Don’t you find it moving?’

Bradshaw peered more intently.

‘She’ll fall in,’ he decided.

‘Now I’ve remembered the street rhyme,’ Yearling said, ‘it goes like this.’

He closed his eyes, digging deep into his memory for the words.

‘Down by the river where the green grass grows

Where Mary Murphy washes her clothes

She sang and she sang and she sang so sweet

And she called for her sweetheart down the street

Sweetheart, sweetheart will you marry me?

Yes love, yes love at half past three

Half past three is very very late

So we’ll have our party at half past eight.’

With guarded politeness Bradshaw asked:

‘Where do you hear these things?’

‘From the children of the back streets when I’m on my way to the foundry. They play these singing games. I find them fascinating.’

‘I’m sure.’ Bradshaw was fidgeting again.

‘It’s nice to have seen Mary Murphy,’ Yearling said. ‘I wonder will I ever meet her sweetheart?’

Bradshaw turned suddenly away from him and waved.

‘There he is.’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘Father O’Connor, dammit, he’s crossing the street.’

Yearling turned from the river too and saw the priest, with quick glances to left and right, hurrying through the traffic. When he joined them his face was red with exertion. He tried to shake hands with both of them at once.

‘I’m so sorry to have kept you.’

‘Something happened, Father,’ Bradshaw said, ‘I know by your manner.’

‘Something dreadful,’ Father O’Connor said.

‘Rest for a moment,’ Yearling advised.

Father O’Connor leaned against the parapet.

‘I had to walk,’ he said, ‘there were no hackneys available. Everything hirable has been snapped up.’

‘But . . . the trams?’ Bradshaw asked.

The truth flashed suddenly into Yearling’s mind. Of course something had been missing, something so large and obvious that he had not thought of it until now.

‘The trams have stopped working,’ Father O’Connor said. ‘Mr. Larkin stopped them at ten o’clock.’

They saw for themselves afterwards, while on their way to the Imperial Hotel for lunch. Tramcars lay abandoned all along the route, left at whatever spot they happened to have reached at the appointed hour of ten o’clock. Their numbers grew until at Nelson’s Pillar a whole fleet stood driverless, surrounded by an excited crowd. There were more policemen than Yearling had ever seen before. They had surrounded the drivers and conductors.

‘What are they up to?’ Yearling wondered.

‘Arresting them, I hope,’ Bradshaw said.

‘They can’t arrest them for going on strike.’

‘They can arrest them for causing obstruction,’ Bradshaw answered. ‘I’ve heard it argued very convincingly.’

So Mr. Larkin had carried out his threat. Yearling pulled up his motor car some distance from the hotel. It would be better to walk the rest of the way. A police inspector, seeing them approach, called two policemen to escort them to the hotel.

‘Too bad this should happen during Show week,’ he said to them.

‘Is it a total stoppage?’ Yearling asked.

‘Seems to be,’ he said, ‘they’ve left the cars lying all over the routes. We’ll be making an effort to bring them in very soon.’

‘Plenty of your chaps around.’

‘Enough to keep the situation under control, I would hope,’ the inspector said, smiling.

‘I wonder,’ Yearling said.

Mrs. Bradshaw found lunch a disappointment. She had looked forward so much to a day of elegance, fashion, interesting conversations, pleasant encounters. Instead the sole topic of the dining room was the situation. Men kept rising from their tables to stare through the windows at the crowded street below. Latecomers brought further news.

‘The company is organising a skeleton staff,’ one of them said to Yearling, ‘but the police say the cars won’t be allowed to run after dark.’

She knew nothing of these matters and found the last remark quite frightening.

‘This is only giving in to them,’ Father O’Connor said.

Bradshaw looked at Yearling, who raised his eyebrows.

On their way back to the car they saw the police at the Pillar clearing a pathway through the crowd. A tramcar rattled past them. Two policemen stood on the front platform, guarding the driver. Later, in Mount Street, they saw the same tram. All its windows had been shattered, glass and woodwork littered the street. The driver and the two policemen were not to be seen.

The incident made a deep impression. Father O’Connor, who was to have gone to the Bradshaws for dinner, decided it would be better in the circumstances to go straight home from the Show grounds. There would be no trams after dark to take him from Kingstown, hackneys would be uncertain, it would be unfair to let Mr. Yearling drive him. Darkness might well bring serious trouble. He decided to walk back on his own, so that Mrs. Bradshaw would not be obliged to travel into the city with them. All agreed with reluctance that this was wise. There might be unpleasant scenes. He hoped they would enjoy their evening and set off.

It was strange to walk back alone. A few trams were now running, each guarded in front and at the back by a policeman. Impulse brought him towards Mount Street. The shattered tram had gone. What had happened, he wondered, what outbreak of back-street violence had ambushed and wrecked it? He examined the fragments of wood and broken glass which had escaped whoever had tidied up. There was blood on the ground. The clotted stains made him feel sick. He remembered the night, years before, when a torchlight procession and the thunder of socialist speeches affected him in the same way. He had thought at first it was the wine Yearling had pressed on him, but it had not been that at all. Anger and violence and blood unmanned him, yet some morbid need now sent him searching the streets aimlessly for further evidence. Perhaps it was the need to look them in the face.

He crossed back over Mount Street Bridge and found himself passing Beggars’ Bush Barracks on his way to Sandymount. At first the roads were busy with Horse Show traffic, but at Irishtown this was left behind. He saw no additional signs of violence and when a tram approached at last he signalled it to stop. The police sergeant at the back saluted and helped him to mount.

‘Sit near this end here, Father,’ he advised.

Father O’Connor noticed his unfamiliar badge.

‘You are not a member of the Dublin Metropolitan Police, are you?’ he asked.

‘No, Father. Royal Irish Constabulary. We’ve been drafted in to give a hand.’

‘Will it be as bad as that?’

‘It could be bad enough.’

‘A terrible state of affairs,’ Father O’Connor said. His hands were trembling.

He took his seat. He had barely done so when the tram, turning the bend that led to Ringsend Bridge, ran into the outskirts of a riot. The driver stamped his foot continuously on the bell. They had got only a little way when the crush became so great that it brought the car to a standstill. The focus of attention lay somewhere on the route in front and at first no one seemed concerned about the tram. The sergeant dashed upstairs to survey what was ahead. When he came down he called his younger companion to him.

‘Is that a tram depot in front?’ he asked. He was new to the city.

‘It’s Ringsend power station,’ the Dublin policeman said.

‘Whatever it is there’s bloody murder going on around it,’ the sergeant said, ‘go up and look for yourself.’

Father O’Connor followed the young policeman upstairs. The street was jammed tight with people. In the distance a solid mass of police and people were at grips. Batons flayed about above a tumult of heads.

‘It’s an attack on the power station,’ the young policeman confirmed. They went downstairs.

‘Get the passengers off,’ the sergeant said to the conductor. But it was impossible. They stood in the tram and waited, surrounded by a wall of bodies, until pressure from far in front began to pack the crowd more tightly. It began to retreat, step by step. Hundreds of faces passed slowly by the windows as Father O’Connor watched. For the most part they were men with cloth caps and women with shawls. The movement backwards increased. They jostled and began to claw at each other. Then in a swirl of faces and writhing bodies the battle between police and rioters came abreast and surrounded them. Sticks and batons beat at each other in a desperate mêlée. He saw foreheads running with blood and sweat, torn hands and faces, hatred and brutality in hundreds of pairs of eyes. The thumping of bodies and sticks against the bodywork of the tram was terrifying. He stood in the inner doorway of the cabin, as far from either window as the small space allowed. The rioters fell back until he could see only policemen’s helmets through the windows on both sides of the tram. They were rescued.

‘Keep steady,’ the sergeant said, ‘we’ll be able to move soon.’

The tram driver went up front again, waiting for the police to be clear of the line. He stood ready, fear and eagerness to be away making his hand tremble on the control lever. The last line of policemen passed the conductor’s platform.

‘Now,’ the sergeant shouted, ‘get her away—fast.’

The driver made a clumsy and eager movement and the tram jolted forward, but after a few yards it stopped again.

‘Keep her moving,’ the sergeant shouted. He went up forward.

‘I can’t,’ the driver said, pointing. Several men, remnants of the battle, lay bleeding on the line.

‘Come on,’ the sergeant said to the young policeman, ‘you and I will get to work.’

‘I wouldn’t advise it,’ the young policeman ventured.

‘The street ahead is clear.’

‘The street is clear,’ the younger man agreed, ‘but the houses aren’t.’

The sergeant looked about him. They became aware, for the first time, of the tenements. On either side windows mounted above rows of windows, silent, watchful, menacing the now isolated tramcar.

‘You know more about this city than I do,’ the sergeant conceded.

If there was danger behind those windows two uniformed police alone in the street would be the right provocation.

‘Our lads will be back to guard that power station,’ the sergeant added, ‘we can clear the street then.’

They stayed in the car and waited.

‘No need for alarm now,’ the sergeant assured the passengers, ‘there’s plenty of help at hand.’

‘Here they come,’ the conductor called.

The police were returning in marching order. They too had suffered severely, Father O’Connor saw. Many of the faces under the protecting helmets were bruised and bloodied. The sergeant stepped off the platform to consult with them. The column came to a halt. They talked for some moments before anything happened. Then Father O’Connor saw one of the upper windows being raised. A missile, aimed at the sergeant, flew wide and shattered the glass in the tram. The passengers began to panic and the sergeant, breaking off his consultation, climbed back on to the platform.

‘Keep your heads down,’ he instructed, ‘use your coats to protect them.’

The police outside, turning their attention to the houses, found window after window opening and had to crouch back under a rain of bricks and bottles. Father O’Connor felt the glass tumbling about his shoulders and heard the volume of the ambush filling the street outside. After a while the noise of missiles gave way to shouting. He looked up to find the police had been driven off and the car was surrounded again, this time by the rioters. They were pulling the sergeant and the conductor off the platform. The driver and the young policeman had already disappeared. He got to his feet in sudden panic and shouted at the crowd.

‘How dare you molest these people. I instruct you to behave yourselves.’

A piece of brick grazed the side of his forehead and he fell back. He felt blood on the stiff, white ring of his collar.

‘Hooligans,’ he said, staggering towards the platform, ‘you must stop at once.’

Those nearest reached out to take his arms.

‘It’s a priest,’ they appealed, ‘let him off the tram.’

‘He shouldn’t be on it,’ an angry voice shouted.

‘None of them should be on it,’ another yelled. There was an angry roar of agreement. Nevertheless Father O’Connor was helped down. They did not handle him ungently. He began to push his way through them. What had happened to the two policemen and the other passengers he did not know. The seething crowd had swallowed them up. Rough clothes that smelled of dirt and poverty brushed against him but made way when his cloth was recognised. The crowd thinned as he reached its outskirts and he found it possible to take his handkerchief from his pocket to staunch the blood that was oozing from the cut on his temple. At a great distance behind him, the tramcar was being hacked to pieces.

In the morning, while he was at breakfast, Father O’Sullivan made a point of joining him for a cup of tea.

‘How does it feel now?’ he asked with sympathy.

A thin bandage surrounded Father O’Connor’s head. Cotton wool and sticking plaster made a bulge over the wound.

‘It’s nothing,’ Father O’Connor said, ‘some scratches and a little bruising.’

The blow did not matter. The gravity lay in the insult to his cloth.

‘Have you seen the morning paper?’ he asked.

Father O’Sullivan had. But he picked it up and found again, prominent among the accounts of strike incidents, the headlines Father O’Connor was referring to.

‘Assault on Clergyman

Priest Manhandled

Sacrilegious Incident at Ringsend’

‘It is heartbreaking to be insulted by our own flock,’ Father O’Sullivan said.

‘These people have always insulted me,’ Father O’Connor answered, ‘since first I came to work for them. When I organised what little charity I could they rejected it and assaulted my helpers. The truth of the matter is they have been taught by scoundrels to covet what is not theirs.’

‘I’ve never known them to lay a finger on a priest before,’ Father O’Sullivan said. ‘Perhaps it was an accident.’

It had been no accident. The brick had been thrown in answer to his command to them to disperse. The situation was deplorable. Father O’Sullivan did not understand its gravity.

‘There are new elements who will stop at nothing,’ he said, ‘and they were present in that crowd.’

The door opened and Father Giffley came in.

‘Are you well this morning?’ he asked.

‘Quite well, thank you.’

‘No ill effects?’

‘None at all—thank God.’

‘Excellent,’ Father Giffley said. He turned to address Father O’Sullivan.

‘The incident is causing quite a stir,’ he said to him. ‘I’ve been coping already with an outburst of clerical fury. They all seem to be adopting Mr. Larkin’s slogan: “An Injury to One is the Concern of All”. Father O’Leary of The Messenger wants to print an article about it and the editor of The Irish Catholic wishes to have the full details for editorial comment. I told them we wanted no more about it.’

‘That was best,’ Father O’Connor agreed.

He hoped Father Giffley would not see the morning paper. It lay open on the table. With unusual complicity Father O’Sullivan picked it up as he rose from the table.

‘May I?’ he asked Father Giffley.

‘Take it, John. The Dublin press has become a ragbag of lies.’

‘Thank you,’ Father O’Sullivan said.

He left, taking the paper with him. Father O’Connor looked after him with gratitude.

‘I am glad you agree with me,’ Father Giffley said.

‘I have no desire for notoriety.’

‘I should hope not,’ the other acknowledged. Then he added:

‘It was unwise in the circumstances to board the car at all.’

‘I had to get home.’

That was not quite true. But how could he give a true account of something so inexplicable.

‘It only serves to inflame the people,’ Father Giffley added. ‘In the past we have usually managed to say the wrong things but contrived to do the right ones—at least the more humble clergy, such as ourselves. In this unfortunate business we must not appear to take sides.’

He was being rebuked again—this time for being assaulted and humiliated. He would say nothing. Nor would he give interviews. He would bend his will to that of his superior.

‘As you wish, Father,’ he said.

The following morning a letter from Mr. and Mrs. Bradshaw sympathised with him and conveyed their warm concern, while one from Yearling expressed his feeling of deep guilt at not having insisted on leaving him home. They, at least, held him in respect and affection. He was not altogether forsaken. During the next few days he followed the newspapers with close attention and wandered through the streets, watching and listening. He saw trams running under police protection and squadrons of police parading through the streets. The papers told him that Mr. Larkin had publicly burned Magistrate Swifte’s proclamation forbidding a mass meeting in Sackville Street on the coming Sunday and promised his followers that meeting would be held. ‘I care as much for Magistrate Swifte’, they reported him as saying, ‘as I do for the King of England.’ But they also reported that there was a warrant issued for his arrest, that all the police had been mobilised and that police pensioners were being recalled to do duty as gaolers. The military, too, were in readiness and standing by. For most, the battle to be fought was between Capital and Labour. For Father O’Connor it was one between Godlessness and God.