“We’ll give him his own beads.”
Tom Kelly took the beads from the small purse and twined them through his fingers before arranging his hands on the breastplate. They then drew up the sheet and placed the hands on the fold. One eye had opened and was closed gently again.
“We are almost through.”
“All we have to do is get the mouth right.”
Tom Kelly fixed the dentures in place. With cotton wool he moulded the mouth and face into shape slowly and with meticulous care.
“It looks perfect,” Ruttledge said, but as he spoke a final press caused the dentures to fall loose. This occurred a number of times: all would look in place and then come undone through striving for too much perfection.
“I can hear people getting restless.”
“Mark you well my words,” Tom Kelly answered. “Everything we have done will be remarked upon. Everything we have done will be well gone over.”
The whole slow process began again. There was no doubting the growing impatience and restlessness beyond the door for the wake to begin.
“If you don’t get it done this time I’m taking over,” Ruttledge said.
Possibly because of this extra pressure the face became undone more quickly.
“Don’t you worry,” Tom Kelly said angrily as he gave up his place. “We will all have our critics. We will have our critics.”
By using more cotton wool and striving for less, Ruttledge got the dentures in place and the mouth to hold shape.
“I had it far better than that several times.”
“I know.”
“The cheeks bulge.”
“They’ll have to do. Can’t you hear?”
“You may not know it but mark my words our work will be well gone over. We will have our critics. We could be the talk of the country yet,” Tom Kelly said.
“I’ll take the blame. You’ll be in Dublin.”
“Whether we like it or not we could be scourged,” Tom Kelly said so anxiously that Ruttledge pressed his shoulder in reassurance.
“You did great. We did our best. We couldn’t keep at it for ever.”
“Maybe it isn’t too bad, then. We could still pass muster,” he replied doubtfully.
The clothes and waste were stuffed in a plastic bag and hid in the wardrobe with the flat cardboard box. The door was unlocked, the basin of water removed. Jamesie and Mary came down to the room. They stood in silence for a long time looking at the face.
“He’s beautiful,” Mary said and reached across to touch the pale forehead.
“He’s perfect. Patrick couldn’t have done it a whit better,” Jamesie said emotionally.
“I had no idea he was such a fine figure of a man,” Ruttledge said.
“Stronger than me, stronger than my father, far stronger than me the best day ever I was,” Jamesie said.
A row of chairs was arranged around the walls of the room. A bedside table was draped with a white cloth and two candles were placed in brass candlesticks and lit. A huge vase of flowers was set in the windowsill.
One by one each person came and took their leave and stood or knelt. Old men and women sat on the chairs along the wall. The Rosary was said, a woman leading the prayers, the swelling responses given back as one voice.
Huge platters of sandwiches were handed around, whiskey, beer, stout, sherry, port, lemonade. Tea was poured from the large aluminium kettle. The murmurs of speech grew louder and more confident. At first all the talk was of the dead man but then it wandered to their own interests and cares. Some who smoked dropped their cigarette ends down the necks of empty beer or stout bottles, where they hissed like trapped wasps. People wandered out into the night and the moonlight. Jokes began and laughter.
“If we couldn’t have a laugh or two we might as well go and lie down ourselves.”
Morning was beginning to thin the moonlight on the street when Patrick Ryan appeared in the doorway without warning, and stood there, a silent dark-suited apparition. The white shirt shone, the black tie neatly knotted; he was clean-shaven, the thick silver hair brushed.
“I’m sorry. Sorry.”
“We know, Patrick. We know. We were looking for you everywhere.”
“I heard. Word was brought. I had to dress.”
With the same slow steps he went down to the room, made the sign of the cross, stood for a long time gazing at the dead man before touching the hands and the forehead in a slow, stern leave-taking.
The loud talk and the laughter his entrance had quelled rose again. Patrick made an impatient movement when he returned from the room but the talk and noise could not be stilled a second time. When offered sandwiches, he made a dismissive gesture, as if what had happened was too momentous to be bartered for the small coinages of food and drink, but he accepted the large whiskey Jamesie poured as if he was absent and the hand that gripped the glass was not his own.
“Who laid him out?” he demanded.
“I did,” Ruttledge said.
“I might have known.”
“I told you,” Tom Kelly whispered. “Our critics have landed.”
“I couldn’t care less.”
With a peremptory wave of the hand, Patrick Ryan indicated that he wished to see Ruttledge alone outside the house. They stood by the lighted window and could see through the bowl of flowers to the lighted candles and the white stillness of the bed.
“Why didn’t you wait for me, lad? Were you that greedy to get stuck in?”
“Nobody could find you,” Ruttledge said patiently. “They looked everywhere. They couldn’t wait any longer.”
“They might have known that important word would have always got to me,” he said.
“They didn’t know. Someone said you could even be in Dublin. They thought the funeral would be over before you got word.”
“I suppose it was that molly of a hairdresser who helped you botch the job.”
“Tom Kelly gave great help. Any faults were mine,” Ruttledge said.
“It was some face to give a poor man leaving the world,” he complained bitterly. “Some face to give him for his appearance in the next.”
“People seem pleased enough.”
“People know nothing, lad. All they want is to be riding and filling their gullets. But there are people who know. The trades know. I know. Anyhow it’s matterless now, lad. It’s done,” he said as if growing impatient of his own thought. “I’ll be over to your place next week. We’ll finish that shed. It’s been standing there making a show of both of us for far too long.”
People were no longer coming to the house and many were beginning to leave. Only those intending to keep watch into the day remained. Kate indicated that she was ready to leave. They took their leave of the dead man. With the watchers on the chairs around the walls and the whiteness of the linen and the flowers and the candles, the small room looked beautiful in the stillness of the ceremony. Ruttledge looked at the face carefully and did not think, in spite of all that Patrick said, that it could have been improved greatly. Jamesie and Mary insisted on walking them all the way to the lake. After the warmth of the house, their own tiredness met them in the coldness of the morning breeze from the lake. The moon had paled and the grey light was now on everything.
“Are you sure you should be coming all this distance?”
“It’s an excuse to get out and draw breath. We’ll be in there enough. Anyhow, everything went great.”
“Patrick Ryan wasn’t too pleased with our work,” Ruttledge said.
“You can quit about Patrick. Everybody knows Patrick,” Jamesie said. “If the Lord God came down out of heaven he still wouldn’t manage to please Patrick. Everybody, everybody said that Johnny looked just beautiful.”
“No matter what they say, Jamesie here is the best of the whole lot of them, Patrick included,” Mary said, her eyes shining.