His letter upset me on several fronts. I observed how that fellow, despite my best efforts, was gradually infiltrating my life and that a day didn’t pass when he didn’t waste my time for one reason or another. I decided to find out what really was behind this excessive interest he showed in me. The fact that he could never find the words to say whatever he wanted to say clearly, or that I couldn’t work out if he was an annoying lunatic or a wily practical joker, had me confused. Without more ado, I set up a meeting with him intending to ask the obvious necessary questions.
“Mr O’Grady,” I said, “I’d like to ask you a question.”
“Anything you’d like to ask,” he replied, his arm making the usual goosey movement, “will be an expression of your trust in me.”
“Listen,” I said grabbing his arm and staring into his face. “Could you tell me what manner of man you really are? Are you not thirsting after something?”
“Thirsting after something? I’ve always been a temperance man myself.”
“I mean are you someone who longs for something that we might say is hidden …”
“Something hidden …?” he asked, puckering his lips into an o while he fiddled with the knot of his tie.
“Yes, you know what I mean … something that is socially unmentionable …”
Mr O’Grady stretched his arms out as if he was about to strangle himself. His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down convulsively. His eyes shrank as if he were about to burst into tears. He wanted to speak but couldn’t. Finally, he made a desperate effort and rasped, “How can you possibly have thought that of me? Something socially unmentionable … What on earth does that mean? In any case, I think that my feelings were quite …”
“You’ll forgive me if I am mistaken … You must recognize, nevertheless, that I’m not entirely to blame. Love for one’s fellow man and the desire to please can, as you’ve seen, lead to things seeming what they’re not. And all because there are some things that one can never take beyond a certain point.”
Tom didn’t budge. He was shocked, his feelings were in turmoil and he couldn’t think straight. We remained like that for a good while. Nevertheless, it was a deadlock that had to be resolved.
“Mr Tom, how about going for a whisky?”
I think that’s a good idea. However, I’ll only have a short … This afternoon I must roast a chicken for Mrs Hudson and I want it to be delicious. What’s more, I’ve got to buy mustard for the old dear because she’s run out.”
We went into the street and walked leisurely to The Golden Lion, the old coaching tavern that was a respectably anachronistic place. In the course of our stroll, I thought he visibly gesticulated much more normally, that the Irishman unbuttoned slightly. He said the way he had acted towards me was simply connected to his idea about people from the countries I came from. “I’d have acted exactly the same with an Italian,” he said. He had read about our country, had formed an idea about its inhabitants and behaved in accordance with that conception. In short, he had fallen victim to travel literature.
He went on to be even more precise, adding that he’d been intending to take French lessons — “French” was what he said — practically for free. To that end he had upped his levels of politeness, and heightened his florid gestures imitating what he’d read about us. He thought I was just as he’d imagined I ought to be after reading about our country.
This entirely true yet strange and laughable story, the source of which I couldn’t possibly have clarified, has come in handy more than once. It has helped me understand how easily one can become a second Mr Tom if you allow yourself to be distracted for only a single moment.
Obscure Northerly Saintliness
Mungo, in Yorkshire, is a dog’s name, but St Mungo is the official, patron saint of Catholics in the cold, miserable city of Glasgow. There are a fish and a ring on the city shield, objects closely related to one of the most extraordinary miracles performed by this venerable, but rather blurry saint, whose name is as cacophonic as it is full of local color.
Mungo doesn’t exist as a name in Spanish. In fact, it is a nickname given to the saint by his admirers in the vein of that same appealing, mysterious mechanism that leads us to call our dear friend Sr M … Ducky, whenever we refer to him. His real name was Ketingern. Ketingern had his heyday back in the sixth century and was a pleasant, helpful fellow who was responsible for some highly worthwhile miracles. His great favorite was the resurrection of birds that cruel children killed in those dark ages. In my opinion, resurrecting birds is as meritorious as whispering sweet nothings to them, which is what St Francis used to do. And this all goes to show that by the sixth century Anglo-Saxons were already as open as the Latin peoples, especially when miracles were involved. As we are talking about wonders, we should also say that St Mungo could set light to the frosty branches of Scottish firs without matches or flint-stones.
However, the high point in the life of this revered gentleman was the incident with the ring and the fish and the theological dispute it gave rise to many years after. The reader will find a retelling of the episode in the following lines. You will also find a short account of the great debate. I personally believe that these facts are in themselves noteworthy and of contemporary relevance. In the course of writing about them I have drawn on the most recent scientific advances and latest discoveries in this important area.
In that bygone era, Glasgow was the capital of a monarchy irrigated by the River Clyde that is still with us today. Little is known of the king, apart from his reputation as a great buffoon. They say he was tall and stout, with a long red beard, a pointy head, and a cheeky girlish voice. His preferred pastime was to call on friendly families, sheathed in iron from head to toe, and talk for hours on end about anything under the sun with respectable old ladies. That was why he entered history as a great loving, generous king and why artists usually portray him surrounded by antique virgins. The queen was addicted to spelling mistakes, and this ensured her an enviable place in the history of the creation of the venerable Gaelic language and brought her fame as a captivating forger of rich new expressions. Edinburgh University Library has in its keeping a copy of the collection of her love letters annotated by Sir Charles Lamb’s spicy, subtle hand. The queen was a frivolous, hedonistic individual endowed with all the traits of a genuine pre-Renaissance figure. She romped with lots of people from a variety of social backgrounds, so much so that one anticipates when the day comes to write a history of the democratizing of blue blood her popular bed will be a mandatory point of reference.
One summer’s afternoon, the king took a stroll along the banks of the Clyde, his courtesans and scribes trailed some distance behind, he fanned himself with the brass crown he wore for everyday use. His head was full of what two old biddies had told him that very morning about an original way of playing poker that had just been discovered by erudite friars in a Breton monastery. All of a sudden he saw the body of a breast-plated man, stretched out some twenty feet away quite close to the water’s edge. He tiptoed silently over and saw — as he had anticipated — the prostrate form of one of the bravest generals of his troops. Scottish generals at the time often took a nap on the banks of the country’s rivers in the summer. The famous historian Gregorovius reports that contemporary German generals had the same habit, which is an estimable comparative discovery. So, then, the warrior was fast asleep and his hoarse breathing made the metal box he was wearing tinkle. He had removed his chain-mail gloves and placed them by his side on the green sod. The king gazed at him a while, pleased that such a fine man was his general. However, in a flash he was struggling to choke down a cry of horror and rage. He undoubtedly had good reason to be horrified! The king had noticed that the general was wearing one of his queen’s rings. As a matter of fact, it was the one he’d given her before they were married. The benign king had heard gossip about his wife’s frivolous ways but had never raised an eyebrow. He’d put it down to distillers speculating with an eye to pushing up the price of whisky. Nevertheless, the discovery was a brutal blow. How the hell, he wondered, did this ring of the queen end up on the finger of a brigadier general? It turned into a distressing obsession. The king, as we’ve said, was being cuckolded on all sides, but his question remained unanswered in his mind. Nonetheless, he decided to act immediately. He tried to remove the ring from the general’s finger as gently as he could. The operation was a great success: he put the ring in his pocket and continued his walk, highly excited, but managing not to show it. A taste for a refined form of vengeance had replaced the primitive, unbecoming rage in his heart. Forty yards upstream he threw the ring into the river. After doing that, he decided to go back to the palace. The queen was waiting for him.