No pounding feet
Climbing up his stair
17
On the chill wet grimy granite pavements. From this bleak comfortless street behind the station. Look back. The dim yellow glow of his bulb burning from the ceiling of Mr Arland’s room. Walk ahead under the train trestle. Carry a sorrow so close to despair. That makes the days ahead, deep black holes where one must step. This darkness here under the railway. The barred window. A light somewhere far within. Silhouetting the arches fading away into the gloom. Could be the bowels of death. Which so convolute in one’s thoughts. And Leila. That envelope propped on her chimney piece. Secret words speaking from another heart.
‘Hello.’
Making a fist to unleash flying behind him, Darcy Dancer gasping back from the window. This high pitched voice behind his shoulder. And at this face all asmile in the cold evening air, drop one’s arm in relief. A fur collared camel hair polo coat draped upon him. Golden buttons on a golden waistcoat peeking agleam in the lamp light. Tight jodhpur cavalry twill trousers. Yellow shirt. A bright orange tweed tie. An emerald green silk scarf flying from his neck. Long blond locks back over his shoulders. Tiny tufts of auburn beard high on these spanking red cheeks. Of none other than the Count Brutus Blandus MacBuzuranti O’Biottus. Who has clearly just detached himself from a waving departing figure, whose rolling gait takes him disappearing around the corner at the end of the street.
‘I must first blow a kiss goodbye to my sailor before I kiss you my dear. Ah but now my dear previous pupil. Who so make me furious to teach you from the tradition of the great days of the Medici to dance that I must tear my hair out in agony. But my pretty, it is so nice to find it is you. I hope you are not spying. Or might you be one of us. And you are letting your hair down. O dear. You blush. But of course you must my dear. And not be like me without a shame in the world. You come from the quays have you.’
‘No indeed. I mean I’m not. I have not. Nor am I letting my hair down.’
‘Ah but you must, you must let your hair down. Let me find for you a nice American sailor whom you would find delicious off the ship which is full of such nice boys as well as ten thousand tons of coal, my dear.’
‘As a matter of fact Count, I’ve just come from visiting. Mr Arland. My tutor.’
‘Ah but my such pretty boy. Regardez moi. I execute le grand jeté pour vous. You need not make excuses to me.’
‘It’s not an excuse.’
‘But now. Let us see you. Do a simple pirouette en pointe. Ah but I embarrass you in the street my pretty. Watch. You see now arabesque penché en pointe.’
‘Count, if you don’t mind I do not like to be referred to in that manner. And I’m afraid I cannot dance.’
‘Ah but of course, of course. I would not dream to offend you. But you must not call me Count. So cold. So unfriendly. Brutus, please. And yes. I do remember so well that dear sad man. And the such terrible sadness of his lady. That such wonderful wonderful Clarissa, so gay, so carefree. Such joy to laugh with her. I always laugh with her. So jolly. But then. We must not dwell on death. We must dwell on the delight of how nice we meet in this neck, how do you say, of the woods. But I tell you now my good news my dear fellow. From Milano Italy comes my inheritance. Of course I still keep my little school. But no longer must I teach. Now I am rich again. So you must come to my party. Only the best people. Of course do not take notice of that sailor. We will have new nicer sailors. I do not mind if they are rough. I am stronger anyway. But I hate when they are too too coarse without the proper manners. And I do not invite him. But since you are not on your way to the gentlemen’s convenience around the corner, we go together to the Buttery. And then you must come with me to my party. And we should not any longer stand here to freeze to death on the street.’
Darcy Dancer keeping abreast of the rapidly striding feet of the Count MacBuzuranti. So lightfootedly gliding over the granite slabs. Executing attitudes allongées nearly en pointe à la Nijinsky off the kerb stones. Passing again the turrets of the Turkish baths. And the closed back gates of Trinity College. The dental hospital. The recent Elizabethan windows of this pub, Lincoln’s Inn. The big brass plate on the door, Mission to Lepers. Turn left up Kildare Street. The Count skipping up to the top step of my father’s club. And diving in a heart stopping attitude croisée to the street again. Thank god the shutters are closed on the windows. Hiding away the big blazing coal fires inside as well as club members’ eyes.
‘But my Darcy, you see it is so simple. And I waste my genius to teach you to dance in the big castle in the country. It is not only good for the body but the mind as well. And now you are so elegant, so tall, and so much more attractive you have become. So many of us, as the time too fast flies, are ugh, so unattractive. You come on Monday. I give you free lessons at my school dear boy.’
Darcy Dancer trotting to keep up. The Count O’Biottus flying through his repertoire. His head snapping back to shout olé over his shoulder, his scarf waving and his coat flapping like wings in the breeze. As he goes en pointe down Molesworth Street. A gang following. Of barefoot newsboys. Their open torn shirts, the worn out seats of their short trousers. Green thick phlegm seeping from their nostrils. As they clap laugh and cheer and chant.
‘Give us a penny mister. Do it again mister. Mister do it again. And give us a penny.’
The urchins’ awed ooos and ahs. The Count leaping from the porch of the Masonic Lodge. So Protestant and respectable. Doing a complete head over heels somersault through the air. Landing miraculously on his feet in front of his openmouthed audience. Thank god the Royal Hibernian Hotel is near ahead.
‘Hey mister are you from a circus. Give us a penny will you mister.’
‘Now little boys of course, here are your pennies. Here are your shillings. And halfcrowns I scatter for you.’
The Count throwing money back down the street. Towards the Dail Eireann. The newsboys fighting. Kicking and punching each other. Screams bites and scratches. As they chase and snatch at the coins.
‘Ah Darcy, you see, how sad. They maim. They hurt. Come let us go. If they did not steal so I would invite all these little boys to my party. But like the colours of the rainbow, I invite the Black Widow. The White Prince. The Lemon Lady. The Purple Fucker, the Green Shit, Josintha, the musical sow. She grunts and squeals as she gets fucked standing on the head. And, my dear, did you know what Lois say about you all over Dublin. Ah you blush already before I tell you. She talk so much about your private part. O I do rush on don’t I. Ah you blush again. She too shall be at my party.’
‘I am certainly not blushing.’
‘Ah but we know so much about you dear boy, much more than you think. Lois say you are well endowed. And of course I see her painting of you. In which is your prick, is flaccid of course. She knows better than anyone, the size of all the pricks in Dublin. She say when hard you have the second biggest. Not the biggest balls of course. But you would not expect god to be so kind to give you both. Would you. She adores to paint mine because I have myself so very wonderful, wonderful balls she says. Tending to be of the more aristocratic perfectly ellipsoidal instead of the more peasant rounder Irish variety. I admit my prick is not the very biggest. But if you come to my party you shall see my portrait. Ah but maybe now you wonder. Who it is who have a bigger prick than you. I tell you. His name is Harry. He is the aesthete. He is poetic. Harry comes to see me dance. Backstage I lock out the crowds. I say in the dressing room to Harry to show me your prick, Harry. But like you he is too shy. And the girls they are too many who push us boys away from Harry. He is so handsome. So I do not see his prick. I take him to Jammet’s for dinner. He eats like a horse. So he must have a cock like a horse. Otherwise we must take such a big cock on trust. But who cares about such monsters. It is the little tiny beauties of the mind, my dear which matters so high above all the long thick delicious cocks and balls like grapefruits. So perhaps if you show me your hard cock I shall know how big is the second biggest, my angel.
Don’t answer yet. Later I ask you again. Maybe then you answer yes. But always let us have ghiribizzo giocoso and grazia in all things.’
The Count gathering in his scarves and coat as he goes sweeping across the black and white tiled front lobby of the Hibernian Hotel. That reassuring coal fire blazing in the grate. The porter nodding and smiling to see one. Girls behind the reception desk giggling, digging each other in the ribs. As I take off my cap. And the Count shakes his blond locks back over his ears. Sauntering by the grand staircase into the lounge. Pirouetting left and right past the little groups gathered about their tables. Under the faint cerulean blue skylight, conversation stopped. The Count casting upon the sudden silence merry and highly suggestive quips.
‘Hello, hello, all you so nice people. Who are so nice to see you. Hello. Hello. Now that I am so unforgivably rich my dears. We shall later together all lift up our dresses, let down our hair and get to know each other better. All our lovely selves we shall unite in love n’est-ce pas.’
The Count waving his departure. Darcy Dancer following him down stairs. Thank god, into the darker cellar labyrinths of the Buttery. Where there won’t be so many eyebrow raising gentry. But plenty of socially outcast untouchables. Whom one should avoid, if not to end up spending the entire rest of one’s shortened life in besotted drunken debauch and penury. Not to mention being flung into a cauldron of the Count’s friends unmercifully prodding each other with their pricks and gigglingly squeezing each other’s balls. Already hear certain loud voices one knows only too well.
‘Bash on regardless, all you damn nae hope commoners. And may I remind you that it is only through the fault of my stern handsome father and my beautiful mother who abandoned me to numerous doting nannies who overindulged me at an early age and set me upon the road to debauchery that I am here among you. I know that my charm and unbearably good looks attract the many queers among you, drinking far too much of my excellent champagne, but would you please stop edging the women away out of my proximity. And do fuck off about your own bollocksing buggery.’
Rashers. My god look at him. In tailcoated splendour, striped trousers. Red carnation. Amid this plethora of misfits. His Ardagh Chalice on the bar being stuffed with another magnum of champagne. As he hefts the aperture about and empties the bottle into the Black Widow’s glass. The mirrors, the murmurs deep down in this Buttery. Rashers grinning with both bulging cheeks. Absolutely on top of his form. As if money were no object. Judging now from the new number of hands holding out glasses which he so readily fills.
‘Drink up, nae hopers. Drink up. And let there be more dreams ahead of you upon which to sail your injured spirits.’
Rashers cocking back his head under his own upended glass. And now he sees me. As his empty glass hits the bar. A distinct if brief apprehension flashing across his face. Disappearing in his welcoming smile. Dismounting his stool. Pushing his way towards me between the jam of shoulders. Of jockeys, trainers and ballroom dancers. And here at this end of the bar, right in front of me, bloody hell, is the poet. Whose first terrified sight of me strangely turns to a most sickly ingratiating grin. His brand new shiny regrettably blue suit. And thoroughly inappropriate red, white and blue striped tie. And taking his cigarettes, not out of a pack of ten, but from a whole pack of twenty. And who suddenly appears to be surrounded by doting admirers instead of the usual indifferent habitués who normally would take great pleasure in shoving his sheets of poetry back in his face and kicking in his teeth or slowly lowering their heels crushingly on his balls.
‘Ah my dearest friend Darcy, my dear Kildare. The noble Marquis of Delgany. Let the man pass. Let him pass through to me. My most triumphant and honoured fellow. Forgive these about among whom one must momentarily rub elbows. But how are you my dear boy. The soul comforting pleasure of your great country house lives still in my heart. Come. Let me lead you. You are of course to drink some champagne. For any moment soon, we shall sadly be hearing our host behind this bar singing last orders now, and time ladies and gentlemen please. From Gray’s Anatomy let me recite for you the muscles of the throat and neck. But oh dear, in a gathering such as this, perhaps it is more appropriate to treat of the muscles of the pelvic outlet. The corrugator curtis ani. The external and internal sphincter ani.’
‘Rashers. I believe you are staying at the Shelbourne Hotel.’
‘Good lord. Am I. How do you know. O dear you do know. But ah not so loud dear boy, not so loud. Although I am in partial incognito up there, there are those still about whose ears I should not like that personally pleasant information to sink into. At least not quite yet. But damn, it is such a nice relief to shake from one’s person the indignities of low life.’
‘I believe you are occupying a suite. And also, so it appears, assuming a title. You do seem suddenly awfully prosperous.’
‘Well yes, but don’t you think it suits me. A few winners at the races dear boy. But heavens above, am I to assume by these questions that you are being shirtily aggrieved in some manner. Pray not be. All is to be well. Of course you shall meet soon my nearest and dearest. She’s bought another pub. Dear girl. And would you believe it her accountants have agreed to her acquiring, at my suggestion, also a turf accountant’s shop. Where I shall in future credit my bets. These are times for acting one’s true role in life. Do taste, my dear boy from this plate. The brown breads and the orange pink of this smoked salmon. Our dear Count Brutus MacBuzuranti is giving one of his soirées tonight. As he did last night and the previous night. And the night before that. You’re coming of course. To frolic among the folk singers and authentic Aran islanders in their pampooties, not to numerously mention the lesbians, nymphomaniacs, literati, the nancy boys and lepidopterists.’
In a turf smoke scented drizzle of rain, a procession of little groups arriving outside this narrow red brick Georgian building down Duke Street. A brass sign over the letter opening. The MacBuzuranti School of Ballet. Red curtains drawn over the lighted windows. Sound of throbbing music. Climbing up these narrow stairs. The walls ashake and banister trembling. The voice of the Count O’Biottus himself on the top landing receiving.
‘Come, come up my dear nice people. And into my office. One and all. Welcome.’
Into the small sea of old familiar faces. Squeezed tight against each other. The wheaty fragrance of Irish whisky. The musky smell of hemp. Stout bottles upending pouring down the throats. The Count’s portraits of the Popes one remembers from another address near Molesworth Street. And smack between these supreme pontiffs of the holy Roman Catholic Church, Lois’s massive stark raving nude portrait of the Count.
‘Take no notice my dear people of me in the altogether. Even though my body is so beautiful.’
Drunken eyes welcoming one back. My god. There is Lois. Her hair braided in a long blond pigtail. The far end of the room gossiping in her loud Bloomsbury voice. With an even longer cigarette holder. And seeing me. Beckoning to me across the heads. As one’s suddenly hardening prick points the way through the turned backs, bent elbows and indeed one or two open flies and gleaming white stiff pricks exposed.
‘Darling dear boy, how nice to see you again. You’re shaving your face. But you mustn’t. Let a little hair grow which I so adore on pretty young men. Of course you are still a callow youth. While my pubic hair is going rapidly grey. You do, don’t you, I understand, have a very adequate place in the countryside. A very very large house. To which, may I say, I am extremely chagrined not to have been invited. How dare you not invite me. I don’t foxhunt but surely you have room somewhere for me to paint by northern light. I’ve just come down from the Dawson Lounge. Been all by myself the entire evening in a most boring corner. Having to smoke my own cigarettes and buy my own drinks. Don’t people know I am poor. And that I must get on with my etchings. Where tell me, are the serious patrons of the arts. Have they no feelings for the artist. Allowing me to subsist on simply nothing at all. But I don’t want to complain.’
‘Lois do forgive me. But you are, are
n’t you, totally full of shit.’
‘I say, how dare you. Damn you. Be so bloody rude. I’ve been suffering. Do you know what it is to truly suffer. How would you know in your big house. That I am freezing to death in my own studio. Not even enough milk to feed my cats. Both of whom have recently died.’
‘I am sorry to hear that.’
‘And you clearly are a very rich young man. While I haven’t had a holiday by the seaside for years. I can’t afford it. Nor can I afford tubes of paint.’
‘Here please, take this Lois.’
‘What. Take money from you. How dare you attempt to bribe me. I have no intention to compromise myself or my art.’
‘Bloody hell, I’m not bribing or compromising you. I’m just trying to shut you up a moment in your complaining. And you can buy your tubes of paint.’
‘In that case, I shall shut up and take it. But insist I give you an etching. It may not be signed of course. And dear boy even though you have become quite rude, it is quite nice to see you. Come closer. I shall stick my tongue deeply in your ear.’
‘Thank you. I am as a matter of fact more than rather mildly randy.’
‘You poor dear lecherous boy. You may come home with me. But you do realise I can’t promise you anything. In fact you may have to masturbate. Since this is my celibate period. One must be celibate to exact from one’s inner spirit the full use of the self in the creation of one’s work. Without the emotional havoc pricks inside one can cause. It is a contradiction in terms but my celibate period is my most fertile, I’m sure any number of our dear friends here will gladly accommodate you.’
‘O god. I am not a homosexual.’
‘Why o god. So despairingly. Most of my nicest friends are homosexual.’
‘I’d rather go home with you.’
‘That’s nice to know. But as I’ve just told you, there’s to be no hanky panky.’
‘You have you know considerably steamed me up by your tongue.’