The Giant, O'Brien

  So it was, in the hour after the lamps were lighted, that Londoners at their supper were surprised by the giant face of an Irishman appearing behind the foggy glass. Some cowered and some cursed, and some called for their watchdog to be let out. “Mary, Bitch Mary!” called Jankin, in his piping voice. Children ran after the Giant—barefoot, bow-legged, toothless children, wilder than any they had seen—and one of them threw a stone which struck Joe smartly on the shoulder. The band did not stop calling until they reached the fields to the west, where they sat down and rested on the rippling black grass. The cold crept into their bones, and the Giant winced as he flexed his fingers, and reached up to knead the back of his neck. They went home to bread and some maggoty cheese. Joe had ceased to order up suppers from the cookshop. “Face it,” he said, “trade’s not what it was. We cannot keep up our standard as aforesaid, unless O’Brien here puts his hand in his sack.”

  “But the money is for my own purposes,” the Giant said. “It is not for laying out in mutton pies. That money is to go back to Ireland.”

  “For why?” Pybus asked. “It’s not as if you’ve relatives living.”

  “It’s for rebuilding Mulroney’s tavern. This time in dressed stone, with columns. That don’t fall down. With marble fireplaces, decorated with urns and wreaths. With lyre-backed chairs for furniture, and marquetry tables inlaid with the fruits of the season.”

  “He has started to believe his own stories,” Claffey said.

  “With looking glasses surmounted by gilded swans, and consoles supported by gilded ladies with wings and their upper torso bare. With clock cases trimmed with laurel leaves and the sun with a smiling face. With fire screens with Neapolitan vistas on them, and serpentine chests with secret drawers. And a frieze with the nine Muses dancing.”

  The next night, Vance stayed at home sulking. He declared he had better things to do than be stoned by street-life. “Like what?” Claffey asked him slyly. “Sit and count the Giant’s money?”

  Joe did not know whether the question expected the answer yes or the answer no.

  He scowled at Claffey. “You get above your station, rag-arse.”

  “I’ll be taking my sack with me,” the Giant said. His tone was serene. “That way, there can be no doubt whether anything has gone out of it, and there need be no harsh opinions. Tonight we look east, my brave fellows. I swear we will see a glint of Mary before the sun rises.”

  For he looked to find her, this misty night, seated by the grey smudge of the river, her hair streaming like a comet, and the sky’s last deep blue pooling in her eyes; to find her in the nasty sites of Old Street by calling her name, or to hear her laugh in Clerkenwell. Oh Mary, darling of our hearts, have you set your foot on Pickle-Herring Stairs? Are you hawking tripe or picking rags, are you scouring ale-pots in Limehouse or sifting ash on the city’s fringe?

  He left Jankin sitting on a wall somewhere, complaining of his feet, and lost Claffey to a game of dice and Pybus to a game of skittles. He stopped in a room of greased beams and smoky tallow, where he ate hot water gruel with some bread crumbled in it and garnished with pepper; he asked for a pat of butter, and the landlady said, what do you think this is, Holland House? He saw some bandits eyeing up his money bag, and stood to his full height, at which they left the room, muttering.

  Later they were waiting for him, in strength, but he casually placed an elbow in the eye socket of one, tripped another bloodynose squash on the cobbles, and nudged a third into the wall head first. Then he picked up their leader—he was tired, and wanted an end of it—and tossed him into a midden.

  It came on to rain. Ambling home down the Strand, towards midnight, he glanced into a back court, and under a dripping gable he saw a woman he recognised, but it was not Bitch Mary. He had seen her last in Ireland, stepping between the puddles, her child riding high in her belly. He could not be mistaken in those lakes that were her eyes, or the white arms which her rags exposed. So she left the grave after all, he thought, the grave of her hero son. I asked her to share my throne.

  He would not shame her by speaking; she was selling herself, it was clear, to Englishmen. He took a coin from his bag, and, as he passed her, let it drop into the filth at her feet. “Here.” Her voice rang out, hard and empty. “Fucking freak throws his lucre at me.” He turned back. Noted her tone: whore bred in Hoxton. He saw that her face was not the same at all.

  Back at the Hampshire Hod, he troubled the landlord for spirits, and climbed the stairs.

  “Did you get her then?” Joe asked. He was hunched in the corner with his prince book and a candle.

  The Giant didn’t answer. “I want to move from here,” he said. “Insufficiently commodious.”

  “Listen Charlie, I’ve been thinking.”

  “Have you so, Joe Vance? Is that the wailing and grunting that carries from here to Ludgate?”

  “Sarcasm doesn’t suit you,” said Joe, looking up. “Broken pates is more your line. What say we pitch you in a prize-fight with that small giant who’s showing at the Haymarket?”

  “No.” The Giant sat down. “It is a man on stilts, and besides, I don’t feel well. I don’t feel right in myself, and I want to move house.”

  “The porterage fees are mounting up. What with your whims and fancies.”

  “It wasn’t my fancy to come here. Anyway … you’d been thinking, you said.”

  “Thinking about that volume of money you’re toting around. Would you let me transmit it back home for you?”

  “Back to where?”

  “O’Connor’s cabin would be safe enough. The man who comes raiding is only looking for his rightful cows; he wouldn’t be so brutal as to loom in and steal from Connor’s chest.”

  “It’s my Mulroney’s money, you understand?” The Giant brooded. “Thank you for your offer, Vance. But I think I’ll keep it where I can see it, for now.”

  Every night they lay at Piccadilly, the Giant dreamed of the Edible House. The travellers who arrive at the house begin by eating it, but it ends by eating them.

  On quarter day they moved to rooms in Cockspur Street. Their new landlord—not so new, because it was Kane—checked them in, and ran through the inventory with Joe.

  “Lucky we’ve brought our own fire-irons,” the Giant said. “That black and evil-looking set of tongs is the devil’s own implement, and the poker inspires me with disgust.”

  “One pot for boiling,” said the landlord.

  “One pot for boiling,” Joe said. “Do we pay extra for the hole in it?”

  “One cup for keeping salt. One iron candlestick—”

  “Dented,” said Joe.

  “Dented, but functional. One bolster, any objection to the bolster? Anything to say about it? Fine. Two chairs with straw seats, one painted chair with a dint in the back, one three-legged stool. And you’ll please not say that it wobbles for that’s just what a three-legged stool don’t do. Three tin pint pots. One jar for vinegar. A pair of green woollen curtains with barely noticeable moth holes. And a deal table.”

  “It’s a table fit for vagrants,” Claffey said. “Jesus, Kane, there’s not a single piece in this establishment that a pawnbroker would look at.”

  “That’s the idea,” said Kane.

  It was Claffey who followed him to the door. “Have you any idea of the whereabouts of the girl Mary?”

  “No, but if I had I’d peel the hide off her.”

  “Because our idiot, Jankin, he is off his fodder, and none of us is too happy till we know she’s not drowned or lost. Would you know the whereabouts of Bride Caskey?”

  “If I knew where Caskey was, I’d call the watch and see her marched to Newgate. When your girl Mary upped and left me, she helped herself to my purse with a guinea in it, and I’d swear Caskey put her up to it.” His eyes narrowed. “Why do you want Mary, anyway?” He sniggered. “You want to put her on the streets and live on her while she’s fresh meat. You’re after making an income for yourself and swaggering out as you used to this s
ummer. Are you feeling the pinch? Your giant’s not what they call open-handed, is he?”

  “He is saving up,” Claffey said. “To restore the Court of Poetry.”

  Kane stared at him.

  Indoors, Joe was trying to put a brave face on it. “It’s not the standard we’re accustomed to, but we can soon impart the individual touch. Wait till I get my set of satirical prints hung up, that will raise the tone.”

  “Somebody’s nailed this window shut,” Pybus said. “And look at these rags stuffed in the cracks. When the fire’s going, the air in here will be so thick you’d need a knife to slice it.”

  “The prudent and economical man,” Joe Vance said, “has no need of silk bedcurtains, and makes do with linsey woolsey. As for this set of spoons—why, a philosopher would not despise it.” Joe looked around at them, smiling. “I’m off to the jobbin’ now. Get some more bills printed. I’m bringing your price down, Charlie. You’re coming down by a shilling. It’s to stimulate demand and appeal to a new class of investors.”

  “Is there any news of Patrick O’Brien?” Claffey asked.

  “Yes.” Joe didn’t cease to smile. “They say he’s booked his passage, and an entourage with him.”

  Their cage was set upon the deal table; and the siskins began to sing.

  One of their first visitors after the price had come down was a low, strong-looking man with not much top to his head, with sandy whiskers and a big jaw. He sat at the back when the viewers were ushered in, and folded his arms and never spoke, but he never took his eyes away either.

  “Jesus,” the Giant said. “He ought to pay double, for the amount he looked. His eyebeams would slice through your flesh.”

  At the point where the usual questions were over—How does it feel to be a giant? Did you always want to be a giant? Can anyone be a giant or are you born to it?—Joe had risen as usual, softly clearing his throat, his fingers making tactful little whisking movements towards the door. The sandy cove had stepped forward, and as the other clients took their leave he asked, “Are you quite well, my good fellow?”

  His words were Scotch, and sharp. But close to, his glance did not seem perturbing; it wandered, and he squinted more than a little.

  “Am I well?” the Giant had said. “Not precisely. My feet are enlarged, and I feel the springy gristle of my ankles and knees to be calcined. My hands are swole, and my arms drag out their sockets. There is a raddling in my kidneys, and my memory fails. I have taken a hatred to strong cheese, my head aches, and I stub my toes as I walk.”

  “I see,” said the Scotchman. “Anything else?”

  “I feel a gathering of the waters of the heart.”

  “Ah.”

  Just at that moment, Joe Vance, who had been ushering out the clients, came bursting back. “Charlie, I’ve been wanting to tell you—I’d the letter just before we exhibited—do you know Mester Goss of Dublin, Goss that trained the intelligent horse?”

  “How so intelligent?” the Scotchman said. “A horse that did tricks, did it?”

  “Tricks you may call them,” Joe said, “but they induced in Goss prosperity and fame. Why, the equine could count! It was exhibited through Europe. Surely you’ve heard of it, sir, or where do you live? Well, the thing is, Charlie, I hear now that Goss is training up a sapient pig. And I’ve been wondering, when it’s trained, to make him an offer for it. Couldn’t we do grand business, don’t you think, a giant and a learned pig on the one bill?”

  The Giant asked, “What is the name of it?”

  “Toby. All sapient pigs are called Toby.”

  “Is that so? It is one of the few facts I had not taken under cognizance.”

  “Well, gentlemen,” said the Scot, “I would recommend you take expert advice before parting with your money, and if it comes to a contract, insert a clause allowing you to return the pig if you are not fully satisfied—within a reasonable time, say, a calendar month, which will give you the opportunity of a fair trial.” (All this time, his eyes are boring into Charlie; the Giant feels his bones will split open and the marrow ooze out.) “That’s my advice and freely given, for I’ve seen a number of these so-called educated bears and the like, and it’s notable that they don’t perform nearly so well when they are parted from their first keepers.”

  “Perhaps they grieve,” suggested the Giant.

  “No, it is a code. If they can count, or tell fortunes, it’s because the keepers have taught them a code.”

  “It’s clever in itself,” said the Giant. “I could take to Toby, if he knew a code.”

  “I wonder,” Vance said, “would you invest in it, Charlie? The money out your sack? Or some of it? If I were to write a billet to Goss?”

  The Giant rubbed his chin. “Could I feel your pulse, sir?” asked the Scotchman.

  “I don’t know. Do we charge for it, Joe?”

  “A donation would be gratefully received.”

  The customer put his hand in his pocket, and slapped down a farthing. His mouth turned down. He grappled the Giant’s wrist in his. “Hm,” he grunted. “Hm.” He began counting. “Hm,” he said again.

  Released, the Giant stood up. The customer came to his waist. “Are you in the physicking line, then?”

  “No, my trade is other. Bid you good day.”

  Joe Vance stood looking after him. “He was a queer little pepper-and-salt gentleman, was he not? He tried to put us off our pig. Does he train creatures himself? I wonder. And seeks to get our trade?”

  O’Brien said, “Have you heard of the Red Caps, small gentlemen of Scotland? They are four feet high, they carry a staff, their nails are talons, and their teeth long and yellow. How do their caps get red? They dye them in human blood.”

  Pybus came up the stairs, bellowing, “Are you ready for your supper?”

  Joe bawled down, “What is that supper?”

  Yelled Pybus, “It is herring.”

  “It is always bloody herring these days,” Claffey said.

  John Hunter, back at Earl’s Court, surveys the space he has available. I must expand, he thinks, get better premises, somewhere central, and set up a gallery, where I can exhibit. Leicester Square strikes him as convenient; those environs generally. It will add to his fame and maybe bring some money in. He rubs his eyes. He rubs his head. I am ruined, he tells himself, by lashing out on specimens. Experiments will bring me to bankruptcy; I’ll go barefoot for knowledge. My wife will leave me. And my friends desert in droves. There, he thinks, just there shall Giant hang. I will move that armadillo three feet to the left, and the giant bones will sway, suspended on their wires, boiled and clean; for the man’s a goner. The freak says it himself; the tides are gathering behind his ribs, the salt oedematous tides. His digits no longer obey him, his faculties flag; give it six months, and the pagan object will be mine.

  “So,” Joe Vance said, “despising your scepticism as I do, let me set out to you how such a pig works. You lay out letters around him, on cards, and ask him to spell a name and he goes to each letter and points with his trotter.”

  “It’s superior entertainment,” the Giant said. “For those that can read.”

  “Then you put down cards with numbers, and give it sums to do. After that, you put down letters again, and ask it to read the thoughts of the people in the audience and spell them out. Or tell their fortunes, as the Scotchman hinted. Sometimes, if your pig’s the prime article, you can blindfold it, and it will work just the same.”

  “But would you trust your fortune,” the Giant asked, “if it were told by a pig?”

  “Well, I do so think,” said Pybus. “For a pig won’t give you a favourable one, to get a tip.”

  “The boy reasons well,” Joe said.

  “And if a pig said, beware of a dray coming up fast on your left and mushing you against the wall, well, you’d beware.”

  “But not if a human said it?” the Giant asked.

  “You see, Giant,” Pybus explained, “the pig wouldn’t have any interest whether it
came true or not. But if a human told it you, and the dray came up and dunted in your ribs, you’d suspect that the said dray was driven by the fortune-teller’s uncle. It’s what they call a ploy. It’s to get future money off you.”

  “Well, well,” said the Giant. “You seem wise in the ways of the world, all of a sudden. Have you been looking into Joe’s book about the prince?”

  Pybus reddened. “I cannot read,” he said. “And you know it, Charlie. Still less any book in a foreign tongue.”

  “You much neglect your advancement.” The Giant sniffed. “Joe, how are you to persuade the ladies to our show? And the fine gentlemen? For a swine do smell.”

  “There you are under a mistake,” Joe said hotly. “There is nothing in the breed, inherently, to make it smell, and you speak out of gross prejudice, O’Brien, at which I am surprised. Goss’s pig almost certainly does not smell.” He spoke with more loudness than conviction.

  Claffey said, sniggering in the corner, “Joe Vance is related to a pig, that’s why he stands up for his tribe.”

  “Come outside, skin-head,” Vance proposed, “and I’ll pound your liver to a fine paste that I will use to stop up the chinks in the door frame.”

  “Gentlemen,” the Giant said, “your complaints are grating in my ears and your incessant quarrels are scratching around in my brain like a rat in a hatbox. Would you not like the story of Bernard Owen O’Neill, whose uncle when on his way to fish for trout met a man without a head?”

  And from his shelf, Hunter plucks out a book.

  Wm Harvey: “Blood is the first engendered part … blood lives of itself … blood is the cause not only of life in general but also of longer or shorter life, of sleep and of watching, of genius, aptitude and strength.” Give me a piece of luck, he prays. Get me this giant. For I have never had a piece of luck. Brother Wullie has had it all.