Tales Of The Gurrier

Sean O’Riordan sat silently in the passenger seat of his father’s 1954 Austin Cambridge as the tiny car trundled slowly through the arched stone gateway, crossed the cattle grid and began its leisurely approach to the broad grey Georgian building looming in the distance. In the drivers seat his father, Sean O’Riordan Snr breathed heavily and rubbed his fist against a patch of windscreen clouded by his breath.

“Have you your letter of introduction?” he said, a slow sighing rural accent made every utterance the heavy pronouncement of a funeral speech.

“Yes Da.”

“And your briefcase, it is very important that you have a briefcase son. Every professional man must have a briefcase. It shows diligence and organisation. A keen mind and a spirit of uniformity.”

“Yes Da. I have me briefcase.”

“My briefcase son, I have my briefcase. Sean there is no excuse for gutter talk. You are not hanging about the place with those sleebheen Dublin cornerboys now. You will be talking with men here. Men of import, men of education.”

“Yes Da. My briefcase. Sorry Da”

“Your mother chose that one special in Boyers.”

“Yes Da.”

“And have you your lunch?”

“Yes Da. Corned beef sandwiches and a flask of tea.”

“Good. Well. Don’t embarrass us son.”

“No Da. I’ll see you this evening”

‘Do you want collecting?’

‘No Da, I’ll get the bus.’

‘Mind yourself.’

‘Bye Da.’

Sean O’Riordan the younger opened the passenger door of the car and collecting his brand new brown patent leather briefcase from the back seat waved his father off. As the back of the Austin disappeared through the distant granite archway he realised he had forgotten his corned beef sandwiches.

He sighed and gazed up at the austere Georgian building housing the offices of his new job and looked at his wristwatch. 8.50am, Monday 5th June 1965, he made a mental note. His first day at work with the Irish Civil Service, Department of Agriculture, Clerical Officer Grade 1,

The lobby of the building smelled of potatoes and furniture polish. A bored receptionist answered calls behind a vast wooden desk.

‘Dia is Mhuire duit, an Roinn Talmhíochta.’

‘Hello, er dia duit’ said Sean stammering slightly, surprised at the address ‘as gaeilge’.

‘Not you!’ said a voice behind him. Startled he whirled around scattering a stack of important looking forms onto the tiled marble floor’

‘Is ea, I mean YES!’ said Sean in a strangled cry. Stooping to gather up the leaflets and knocking heads with the porter.

‘Sorry, sorry,’ said Sean wishing he could crawl beneath the pile of forms and disappear.

‘Feckin’ eejit,’ said the porter rubbing his balding crown. ‘Are you only starting today.’

‘Yes sorry, I just got here. It’s my first day,’ said Sean desperate to shore up the rapidly deteriorating situation. He thrust his letter at the porter.

The porter an ancient gent in advanced state of corporeal decay pushed the letter back into Sean’s hands and sucked his teeth in a disapproving manner.

‘Oh no I can’t take that son. That’s for your Executive Officer. Goes into your permanent record,’ he said adding a conspiratorial wink.

‘Right sorry. I understand,’ said Sean. He did not understand and worried he was saying sorry too much. Da often admonished him for apologizing too much. But Ma said that ‘apologising was a sign of courtesy and good manners’. He was glad his Da wasn’t here now.

‘What do I do?’ he said miserably.

The porter chewed the bristles on his lower lip for a moment and said ‘tell you what. Yer one over there has an awful bee up her hole today so I’ll do ye a favour. Give us a quick gander at the letter and I’ll tell ye where to go. But don’t be tellin’ anyone ye showed it to me okay.’

‘Okay, thanks,’ said Sean relieved at being spared the ordeal of experiencing the insect infestation the unfortunate receptionist suffered from. It sounded serious and he was allergic to bee stings. He tore open the envelope and showed the porter its contents.

‘Right, lets have a look here,’ said the porter producing a pair of wire frame spectacles with lenses thicker than the ends of a milkbottle and squinting at the official carbon copy of Sean’s acceptance letter. The porter’s lips moved as he read and he muttered under his breath ‘Sean O’Riordan,.seven honours in the Leaving, clever bollix,civil service exams,highly placed,.smart arse,acceptance for position of Clerical Officer Grade I,.present yourself at,..on this date,blah, blah, blah,,..ahh shite.’

Sean looked up alarmed.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘Aah shite, you poor bollix,’ the porter was shaking his head now pushing the letter back into Sean’s hands as if it were hot to the touch. ‘Here Eileen, Eileen! This poor young fella is going to Section 8.’

Eileen who had until now ignored the discourse occurring in front of her desk abruptly disconnected the gentleman caller with whom she had been engaged in conversation.

‘He’s wha?’ she said, standing up to get a closer look.

‘Yeah Section 8, says so in his letter.’ said the porter taking step back from Sean to disassociate himself from the situation.

‘Did ya read it?’

‘Yeah it says so right there’

‘Give us a look.’

‘I gave it back to him’

‘Here youngfella give us a look.’

Eager to please, nevertheless increasingly worried at the turn of events Sean wordlessly handed over the letter. Eileen snatched it with red taloned hand and dialed her friend Josephine on the fourth floor.

‘Yeah Jo it’s me, no you’ll never guess. No a Section 8. Yeah, Janey mack is right. No he’s standing right here, poor young fella. No he’s only me brother’s age. No not Paul, Eddie. Yeah Eddie. No that’s me sisters young fella. Yeah Eddie. Yeah he’s standing right here. Well come on down and see for yourself if you don’t believe me.’ Eileen hung up the phone slightly miffed at Josephine’s insistence that Eileen was not in fact looking at a Section 8 and was only pulling her leg.

‘Erm can you tell me where to go please’ said Sean, eager to seize on the lull in conversation. His watch read 9.05am.

‘Go?’ said Eileen nonplussed.

‘Yes. I have to report to my Executive Officer,’ said Sean ‘with my letter,’ he added indicating the document in what he hoped was vaguely helpful manner.

‘Janey,’ said Eileen. ‘Mickey you know where the Section 8 offices are.’

‘I might,’ said Mickey the porter.

‘You take him.’

‘Ah you know now Eileen, that’s not my job is it.’

‘I’m not doing it,’ said Eileen jutting out her jaw in manner that indicated the matter was closed for discussion.

‘What is going on here?’ The booming voice echoed through the lobby carrying with it that unmistakable air of authority borne of long years toiling upwards on an increasingly narrow ladder of mismanagement and incompetence.

‘Principal Officer Murtagh,’ said Eileen now shorn of all traces of boredom and ennui. ‘I was instructing Mickey, I mean Michael here to show this young man to his new post.’

‘I see,’ said Principal Officer Murtagh in a tone that managed to convey he was most displeased with this turn of events. He turned to Sean and gave him his most welcoming smile, the one he reserved for all new recruits. Sean observed that Principal Officer Murtagh looked like he was suffering from a bout of serious constipation ‘and where is this fresh faced young convert to the temple of the civil sacrament headed.’

‘What?’ said Eileen.

‘What section is he assigned to Ms. O’Mahoney?’ said Principal Officer Murtagh with a sigh.

‘Section 8 sir,’ said Eileen hastily disappearing beneath the parapet of her bunker shaped desk.

Principal Officer Murtagh face froze and he drew himself up to his full height (5′9′), dropped his official welcoming smile and replaced it with the look he reserved for his most serious, official dressing downs. ‘I see,’ he said.

‘Name?’

‘Sean O’Riordan sir,’ said Sean shaking with fear.

‘Letter, quick boy’

‘I have it here sir’ said Sean handing him the ill fated document.

‘This has been opened’ said Prinicpal Officer Murtagh giving Sean another withering look of official disapproval.

‘I, I, well that is, sir I mean to say that.’

‘That’s enough,’ said Murtagh thrusting the letter back at Sean as if it were plague riddled vermin.

‘Mr O’Riordan let me make this quite clear to you. We do not hold with any funny business in this Department do you understand.’

‘Yes sir.’

‘No, I do not think you do understand. Let me explain something to you Mr. O’Riordan, serving your country under the auspices of the civil service is a great thing. It is a sacred and onerous duty to the State. I do not hold with undesirables under my license do you hear me. I do not hold with it, nor with those who would bring this great organization of ours into disrepute. Are you one of those persons Mr. O’Riordan?’

‘No sir.’

‘ I should fervently hope not, but see that you grasp this one detail Mr’ O’Riordan. I have my eye on you.’

‘Yes sir,’ said Sean now thoroughly dejected.

‘Mr. Byrne please see to it that Mr. O’Riordan is delivered to the Section 8 offices personally and get back here on the the double. No shilly shallying understood.’

‘Yes sir Mr. Murtagh sir,’ said Mickey the porter.

‘Very good,’ said Principal Officer Murtagh mounting one of the two sweeping staircases flanking the lobby and disappearing into the rarified atmosphere of the upper echelons of the Agricultural Department.

‘Don’t mind yer man,’ said Mickey ‘he’s only an auld bollix.’

‘But what have I done?’ said Sean in despair.

‘You’ve not done anything son,’ said Mickey ‘Look it you’ll find out soon enough. Come on and I’ll take you to the offices.’

Mickey led Sean through the lobby and down into the labyrinthine warren of departmental offices, tea rooms, equipment cupboards, conference rooms, typing pools, canteens, back stairs and endless corridors making up the beating heart of the mighty department of Agriculture. The place had the smell somewhere between a school and a hospital. All carbolic soap and green paint. Mighty cast iron radiators and bleak institutional light. Sean’s spirits fell even further. On and on they trudged past rooms full of broken men slumped at their desks staring into space, gaggles of secretaries nattering in clouds of cigarette smoke, big country lads in overalls carrying buckets of things down into the cellars.

At last they emerged blinking into daylight and Sean realised they had walked the length of the building and were now crossing the outer courtyard and approaching a stable block converted into garages. Evidence from the guts of a variety of agricultural machinery littered the cobbled stone yard. Mickey reached a green painted garage door marked EXTREME DANGER, NO ENTRY and with much spitting and cursing drew it aside. The darkness within was total. Sean heard Mickey stumbling about in the gloom cursing the fecker who moved the light switch. He moved slowly into the cavernous depths to accustom his eyes to the darkness.

‘Who in the name of Jaysus put the lights over here,’ said Mickey from the darkness illuminating the garage with the weak light from a 40w bulb suspended high in the rafters. Sean stumbled backward. Before him a huge black Bedford van sat drooped on a broken suspension and leaking oil onto the concrete. To the right a vast collection of agricultural implements festooned the walls of the former stable. Pick axes, shovels, spades, scythes, rakes, hoes, butter churns, weird wooden spiked objects that baffled Sean’s imagination. What the hell could you use that spiral thing for? To his left a half hearted attempt to construct a partition wall had resulted in a kind of roofless shack. The shack clung to the stable wall with a certain dogged tenacity.

Sean followed Mickey into the tiny office. If the outer garage had the air of a demented farmers graveyard the office shack resembled nothing less than a mad scientist’s nightmare. Paper, files, maps, pencils, clipboards and cigarette butts spilled from every available flat surface. Tottering piles of mildewed Census reports fought for space with yet more mysterious and dangerous instruments of unknown purpose. The entire rear wall of the shack was occupied with tightly packed, wooden shelves housing a collection of chemicals, powders, unguents, tinctures, titrating equipment, test tubes and bottles of strange and terrifying looking substances. Sean took a faltering step forward and peered at the contents of the closest shelf. The stench of formaldeyhyde was overpowering. Jars of pickled cat’s heads, cow’s eyeballs, a sheep foetus, frog spawn, a two headed badger and some kind of toad in a tincture of alcohol and above that was a, what the hell, was that some kind of a horsebaby with, were those wings.

‘Get the hell away from my things!’

Sean spun around and came face to face with an older man blocking his exit from the shack hovel. The man appeared in a state of extreme agitation. Somewhere between fifty and sixty years of age he was dressed in a dishevelled suit and overcoat stained with cigarette ash and dried egg yolk. Sean realised the man may have been sleeping under one of the piles of newspapers and agricultural reports.

‘Who the hell let you in here? Was it that bastard Murtagh. Tell me!’ said the man, his large eyes wide with alarm and his eyebrows threatened to leap off his head. He made a grab at a vicious looking metal spike propping up a heap of telephone directories sending them crashing to the floor. ‘Answers now or you get the spike!’ he screamed making stabbing motions at Sean with the rusty skewer.

‘No, no, Mickey brought me down here,’ said Sean backing away from the madman with the spike. He looked around desperately for the porter but the auldfella was nowhere to be seen.

‘Lies. LIES! It’s the truth serum for you child. Hand me that bottle.’

‘My name is Sean O’Riordan. I’m here to report to my Executive Officer Diarmaid McNessa,’ said Sean thrusting his tattered letter forward like a shield.

The man stopped brandishing the metal spike and looked quizzically at the proffered letter. A wire thin hand shot out and grabbed the letter. He read it, one hand pointing the spike at Sean. ‘Hmm I see. It says here you’re the new Clerical Officer Grade One. Sent in to replace O’Malley.’

‘Yes, my name is Sean O’Riordan. Can you tell me where I can find Mr. McNessa.’

‘I’m McNessa now shut up and let me think.’

‘You’re McNessa’

‘What did I just say’

‘Sir, I know its my first day but I’ve had a really bad start and well if someone would please tell me what is going on. The recruitment officer never mentioned anything about all of this, ‘ he gestured helplessly at the shelf of nightmares behind him, ‘and why does everyone keep acting so strange, and what the hell is this place.’

‘This? This is Section 8 buachaillín’ said McNessa dropping the spike and slumping into a chair

‘But what is Section 8?’

‘Tell me something do you believe in Faeries?’

‘What? No. What do Faeries have to do with anything’

‘Lots, little bastards. Tell me, do you know them archaeologist fellas up there in the Dublin University. Big load of brains on them, always digging things up.’

‘Yes,’ said Sean and a ray of hope shining briefly into the dark cave of misery he now found himself in. ‘Is this an archaeological section of the department?’

McNessa gave him a look of absolute horror tinged with disgust.

‘For the love of God no. Them brainy bollixes up in the University keep digging shite up. Shite that’s best off left where it is, deep, deep underground. The deeper the better. I keep telling them but they keep digging it up like bleeding rabbits. Tunnels, holes, shafts they’re mad for it them arkie-ologists. No tellin’ them about it. So we make sure if they dig something up that they should not have dug up or if some poor bollix down in Kerry runs over something with his tractor that then gets up and eats his legs. Well we make sure it falls down a hole followed by about two ton of muck after it.’

‘I’m not sure I understand.’

‘Good. I’ve been doing this for thirty year and I still don’t understand it.’

They were interrupted by a shout from outside and someone pulling open the garage doors spilling light into the interior. An eager looking man in his thirties appeared at the door in a state of great excitement

‘Boss we have a problem’

‘How’s it going Martin. Say hello to our new Clerical Officer Grade one. Sean O’Riordan. He doesn’t believe in Faeries. What do ye think of that?’

‘Howareyeh,’ said Martin nodding to Sean and turning back to McNessa. ‘Boss we have a class five loose.’

‘A what?’

‘A class five Boss’

‘Where?’

‘Offaly’

‘Shite.’

‘Yeah. The Bog of Allen.’

‘Ah shite, a Bogman. Get the van going’

Martin raced to the wall of deadly farm implements and began hurling equipment into the back of the Bedford before vainly attempting to secure the doors with a length of baling wire.

‘What’s a bogman?’ said Sean a faint feeling of doom building in the pit of his stomach.

‘You’ll see,’ said McNessa grinning through his three day stubble, ‘here you’ll be needing your own shovel’

————————————————————————————————-

Phew, congratulations if you made it through that marathon Flickr Fiction piece. November approaches with a relentless malevolence and the above is the first half of a prologue/colour background piece for my planned Nano novel. There is another section planned for this prologue which I will post up here when I get it finished.

This weeks Flickr Fiction photo was brought to you by Flickr user Masticanotte, other participants this week are Teaandcakes, Elimare, Tadmack, Aquafortis, and Chris Click on the links to read their versions.

This entry was posted on Monday, September 11th, 2006 at 12:27 am and is filed under Flickr Fiction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.