The Storyteller

New Zealand Tablet, 21 July 1921, Page 3

The Storyteller

(By William O’Brien.)

WHEN WE.WERE BOYS

CHAPTER XXV.—(Continued.)

They found the American Captain without going so' far afield (or shall we say a dungeon as the county gaol. He was studying the Stop Press edition with the aid of an enormous black cigar in the dingy back shop in which Mat Murrin, like a Jupiter in his shirt-sleeves, was hammering out his thunders for that night’s Banner. “Just dropped in to tap the editor’s wires,” said Captain Mike. “News purty niftey, hey, sonnies? Straight without sugar, hey, boys?” It was the first time Ken Rohan had ever penetrated the recesses of Mat’s cloudy Olympus; and his wonder and awe in these mysterious regions acted, as the thought of the cheque had done, as a fresh bullet-conductor to render him insensible for the moment to any deadlier impressions. In those days, at all events, the operations by which a newspaper came into being and was sped upon its wondrous work were sufficiently enveloped in mystery to render the floor of a newspaper-offiqe holy ground to an imaginative country schoolboy. His eye rested with an entirely new degree of reverence upon Jupiter Tonans determinedly squared out before a great blotched “slip” of pointing-paper and a half-finished tumbler of whisky-and-water, while a youthful scion of the editorial family squatting on the floor beside his chair was in vain endeavouring, by pinching his trousers and monotonous vocal performances of a funereal character, to awaken its stern parent to a petition for “a penny for bull’s-eyes.” He took in with much respect , the cloud-capt window-panes, crippled furniture, and debris of ragged ledgers, hieroglyphic “proofs,” job-printing bills, tobacco-pipes, newspaper exchanges, and household odds-and-ends (including Mrs. Murrin’s walking-bonnet) which adorned the sanctuary, and sniffed up the vague mouldy smell of paste, printing-inks, and rotting newspaper files, as a sweet incense peculiarly acceptable to the nostrils of the Masses. It was impossible to resist the temptation to skip into the printing-office, which was as visible as anything could be through the nebulous window of Mat’s throne-room ; and here our young friend gazed in silent awe at the boxes of types at rest in their various compartments like an innumerable array asleep in their encampments—so still, and yet with such a wonder-working potency to arise and conquer the world; and he listened intently while Noble Nolan, the foreman, explained to him how the tiny metal soldiers were put together and went forth to the machine-room in all their panoply; and he heard the snort of Mat Murrin’s small donkey-engine, as if it were a wild spirit getting up steam to fly through the roof and through the civilised world presently on the “wings of the Press.”

His state of wonderment was not lost upon the editor, who threw down his pen as if there was really nothing more for the pen of man or angel to add on the subject, and, fixing his eye-glass with majesty, said: “Singular the power of the Press, isn’t it? By the way, that was a very creditable thing of yours in the X , young Rohan—should say, devilish creditable. Shouldn’t be surprised if ’twas that brought the Government down on them. Why not try a little thing, an occasional scintilla or so, for the Banner? We are always anxious to encourage local talent in the Banner. I. don’t mind if they suppress me, not a blasted bit.”

“By George, that was the very thing I came here to propose!” said young Rohan, whom Mat’s jolly carnal voice at once recalled from cloudland. “And if Captain Mike only agrees with me, sir, we’ll make the Banner flap its old wings in a way that, will astonish Drumshaughlin.” “Aloysia, darling,” said Matito the grimy little cherub at his side, “tell your ma—tumblers, loveyj tumblers,—a commission which the g. 1. c. rushed to 'execute with all the more expedition that, as the next best thing to bull’seyes, she had just succeeded in upsetting the contents of the ink-bottle over Mat’s leading article. “Here, Noble Nolan,” he thundered out into the printing-office. “Bless my soul!” observing the. black cloud overspreading his

manuscript like the Eastern Question, of which his readers received so many inky bodements, “that child’s passion for literary work is—really unnatural! I am afraid you won’t be able to read it, Noble Nolan.”

“It don’t matter, sir,” said Noble Nolan, meekly draining off the superfluous fluid, and disappearing with a sigh which seemed to indicate that reading Mat’s MS. under an eclipse was but a slight additional item in the extraordinary duties of Mat Murrin’s foreman, compositor, machine-boy, job-printer, accountant, advertising agent, bill-diplomatist, and (in general) Cabinet Minister-in-wait-ing.

“Now, young Rohan!” said Mat, readjusting the eyeglass and the editorial chair in a more affable manner, and proceeding to charge a clay pipe and pass a depleted tobacco-pouch around. Thus encouraged, Ken Rohan unfolded his scheme, having first elicited Captain Mike’s opinion that the Dublin arrests would not be allowed to force the leaders into immediate or premature action. “I don’t know a darned bit myself,” he said. “I 'only know my orders is to freeze' on right here till further orders, and I’ll freeze. There are fools at head-quarters fit for anything,” he groaned, with recollections of his pawned revolver and unpaid hotel-bill, “but I guess they ain’t such goslings as not to be prepared for a blizzard of this sort. No, sir, we ain’t going to get rushed, I reckon, till the boys from the other side are signalled.” In that case, young Rohan’s plan was, briefly, that the work of the suppressed newspaper should be taken up, and the confidence of the organisation maintained, by a journal of which he was ready to assume the risky honors of director. One openly printed within reach of the Castle would not survive a second issue. His notion was that Mat Murrin’s printing office should be availed of for the purpose. A district so sequestered would be the last in the island suspected of being the fountain of a revolutionary newspaper propaganda. The carters from the Cork breweries could convey, the edition in barrels, that would pass as returned empties; and from Cork the railways ‘would send the paper flying like the fiery cross from shore to shore of Ireland. The Banner would continue to wave on its own account over the local battlements; and Mat would, of course, be still worshipped with divine honors as the one undivided and indivisible Cloud-Compeller of the firm, while young Harold and young Rohan were to pour out the treasures of their capacious intellects weekly, in coruscations of patriotic passion, song, wit, and story, in the secret press. “Yes, but, by all the boodlers in the Sixth Ward, I’m going to chip in too, young fellars!” sang out the Captain, in high glee. “I kin turn a rale tony yarn .with any of the boys on this bar. Jest send round your shorthand man to take me on. Why I wasn’t scalped at McGahan’s Gulch by them red Soo divvils, or by the Nigger Ghost of the Rappahannock—guess you don’t come on 4 a streak like that this side. No, sir.” While these plans were in course hf development, Mat Murrin had vanished incontinently at certain rumblings of female thunder (so to speak) on the kitchen staircase, and the plotters could hear, amidst their own eager colloquy, fragments of another stifled exchange of views from the depths— e.g. (in damaged but high soprano) “An unpardonable old fool”—(in tenore the least in the world robnsto) “Eliza, my love, reelly”—(sop. con spirito) “gadding about with young spree-boys in place of putting a decent stitch of clothes on the backs of your children” —(ten.-rall.) “there now— you, my heart’s jewel—the decanter” : —after which, preceded by a light oscillatory echo, Jupiter emerged from his cloud, serenely bearing a little tray of glasses with a flat-jowled decanter of spirits.

“The resources of this establishment are at your service, gentlemen, as long as there’s a tatter of the old Banner flying,” said the Editor, as he distributed „the “spirits” in a series of large-hearted, or, as he would himself say, flauhoolach spills. “But you see it’s all a v question of ha’pence— them same ha’pence! Swift was right this would be the happiest little country in the world if such things were never invented. But there they are the mean little copper sprissauns or rather, faith, there they aren’t, for I may impart to you, gentlemen, in confidence, that I’m no more in a position to start a newspaper, privately or publicly, big or little, at this

moment than to launch a fleet 'of ,ironclads into Bantry Bay to sweep British commerce from the seas, however excellent both consummations would be. What is it now, Noble Nolan?” he demanded with dignity, as the foreman reappeared at the glass door of the printing-office with a Miserere expression of countenance.

“The staff won’t set it, —they refuse to set it,” he said, agitating gently the MS. of Mat’s black-avised leading article.

‘What, can’t make me out in the dark, eh? —turn up their noses at a blotch of ink, the rascals, do they? Well, I suppose we must re-indite the legend for the rogues.” .

“It isn’t that, sir. The staff say they won’t bring out the Banner unless they get their wages down.”

“The staff say that, do they?” thundered Jupiter, arising in his wrath. “The staff scfy they won’t bring out the Banner —they’ll let it drop in the face of the enemy—they’ll let it drop and be damned to them! Noble Nolan, this is rebellion foul and unnatural — rebellion, sir. Tell the staff on barren mountains shall we starve ere wo redeem the' traitors from our coffers. Tell the staff to get them to their cases or to get them to the devil.’,’

The foreman stood scratching his head in a mildly suggestive manner. “ ’Tis coming on five o’clock, sir, and I’m afraid we may lose the post,” he said, gently. “Upon my soul,. we just may, most Noble Nolanwe just may, as you remark,” said Jupiter, laying down the sceptre of the skies and imbibing a mouthful of the whisky-and-watcr. “What’s to be done, ancient comrade, eh? You might drop round and colle'ct that little thing of old Dargan’s for the magistracy and the wedding—charge him election rates, a shilling a line, the thundering old thief,” “I collected that early this morning, sir, for the

missus. I believe the butcher wouldn’t send the chops,” he added in a confidential undertone.

“Ha, domestic treason, too! Well, let us inspect the books,” said Mat, running his finger down the wellthumbed pages of an anarchical old ledger. “Now, there’s that double-ad. of The Drumshaughlin Crystal Palace thirty shillings an insertion. Oh! I forgotthe Crystal Palace is in the Court. Why the devil weren’t we in the Court ourselves long ago, Noble Nolan, and why didn’t we come out of it as rich as Begumsthat’s what I want to know. You couldn’t manage to get the Town Clerk to back a little bill on the security of the next quarter’s account for the Commissioners’ —no?”

“Tried him last week, sir—said the Commissioners mightn’t like it, if it oozed out.”

“Never much good. in that same Town Clerk since ho took the pledge—the Banner will have to flap a protecting wing or so over our corporate institutions, I’m thinking. K.L.M. “McG rudder —stop”—ay, the gold-spectacled Italian old son of a Sabine, “stop,” as I hope he’ll stop whenever he gets a distant view of Heaven! N.O.P.— running perilously low in the alphabet, as I’m a Gentleman of the Press. Stay—that damned auctioneer hasn’t stumped up yet—a low fellow, with two public-houses, and a sketch of a farm, besides the auctioneering. Not a sixpence, and two months overdue.”

“I called to him three times last pay-day, sir, and got nothing but the heighth of im-pfr/d-ence from him, with respects to you,” said the meek foreman, showing that even meek foremen have their feelings, like the gods and rich auctioneers with two public-houses and a sketch of a farm.

“The heighth of im-p/dd-ence, you diddid you? Noble Nolan, we’ll roast that auctioneerwe’ll baste him finely in his own gravy—and we’ll distribute the joint among the Staff, sir, in platefuls, or what’s better still, in bottlefuls. Just attend to me. This is an order from me on the auctioneer’s pub. for whisky and porter to the value of one pound sterling, which, according to my reckoning, comes to sixty glasses best John Jameson, br one hundred and twenty pints J. J. Murphy & Co.’s porter, to be charged against my account. Give the blackguard one more chance, and, if he won’t pay up, send down the Staff on him, as soon as they’ve got out the Banner let them call for liquor galore and make a night’ of it, and present this note of mine, in i payment for it all; and if he objects, you may mention to the Staff that

I won’t deduct anything from their wages if they leave that slug of a fellow an eye or two as black as my MS. in a mild way and I shouldn’t object if a few of the decent neighbors were called in just to take pot luck in the entertainment, do you mind ? There, now, my delicate Ariel, my tricksy spirit, go charge my goblins that they grind his joints—the heighth of im-jndd-ence, did he, the subternatural bosthoon?we’ll hunt him soundly. Depart, Noble Nolan, and tell. the boys for Heaven’s sake to hurry up with that articlethis really wouldn’t bo a country , worth living in if flic government hadn’t an opportunity of perusing our views on their iniquitous proceedings in the morning. Prithee, despatch!”

The familiar spirit vanished with Mat’s sign-manual, as though all this were not altogether a* phenomenal episode in transactions with the Staff.

“I hope we weren’t in the way, mate? Leastways, my heavy curse on fortune that our purses weren’t in the way to go on active service,” said the American Captain, who had been a highly edified and sympathetic student of the Banner's commercial system. “Oh, they’ll fetch that stingy old curmudgeon right enough, you’ll findcither that, or we’ll have fireworks and torchlight processions when the Staff get out,” said Mat, resuming the eyeglass and his place in the councils of the nation. “No, gentlemen, this slight interruption wasn’t at all irrelevant, because it explained exactly what I was trying to convey. Wo couldn’t clean out an auctioneer s pub. every week on a national scale, could we?” said the Editor, unbending at last into a sly chuckle and another deep “mouthful” out of his tumbler.

Young Rohan was prepared, of course, with a suggestion for the financial part of the difficulty. The secret Press would be an indispensable part of the organisation. The organisation must be prepared to undertake the preliminary expense. How could one small thousand dollars of the tens of thousands weekly subscribed in America be more faithfully invested for the advantage of the cause? He proposed that, fortified with credentials from Captain Mike, Jack Harold should undertake a mission to Dublin to communicate with the chiefs of the Secret Council with a view to obtain the necessary funds, and acquire possession of the agents’ book of the suppressed journal, which would enable the new organ to start upon its work immediately at ridiculously 7 small cost to begin with; and once launched on its career, the returns would not merely recoup the initial expenditure, but bring in an amply sufficient revenue to remunerate the publisher and the contributors. The scheme, advocated with all Ken’s sanguine and impetuous rhetoric, carried all before it, and the friends thrashed it out affectionately in all its possible and 'impossible bearings, until the'golden contents of the flat-jowled decanter had given place to cold white vacancy —(like a bright soul emptied of its rich life, a process with which decanters are familiar)—and until certain fiorituro of the damaged soprano on the staircase again made Jupiter- Tonaiis paler than he had grown in presence of the ultimatum of the Staff. (The Staff, for their part, were all this time setting away like men whose every stickful of the Banner's views in solid typo brought them a hundred yards nearer to the bung of the auctioneer’s whisky-casks.)

“I think, Captain, you’d betther remain where you are till I skirmish up the street a bit. I don’t like the way thim Bobbies are hoverin’,” said Con Lehane, the stone-mason, putting in his honest mug and massive shoulders from the shop with the air of a mastiff on duty. Ken Rohan strolled back to the Mill, in a state of exultation, in which ho was prepared to welcome his father’s banter about the profession of poetry with the most filial indulgence, and was astounded to find that unaccountable old miller take him brusquely by the hand, as a rough dog might take’ a child’s, and never make the smallest reference to the cheque or to the fate of the revolutionary organ; on the contrary, after dinner, for the first time since the ominous word “Fenianism” was breathed’in the household, he related how he had once made a journey to Dublin to see John Mitchel about a consignment of pikeheads, and how grandly Mitchel’s dark hair clustered over his forehe’ad. The two young men had parted with the understanding -that Jack Harold was to start on his Dublin embassy by the morning'mail-car,

fortified with ten sovereigns and some shillings, which Ken Rohan had banked with his mother, since his early child days, as a fortune for little Katie, and to which that reckless young lady proposed secretly to add two sovereigns of her own, the proceeds of., two consecutive years’ prizes for “best general conduct”' while under the wing of darling'old Mother Rosalie. The prospect of a journey to Dublin, rather than any other aspect of the undertaking, had put the ambassador in high good humor, and he grasped Ken Rohan’s hand buoyantly, whispering “The foul midnight hags have sung their chant du depart. They are gone!. You are a greater enchanter than they.”

As he walked away, ho met Mr. Hans Harman.

(To be continued.)