A Novel's Opening

No one can know whether the world is fantastic or real, nor whether there is any difference between dreaming and living.

Jorge Luis Borges

 

One morning, I had received a visit from the Morgans. During the evening we had spent with Liam, I had given them my address so that they could come and collect the painting of Mullaghmore’s coast that they had so admired when we met. Eleanor was radiant at the thought of returning to Los Angeles, Jim much less so; he had truly grown attached to the lands of his ancestors, and to Liam too, I think; the days they had spent together, roaming the country, fishing, and haunting pubs, had forged a bond between the two men, and I understood how he felt at that moment. Since I had shown them around the place, or rather the tenant’s place, they had seen in my room the canvas of Assaroe Abbey’s mill and had bought that too. I was over the moon.

style="text-align: justify;">On the pavement outside the house, after exchanging our contact details, we parted like old friends, after embraces in which I had been able to gauge the feelings they held for me. I promised them that if I ever went to America, I would stop off in California to visit them. Curiously, although we had spent only an afternoon and an evening together, I felt very close to them, and especially to Jim; I knew that when my turn came to leave Ireland, I would, like him, have a huge knot in my stomach. It was only when they turned the corner of Barber Street and Main Street that I stopped waving…

 

*

 

That afternoon, I had gone as far as Mermaid’s Cove, a little before Mullaghmore. The place was magnificent, and I had painted a watercolor showing a blue sky heavy with grey clouds, above a green sea filling the lower two-thirds of the composition, receding in rivulets from the terraced rocks. The coastline in perspective, topped with green hills, met the sky on the right-hand side. The composition seemed pleasing to me, and I thought that the following morning I would really enjoy beginning this painting. Straight away, I painted another of the same landscape, but from a slightly different viewpoint.

As I was finishing my study, a kind of mist enveloped the coast, and I decided to head back up toward the hills. Indeed, I had spotted about a hundred meters uphill, near the cliff path I had taken on the way there, a pretty, typically Irish cottage that had charmed me. Once I reached the spot, I sat down on a nearby rock, took out my materials, and began to draw.

I was painting in watercolor when I heard someone shouting below. Letting everything drop, I moved closer to the cliff edge. On the beach below, despite the mist, I saw a young woman with long red hair, wearing trousers and a white sweater, washing a coat in the ocean that I guessed was grey-green. Agitated, she was shouting. When I saw blood in the water near the garment, I cried out:

“Are you hurt...? Do you need help?”

She turned round, shouting something at me that I did not understand. So, to be safe, I ran along the path to reach the trail leading from the cliff down to the beach, and, descending it too quickly, slipped on some moss, but fortunately I immediately caught myself on a hawthorn bush bent over by the wind. Finally reaching the beach, I ran along it to the spot where I had seen her. When I arrived, out of breath, I saw no one, and the mist, growing denser and denser, prevented me from seeing more than ten meters ahead. On the sand, there was no trace of footprints. As a wave washed up around my feet, I noticed something shining in the water. Bending down, I discovered a bracelet made up of three interwoven silver chains, supporting three medallions: the first showed a tree whose foliage was as abundant as its roots, the second a triskelion, and the last a pentacle with the letters M and M engraved on the reverse in Gaelic script. I immediately put it in the right pocket of my jeans, beneath my handkerchief.

style="text-align: justify;">I put the bracelet in my pocket and continued running, shouting from time to time so the young woman might hear me, but the mist seemed to have swallowed her...

As I went back up the path, the mist did the same; at the cottage, it was so thick that I could no longer work... In any case, I was now a little disoriented, plagued by a host of questions, and beginning to doubt what I had seen... Of course, it had taken me time to reach the beach, but afterward I had run for about a hundred meters and should, at some point, have seen the girl on horseback. Something did not add up…

 

*

 

It was past eight o’clock when I entered the Crazy Shamrock. Despite the music and the noise of conversation, I heard someone call me. I looked in the direction of the voice and saw Liam rise from a table, waving at me. I went straight over.

“All right, Liam?” I asked as we sat down.

“Not too great, actually,” he replied.

And I saw in him what I had previously seen in Jim. He, too, was badly down in the dumps.

“The Morgans came by my place this morning... I was surprised not to see you with them.”

“Yes, I know... Jim phoned me, asking whether I didn’t want to spend one last moment with them before they left for Dublin airport. I told him I had gastroenteritis... I find farewells a bit hard... You see, you enter people’s lives for a few days, but with some of them you click so much that when they leave, you feel a bit...”

“Queasy?... You know, with Jim, it was the same thing... I could tell he would have liked to extend his stay.”

“Oh, if he had been on his own, I think he would have stayed... But then, Eleanor, Ireland and her, I think that makes two.”

“That’s really a shame.”

“Yes, because in the end, you know, even if at times she’s irritating, I like her. You know they gave me a nice bonus, in addition to what had been planned.”

“They’re generous people... Me, this morning, they bought me a second painting.”

“Really?! Which one?”

“A view of the watermill.”

“Ah, that doesn’t surprise me... It’s a part of Ballyshannon they liked very much.”

“Yes, Eleanor told me all about it... I’m sure they also gave you their address and said that if you...”

“Yes, I’d love to go and see them one day, but I’m not very keen on planes...”

“You’re afraid of flying?”

“A real phobia... Since I was very little.”

“Well then, you’ll have to take a cruise.”

“I think that since the Titanic, we Irish tend to avoid cruises,” he replied, laughing.

“By the way, you! You told me lies the other time.”

“Me?!” Liam replied, feigning surprise.

“Yes, you. As it happens, the next day I had lunch with your Tom Mullighan.”

Liam burst out laughing...

“You remember in the cave?!... You said I was a painter of words... It’s true. I’m not that different from you. You look at a landscape and, in your mind, put it back together... You remove what seems unnecessary, add what is missing, and color it according to your taste... You embellish reality... With my tale, I did the same as you. I used an anecdote I had heard, imagined other things, put it all back together, and anchored my story in a pseudo-reality.”

“Pseudo-reality... I wonder what part of it is true and what part false.”

“I invented Tom Mullighan and his family, but old Mac Namara really existed... He died last year... As for Maura Kinney, she’s sitting two tables behind you.”

I turned around at once, staring at the people seated behind me. Indeed, I spotted a lovely woman in her forties, red-haired with green eyes, speaking with an older couple.

“You wouldn’t be pulling the Tom Mullighan stunt on me again, would you, Liam?”

“You have my word, Jean... Just go and ask her,” he replied, laughing.

“Yes, sure... By the way, since we’re talking about strange things, this afternoon something rather odd happened to me near Mermaid’s Cove...”

“Oh really?! Do tell,” Liam replied, cleaning out his pipe.

“Well, after painting a few sketches by the sea, I had gone back up to sit on the cliff to do a study of a pretty cottage I had spotted while walking out there when I heard cries coming from the beach... I went to the edge and there I saw a young red-haired woman dressed in white, washing her coat in the water. Since I saw blood in the water, I called out to ask if she needed help, but I think she didn’t hear me...”

“And then?” Liam asked, stuffing tobacco into his pipe bowl.

“So then I ran back down to join her... and by the time I got there, poof, she had vanished... I thought she had gone back the way she came, so I ran after her... but I saw no one... It was as if she had evaporated...”

Liam lit his pipe.

“Jean, that’s a bad omen,” he said, letting the smoke drift out.

“Why, Liam?”

“The young woman you saw seems to me to be a banshee...”

“A banshee? What’s that?”

“It comes from Gaelic... from bean, meaning woman, and sidhe, which relates to the other world.”

“You mean that young woman is a fairy?”

“No, not a fairy... a messenger of death.”

“Fantastic! Thanks a lot, that’s really reassuring, Liam! So for me, it was just a young woman who fell from her horse, got hurt, stained her coat with her blood, and washed it in the ocean.”

“You know, that blood wasn’t hers, but yours,” Liam said.

“Stop doing your Stephen King act, Liam... I really don’t follow you there...”

“The only thing I don’t understand is why a banshee appeared to you, a Frenchman... Usually, they are tied to Ireland, though it is true that some followed the settlers, and then the emigrants, to America... You know, in the old days, every great Irish family whose name began with O’, Mac, or Fitz had its own banshee...”

“Well, she appeared to me... because precisely, she is not a banshee...”

Ignoring what I had just said, Liam continued:

“The best-known one is called Aibhinn... She is attached to the O’Brien family. It is said that on the night before the bloody Battle of Clontarf against the Vikings and their Irish allies, the old king Brian Boru, dozing in his tent, was awakened by moans and then terrible cries. Taking one of the torches, he came out of his tent, wandered through the camp, then discovered in the nearby wood, kneeling beside a stream, a young woman dressed all in white, washing a bloodstained suit of armor. It was Aibhinn. Beautiful Aibhinn. Before he could say a word, she turned round and stood up. Her wild hair flowed all around her head, and there she told him that he would not survive the battle of the following day... And that is exactly what happened... But Aibhinn did not appear only to Brian Boru... Since that famous day, she has returned to warn all his descendants, and even today she delivers her fatal message to the O’Briens.”

“Yes, but I’m not an O’Brien, I’m a Bargemon... and the Bargemons have no banshee in their family.”

“Well, then you’re inaugurating it... Now you’ve got one,” he said, laughing and giving me a hearty slap on the back.

At that moment, Kenny the waiter appeared and said:

“Ah, it’s a pleasure to see you guys... What can I get you?”

“Hi Kenny, I’ll have a Guinness... and you, Liam?”

“I’ll have a whiskey... A Jameson, please, Kenny.”

“So, a Guinness for Mad Biker and a Jameson for Big Liam. Deal, guys.”

“You see, you’re famous all over Ballyshannon now... Even Kenny calls you Mad Biker...”

“Yes, that’s what fame is, Big Liam... When I met you, Liam, inwardly I christened you the Red Giant, in reference to the Green Giant.”

Liam laughed, adding:

“Any red-haired Irishman built like me can be called either one or the other.”

“I prefer Big Liam,” Kenny said, returning and setting the pint and the whiskey glass on the table in front of each of us... “That’s what they called him at the club,” he added, ruffling his hair.

“Thanks, Kenny,” Liam and I replied in unison.

“Don’t mention it, guys... Have a good evening,” he answered, before slipping away.

“The club?”

“Yes, with Kenny I played on the town team, I was...”

“Prop, surely,” I cut in.

“Uh, yes... And Kenny played scrum-half.”

“By the way, Liam, I’m going to jump around a bit... Tell me... What does the Celtic symbol of the triskelion represent?”

Liam set his pipe in the ashtray, took his glass, and clinked it against my pint as he said:

“Cheers, my friend...”

He took a small sip of Jameson, smacking his lips; then he added:

“Actually, it isn’t so simple to answer... You know, most people think the triskelion is a Celtic symbol... but it existed long before the birth of the Celts... and besides, you find it in many other cultures... among the Greeks... and among the Indians.”

“Okay, but it must still have a meaning, some general sense.”

“I was talking to you about the Greeks: ‘triskelion’ is not a Gaelic word, but a Greek one meaning ‘three legs’... The triskelion celebrates any form of trinity... The number three is a sacred number... Many agree that the three branches of this symbol represent the three elements: earth, fire, and water...”

“That’s all?!”

“Wait, I’m not finished... Those three elements themselves represent a lot of things... My mother, who was very good at reading cards, taught me that in tarot earth is symbolized by the pentacle, fire by the wand, and water by the cup...”

“I don’t see where you’re going with this, Liam.”

“That’s normal, you keep interrupting me, Mad Froggy!”

“The pentacle corresponds, of course, to money; it is everything to do with the material world, the wand is everything to do with action, and the cup represents emotions...”

“Ah, I see... And the fourth element, air?”

“Air is represented by swords; it corresponds to ideas, thoughts, but it does not enter into the symbolism of the triskelion, which is that of composition...”

“Composition?!”

“Yes, earth is peasants and craftsmen... fire, warriors... and water, artists... In short, the components of any society... That is also why this symbol, among the Celts, is often associated with the god Lugh, a versatile god, both blacksmith and poet, and above all a great warrior.”

“Thanks, Liam, that’s...”

“I haven’t finished... As I told you earlier, it is a fairly broad symbol in which one can see many things... The design of the triskelion is dynamic... In its three branches one can see: sunrise, zenith, and sunset... by extrapolation, youth, maturity, and old age... the past, present, and future... It sometimes adorns Catholic places where it represents the Holy Trinity: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, as among us the gods Lugh, Dagda, and Orme... In short, as I was telling you before I started my little lecture, the meaning of this symbol is not so simple... and one can also say that it really makes you thirsty,” he finished, emptying his glass of Jameson.

“Liam, a moment ago you spoke about your mother in the past tense, I...”

“Yes, she died when I was still just a child... She was quite a special person,” he said, scratching his scalp. “Another pint, Jean?”

“Wait, I haven’t finished the pre—”

“Same again!” he shouted to Kenny, who was wiping glasses behind the counter.

I very much wanted to know the meaning of the tree of life as well, but I could feel Liam was a little upset at the mention of his mother... Perhaps I should have been less curious about her…