Rain over Woolsley Bay
An excerpt from Patrick McCabe's newest novel, Goldengrove
The rain has begun again over Woolsley Bay and what few remaining cars there may have been have already departed for the city. And now, in their absence, hovers that unmistakable melancholy which always seems to descend whenever a bank holiday comes to an end–in a specific type of British coastal ‘home from home’, at any rate. A description more than appropriate to the surroundings in which now, after all this time, I have found myself. Ah yes, that old home from home. Which is how Miss Rosie Dixon–the famed proprietress of what was, once upon a time, an ‘entertainment hotel’–elects to promote her once-upon-a-time magnificent edifice. In all honesty, a testament to Victorian overreaching. Now, in fact, little more than a birthday cake slowly but surely sinking into the ocean.
Not that Madame Dixon appears to care very much–snoring her head off, as is her wont, lying there helplessly slumped across a deckchair and not caring a damn about being caught out in another shower.
Reminding me, actually, as I stand here looking out at her, of no one more so than the grand dame Beryl Reid, another oldstager, if you happen to remember any of her performances. Such as, for example, The Killing of Sister George.
The Killing of Brother Henry, ha ha. Forgive me, will you–just my silly little idea of a joke. In poor taste, I acknowledge. Pray please, if you would–let me continue. With my little sea-side story–concerning Mme Dixon and our adventures chez Woolsley Bay.
Rosie’s father was Alderman Whitney Dixon. Along with a considerable complement of tics and neuroses and a tendency to give utterance without any significant degree of consideration, the Woolsley Bay Hotel had been his parting gift to his beloved daughter. Who had nursed him through to the end of his life, for the best part of twenty-five years–after his wife had flung herself across a balcony. Regrettably, the coroner had never established the precise sequence of events. Not with any degree of certainty, or so Dixon told me.
Standing here watching her, it occurs to me that it would probably be for the best if I went out and summoned her inside–for I fear that the rain is not going to abate. As a matter of fact, I would venture to suggest that there well may be an electrical storm in the offing. Certainly by the looks of those clouds just beyond the cliffs. Such a brooding cumulus as presents itself before me.
There isn’t–at least, not yet–any great need, however, to be overly concerned about the fortunes of poor old departed Henry, aspirant OBE. For a start, I’ve taken the precaution of pocketing the bathroom key. And, in any case, poor old Dixon–as I say, by now she’s so intoxicated she could barely establish a barn door directly in front of her. Still snoring. You can hear her from here, gagging through the swathes of rain.
Such quiet, though, apart from that. Ho hum.
I realise, of course–on some level, at least–that I ought to feel guilty over what has taken place with Henry. Indeed, there are those who would bullishly insist upon it, considering what the pair of us have shared throughout the years. And not just in Clod Land.
‘After all, you were a team, were you not?’ I can hear them object. And which is true–after a fashion, at least.
‘Did you not share serious responsibilities together–for the organisation of atrocities and such?’
I can imagine that being one of their more strident assertions. A perception to which they are more than entitled–how am I in a position to complain? With the facts, of course, being that in our line of work, what often appears to be the case very rarely is.
Especially on the atoll where the pair of us stout hearts soldiered together–often at great risk to our personal health. And that is putting it mildly–over there in what he habitually referred to as Terra del Swede. Aka Ballyturnip, as I used to say, weighing in with my own little tuppence worth.
Its official name, at that time, was of course: Éire. Ireland, in other words.
‘I’m sure you’ve heard of it,’ old Plummsers used to say, whenever his intention was to raise another laugh. And which, to be honest, was pretty much every single day of the week.
Pat McCabe’s Goldengrove, a dark satire about a theatrical agency acting as a front for British counter-terrorism in 1960s Dublin, has just been published by Unbound