The Sentry

Father MacEnerney was finding it hard to keep Sister Margaret
quiet. The woman was lonesome, but he was lonesome himself. He liked
his little parish outside the big military camp near Salisbury; he
liked the country and the people, and he liked his little garden (even
if it was raided twice a week by the soldiers), but he suffered from
the lack of friends. Apart from his housekeeper and a couple of private
soldiers in the camp, the only Irish people he had to talk to were the
three nuns in the convent, and that was why he went there so frequently
for his supper and to say his office in the convent garden.

But even here his peace was being threatened by Sister Margaret’s
obstreperousness. The trouble was, of course, that before the war
fathers, mothers, sisters, and brothers, as well as innumerable aunts
and cousins, had looked into the convent or spent a few days at the
inn, and, every week, long, juicy letters had arrived from home,
telling the nuns by what political intrigue Paddy Dunphy had had
himself appointed warble-fly inspector for the Benlicky area, but now
it was years since anyone from Ireland had called and the letters from
home were censored at both sides of the channel by inquisitive girls
with a taste for scandal until a sort of creeping paralysis had
descended on every form of intimacy. Sister Margaret was the worst
hit, because a girl from her own town was in the Dublin censorship,
and, according to Sister Margaret, she was a scandalmonger of the most
objectionable kind. He had a job keeping her contented.

“Oh, Father Michael,” she sighed one evening as they were walking
round the garden, “I’m afraid I made a great mistake. A terrible
mistake! I don’t know how it is, but the English seem to me to have no
nature.”

“Ah, now, I wouldn’t say that,” protested Father Michael in his deep,
sombre voice. “They have their little ways, and we have ours, and if
we both knew more about one another we’d like one another better.”

Then, to illustrate what he meant, he told her the story of old Father
Dan Murphy, a Tipperary priest who had spent his life on the mission,
and the Bishop. The Bishop was a decent, honorable little man, but
quite unable to understand the ways of his Irish priests. One evening
old Father Dan had called on Father Michael to tell him he would have
to go home. The old man was terribly shaken. He had just received a
letter from the Bishop, a terrible letter, a letter so bad that he
couldn’t even show it. It wasn’t so much what the Bishop had said as
the way he put it! And when Father Michael had pressed him the old man
had whispered that the Bishop had begun his letter: “Dear Murphy.”

“Oh!” cried Sister Margaret, clapping her hand to her mouth. “He
didn’t, Father Michael?”

So, seeing that she didn’t understand the situation any more than
Father Dan had done, Father Michael explained that this was how an
Englishman would address anyone except a particular friend. It was a
convention; nothing more.

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that at all,” Sister Margaret exclaimed
indignantly. “‘Dear Murphy’? Oh, I’m surprised at you, Father Michael!
What way is that to write to a priest? How can they expect people to
have respect for religion when they show no respect for it themselves?
Oh, that’s the English all out! Listen, I have it every day of my life
from them. I don’t know how anyone can stand them.”

Sister Margaret was his best friend in the community; he knew the
other nuns relied on him to handle her, and it was a genuine worry to
him to see her getting into this unreasonable state.

“Oh, come! Come!” he said reproachfully. “How well Sister Teresa and
Sister Bonaventura get on with them!”

“I suppose I shouldn’t say it,” she replied in a low, brooding voice,
“but, God forgive me, I can’t help it. I’m afraid Sister Teresa and
Sister Bonaventura are not genuine.”

“Now, you're not being fair,” he said gravely.

“Oh, now, it’s no good you talking,” she cried, waving her hand
petulantly. “They’re not genuine, and you know they’re not
genuine. They’re lickspittles. They give in to the English nuns in
everything. Oh, they have no independence! You wouldn’t believe it.”

“We all have to give in to things for the sake of charity,” he said.

“I don’t call that charity at all, father,” she replied
obstinately. “I call that moral cowardice. Why should the English have
it all their own way? Even in religion they go on as if they owned the
earth. They tell me I’m disloyal and a pro-German, and I say to them:
‘What did you ever do to make me anything else?’ Then they pretend
that we were savages, and they came over and civilized us! Did you
ever in all your life hear such impudence? People that couldn’t even
keep their religion when they had it, and now they have to send for us
to teach it to them again.”

“Well, of course, that’s all true enough,” he said, “but we must
remember what they’re going through.”

“And what did we have to go through?” she asked shortly. “Oh, now,
father, it’s all very well to be talking, but I don’t see why we
should have to make all the sacrifices. Why don’t they think of all
the terrible things they did to us? And all because we were true to
our religion when they weren’t! I’m after sending home for an Irish
history, father, and, mark my words, the next time one of them begins
picking at me, I'll give her her answer. The impudence!”

Suddenly Father Michael stopped and frowned.

“What is it, father?” she asked anxiously.

“I just got a queer feeling,” he muttered. “I was wondering was there
someone at my onions.”

The sudden sensation was quite genuine, though it might have happened
in a normal way, for his onions were the greatest anxiety of Father
Michael’s life. He could grow them when the convent gardener failed,
but, unlike the convent gardener, he grew them where they were a
constant temptation to the soldiers at the other side of his wall.

“They only wait till they get me out of their sight,” he said, and
then got on one knee and laid his ear to the earth. As a country boy
he knew what a conductor of sound the earth is.

“I was right,” he shouted triumphantly as he sprang to his feet and
made for his bicycle. “If I catch them at it they’ll leave me alone
for the future. I’ll give you a ring, sister.”

A moment later, doubled over the handlebars, he was pedalling down the
hill towards his house. As he passed the camp gate he noticed that
there was no sentry on duty, and it didn’t take him long to see
why. With a whoop of rage he threw his bicycle down by the gate and
rushed across the garden. The sentry, a small man with fair hair, blue
eyes, and a worried expression, dropped the handful of onions he was
holding. His rifle was standing beside the wall.

“Aha!” shouted Father Michael. “So you’re the man I was waiting for!
You're the fellow that was stealing my onions!” He caught the sentry
by the arm and twisted it viciously behind his back. “Now you can come
up to the camp with me and explain yourself.”

“I’m going, I’m going,” the sentry cried in alarm, trying to wrench
himself free.

“Oh, yes, you’re going all right,” Father Michael said grimly, urging
him forward with his knee.

“Here!” the sentry cried in alarm. “You let me go! I haven’t done
anything, have I?”

“You haven’t done anything?” echoed the priest, giving his wrist
another spin. “You weren’t stealing my onions!”

“Don’t twist my wrist!” screamed the sentry, swinging round on
him. “Try to behave like a civilized human being. I didn’t take your
onions. I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

“You dirty little English liar!” shouted Father Michael, beside
himself with rage. He dropped the man’s wrist and pointed at the
onions. “Hadn’t you them there, in your hand, when I came in? Didn’t
I see them with you, God blast you!”

“Oh, those things?” exclaimed the sentry, as though he had suddenly
seen a great light. “Some kids dropped them and I picked them up.”

“You picked them up,” echoed Father Michael savagely, drawing back his
fist and making the sentry duck. “You didn’t even know they were
onions!”

“I didn’t have much time to look, did I?” the sentry asked
hysterically. “I seen some kids in your bleeding garden, pulling the
bleeding things. I told them get out and they defied me. Then I chased
them and they dropped these. What do you mean, twisting my bleeding
wrist like that? I was only trying to do you a good turn. I’ve a good
mind to give you in charge.”

The impudence of the fellow was too much for the priest, who couldn’t
have thought up a yarn like that to save his life. He never had liked
liars.

“You what?” he shouted incredulously, tearing off his coat. “You’d
give me in charge? I'd take ten little sprats like you and break you
across my knee. Bloody little English thief! Take off your tunic!”

“I can’t,” the sentry said in alarm.

“Why not?”

“I’m on duty.”

“On duty! You're afraid.”

“I’m not afraid.”

“Then take off your tunic and fight like a man.” He gave the sentry a
punch that sent him staggering against the wall. “Now will you fight,
you dirty little English coward?”

“You know I can’t fight you,” panted the sentry, putting up his hands
to protect himself. “If I wasn’t on duty I’d soon show you whether
I’m a coward or not. You’re the coward, not me, you Irish bully! You
know I’m on duty. You know I’m not allowed to protect myself. You’re
mighty cocky, just because you're in a privileged position, you mean,
bullying bastard!”

Something in the sentry’s tone halted the priest. He was almost
hysterical. Father Michael couldn’t hit him in that state.

“Get out of this so, God blast you!” he said furiously.

The sentry gave him a murderous look, then took up his rifle and
walked back up the road to the camp gate. Father Michael stood and
stared after him. He was furious. He wanted a fight, and if only the
sentry had hit back he would certainly have smashed him up. All the
MacEnerneys were like that. His father was the quietest man in County
Clare, but if you gave him occasion he’d fight in a bag, tied up.

He went in but found himself too upset to settle down. He sat in his
big chair and found himself trembling all over with frustrated
violence. “I’m too soft,” he thought despairingly. “Too soft. It was
my one opportunity and I didn’t take advantage of it. Now they’ll all
know that they can do what they like with me. I might as well give up
trying to garden. I might as well go back to Ireland. This is no
country for anyone.” At last he went to the telephone and rang up
Sister Margaret. Her voice, when she answered, was trembling with
eagerness.

“Oh, father,” she cried, “did you catch them?”

“Yes,” he replied in an expressionless voice. “One of the
sentries.”

“And what did you do?”

“Gave him a clout,” he replied in the same tone.

“Oh,” she cried, “if ’twas me I’d have killed him!”

“I would, only he wouldn’t fight,” Father Michael said gloomily. “If
I’m shot from behind a hedge one of these days, you’ll know who did
it.”

“Oh, isn’t that the English all out?” she said in disgust. “They have
so much old talk about their bravery, and then when anyone stands up
to them, they won’t fight.”

“That’s right,” he said, meaning it was wrong. He realized that for
once he and Sister Margaret were thinking alike, and that the woman
wasn’t normal. Suddenly his conduct appeared to him in its true
light. He had behaved disgracefully. After all his talk of charity, he
had insulted another man about his nationality, had hit him when he
couldn’t hit back, and, only for that, might have done him a serious
injury—all for a handful of onions worth about sixpence! There was
nice behavior for a priest! There was a good example for
non-Catholics! He wondered what the Bishop would say to that.

He sat back again in his chair, plunged in dejection. His atrocious
temper had betrayed him again. One of these days it would land him in
really serious trouble, he knew. And there were no amends he could
make. He couldn’t even go up to the camp, find the man, and
apologize. He faithfully promised himself to do so if ever he saw him
again. That eased his mind a little, and after saying Mass next
morning he didn’t feel quite so bad. The run across the downs in the
early morning always gave him pleasure, the little red-brick village
below in the hollow with the white spire rising out of black trees
which resembled a stagnant pool, and the pale chalk-green of the hills
with the barrows of old Celts showing on their polished surface. They,
poor devils, had had trouble with the English too! He was nearly in
good humor again when Elsie, the maid, told him that an officer from
the camp wished to see him. His guilty conscience started up again
like an aching tooth. What the hell was it now?

The officer was a tall, good-looking young man about his own age. He
had a long, dark face with an obstinate jaw that stuck out like some
advertisement for a shaving-soap, and a pleasant, jerky, conciliatory
manner.

“Good morning, padre,” he said in a harsh voice. “My name is Howe. I
called about your garden. I believe our chaps have been giving you
some trouble.”

By this time Father Michael would cheerfully have made him a present
of the garden.

“Ah,” he said with a smile, “wasn’t it my own fault for putting
temptation in their way?”

“Well, it’s very nice of you to take it like that,” Howe said in a
tone of mild surprise, “but the C.O. is rather indignant. He suggested
barbed wire.”

“Electrified?” Father Michael asked ironically.

“No,” Howe said. “Ordinary barbed wire. Pretty effective, you know.”

“Useless,” Father Michael said promptly. “Don’t worry any more about
it. You'll have a drop of Irish? And ice in it. Go on, you will!”

“A bit early for me, I’m afraid,” Howe said, glancing at his watch.

“Coffee, so,” said the priest authoritatively. “No one leaves this
house without some nourishment.”

He shouted to Elsie for coffee and handed Howe a cigarette. Howe
knocked it briskly on the chair and lit it.

“Now,” he said in a businesslike tone, “this chap you caught last
night—how much damage had he done?”

The question threw Father Michael more than ever on his guard. He
wondered how the captain knew.

“Which chap was this?” he asked noncommittally.

“The chap you beat up.”

“That I beat up?” echoed Father Michael wonderingly. “Who said I beat
him up?”

“He did,” Howe replied laconically. “He expected you to report him, so
he decided to give himself up. You seem to have scared him pretty
badly,” he added with a laugh.

However much Father Michael might have scared the sentry, the sentry
had now scared him worse. It seemed the thing was anything but over,
and if he wasn’t careful, he might soon find himself involved as a
witness against the sentry. It was like the English to expect people
to report them! They took everything literally, even to a fit of bad
temper.

“But why did he expect me to report him?” he asked in
bewilderment. ‘When do you say this happened? Last night?”

“So I’m informed,” Howe said shortly. “Do you do it regularly? ... I
mean Collins, the man you caught stealing onions last evening,” he
went on, raising his voice as though he thought Father Michael might
be slightly deaf, or stupid, or both.

“Oh, was that his name?” the priest asked watchfully. “Of course, I
couldn’t be sure he stole them. There were onions stolen all right,
but that’s a different thing.”

“But I understand you caught him at it,” Howe said with a frown.

“Oh, no,” replied Father Michael gravely. “I didn’t actually catch him
at anything. I admit I charged him with it, but he denied it at
once. At once!” he repeated earnestly as though this were an important
point in the sentry’s favor. “It seems, according to what he told me,
that he saw some children in my garden and chased them away, and, as
they were running, they dropped the onions I found. Those could be
kids from the village, of course.”

“First I’ve heard of anybody from the village,” Howe said in
astonishment. “Did you see any kids around, padre?”

“No,” Father Michael admitted with some hesitation. “I didn’t, but
that wouldn’t mean they weren’t there.”

“I’ll have to ask him about that,” said Howe. “It’s a point in his
favor. Afraid it won’t make much difference though. Naturally, what
we're really concerned with is that he deserted his post. He could be
shot for that, of course.”

“Deserted his post?” repeated Father Michael in consternation. This
was worse than anything he had ever imagined. The wretched man might
lose his life and for no reason but his own evil temper. He felt he
was being well punished for it. “How did he desert his post?” he
faltered.

“Well, you caught him in your garden,” Howe replied brusquely. “You
see, padre, in that time the whole camp could have been surprised and
taken.”

In his distress, Father Michael nearly asked him not to talk
nonsense. As if a military camp in the heart of England was going to
be surprised while the sentry nipped into the next garden for a few
onions! But that was the English all out. They had to reduce
everything to the most literal terms.

“Oh, hold on now!” he said, raising a commanding hand. “I think there
must be a mistake. I never said I caught him in the garden.”

“No,” Howe snapped irritably. “He said that. Didn’t you?”

“No,” said Father Michael stubbornly, feeling that casuistry was no
longer any use. “I did not. Are you quite sure that man is right in
his head?”

Fortunately, at this moment Elsie appeared with the coffee and Father
Michael was able to watch her and the coffee pot instead of Howe, who,
he knew, was studying him closely. If he looked as he felt, he
thought, he should be worth studying.

“Thanks,” Howe said, sitting back with his coffee cup in his hand, and
then went on remorselessly: “Am I to understand that you beat this
chap up across the garden wall?”

“Listen, my friend,” Father Michael said desperately, “I tell
you that fellow is never right in the head. He must be a hopeless
neurotic. They get like that, you know. He’d never talk that way if he
had an experience of being beaten up. I give you my word of honor it’s
the wildest exaggeration. I don’t often raise my fist to a man, but
when I do I leave evidence of it.”

“I believe that,” Howe said with a cheeky grin.

“I admit I did threaten to knock this fellow’s head off,” continued
Father Michael, “but that was only when I thought he’d taken my
onions.” In his excitement he drew closer to Howe till he was standing
over him, a big, bulky figure of a man, and suddenly he felt the tears
in his eyes. “Between ourselves,” he said emotionally, “I behaved
badly. I don’t mind admitting that to you. He threatened to give me a
charge.”

“The little bastard!” said Howe incredulously.

“And he’d have been justified,” the priest said earnestly. “I had no
right whatever to accuse him without a scrap of evidence. I behaved
shockingly.”

“I shouldn’t let it worry me too much,” Howe said cheerfully.

“I can’t help it,” said Father Michael brokenly. “I’m sorry to say the
language I used was shocking. As a matter of fact, I’d made up my mind
to apologize to the man.”

He stopped and returned to his chair. He was surprised to notice that
he was almost weeping.

“This is one of the strangest cases I’ve ever dealt with,’ Howe
said. “I wonder if we’re not talking at cross purposes. This fellow
you mean was tall and dark with a small mustache, isn’t that right?”

For one moment Father Michael felt a rush of relief at the thought
that after all it might be merely a case of mistaken identity. To mix
it up a bit more was the first thought that came to his mind. He
didn’t see the trap until it was too late.

“That’s right,” he said.

“Listen, padre,” Howe said, leaning forward in his chair while his
long jaw suddenly shot up like a rat-trap, “why are you telling me all
these lies?”

“Lies?” shouted Father Michael flushing.

“Lies, of course,” said Howe without rancor. “Damned lies, transparent
lies! You’ve been trying to fool me for the last ten minutes, and you
very nearly succeeded.”

“Ah, how could I remember?” Father Michael said wearily. “I don’t
attach all that importance to a few onions.”

“I’d like to know what importance you attach to the rigmarole you’ve
just told me,” snorted Howe. “I presume you're trying to shield
Collins but I’m blessed if I see why.”

Father Michael didn’t reply. If Howe had been Irish, he wouldn’t have
asked such a silly question, and as he wasn’t Irish, he wouldn’t
understand the answer. The MacEnerneys had all been like that. Father
Michael’s father, the most truthful, God-fearing man in County Clare,
had been threatened with a prosecution for perjury committed in the
interest of a neighbor.

“Anyway,” Howe said sarcastically, “what really happened was that you
came home, found your garden robbed, said ‘Good-night’ to the sentry,
and asked him who did it. He said it was some kids from the
village. Then you probably had a talk about the beautiful, beautiful
moonlight. Now that’s done, what about coming up to the mess some
night for dinner?”

“I’d love it,” Father Michael said boyishly. “I’m destroyed here for
someone to talk to.”

“Come on Thursday. And don’t expect too much in the way of grub. Our
mess is a form of psychological conditioning for modern warfare. But
we'll give you lots of onions. Hope you don’t recognize them.”

And he went off, laughing his harsh but merry laugh. Father Michael
laughed too, but he didn’t laugh long. It struck him that the English
had very peculiar ideas of humor. The interview with Howe had been
anything but a joke. He had accused the sentry of lying, but his own
attempts at concealing the truth had been even more unsuccessful than
Collins’s. It did not look well from a priest. He rang up the convent
and asked for Sister Margaret. She was his principal confidante.

“Remember the sentry last night?” he asked expressionlessly.

“Yes, father,” she said nervously. “What about him?”

“He’s after being arrested.”

“Oh!” she said, and then, after a long pause: “For what, father?”

“Stealing my onions and being absent from duty. I had an officer here,
making inquiries. It seems he might be shot.”

“Oh!” she gasped. “Isn’t that awful?”

“’Tis bad.”

“Oh!” she cried. “Isn’t that the English all out? The rich can do what
they like, but a poor man can be shot for stealing a few onions! I
suppose it never crossed! their minds that he might be hungry. What
did you say?”

“Nothing.”

“You did right. I'd have told them a pack of lies.”

“I did,” said Father Michael.

“Oh!” she cried. “I don’t believe for an instant that ’tis a sin,
father. I don’t care what anybody says. I’m sure ’tis an act of
charity.”

“That’s what I thought too,” he said, “but it didn’t go down too
well. I liked the officer, though. I'll be seeing him again and I
might be able to get round him. The English are very good like that,
when they know you.”

I’ll start a novena at once,” she said firmly.


(1950)
Source: Collected Stories, 1981