Mr Carnovan's Little Shop of Dreams, Part 2b of 5

‘There was something else, something very strange next to the bridge. At first your grandmother thought it was a misshapen pile of mud that a thoughtless person had left beside the bridge to ruin the pleasure the weary traveller would find in such a well-made bridge. For, sad to say, there are those who delight in despoiling beauty when they see it. And your grandmother was troubled by the sight. She wished for her broom and her dustpan that she might clean the mess up.

‘But when she got close, no further from where you are now to the corner of the street, the pile of mud moved and looked up. A pair of sad brown eyes looked out at your grandmother from deep within a craggy face. The ogre, for an ogre it was, was covering his ears with his hands. His face was filled with misery, and his eyes were red from all the crying he had been doing.

‘Now, you mustn’t believe everything you read in the newspapers about ogres or hear on the telly. They do not eat people, not even tender little children. No, give a ogre a big bowl of mashed potatoes with a slab of butter melting on top and a great glass of cold milk, and you will make him very happy. Ogres are really very kind creatures. An ogre fell asleep one fine spring day in our garden at Dunfanaghy, and while he was sleeping a pair of birds came by and built a nest in his hair. And when the ogre woke up, he started to stand up. The father bird came flying up to him in great distress and said, “Oh, begging your pardon, Mister Ogre, but we thought you were a tall tree. We have built our nest in your hair, and my lady wife has laid three bright purple eggs with red spots in it. What are we to do? If you move, the nest will fall off, and the eggs will break.”

‘Well the ogre didn’t hesitate for an instant. He stood still and didn’t move for six weeks until the eggs had hatched and the baby birds had grown and could fly away. Of course, the grateful birds named all three of their children after him. There was young Master Ogrebird, the beautiful Miss Ougrabhiard and the youngest one, Oggie the Bird, who, it pains me to say, was not always as good a bird as he should have been. But that’s a story for another day.

‘Now, your grandmother could see that the ogre beside the beautiful bridge was in distress. There is nothing sadder that a grown ogre blubbering away, the tears gushing out of his eyes and running down the wrinkles in his face and falling on his brown clothes and into his big brown wooden clogs. “What is the matter, my dear Mr Ogre?” asked your grandmother. She had to shout very loudly to make herself heard over the racket that was coming from under the bridge. It was painful to listen to it, and your grandmother stuck her fingers tightly into her ears.

‘The ogre bent down and stuck his head under the bridge, or rather he stuck the tip of his nose under the bridge, for that was all that could fit. “Can you not be quiet for a moment? We have a visitor. It’s Nora Kathryn Orrin from Dunfanaghy come to visit us on her way to Lansby to buy a box full of good dreams at Mr Carnovan’s Little Shop of Dreams for her grandson Michael in Dublin whose sleep is troubled by the nightmares.”

‘Your grandmother didn’t have to ask how the ogre knew why she was travelling on the road to Lansby, for ogres have a way of knowing such things. I think it’s those big ears of theirs. They can hear the birds gossiping with the winds from miles away, or the mice whispering in the meadows as they pause in their search for seeds to nibble.

‘The noise stopped. “Oh, that’s much better,” said your grandmother. “But whatever was making that din? It quite drove the thought from my mind.”

‘ “It’s enough to drive anyone mad,” said the ogre. “They’ve been living under the bridge for three hundred years now, and I can’t get rid of them.” The ogre stuck his head under the bridge again and shouted, “Will you not come out and introduce yourselves then? Nora Kathryn Orrin is wanting to meet you, although why she would want to meet such a sorry lot of troubadours, I cannot say. She is too kind for her own good.”

‘Out from under the bridge came the strangest trio you would ever want to see, Michael. Their clothes were all tattered and made of patches, star-shaped patches of pink sewn on square patches of black sewn on circles of puce. Their shoes were cracked and torn, so that their toes hung out. The first man, for men they were, was wearing a broad-brimmed hat with an ostrich feather in it. At least, it had once been an ostrich feather. Now all that remained was the bare naked quill. The hat had a great many holes in it, and the man’s hair, which needed to be washed, poked out through the holes. The second man had a very dirty handkerchief wrapped round his head. And the third wore a newspaper folded into a tricorne hat. It was a very old newspaper, and the ink had run into the yellow paper.

‘ “Good morning to you, Mrs Orrin,” said the first man. “We welcome you to the bridge over the little stream at the bottom of the valley that lies beneath the road to Lansby.” And the three man bowed at their waists, as they took the hats from their heads and swept the ground with them.

‘ “Well, I am glad to see that you are a polite trio of men, but why are you living beneath the bridge and why are you making that infernal noise?” asked your grandmother.

‘The leader of the band drew himself up to his full height. “I beg your pardon, Mrs Orrin.” Your grandmother knew instantly that her question had insulted the man. “But we were practicing our singing. We are the three tuneless tenors. Are we to blame that we were never taught to sing properly? Is it our fault that no one can give us a song to sing? We were cursed by a wicked ballymhough who thought we were trying to steal his sheep and set us down here. And here we must remain until someone teaches us a tune.”

‘ “They won’t leave until I teach them a song. I keep telling them that ogres can’t sing and that I know no songs. They keep making that din in the hope that some day they will find a song by good luck. And only time they stop is when they are eating. The only way I can get any peace and quiet is to feed them. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner—for three centuries. My life is a misery, Mrs Orrin, and I don’t know what to do,” said the ogre.

‘ “Is that all that is wanted? A tune? And then they will leave?” asked your grandmother.

‘She looked at the ogre, and the ogre nodded his head yes. She looked at the three tuneless tenors, and each in turn nodded his head yes. “Well, I can teach them a tune. I will teach them the same tune I taught my darling grandson Michael last summer when he visited me in Dunfanaghy.”

‘ “Oh, can you? If you can do that, Fair Lady, I will bless your name forever,” exclaimed the ogre. And he hopped about in a happy jig that made the ground shake, for although ogres cannot sing and know no songs, they are great dancers (as long as they don’t step on you with their great big feet).

‘ “Oh can you, Mrs Orrin?” cried the three tuneless tenors. “If you can do that, Fair Lady, we will sing your praises the length and breadth of Ireland.” And they danced about in joy, with the soles of their shoes flapping against the ground.

‘ “Of course, this song is properly sung with two fiddlers, one drummer, and a tin whistler. But we will have to do without,” said your grandmother.

‘ “Oh, I can help with that,” said the ogre. And he stood up to his full height and stuck one of his enormous hands deep into the right front pocket of his shirt, and he pulled out a fiddler and sat him on the ground. Then he reached into his left front pocket and pulled out another fiddler. The two fiddlers stretched and yawned, because they had been sleeping in the ogre’s pockets for years. Then they bowed to everyone and took their places off to one side.

‘The ogre then started rummaging through his knapsack. He unzipped the top zipper and pulled out a candlestick and his teddy bear and the cap he wore when he was sleeping, which he placed carefully on the ground. “I know I have a drummer in here somewhere,” he said, as he unzipped zipper after zipper. Soon there was a mound of goods lying beside the road that was taller than you are, Michael, but no drummer. “Ah, I am so stupid,” said the ogre as he struck his forehead with a tremendous slap of his palm. “I forgot I was using him to drown out the three tenors.” And he reached into his left ear and pulled out the drummer and sat him on the ground beside the two fiddlers. The drummer shook himself out and bowed to everyone. I won’t describe what he looked like, Michael, because after being in the ogre’s ear, he was not a pleasant sight. You can imagine that he was in need of a bath.

‘Then the ogre reached into the thatch of hair on his head and pulled out a tin whistle. He bowed to everyone and said, “You might not think it to look at me, but I play the tin whistle.” And he put the tin whistle to his mouth and blew a little tune, with notes both high and low. And the tin whistle was so small in his fist, Michael, that it would be like me or you holding a toothpick to our mouth. But, I must admit, the ogre could play that tin whistle quite well.

‘ “So what song will you teach us, Mrs Orrin,” asked the leader of the three tenors.

‘ “It is called ‘Báidín Fheilimí’, Feilim’s Little Boat.” Your grandmother turned to the musicians and asked, “Do you know it?”

‘ “We do,” all of them said.

‘She leaned back on her heels and looked way up into the sky towards the ogre. “And do you know it,” she asked.

‘ “I do indeed. It is a great favourite.”

Michael’s father put his hand to his chin and rubbed it with his fingers. He put on a very sad face. ‘Oh, this is a nuisance, Michael, but I’ve forgotten the words to “Báidín Fheilimí”. I’m afraid I won’t be able to tell you the end of the story.’

‘I know them,’ cried Michael, and he sat up in his bed and began singing ‘Báidín Fheilimí d’imigh go Gabhla, Báidín Fheilimí ’s Feilimí ann.’

‘Yes, that’s it,’ shouted his father and he joined in for the second half of the first verse, which is the same as the first half.

Both father and son sang all three verses of the song and all three choruses happily together. Lú’s feet began to twitch as soon as Michael started singing, and before the second line was half over, he had risen to his feet and began dancing, the golden bells on the ends of his shoes ringing in time with the rocking of Feilim’s little boat on its way to Gola Island. Beneath the bed, the tip of The Murphy’s tail swayed back and forth with the music. The tune and the verses had been written by one of his ancestors—luckily, thought The Murphy, an ancestor who had travelled with Feilim only as far as Gola Island. The ancestral Murphy had declined to accompany that foolish sailor on the second stage of his voyage, the fatal trip to Tory Island, and instead had signed on as the ship’s cat on a boat headed for Dunfanaghy, where he settled down and begat the line of brindled cats named The Murphy.

‘Ah,’ said Michael’s father when they had finished. ‘Now that is what I would call a good song. It is no wonder that your grandmother thought to teach it to the three tuneless tenors.’ And he stopped there and lost himself in his thoughts, thinking of the years when he had been Michael’s age and first learned the song about Feilim, with some of the very waters that Feilim had sailed outside the windows.

Michael waited for a minute or so for the story to begin again. When his father showed no inclination to resume the story, he cleared his throat and said, ‘And did Grandmother teach the three tuneless tenors the song?’

‘Ah, you’ll be wanting to hear the rest of the story.’

‘Please.’ And Michael settled back down into his bed and pulled the covers up.

Continues