Mr Carnovan's Little Shop of Dreams, Part 3b of 5

‘So, having made her choice, your grandmother walked on, and the path wound on, up over a hill and then down into another valley. And in the distance, at the bottom of the valley, a broad ribbon of silver water glistened through the leaves of the trees and between their trunks. To the left, the ground dropped away in a pile of mammoth rocks, as big as big houses. And the path went down and down until it reached the river and then followed along its banks until it reached the point where the river flowed between the rocks as big as big houses. Your grandmother could hear the sound of rushing water, and the closer she drew to the river, the louder the river became.

‘As she rounded the final bend in the path and stood on the banks of the river, she saw that this was no ordinary river, no quiet river that flowed gently over pebbles and was only a few inches deep. Not a river where you could take your shoes and socks off and fold the legs of your trousers up to your knees or lift up the hems of your skirts to keep them dry and then wade across. Not a river where you could let your tired feet cool off in the clear water and then step out on the other bank and put your socks and shoes back on and continue on your way refreshed.

‘No, this was a river that went crashing over giant rocks and flew skyward in a rush of white water. A river that made you all wet just as you stood by it. A river that would sweep you away if you were unwise enough to step into it. A river that would drag you down and toss you about and twirl you every which way until you didn’t know what was down and what was up.

‘But that is where the path led. It led to the bank of the raging torrent and there it stopped. And across the river, on the other bank, the path started up again. And your grandmother looked up and down the river for a bridge that crossed over it. But there was no bridge. And she looked up and down the river to see if there was a quiet place where there were stepping stones that she could hop across and get to the other side. But there was no quiet place with stepping stones.

‘Your grandmother sat on a rock beside the river and took off the knapsack the ogre had given her and set it to one side. She thought and thought about how to get across that river. But no answer came. She knew that there had to be some way to get across because the path started up on the other side right across from where she sat. And a bit further on, there was a very nice lawn all neatly mown, with beds of flowers nicely laid out with straight rows and crooked rows and rows that hopped and skipped and went nowhere in particular. So someone or something lived near the river. But the more she thought, the more hopeless it seemed. Finally, she decided that it would be better to go back and take the path to the right. For the path to the left may have been shorter, but it was turning out to be much longer.

‘Your grandmother stood up and put the knapsack back on, ready to trudge back to the fork in the road and follow the right path. To put her arms through the straps, she had to twist her body about and shrug her shoulders. That was when she saw it—the little brown sign. It was attached to a brown tree trunk. It was so close in colour to the tree trunk that it was almost invisible. And the sign had been there so long that there was moss growing over it and it was quite dirty. But it was most definitely a sign.

‘Your grandmother reached into a pocket and pulled out her handkerchief and scrubbed the sign clean. It was filthy, and when she was through, the handkerchief was so soiled that she knew she would never put that handkerchief to her nose again. So she tossed it in the Help Keep Ireland Green and Litter Free bin that stood a few feet off beside the river. Then she walked back to the sign and examined it closely. The letters were very worn and very faint, and she had to put on her glasses and stick her nose right up against the sign to read it. “Ring bell to summon ferry. Operated by Fomor Ferries, a division of Fomor Enterprises, Ltd.” Well, you can imagine how happy your grandmother was to read that sign and discover there was a ferry that crossed the river.

‘So she stepped back and looked around for the bell. Now, Michael, if you or I or The Murphy were to put a sign up saying “Ring bell to summon ferry,” we would put the sign beside the bell and to make it extra clear so that even a numbskull would understand, we would draw an arrow from the sign pointing towards the bell that had to be rung to summon the ferry. But nothing on the path to Lansby is ever simple. There was no bell, at least no bell on that tree trunk. To make sure, your grandmother walked all around it and looked high and low. No bell. She walked around all the other trees. Still no bell.

‘She was so discouraged, Michael. She thought she had found a way across that river and now she couldn’t summon the ferry because she couldn’t find the bell. In despair, she sat down with a thump on a rock. And that’s when she heard it. A single muffled clang behind her. The sound was quite quiet, so quiet that it could barely be heard, but it was definitely the clang of a bell. She jumped up and whirled around to see where the bell was. Then came another clang, also behind her. She whirled around again, and the bell rang several times, still from behind her.

‘No matter how often she turned around, the bell was always behind her. She was becoming very frustrated. So she turned around very slowly to discover the bell’s hiding place. She tried to look as if she didn’t have a care in the world and the thought of a bell was the furthest thought from her mind. For sometimes things hide themselves only because we want to find them. But still she could not find the bell.

‘Well, all that spinning about was making your grandmother thirsty, and she remembered that thermos of tea the ogre had put in the knapsack. She pulled her left arm out of the strap of the knapsack and eased it off her back and sat it down on the rock. She unzipped the top zipper and reached for the thermos labelled “tea”, and there it was. A silver hand bell with an ebony handle. It was the most beautiful bell your grandmother had ever seen. And then she understood. The sign said “Ring Bell to Summon Ferry.” It didn’t say which bell. Any bell would do.

‘Your grandmother commenced ringing that bell. It had a silvery peal and it was quite pleasant to listen to, but it wasn’t very loud. Certainly not loud enough to be heard over the noise of the river. You can guess how disgusted your grandmother was. She was so disgusted that she tossed that silver hand bell with the ebony handle back into the knapsack. As it fell to the bottom of the knapsack, there was loud clang. Your grandmother spread the knapsack open further and peered in. There, in a dark corner of the knapsack was a larger bell. It hung from a stand and it had a large clapper. On one side was a handle that you moved so that the bell swung back and forth and started the clapper in motion until it too was swinging back and forth and would strike the sides of the bell.

‘Your grandmother pulled the larger bell out of the knapsack and set it up. But you know what, Michael? Even that larger bell wasn’t loud enough to be heard over the noise of the river. In fact, just to spite your grandmother, the river just got louder and louder so that no one could hear the bell ringing.

‘Your grandmother was becoming more than a bit angry now. She looked in the knapsack again. There are the bottom was a CD labelled “All the Bells of Ireland”. She took it out and laid it on the rock. Then she looked in the knapsack again, and she saw a CD player. She took that out and put the CD in it and pressed “Play”. Well it was very pretty music, and at any other time, your grandmother would have been quite pleased to listen to it, but it wasn’t very loud. Certainly not loud enough to be heard above the sound of the river. The river just laughed merrily at the sound. It was beginning to enjoy frustrating your grandmother.

‘So she checked the knapsack again and discovered a pair of amplifiers—the big kind that rock singers use when they are giving concerts in huge stadiums and want to be heard miles away. She also found lots of leads to attach to the amplifiers and a wiring diagram that showed how to attach them. Your grandmother followed the diagram exactly. She put the red end of Lead A in the red socket on Amplifier A and the green end of Lead B into the green socket on Amplifier B, and then she attached the leads to the CD player. Finally she picked up the plug and looked around.

‘Well, of course, she was out in the woods beside a raging river, and there was no electrical socket anywhere. She stood there holding the plug in one hand and she turned to the right and then she turned to the left. She looked behind herself and she looked under the rock. She even leaned over the riverbank to see if there might be a socket there. No socket.

‘Your grandmother sat down again on the rock with a thump. She was so disgusted that she gave the knapsack a shove and it fell over on its side. And there on the bottom was an electrical socket. Your grandmother jumped up and did a jig of joy. She plugged the plug in. The lights on the amps glowed red and then yellow. They blinked several times, and then they turned green.

‘By now, your grandmother was expecting the worst, so much had gone wrong. She crossed her fingers and then closed her eyes. She pressed the play button and out of those amps came the sounds of all the bells in Ireland. Little bells, big bells, hand bells, church bells, school bells, southern bells, northern bells. But most of all LOUD BELLS. VERY LOUD BELLS. The river fretted and fumed. It was very put out that the bells were louder than it was. So it doubled its efforts. But to no avail. It just could not be louder than the sounds produced by those amps.

‘ “Who’s making that infernal racket? I am trying to sleep and you’ve woken me up.” The voice came from deep in the pile of rocks large as houses. “I suppose you’ll be wanting the ferry. Just give me a moment until I put me trousers on and find me shoes and I’ll be there.”

‘To say the least, your grandmother was overjoyed. “I suppose you’ll be wanting the ferry.” That sounded promising. The man would hardly have supposed that she wanted the ferry unless there was a ferry to be wanted. His words clearly meant that a ferry existed. And such a deep voice. He must be a very big man indeed to make himself heard over the torrent.

‘That’s when the ground started to shake. At first, your grandmother thought that she was becoming too excited and was feeling a bit faint. She put a hand against a tree to steady herself. Boom. Boom. Boom. The ground shook even more. It sounded like someone taking giant steps. The booms came closer and closer. Suddenly the shade closed in around your grandmother.

‘She looked up to see what was blocking the sun, and up, and up. And there towering at the edge of the glade was a giant. He was easily twenty-eight feet tall. “Fomor Ferries, at your service, madam.” The giant was dressed in the Fomor Ferries uniform. His shirt was so white it outdazzled the sun. His blue pilot’s cap was so large that all of your clothes could have been made from the cloth that went into it. And his shoes were the size of this bed.

‘The giant bowed low and looked your grandmother in the face. “What a mess you have made. What is all this junk?” The giant pointed towards the amps and electrical wiring on the rock.

‘Now, your grandmother is brave, but even she felt frightened. It isn’t every day that a giant accuses your grandmother of making a mess. And, truth be told, she had made a bit of a mess.

“I, I,” your grandmother was at a loss for words. “The smaller bells couldn’t be heard over the sound of the river. So I had to rev up the amps. Just give me a minute, and I’ll put these things away.” And your grandmother started stuffing everything back in the knapsack. She didn’t know if all of it would fit, but she felt, just to keep on the giant’s good side (if he had one), that she had to make an effort. She unhooked the leads and coiled them up and then placed them in the knapsack. She spread the sides of the knapsack and then lifted one of the amplifiers into it. The knapsack opened its mouth wide and said “aaah” as it swallowed the large box.

The giant watched with great interest as your grandmother picked up the second amplifier. When it disappeared into the knapsack, he exclaimed in admiration, “That is a very roomy bag. Indeed, we could say that it is a most commodious bag, madam, most commodious indeed. But why does it smell like roast chicken?”

‘ “That’s my lunch. It’s in there somewhere. I do apologise if I made too much noise, but I couldn’t make myself heard. And the sign says to ring a bell.”

‘ “But why didn’t you just ring the Fomor Ferries bell?”

‘ “What bell?”

‘ “There beside the sign.” The giant pointed towards the tree with the sign. And your grandmother looked, and there on the tree beside the sign was a large red button. Written clearly on it in white letters was “Push to ring bell.” “If you will ring the bell, madam, I will come,” said the giant.

‘Now, your grandmother was quite sure that the red button hadn’t been there earlier, but she didn’t want to argue with the giant. So she pushed the button. Far off, among the rocks, a loud bell tolled once.

‘ “There, you see, Madam, the bell. And here am I. Now, you’ll be wanting the ferry.”

‘Your grandmother nodded her head. “Yes, I must get to Lansby.”

‘ “Half a tic. No need to be impatient, Madam. Let me open the ticket office, and then you can purchase a ticket, for you must purchase your ticket before boarding the ferry. Fomor Enterprises has established this regulation for its own safety and well-being. We can’t have anyone riding the ferry for free.”

Continues