The Dalkey Archive by Flann O'Brien

Author:Flann O'Brien
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
ISBN: 9781564781727
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Published: 2006-09-01T14:00:00+00:00

11

At the time of these events, the Royal Marine Hotel in Dunleary was a big hulk of faded splendour, with hints of red plush and gilt of bygone good times. Yet there was comfort there still, good food, and the peculiar solace which sometimes can be got from cross-channel accents.

Mick arrived twenty minutes too early, sat in the lounge and fortified himself with a precautionary glass of the French water. His intention was to represent to Father Cobble that De Selby was an eccentric man, though of exceptional intellectual powers, and that he seemed spiritually very confused; and that perhaps he would be the better for a straightforward talk on the immutability of the Christian ideal, the immortality of the soul, and the respect which was due to the Church. He aimed also to steer a theme, such as the propagation throughout the world of Christ’s message, round to the nature of the secret scheme which De Selby was harbouring for dissemination simul­taneously everywhere of his ghastly D.M.P. He saw it would be worse than futile to inform Father Cobble about the unearthly problem which confronted him in his effort to shield mankind from an unparalleled sort of threat.

Father Cobble came punctually. He had the look which his deep booming voice had told Mick he would have — a thin, dark, very small man of sixty or so, with a lined but pleasant, well-meaning face. He was very well-dressed. As he paused in the large lounge gazing enquiringly about him, Mick rose, went to his side, touched his arm and put his hand out.

– Father Cobble, I think?

– Ah!

He shook hands affably.

– Well, well. You are Michael, of course. Excellent. Capital.

– Perhaps we might sit over here, Father, Mick said, leading the way to his little table. The priest smiled and sat down, neatly stowing his hat and furled umbrella at a nearby stand.

– And isn’t it the heavy evening, he said agreeably. I can’t say I enjoy this sort of heat. I’ve spent many years in Rome; the thermometer’s higher, there, of course, but somehow it’s a different sort of heat.

– Everybody says the exhausting thing here is the humidity of the atmosphere, Father, but I’ve never quite understood what that means.

Father Cobble was looking brightly about him.

– I think we may take it that the strong sunlight of summer extracts vapours from our sodden landscape, he remarked, but I imagine that situation is beyond human redress. Of course in some big cities, particularly in America, the problem is met indoors by air conditioning. Our own house in Cleveland has this arrangement and, believe me, it makes an enormous difference. Well now! What about a nice cup of tea and perhaps some sugartops?

– Sugartops?

– Yes, yes. You know, those little circular cakes with icing on top, white or pink. I’m serious.

What a horrible suggestion! Was this sybaritism as under­stood by the Jesuits? Mick gave what was intended to sound like a gentle little laugh.

– Father, I couldn’t possibly.

– Ah,

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