The Holy City by Patrick McCabe Page B

save us two: Marcus Otoyo and I, betrothed to Christ the King and his mother Mary.
    As he stood there by the window of his kitchen, with his glossy curls shining, thinking to himself, or so it seemed:
Iam the one who has been selected.
Though I despise the rough tribes of the cottages, their dull piety and the sickly smell of cheap hair oil with which they anoint their heads, it is I above all others who have been selected from amongst them and am now fated to join the order of Melchizedek, to bring glory to my parents and to the town of Cullymore. I am the unique, the uplifted — the elected. I alone am the tabernacle of Christ.
    I could see him so clearly, pacing the floor of his room, head bent — hands clasped behind his back, deep in contemplation.
    â€” Forget about Protestants and their hard, ungiving hearts, his expression seemed to suggest, forget about Henry Thornton, his well-bred abstinence and studied incuriosity. It is your surrender to tenderness which will be your salvation. Thus do I bless you, Christopher, my friend.
    Sometimes I used to leave that cottage in a trance, scarcely hearing the words that Dolores addressed to me, as she took my arm and we negotiated the rainswept back lane, picking our way through the puddles and wet rubbish. Where Joyce’s ‘rough tribes’ abided, and where once upon a time he too might have seen himself as a creature driven and derided by vanity. But where now, as we proceeded through the hoarse riot of those dwellings, nothing, for me, could have been further from the truth.
    And for the first time in my life, I began to entertain the possibility of love. That night, for the first time writing, by the light of the moon, at my kitchen table:
    For many days I had travelled, mindful above all that my journey at its end might prove to be fruitless and heartbreaking. And that when, at List, I gained the walk of the holiest city: the one that is called love and is sacred above all others. That no answer might be made to my knocking upon the gates of the new Jerusalem. That the echo of my plea might die as so often before, a hollow appeal destined to be heard by no human ear. Let me in, I might cry, above all things please let me in. Lift up these gates, for more than anything I need to belong. Only to find, as my soul was about to commit itself to despair, that the massive wooden gates swung effortlessly open and I was almost blinded as I stood there in a shaft of desert sun. Only for the sight to be returned to my eyes as I beheld him before me, Marcus Otoyo, attired in a fine tunic after the manner of a prince, with a crown of olives upon his head, as he extended his hand and in a soft voice told me:
    â€” You are welcome, friend. To this holy place where we venerate and praise love. Come in. Now, Christopher Maximus, you are one for ever with us.
    My soul was exalted as, at last, approaching dawn, I began my ascent of the stairs towards sleep.

12 Mr Wonderful
    The night Man. United won the European Cup, the town erupted with a fervour greater than anything experienced ever before — with the streets and the squares sinking beneath a wavering sea of red banners and flags. Yet another effigy had appeared — this time of Sir Matt Busby, the successful team’s manager, which had been erected outside the library.
    At the counter of the Good Times they were gathered around Dolores like a pride of tomcats. As she, mischievously, patted her perm, batting her eyelashes and puckering her nose.
    They asked her to sing another Peggy Lee.
    â€” Sing ‘I’m a Woman’! someone bawled.
    It had gone down a storm in the bar the night before.
    â€” Sing ‘Black Coffee’!
    â€” Let the dame sing whatever she likes.
    Now she was provoking them towards all sorts of bravado. The word ‘dame’ was rarely heard in the town before. Not outside the pages of the
Mike Shayne
magazine. But around Dolly Mixtures, as she was now called,