The Dead Page #2

"The Dead" is not a standalone book but is the final short story in James Joyce's collection, "Dubliners". This story follows the protagonist Gabriel Conroy through a Christmas season feast, where he grapples with issues of identity and Irish Nationalism. The narrative culminates with Gabriel's profound emotional epiphany about love, mortality and the continuity of life and death, invoked by hearing about his wife's past lover who died young.

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little paper and glanced at the headings he had made for his speech. He
was undecided about the lines from Robert Browning for he feared they
would be above the heads of his hearers. Some quotation that they would
recognise from Shakespeare or from the Melodies would be better. The
indelicate clacking of the men’s heels and the shuffling of their soles
reminded him that their grade of culture differed from his. He would
only make himself ridiculous by quoting poetry to them which they could
not understand. They would think that he was airing his superior
education. He would fail with them just as he had failed with the girl
in the pantry. He had taken up a wrong tone. His whole speech was a
mistake from first to last, an utter failure.

Just then his aunts and his wife came out of the ladies’ dressing-room.
His aunts were two small plainly dressed old women. Aunt Julia was an
inch or so the taller. Her hair, drawn low over the tops of her ears,
was grey; and grey also, with darker shadows, was her large flaccid
face. Though she was stout in build and stood erect her slow eyes and
parted lips gave her the appearance of a woman who did not know where
she was or where she was going. Aunt Kate was more vivacious. Her face,
healthier than her sister’s, was all puckers and creases, like a
shrivelled red apple, and her hair, braided in the same old-fashioned
way, had not lost its ripe nut colour.

They both kissed Gabriel frankly. He was their favourite nephew, the
son of their dead elder sister, Ellen, who had married T. J. Conroy of
the Port and Docks.

“Gretta tells me you’re not going to take a cab back to Monkstown
tonight, Gabriel,” said Aunt Kate.

“No,” said Gabriel, turning to his wife, “we had quite enough of that
last year, hadn’t we? Don’t you remember, Aunt Kate, what a cold Gretta
got out of it? Cab windows rattling all the way, and the east wind
blowing in after we passed Merrion. Very jolly it was. Gretta caught a
dreadful cold.”

Aunt Kate frowned severely and nodded her head at every word.

“Quite right, Gabriel, quite right,” she said. “You can’t be too
careful.”

“But as for Gretta there,” said Gabriel, “she’d walk home in the snow
if she were let.”

Mrs Conroy laughed.

“Don’t mind him, Aunt Kate,” she said. “He’s really an awful bother,
what with green shades for Tom’s eyes at night and making him do the
dumb-bells, and forcing Eva to eat the stirabout. The poor child! And
she simply hates the sight of it!... O, but you’ll never guess what he
makes me wear now!”

She broke out into a peal of laughter and glanced at her husband, whose
admiring and happy eyes had been wandering from her dress to her face
and hair. The two aunts laughed heartily too, for Gabriel’s solicitude
was a standing joke with them.

“Goloshes!” said Mrs Conroy. “That’s the latest. Whenever it’s wet
underfoot I must put on my goloshes. Tonight even he wanted me to put
them on, but I wouldn’t. The next thing he’ll buy me will be a diving
suit.”

Gabriel laughed nervously and patted his tie reassuringly while Aunt
Kate nearly doubled herself, so heartily did she enjoy the joke. The
smile soon faded from Aunt Julia’s face and her mirthless eyes were
directed towards her nephew’s face. After a pause she asked:

“And what are goloshes, Gabriel?”

“Goloshes, Julia!” exclaimed her sister. “Goodness me, don’t you know
what goloshes are? You wear them over your ... over your boots, Gretta,
isn’t it?”

“Yes,” said Mrs Conroy. “Guttapercha things. We both have a pair now.
Gabriel says everyone wears them on the continent.”

“O, on the continent,” murmured Aunt Julia, nodding her head slowly.

Gabriel knitted his brows and said, as if he were slightly angered:

“It’s nothing very wonderful but Gretta thinks it very funny because
she says the word reminds her of Christy Minstrels.”

“But tell me, Gabriel,” said Aunt Kate, with brisk tact. “Of course,
you’ve seen about the room. Gretta was saying....”

“O, the room is all right,” replied Gabriel. “I’ve taken one in the
Gresham.”

“To be sure,” said Aunt Kate, “by far the best thing to do. And the
children, Gretta, you’re not anxious about them?”

“O, for one night,” said Mrs Conroy. “Besides, Bessie will look after
them.”

“To be sure,” said Aunt Kate again. “What a comfort it is to have a
girl like that, one you can depend on! There’s that Lily, I’m sure I
don’t know what has come over her lately. She’s not the girl she was at
all.”

Gabriel was about to ask his aunt some questions on this point but she
broke off suddenly to gaze after her sister who had wandered down the
stairs and was craning her neck over the banisters.

“Now, I ask you,” she said almost testily, “where is Julia going?
Julia! Julia! Where are you going?”

Julia, who had gone half way down one flight, came back and announced
blandly:

“Here’s Freddy.”

At the same moment a clapping of hands and a final flourish of the
pianist told that the waltz had ended. The drawing-room door was opened
from within and some couples came out. Aunt Kate drew Gabriel aside
hurriedly and whispered into his ear:

“Slip down, Gabriel, like a good fellow and see if he’s all right, and
don’t let him up if he’s screwed. I’m sure he’s screwed. I’m sure he
is.”

Gabriel went to the stairs and listened over the banisters. He could
hear two persons talking in the pantry. Then he recognised Freddy
Malins’ laugh. He went down the stairs noisily.

“It’s such a relief,” said Aunt Kate to Mrs Conroy, “that Gabriel is
here. I always feel easier in my mind when he’s here.... Julia, there’s
Miss Daly and Miss Power will take some refreshment. Thanks for your
beautiful waltz, Miss Daly. It made lovely time.”

A tall wizen-faced man, with a stiff grizzled moustache and swarthy
skin, who was passing out with his partner said:

“And may we have some refreshment, too, Miss Morkan?”

“Julia,” said Aunt Kate summarily, “and here’s Mr Browne and Miss
Furlong. Take them in, Julia, with Miss Daly and Miss Power.”

“I’m the man for the ladies,” said Mr Browne, pursing his lips until
his moustache bristled and smiling in all his wrinkles. “You know, Miss
Morkan, the reason they are so fond of me is——”

He did not finish his sentence, but, seeing that Aunt Kate was out of
earshot, at once led the three young ladies into the back room. The
middle of the room was occupied by two square tables placed end to end,
and on these Aunt Julia and the caretaker were straightening and
smoothing a large cloth. On the sideboard were arrayed dishes and
plates, and glasses and bundles of knives and forks and spoons. The top
of the closed square piano served also as a sideboard for viands and
sweets. At a smaller sideboard in one corner two young men were
standing, drinking hop-bitters.

Mr Browne led his charges thither and invited them all, in jest, to

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