Doc was a newspaperman. That is, he delivered newspapers and although I was at school with him I didn’t know him well. In fact nobody did.
When he was a child he lived alone with his mother in a small cottage on the edge of the town. He came to school for the first time halfway through the school year in about third class. New boys coming into a class always seem different at first but soon integrate. Doc didn’t. He had a different way about him. He was always well turned out and when he came first his mother used to bring him in the morning and collect him after school. There was no sign of a father.
Some of the lads gave him a hard time for a while, but he always had a knack of out-manoeuvring them, which won their sneaking respect. In class Doc was good at History and English but he was always in trouble at Religion. When we went on to secondary he was forever asking awkward questions. One day the priest shouted at him: “Doherty, if you go on asking those kinds of questions you’ll end up in the halls of hell for all eternity”. This didn’t seem to bother him. We didn’t know how he had the nerve to question the priest, but we knew he had him rattled. During school holidays Doc was never around. They used to say he went to his mother’s people in the country.
When he left school he started delivering papers and although he wasn’t a native of the town he soon became better known than many who claimed their families had come with the Vikings. After his mother died he lived alone in the cottage.
Doc’s day started when his moon-faced alarm rang at its own estimate of half-past six. He drank a cup of tea before leaving to meet the 7.15 a.m. train to collect the papers from Dublin. His weekday morning ritual never varied. He arrived at the station at five past seven, lit a cigarette and waited for the train. In foul weather he stood with his back to the turf fire in the waiting room and in fair weather he went to the north end of the platform and positioned himself opposite to where the guard’s van would stop.
Doc was always civil but never used two words where one would do, and he never ever spoke about himself. Despite his shabby raincoat and greasy cap that looked as if it never left his head, there was a dignity about the man. Adults called him “Doc”, but to the children he was “Mr Doherty”. He was as regular as clockwork and when he was behind time with his deliveries it was because the train was late.
On Friday evenings he collected his payments, calling at each house in turn according to the order of his morning delivery. It was on this Friday evening call when his customers had most conversation with him and even that wasn’t much. In fact for some it was the only time they spoke to him.
This pay-day call was even more regular than the morning deliveries because there was no train to keep him late. He would knock on the door, and when it was answered would touch his cap with a “Good evening ma’am” or “Good evening sir”. His customers, expecting him, had their money ready. In one pocket of his raincoat he carried coin and in the other a roll of notes as big as that of any cattle dealer. He never took more time than was necessary to transact his business and left each customer with a polite “Thank you”. On his morning round he used his bike but on Friday evenings he walked.
Every Friday after his round at about quarter past nine he would go into the bar at the back of Fraynes’ grocery shop on the Main Street. There were usually three or four regulars, there. They knew him as well as anybody. He would arrive and with a “Good evening” he’d sit on the tall stool nearest the partition at the grocery end.
Though Doc’s order was always the same, Jack, the barman never presumed. “A pint of stout, please,” and pulling a paper from the inside pocket of his mac he might make a comment to the others on the weather and set in to reading his paper.
They expected this routine, and while they indulged in the latest news, gossip or scandal of the town or the world at large Doc would keep his head buried in the paper until he called for his second and last order.
“A pint and a Gold Label, please.”
While waiting for his order Doc might join in the conversation with a short comment or two, which usually had the effect of pointing up a different perspective altogether on the topic under discussion. Often his comment was in the form of a question which left you thinking long after he had gone. When his drinks arrived and were paid for he would bury his head in his paper again. At between ten minutes to ten and ten o’clock, but never later than ten, Doc would finish his drink, put his paper into his pocket and with “Goodnight gentlemen” get down from his stool and leave.
Nobody troubled Doc and Doc troubled nobody. Like many a one who had worked hard and been thrifty all his life he did not know how to slow down or spare himself. Many the day he pushed his bike, canvas bag of papers over the handlebars, against the driving rain with no regard for himself. His only concern to get his papers delivered. He went on working his self-imposed routine day in day out; the thought of stopping would never have entered his head. Only once, that any of his customers could remember, did he miss a day. It was during a severe February when half the town was down with ‘flu. Despite having the bug Doc struggled on delivering papers his customers were too sick to read, until one morning he couldn’t put a foot under him. Reliable to the last, he sent for the son of one of the neighbours, who was only too glad to do the round for the price of the pictures and a packet of cigarettes.
On the following day Doc struggled out of bed and resumed his daily routine, and though nobody had been left without their paper he felt he had somehow let them down. Whether he had failed them or failed himself he wouldn’t have known, but when collecting that Friday he pulled his cap further forward on his head and was even less inclined to talk than usual.
Doc never worked on Sundays. He didn’t go to church, chapel or meeting house, but he wasn’t the kind of man that anybody would question on the matter, not even the priest.
On Sundays during the winter he was seldom seen. He didn’t go out but stayed at home and read. In summer he would go to the harbour, take out his small rowing boat and spend the day fishing in the bay. After a good day’s fishing he would give away most of his catch to people on the quay or to neighbours, keeping one or two fish to cook for himself.
On a Monday evening one summer, Pat Byrne, the boy who had done the round for Doc on the day he had had the ‘flu, called to the door.
“Mr Doherty, can I help you with the round?” he asked.
Doc received him at the door. People were seldom invited in, which gave rise to all sorts of rumours about his living conditions. His kitchen consisted of a large armchair beside the range, a dark-stained dresser piled high with books and papers and an oilcloth covered table in the middle of the floor littered with milk bottles, bread wrapping, egg boxes and unwashed delph. Doc was taken aback.
“What’s that?” he said.
“Can I help you with the paper round?” the boy repeated.
“I don’t need help, thank you,” said Doc, but remembered immediately how the boy had seen him out of a spot.
“Well all right then,” he added.
“You can do High Street to-morrow. Meet me at the train in the morning.”
The boy was at the station as arranged and Doc gave him the High Street list which he had copied out of his Friday payment book. One day borrowed another, two became three and in no time Pat Byrne was helping with Doc’s paper round for as long as the school holiday lasted.
Pat didn’t like school but was determined that when he left he’d work at something and wouldn’t end up on the dole and hanging around the bookies. Jobs were scarce and most of the youngsters leaving school were unemployed. Pat had got the taste of earning and liked the feeling of independence it gave him.
On the evening of the day Pat left school he knocked on Doc’s door. He woke Doc who had fallen asleep beside the fire after his tea.
“Mr Doherty, would you mind if I delivered evening papers to your customers?” In spite of being taken off guard, he replied:
“Even if I did I couldn’t stop you.”
“Well, I wouldn’t like to do it if you’d mind,” said Pat.
“Come in.”
Pat was surprised. He had never been asked in before. He stood awkwardly inside the door while Doc closed it and led the way across the kitchen.
He sat down at the table. Pat followed but stayed standing.
“Sit down.”
As there was only one chair at the table Pat sat in the easy chair at the range.
“Is it just for the summer?” asked Doc.
“I’ve left school now and I’d do it all the time,” Pat replied. “It wouldn’t cut across you because you only do the mornings,” he added.
Doc picked up a spoon from the table and put it in the sugar. He dug a hole in the middle and heaped the sugar around the edge of the big glass bowl.
“How do you know they want it?” Doc enquired.
“I asked a few of them and they said they did,” replied Pat.
“Who’d supply you?” asked Doc.
“I’d ask Finnegan on the Main Street where he gets his.” Doc filled the sugar back into the hole.
“You have it all worked out,” he said. “I don’t mind,” he added, “and good luck to you.”
“Thank you, Mr Doherty, thank you very much,” said Pat, and he moved quickly towards the door. Doc stayed sitting at the table doodling with the sugar for a moment before going back to his chair beside the range.
During the summer some of Doc’s customers cancelled their papers.
Soon more shops in the town started to carry morning papers, and his customers dwindled slowly. Despite the fall off in business Doc kept up his routine until one wet December evening on his way home a car hit him and knocked him off his bike. They brought him to the hospital unconscious. He partly regained consciousness and Pat and his mother went to see him, but they weren’t sure whether he knew them or not. He soon lapsed into unconsciousness again and died a few days later.
The priest from the hospital made all the arrangements for the funeral. There was great interest among the neighbours to see who would turn up as chief mourners, but there weren’t any. There were some of his neighbours, a few of his customers and one of the porters from the station.