Cathy was stunned. The doctor pushed open the two large gates and as he walked back to the driver’s door he looked straight at Cathy, smiled, and winked! Just before he sat back in the car he said, ‘Home to change your knickers, then?’
Cathy was gobsmacked - he was a mind-reader! He wasn‘t, of course - but he had been doing the school rounds for fifteen years. He knew the story. The car moved slowly. Cathy, crouched, held on to the door-handle and crept beside it. As the doctor was locking the gates, Cathy was already half-way across the yard. She looked back at him and he was still smiling. She waved. He nodded. The bell rang.
Cathy put her tongue out as far as it would go. The doctor pressed the lollipop stick down on the back of it and shone his light down her throat.
‘And again,’ he said.
‘Ahhhh.’
‘Good.’ He removed the stick and between his thumb and the palm of his hand, he snapped the stick in two and dropped it into the waste bin. He wrote a note in his book and patted her on the head.
‘Okay, my little escapee, you’re fine! Back to your class.“
Cathy hopped off the chair and made for the door. She placed her hand on the door handle and stopped. She turned, still holding the handle and said, ‘Doctor?’ He had his back to her, but turned, ‘Yes?’ With her left hand she brushed back her fringe and said, ‘Thanks!’ He smiled, ‘My pleasure ... and hey, nice knickers!’
Cathy giggled and left the room. She went to the cloakroom to dress. She had not been back to her classroom since the big break, as she and the other four girls had come straight to the doctor. As she dressed she reflected on how things had worked out so well and that life was indeed worth living! What she did not know was that after break, when Cathy’s cousin Ann did not see her return, she got scared. As soon as the class was seated Ann timidly raised her hand and when Sister Magdalen asked what was the matter, Ann tearfully confessed all. The cat was well and truly out of the bag! As Cathy entered the classroom she noticed a definite air of impending disaster. She did not, however, suspect that this had anything to do with her. She took her seat. Sister Magdalen said nothing to her, but carried on with the English lesson that was in progress.
All was normal for the time being, although Cathy noticed a few peculiar looks from classmates.
The bell rang through the corridors to end the day’s schooling, and Sister Magdalen issued her instructions: ‘Don’t forget questions sixty-five to seventy tonight, we’ll be doing them first thing in the morning. Oh, and Miss Browne, you stay after school, I wish to speak to you.’
The class stood and said the ‘Hail Mary’ aloud. Only the girl standing next to Cathy Browne heard the tremor in her voice. The classroom was soon empty and deathly quiet. Cathy sat alone at her desk. Sister Magdalen had, as usual, walked her girls down to the front door in single file and would return at any moment. Cathy heard the ’clack, clack’ of Sister Magdalen’s heels coming towards the room, and the fear tasted like a rusty nail in her mouth. The nun entered. She closed the door and walked to her desk. She did not look at Cathy. Instead she opened the top drawer of her desk. In this drawer was a Bible, a roll-book, used to mark the daily attendance of the each pupil - a dash for present and a circle for absent - a box of blackboard chalk and the ‘wrath of God’. The ‘wrath of God’ was a strip of leather one and a half inches wide, one half-inch thick and twelve inches long. Somebody, -somewhere had sat over a drawing board and designed this strip specifically for beating children. It served no other purpose. It was expensive to make and to buy. The nun did not take it out. Instead, she placed her hand on it in the drawer. She still did not look at Cathy. Her eyes were firmly on the ’wrath of God‘. She took a deep breath and as she exhaled, she said, ’Miss Browne, do I like lies?‘
‘No, Sister Magdalen.’ Cathy knew what the nun was holding.
‘And do I like liars?’ The nun still did not look up.
‘No, Sister Magdalen.’ A tear shot down Cathy’s cheek.
‘Come up here,’ the nun said as she whipped out the strap and slammed it on the desk. Cathy walked unsteadily to the front of the room. The nun was glaring at her now.
‘What do liars get?’ she asked in a low, husky voice.
Cathy bowed her head and mumbled.
‘Speak up, girl!’ the nun screamed.
Cathy jumped with fright. The tears were now streaming down her cheeks and dripping from her quivering chin. Her long fringe was damp and stuck to her cheeks.
‘The “wrath of God”,’ Cathy cried.
‘The “wrath of God”,’ the nun repeated, ‘so do not lie to me here,’ she pointed to the crucifix, ‘before God our Saviour.’ The nun now seemed to be shaking as much as Cathy. ‘Hold out your hand,’ she said as if telling Cathy to sharpen her pencil. The child stretched out her hand and bent her fingers back so that her palm was sticking up. She closed her eyes.
‘Why did you leave the school grounds today?’
The question was simple, the answer embarrassing. Cathy was afraid to lie before ‘God the Saviour’, yet she could not tell the truth, it just wouldn’t come out. Whack! The pain shot up her arm and out through her head. Her hand was tingling.
‘I am waiting for an answer, Madam,’ the nun said and raised her arm again.
Cathy opened one eye. The huge, dark figure loomed over her, the arm pointing to Heaven, the strap flapping like a wild animal’s tongue. Cathy withdrew her arm and ran to the door. The nun was startled, but quick enough to catch Cathy before the door was opened. Cathy had now balled her hands into two fists and had them under her armpits. The nun gripped her above the elbow and dragged the girl easily along the polished floor to the desk. She threw the strap on the ground and, still holding the child’s arm, rummaged with her free hand in the drawer.
‘I’ll teach you, Miss ... Miss ... trollop!’ she said as her hand came out of the drawer clutching a chrome scissors.
By the time Cathy reached home her tears had stopped. As she entered the noisy flat, Agnes said, ‘Cathy, your dinner is in the pot, do your homework before you eat it. Where did you get that bloody thing?’ Agnes was pointing at the woolly hat with a tassel that Cathy was wearing. It was called a ‘monkey hat’, after Mike Nesbith, one of the band The Monkees, Cathy’s favourite band.
‘Ann Reddin gev’ it to me.’
‘Well, it looks stupid,’ Agnes said. But knowing that kids will be kids, she did not interfere with their fashion whims. ‘I’m goin’ down to Marion. You be in your bed when I get home.’
Cathy went to her bedroom and cried.
Chapter 10
WEDNESDAY MORNING CAME, Marion’s day for the doctor. Agnes stood beside the two prams at the bottom of the church steps. As usual, Marion was doing her early-mom- ing shout, except this time, when the echo of ‘Good morning, God, it’s me, Marion’ died down, Marion said softly, ’Don’t leave me in trouble today.‘ As she came back down the steps, Agnes simply said to her: ’All right?‘, to which Marion answered, ’All right!‘, and off they went to ply their wares. The morning was busy so the time flew by. Before Marion knew it, Agnes was standing beside her, waiting to leave for Dr Clegg’s clinic.
‘Are you right?’ Agnes asked.
‘Nearly. I’ve only half me apples washed, me mind is not me own.’
‘Leave them. Fat Annie will do them for yeh. Come on, it’s nearly eleven. Get your coat.’
Marion did, and the women set off on the fifteen-minute walk to the doctor’s clinic rooms. They walked to the end of Moore Street and took a right down Parnell Street towards Summerhill, where Dr Clegg sat each morning from eleven to one. There was no conversation between the women before they reached the huge triangular edifice that was the Parnell monument at the northern end of O‘Connell Street. As they passed beneath the giant outstretched hand of Charles Stewart Pamell, Agnes said: ’Did I tell you that my Mark is gettin’ pubic hair?‘
‘Where, on his willy?’
‘No, on his tongue! Of course on his willy!’
‘How do you know?’
‘He told me. Very worried he was. Thought he was abnormal - reformed or somethin’.‘
‘Ah, God love him. Did he ask you about the “birds and the bees”?’
‘No, not really.’
‘What do you mean, not really?’
‘Well, he asked me why he was getting hair on his willy.’
‘What did yeh tell him?’
‘I told him it was to keep his willy warm when he’s swimmin’.‘
The women roared laughing as they stepped on to Gardiner Street and a car screeched to a halt, its horn honking loudly.
‘Ah, keep yer hom for someone what loves yeh,’ screamed Agnes.
The driver gave her a two-finger salute and drove on. Both women returned the gesture.
‘Bleedin’ cars, think they own the road,’ Marion said as a token of support to Agnes’s outburst.
Just one hundred yards up Summerhill and they were outside Dr Clegg’s clinic.
‘Jaysus, Agnes, I’m shittin’ meself.’
‘Ah, you’ll be grand. Come on, in yeh go - you’ll see!’ The women hugged each other and entered the clinic.
That evening at six o‘clock the Browne children sat or stood around the kitchen awaiting their tea. They chattered amongst themselves while Agnes busied herself at the cooker. She was distracted, and was doing things ’arseways‘. She poured the boiling water into the pot but forgot to put tea-leaves in it; she had put bread under the grill to toast it but never turned the grill on. She kept remembering the look of pure terror on Marion’s face as she said: ’He wants me to go in for tests next week in the Richmond Hospital.‘ Marion had burst into tears. They didn’t go straight back to Moore Street like they had promised Fat Annie they would, instead they stopped at the pub on the comer and had a drink. Dr Clegg had told Marion that it might be a malignant tumour and if it were, she would have to have a breast removed. Marion was frantic.
‘That’s only the start, Aggie! First a breast, then a leg, then another leg - bit by bit - and then they bury the bits that are left.’
Agnes slapped her on the face and did some hard talking. ‘Listen you, you’re ’way ahead of yourself! It could turn out to be nothing. And so what if they take a breast - look at Mona Sweeney in the pawn shop, she has only one diddy and she’s grand! Now get a grip.‘ They had finished the drinks in silence and made their way back to their stalls, and a very irate Fat Annie.
The chattering of the children was rising to a screeching match.
‘Shut up!’ Agnes screamed. ‘All of yis, shut up. This is not the Phoenix Park. If yis have to talk, talk quietly, yis are drivin’ me round the fuckin’ bend.’ All went quiet for a moment, then Cathy spoke up. ‘It’s Dermo, Ma, he’s makin’ Marko mad.’
‘It’s not me, it’s him,’ Dermo said, pointing at Mark.
‘Shut up, I told yis, and Cathy, your brother’s names are Dermot and Mark, keep those nicknames for the street.’ Agnes put the pot of tea on the table and a huge plate of hot, buttered toast. She wiped her hands on her apron and took it off.
‘Mark,’ she ordered, ‘pour out the tea, and there’s two slices of toast for everyone. I don’t want to hear any arguing.’
She left the room and bolted herself in the toilet. Peace and quiet. Mark poured out the tea and the toast was seized upon. Dermot started up again, but this time in a quieter voice. ‘She’s a slut,’ he said with an impish grin on his face.
Cathy was next. ‘She is not. Maggie O’Brien is very nice, and if Mark loves her that’s his own business.‘
‘Shut up, you don’t know anything, you’re a kid!’ Dermot said with some authority. ‘Anyone will tell you, that for a penny worth of liquorice Maggie O’Brien will let you see her bum.‘ Dermot knew these things.
Mark finished pouring out the tea and with a smile, said to Dermot: ‘Well, I’m meeting her at the back of Foley’s - and I won’t need
any
liquorice.’
The whole crowd of them went ‘Wooooo!!’
Dermot was not convinced. ‘Why not?’
‘Cause I have something the other fellas haven’t got.’
Dermot thought for a moment. ‘You mean hair on your willy?’ He laughed - and so did the entire gang except Mark.
‘No - charm!’ Mark spat out defiantly.
Agnes returned and all went quiet. She poured herself out a cup of tea, sugared and milked it, and leaned against the sideboard. ‘Right youse, finish that tea, and into your pyjamas.’
‘I have to go out,’ said Mark.
‘Where?’ Agnes spoke like a barrister.
‘To the ... boxing club.’
‘Of a Wednesday night? Why, what’s on?’
‘Eh... some man is coming down to talk to us about ... something.’
‘Oh all right, but you be back here by nine, d’yeh hear me?‘
‘Yeh! Nine!’ Mark answered, relieved that his date with Maggie O‘Brien - his date with destiny - was allowed to take place. The other children kept their eyes down. Brownes don’t snitch.
As Mark skipped down to Foley‘s, his excitement almost made him burst. So this is love, he thought. He had practised some romantic lines he had heard at the matinees, and was ready to tackle the serious business of wooing his lady. As he rounded the turn from James Larkin Court into James Larkin Street, he saw her standing there outside Foley’s pub. His heart leapt. He had never felt like this about anyone or anything before. He slowed his walk to try and look ’cool‘. It was impossible. Cool, me hole, he thought, and began to run. When he got to her, she went all coy.
‘How ye?’ he said.
‘How ye,’ she answered, without looking at him.
There was an awkward silence. She was leaning with her back resting against the lamp post, and for some reason she kept slipping her heel in and out of the black brogues she wore. She’s gorgeous, he thought. Okay, so one of her teeth sticks out, the one beside the yellow one, but it was nice in a kinda way. Time for one of his romantic lines.
He cleared his throat. ‘Your hair shines in the moonlight.’
‘Fuck off! Yours isn’t even combed!’
Her retort caught him off guard. I must have said it wrong, he thought. Try another one, his brain screamed, try another one. ‘Your pools are like big eyes,’ he stumbled out.
‘What boobs? I haven’t got any yet, and if I had you wouldn’t be gettin’ your fuckin’ hands on them.’