“It’s all right, sweetheart,” her father soothed her. He lifted her tiny chin. “And I’ll tell you what. When I come and get you tomorrow? I just might just have a big surprise for you.” He smiled. Agnes wiped her eyes. “Surprise?” she repeated every child’s favorite word. Her father nodded and smiled. She kissed her daddy, and then he was gone. She was so hungry, but she didn’t say anything to Auntie Florrie, it wouldn’t be manners, so when she was put to bed her tummy was so empty it was paining her. She still had not gotten over her ordeal, and even as she slept the odd huge sob would stagger from her lips. Next morning, she came down the stairs to find Aunt Florrie all jolly in the kitchen. Agnes sat at the kitchen table and within minutes had devoured two bowls of porridge.
“My gosh,” Florrie exclaimed, “you like your porridge, don’t you?”
Actually, Agnes hated porridge, but she was so hungry that she would have eaten Uncle Conor had Auntie Florrie served him up.
As soon as Agnes arrived at school, she went in search of Marion to tell her of her ordeal. She looked everywhere but to no avail. Agnes prayed that Marion would not miss school today of all days. When the school bell sounded, all the children began to assemble into their lines. Agnes stood in her line looking around feverishly for any sign of Marion. The line began to move toward the school door, and Agnes saw Marion tearing across the schoolyard. She was late, but Agnes was just relieved that she was there. As soon as they got out to little break, Agnes took Marion aside and told her the whole story. Marion listened with great interest. By the time Agnes had finished telling the story, especially the piece about the surprise, Marion was grinning from ear to ear and nodding knowingly.
“It’s a baby,” announced Marion.
“What is?” Agnes asked.
“Your surprise. It’s a baby. Your mammy’s gone to get a baby.” Agnes stood rooted to the spot, her mouth open wide, staring at Marion.
“But how do you know?” Agnes asked.
“Its always a baby. Every time your mammy goes away and your daddy says, ‘We might have a big surprise tomorrow’”—she mimicked Agnes’ father—“it’s a baby. It always is. We’ve had so many surprises in our house that me mother can’t feed them all. It’s a baby, I ought to know.” Marion of course came from a household that was so large that some of the children didn’t even know the others’ names. Agnes was shocked and stunned.
“But, but,” she stammered, “my mammy and daddy already have a baby,
I’m
their baby.”
“You’re not a baby anymore, Aggie, you’re a young wan.”
The bell sounded for the end of the break. Marion trotted back into the class. Agnes dragged her feet slowly behind her. As promised, Agnes’ father was indeed waiting outside the school gates when she finished school. She ran to him and threw her arms around him. He was all cleaned up, like it was Sunday, and he was beaming with joy.
“Come on, missy, let’s get on home; I have that surprise for you.” He smiled. He took her hand and they began to walk. Agnes stopped and looked up at her father. He looked down. “What?” he asked.
“My surprise, is it a baby?” she asked. Bosco’s eyes widened and he began to laugh.
“How did you know? Yes, it is a baby! A beautiful little sister for my Agnes,” he announced.
Agnes stomped her foot. “I don’t want it. Give it back!”
Bosco took her by the hand, and they walked home in silence to meet Agnes’ new sister.
Connie was sitting in the armchair, a tiny bundle in her arms. She was smiling. Agnes was not. Connie motioned Agnes to come closer with a wave of her hand and whispered, “Come, Agnes, come meet your new sister. Her name is Dolly.” Slowly Agnes went over and tried to peek in at the bundle. She angled her head this way and that. Connie pulled the blanket down slightly, and Agnes could see this pink wrinkled “thing” chewing its hand.
“Isn’t Dolly beautiful?” Connie asked.
“Maybe it’ll die,” Agnes said.
“Agnes, don’t be so nasty,” her mother admonished her.
“I hope it does die,” Agnes said through pouting lips, and stomped off to her bedroom for a cry. Bosco stayed in the flat for just half an hour, then made his way back to the foundry to work. Connie went to the bedroom, and after she fed the baby, she and the baby had a nap. When Agnes came out of the bedroom, the flat was quiet. She turned on the radio and sat listening to the music. Agnes, even at five years old, was beginning to learn how to be alone.
Despite Agnes’ first hope for the child, Dolly didn’t die. Like many second-born children, Dolly was spoiled at every turn, leading Agnes to feel a little neglected, even though she was not. And worse was to come as she grew older, for on Dolly’s first week in school, Connie insisted that during the breaks Agnes was to hold Dolly by the hand for the duration. She hated it, but she did it. At times so tightly that Dolly’s hand lacked blood flow.
Dolly took to school well, and Agnes’ life was diverted by her preparation for her first confession.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“How do I look, Mammy?” Agnes asked. Connie studied her daughter carefully. “Like a beauty queen,” she proclaimed.
“Ah, no, really, Mammy. Do I look all right?” the little girl begged.
“Agnes dear, you will be giving your confession in the dark. The priest won’t see you.”
“God will. He sees everything, and He’s everywhere,” Agnes spouted her newfound knowledge.
“Well, then, if it’s God you are trying to please, you look good enough.” Connie was concentrating. She had marked the pattern of the dress out, using blue chalk. Everything was ready, but she was still trembling, the cutting shears felt heavy in her hands. It had been the same on the two previous occasions when she had had to cut into the train. For the christening robe for Agnes and then later Dolly. This satin train had been on the wedding dress, untouched, for three generations. She was not cutting it by choice, but her child needed a Communion dress and she was going to have one. Connie was about to close the blades of the shears.
“It’s so beautiful, Mammy!” Agnes screeched with delight. Connie jumped with fright.
“Agnes dear, why don’t you run along to school now. Like a good little girl.” Connie put the shears down gently as she spoke.
“Okay. Bye,” and Agnes was gone.
Connie decided to have a cup of tea and calm down before trying the cutting again.
The children were lined up into two lines. They were instructed to hold hands with the person beside them. Then, like a wagon-train boss of the old American West, Sister Benedict raised her hand and the group began to move. The trek was on to St. Jarlath’s Church for the big day.
The forty-one little girls snaked their way along the footpaths, the May sunshine on their faces and old dears “cooing” as they passed. Soon they arrived at the gigantic front doors of the church, and the smiles vanished from their faces. Now they slowed in their walk, passing through the doors silently, each girl dipping her fingers in the font of holy water and making the sign of the cross. Sister Benedict ushered them to a pew beside one of the confessionals. She halted them before they could enter. She had not figured out her problem yet. Should she get Marion Delany to be the first to go and get her out of the way, or should she hold her back to last, so that any trouble she caused could be minimized by a swift exit? She decided on the former.
“Delany,” she whispered down the line, and motioned for Marion to come front and center. Marion arrived still holding Agnes’ hand. Without explanation she ushered the two girls down the pew, and the rest followed.
The confessor for the big day was Father Angelus. An old campaigner. He was already installed in his center cubicle, awaiting the toddlers’ invasion. These were straightforward. The child would enter. The sins confessed were a narrow range, and most usually got by with, “I disobeyed my father and my mother.” He peeked through the red velvet curtains and watched the children take their places. Sister Benedict came to the curtain and whispered, “Ready, Father?”
“Ready, Sister. Let them go.” He crossed himself and kissed his scapulars. Sister Benedict gave a nod to Marion and Agnes, and they entered the boxes on either side of the priest’s cubicle. Marion knelt in the darkness and waited. Suddenly there was a wooden
thud
sound as the priest pulled back the window cover. A small shelf protruded from the bottom of this window for the sinner to lean his/her elbows on. With Marion now on her knees, the shelf was six inches above her head, and she could see nothing.
“In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,” the priest rattled off quickly, and to Marion this was just a voice in the darkness. This was Marion’s cue to begin.
“Hello? Father, are you there? Hello,” she whispered.
“What, what’s that?” the priest said; he was squinting, trying to see if there was anyone there. “Stand up, child.” Marion did, and the priest could now see her little eyes peeping over the shelf. Marion didn’t know why she was told to stand, as all rehearsals had been done kneeling, so she awaited further instructions in silence. The priest now took this as the girl being stagestruck at her first confession, so he tried to help her. “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned,” he hinted to her. Now Marion was completely confused: this was
her
line. She now thought someone else had skipped in front of her.
“Hey, mister, fuck off, I was here first.” She was having none of it. She took a deep breath and went for it.
“BLESS ME, FATHER, FOR I HAVE SINNED,” she said at the top of her voice.
“Aghhh!” Father Angelus yelped with fright.
“THIS IS MY FIRST CONFESSION,” she went on.
Father Angelus was now pressed back against the wall in an effort to get away from this voice. “Who is this?” he called.
“I SLAPPED ME LITTLE BROTHER . . . TWO TIMES. I STOLE TWO PENNIES ON ME MOTHER . . .”
Father Angelus was now leaning out through the curtains looking for Sister Benedict, who had been lighting a candle to the Virgin Mary at the far side of the church but was now scrambling across pews to get to Marion.
“Sister, Sister,” the priest was calling in minor panic.
“I’m coming, Father,” the breathless nun called back.
The other children were giggling, and Agnes was in tears with laughter on the floor of the opposite cubicle. However, everything came to a sudden silence at Marion’s finish. Which coincided with the nun’s arrival.
“I ATE MEAT ON A FRIDAY . . . I DISOBEYED ME FATHER AND ME MOTHER . . . AND I LET JOHNNY HANNI-GAN SEE ME KNICKERS.”
The nun froze. The priest froze, and the children froze. Marion waited for her absolution. The silence prevailed. Everybody with his or her own thoughts. The little girls thinking of Johnny Hannigan. Needless to say, it was Marion that broke the silence.
“ARRAGH! WHAT’S THAT SMELL? DID YOU FART, FATHER? THAT’S NOT ME PENANCE, IS IT, FATHER?”
Father Angelus blushed, Sister Benedict went pale, the girls giggled as they watched Marion leave the cubicle with the help of Sister Benedict, faster than an ejector seat.
It was a day to remember. The Communions went beautifully. Agnes was the best dressed, in satin and silk made from her mother’s wedding-dress train. But the star of the show was Marion Delany and the telling and retelling of her first confession.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Life was getting a little better for Connie and Bosco too. The foundry was now fully unionized, and conditions had improved some for the men. Bosco had been elected onto the branch committee of the union, and he loved his involvement.
The insecurity felt by Agnes at having to share her parents’ attention with Dolly was tempered somewhat by the excitement which Marion brought into her life. The following years, for Agnes and Marion, were the most fun-filled anyone could ever have. Marion would constantly regale Agnes with the funny stories that she would tell of a place she called “the Markets.” It seemed to Agnes that “the Markets,” whatever it was, was at the center of the universe, and that Marion and her family were the center of “the Markets.” The place existed only in Agnes’ mind and Marion’s stories. Agnes pleaded with Connie every day to allow her to go with Marion to this place. Connie managed to hold out, just, until Agnes was twelve years old. When she said “yes” to Agnes that first time, her daughter gave her the biggest hug she had had in years. The night before her trip to “the Markets,” Agnes barely slept she was so excited.
Of all of the endearing characteristics of the Markets, the one most notable and unique is the speed and frequency with which one can be insulted by a Moore Street dealer woman. Their tongues are as fast as lightning and can crack like a bullwhip. And with each lash they take a layer of skin off of the most hardened ego.
There are no double standards on “the street.” The women apply citrus wit to each other just as much as to a passing customer. For instance, whereas in most pleasant circles a person’s individualism, such as minor blemishes on one’s beauty, would not be mentioned, not so in Moore Street. Fact is, if it were obvious enough, it would probably be added to your name! Thus you have people with names like Hopalong Hannah, who had been the victim of an accident some years ago that left her with a stiff leg. Or two of the fish sellers, Winnie the Mackerel and Smelly Nelly. The woman with the excessive body odor was Sweaty Betty. Across from her stall was a woman that had had so many surgical procedures on a congenital vaginal deformation she was addressed simply as Funny-Fanny. Believe it or not, these were regarded as names of affection.