Patrick McCabe - The Butcher Boy

Oh oh er er I'm only saying he says. No, I says, you didn't answer me – Isn't what a terrible pity?

All right then I says have it your way so crack, off the side of the washbasin and down into the plughole goes his little head just sitting there sideways looking up glug glug. There was a gaping hole in my stomach for I knew Joe would have heard all about Nugents by now. I had let him down. I had nobody now that was for sure and it was all my own fault. I wouldn't blame him for not writing to me, why should he after what I'd done on him? I broke my promise and that was that. I tried to get at my wrists with the jaggy bit of the statue. I managed to get at bits but it was doing no damage you could still be at it in a hundred years time the way it was going. Then over comes this bogman fellow here's my head and my arse is coming. What are you doing oh my God luck he's broke Our Lord if the priest sees you with that he'll kill you! I looked at him with the statue in my hand. There was a little red Elizabethan collar round the neck of it where I'd been hacking with it. I never seen the like of that bogman. He had this big tuft of hair sticking up and two other bits like indicators on either side. O you're goanta bee in terrible trubble he says. His scarecrow trousers stopped at the ankles and he stood there hunched up with his bony arse cocked in the air like he was carrying an invisible bag of spuds on his back. I wouldn't like to be you he said again but I was fed up of him by then so I made a go at him with what was left of the statue and off he went as white as a ghost nearly skittering himself. Then I threw No-Head in the bin and lay down on the bed.

Whee – hoo said Joe and the toboggan came thundering down the white blanket of the fairgreen. Them was the days, I said to Joe, we had peace then. The coloured orb of the marble sat in the cradle of his thumb. He looked at me puzzled. Whose turn is it Francie? Is it my turn? I said it was, even if it wasn't.

The marble rolled along the hard clay in a trail of light.

That old Joe. I didn't know what to do when the letter came. I told everyone about it. All they said was: Huh? but I didn't care. I was speechless. But one thing was for sure. I wasn't going to be getting in trouble ever again. From now on I would be studying for the Francie Brady Not a Bad Bastard Any More Diploma so I could get out of the school for pigs and bogmen. Me and Joe would ride out to the river and there we'd stay. I had found a good place for myself when I wanted to be away from the bony arses following you around and asking questions, it was the boilerhouse down behind the kitchens, and I went in there and read the letter over and over. Whumph!, went the big stove, glowing away with a carnival of sparks going hell for leather in the pit of its big belly. I sat on a pile of bags, old sacks and read:

Dear Frantie you eejit what are you doing. I told you about Mrs Nugent but you wouldn't listen what were you doing in their house? Were you trying to burn it down there's all sorts of stories Francie. I asked Philip but he won't tell me. Philip is OK Francie if you ever touch him again you'll put yourself in trouble bad trouble. He really is OK. He doesn't want any trouble with anyone. He told me. We shouldn't have robbed the comics Francie it was wrong. There's a carnival here now it stays open till twelve. You can win all sorts of things. Bears, anything. Did you ever see Laramie Shoot-Out? You aim the rifle and up comes the sherriff. He's made of cardboard. He draws first but if you hit him you get five more goes. We were round there last Saturday. The rifle range – its brilliant! Philip Nugent got two bullseyes so he won a goldfish. He gave it to me because they have one already. I put it in the window. We're going round again next weekend. If I win anything I will send it on. Philip says he has a special plan to work on the slot machines so I might. Write soon Joe.

I kept thinking about the goldfish. What did Philip Nugent think he was doing? I just couldn't believe it. He was nothing to do with us. I wished I could get the goldfish back off Joe. But what did Joe take it for? Why didn't he say: Sorry Philip you're nothing to do with us.

Then it came to me: he was only doing it to make peace between us all so that there would be no trouble and when I came home me and Joe would just carry on the way we always had. I just hoped that Philip Nugent didn't think he was going to be hanging round with us just because Joe took a goldfish off him. Because if he did he was going to be sorely disappointed. Me and Joe had things to do. Tracking in the mountains, huts to build. If Philip Nugent wanted to pray to the Manitou he would have to form his own blood brother gang. For his own sake I hoped he didn't think that he was all in with us now. But he wouldn't. I knew Joe would put him right and there would be no problem. It was just as well it was Joe, I thought, instead of someone who would just tell him to shove off or something soon as I appeared home and make him feel real bad about it. That was the kind of Joe. He would explain it all gently and clearly to him so that he wouldn't be hurt. He was good at that Joe, taking things easy and explaining them, just like the way he did with me after the chickenhouse and all that.

The main thing was for me to get out of this School For Pigs so we could get back into action. I was as light as a feather when I had all that thought out. I said hello to the bogmen and everything. That night I wrote to Joe and told him that it was all changed now. There was going to be no more trouble with Francie Brady. It was all over. I was glad to hear that he had taken the goldfish off Philip I said there was no point in us being enemies. From now on the Nugents can go where they like I said. We were going to have too many things to do and places to be. If I met them on the street I would salute them and say hello but that would be it. I would go on ahead about my business from now on. The Francie Brady trouble days with Nugent and all that, they were over. Kaput. Trouble days – all over Joe, I said.

Then I licked the envelope and sealed it. I smiled and left it on the window-sill for posting in the morning.

But the minute I left it down, I thought: But what about the goldfish? What did he have to take it for?

I woke up m the middle of the night. I had been dreaming about Mrs Nugent. She was out in the scullery baking scones. The house was full of baking smells. She called in: Is anybody ready for some more scones?

Yes I am said Philip and then he said what about you Joseph?

I felt the blood draining from my face when I saw Joe looking up. He was doing his lessons with Philip. He smiled and said: Yes please. They're quite beautiful Mrs Nugent.

Thank you Joseph, called Mrs Nugent.

That was the end of the sleep for that night I couldn't sleep any more thinking of what Philip was saying to Joe. It wasn't that they were talking about me or anything. That was the funny part. In the dream they didn't even know who I was. The next day I said to myself: I never want to dream that dream again.

In the nights I would lie there hatching all my plans and schemes for when I got out. It was hard to hatch anything with all them bogmen around me. Soon as the lights went out, wheeze wheeze. Quit breathing youse bastards!, I wanted to say but you never knew when Bubbles was lurking down below with his torch. I'd build a raft that was the first thing and send her sailing down the river. Off we'd go, who knew where we'd wind up? A tree house, what about that? That was good. Joe above pacing up and down on guard blam with the Winchester Die dogs of crows! There was a warehouse up at the old railway, we could make a Nazi Headquarters there. I was as bad as the sparks in the boilerhouse stove with all these notions tearing about in my head. You'd only be half-finished with one idea and the next thing here would come along another one, no I'm a better idea what about me it would say. One thing for sure, it would be a long time before I bothered Philip Nugent again. I was glad now that Joe had taken the goldfish. It cleared everything up and now we could all start from the beginning again. Philip could live his life and we could live ours. The beautiful things of the world, I had been wrong about them. They meant everything. They were the only things that meant anything. That was what I thought now. I fell asleep and dreamed I was Bird Who Soars gliding through the snow-covered mountains of Winter.