Patrick McCabe - The Butcher Boy

One day I was down in the boilerhouse watching the circus of sparks putting on a show inside the big stove. I was puffing away on a Park Drive Tiddly had given me. Then I heard the voice: I know you're in there, you can't fool me! You needn't think I'm afraid of you, Mr Head-The-Ball Brady. I'll take you! I'm the man will take you! Your trick-acting'll not annoy me! Come on! Come on out you snakey bastard!

I heard the keys rattling and when I looked up who was it only the gardener with a big graip pointed at me and his eyes mad in his head, I have you now my buck what'll the priests have to say about this!

I went white and I said well I suppose that's me fucked but then what does he do only start chuckling to himself and lock the doors, give me a light he says. Effing sky pilots, what do I care about them! What one of them was ever any good? They wouldn't give you the steam of their piss. He said they owed him five shillings since nineteen forty. All of a sudden the whole boilerhouse smelt of weeds and fertiliser. We stood there watching the sparks circus inside the little door of the stove. There was a touch of the bogman in that gardener too. Hate, he called it. There's great hate off that stove, he said. O, I says, powerful hate! Powerful hate altogether!

I'm afraid you appear to have missed this part of the grass verge, the sky pilot says to me. I had the shears in me hand! I had! He was a lucky man that day I can tell you. He was within that of getting it with the shears!, he says, and showed me a bit of his thumb squeezed between two fingers.

He bit away at the butt of the cigarette. Me, he said, who fought for this country. O yes, he says, I was in the GPO in Easter Week. All I cared about in the GPO was Michael Collins and that was only because da was reading a book about him when they were in Bundoran. Did you know Michael Collins, I says to him. He nearly had a stroke. Did I know him? Didn't he stay in our house!

He stared at me with the eyes dancing, flicking away at the fag. I said da knew about him. O aye but not as much as me, oho I knew him all right he said and hunched down looking right at me. You don't believe me?, he said and gave me a thump on the arm it nearly knocked me into the fire. I do believe you I said. You want to see the amount of rashers and black puddings that man'd eat, he said, small wonder he was a good soldier!

Then he leaned back and folded his arms with the butt stuck in the corner of his mouth. His foot was tapping away waiting for me to say something. I landed a big farmer spit in the middle of my hand. By Christ!, I said, there's not many men can say that! Stayed in your house! He looked at me proud as a dog with two cocks.

Now you said it he says and dragged happily on the butt.

And I'll tell you another thing he said – I was one of the best lads with a rifle he ever seen.

Be the hokey Jasus!, I said with my mouth open.

There you have it, he said and closed one eye: But don't breathe a word. I wouldn't please the bastards.

It was nearly dark by the time he was finished blowing up Crossley Tenders and plugging Tans.

The red eye of the cigarette glowed as he pulled on it through the pink claw of his clay-caked fingers.

I'll meet you here tomorrow he says and I wondered was he another Tiddly. But I knew he wasn't. All he wanted was a Black and Tan to sit on his knee so he could shoot him in the head. Jasus he shouts there's the priest get down get down and the two of us hunkered down. When I looked at him he had his arms wrapped around his head like an octopus. All you could hear was mumble mumble oh yes indeed and the squeak of the leather shoes as they went past. O yes, I could hear them saying, he certainly came into his own in the county final! Its all right I said they're gone now. The bastards he said, peeping out through a crack in the door, if they catch me here its more than my job's worth!

So that was the way it went. Between being Tiddly's wife and keeping an eye out for the Black and Tans for the gardener I was doing all right in that old school for pigs only for Tiddly had to go and fucking spoil it didn't he.

Sit up here now, he says and took me on his knee. O he says you're a picture. Ha ha I says the way he liked it and he says you'll never guess what I got for you.

I stuck my finger in my mouth and rolled my eyes mischievously.

Guess, he says. Go on, guess.

Sweets, I said.

No, its not sweets.

A book, I said, its a book.

No, he said, its not a book.

I tried all sorts of things but it was none of them. I could hear Tiddly rooting about behind the big armchair and the crackling paper of a parcel. His fingers were all over the place as he fumbled with the twine and tried to open it.

Let me, I said.

O, said Tiddly.

Tiddly's eyes were the size of jampot lids. I swooned.

O father it's lovely!

It was a woman's bonnet with a long white ribbon dangling down.

I felt like laughing my arse off but poor old Tiddly wouldn't have liked that biting away at the skin of his mouth oh Francis.

What do you think says I putting it on and doing a twirl for him in front of the mirror. I went spinning round the room and Tiddly got so weak he had to steady himself against the arm of the chair.

Oo do you think – ah I'm beautiful – ah!, I says.

His bottom lip was trembling. Sit up here now I says so up I went. He puts his arm around me you've no idea how much I love you Francis he says in the nights I even dream about you. I want to know everything about you. Ten Rolos, says I. Tell me all about yourself. I told him a heap of lies and true stuff mixed in. That was a good laugh, all about the football match and the town and the drunk lad and all the things that went on but that wasn't what he wanted to know. Yes yes he says but I want to know about you Francis. I'll bet you live in a nice house do you? Do you live in a nice house?

He gave me a big uncle smile and that was the first time I thought to myself: I don't like you any more Tiddly.

He chucked at the ribbon of the bonnet and crinkled up his eyes. Go on, he says you can tell me. I was going to tell him nothing but he kept at it go on go on and all this. I told him we had black and white tiles in the scullery and a twenty three inch television but that wasn't enough for him he still kept at it. The more he made me say things the redder my face was getting I had said so much now I could never go back and say that I wasn't telling him about our house at all but Nugents I had to keep going if he had stopped then it might have been all right but he didn't, he kept making me saying more and more. And that's what Mrs Nugent wanted. I saw her standing there beneath a tree in the lane behind the houses not far from me and Joe's puddle. Ma came out into the yard to take in the washing. When she seen her Mrs Nugent smiled through her thin lips. Then she went over to her and leaned over the wall. Ma stumbled with the washing piled under her arm. She just kept smiling at ma. With her eyes she was saying: I'll speak when I'm ready.

And when she was, she said: Do you know what he did? He asked me to be his mother. He said he'd give anything not to be a pig. That's what he did on you Mrs Brady. That's why he came to our house! Her breast was choking me again, lukewarm in my throat. I think I hit him first he fell back and I heard him shout Don't hurt me Francie I love you!

There was a paper knife on his desk I seen it there plenty of times I just felt around for it and tried to cut him but I couldn't get at him please please I love you! was all I could hear. Put it down!, I heard I wasn't sure who it was I think it was Bubble and someone else I couldn't see their faces right my head swum, all I could see was ma smiling and saying to me over and over again don't worry Francie no matter what she says about you I'll never believe it I'll never disown you ever ever not the way I did you ma I said no son no! she said I said its's true ma no she says but it was and it always would be no matter what I did.