Grandma is wailing at my mother, Mother o God, Angela, whats
up with you in the bed? What did they do to you?
My mother runs her tongue over her dry lips and gasps for more
lemonade.
She wants lemonade, says Michael, and we got it for her and bread
and marmalade and were all outlaws now. Frankie was the first outlaw
till we went raiding for coal all over Limerick.
Guard Dennehy looks interested and takes Michael downstairs by
the hand and in a few minutes we hear him laughing.Aunt Aggie says
thats a disgraceful way to behave with my mother sick in the bed.The
guard comes back and tells her go for a doctor. He keeps covering his
face with his cap whenever he looks at me or my brothers.Desperadoes,
he says, desperadoes.
The doctor comes with Aunt Aggie in his motor car and he has to
rush my mother to the hospital with her pneumonia.Wed all like to go
riding in the doctors car but Aunt Aggie says, No, ye are all coming to
my house till yeer mother comes home from the hospital.
I tell her not to bother. Im eleven and I can easily look after my
brothers. Id be glad to stay at home from school and make sure every-
one is fed and washed. But Grandma screams I will do no such a thing
and Aunt Aggie gives me a thump for myself. Guard Dennehy says Im
too young yet to be an outlaw and a father but I have a promising future
in both departments.
Get your clothes, says Aunt Aggie, ye are coming to my house till
yeer mother is out of the hospital. Jesus above, that baby is a disgrace.
She finds a rag and ties it around Alphies bottom for fear he might
shit all over the pram.Then she looks at us and wants to know why were
standing there with our faces hanging out after she told us get our clothes.
Im afraid shell hit me or yell at me when I tell her its all right, we have
our clothes, theyre on us. She stares at me and shakes her head. Here,
she says, put some sugar and water in the childs bottle. She tells me I
have to push Alphie through the streets, she cant manage the pram with
that bockety wheel that makes it rock back and forth and besides tis a
disgraceful-looking object shed be ashamed to put a mangy dog in. She
takes the three old coats from our bed and piles them on the pram till you
can hardly see Alphie at all.
Grandma comes with us and barks at me all the way from Roden
Lane to Aunt Aggies flat in Windmill Street. Cant you push that pram
properly? Jesus, youre going to kill that child. Stop goin from side to
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