door goes in, I climb in Mr.Timoney’s window for Gulliver’sTravels and walk miles to the City Home so that he won’t miss his reading.The man at the gate says,What? You want to come in an’ read to an oul’ man? Is it coddin’ me you are? Get outa here before I call the guards. Could I leave the book for someone else to read to Mr.Timoney? Leave it. Leave it for Jaysus sake an’ don’t be botherin’ me. I’ll send it up to him. And he laughs. Mam says, What’s up with you? Why are you moping? And I tell her  how  Uncle  Pat  doesn’t  want  me  anymore  and  how  they  put Mr. Timoney in the City Home for laughing just because Macushla bit  the postman, the milkman and a passing nun. She laughs too and I’m  sure the world is gone mad. Then she says, Ah, I’m sorry and it’s a pity you lost two jobs.You might as well start going to the Confra- ternity again to keep The Posse away and, worse, the director, Father Gorey. Declan tells me sit in front of him and if there’s any blaguarding he’ll  break my feckin’ neck for he’ll be watching me as long as he’s prefect and no little shit like me is going to keep him from a life in linoleum. Mam  says  she  has  trouble  climbing  the  stairs  and  she’s  moving  her bed to the kitchen. She laughs, I’ll come back up to Sorrento when the walls are damp and the rain runs under the door. School is over and she can stay in bed in the kitchen as long as she likes because she doesn’t have to get up for us. Dad lights the fire, makes the tea, cuts the bread, makes sure we wash our faces and tells us go out and play. He lets us stay  in bed if we like but you never want to stay in bed when there’s no school.We’re ready to run out and play in the lane the minute we wake. Then one day in July he says we can’t go downstairs.We have to stay up here and play. Why, Dad? Never mind. Play here with Malachy and Michael and you can go down later when I tell you. He stands at the door in case we might get a notion to wander down the stairs.We push our blanket up in the air with our feet and pre- 179