to say the prayers, and when we returned to the room, Grandma gave
Dad money to bring a few bottles of stout from the pub. Mam said, No,
no, but Grandma said, He doesnt have the pills to ease him, God help
us, and a bottle of stout will be some small comfort.Then she told him
hed have to go to the undertaker tomorrow to bring the coffin back in
a carriage. She told me to go with my father and make sure he didnt
stay in the pub all night and drink all the money. Dad said, Och, Frankie
shouldnt be in pubs, and she said,Then dont stay there. He put on his
cap and we went to Souths pub and he told me at the door I could go
home now, that hed be home after one pint. I said, No, and he said,
Dont be disobedient. Go home to your poor mother. I said, No, and he
said I was a bad boy and God would be displeased. I said I wasnt going
home without him and he said, Och, what is the world coming to? He
had one quick pint of porter in the pub and we went home with the
bottles of stout. Pa Keating was in our room with a small bottle of
whiskey and bottles of stout and Uncle Pat Sheehan brought two bot-
tles of stout for himself. Uncle Pat sat on the floor with his arms around
his bottles and he kept saying,Theyre mine, theyre mine, for fear theyd
be taken from him. People who were dropped on their heads always
worry someone will steal their stout. Grandma said,All right, Pat, drink
your stout yourself. No one will bother you. She and Aunt Aggie sat on
the bed by Eugene. Pa Keating sat at the kitchen table drinking his stout
and offering everyone a sip of his whiskey. Mam took her pills and sat
by the fire with Malachy on her lap. She kept saying Malachy had hair
like Eugene and Aunt Aggie said no he did not till Grandma drove her
elbow into Aunt Aggies chest and told her shut up. Dad stood against
the wall drinking his stout between the fireplace and the bed with
Eugene.Pa Keating told stories and the big people laughed even though
they didnt want to laugh or they werent supposed to laugh in the pres-
ence of a dead child.He said when he was in the English army in France
the Germans sent gas over which made him so sick they had to take him
to the hospital.They kept him in the hospital a while and then sent him
back to the trenches. English soldiers were sent home but they didnt
give a fiddlers fart about the Irish soldiers, whether they lived or died.
Instead of dying Pa made a vast fortune. He said he solved one of the
great problems of trench warfare. In the trenches it was so wet and
muddy they had no way of boiling the water for the tea.He said to him-
self, Jasus, I have all this gas in my system and tis a great pity to waste it.
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