full price and interest on top.You pay her back weekly. Some of her cus-
tomers fall behind in their payments and they need threatening letters.
She says, Ill give you threepence for every letter you write and another
threepence if it brings a payment. If you want the job come here on
Thursday and Friday nights, and bring your own paper and envelopes.
Im desperate for that job. I want to go to America. But I have no
money for paper and envelopes. Next day Im delivering a telegram to
Woolworths and there is the answer,a whole section packed with paper
and envelopes. I have no money so I have to help myself. But how? Two
dogs save the day for me, two dogs at the door of Woolworths stuck
together after the excitement.They yelp and run in circles. Customers
and sales clerks giggle and pretend to be looking someplace else and
while theyre busy pretending I slip paper and envelopes under my
sweater, out the door and off on my bike far from stuck dogs.
Mrs. Finucane looks suspicious. Thats very fancy stationery you
have there, by. Is that your mothers? Youll give that back when you get
the money, wont you, by?
Oh, I will.
From now on Im never to come to her front door.Theres a lane
behind her house and Im to come in the back door for fear someone
might see me.
In a large ledger she gives me the names and addresses of six cus-
tomers behind in their payments.Threaten em, by. Frighten the life out
of em.
My first letter,
Dear Mrs. OBrien,
Inasmuch as you have not seen fit to pay me what you
owe me I may be forced to resort to legal action.Theres your
son, Michael, parading around the world in his new suit
which I paid for while I myself have barely a crust to keep
body and soul together. I am sure you dont want to languish
in the dungeons of Limerick jail far from friends and family.
I remain, yours in litigious anticipation,
Mrs. Brigid Finucane
She tells me,Thats a powerful letter, by, better than anything youd
read in the Limerick Leader. That word, inasmuch, thats a holy terror of
a word.What does it mean?
331