house, who makes me laugh over Ukridge and Bertie Wooster and
Jeeves and all the Mulliners. Bertie Wooster is rich but he eats his egg
every morning for fear of what Jeeves might say. I wish I could talk to
the girl in the blue dress or anyone about the books but Im afraid the
Kerry nurse or Sister Rita might find out and theyd move me to a big-
ger ward upstairs with fifty empty beds and Famine ghosts galore with
green mouths and bony fingers pointing.At night I lie in bed thinking
about Tom Brown and his adventures at Rugby School and all the char-
acters in P. G.Wodehouse. I can dream about the red-lipped landlords
daughter and the highwayman, and the nurses and nuns can do nothing
about it. Its lovely to know the world cant interfere with the inside of
your head.
Its August and Im eleven. Ive been in this hospital for two months
and I wonder if theyll let me out for Christmas.The Kerry nurse tells
me I should get down on my two knees and thank God Im alive at all
at all and not be complaining.
Im not complaining, nurse, Im only wondering if Ill be home for
Christmas.
She wont answer me. She tells me behave myself or shell send Sis-
ter Rita up to me and then Ill behave myself.
Mam comes to the hospital on my birthday and sends up a package
with two chocolate bars and a note with names of people in the lane
telling me get better and come home and youre a great soldier,Frankie.
The nurse lets me talk to her through the window and its hard because
the windows are high and I have to stand on Seamuss shoulders. I tell
Mam I want to go home but she says Im a bit too weak and surely Ill
be out in no time. Seamus says, Tis a grand thing to be eleven because
any day now youll be a man shaving and all and ready to get out and
get a job and drink your pint good as any man.
After fourteen weeks Sister Rita tells me I can go home and arent
I a lucky boy that the day will be the feast of St. Francis of Assisi. She
tells me I was a very good patient, except for that little problem with
the poem and Patricia Madigan, God rest her, and Im invited to come
back and have a big Christmas dinner in the hospital. Mam comes for
me and with my weak legs it takes us a long time to walk to the bus at
Union Cross. She says,Take your time.After three and a half months we
can spare an hour.
People are at their doors on Barrack Road and Roden Lane telling
me its grand to see me back, that Im a great soldier, a credit to my
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