drift off till the Angelus booms out of the Redemptorist church and we know we’re in trouble with Aunt Aggie for being late. We don’t care. She can yell at us all she wants but we had a grand time out the country with the cows and the sheep and then the lovely fire above in Italy. You can tell she never has grand times like that. Electric light and a lavatory but no grand times. Grandma comes for her on Thursdays and Sundays and they take the bus to the hospital to see Mam. We can’t go because children are not allowed and if we say, How’s Mam? they look cranky and tell us she’s all right, she’ll live.We’d like to know when she’s getting out of hospital so that we can all go back home but we’re afraid to open our mouths. Malachy tells Aunt Aggie one day he’s hungry and could he have a piece of bread.She hits him with a rolled-up Little Messenger of the Sacred Heart and there are tears on his eyelashes. He doesn’t come home from school the next day and he’s still gone at bedtime.Aunt Aggie says,Well, I suppose he ran away. Good riddance. If he was hungry he’d be here. Let him find comfort in a ditch. Next day Michael runs in from the street, Dad’s here, Dad’s here, and runs back out and there’s Dad sitting on the hall floor hugging Michael,  crying, Your  poor  mother,  your  poor  mother,  and  there’s  a smell of drink on him.Aunt Aggie is smiling, Oh, you’re here, and she makes tea and eggs and sausages. She sends me out for a bottle of stout for Dad and I wonder why she’s so pleasant and generous all of a sud- den. Michael says, Are we going to our own house, Dad? We are, son. Alphie is back in the pram with the three old coats and coal and wood for the fire. Aunt Aggie stands at her door and tells us be good boys, come back for tea anytime, and there’s a bad word for her in my head, Oul’ bitch. It’s in my head and I can’t help it and I’ll have to tell the priest in confession. Malachy isn’t in a ditch, he’s there in our own house eating fish and chips a drunken soldier dropped at the gate of the Sarsfield Barracks. Mam comes home in two days. She’s weak and white and walks slowly. She says,The doctor told me keep warm, have plenty of rest and nourishing food, meat and eggs three times a week. God help us, those poor doctors don’t have a notion of not having.Dad makes tea and toasts bread for her on the fire. He fries bread for the rest of us and we have a lovely night up in Italy where it’s warm. He says he can’t stay forever, he 248