Theresa Carmody answers the door.She has the consumption and theyre
afraid of catching it from her. Shes seventeen, in and out of the sanato-
rium, and shell never see eighteen.The boys at the post office say sick
people like Theresa know theres little time left and that makes them mad
for love and romance and everything. Everything.Thats what the con-
sumption does to you, say the boys at the post office.
I cycle through wet November streets thinking of that shilling tip,
and as I turn into the Carmody street the bicycle slides out from under
me and I skid along the ground scraping my face and tearing open the
back of my hand.Theresa Carmody opens the door. She has red hair.
She had green eyes like the fields beyond Limerick. Her cheeks are
bright pink and her skin is a fierce white. She says, Oh, youre all wet
and bleeding.
I skidded on my bike.
Come in and Ill put something on your cuts.
I wonder,Should I go in? I might get the consumption and that will
be the end of me. I want to be alive when Im fifteen and I want the
shilling tip.
Come in.Youll perish standing there.
She puts on the kettle for the tea.Then she dabs iodine on my cuts
and I try to be a man and not whimper. She says, Oh, youre a great bit
of a man. Go into the parlor and dry yourself before the fire. Look, why
dont you take off your pants and dry them on the screen of the fire?
Ah, no.
Ah, do.
I will.
I drape my pants over the screen. I sit there watching the steam rise
and I watch myself rise and I worry she might come in and see me in
my excitement.
There she is with a plate of bread and jam and two cups of tea.Lord,
she says, you might be a scrawny bit of a fellow but thats a fine boyo
you have there.
She puts the plate and the cups on a table by the fire and there they
stay.With her thumb and forefinger she takes the tip of my excitement
and leads me across the room to a green sofa against the wall and all the
time my head is filled with sin and iodine and fear of consumption and
the shilling tip and her green eyes and shes on the sofa dont stop or Ill
die and shes crying and Im crying for I dont know whats happening
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