Theresa? Why did you let her go to hell? You let my mother climb to the loft.You let me get into a state of doom. Little children’s shoes scat- tered in concentration camps. I have the abscess again. It’s in my chest and I’m hungry. St. Francis is no help, he won’t stop the tears bursting out of my two eyes, the sniffling and choking and the God oh Gods that have me on my knees with my head on the back of the pew before me and I’m so weak  with  the  hunger  and  the  crying  I  could  fall  on  the  floor  and would you please help me God or St. Francis because I’m sixteen today and I hit my mother and sent Theresa to hell and wanked all over Lim- erick and the county beyond and I dread the millstone around my neck. There is an arm around my shoulders, a brown robe, click of black rosary beads, a Franciscan priest. My child, my child, my child. I’m a child and I lean against him, little Frankie on his father’s lap, tell me all about Cuchulain, Dad, my story that Malachy can’t have or Freddie Leibowitz on the swings. My child, sit here with me.Tell me what troubles you. Only if you want to. I am Father Gregory. I’m sixteen today, Father. Oh, lovely, lovely, and why should that be a trouble to you? I drank my first pint last night. Yes? I hit my mother. God help us, my child. But He will forgive you. Is there anything else? I can’t tell you, Father. Would you like to go to confession? I can’t, Father. I did terrible things. God forgives all who repent. He sent His only Beloved Son to die for us. I can’t tell, Father. I can’t. But you could tell St. Francis, couldn’t you? He doesn’t help me anymore. But you love him, don’t you? I do. My name is Francis. Then tell him.We’ll sit here and you’ll tell him the things that trou- ble you. If I sit and listen it will only be a pair of ears for St. Francis and Our Lord.Won’t that help? 342