The Poor Mouth by Flann O’Brien, Patrick C. Power Read Free Book Online Page B

on in silence. Annie began to lay the table for tea.
    –I don’t think, Mr Collopy said at last, there there will be any need for you boys to go to school tomorrow and maybe the day after. Mourning, you know. The Brothers will understand.
    The brother put his glass down on the range with a clinking thud.
    –Is that so, Mr Collopy, he said in a testy voice. Well now is that so? Let me tell you this. I am not going back to that damned school tomorrow, the day after or any day.
    Mr Collopy started up in astonishment.
    –What was that? he asked.
    –I’ve left school—from today. I’ve had my bellyful of the ignorant guff that is poured out by those maggots of Christian Brothers. They’re illiterate farmers’ sons. They probably got their learning at some dirty hedge school.
    –Will you for pity’s sake have some respect for the cloth of those saintly servants of God, Mr Collopy said sharply.
    –They’re not servants of God, they are slaves to their own sadistic passions, they are humbugs and impostors and a disgrace to their cloth. They are ruining the young people of this country and taking pride in their abominable handiwork.
    –Have you no shame?
    –I have more shame than those buggers have. Anyhow, I’m finished with school for good. I want to earn my living.
    –Well now, is that so? Doing what? Driving a tram or a breadcart, or maybe sweeping up after the horses on the roads?
    –I said I wanted to earn my living. What am I talking about—I am earning my living. I am a publisher, an international tutor. Look at that!
    Here he had rummaged in his inside pocket and pulled out a spectacular wad of notes.
    –Look at that, he cried. There’s about sixty-five pounds in that bundle and upstairs I have twenty-eight pounds in postal orders not yet cashed. You have your pension and no work to do, and no desire to do any.
    –That will do you, Mr Collopy retorted with rising temper, that is quite enough. You say I have no work to do. Where you got that information I cannot say. But let me tell you this, you and your brother. I have been engaged on one of the most ardious and patriotic projects ever attempted by any man in this town. You will hear all about it when I’m gone. You have a damned cheek to say I do no work. What, with my health in the state it’s in?
    –Don’t ask me that. I’ve left school and that’s all.
    The subject seemed to become inert and was dropped. It had been a tiring day, physically and emotionally, and both Mr Collopy and the brother were the worse for drink. Later, in bed, the brother asked me whether I intended to continue going to the Brothers in Synge Street.
    –I might as well for the present, I replied, until I can find some job to fit into.
    –Please yourself, he said, but I don’t think this place is suitable for me. An Irish address is no damned use. The British dislike and distrust it. They think all the able and honest people live in London. I am giving that matter some thought.

9
    D URING the year that followed Mrs Crotty’s death, the atmosphere of the house changed somewhat. Annie joined some sort of a little club, probably composed mostly of women who met every afternoon to play cards or discuss household matters. She seemed to be—heavens!— coming out of her shell. Mr Collopy returned to his mysterious work with renewed determination, not infrequently having meetings of his committee in our kitchen after warning everybody that this deliberative chamber was out of bounds for that evening. From an upper window I occasionally saw the arrival of his counsellors. Two elderly ladies and the tall, gaunt man of the funeral came, also Mr Rafferty with a young lady who looked to me, in the distance at least, to be pretty.
    The brother went from strength to strength and eventually reached the stage of prosperity that is marked by borrowing money for industrial expansion. From little bits of information and from inference, I understood that he had borrowed £400 short-term