Runner-up story from our Writing Competition 2024

 

By Daniel Dunne, Mullingar, County Westmeath

 

The boys loved to spend some time at Uncle Dominic’s place. There were a few reasons for this.

To start with Uncle Dom was their favourite. He was the local blacksmith and owned the village forge. He had no family, and he was often chastised by their father for spoiling the boys too much.
Uncle Dom and Aunt Tess longed for those times when the lads could come and stay. The biggest attraction of all was that the forge was only four doors down from Austin Kelly’s shop. There were luxuries there one would never find living miles away out in the country. He sold everything from a needle to an anchor.

It was not unusual to see loaves of bread shelved close to spades, shovels, hammers, and nails, as well as pounds of butter and bags of sugar. The boys were more interested in the confectionery available there. Such luxuries were few and far between at home on the farm.

A few sticks of Peggy’s Leg would appear on occasion from their father after a fair day, or maybe when he returned from the occasional visit to the pub.
During the day, Tommy and Brian felt it their duty to be of help to their uncle, as Aunt Tess would later produce a dinner for them fit for a king, with custard and jelly afterwards. They were forewarned by their mother not to be greedy, but to earn their keep.

Their work in the forge was quite limited, apart from keeping the place tidy and manning the bellows to keep the fire going when Uncle Dom wanted to heat the metal for making the horseshoes. He was a big man, built like a bulldozer, frightening to look at, but as gentle as a lamb. He would never lose his temper and had ways of whistling, chirping, and cooing at a nervous horse when removing an old shoe and paring the hooves.

There were times when they could be in the way and to keep them safe from harm, he’d say, “Now lads, it’s time to go off and play.” Reaching into the pocket of his black stained dungarees, he’d say, “Here’s sixpence each, and head off to Kelly’s for a bar of chocolate.”

The boys, keeping to their mother’s pre-holiday lectures about manners, good behaviour, and all that, thanked him very much and headed down the village to the shop.
Austin Kelly was an astute businessman. As well as keeping his main business in the village, he ran a travelling shop, traversing the highways and byways around the country on Tuesdays and Fridays selling, bread, milk, butter, sugar, tea, flour, porridge meal and biscuits, as well as washing powder, bread soda, matches and cigarettes.

This was a godsend for people living in remote areas, as there were often shortages on the Monday after the weekend and by Friday, there was little or nothing left of the essentials in the cupboard, only the remains of the previous week’s shopping.

The Friday call would tide them over until the week’s shopping was done on a Saturday. So, this earned a nickname for Friday. It was called shake bag day. Austin provided a very welcome service for people living in remote areas and he earned their respect and appreciation with a cup of tea and a scone or a biscuit. He varied his stops to spread his afternoon tea at a different house each week.

He had a list posted on the wall of the van to make sure he had a cuppa at the correct stop each week.

When the boys were staying in the village, they’d often time their visit to coincide with the return of the travelling shop in the evening as they’d earn a little treat from Austin for helping him unload the van with any stock he hadn’t sold and place it in the storeroom at the back of the shop.
When they were finished, there was one item which they were told not to touch, but to leave in the van. It was a little black metal cash box, which rested on the top shelf and Austin never seemed to go near it.
“Why are you not taking the box in as well?” asked Tommy.
“If there’s money in it, someone could steal it,” said Brian.
“That’s my little secret,” said Austin, “there’s no money in it and I don’t want Mrs. Kelly to know about it.”
“Can you not tell us?” asked Brian?
“There’s one thing Mrs. Kelly doesn’t like and that’s smoking. So, I have a little secret stash here in the van.”
He took the little cash box down and opened it. It wasn’t locked as he had lost the key to it some years earlier. Inside were three packets of Woodbine cigarettes.
“That’s my week’s supply. Whatever you do don’t tell Mrs. Kelly.” He placed the little cash box back on the shelf and returned to the shop.

His wife was a pleasant woman, very devout and made sure she did the nine Fridays in the church during the year as well the occasional Holy hour, especially during the rosary month of October. But she couldn’t tolerate drunkenness, dancing, and smoking.

She overlooked the fact that her husband went for the occasional drink to the pub. She didn’t want to deny him some creature comforts.
But the buck stopped there.

She would not tolerate any smoking in the house. She regarded it as sinful, and the smell of tobacco would remain on the furniture and the curtains, and it would never go away.
That night, Brian, who was the older brother, lay awake and couldn’t sleep. There were thoughts going through his head. He twisted and turned many times, and it woke his younger brother.
“What’s wrong with you?” asked Tommy.
“I was just thinking.”
“About what?”
“Have you ever smoked?”
“No, I haven’t. You know Da would kill us if he caught us. As well as that we cannot buy them in the shop.”
“I’m going into sixth class this year and I know some of the boys are smoking. Wouldn’t it be great to carry a packet of fags in your pocket. You’d be a real man.”
“How are you going to get some?” asked Tommy.
“We can take Mr. Kelly’s box and hide it. He will think someone stole it.”
“That’s a mortal sin Brian and you’d have to tell it in Confession.”
“I’m going to give it a try, will you give me a hand?”
Tommy agreed, as he didn’t want to be in his brother’s bad books. As a pair, they were always agreeable with each other. He was fearful of the consequences if it was found out.

Continue reading in this week’s Ireland’s Own