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By Root 604 0

hair over the bright red parchment of his scalp. He looked up briefly as the door creaked open and Brother Boland jittered his frail frame into the room. Boland’s watery blue eyes cowered in their sunken sockets and darted about the room as if expecting some sudden attack. The man had jittered for as long as Brother Kennedy could remember. Brother Kennedy was in his seventies and Boland seemed to him to be at least a generation older. School lore had it that when Brother Boland was in his thirties, one of the sixth years had dropped a desk on him from a third-floor window while allegedly trying to knock dirt out of the inkwell. The boy had been dispatched to Saint Loman’s Reformatory and later escaped to London. Brother Boland was never quite the same after it.

Brother Kennedy rarely exchanged words with Boland. It was too slow and arduous an undertaking, particularly first thing in the morning when the man’s speech was still staggered and hesitant.

“Ge-ge-ge-ge-ge-good morni-ni-ni-ni-ni-ni …”

“Good morning, Brother Boland.” Brother Kennedy snapped his newspaper and went back to the Gaelic football results. His county, Mayo, were not doing too well but he still held out hope that they would make the Connaught finals. More hope than he could ever hold out for the pathetic school team. The scholarship boys, mostly from the local flats and tenements, had the audacity to show their ingratitude to the Brothers by being good at soccer only. It was typical of bloody Dubliners. The more malleable boys who came from the suburbs because their parents were under some illusion about the reputation of the school were just not rough enough for Gaelic football, try though they might.

New Roof for Mullingar Dog Track in Jeopardy, Bishop May Intervene, Brother Kennedy read with interest.

Brother Boland checked his watch against the wall clock and left the common room with a reptilian urgency.

Francis Scully turned into Greater Little Werburgh Street, North. There, on the corner with the West Circular Road, stood The Brothers of Godly Coercion School for Young Boys of Meager Means, or “De Brudders,” as it was more commonly known.

The sun was shining somewhere, but not anywhere near where Scully was. A dark shroud of despair surrounded him. The long summer of drizzly days with scattered outbreaks of sunshine lay lost behind him; it was now time to go back to school.

He looked up from the ground and the appalling sight of the dead end of Greater Little Werburgh Street, North, and the heavy school gates greeted him like a bout of stomach cramps.

Forty shades of gray was the only way to describe the schoolyard. The school buildings and the monastery that surrounded it on three sides were gray. Even the windows seemed to be gray. The concrete surface of the yard was gray. The sky above it was gray. The boys’ shirts, sweaters, and trousers were gray. The only thing that broke the uniformity was the occasional black school blazer. The yard was a variegated fugue on the theme of gray. Had it been music, it would have been slow, mournful stuff played on a bassoon, a tuba, and the pedals of a church organ.

Scully turned heavily into the yard and looked around. It was exactly the same as last year, but even familiarity with the scene could not lessen its soul-sapping effect. The dull murmur of subdued teenage voices only added to the overall gloom.

“Scully, ye bollix! Are they lettin’ ye back in?”

Scully looked over to see Lynch and McDonagh sitting beside the bin in the small covered shed. He walked over and stood in front of them.

“So?” asked McDonagh.

“So, nothing,” muttered Scully.

“Yeah, right,” agreed McDonagh.

“Shite,” added Lynch meaningfully. He extended his cupped hand and Scully took the lit cigarette it contained. He took a long drag and exhaled slowly so as not to cause a cloud.

“Now, you boys!” It was Brother Loughlin, the Head Brother. He was on the steps of the monastery. “You will all go to the hall and get your class assignments there. First years will report to Mr. Laverty, second years to Mr. Devlin, third years