Free Maggie's Breakfast by Gabriel Walsh

madness in his eyes when he heard that my father was once a British army soldier frightened me more than the priest who stole my
mother’s wedding ring.
    The Brother walked away from me and with his back turned to the rest of the class he yelled out, “I can see England rolling in the dust of Babylon! The Chinese will take Hong Kong and the
Spanish, God bless their hot-blooded hearts, will take Gibraltar, which rightfully belongs to them! And Ulster will come back to Ireland!”
    When he got to the front of the class he turned around, bamboo cane in hand, and stared back at me again. I thought I was finished. I trembled and regretted telling him about my father’s
time in the British army. As he stared at me a smile crawled over his face. He began to talk as if he was making his First Communion or his Holy Confirmation. For no reason that I could think of or
imagine, he sounded calmer and more peaceful than ever before.
    “I’ve often wondered how great England would have been if it didn’t have the Irish and others to fight its wars. If you ask me, the Irish were always too good and kind to the
English. Pity the buggers up there in the North not knowin’ if they’re English or Irish. The poor Protestants marchin’ around on Irish soil with Irish rain fallin’ all over
’em. If ya met an Orangeman in India or England he’d quickly tell ya he was Irish. If ya met the same fella in Ireland he’d tell ya he was English.”
    When he finished his political rant he turned his attention to religion.
    “Boys oh boys! You may know bits and pieces about the physical body but what do you know about your soul? Or anyone’s soul? Even the souls of the people you love most. Souls? What
are souls? What? What? Souls that are pure and clean and spotless – that’s what we strive for and seek while we live on this earth. And it’s only by having a clean and pure soul
that you can join our Heavenly Father in Heaven. D’ya know we were all pure, spotless and sinless souls in Ireland at one time?”
    There was a silence. He started again.
    “We’re the ones who put up them big heavy stones in Stonehenge. Everybody’s been wonderin’ for centuries how anyone could lift up such heavy things like that. The doctors
and educated fellas can’t account for that, you know.” He stared right at me again. “How did we put them up?” he asked me.
    I didn’t know. I didn’t even know they were up or what they were. I’d never heard of Stonehenge.
    “Where is it?” I asked.
    “Stonehenge?”
    “Yes.”
    “In England.”
    “How did they get lifted up so high?” another boy called from the back of the class.
    “Y’want to know?”
    I didn’t know what he was talking about and he was getting very excited about what he was saying. He seemed to be enjoying it.
    “How?” I asked.
    “Spiritual levitation. We were connected to the magnetic forces of the Earth and the Universe. We in Ireland know how to make things rise without touching them. An’ you want to know
somethin’ else? D’ya want to know somethin’ else?” He rattled the money in his pocket and went on talking. “That’s why the English came over here in the first
place. They were in search of their souls.”
    I shrugged my shoulders and hoped he was going to stop talking. He didn’t. He kept playing around with the bamboo cane in his hand.
    “We were the centre of commerce and trade during the Bronze Age. And most of the gold found in Mycenae came from Ireland. The treasures in our national museum here in Dublin will bear
witness to that. Go to Knocknarea in County Sligo and fascinate your imagination with your heritage. Yes, by Christ, that’s what you can do. Did you know that Ireland was never incorporated
into the Roman Empire?” The man then crashed the bamboo cane against his desk. “Oliver Cromwell was the vilest man who ever lived!”
    The class was quiet. Most of us didn’t understand the word ‘vilest’.
    Then Brother Fish