Free An Irish Christmas Feast by John B. Keane Page B

for the final act by finishing off their near-empty bottles and lighting fresh cigarettes.
    Indoors there followed barrage after barrage of the most intense, most damaging free-for-alls.
    â€˜The devil’s a darling,’ Mary was to say to the delight of her numerous fans on the outside. ‘Oh the devil’s a sweet commodity entirely when compared to some that I know, some that isn’t a spit away from where I sit.’
    Altogether incensed by this monstrous comparison Martin held forth with unprecedented spite.
    â€˜Repeat that before my face,’ he bawled with all his might, ‘repeat it that’s a bitch and a backbiter’s and a beggarman’s baggage. Repeat it you barefaced bouncer that never wore a slip or a knickers till she was twenty-five years of age. Repeat it you virago and I promise you that I’ll be vexed no more for I’ll baptise you proper with a two pound pot of raspberry jam and the full chamber pot that you forgot to empty for weeks, all down on the crown of your lousy head!’
    Mary Scubble rose to her feet and folded her arms in a frightening pose. She threw back her grey head so that more authority might be added to her next bombardment.
    â€˜I’ll do as I please,’ she replied at the top of her voice, a voice that showed no sign whatsoever of weakening, ‘and while I have two feet I won’t be daunted by blackguards with jam pots for my seed and breed didn’t take it from the Black and Tans not to mind taking it from you and we didn’t take it from the Peelers you dirty dago that would begrudge his own mother the colouring of her tea. If you don’t stop your ranting straightaway, you balding battle-axe, I’ll snip off your withering tassel with a stainless steel scissors.’
    â€˜Will you listen to her,’ Martin extended a hand as if he was calling upon the fire in the hearth to bear witness. ‘Oh what a mangy maggoty mongrel she is,’ his tone soared in derision. ‘Oh there is no gander as vulgar, there’s no magpie as raucous and there’s no badger as grey or mottled and to think she calls herself Christian!’
    â€˜Listen to what’s talking,’ Mary responded quickly before he had time to strengthen his advantage, ‘with his rotten poll and his withered head that didn’t host a black hair in forty full years and wrinkles all over him like they’d be ploughed by horses. Consecration is the only thing now that’ll save you, consecration by the bishop and by the four canons of the diocese and then to steep the wretch in a barrel of holy water for nine days and nine nights till the evil inside and outside is washed away and then to have the water turned into steam and fanned away to the ends of the world for fear he’d contaminate the whole of humanity.’
    Suddenly Martin cut across his wife and it seemed that he must surely strike her but no! He resorted once more to the spoken word.
    â€˜â€™Tis not in my breeding,’ said he coldly and murderously, ‘to spill female blood but yours will flow like water if you don’t put a reins on that runaway tongue of yours, that black tongue that should be hauled out by the roots and ground into mince!’
    Mary circled her husband like a cat contemplating a mouse.
    â€˜He’s gone mental this time for sure,’ she informed the tongs which she had taken into her hands. She swung the cumbersome instrument dervish-like around her head before smashing it into the fire. The bright structure collapsed about the hearth sending showers of sparks upwards and outwards. Martin withdrew towards the doorway in alarm, his hands covering his head.
    â€˜In the asylum you should be,’ he thundered, finding himself safely out of reach of the deadly weapon which his unpredictable spouse now twirled around her midriff, ‘but what asylum would take you with your name for mischief and agitation! ’Tis no one