And I did run, Yes Siree Bob! I didn’t want to see or hear what was about to happen but the lane is rough and long and I tripped and fell and skinned my good Holy Communion knees. Jeepers, they stung! I held my hands over them ’til they calmed down a bit then I picked up the spuds lying one here, one there and carried on. I had to make it past the white wall at the end of the orchard at the back of Johns Farm, then I’d be safe. Mammy never crossed that point. When I got indoors I got hugs and kisses and even a plaster from Mrs Johns.

I loved getting a plaster. At home I got iodine. Mrs Johns has a big roll of plaster and cuts off a piece the right size for each cut. She saw my poorly lip before I remembered to suck it in. Ages ago, I told her about the strap that is kept in the scullery even though I know I shouldn’t have. Once I showed her the kind of mark it can leave on the back of a leg. I got a second slice of cake that day.

She’s called Poor Bridie Johns because she’s had TWO husbands and they’re BOTH dead and she can’t cook, she could burn water. It would be nice to have her as my mother. Mrs Johns has only one child left because, like Mammy, two of her sons died as little boys, so she would have room for me. I could sleep in the Lower Room at Johns Farm, I’d be no trouble.

I imagine all four of the little baby boys flying about as angels in Heaven because THANK GOD they were all christened and didn’t have to go to Limbo. I close my eyes and watch them roar about with their goldy angel wings, swooping around the chapel like swallows in spring and hovering at our backs when we stop to pray at the graves. Frances Rattigan, 23 March–30 April 1955; Declan Rattigan, 7 January–10 February 1964; Eugene Johns, 20 April 1953–7 September 1958; and Daniel Johns, 24 November 1956–21 November 1960. If I’m not careful I can think about the muck hitting their little eyes the same way it did when Daddy buried the kittens.

Mrs Johns plants a jokey kiss on both of my cut knees to make it really, really better so I wrap my arms around her neck and she hugs me back and says, what we need now is a treat!