I’ll cut straight to the point, I says to him. We are speaking here about the arms stash in Armagh. You’re the only one that didn’t go to jail, I says. And I know you had to deny the existence of any stash. And I also know, by the way, that at that time there were certain factions, shall we say, that were more interested in getting hold of the arms in order to secure their own economic status in certain areas. And kids were getting gunned down. In our own communities. You did the right thing. You took a noble stance. You said in court that the arms did not, in fact, exist. You said it was all bravado and double-dealing. And I know that later everybody gave a statement to the high command that the weapons were actually at the bottom of a river near the border. But I’m asking you. And this is coming direct from the boys up top, boys with no personal agenda or axe to grind, boys what are only interested in guerrilla warfare and in uniting this beautiful country what is where we live. What I’m trying to say, Mr Kentigern, is that you’re the one holding the cards. And they’re the ones writing the history books.

I sit back and I take a big gulp of tea from out this chipped royal mug. Another long silence, then another coughing fit, and then he replies. Are there going to be any cracking wee birds in it? he says to me, and Tommy’s ma cursed him and all of Ireland, and Tommy cracked up laughing, and when I looked into Tommy’s eyes, into those laughing Irish eyes, it was like I could see the future, mirrored there, and I says to myself, this is going to be beautiful, so it is.

*

Wait, see if you know this one:

There’s a Irish priest, in a Vauxhall Viva,

on the other side of the border

and he’s swerving to this way and to that

across the lanes, so as the garda have got zero choice

but to pull him over,

for that.

This is on the road, from Newry to Dundalk,

I’m sure youse mind the one.

Have you been drinking, Father? the first garda says,

and he smells booze on the priest’s bad brefff.

On the passenger seat, he spies a bottle,

of Blue Nun, emptied, to the last.

Sure, says the priest, but only water has passed these lips.

Then how is it I can smell wine?

And the priest looks down, at the empty wine bottle, and he says,

Christ Jayzus, he’s done it again!

*