An Irish Christmas Feast Read Free Page A

won’t see you as a threat to him.’
    In truth, the new curate presented a greater threat to the housekeeper. She knew this from the beginning. When Father Canty retired and retire he must, sooner rather than later, she would find herself unemployed. There would be no place for her in the Old Priests’ Home where elderly parish priests spent their declining years. No lay people were employed on the staff which was made up exclusively of nuns. With care, however, and unremitting attention to Father Canty’s welfare she would see to it that it would be many a year before he relinquished his pastorship. Please God they would sustain each other to the very end. It would not be her fault if his parochial duties were terminated prematurely.
    Agnes heaved a great sigh of contentment as she poured the boiling water over the whiskey, lemon, sugar and cloves in the tall glass. The sugar began to melt instantly while the glistening lemon surfaced tantalisingly at the rim.
    Agnes Mallowan inhaled the uprising steam and wondered, not for the first time, if she was placing her Confirmation pledge in jeopardy. Always she would reassure herself that there was no harm in steam and that the whiskey content therein was at such a minimum that it must surely be rendered ineffective before infiltrating the nostrils.
    Just to be sure that her pledge remained intact she inhaled only once. She might have averted her head but then how would she identify the tiny foreign bodies such as flecks, specks and motes which needed to be extracted from his reverence’s punch before she deemed it worthy for delivery not that he would notice for he always kept his eyes firmly closed as he swallowed.
    He drank noisily.
    â€˜There is no satisfaction,’ he would explain, ‘unless I can hear myself drinking. It helps me relish the punch even more.’
    From the moment he closed his eyes preparatory to the first swallow he would keep them closed, blindly extending the glass in her general direction, before drawing the coverlet under his chin. She always stood in close attendance while he drank and, upon receipt of the glass, would lower the wick in the shapely globe of the paraffin lamp before blowing out the flame. Then she would withdraw silently, closing the bedroom door behind her. Now, as she gently stirred the amber mixture with a slender spoon before embarking on the upstairs journey, the contentment departed her placid features and was replaced by a frown. It was a frown with which every parishioner in the remote, rambling parish was familiar. Agnes Mallowan was best avoided while the frown was in residence. Otherwise she was good-humoured and tractable. The frown deepened when the front door bell rang for the second time.
    â€˜Let them wait!’ she spoke out loud and ascended the tarpaulin covered stairs. Gently she knocked on the bedroom door.
    â€˜Come!’ the response was immediate.
    She stood silently at the bedside while he closed the leather-bound copy of Ivanhoe without marking the page and placed it on the table near the bed. He liked to open the covers of his favourite novels at random and proceed from the beginning of the paragraph which presented itself.
    â€˜It was a quiet Christmas thank God,’ he said as he accepted the punch. He swallowed without closing his eyes and she knew that he had heard the front door bell. He would ask about it. If only she had brought him the punch ten minutes earlier he would be fast asleep and the caller or callers could be fobbed off till morning.
    Certain parishioners, especially the more isolated, had a habit of making mountains out of molehills as far as sick calls were concerned.
    â€˜Better go and see who’s at the door Agnes,’ he spoke resignedly, ‘we don’t want to be the cause of sending some poor soul to hell for the want of a priest.’
    â€˜Yes Father. At once Father,’ she answered dutifully. She could truthfully say that never