Attention Saint Patrick | Page 7

hopefully forward, and another. The dinies were not bright. The three
committeemen and two members of the cabinet were thigh-deep in
water when the boat came back. They still whacked valorously if
wearily at intrusive diny heads. They still had made no progress in
implanting the idea that the dinies should go away.
The men from the mainland hauled them into the boat. They admitted
that the president had returned to Tara. Sean O'Donohue concluded that
he had gone back to supervise some shenanigans. He had. On the way
to the mainland Sean O'Donohue ground his teeth. On arrival he
learned that the president had taken Moira with him. He ground his
teeth. "Shenanigans!" he cried hoarsely. "After him!" He stamped his
feet. His fury was awe-inspiring. When the ground-car drivers started
back to Tara, Sean O'Donohue was a small, rigid embodiment of raging
death and destruction held only temporarily in leash.
On the way, even his companions of the committee were uneasy. But
one of them, now and again, brought out a small piece of whitish rock
and regarded it incredulously. It was not an unusual kind of rock. It was
ordinary milky quartz. But it had tooth marks on it. Some diny, at some
time, had gnawed casually upon it as if it were soft as cheese.
* * * * *
Faint cheering could be heard in the distance as the ground-cars
carrying the committee neared the city of Tara. To those in the vehicles,
it seemed incredible that anybody should dare to rejoice within at least
two light-years of Sean O'Donohue as he was at this moment. But the
cheering continued. It grew louder as the cars entered a street where
houses stood side by side. But there came a change in the chairman of
the Dail Committee, too.
The cars slowed because the pavement was bad to nonexistent. Trees

lined the way. An overhanging branch passed within two yards of
Moira's grandfather. Something hung on it in a sort of graceful drapery.
It was a black snake. On Eire! Sean O'Donohue saw it. It took no notice
of him. It hung comfortably in the tree and looked with great interest
toward the sounds of enthusiasm.
The deathly pallor of Sean O'Donohue changed to pale lavender. He
saw another black snake. It was climbing down a tree trunk with a
purposeful air, as if intending to look into the distant uproar. The
ground-cars went on, and the driver of the lead car swerved
automatically to avoid two black snakes moving companionably along
together toward the cheering. One of them politely gave the ground-car
extra room, but paid no other attention to it. Sean O'Donohue turned
purple.
Yet another burst of cheering. The chairman of the Dail Committee
almost, but not quite, detonated like a fission bomb. The way ahead
was blocked by people lining the way on a cross street. The cars beeped,
and nobody heard them. With stiff, jerky motions Sean O'Donohue got
out of the enforcedly stopped car. It had seemed that he could be no
more incensed, but he was. Within ten feet of him a matronly black
snake moved along the sidewalk with a manner of such assurance and
such impeccable respectability that it would have seemed natural for
her to be carrying a purse.
Sean O'Donohue gasped once. His face was then a dark purple. He
marched blindly into the mob of people before him. Somehow, the
people of Tara gave way. But the sides of this cross street were
crowded. Not only was all the population out and waiting to cheer, but
the trees were occupied. By black snakes. They hung in tasteful
draperies among the branches, sometimes two or three together. They
gazed with intense interest at the scene below them. The solicitor
general, following Sean O'Donohue, saw a black snake wriggling deftly
between the legs of the packed populace--packed as if to observe a
parade--to get a view from the very edge of the curb. The Chancellor of
the Exchequer came apprehensively behind the solicitor general.
Sean O'Donohue burst through the ranks of onlookers. He stalked out

onto the empty center of the street. He looked neither to right nor left.
He was headed for the presidential mansion, there to strangle President
O'Hanrahan in the most lingering possible manner.
But there came a roar of rejoicing which penetrated even his
single-tracked, murder-obsessed brain. He turned, purple-face and
explosive, to see what the obscene sound could mean.
He saw. The lean and lanky figure of the chief justice of the supreme
court of the Planet Eire came running down the street toward him. He
bore a large slab of sheet-iron.
As he ran, he played upon it the blue flame of a welding torch. The
smell of hot metal diffused behind