The Playboy of the Western World | Page 7

a dunce itself, you'd have a right to know that
larceny's robbing and stealing. Is it for the like of that you're wanting?
CHRISTY -- [with a flash of family pride.] -- And I the son of a strong
farmer (with a sudden qualm), God rest his soul, could have bought up
the whole of your old house a while since, from the butt of his
tailpocket, and not have missed the weight of it gone.
MICHAEL -- [impressed.] If it's not stealing, it's maybe something big.
CHRISTY -- [flattered.] Aye; it's maybe something big.
JIMMY. He's a wicked-looking young fellow. Maybe he followed after
a young woman on a lonesome night.
CHRISTY -- [shocked.] Oh, the saints forbid, mister; I was all times a
decent lad.
PHILLY -- [turning on Jimmy.] -- You're a silly man, Jimmy Farrell.
He said his father was a farmer a while since, and there's himself now
in a poor state. Maybe the land was grabbed from him, and he did what
any decent man would do.
MICHAEL -- [to Christy, mysteriously.] -- Was it bailiffs?
CHRISTY. The divil a one.
MICHAEL. Agents?
CHRISTY. The divil a one.
MICHAEL. Landlords?
CHRISTY -- [peevishly.] Ah, not at all, I'm saying. You'd see the like
of them stories on any little paper of a Munster town. But I'm not
calling to mind any person, gentle, simple, judge or jury, did the like of
me. [They all draw nearer with delighted curiosity.]
PHILLY. Well, that lad's a puzzle--the world.
JIMMY. He'd beat Dan Davies' circus, or the holy missioners making
sermons on the villainy of man. Try him again, Philly.
PHILLY. Did you strike golden guineas out of solder, young fellow, or
shilling coins itself?
CHRISTY. I did not, mister, not sixpence nor a farthing coin.
JIMMY. Did you marry three wives maybe? I'm told there's a
sprinkling have done that among the holy Luthers of the preaching
north.
CHRISTY -- [shyly.] -- I never married with one, let alone with a
couple or three.

PHILLY. Maybe he went fighting for the Boers, the like of the man
beyond, was judged to be hanged, quartered and drawn. Were you off
east, young fellow, fighting bloody wars for Kruger and the freedom of
the Boers?
CHRISTY. I never left my own parish till Tuesday was a week.
PEGEEN -- [coming from counter.] -- He's done nothing, so. (To
Christy.) If you didn't commit murder or a bad, nasty thing, or false
coining, or robbery, or butchery, or the like of them, there isn't anything
that would be worth your troubling for to run from now. You did
nothing at all.
CHRISTY -- [his feelings hurt.] -- That's an unkindly thing to be saying
to a poor orphaned traveller, has a prison behind him, and hanging
before, and hell's gap gaping below.
PEGEEN [with a sign to the men to be quiet.] -- You're only saying it.
You did nothing at all. A soft lad the like of you wouldn't slit the
windpipe of a screeching sow.
CHRISTY -- [offended.] You're not speaking the truth.
PEGEEN -- [in mock rage.] -- Not speaking the truth, is it? Would you
have me knock the head of you with the butt of the broom?
CHRISTY -- [twisting round on her with a sharp cry of horror.] -- Don't
strike me. I killed my poor father, Tuesday was a week, for doing the
like of that.
PEGEEN [with blank amazement.] -- Is it killed your father?
CHRISTY -- [subsiding.] With the help of God I did surely, and that
the Holy Immaculate Mother may intercede for his soul.
PHILLY -- [retreating with Jimmy.] -- There's a daring fellow.
JIMMY. Oh, glory be to God!
MICHAEL -- [with great respect.] -- That was a hanging crime, mister
honey. You should have had good reason for doing the like of that.
CHRISTY -- [in a very reasonable tone.] -- He was a dirty man, God
forgive him, and he getting old and crusty, the way I couldn't put up
with him at all.
PEGEEN. And you shot him dead?
CHRISTY -- [shaking his head.] -- I never used weapons. I've no
license, and I'm a law-fearing man.
MICHAEL. It was with a hilted knife maybe? I'm told, in the big world
it's bloody knives they use.

CHRISTY -- [loudly, scandalized.] -- Do you take me for a
slaughter-boy?
PEGEEN. You never hanged him, the way Jimmy Farrell hanged his
dog from the license, and had it screeching and wriggling three hours at
the butt of a string, and himself swearing it was a dead dog, and the
peelers swearing it had life?
CHRISTY. I did not then. I just riz the loy and let fall the edge of it on
the ridge of his skull, and