The afternoon play is Fred Brimble, based on a short story by John B. Keane, who sadly died last year.Today would have been John B.'s 75th birthday.The short story has been dramatised by Kerry Lee Crabb, and stars Adela Hakanla and Doreen Keogh.
My lord, a wee dram, if you please.Welcome, stranger.
Are you passing through?Passing through?I'm moving in.Moving in?Are you, uh, by any chance taking the bungalow below by the crossroads?The pink bungalow itself.My name is Paddy O'Shea Poulter.Matt Weir, publican.The pink bungalow, is it?
Opposite the thatch?Bang opposite.The thatch belonging to the Conlins, that'd be.The Conlins? Tell me more.You've come to the right place.Say nothing till you hear more.I'm all ears.
Do you see your man sitting with his back to us, there beside the fire?
Hunched over in a heap and gazing into the flame?Shh!
That there is Jim Conlon, your new neighbor.Will I bow over and introduce myself?Not in time, Paddy. All things in good order and good time.Before you leave your stool, there's things you should know to say, and other things not to say.
Do you follow me?Not yet.Rest easy now till I fill you in.You'll thank me after.
Fill me in.Good evening, Doc.Your usual brandy?I had triple match.There's germs about.Oh, there is surely.I was sneezing myself only this morning.Bless you.
This here, Doc, is one Paddy O'Shea.Poulterer.Moving into the bungalow down by the crossroads.
Doc Dolan.Happy to shake your hand, man.The pink bungalow, is it?
I'm thinking I may repaint it.Opposite the Conlon.Do you see?
Have you told him at all?
What?The Doc here will give you the lowdown on my mother. Whilst I tend to a few lone birds, I see languishing about the place.
Go easy now, da.I will, I will, I will, I will.Now, Paddy, my man, what have you heard?Nothing.Nothing.Well, Maggie Conlon, mother of Jimmy Conlon, him slumped over by the fair there behind you, is a woman well in her seventies.So?Does she look it?
Oh, not at all.I'd say she belies her age by several years.Her hair, for instance, retains the most of its raven black. The eyes on her, bright and clear, dimly clear.
Her step is jaunty, and her appetite, she'd never admit this now, not to me, you, nor anybody, is hearty.Unimpaired, as we say in my trade.Would you say now that she'd be well pleased with the state of her general health?
I'd say her lot sounds a happy one.
No, alas, the opposite is the case.Maggie Conlon, your new neighbour, is a hypochondriac. one of the worst to come my way in 30 years of practice.
A cast-iron fact, man.To tell the God's honest truth, I've never been able to find a thing wrong with her.But hope springs eternal with Maggie.Ho-ho!Even when the best specialists have drawn a blank.
She keeps me and the local pharmacist in business, I don't mind admitting.She sounds the case.Oh, you can say that again.The mystery is she's managed to survive it all.
What with the unbelievable intake of potions and pills, not to mention the various liniments and lotions, she harasses the imaginary aches and diseases with.And you know what the most malignant aspect of this type of hypochondria is, Paddy?
By the hokey, it must nearly kill her.It hasn't hastened her demise at all.Why?But it dispatched her husband, Jim's father there, to an early grave.I'm not surprised.
Though there are some men who thrive off selfish wives, I've seen it.They excel themselves in the face of adversity.
True enough, true enough.But there are others who suffer in silence. waiting only for death to rescue them.Maggie's husband, I fear, was of this leather mould.
A gold engraved one.And a son?
Young Jim? You knew him well in the old days, didn't you, Father?
What, uh, Jim Conlon?Oh, I did indeed.Poor wee man.Oh, just a lemonade, if you're buying.Thanks, Doctor.
Father Fogarty.Meet Paddy O'Shea, Polterer.Moving into the bungalow down by the crossroads, so he is... Not the pink monstrosity.
Pleased to meet you, Father.I was thinking of doing the place up blue.As soon as I settle in.Well, blue, pink or white, you'll still be opposite the Conlons.
Do you know, I think it's the cycling makes me so thirsty.
Matt, a lemonade and a triple brandy.And another whiskey when you're ready.
Coming up.Yes, I've known the boy Jim now from the second he was born, bawling right up to the melancholy man who moves among us today.Look at him, chasing his dreams up the chimney.Don't make a show of it for Pete's sake.Be merciful.
What is it that ails him?Well, of course, he lives with the mother.No more need be said.Except only this.He should have married.Made his getaway.Headed for the hills with a bride on his arm.Well, there was time.
Myself, now, I tried and I tried to get him matched.Every local dance and parish get-together, I'd introduce him around, peel him off the wall, and thrust him at a well-brought-up Christian female.
Of which there's no shortage hereabouts.More's the pity.
Indeed.Now, will you look at him now?Look.Oh, easy, easy, easy. Discretion is the better part of valor, huh?
A mild-mannered, easy-going fella, asking little enough of the world, a decent indoor job, bookkeeper at the local creamery, with a more than adequate wage.
Grandbranny this, father.Do you remember nice Nola now?
Remember her, huh?How could I ever forget her?Nola was the nicest girl you could hope to clap eyes on.
Nice Nola.A skin like peaches and cream.
Haunches on her like a young heifer.Tis well I remember the carnival dance, 1951, when those two lovebirds first fell off their perches into each other's line of space.
Young Jim had somehow finagled a night off from tending to the mother.Yeah, the Sunday suit and shirt on him, the bull cream soaking into his collar at the back.
And nice Nuala in an adapted communion dress with frills and fubblos and ribbons in her hair.
Break it up now, boys and girls.Break it up.There's Arden Jade galore on the treacherous table there for you after all that thirsty work.Jim, what are you doing hovering there by the door?
Oh, I'm fine here.Thank you, Father.It's a grand sight to see all the youngsters hopping and leaping to the music.No spectators allowed, Jim.Aren't you still a youngster yourself?Oh, I wouldn't go that far, Father. Besides, I have two left feet.
Come on now, man.I will brook no excuses out of you.There's enough wallflowers here to fill a meadow.Come along with me and say hello to Nuala.
You won't find a nicer girl in a month of Sundays.
Which one is she?The round girl, look, with the green ribbons, pretending to read the parish newsletter. Nola!Nola!Over here, girl.I have a man lined up for you for the next dance.
Yes!Nola, meet Jim Condon.Works above in the Creamery.The steadiest pair of hands in the hall.Disney, please don't worry about Father.
How do you do, Jim?Do you like the band?Band?I'm afraid I'm not a great dancer.
Me neither. Why don't we just sit this one out?You dare!Neither one of you is taking to the floor all evening!Away with you!You're lunged!They're off!Oops, sorry.
My fault.Sorry.Oh, sorry.
Not at all.My stupid feet.
No, mine.Do you enjoy this type of thing at all, Nuala?
I don't know.I've never tried it before.
Nor me.If I'd known it would come to this, I'd have put in a bit of practice.
As luck would have it, it turns out they had much more in common than the four left feet.Ah, yes.Nice Nola had lost her mother to pneumonia when she was only six.
Poor girl.Just as Jim there lost his dad when he was only four.
And did the terrible early losses bring the two of them together?Oh, love at first sight, I say, would you, father?
Between the skeeler's reel and the last waltz, the thing was set in stone, cemented, you could tell from the blush on her neck and the way he walked to his bicycle.
Come summer they took to strolling every evening under the oaks and sycamores down by the river.
Oh, but me ma was a poor wee woman.
Was it a slow-lingering type of a death, or more short and sharp?
Short and sharp.You're a sensitive soul, you are, Jimmy Candlin.No man ever asked me that before.
Well, me own father, see, collapsed at the head of the stairs.It brings me closer to you somehow.
What was it brought about the death of him? I want to know all about you.
Fatigue.From dawn to dusk he was on call.
For what?Husbandly attentions?
No such luck.Poultices, hot drinks, gargles and numerous other medicaments.Me ma was too busy warding off occupational diseases and wayward draughts.The germs of romance can only blossom in perfume surroundings.
Instead of being slowly but surely exterminated by the smell of deadly disinfectants.
You now, Nuala.The smell of sugar and spice and all things nice.Kiss me.Marry me.We could get a motorbike and a sidecar.
And babies, Jim.Oh, I will.I will.
So down the primrose path they tripped, blessed their cotton socks and soaring souls, till they hit the bad wire barricade of the mother's health, or lack of it.
Ma'am, ma'am, are you in?There's someone here I have to introduce to you.
Oh, quiet now, Jim, for pity's sake.My head is splitting.Hello there, Mrs. Conlon. Jim has told me all about you.Who's this?Nuala, Mother.Nuala McBride.Jim, turn off that lamp.It's bearing down on me right between the eyes.
Do you often suffer from the headaches, Mrs. Conlon?Hasn't he told you?I'm a martyr to them.Will I get you a drink of water?Water?Water?Do you think I'm cotton?Jim, help me up.There's only one thing for it.
I'll have to lie down in the dark with the curtains closed and absolute quiet till this passes.Ma, me and Nuala's thinking of getting... Shh!Show her the door.I can't have strange women in the place while I'm above in the bed.
There's enough strain on me as it is.
Don't tell me in the battle of wills your man gave in to the mother.
A reed in the wind. Though a nice Nuala did all she could to stiffen his resolve.
I remember the two of them sitting one lunchtime in that corner by the door.
I couldn't help overhearing.Nuala, I'm in bits.Don't turn your back on me now.I have my eye on the very sidecar.
Jim, I'm willing to marry you.And I'm willing to devote the rest of my life to you.But it'll have to be in a town or city a long way from here.
I just can't walk out on her altogether.After all, she's my own mother.
I'm not asking you to walk out on her. You can visit her from time to time, and she can visit us if she feels like it.You have your own life to live, and I'm sure your mother will accept this when you explain it to her.Nicely.
Why are you talking to me like this?
All bolt upright and cut and dried like a civic guard.
I'm laying down the law, that's all, Jim.It is better to be clear about these things now than repent and regret later.
Oh, Nuala, come for a walk, will you?Down by the river, like we used to.
Not now, Jim.I have to go home and finish a jigsaw.
Nuala, sit down, please.Won't you have another Virgin Mary and talk this over?
Don't quit.Promise.I'll think of something.I know I will.I want you by my side so much, forever and a day.
So that very night, Jim went home and read the riot act to the mother, all fired up.Do you see?
I can't.Not really. be in two places at the one time.That's the conundrum I'm trying to solve.
Jim, why are you talking to me like this?Like what?All cut and dried and bolt upright, like a civic guard.
I'm putting me cards on the table, is all, ma.I'm a grown man now, and I have me own life to lead.
I never heard the like.I mean, it's not as if I were asking the pair of you to come and live with me under this roof, is it?
Not in so many words.Then anyway.
Where are you going to get another job if you leave Deering Row?Have you thought of that?
I'll get another job, all right, with my experience and decent references.References?
Experience?I'd like to see you fend for yourself outside the four walls of that creamery.You'll worry me into an early grave.I'm thirty-one!You think I don't know that?Thirty-one years for me of fretting and fainting and...
Ma, Ma, are you all right?
Oh, what does it look like?Get me on to the couch, will you?Should I send for the doctor?Doctor?An ambulance.It's the hospital for me this time, Jim.
Don't you know an emergency when you see one?
Oh, swear to me, son.Swear by all that's holy.
I swear it, Ma.If you live, I'll never set foot outside of Dereen Row.
And then, of course, it was straight out of the frying pan and into the fire.
And you're putting her first.She's not a well woman.She's as fit as a fiddle, and she's playing you like a fish.A fish?I've never been called that before.Don't start sulking on me, Jim.Are you a man or a mouse?
Mouse, fish.I don't know whether I'm coming or going.
Wish now, Jim.For I've something important to confess to you.
Confess?What is it?What have you done?
Nothing.Yes.This is the way of it, Jim.My father's lined me up with a friend of his from Listowel to go to the pictures with next weekend.And I can't get out of it.Pictures?Yes.Odd man out.He has a car.
Odd man out?Who is he, this customer?
I told you.He's from Listowel.Just a small farmer.
Twelve acres, that's all.
Twelve.Could be smaller, I suppose.And do you like him?
But you might.What type of a car?
Jim.Jim, I love you.Do you hear me?It's your mother that's the problem.
I don't know, Jim.I'm sorry, but she's driving you mad, and I'm mortally afraid she'll drive me up the walls, too.
I'll think of something. I will, I will, oh, Nuala.
Well, the course of true love always comes up against a few jumps and ditches, but what of your woman's total collapse?Did the mother ever emerge out of the hospital?
The medical men were mystified.Her heart was strong, the pulse steady, the blood pressure normal, released after a week with a clean bill of health.
That very same weekend, nice Nuala saw odd man out with the small farmer from the stall, and Jim started to fear he was seeing the writing on the wall.Came in here on his own more and more often.Endless pints of porter and a seat by the fire.
He's back to the room.One evening, I chanced to say to him, what is the dis time, Jim boy?
Backache, moving up her side.I never know now what malaise will be waiting for me when I get home.And yourself, do you know what it is, Matt?
I am on the threshold of mental disintegration.He was, too.Not that I noticed it at the time.Not my speciality, you see.The old brain box.
You were round at the cottage a great deal then, weren't you, Doc, after the mighty collapse?
Oh, I was, I was.And I don't mind admitting my own patience was starting to wear very thin.How is she, Doctor?
Ah, never better. Then why won't she stop groaning and get up like any normal woman?
Yeah, the bitter truth is she's getting it all her own way as it is, Jim.How's that nice Nuala of yours?At the pictures again, with the small farmer.Pictures?Yes.Dumbo.Dumbo?With a small farmer?And you stand here and take it lying down?
Nuala won't marry me till my mother's health improves and she stops bothering me all the time.Your mother isn't sick, Jim.
You know that as well as I do.She's a damn finical hypochondriac and that's the short and the long of it. She doesn't know the meaning of illness, that one.I tell you, I've a patient the other side of town would put her hair in colours.
The poor man is working through every complaint in the medical dictionary single-handed.Quincy boils, asthma shingles, hardening of the arteries, dropsy, gout, gallstones, housemaid's knee.No.Yes.
And to cap it all, he's undergone a series of accidents through himself and his family that has him back and forth to hospital like a greyhound.Will you take a dram, Doc?
I'd like to hear more about this doomed patient of yours.
Jim told me later it was that very set-to with the doc that inspired his next move with the mother.
I shan't get a winky sleep tonight anyway.What's he standing staring out of that window for?Thinking, Ma.Only thinking.What have you got to think about?I tell you, no one has an ear like mine.
I don't know, ma'am.A chap had his ear chopped off at the creamery today.His left ear.
From Dublin.A travelling salesman demonstrating gadgets to the staff in the canteen at lunchtime.Oh, the poor man.
What hospital did they take him to?No hospital.But I don't understand. You say he had his ear chopped off?
Yes.Yes, he had his left ear chopped off.
And he didn't go to hospital?
I'm afraid I don't understand.
Well, he was demonstrating an electric potato peeler.And the next thing you know, the damn thing stopped.So he bent down right where the potato goes in, and off she starts without warning.And the ear?
He put it in a bucket of ice and clapped a handkerchief over the wound. and then he hit for Dublin to have its own back on.What did you say his name was?Fred Rimble.I don't know any Rimbles.How could you when he doesn't come from around here?
I told you, he came from Dublin.
And so it was that Fred Rimble was born into this world at about eight o'clock in the evening in the misty autumn time.No celestial manifestations marked the event mind We only found out about it long after.
Indeed, Jim himself admitted to me at a later date that he'd never have brought the poor creature into the world at all, but for being driven to it by his mother's earache, on top of all the tension and suspense he was going through with nice new love.
I'd say this calls for another round.Coming up.And one for yourself, Matt.What happened then?
Well, by the time Jim arrived home for lunch the next day, the mother was up and about.That pain in the ear was gone.
And for a change, a hot meal stood steaming on the table.Mmm, sausage and mash.
More gravy, son?Any news of Fred Rimble?
He's lucky to be alive, this Fred Rimble.Did he get back to Dublin in one piece?Not off his own bat.He fainted in the car from loss of blood and crashed into a telephone pole.
Goodness!What happened then?
Well, he was taken by ambulance to Dublin.Apparently the ice spilled from the bucket with the impact of the crash.The ear was thrown onto the roadway and couldn't be found anywhere.
The fear a magpie may have made off with it or a great crow or the likes.
Blessed save us!Oh, there's apple pie and cream after that if you're hungry, Jim. Is he married?
Fred Wimble?Yes.Has he a family?
Eight.Four boys and four girls.
May the Lord protect them, one and all.Young Jim, it's it here of an evening.Working on his plan of campaign.Of course, it was gross deception.But who among us could cast the first stone?
Fair play to you, Father.I know I couldn't.And the means soon justify the end. But with all the grub and peace and quiet at home, Jim got his dunder up and went round to Nuala's with a bunch of cowslips.
Oh, Jim.These are lovely.
I plucked them down by the river, where we used to walk.
I'll just go and find a vase.
Hold on a minute there, Nuala.Tell me, how did you get on with old Dumbo?
He was nice enough in his own way, I suppose. Talking about drainage grants and certified seed potatoes.
More of a van, to be honest.How's your mother been keeping, Jim?
I was coming to that.Never better.
Is that right?I'm glad to hear it.Why?
I have the hang of her at last, I think, Nuala.With luck, she'll never play up again.
Oh, wouldn't that be grand?
I'd bet me last make on it.Tis high time you and I set a date, Nuala.
Itself. Would this time next year be too soon for you?
The happy pair came to me hand in hand and heart in mouth, to book in early for the nuptials.And needless to say, I gave them my warmest blessing.And did the game hold?Was young Jim able to keep the ball in the air?
For a while, yes.To begin with, he settled for releasing minor bulletins concerning the tragic loss of the ear. and the effects of the same on Fred Rimble.Little by little, I grew involved myself, like a kind of a lieutenant.
Aye.You're very thoughtful lately, Jim-boy.A friend of mine took a bad turn lately.I'm sorry to hear that, Jim.Yes.Would you believe it?He's lost an ear.An ear?
He could... Well, mind you, these days, there's no end to what they can do in a case like that.Is that right?Oh, yes.Miracle workers they can be, them surgical lads.For instance, Has no one thought of attaching a plastic ear?A plastic ear?
What was the name of this friend of yours, did you say?Rimble.Fred Rimble.Mind you, the plastic surgery may well have been a bit of a tactical error, for a week after she heard the substitute ear was in place,
Maggie took to the bed again.Oh, no.Aye, she blamed an old ankle injury, which had been aggravated by a sudden change in the weather.
And once more, Jim found himself fending for the pair.Aye.
This has made the death of me.Nobody knows what I go through.
Fred Rimble's wife left him.
No.Was there another man?
Right, first time. His best friend to boot.
The devilment of the people you live in the same streets with.You'd never guess who's going to stab you in the back next.
You can say that again.A decent fellow like Fred too.
May he rot in the nether regions whoever's done this to him.Pass me my stick there, Jim.Why?I have a hand of bacon and the larder needs boiling.
By the time your man had washed his face and hands, there was a fine spread of bacon and cabbage waiting for him on the table.
Well, weeks passed before she suffered as much as a twinge again, and Nuala and Jim started courting like there was no tomorrow.Now, the run-up to Christmas it was when Maggie found that she had a crick in her neck.
Maggie's cricks, mind you, are like no other.They might last weeks and develop into a much more sinister class of an ache altogether.This time, though, Jim was in like Flynn.
Oh.Oh, the quick, honey.Oh, my quick.
Nah.You'll never guess what's happened.Oh, who to?Fred Rimble.What now?What?Car accident.
Saints Preservers.Another one.Did he survive?
Only just.And only by the skin of his teeth.Oh.
Break it to me gently, Jim.
No. Some luck that poor man is cursed with.Still, legs can mend.
True enough.But that's not the worst of it.There's more?Far more.Both legs in plaster, as they were, Fred insists he must carry on regardless, for the sake of the family, you know.Well, he won't.That's the sort of man he is.
So, first weekend out of hospital, he's up a ladder painting the gable end, plaster or no plaster. I can picture the scene.Me too.Didn't a dog roar past?Knock against the foot of the ladder and bring him tumbling into the rockery.
Not a soft landing at all.
Well, when they totted us all up, it came in at three fractured ribs, a broken collarbone, and two hands smashed.Beyond repair.Beyond repair? Is there nothing they can do?Nothing.Nothing.He'll never pick up a brush nor peel a potato again.
Electrically or manually.Them days is gone.
Still, at least he'll put a brake on his driving.There's always a silver lining of some sort if you look hard enough.Leave me now, Jim.You'll have to make your own supper while I lie here and take all this in.
I only pray to God it won't give me nightmares.
Right you are.Oh, there's one other detail.I don't know if I should burden you with it, though.
Oh, hold nothing back, Jim.
I can take it.Can you, ma'am, with that terrible crick on you?Don't you have enough crosses to bear through this veil of tears already?Are you certain, sure?
Of course I'm sure.I'm not the kind of woman needs mollycoddling.You know that.
Not the ear again.Which ear?The plastic or the human?
The single, solitary, remaining human one.The right ear.How?How?Don't we all know these things can happen easy enough in the modern world?
After hitting the rockery with full force, you see, your man rolls head over heels straight into the cold frame with a smash of glass and splinters.Fred himself admitted afterwards he should have seen it coming.
With the festive season on the way too, I can't bear it.Give me a hand out of bed, Jim.We must invite Fred and the children over to spend Christmas with us.Ah, no, no.
No.I know Fred.He's not the sort of man who would want to spend Christmas away from home.Oopsy-daisy.But who's going to cook the Christmas dinner for them?No problem there.The eldest girl is 15.
And then there's a woman nearby who looks in now and then.
What woman nearby?Just a neighbour. She wouldn't be behind a chance the missus of the man who went off with Fred's wife.No chance.Fred isn't that sort.Of course not.
That wasn't what I meant.But I have a turkey downstairs I bought on the way home.Needs plucking.Seeing as how you're up.
Right.You see, it was the removal of the second oracle did the trick.
And provided Jim with the happiest Christmas he'd spent since childhood.
There was a grand bit of turkey, Mrs. Candlin.Jim, will you pull the wishbone with me?
This is my wish, my wish.You don't have to tell me, son.Sure, I can see the wishes written all over the pair of you.A glass of port, honey.And the crackers.
We must all have a go at the crackers.
Every week or ten days, Jim would dole out what he privately termed a rimble of rasher.So your man was winning, hands down.Towards the end of Lent, young Jim had reason to resort to extreme measures.
The mother had taken suddenly to bed one wet afternoon.I couldn't make head nor tail of her symptoms myself.
Anyway, Jim sensed that a broken leg or a missing organ wouldn't be sufficient.Not this time.Her appetite had been whetted, you see.
Oh, yes.She needed stronger meat now, if a cure was to be effected.
Soup.Soup.I'm beyond soup.What's in it?
Oh, well.I might try to force a little down.
Ma, do you remember me speaking to you about Trixie at all and Cornelia?
The Rimble girls.What of them?
At sea, the pair of them.
Hadn't Fred been scrimping and saving since Christmas to give the family a day out by the coast.The two girls went out in overcast weather for a jaunt in a paddle boat.Before Fred knows it, a storm brews up and the rain lashes down.
The waves whip up higher and higher.Visibility was nil.The coast guards drew a blank. The bodies were washed up a week later, black and bloat beyond recognition.
How were the corpses identified then?
Well, Trixie was wearing a communion ring Fred gave her.He'd have known that ring anywhere.And Cornelia had a mole on her chin.
Give me a leg out of bed here, Jim.But, ma'am, your heart.Oh, God, send me strength.This is one funeral I'm not going to miss.Easy, ma'am.Hand me that paper from the table there.Let's see now.Deaths.Ratican, Remney, Reeves, Riley, Romney, Rutledge.
Ah.Now, I know Fred Rimble.Fred hates any sort of a show.The funeral would be private, naturally.That's why it's not in the papers.
We'll send him a telegram, then, and a letter of sympathy.I'll write it myself.
Of course.I'll send the telegram tomorrow morning.You go ahead and write your letter, and I'll post it for you during the lunch break.Right.Here's a pen and pad for you.
Thank you.Right, now... Oh, um... Now, um... Dear... Mr. Rimble?Ellie.Ellie, yes.I know you are a close friend of my only son, who...
Jim took the letter downstairs and buttoned it in the grate.Another heinous sin, of course, to torment his conscience for all eternity.Oh, that's not that.At work, he typed out a letter of reply from Jim using a fictitious Dublin address.
Oh, Lord, what a tangled web we weave.Still, a bird never flew on one wing as the saying goes.
And that letter proved the best tonic Maggie ever received.It kept her out of bed for weeks.
But when the effects of that wore off, Jim found himself doing away with the other children, pair by pair.
The first lot by food poisoning, wasn't it?
Right, yes, and the second race, they fell into a cement mix forever.A shocking end.Oh, brutal if you start to think about it.And the third and last couple of youngsters went up in smoke, if memory serves me right.A fire.That's it.
Double death by fire? What's the poor man ever done to deserve a string of catastrophes the height of this?
Exactly what I feel meself.
More or less intact.More or less?Singed.The eyebrows and moustache.
Hand me my writing implements from the press, Jim.This calls for words of condolence if anything ever did.
The family home is razed to the ground, ma'am.Fred no longer has a permanent address to his name.
She never opted out of Mass after that, regardless of wind or weather.The debts of them poor children had a massive effect on her, right enough.
Aye, she'd inquire daily after the well-being or otherwise of Fred Ringpin.
But with the house gone and your man wandering from pillar to post round Dublin, news must have been scant.It was.But the next she heard was this.
By all accounts, he's taken up work in Australia.
Emigreses. Oh, what kind of work?
Sheep farm.They've given them a kind of an indoor job there, apparently.Making ear tags for the sheep.
An earless man manufacturing ear tags.Fate can be awful cruel.
Still, Australia it is from this out.Somewhere deep in the wilds of the outback.Near Wangawara, I do believe.
Left the old country.Too many memories in the home place. I imagine if it were me in that position, I might very well do the self-same thing.Me too, ma'am.Me too.
So spring came around once more.
And Jim Conlon grew fat and content.But look at him now, like a ghost, like the walking or drinking dead.You never spoke a truer word.You see, before summer was upon us, Maggie inevitably took once more to the bed.Oh, no.
I was round there like a shot. I'm telling you once and for all, Maggie, you do not have cancer of the throat.
I do.I do.Listen to that.
Tis no more than a frog in the windpipe.
I'll give you frogs.I want x-rays.I want tests.A whole series of them.Do you think they've nothing better to do up at the hospital than engage in wild goose chases?I have a dread disease in the neck department.I swear to it.Listen.Listen.
The upshot was, of course, that teams of the best men could find no evidence at all of cancer of the throat, nor anybody else.And when no decent decline set in, she lay the agony on with a thrall.
Morbid she became.She made young Jim summon me on a weekly basis.Every time I administered the last rites, she would close the owl eyes as if resigning herself to the ultimate contingency. Alas, the grim reaper failed to materialize.
Father, tell Paddy here about the night of the star.
Ah, yes, now we come to it.You see, Paddy, there I was one terrible night, with the rain lashing down on the roof and the wind rattling the windows, thunder, lightning, hailstones, and myself administering the last rites as usual.I get you, Father.
So there I am, above with the mother and young Jim and nice Nuala, below in the kitchen, arguing fit to bust.
Look at me, Jim.I'm worn out.All me dresses reek of medicines and disinfectant.I've heard the last rites more times than tis healthy for a girl of my age.And all to no avail.
Avail?How do you mean, avail?
Don't get me wrong, Jim, please.But it's not as if there's the slightest chance, is there, of your mother being, well, claimed by the clay.
Ah, no, Nuala.Don't say she's got you feeling the same as I do myself, in me darkest hours.
Yes.Yes.Sometimes I feel as though I'm circling this cottage and this kitchen like a... a... a carrion crow.
I know.I know.Time and time again I've asked myself lately, Jim, are you a man or a... a vulture?
Oh, Jim.You're a man.I promise you are.
A fine man, Jim.And a devoted son and all.
But... But... But no match for a small farmer with 12 acres, a dead mother and a handy little van.
You must seek on with the wind if you can, Jim.It is so beautiful and so sad.I'll never forgive myself for this, Jim.Goodbye, Jim. Don't think ill of me.
Come back, Nuala.You'll catch your death.Well, another day, another benediction.
Where's that nice Nuala of yours gone, huh?It's high time you and me made an honest woman of her, Jim, huh?
Father, bless me.For I've lost the only nice girl in the Western world.
Now, I don't mind confessing.I took poor Jim in my arms there and anointed him with my own tears.For I'm as human as the next man under these holy wheels.
Nice Nuala moved to Lestowel a fortnight later.None of us ever saw her nor heard of her again.
Small wonder the poor fella by the heart there is wasting away.Your man has been a permanent fixture on the premises ever since, alongside the poker and tongs.Then, only last week at closing time, he declares himself at his wit's end.
Staggering to his feet and stumbling to the door, he mutters something about the last trump before falling out into the night.The last trump?Blowing it or playing it?Playing it, Paddy.
The chips was down, the game was up, the heel of the hunt was afoot, and no two ways about it.
I've just had some dreadful news. Fred Rimble is dead.
Oh, mercy on his soul!How did this happen?
They say he died of a broken heart.
That's what they say, right enough.
Well, it's all behind him now, the poor man.Isn't it incredible what can bring about the end for some sad, unlucky souls among us?A broken heart, eh? I'll be lucky to escape the same fate myself.
Why not?Haven't I suffered enough, Jim?
I can feel the old Tompah giving way under me ribs, even as I speak.
At Maggie's insistence, I conducted a high mass for Fred Rimble at our own parish church.It was an unpretentious affair.You know, only myself, two other priests, a parish clerk, and Maggie and Jim in attendance.
The split second the last bell sounded, she tore home and leapt back into the bed.
Young Jim brought her a tray upstairs.She bolted down a charger grub, then lay back with a pathetic groan.
What's wrong with you?You were fine a moment ago.You put away a feed fit for a ploughman.
I know, but the bitter truth is my heart is breaking.
No, no.You mustn't let it upset you.It's not in the least like a coronary or angina.It is far worse.
I'll just lie here now and wait for my time to come.If that's all right with you, Jim.
Well, well, well.And is her heart broke yet?No, I fear not.She's taken no time about it.The run for Maggie's last rights is still a major part of my weekly schedule, I can tell you that.The tires are gentle.
Now, Paddy, Paddy, now that you're armed with the entire inside story, tis high time you met the man himself, wouldn't you say?Right, right.After you.No, you two.You two wheel him across, will you, boys?
I'd rather start winding up proceedings for the night.My job, lad.Here goes.
Hello, Doc.My child.How are you, father?
There's a new neighbor for you to meet here, Jim.One Paddy O'Shea Porter.
Moving into the bungalow opposite you, he is.The blinding pink one.I'll be redecorating shortly, though.Inside and out.Well, slánche, Jim.
Your good health.Paddy, Paddy, Paddy.Look at me, man.Look in me eyes now and tell me what you see.I see a local legend, Jim.
No, man, no.What you see here is a man who killed the best friend he ever had.
Time now, ladies and gents, time!
Oh, see, Daisy, now, Jim, come on, let me see, let me see.Oh, man, no.Oh, Lord, no.
That was Fred Rimble by John B. Keane, dramatised by Kerry Lee Crabb.Jim was played by Ard Laughanlan, Maggie by Doreen Keogh, Nuala by Tina Kelleher.
The Doctor was Frank Kelly, Father Fogarty, Jim Norton, Matt, Pat Laughan, and Paddy, Don Witcherly.Fred Rimble was directed in Belfast by Gemma MacMullan.
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