Maggie's Breakfast by Gabriel Walsh Page A

carryin’ on?” the man sitting in the centre said to my mother.
    “He meant no harm, sir,” my mother responded.
    The pain of thinking about Daingean forced my mouth open but prevented me from opening my eyes. My future was looking as bleak as my present. I wished a silent suicide upon myself but I
didn’t know how to die. Outside in the corridor the cries of mothers who were separated from their children could still be heard. Then, as if to detract from the sad and painful wails, the
senior-looking man looked directly at me and raised his voice.
    “This fella is not learnin’ a ha’purt in school. He’s giving the Brother a lot of back talk and isn’t in any way disciplined. Daingean will be the proper place for
him.”
    When the man mentioned “Daingean” my mother’s face went white. I exchanged a fearful look with her and went so numb I didn’t know if I fainted or not. My mother then
walked up to the man behind the bench and looked directly at him. She began to talk with the conviction of a saint or a martyr.
    “Me son will change. I promise and pray that to you. He’s a good boy but his father has been no help to him. His father hasn’t been able to earn a penny in years and he’s
been back and forth to England searchin’ for a bit of labourin’ work. Gabriel couldn’t do his school lessons ’cos the free books were gone so he had no books to look at and
we couldn’t afford him a pen or pencil. No boy can be expected to learn with that kind of drawback. I’ve prayed and I’ve done me best and I ask you not to send him to
Daingean.” She then leaned forward and raised her right hand, with her rosary beads clutched in it. “Look! Look how worn out me rosary beads are from constant prayin’!” She
placed the small wooden crucifix over her heart and pleaded with the panel not to send me away. “It won’t be long till he can get himself a job and earn a few shillin’s. After
that he’ll be a great help to all of us at home. Give him another chance, I beg ya!”
    ‘Daingean’ was written all over their faces.
    As I watched my mother plead for me I remained choked with fear.
    The men behind the bench looked at each other and then back at me and my mother. Dublin, of course, had many oddball characters and some who might have even defied reason but my mother’s
performance had to be up there with the best and oddest of them.
    A member of the board looked directly at my mother. “He’d be as well off in a reformatory. By our Divine Saviour, he’d learn there. This lad is bold, very bold. In my opinion,
if he’s not checked now it will be too late in a year or two. If he’s let loose he won’t know how to read or write. I’ve seen it all before. You’ll be proud of him
when he’s released in a coupla years.”
    My mother put her crucifix to her lips and made the Sign of the Cross with it. She then raised her eyes to Heaven and took off as if she was transported. She called upon all the souls of every
saint in Heaven – foreign or otherwise – as if she knew them personally. Molly knew many prayers and she knew how to pray as if she wrote the words to them. She recited acts of
contrition and spat out an encyclopaedia of hymns that dealt with every dimension of forgiveness. I’m sure the school board members had never experienced anything like what they saw that day.
Two members of the panel simultaneously blessed themselves. They appeared to be rethinking their rubber-stamped decision.
    A miracle happened. My mother saved me from the persecution and agony of the reformatory school. Her sorrowful presence and her ability to call upon saints and angels as well as deceased bishops
and popes convinced the inconvincible. Dressed in her old clothes and with stockings hanging around her ankles, Molly won the day. I was saved. All the thoughts and feelings of embarrassment I had
previously felt for and about my mother vanished rapidly. She was now my saviour and, with the