One dusty July afternoon, somewhere around the turn of the century, Patrick
Malone was in Mulcahey's Bar, bending an elbow with the other street car
conductors from the Brooklyn Traction Company. While they were discussing the
merits of a local ring hero, the bar goes silent. Malone turns around to see
his wife, with a face grim as death, stalking to the bar.
Slapping a four-bit piece down on the bar, she draws herself up to her
full five feet five inches and says to Mulcahey, "Give me what himself has
been havin' all these years."
Mulcahey looks at Malone, who shrugs, and then back at Margaret Mary
Malone. He sets out a glass and pours her a triple shot of Rye. The bar is
totally silent as they watch the woman pick up the glass and knock back the
drink. She slams the glass down on the bar, gasps, shudders slightly, and
passes out; falling straight back, stiff as a board, saved from sudden contact
with the barroom floor by the ample belly of Seamus Fogerty.
Sometime later, she comes to on the pool table, a jacket under her
head. Her bloodshot eyes fell upon her husband, who says, "And all these
years you've been thinkin' I've been enjoying meself."
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