Читать книгу Ireland in Travail онлайн

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“The C.I.D. did go. Oh yes, the C.I.D. went. I butted into an old beggar lady, and knocked her spinning. I rushed down one street and up the next, and bowled over two or three children, and a dear old girl who was trotting out of church full of beans at having saved her soul. I trod on a blind man and his dog, and the dog bit the blind man, and all the other dogs barked, and all the boys whistled, and the married women hitched up their stockings, and the old men and the cripples joined in the chase, shouting, ‘There goes the C.I.D.’ And if I couldn’t have heard ’em, I could have smelt they were after me.

“And then I began to get a stitch, a terrible stitch, and every yard I went it got worse. Money for nothing! Yes! What? I couldn’t go another yard, and I pulled out my gun and came about under a lamp and waved it at them.

“It was money for nothing the first time since I came over. They pulled up like a tide coming against a wall—the old girls, and the boys, and the cripples, and the dogs, all treading on one another’s toes. And while I waved I tried to get rid of my damned stitch. ‘Now you stop where you are,’ I said, giving my gun a final shake, ‘or you’ll find it the worse for you!’ And round I went, and started to run again. And all the dogs barked, and all the beggars picked up their crutches, and all the married women hitched their garters, and came after me again. And I didn’t know where I’d got, and I charged over a few more blind men, and I got the damned stitch again, and I stopped and shook my gun at ’em, and we all lined up again, and then we started off once more. And then, when the stitch was killing me, a tram came by, and I made a running jump on to the step, and dug my gun into the conductor’s ribs. ‘No funny business with the bell,’ I said. ‘You let her rip.’