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Ireland’s division. Then someone stood on a chair and called for three cheers for Hugo Dolan. When Benny heard
the name he tried to wade his way back through the fog that the drink had drawn about his mind but the volume of the cry they sent up confused him even more. It was only when he saw the glass
shaking in his father’s hand that things began to clear for Benny. When the cheer had subsided they all looked expectantly at Hugo Dolan. They were sure that the smile they wanted would soon
spread across his face. But it did not. And when he spat and flung the glass against the wall where it smashed in pieces, they were dismayed. They looked at him, awaiting his explanation. His hands
trembled. “Fucking circus,” he said tensely. “Fancy flags and a porter-bellied minister wining it above in the hotel with the doctor and the priest. They get their rewards all
right. They’ll see to themselves. The same people who locked up Luke Devlin and Mickey Kerr, parading like fucking royalty. Off to Dublin with the Thompson Gun. Fighting the good fight. The
hand on the shoulder boys—I’m with you all the way men. Up the republic. Let them ask Joe Carron about the republic, or Lukey, twenty years in front of him. Hypocrites and liars! A
bunch of mealy-mouthed sham republicans! Republic—don’t make me fucking laugh!”
    They stared at him in disbelief and wondered what to do next. They looked away and hoped he would disappear. He swayed to and fro and stared. Then he turned on his heel and left, banging the
door behind him. The humming began anew and they turned to the bar, splitting up into various groups to discuss this sensational new development. Some of them attributed it to nervous trouble that
he had never got over. He had seen them being riddled. “How would you get over that?” they asked. Others felt that this wasn’t true. They said that Hugo Dolan had always been a
bit touchy. They recalled incidents which although innocuous at the time now appeared loaded with significance. They continued to drink and debate, their initial understanding and objectivity
gradually being overtaken by anger and annoyance. It began to seem as if Hugo Dolan had spoiled the whole day for everyone. They said that no matter what trouble he had had himself he had no
business going about insulting the people of the town. And the minister, that minister had done a lot for Carn. It was he who had tried to step in and block the closing of the railway. One man
suggested that they ought to break the newly-erected plaque to teach Dolan a lesson.
    The debate was still raging when Benny finished his drink and went outside.
    He stood in the doorway to get his bearings. Above the town hall the tricolour sagged. The signatories of 1916 stared impassively from the library window. Benny stood there, replaying the hurt
and anger on his father’s face. Then, hearing new voices in the yard behind him, he set off across the empty square towards home.

III
    The day the Turnpike Inn opened its doors to the goggle-eyed citizens of Carn, Sadie Rooney leaned over the privet hedge at the bottom of her garden and thought to herself how
much she loved Elvis Presley. She would have gone anywhere with him and indeed dreamed up an interminable series of locations where herself and the handsome crooner tripped the light fantastic.
Fairgrounds where they soared into the vast blueness of the sky on the back of a big dipper to the accompaniment of a pulsating rock and roll soundtrack. The very mention of the word
“Elvis” made every muscle in her body stiffen. Whenever an Elvis film was due to play in the local cinema, she was tense for days before. She knew every line of dialogue in
Love Me
Tender
and whenever she got the chance would relate the entire plot from beginning to end. She would savour every moment and work herself into a frenzy until tears came to her eyes as she spoke
of the bullets hitting Elvis as he lay dying on the prairie with