Tale from Café in Lifford Saturday Night
Blast from the past – Fran and Annette Mc Glynn outside the café in Lifford about 196
And Fran and me -Main
Street Lifford 1963
The crowds of drinkers and cinema-goers usually abated around 2am – Saturday night Sunday morning. My father would lift the keys of his minibus to take the waitresses home. I recall there was one taxi in Lifford in the early 1960s. It was owned by an elderly man called ‘Bumby’ McNealy. (I don’t think I ever knew his real first name.) No way was he doing business in the early hours of Sunday morning. So it was up to my father to see his staff safely home. He often gave other people ‘lifts’ home too.
This true story is about one such man.
He regularly parked his bike at Anthony Maron’s Cycle Shop in Upper Main Street, and asked for a lift home if it was raining.
Every Saturday night we hoped it wouldn’t rain.
His name was A…He lived in the outskirts of Ballindrait. Since our father was going that way he didn’t like to refuse this man a life on a bad night. But every night as we left the lights of Lifford behind, he’d start feeling my sister Annette’s knee. By the time we reached home she would be in a state of agitation.
In bed at night she’d whisper to Gertie about it and be even less willing to serve customers in the cafe, especially the men, than before.
Why didn’t we tell our father? The simple reason we didn’t tell was because he’d have said Annette was a drama queen – making something out of nothing (which she did sometimes when things didn’t go her way).
The next night A… got a lift home our sister Gertie devised a plan. We’d all get in the minibus, take our seats as usual but as soon as we passed Murlog graveyard and came on to the darkest part of the road where the high hedges made inside the minibus pitch dark – the spot leering A… usually made his move, we’d swap places so that Annette was well out of reach of his wandering hand.
It worked. He found Gertie’s leg instead and Gerties stiletto heel found its way into A… soft ankle.
He let out an agonised squeal like a rat caught in a trap.
We all giggled.
“What’s going on back there,” our father’s irritable voice asked.
“Nothing,nothing at all, Tommy, A… lisped rubbing his ankle.
But it didn’t deter him. So a new plan was devised.
Salt and pepper shakers were always filled last thing at night ready for the ‘early bird’ customers the next day. As our father ushered us and A …out in front of him to the minibus he turned back to put out the lights and Gertie slipped a pepper shaker into her pocket. “If sleazy A… tries to feel our legs tonight he’s in for a surprise, “she chortled.
As the minibus came up the hill at Quentin’s Lane, the place where A…usual made his move on Annette we all quickly changed seats. It stalled his wandering hands for a minute. But as we reached Throne’s Lane – a stone’s throw from home, he made his move.
And Annette made hers. The pepper hit him between the two eyes. As the pepper floated in the air we all began to sneeze and giggle.
. A…began to shout out of him,” They’ve blinded me! The bitches have blinded me.”
Our father swerved the minibus to a stop in the middle of the road and switched on the overhead light. “Its two O’clock in the bloody mornin’ what the hell is goin’ on back there?”
“Let me out. I’ll walk the rest of the way,” A…shouted mopping at his streaming eyes.
Our father inhaled the pepper and glared at us.
Annette started to cry. “It was me. But he deserved it.”
“I’ll ride the bicycle home in future, it’s safer.” A…spluttered, clamouring over our legs and feet in his haste to get out of the minibus.
The following week A…came into the café glared balefully at us all and asked for his usual order.
In fits of giggles, we all made a run for the kitchen. Gertie eventually took him his order of soup and a roll and plonked it down on the table in front of him. “Would you like pepper with that,” she smirked hardly able to keep her face straight.
There was no answer. Nor anymore lifts home in the minibus on a Saturday might
Gemma Hill June 2018 ©
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