Two Walls and a Roof (12 page)

Big Kyrl had begun to show films in a hall he was hiring from the British Legion. He was always an amazing
entrepreneur
and my idol in Ireland, as distinct from Huck Finn in the US. We had free entry into the cinema as teenagers and even earned some money as ushers now and again. These films were to become our inspiration for all kinds of adventures. At this time we had become friends with a very gentle boy called Martin Sweeny. His people lived up on New Street
and his dad, Ger, worked for
Cork County Council in the roads division. Ger had a big shed out the back and it was full of all kinds of items that we wer
e to use later on  like p
araffin oil, tar, tar barrels
, sheets of galvanized iron,
long metal pipes and an endless supply of wood. The shed was an Aladdin’s cave for adventurers like us. Martin was a few years younger than us and his people had a television set when it was almost unheard of in those days. Martin
’
s parents seemed to be very happy that we w
ould play with him each evening
and at weekends, and we three became like the Musketeers and actually acted them out at times with great swordfights.

Pretty soon we began to act out the films shown by Big Kyrl. Initially it was just the usual cowboys and Indians stuff, but soon we progressed to submarine warfare. We actually built a big submarine in a field next to Martin
’
s house. It was made f
rom tar barrels, sheets of iron
and boards
,
all taken
(
or stolen
)
from Ger’s shed. Inside our submarine we had an old wind
-
up gramophone with one vinyl record, the French National anthem
:
La
Mars
eillaise
. I got so sick of hearing this that I started to have nightmares from it, and to this day it is not good for me to hear it.

Kyrle added the real touch of class to our sub when he somehow managed to get a barrel with no top or bottom, and this became his conning tower. I see him as clear as day, standing in the barrel or conning tower
,
giving orders and surveying the sea field with his hands as binoculars. In winter we lit a fire inside the sub and burned the old felt used for roofing. The fumes were terrible and it’s a wonder we are still alive considering what we were breathing. We had a library and charts and seats inside
,
and it actually was almost waterproof. Our sub lasted through a good number
of attacks from the townie gang
and others. They were
all jealous of it and us,
and constantly plotted its destruction.

As we saw each new film
,
we
would build a set and get to re-
enacting our own version of events. One of these almost ended in tragedy for Martin. We had seen a film called
Fort Apache
I believe, but I could be wrong. I
n any case
,
the fort was attacked by the Sioux and burned. This was inspiring stu
ff for us. It just had to be re-
enacted. Kyrle was going to be a Sioux warrior which he pronounced as
‘
see
-
uxx
’
.  It took him years before h
e realized his mispronunciation.
I had no idea either and j
ust followed his version until U
ncle Michael mocked him one day, and I knew then how to say the word, but I never told Kyrle
: I
just sniggered at his ignorance.

We had to first make a fort and then I would decide if I was a Sioux or a cavalry man
,
depending on the fort and how it looked, though I was far more partial to the Indians. To make sure this fort would burn, we were not going to use iron sheets but cardboard soaked in oil. To get this cardboard
,
we resorted to our old faithful suppli
er:
Tadgh Hurley
’
s drapery store at the bottom of the ball alley lane. Tadgh always had cardboard packing boxes that h
e used to protect his furniture
out in his back yard, and we were always stealing them from him. We stole a large number of these cardboards over a few days and soon were ready to build the fort. It was made by beating stakes into the ground and nailing the cardboard to the stakes so that it formed a square. My guess now is it was about ten feet or so along the sides. The gate was a section of cardboard which could swing on a stake. At this stage I had become completely on the side of the Indians even though K
yrle had already become ‘Chief’.
I opted to join the war party and do some burning, and the excitement was building inside us all. Martin was given no choice but to be a soldier in the fort. He had a rifle and he liked being in the safet
y of the fort, wrongly
as it turned out. The Plains would be far safer if only he knew what was planned for his fort. What Martin did not know was that Kyrle really intended to burn the fort
.
Martin had never seen the film like us, so he didn’t know the danger he was in. To ensure success
,
Kyrle got a drum of paraffin oil and doused the cardboard walls liberally with the oil. Then the battle began.

Initially we ran round the fort with our bows, hollering and whooping just like the real Sioux did. Martin fired volley after volley
,
and now and again one of us would fall to the ground dead or wounded. This went on for about ten minutes before Kyrle gave the command
,
“Light the arrows”. He had stolen some firelighters from home and broken them into small squares. We tipped our arrows with the spongy materials and soon he had his one lighting. I lit mine off of his and we began the attack, circling round and round. “Fire arrows
!
”
Z
inggg
…
his arrow went into the fort
,
followed by mine. Both aimed at the walls and not at Martin
,
thank God. Not a thing happened other than Martin shouts out
, “Y
e missed and John you
’
r
e
dead”.

I feigned death and lit another arrow from the small fire of papers Kyrle had now lit as our fire source. So did he
,
and this time we sent two more flaming arrows straight into the wall. I saw the oil catch fire and a black smoke began to rise.
“
Yip
pee, they’re
done for
,”
says Kyrle,
“F
ire more arrows
”
. By then all pretence of circling was gone and we just stood there like two Robin Hoods and fired arrow after arrow into the fort. Soon it was really blazing and the whole area was filled with black acrid smoke. Martin stopped firing and shouting. In fact we could neither hear him nor see him at that point and I got a bit worried
. I
ran up to
the blazing gate and called out,
“Mar
tin where are you, you in there,
you surrender yet?” Only choking and coughing came from inside and the heat beat me back. By then Kyrle was at the for
t too and he called out as well. T
he fire was so hot that we both got scared.  I felt we had to save Martin, so I ran across the field and got one of our long pipes and poked at the burning wall of cardboards. Now I could see Martin on the ground choking and coughing and clutching his throat. Kyrle ran back with his ‘Quix bottle’ fire extinguisher which was useless
,
and after pushing down the burning wall
,
I ran in and pulled M
artin out to the air. He was ok
but red
-
faced amid the black smoke and choking for air. The fort burned out as the three of us watched it. Martin said the most unforgettable words
,
“Next t
ime I wanna be with the Indians
”
.

On another occasion we had seen the Romans capturing Troy or Egypt or someplace and they had been using huge catapults firing rocks
as big as cann
onballs at the enemy. By then our little gang had a lot of enemies in town. There was the Knockbarry gang, the Townies gang, Charlie Mack and Joe Hurley
(
a born ringleader
)
, as well as the crowd from the area known as the Quarters.  Usually we were well able to defend ourselves with our small catapults, fire tipped arrows and our secret weapon
:
the ‘weed killer bomb’,
which was
still not used in battle but under development.

W
e heard a combined attack was being planned for a Saturday with the aim of destroying our submarine once and for all. As luck would have it
,
some weeks earlier we had seen the Romans in action and I felt that we should use the sapling trees on the ditch in front of the sub as our catapults. These would be our first line of defence. We all agreed
,
and soon we had ropes attached to the tops of the young trees and were bending them down to the ground, where the ropes were attached to some iron stakes driven into the soil. I believe we had three of these systems ready all along the ditch prior to the attack.

Kyrle got some canvas bags and filled them with rocks and stones
,
and we tied these to the tops of the trees now sprung back and ready to fly forward. Unfortunately we had never tested these new weapons.

Saturday came, bleak and overcast, and we waited and waited. All of a sudden there was a yelling from Joe Hurley
,
the self appointed ringleader of the combined gangs, and he and a few others began climbing over the outer wall of a nearby field, shouting and roaring at us and firing their catapults as they advanced on our submarine. “Launch one
,
” Kyrle shouts at me and I cut the rope holding down the first tree. Whoosh
,
up went the sapling with its bag of stones and it flew right over their heads
,
breaking into shrapnel all over the road. From what I could see
,
the gang still on the road took off, ne
ver having seen such a weapon, b
ut the others
,
now numbering about five or so
,
cautiously edged forward, firing all the time. “Launch, launch, launch,” Kyrle screamed at Martin and me while he fired his arrows. More stones flew off and again they went over the gang
’
s heads and the wall
. T
his was not working at all
. T
he trees were too good and we had fi
red too late. Hurley’s gang was
almost upon us, and now becoming desperate, I gave the order, “Catapults …and aim for the eye
,
” and I did just that
.
I aimed for Joe Hurley’s eye. The stone hit him on the forehead and he reeled backwards in pain. W
e sent a hail of stones at them
as their hail zinged all about us, and even though a stone or two hit me and the lads, we were winning.  Hurley was bleeding badly from the forehead and ran back over the wall heading for home. I ran out after him to make sure he got the message, and was caught in an ambush by Mickey O’Rourke who punched me into the nose and tried to kick me to the ground as well. I was now bleeding too and made a dash back for the camp where Kyrle and Martin came out
to save me.  As for the others;
with their leader gone they lost the will to fight and soon all became quiet. I remember us
all shaking hands and cheering
because our sub was safe. We were never attacked again either. After that incident Hurley became Kyrle’s arch enemy with no possibility of forgiveness ever.

We had beco
me experts in
bomb-
making after Kyrle was given
the secret from a friend of his:
a spy in the Knockbarry gang. He was told that if you mixed sugar with weed killer powder you would get an explosion. The problem for us was he did not know what the proportions were. The weed killer was sold as a white powder in the chemist shop or hardware shop I believe, and I don’t know how
we got a load of it, but we did and were soon in the bomb-
making business. The first attempt did not explode at all but burned fiercely. The next attempt did almost nothing and we did a lot of experimenting before we began to use science to help us. I f
igured that we should stop wasting this powder, and start
measuring the amounts
we used
and keeping a record of it
until we got the mixture right
. Pretty soon this began to show a pattern, though for the life of me now I can
’
t remember wha
t the proportion was for a bomb
,
as against the intensely burning proportion
s of a rocket
. One
was the direct opposite
of the other
,
I do remember that. It was not long before we blew a good size hole in the ditch and then
,
having perfected the explosive side of things
,
we advanced to making rockets.