’Ball alley. After school’. Chilling words. Even more chilling when they came from Jimmy Henderson. The biggest, meanest, ugliest bastard in the classroom. It had started during the football match at lunch time. He insisted the ball had crossed the line for a goal. Henderson disagreed. He wouldn’t back down. Henderson called him a dirty cheat ‘like your old fellah before you’. He had lost his temper. ‘Shut that open sewer you call a mouth, Henderson’ he shouted back. Deadly silence. Nobody had ever dared mention Henderson’s bad breath to his face before. Luckily, the school bell went at that very moment. Henderson turned and walked away. ‘Saved by the bell,’ said Francis Murphy. Unfortunately, it was not to be. Later, in the classroom, Henderson came over to his desk, leaned in, and uttered the chilling words.
School finished at 3:00 PM. Normally there was a mad rush to get home. Not on this day. All the boys from the senior room made their way to the ball alley, less than half a mile from the school gates, to witness the eagerly anticipated fight. The rules had already been agreed. Three rounds of three minutes. John Henry – the only boy with a watch – would act as time keeper. Gerard McDonagh, an honest lad, would referee. In the absence of a knock out, he would decide the winner. His decision was final; no appeal would be considered. The two opponents stood in the middle of the ball alley sizing each other up. They conceded nothing in age – both had been twelve on their last birthdays. In all other ways, the fight was a total mismatch. Henderson was at least two inches taller and a lot heavier than his rival. The two fighters stripped to their waists. On a different day, the romantics among the spectators might have been tempted to back the underdog. No such feelings were entertained by this bunch of little savages. They were there to back the winner. Jimmy Henderson was their man.
He did very well to survive the first round. Now, early in the second, Henderson catches him full on the nose, drawing bright red blood. A roar of appreciation rises from the onlookers. He looks up. A group of girls, Mary Clarke among them, have arrived. They are now standing at the back watching the fight with interest. A sickening feeling starts to build in his stomach. He is hit again, hard on the chin. His feels dizzy. His knees start to buckle. Henderson stands over him, smirking ‘You are a dead man, Gavaghan‘. The crowd gather around with excitement to watch the knock out blow.
It never comes. Henderson’s younger sister, Geraldine, moves forward from the group of girls and stands between the two pugilists. ‘Leave him alone,’ she warns her brother ‘or I will tell mammy that you were fighting. You know what happened the last time’. Henderson backs off. Saved by a girl. The knock out blow would have been less painful.