“Good girl yourself,” said her father, as she put down the pot.
“I need to go as well, Mammy,” she said, soft as she could.
“You’ve no time for tea either?”
“I’m sorry, I have to be in town by half-past two. But I’ll be back in time to give you a hand with the supper.”
She replaced the butter and salt in the pantry, put the dirty delph in the basin, poured boiling water into it.
“Leave it, so,” her mother said. “I’ll do them myself.”
“Are you sure?”
Her mother made a cross face. “You have to go is what you said.”
That wasn’t fair. How was it allowed for Barney to trot off to a hurling match without a word said about it? You couldn’t but feel for Mammy, her weakness went hard on her, but how was it Peg was always the one to get the lash of her tongue?
“Go on, then, if you’re going,
