“Don’t listen to him,” Dermot mumbled to me. “He’s just saying that. In fact, he likes people. And the more he drinks, the more he loves everybody.”

“You’re a bunch of blockheads,” Danny scowled at us. “And the Irish Americans are the worst. They only come to hear ‘When Irish eyes are smiling’ and to try real Guinness. That’s all they care about.”

We were sitting in Polly Maggoo, an obscure but cozy bar on the edge of the Latin Quarter in Paris. I had come here after my meeting with Teacher. It was exactly one week before our next mission to London. Chuck, who arrived at the bar earlier than I, was now drinking beer and talking poilitics with two nice fellows from Éire. As usual, as instructed, Chuck and I pretended ignorance, and, in case of meeting an informer, or somebody from British intelligence, were ready to condemn terrorism and even support Ian Paislay and his ilk.

The place was filling up and there was hardly enough room at the bar to put down a mug or a glass. We were at the table closest to the toilet, almost under the poster of a woman with the question Qui êtes-vous Polly Maggoo? along the bottom edge. It was Maureen’s favorite table. She liked this bar, though she didn’t come here as often as Chuck and I did. And she knew Kieran, the bartender. I had told her that we should spend this evening together, but she refused. After my last trip to England she became strange. For the first time she didn’t want me to stay in her place overnight. I even thought she had found somebody. This was Paris, after all, and there were a lot of men around.

And alien tears will fill for him
Pity’s long broken urn
For his mourners will be outcast men
And outcasts always mourn.

“Have you already been to Père Lachaise?” asked Chuck, quoting the inscription on Oscar Wilde’s tomb.

“At the stroke of midnight,” said Dermot.

“But the cemetery closes before then,” I remarked.

“We had to hide in a sepulcher,” explained Dermot. “This one even wept,” he pointed at his companion.

“Was he so touched?”

“Not at all. He cried because he couldn’t drink anymore, and we still had a bottle of whisky.”

“Rubbish,” Danny was indignant. “The most we had was a half bottle.”

Dense clouds of smoke made it difficult to make out the features of the people sitting around us. At unvarnished oak tables thousands of words jostled each other in the clamour of clinking mugs, high-pitched laughter, the hiss of drowing cigarette butts.

I thought that Danny and Dermot would be perfect students for Teach. One day he would be lecturing people like me and them somewhere at an Irish university, maybe even at Trinity College, teaching history, and the lecture hall would be full of real students.

I was also thinking about his tale of O’Donovan. Teacher used our meetings as an opportunity to talk about Éire, but I never knew whether he was trying to strengthen our resolve by stressing our ties to the glorious past and heroic dead, or if his talking on this subject was a part of his character.

“No matter what you say,” retorted Chuck. “Jacob Epstein wouldn’t have honored you with a monument.”

“Who was Epstein?” asked Danny.

“He probably meant Einstein,” corrected Dermot.

“The theory of quality!” said Danny triumphantly.

“Relativity! Donkey!” Dermot corrected him again.

“What did they teach you in school?” wondered Chuck.

“And what are they supposed to teach us?” Danny was still aggressive.

“You don’t even know who Benvenuto Cellini was.”

“You mentioned Einstein, not…”

“It’s not important who I was talking about,” Chuck interrupted him.

“There’s nothing to argue about,” I offered peacefully.

“Don’t imply that we’re fools because you might regret it,” Danny warned Chuck.

“Maybe he never heard of the fellow you mentioned, but he could have told you about General Maxwell,” Dermot hadn’t finished yet.

“Who was General Maxwell?” now Chuck was surprised.

“And he told us his grandparents came from Ireland,” Danny mocked him.

“Let’s not talk about it,” I still tried to change the direction of our discussion. “American schools are not much better, if at all.”

“You came straight from the States?” Dermot swallowed the bait.

“We’re on our way to Normandy,” Chuck evaded the question.

“Are you going to Ireland?” asked Dermot. “There’s a ferry from Cherbourg.”

“Maybe to Belfast, but going there seems rather risky,” Chuck was a little provoking.

“Go to Dublin,” said Danny. “Go pray for the souls of your grandparents and ask for forgiveness in front of the GPO.”

“I have family in Belfast,” Chuck developed the skills he had mastered during hitchiking.

“How are they doing?” asked Dermot.

“Well, I think, but they complain about terrorists,” continued Chuck.

“Who are you calling a terrorist?” said Danny.

“Brits don’t plant bombs in Dublin,” noticed Chuck.

“Don’t be an ass,” Dermot responded. “Eight hundred years of pillaging and killing isn’t enough?”

“You’re a fanatic.”

“And you’re talking like some of the whites in South Africa.”

“That’s right,” agreed Chuck, enticing them further and further into his swamp. “People who live in place for several hundred years have a right to the land.”

“And hang all the blacks?” asked Dermot politely.

“England brought them civilization, as it did to Ireland.”

“With the spontaneous support of the rest of the population like in 1846?” Danny laughed harshly.

“One more myth,” Chuck shot back. “It’s enough to look at statistics. If not for England’s help, the losses would be…”

“Help? He, he!” roared Danny. “Statistics? Check the Britannica. You will find Great Falls or the Great Fire of London but not one word about the Great Famine. And we’re talking about more than one million dead! Today we would call it a crime against humanity.”

“Call it anything, but you can’t constantly be involved in the past,” objected Chuck.

“Frankie Hughes and Bobby Sands are not the past.”

A fight broke out at a table between the front door and the bar. Kieran, doubling as a bouncer, quickly shoved the two combatants outside where they faded into a crowd. Peace descended on faces yellow in the light of the Chinese paper lantern over the bar.