Dublin 1970 Streetwise

 It was just another day and now was just another afternoon in my teenage years. The school bell rang loudly from somewhere deep in the bowels of the building and three hundred uniformed kids poured out of St. Marys College. They ran along Military Road and up the Rathmines Road Lower at 3:30 pm one sunny May afternoon. The Marys boys were easily identifiable with their short peaked caps, blue badge encrusted jackets, grey slacks or shorts and grey socks. Bags weighed down by school books and empty lunch boxes hung from their backs or were dragged along the pavement behind them.

As the minutes passed they split up into smaller units of threes and fours and dissolved in amongst the everyday foot-traffic of the busy Dublin suburbia. Most off the boys were heading for Terenure, Rathgar or Templeogue, areas that at that time were much sought after with many new housing estates being constructed. The schools own past-pupils rugby clubhouse and grounds were in Templeogue but the school's pitches and dressing rooms were still in Kenilworth Square, only half a mile from the school.

I and my younger brother didn’t live in any of those local areas where Mary’s boys grew up playing together, schooling together and bonding together in friendships for life. We lived eight kilometres away, due south. This distance was normally bridged by a bus journey or a pick-up by my father when he was passing at 5:30 pm on his way home from work.

We crossed the Rathmines Road Lower and turned down a laneway walking past a laundrette where the large tumble dryers were noisily tossing clothing wildly about in the warm air. I remember that day we were both quiet and pensive as we passed the local national school which lay deserted and ominously quiet. It’s occupants always exited half an hour before us so they could be anywhere now.

We turned right at the end of the road and past a small shop that sold bags of broken biscuits and “Gur cake, my favourite treat. If I had a spare shilling I’d buy some and occasionally I bought it even when I hadn’t a shilling to spare. On those days I walked home.

Today we did a quick right and left and strode into Mount Pleasant Square, a Georgian area built in the eightieth century. It’s tree-lined streets enclosed a large private tennis club whose black metal fences secured the square itself and though its houses were of glass and brick with pillared ornate fan-shaped doorways and granite steps, we knew were entering an area of extreme danger.

Normally we had Decko, Brian, and Rodney with us. We’d cover this route in convoys of five or six boys at a time but today there we were just two. We had taken the chance and come this way as it cut ten minutes off the safer route and on a sunny day like this was the world seemed a benign place.

Further up the road, two local boys with a large German shepherd were to be seen walking briskly towards us. I thought about fleeing but we had been seen. No point in running as they knew the surrounding streets far better than we did.  If we stuck to this road someone, an adult, may stumble across us and them. There was no such chance on the other roads.

My brother, two years my younger, stood by my side as we got a better look at the pair now almost on top of us.  The dog, not on a lead, was held by the hair on the nape of his neck and was growling with intent. We stepped off the pavement in an effort to avoid head-on contact but they merely stepped onto the road in front of us. They stopped a foot ahead of us and I saw that they appeared to mirror our ages. This was to be a clash of the classes.

“Give us a fag mister” demanded the older of the two as he wrestled to restrain the dog who was snarling viciously at me. I stared hard at the boy, his dirty freckled face with eyes of unflinching coldness. He surveyed me with zero empathy.

“I don’t smoke” I replied.

“Me neither” piped up my brother.

“Then gimme a lend of a quid mister” the older one demanded, his left hand stretched out in a cupped palm.

“I don’t have a quid” I retorted, which happened to be true.

He didn’t bother demanding anything of my brother. He focused just on me and he froze me with his look. I felt powerless to look anywhere but into his dark menacing eyes.

“Empty your pockets misters – both of yea” he ordered and he now stuck the cupped hand closer and the snarling dog now moved in to within an inch of my trousers. Its flecks of foaming drool dripping from his mouth discoloured my light grey trousers and I could feel its breath warm on my leg. I could also see that my brother was shaking.

“We’ve only got our bus fare” I protested but it was cutting no ice with this pair.

“Fucking hand it over. All of it mind you! All of it or I’ll set the dog on yea!” He replied jerking the dog up by its hair and the animal let out a blood curling snarl. I glanced about the street desperately willing someone to wander up it but my luck was out. I reached into my pockets and dropped the half crown into the palm of his hand. My brother did likewise. I could see he still wasn’t happy.

“Michael – take the bags off this pair and go over there and go through them” and he pointed to the roadside kerb a few feet away. “Now fuckin dammit now!”

I sensed he was on a tight rein, perhaps missing his nicotine hit. Michael dutifully relieved us of our heavy leather satchels and took them over to the pavement where he opened them up and delved inside. He opened pencil cases, looked between copy books and unclipped side pockets. He was searching for something, anything that might be valuable, that they could flog. He picked out our plastic toy cowboys and Indians and stuffed a handful of them in his pockets.

Out of the corner of my eye, a bicycle and rider came into view behind the ragged pair of robbers. Slowly the young man, perhaps in his twenties progressed up the road towards us. He seemed a well-dressed man and it seemed to me that he correctly assessed what was going on.

“What are these boys demanding of you?” he asked of me as he dismounted his bike and came to join the group.

The older robber twirled around in surprise. Being streetwise, in a nanosecond he had sized up the newcomer and computed his options which were 1) abandon the robbery taking the cash in his hand 2) continue with a bluff greeting and brave it out. This situation has the potential to get better so he chose option two.

 “What the fuck has it got to do with you?” he delivered it loudly and aggressively and it stopped the Good Samaritan in his tracks.  “You stand over there” he pointed to a place next to me and the man walked over to my side.

 “Michael” he shouted “take them bags and put them on the bike and go to Spritzer’s gaff with the lot.”

“I say -” protested the well-bred do-gooder.

“No mister. You say nothing. I say what happens around here so shut the fuck up or I’ll set the dog on you” said the older robber said asserting his authority. Turning back to the newcomer he ordered: “Now you can empty your pockets mister.”

“Now!”

“I haven’t got all day and I need the money to buy the dog some food. He’s starving right now so don’t try anything funny. My hand is getting tired holding him back. One false move and he’ll pounce.”

The newcomer looked dejected as his bike disappeared around the corner. He reached deep into his pockets and emerged with a packet of chewing gums and five pounds which he deposited in the villain's palm.

Our captor allowed himself a smile. He stuffed the lot in his pocket and then spun around when he heard a voice from just over his shoulder say “Ciaran what the hell are you up to?”

“Oh – Hi ya Phil” answered our captor to an older man who’d just appeared, like out of nowhere. I never saw him coming but he knew our Ciaran all right.” Ciaran was no longer that confident streetwise kid. Phil had assumed control of the situation.

“Excuse us will you?” said Phil politely to the three of us as he led Ciaran firmly by the arm to the nearby kerb where a whispered conversation took place for a minute or two. When it was over Ciaran and the dog then set off up the road, slouching along looking at the pavement but not looking back.

Phil walked back over to us. “I must apologise to you for what happened just now. You two are free to go.” He didn’t have to say it twice.

“What about our bags mister?” said my brother and Phil answered “Go on now. Stand over there at the bus stop and you’re bags will be brought to you in a few minutes.”

A few minutes later our bags were brought to the bus stop and our bus fare returned to us. While we stood waiting for the 62 bus we saw the Good Samaritan cycling away in the opposite direction. “I wonder if he got his fiver back?” asked my brother.