you’ll have to wait for some other night—
FINN (incensed)
Can you name one night in history wasn’t a night of earth-shaking consequence at Heeber Finn’s?
THE OLD MAN (scratches head) I can’t.
FINN You can’t. (Turns) Son, do you play darts?
THE YOUNG MAN Yes.
FINN Good! Do you lie?
THE YOUNG MAN Lie?
FINN Can you tell untruths, man? Big ones, small, all sizes?
THE YOUNG MAN (dubiously) I’ll try.
FINN (pleased) I’m sure you will! We
Suddenly THE OLD MAN quickens, catching hold of elbows to right and left.
THE OLD MAN Hist!
All down the bar, everyone freezes.
(Whispering) That was it!
Every head, on a single string, turns toward the door.
THE YOUNG MAN What . . . ?
THE OLD MAN Ssst! Listen . . .
All lean. All hear—something, far away. (Eyes shut) That’s it … yes . . . yes . . .
Everyone stares. Footsteps batter the outside step drunkenly. The double wing doors flap wide as a bloody man in his thirties staggers in, capless, holding his bloody head with a bloody hand. He stops, blinking numbly at the crowd.
THE YOUNG MAN stares, amazed.
AII down the bar, the men lean toward the intruder.
The intruder sways, trying to find words, eyes glazed.
THE OLD MAN moves forward, frantically curious, gesturing his hand as if bidding the man to speak up, speak up!
The bloody intruder finally gasps for breath.
THE INTRUDER Collision! Collision on the road!
Then, chopped at the knees, he falls down. The men glance at each other.
ALL Collision!
HEEBER FINN vaults the bar. His landing breaks the spell.
FINN
Kelly, Feeney, quick!
All run toward the “body.” HEEBER FINN is first, with THE OLD
MAN.
THE OLD MAN Easy does it!
FINN
Quinlan, out to the road! Mind the victim! Kilpatrick, run for the Doc!
A VOICE Wait!
ALL look Up.
THE DOC steps out from the far end of the bar, from a little dark cubby where he has been standing alone with his philosophies.
FINN is surprised.
FINN Doc, you’re so quiet I forgot you was there! Out you go!
THE DOCTOR plunges out the front door with half a dozen men. The fog streams in past them.
THE YOUNG MAN looks down at the “victim” on the floor. The “victim’s” lips twitch.
THE VICTIM (gasping, whispering) Collision . . .
FINN Softly, boys.
They lift “the victim” and carry him over to lay him on the bar. THE YOUNG MAN comes up to stare at the man lying there, and at his image in the mirror behind the bar . . . two dread calamities for the price of one.
THE YOUNG MAN (puzzled) But … I didn’t hear any cars on the road.
THE OLD MAN is proud to reply:
THE OLD MAN That you didn’t!
He beckons. With a high sense of melodrama, THE OLD MAN escorts him to the swinging doors, opens one for him.
A scrim has come down as they move toward the door.
As they emerge into the “outside,” the “world,” the lights go off behind the scrim and come on in front of it. This particular scrim is a mist, a fog, a gray background across which they may wander, looking out over the apron at the night, the weather, and the men foraging beyond. There are wisps of fog or mist moving in from either side, from the wings, and from below in the pit.
THE OLD MAN stands next to the young one, on the steps of the pub, sniffing the weather appreciatively.
You’d almost think that Ireland was gone. Oh, but it’s there, all right.
THE YOUNG MAN stares into the fog, continuing his thought.
THE YOUNG MAN . . . nor did I hear a collision.
THE OLD MAN {shouting beyond)
Try the crossroad, boys! That’s where it most often does! {Quieter, he turns to THE YOUNG MAN) Ah, we don’t be great ones for commotion, nor great crashing sounds. But collision you’ll see if you step on out there. {Points stage left)
THE YOUNG MAN moves stage left, probing into the fog, groping.
Walk now, don’t run! It’s the Devil’s own night. You might head-on into Feeney, too drunk to find any road, no matter what’s on it. You got a match?
THE YOUNG MAN A match?
THE OLD MAN Blind you’ll be, but try it!
THE YOUNG MAN strikes a match, holds it out in front of him.
That’s pitiful poor, but on you go, and me behind you. Careful now, walk!
Both move in a great circle about the stage. Hist, now!
They listen to a rally of voices approaching. Here they come!
A VOICE (hidden in jog) Easy now. Don’t jiggle him!
ANOTHER VOICE Ah, the shameful blight!
Suddenly from the fog, stage left, a steaming lump of men appear bearing atop themselves a crumpled object.
THE YOUNG MAN stares up, holding the match. We glimpse a bloodstained and livid face high up there.
Someone brushes the lit match, which snuffs out.
The catafalque rushes on.
A VOICE Where’s Heeber Finn’s?
ANOTHER VOICE Bear left, left, I say!
The crowd vanishes, THE YOUNG MAN peers after. He hears a chilling insect rattle approach in the fog. He strikes another match.
THE YOUNG MAN Who’s there?
A VOICE ;
It’s us! !
ANOTHER VOICE With the vehicles!
THE YOUNG MAN blinks at the old, who nods sagely.
A VOICE You might say we got—the collision!
Two men trot out of the fog, bringing with them under their arms two ancient black bicycles, minus head and taillights.
THE YOUNG MAN stares at them. The two men with the bikes smile, proud of their task, give the bikes a heft, tip their caps, and trot off away again, vanishing in mist, toward Finn’s, just as the last match dies forever, THE YOUNG MAN, stunned with the simple facts, hangs his mouth open, turning to THE OLD MAN.
THE YOUNG MAN What?
THE OLD MAN (winks) What? What, indeed! Ah, the delightful mysteries!
And he runs off into fog. THE YOUNG MAN, musing, follows.
THE YOUNG MAN Men . . . bicycles . . . collision? Old Man, wait for me!
THE YOUNG MAN runs, finds the front door to Finn’s, and plunges in. The lights come on inside Finn’s, the fog-scrim vanishes.
Inside Finn’s, THE OLD MAN turns to welcome the arrival of THE YOUNG MAN.
THE OLD MAN
Ah, there you are! (lowers voice to a whisper) We got the “bodies” on the bar.
THE YOUNG MAN peers over the crowd at the two “bodies” laid out in pale ruin on the long bar, THE DOC moving fretfully between the two, shouldering the crowd aside. THE OLD MAN whispers:
One’s Pat Nolan. Not under employment at the moment. THE OLD MAN peers and nods at the next.
The other’s Mr. Peevey from Meynooth. In candy and cigarettes, mostly.
THE OLD MAN raises his voice.
Are they long for this world, now, Doc?
THE DOC mutters, swabbing a marbled face.
THE DOC Ah, be still, won’t ya! Here, let’s put one victim on the floor.
THE DOC moves, FINN stops him.
FINN
The floor’s a tomb. He’ll catch his death down there. Best leave him up where the warm air gathers from our talk.
THE DOC shrugs and continues working, THE YOUNG MAN whispers in THE OLD MAN’S hairy ear.
THE YOUNG MAN But I’ve never heard of an accident like this in all my life!
THE OLD MAN (fascinated with THE DOC) That you didn’t!
THE YOUNG MAN Are you sure there were absolutely no cars?
THE OLD MAN None.
THE YOUNG MAN Only these two men on their bikes?
THE OLD MAN (turning) Only! Only!
THE YOUNG MAN (embarrassed) I mean—
THE OLD MAN Great gods, man, what do you know of buy-cycles?
THE YOUNG MAN Just—
THE OLD MAN Just nothing! Clear the way!
THE OLD MAN fists a path to the two bikes leaned to the wall. Flynn! Donovan! Lend a hand! Casey, the other bike!
He kicks the hackstand of the bike down. He swings astride a bike. The men grab front and back to steady it. CASEY does likewise with the second bike.
Where am I now?
THE YOUNG MAN In Heeber Finn’s—
THE OLD MAN
No! I’m on the Meynooth Road . . . idling home lazy as you please . . .
He pumps. The back wheel, being free, hums quietly at a nice easy pace, CASEY pumps, too.
(Listens) I hear a church bell. I know I’m late for meals. So what do I do?
THE YOUNG MAN (trying) Go faster?
THE OLD MAN
Now you’re with it, lad! Faster I go! Where before I was toddling along easy at twenty or twenty-five, now here I work up a drizzling sweat at—
FLYNN
Forty an hour!
THE OLD MAN Forty-five! Fifty!
He pumps furiously, bent down in concentrated passion.
Now with a long downhill glide I hit sixty! So here I come, with no front or taillights.
THE YOUNG MAN Isn’t there a law against that?
THE OLD MAN To hell with government interference! So here I come!
CASEY And here / come! the other way!
Both pump furiously, heads down.
THE OLD MAN
The two of us, no lights, heads down, flying home from one town to the next, thrashing like Sin himself’s at our behinds! Both going opposite ways—
CASEY But both on the same side of the road!
THE OLD MAN
Always ride the wrong side of the road, lad, it’s safer, they say! But look on those boys, fair destroyed by all that official palaver. Why? One remembered it, the other didn’t! Better if the officials kept their mouths shut! For there the two boys lie, dying!
THE YOUNG MAN stares. The wheels hum, whining!
THE YOUNG MAN Dying?
CASEY (pumping)
Well, think on it, man! What stands between two able-bodied hell-bent fellas jumping along the path from Kilcock to Mey-nooth?
THE OLD MAN (pumping)
Fog! Fog is all. Only fog to keep their skulls from bashing together. So look now! Here we come, bang! The old man jerks his bike up in the air with a grand whining, humming flourish, as does CASEY.
There we go, nine feet up in the air, heads together like dear chums met, flailing the mist, our bikes clenched like two tomcats. Then