An Irish Christmas Feast by John B. Keane Page A

survived for so long.
    When word went abroad in the village of Ballybradawn that a number of spring salmon were showing in the river before their time there was great excitement among the poaching fraternity. From morn till night they would discuss ways and means of supplementing their Christmas fare with the delicious flesh of an illicitly taken salmon. Mouths watered all through their conversations as the many methods of cooking this prize product of the Bradawn River were recounted. Plans were made but none saw fruition because of the vigilance of the local water-keepers who patrolled the river day and night. All known poachers were trailed as they indulged in seemingly innocuous walks along the riverside. Towards the afternoon of Christmas Eve a man by the name of Ned Muddle chanced to be standing at one of the village’s more prominent corners when he was approached by a friend who informed him about the premature arrivals. Ned expressed doubts about the veracity of his friend’s information.
    â€˜It’s true!’ that worthy assured him.
    â€˜But how come?’ Ned Muddle asked.
    â€˜Some say seals,’ said his informant, ‘while others maintain that it’s merely an error of judgment on the part of the salmon.’
    A lengthy silence ensued while Ned digested the theories put forward by his friend. Ned was greatly addicted to salmon and if presented with a plate of it would not question its origins or the way it was cooked or the manner in which it was served.
    Salmon, alas, were expensive and when Ned fancied fish his longings, of necessity, would generally be catered for by either herring or mackerel. Ned Muddle moved to the other side of the corner. His friend followed suit. They rested their backs against the wall while the friend held forth about the numbers and quality of the salmon which had presented themselves before their time and pointed out too how early fish fetched phenomenal prices in the country’s fish markets and even a solitary kill was an assurance of drinking money for days on end.
    â€˜Yes. Yes,’ Ned announced with some impatience, ‘but what’s all this to me?’
    â€˜What’s it to you?’ his friend expostulated incredulously.
    â€˜Why man dear,’ he went on in a more mollifying tone, ‘I would have thought it applied more to you than to any man.’
    â€˜Why is that?’ asked an increasingly puzzled Ned.
    â€˜Don’t you see?’ said his friend, now facing him directly as he drove home his point, ‘you are a handyman, probably the best handyman in Ballybradawn and maybe, just maybe, the greatest handyman in the country.’
    Ned frowned and then smiled as he wondered if he might indeed be such a handyman, might just about be the greatest handyman in the country, the world!
    â€˜All right!’ he conceded gruffly, only barely managing to conceal his pleasure, ‘so I’m a handyman but what’s a handyman got to do with there being salmon in the river?’
    â€˜Only a skilled handyman could make a wire cage to trap these salmon. Any ordinary handyman just couldn’t do it. He would have to be the best. He would have made wire cages before this. He would have trapped salmon before this!’
    â€˜Before he went to jail you mean,’ Ned Muddle suggested with a wry laugh.
    The villagers of Ballybradawn would remember, but not if they were asked, when Ned Muddle went to jail and for how long and why. It had happened ten years before. He had received a three-month sentence. He had been convicted of poaching or, to be more specific, of being found in possession of explosive substances on the river bank for the express purpose of blowing the souls, if any, of the river’s inhabitants to Kingdom Come and their filleted bodies to the empty larders of Ned Muddle and his wanton fellow poachers.
    There had been a fine-related option but neither Ned nor his henchmen were in a position to