Read Online Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle - Free Book Online Page B

I hit his leg. He didn’t turn. I sat up properly again and waited, and turned to James O’Keefe.
    —McEvoy’s gone asleep.
    James O’Keefe bit his jumper to stop himself from laughing. Someone in the class was in big trouble, and it wasn’t him.
    We all waited. We shushed each other so we wouldn’t wake Ian McEvoy, even though we weren’t making any noise anyway.
    Henno closed the door.
    —Sit up now.
    We did, quickly; we sat up straight. We looked at Hennessey, to see when he’d see Ian.
    We were doing spellings, English ones. Henno had his book out on the desk. He put all our scores and marks into the book and added them up on Fridays, and made us change our places. The best marks sat in the desks along the windows and the worst were put down the back beside the coats. I was usually in the middle somewhere, sometimes near the front. The ones at the back got the hardest spellings; instead of asking them, say, eleven threes, he’d ask them eleven elevens or eleven twelves. If you got put into the last row after the marks were added up it was very hard to get out again, and you were never sent on messages.
    —Mediterranean.
    -M.e.d. -
    —The easy part; continue.
    —i.t.—
    —Go on.
    He was going to get it wrong; it was Liam. He usually sat behind me or in the row beside me nearer the coats, but he’d got ten out of ten in sums on Thursday so he was sitting in front of me, in front of Ian McEvoy. I only got six out of ten in the sums test because Richard Shiels wouldn’t let me have a look in his copy, but I gave him a dead leg later for it.
    -t.e.r.—a.—
    —Wrong. You’re a worm. What are you?
    —A worm, Sir.
    —Correct, said Henno.—Urr-wronggg! he said when he was marking Liam’s mistake into the book.
    He didn’t only make us change our places on Fridays; he biffed us as well. It gave him an appetite for his dinner, he told us. It gave his appetite an edge, and he needed that because he didn’t like fish as a rule. One biff for every mistake. With the leather he soaked in vinegar during the summer holidays.
    Kevin was next, then Ian McEvoy.
    -M.e.d., said Kevin.—i.t.e.r.r.a.n—
    —Yes?
    —i.a.n.
    —Urr-wrong!—Mister McEvoy.
    Ian McEvoy was still fast asleep. Kevin sat in the same desk as him and he told us later that Ian McEvoy was smiling in his sleep.
    —Dreaming about a molly, said James O’Keefe.
    Henno stood up and stared over Liam at Ian McEvoy.
    —He’s gone asleep, Sir, said Kevin.—Will I wake him up?
    —No, said Henno.
    Henno put his finger to his lips; we were to be quiet.
    We giggled and shushed. Henno walked carefully down to Ian McEvoy’s side of the desk; we watched him. He didn’t look like he was joking.
    —Mis-ter McEvoy!
    It wasn’t funny; we couldn’t laugh. I felt the rush of air when Henno’s hand swept through and smacked Ian McEvoy’s neck. Ian McEvoy shot up and gasped. He groaned. I couldn’t see him. I could see the side of Kevin’s face. It was white; his bottom lip was out further than his top one.
    Hennessey warned us about being sick on Fridays. If we weren’t in school on Friday for our punishment he’d get us on Monday, no excuses.
    All the desks smelt the same, in all the rooms. Sometimes the wood was lighter because the desk was near a window where the sun could get at it. They weren’t the old-fashioned desks where the top was a lid on hinges that you lifted and there was a place for your books under it. The top was screwed down on our desks; there was a shelf in under it for books and bags. There was a hollow for your pens and a hole for the inkwell. You could roll your pen down the desk. We did it for a dare cos Henno hated the noise when he heard it.
    James O’Keefe drank the ink.
    When we had to stand up, when we were told to, we had to lift the seat back and we weren’t allowed to make noise doing it. When there was a knock at the door, if it was a master coming in or Mister Finnucane, the headmaster, or Father Moloney, we had