he knew what his son did to you today, he’d be very disappointed. Conkers is a great game. But if I’m not mistaken, you started to believe you were some kind of a big man, prancing around like the mayor of the town. I was chatting with your teacher, Mr Byrne, in town on Saturday. He was worried that something like this might happen if you continued to rub your success in the lads’ faces. If Johnny is anything like his father, I don’t think he would tolerate anyone that thought they were better than everyone else. Now there’s no excuse for him attacking you over it, but you need to clear the air with Johnny. I’ll talk to Seanie about it.’


With that, he stood up and left the room, but returned shortly with a small black box in his hands. Unlocking it, he handed it to Paul.


‘Play with this tomorrow but play like a man. Forget these airs and graces. You won’t lose, but when October is over you are going to hand me this back and start again. Johnny Kelly won’t be able to say anything because he’d have to admit he took your conker and broke it.’


Paul didn’t know what to say. They spoke for a few more minutes, and Paul realised his father must have given his mother some sort of signal to leave because she hadn’t reappeared. He now spoke openly about the process of preparation and the skill involved, and Paul wondered why his father had never told him all his secrets before. So he asked him.


‘Paul, the fun of something like this is in the discovery of it. If I gave away all the secrets, you would have missed out on all the fun. Now I never thought you’d catch a beating over it, but I’ve seen the time you have spent searching, discovering, preparing and playing. Would you have enjoyed me telling you how to do that as well?’


With that he went to the hall and picked up the phone. Paul wasn’t quite sure what had just happened, but he knew that it was important.


The next day Johnny Kelly even managed a mumbled apology, and he couldn’t help but grin when Paul mumbled an apology back.


‘So, do you think you might want a game tomorrow?’ asked Kelly.


‘Yeah okay, I think I might have found another champion but I’d have to test it against the best fi rst’. ‘Damn right,’ smiled Kelly as he pulled out a fresh conker. ‘Maybe he’s learning,’ thought Paul. Maybe they both were.


Passions and Pastimes 151


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