LADY BRENDA Joe Regan’s sister Brenda was several years older than himself, and by long chalks she was the toughest of the family, though none of them was exactly what you would call a sissy. A sissy would have had very little chance with Joe’s father. He was tall and gaunt and angular, a monk who had strayed into workaday clothes and grown a big mustache. In Mr. Regan’s considered view of the universe, the whole town was in a conspiracy against him, and that included every one of his own family from the baby up—always excepting his wife whom he regarded as a friendly neutral. As long as Joe had known it, life at home was one long battle, with his father, in an imperialist frame of mind, trying to get at them, and his mother, acting as protecting power, trying to keep him off. That didn’t mean that life wasn’t sufficiently exciting. Protect her flanks as she might, Joe’s mother never could keep one or another of the children from showing a light in some position covered by his father, or his father from discovering a new firing point from which for days on end he could decimate the children. But his mother’s defenses were superb. No reconnaissance of his father’s ever brought back prisoners or information; his intelligence system was blown to bits—and Joe’s mother rationalized it all to herself as “not worrying poor Dad.” When there really came to be things to worry about, the suspicion of all that was concealed from him nearly drove Jim Regan to his grave. They had to be tough, there was no other way; but Brenda, whose principal task was looking after Joe, was tough by disposition. She was tall and gaunt and handsome like their father, and she would do anything a boy would do and a lot of things that most boys in their senses would not do. It was never safe to dare Brenda to anything. She scared Joe a great deal more than his father did. For instance, the two of them would be sitting by the tram-stop in the evening when some corner-boy would start to jeer at her, and then anything might happen. One evening a fellow named Wright accused her of swanking—people were always accusing her of that—and Brenda began to boast more and more of her grand acquaintances. Everyone in the big houses by the tram-stop were friends of her family. Joe began trying to get her away, but you couldn’t detach Brenda from a row. “Go on!” bawled Wright. “Prove it! Go up to Lacy’s house and prove it.” “Come on, Joe,” Brenda said lightly. “Don’t, Brenda, don’t!” sniveled Joe. “Why wouldn’t I?” snapped Brenda, angrier with him than with Wright. “Don’t be a blooming baby!” “They might send for the bobbies,” said Joe. Everything about Brenda suggested policemen to Joe. “Well, let them send for the bobbies,” Brenda replied contemptuously. Away she went up the steps to the house while Joe in terror watched from the gate. He knew if it was only the maid answered, she could get away by pretending she had come to the wrong house, but instead a lady came out. Brenda spoke to her a few minutes and then the two of them came down the steps together. Joe was astonished at the way Brenda spoke, just like a grownup. “You turn down here by the church,” said the lady. “Then take the turn to the right when you reach the old bridge, and you’re almost opposite the station. Is this your little brother?” “Yes,” Brenda said with a sad smile at Joe. “I have to look after him. My mother died last year, and my father is thinking of putting him in an orphanage.” “You should really hurry and get home before dark,” said the lady. “Here’s something for you, sonny,” she added, giving Joe sixpence. They walked off in silence, Brenda looking mockingly at Wright who was sitting on the wall, a picture of mortification. “Keep the tanner,” she said good-naturedly to Joe. “it was only that I didn’t want to give that fellow the satisfaction.” It was like Brenda to give sixpence away in that lordly way of hers, but all the same it wasn’t wishing to Joe. For weeks he went round in dread the lady might see him with his mother and find out that he wasn’t an orphan. He felt it was fated that one of those days Brenda would get him into the hands of the bobbies. One year Brenda took it into her head that they should give their father a proper Christmas present, not the miserable pincushions and things the girls had made him previously. “Why should we give him a Christmas box?” snapped Colum. Colum was the eldest of the family and very conscious of his superiority, particularly with the girls. “What does he do for us?” asked Maeve who always supported Colum. “Doesn’t he keep us, woman?” asked Brenda. “Sure only for him we wouldn’t be here at all.” “That’s no good reason for giving him a Christmas box,” growled Colum. “What could we give him?” “He wants a fountain pen,” said Brenda, who, as usual, had it all worked out. “Pity about him!” said Colum. “Ye needn’t be so blooming mean,” said Brenda, beginning to get into a wax. “Rooney’s have very nice pens for ten and six. What is it only two bob a man? Ye’ll get more than that out of the aunts.” The aunts were the O’Regan sisters from Kanturk who always stayed with their brother during the Christmas shopping, and, on the strength of their half crowns, it was decided to give Mr. Regan the fountain pen. Brenda collected the subscriptions and Joe paid up like a man. He knew that with Brenda you had always to pretend generosity even when you didn’t feel it, and he was shrewd enough to realize that, since he was her favorite, he never really lost by it. It was the same about the pen. She not only allowed him to go to town with her to buy it, as well as that, she took him to a toyshop and out of her own money bought him an air gun. That was another peculiar thing about Brenda. Not even the other girls ever knew how much money she really had, and if anyone asked questions she always replied with lies. But Joe liked her just the same. It would be a long day before ever he got anything out of Colum or Maeve. After that they went back up Patrick Street in the twilight, and into Rooney’s, which was a combined stationery and bookshop. Brenda made straight for an assistant called Coakley who lived near them and who was friendly with her father; a tall chap with pince-nez, black curly hair and a pencil behind his ear. He leaned across the counter, laughing at Brenda, and Joe could see that he liked her. “And what can I do for you, Miss Regan?” he asked, and Joe nearly died with pride to hear her so addressed. “You can show us a few fountain pens,” she said with a queenly air as if she had never been called anything else. “Well,” Coakley said eagerly, producing a tray from under the counter, “to make a long story short, you can’t do better than the best.” Then he produced another tray. “Of course, we have the cheaper ones as well, but they’re not a patch on those.” “How much is this?” asked Brenda frowning, taking one from the first tray. “Thirty bob,” Coakley said, leaning his elbows on the counter. “’Tis too dear,” said Brenda, putting it back. “That’s a Standard,” said Coakley. “’Tis a lot of money, of course, but ’tis worth it. That other stuff, I wouldn’t waste your time recommending it to you.” “They all look much alike to me,” said Brenda, taking up one of the cheaper pens. “Ah, Miss Regan,” Coakley said bitterly, “they’re only got up like that to please the mugs. ’Tisn’t the appearance that counts at all, but the nib.” Then he took a fountain pen from his breast pocket and unscrewed the cap. It looked as if it would hold a half pint. “See that pen?” he asked, holding it out to Brenda. “Go on! Look at it! Guess how long I have that!” “How long?” she asked curiously. “Fifteen years,” Coakley replied dramatically. “Fifteen blooming years. I bought that pen out of the first week’s money I ever earned, and I give you my word there wasn’t much of it left when I bought it. They were cheaper then, of course. That’s so old that they’re not even making them any more. They mend it for me as a personal favor, because I’m in the business. I had that through the war, in gaol and everything. I did every blessed thing with that pen only stop a bullet with it, and, I declare to God, I believe if I did that itself, I could have written home afterward with it to tell the story. I’m not telling you a word of a lie, Miss Regan. If you offered me the full price of that pen at this minute I wouldn’t sell it to you. That’s a Standard for you! There isn’t another pen on the market you could say the same about.” He took it back from her, looked at it lovingly, screwed back the cap and returned it to his breast pocket. Joe could see he was really fond of the pen and that Brenda was impressed in spite of herself. “Give it to us for a quid and I’ll take it,” she said coolly. “A quid?” he replied, taken aback by her tone. “You might as well ask me to give it to you for nothing. Thirty bob is the price of those pens, and God knows I wouldn’t tell you a lie.” “Don’t be so blooming mean,” said Brenda, a bit put out at her failure in her first attempt at bargaining. “What’s ten bob one way or the other to ye?” “What’s ten bob to us?” he echoed blankly. Then he raised his hand to his mouth, reached a bit farther across the counter and indicated a small fat man serving at the far end of the shop. “Do you know Mr. Rooney?” he whispered. “No,” replied Brenda. “Why?” “You ought to go up and ask him that question,” Coakley said, and went into a stifled guffaw that shook every bit of him. “Just ask him what’s ten bob to him, one way or the other. I’d love to see his face!” “Anyway,” said Brenda, seeing that this line was a complete wash-out, “you can split the difference. I’d give you the thirty bob, honest to God, but I’m after buying an air gun for the kid.” “Listen, Miss Regan,” Coakley said with genuine earnestness, throwing himself over the counter again and speaking in a confidential whisper. “I’d do it like a shot, only ’twould be as much as my blooming job is worth. Your father will tell you. He knows the way I’m situated. I wouldn’t tell you a lie.” Joe thought that Brenda would still take the good pen even if it meant throwing in his air gun to make up the price. By that time he would not have minded. He was fond of Brenda, and he could see that she was having a terrible time with her pride. It went through her to offer their father anything that was not the very best. It was as though she wasn’t quite the thing herself. Then she gave a shrug. “Ah, I’ll take the ten and a tanner one so,” she said. “It looks all right anyway.” “Oh, it is, it is,” Coakley said, shaking his head and trying to put things in the best light. “I wouldn’t give it to you at all if it wasn’t. As a matter of fact, ’tis quite a decent little pen considering the price. We’re selling them by the hundred.” Even Joe could see that this was a most unfortunate remark because in his sister’s eyes nobody valued what everyone had. She was a natural aristocrat. It was dark when they came out and stood on the edge of the footpath with the lights reflected in the wet streets all round them. Brenda set her jaw and shook her head. “I was an idiot to go to Coakley,” she said with finality and turned to go. “But why, Brenda?” asked Joe. “He knows us too well,” she said shortly. “If we might have gone to a stranger I could have fecked one of the good pens.” The panic Joe knew so well was beginning to rise in him again. They had still a good bit of Patrick Street to walk, and he knew his extraordinary sister so well that he realized there was every possibility of her staging a smash and grab raid on some other shop, with policemen chasing after them through town. The very thought of it made him sick. “We’d get caught,” he said sagaciously. “Ah, you never think of anything only getting caught,” Brenda said and gave him a savage dig. “Old baby!” “Anyway,” he said, trying to assert himself, “’twould be wrong.” “What’d be wrong about it?” she retorted. “As if they were going to miss one pen out of all they have! Robbers!” He saw that was the wrong approach too. It was never much use talking to Brenda about right or wrong. He summed up all his cunning. “I think the pen we got is better,” he said. “It is not better, you idiot!” said Brenda viciously. “Only for you and your blooming old air gun I’d have had enough for it, too. Not,” she added in bitter meditation, “that I’d get any thanks for it. That crowd at home think I’m going to offer Daddy any old thing as if that was all we thought of him. Then they blame him if he gives one of us a clout. Is it any wonder the man would give us a clout and the little we make of him? God, it makes me sick!” On Christmas morning Mr. Regan came downstairs in what for him was a very benevolent mood. Christmas was always a trying time for him. Between the universal claims for Christmas boxes, his sisters, and his children home from school, he could not help feeling put-upon. His wife had worked hard on him that morning, and he had almost been persuaded into promising not to do anything to upset the occasion for the children. He looked at the little parcel on his own plate and studied it for a moment. “Hullo,” he said with a pleasant grin. “What’s this?” “Something Santa brought for you,” said Brenda. Then he sat down, undid the wrapping, opened the little box and saw the pen. “Oh, now, that’s very nice,” he said with real glee, just like a kid. “That’s the very thing I want. Which of ye thought of that?” “Brenda did,” Joe said quickly to make sure that no one robbed his sister of the credit. “That was very thoughtful of her,” said Mr. Regan, making a really gracious bow. “Very thoughtful of all of you,” he added, giving each of them a grin in turn. “How much was it?” he asked briskly. That was more like him. “Really, Jim,” said Mrs. Regan with a laugh. “Such a thing to ask!” “Why wouldn’t I?” he asked, beginning to frown. “The price is on the box,” Brenda said quietly. “Oh, begor, so it is,” said Mr. Regan, glancing at it. “Thirty bob!” he added, impressed in spite of himself. His patrols had never brought back information about the economic state of the enemy’s troops, and most of the time he seemed to think they lived off the country. Joe looked at Colum, Maeve and Brigid, and he saw that they were impressed too, only in a different way. They were looking at Brenda to see what she was up to now. She didn’t look as if she was ever up to anything. She just sat there with a radiant look that would have suggested sanctity except to someone that knew her. “Where did you get it?” her father asked with a trace of suspicion. “Rooney’s,” Brenda replied lightly. “Rooney’s?” her father echoed as he unscrewed the cap of the pen and looked at the nib. “Rooney’s have Standard pens for that.” “I know,” Brenda said composedly. “Joe and myself looked at them but we didn’t like them. The assistant didn’t like them much either. Isn’t that right, Joe?” “That’s right,” Joe said loyally. “Them were the best, Daddy.” “They were the best, dear,” his mother said comfortably. “Wisha, Jim,” she added. “I don’t know is that school any good at all. The monks don’t seem to teach them anything.” The children knew that their mother was sketching a diversion on her flank, but their father did not follow it up. Monks were another of his phobias. Any other time he’d have had quite a lot to say on the subject of monks, but not just then. He lived in a state of suspicion about life in general and shopkeepers in particular. He sucked in his cheeks, breathed through his nose and looked at that pen as though it could tell him what dirty trick the world was trying to play on him now. He rubbed his forehead briskly and turned on Brenda again. “Which assistant was that?” he asked. “Coakley?” “No,” said Brenda. “A fellow we didn’t know.” “Hah!” exclaimed her father, nodding as he began to see deeper into the plot. “I thought as much. I’d be surprised if Coakley had anything to do with that. Isn’t that Rooney all out?” he said to his wife. “He saw the unfortunate children coming and knew he could impose on them.” “Wisha, nonsense!” she replied lightly. “He couldn’t stand over a thing like that.” “But you don’t mean to tell me that—that thing is worth thirty shillings?” he snarled, handing her the pen. “Wisha, really, Jim,” his wife said indignantly, “what way is that to talk about the children’s present?” “Now, I’m not complaining about the children at all,” he said vindictively. “I know the intention was good. What I’m complaining of is Willie Rooney and his sanctimonious air, and I’m going to show him that he can’t treat me like that.” “Sure, if you don’t like it, they’ll change it,” said his wife. “I’ll do it after the holidays,” Brenda said quickly. “You’ll only let yourself be fooled again,” said her father. “She’s no fool at all,” her mother said with a touch of asperity. “Oh, all right, all right,” said Mr. Regan, as cross as two cats at being deprived of such a neat excuse for a row. “Here, Brenda,” he added, replacing the pen in the box, “put that away carefully till Thursday, and then take it back. Mind, now, and don’t use it. Go to Coakley. You know Coakley? Pay attention to what I’m telling you. Have nothing to say to the other assistants. Go to Coakley and say I sent you, and that he’s to give you a Standard pen instead of that one. He’ll see you’re not codded again.” Then Mr. Regan was perfectly happy, having ruined the whole day on the family. “That’s the last Christmas present that old show is going to get from me,” said Maeve. “Never mind him,” snapped Colum. “What do you say to this one, changing the price on the box?” “Ah,” said Maeve contemptuously, “we might have known what she’d do with it. Always swanking.” Brenda was laughing at them. At least, she seemed to be laughing, but she frightened Joe. “Anyway,” she said. “I want another four bob now from each of ye.” “Try and get it.” said Colum. “Oh, I’m going to get it all right,” said Brenda, tossing her head. “If ye don’t give it to me I’ll go and tell my father that ye put me up to it.” “I wouldn’t put it past you,” said Maeve with a sneer. “I suppose you think I wouldn’t?” asked Brenda. They had gone too far, and they knew it. It was in the highest degree unsafe to challenge Brenda to do anything, because there was nothing you could positively say she would not do, and what was worse, nothing you could positively say her father would not believe. As Colum said once, they were lick alike. Joe knew it was wrong, and he was sorry that Brenda made the rest of them feel that way about her, but he could not help admiring her spirit. They paid up and walked out on her. Joe emptied his pockets and offered her everything he had. It was his way of showing that he didn’t really mind. “Keep it,” she said sharply. “I had it all the time, and I’d have paid it too if only they had the decency to stick by me.” Then she smiled, a bitter sort of smile, and Joe thought with interest that she was probably going to cry. “The trouble with our family,” she went on, “is that they have all small minds. You’re the only one that hasn’t, but you’re only a baby, and I suppose you’ll grow up like the rest.” Joe thought that unkind, but he could see she was upset. (1958) Source: Angley, P. et al. _Ways of Reading Frank O'Connor's "Lady Brenda"_ in Evans, Robert C. & Harp, Richard. _Frank O'Connor: New Perspectives_, Locust Hill Press. West Cornwall, CT, 1998.