Summary

The novella opens in 1985 in the small Irish town of New Ross, where the townsfolk “unhappily endured” (1) another cold winter. Bill Furlong is the coal and timber merchant in town. He and his employees are extremely busy with deliveries of “coal, turf, anthracite, slack and logs” (3). Furlong makes many of the deliveries himself. Each day, when the Angelus bell rings, his employees enjoy a simple, warm meal at Kehoe’s, a local restaurant.

In Chapter 2, Furlong recalls his childhood in New Ross. He came “from nothing. Less than nothing, some might say” (5). His mother, as a teenager, worked for a kind Protestant widow named Mrs. Wilson. After Furlong’s mother became pregnant at sixteen, Mrs. Wilson took her in and allowed her to continue working. Furlong grew up in Mrs. Wilson’s large, warm home; the childless Mrs. Wilson “took him under her...