Page 64 - a-portrait-of-the-artist-as-a-young-man

and the Roman people.
What would happen?
He heard the fellows of the higher line stand up at the top
of the refectory and heard their steps as they came down the
matting: Paddy Rath and Jimmy Magee and the Spaniard
and the Portuguese and the fifth was big Corrigan who was
going to be flogged by Mr Gleeson. That was why the prefect
of studies had called him a schemer and pandied him for
nothing: and, straining his weak eyes, tired with the tears,
he watched big Corrigan’s broad shoulders and big hanging
black head passing in the file. But he had done something
and besides Mr Gleeson would not flog him hard: and he
remembered how big Corrigan looked in the bath. He had
skin the same colour as the turf-coloured bogwater in the
shallow end of the bath and when he walked along the side
his feet slapped loudly on the wet tiles and at every step his
thighs shook a little because he was fat.
The refectory was half empty and the fellows were still
passing out in file. He could go up the staircase because there
was never a priest or a prefect outside the refectory door.
But he could not go. The rector would side with the prefect
of studies and think it was a schoolboy trick and then the
prefect of studies would come in every day the same, only it
would be worse because he would be dreadfully waxy at any
fellow going up to the rector about him. The fellows had told
him to go but they would not go themselves. They had for-
gotten all about it. No, it was best to forget all about it and
perhaps the prefect of studies had only said he would come
in. No, it was best to hide out of the way because when you

64 A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man