He Took Me to Catch the Rat, But the Rat Was Him novel · Chapter 19 of 24
Chapter 19: A Quarter in the Slot
Cathal's POV
I left her bed at six, while she slept with one hand on the pillow where my head had been.
Then I went to work on everything I owned.
The loan book was a black ledger in the safe at the back of my pub on Richmond Street.
It held two hundred and eleven names, and every one of them owed my family money at a rate no bank would have written down.
My father started the book, and Fintan kept it, and Phelim collected.
At nine I unlocked the front door and set out a pot of coffee on the bar.
By ten the pub was full.
A roofer stood at the front with his cap in his hands.
A widow in a church coat held a grocery bag against her chest.
A tow-yard man leaned on the jukebox, and a dozen more stood behind them in the cold.
Word had gone down every street in the ward since Mass.
Nobody knew what I would do, and nobody sat.
I opened the ledger on the bar and tore out the first page.
"Your note," I said to the roofer.
He took it from my fingers and stared at it.
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–6 of He Took Me to Catch the Rat, But the Rat Was Him are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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