Ned Connor was noted but fierce for the drink. One of the pledges he took only allowed him one drinka day. He settled for a pint and he got into the habit of taking the pint about closing time or alittle after it and there is a bit of history attached to that too and I might as well tellit while I'm at it. Ned had a white tomcat that used to follow him everywhere. He'd go up thestairs after Ned every night when he was going to bed and Ned would be tricking with the catand they'd have a little boxing match out through the banisters of the stairs.When Ned would take his trousers off he'd put it in the seat of the chair and the cat would make ahammock of that until morning. He'd cross the street every night after him and the cat wouldsit in the windowsill of the pub until Ned came out. The cat was as well known as a bad ha'penny.People passing along the village at night and seeing him sitting in the windowsill of Meshkill'spub knew that Ned Connor was inside having his daily imperial as he used to call it.Which he never went beyond and his temperance brought him a little prosperity. You see he hada fine roomy house and the wife encouraged by the aunt he had began to keep people. Turned it intoa lodging house. Two young guards used to have their dinner there. The force was only in itsinfancy at the time. The guards weren't long coming to the house when they were like one of the family.Here they'd go in and sit in the kitchen and throw their caps on top of the dresser. In the kitchenthey came to know the cat and they came to know too about Ned's habit of going across the road toMeshkill's pub for his daily pint after closing time and knowing Ned so well they'd never raidthe pub while the cat was sitting outside in the windowsill. Raiding pubs was almost a nightlyoccurrence at that time for the licensing laws were not as liberal as they are now.The weekly paper would be full of court cases. I saw it given down in the paper myself where a guardat 12 o'clock would say,at 12 o'clock at night after being given an assurance by the publican that there was no oneon the premises. The guard went upstairs, opened the door of a wardrobe and a man fell out. Peoplehad gone to inaugurate hall rather than have their names in the paper. The same guard swore that inanother room he found three men sound asleep in a small bed with the claws up to their chins thepicture of innocence. What they didn't know was that their feet were cocking out of the bottomof the bed. I wondered they didn't feel the cold.Judge, how could this is the guard and they're having their shoes on? But to go back to Ned,I was in Meshgill's myself one night when he came in. Even though it was gone closing time,there was a big crowd inside. There was something on in the village the same day. I think it was abull inspection and the publican was in no hurry out with him. Know that Ned was inside and thecat outside he felt safe. At least for the length of time it took Ned to down one imperial pint.The talk was nice and leisurely and Ned had beenmore than halfway down the glass when there was a sharp knock at the front door.Open up in the name of the law. Crane deal, says Ned. It must be strange guards or own lads thathave seen the cat. Clear, says the publican, frightened of an endorsement in his license,out the back. And he began to pour drink down the shore. In another second the lights were outtotally eclipsed and there was what I can only describe as a stampede towards where we thoughtthe back door should be. We were going into presses and closets and everything.And when we found out the door, the first of the crowd out were bolting back like a squad ofrabbits that had meet a ferret in the turn of a burrow. There was another guard, you see, at theback gate. Now we all made for the stairs and some of us got out the upper window onto the roof of ashed. And the plan was, if our geography was correct, to get down into a neighbour's yard andmake good our escape. And do you know what I'm going to say now? The corrugated iron roof of ashed on a wet night is an awful slippery slope. And the first of the crowd out the door was aplace. The legs were taken from under one fella and he went sliding down and fell ten feet on topof God only knows what. I could not repeat here what he said. And he had hardly himself straightenedup when another fella fell on top of him. Well, there was one huge corporation of a man there.They told me after that he was home on holidays from America. I don't know. But we were all hangingout him. Blessed over tonight if the man didn't lose his balance and crashed in the flat of hisroof, bringing us all down with him. Such a report. Cows, pigs, geese, all the animals in thevicinity woke up as we went skeeting down the roof and fell on top of one another into the black holeof Calcutta. Then you heard language. Drink lubricates the talking machine. Twas like Dunkirk.And to make matters worse, whatever way it happened, down into the publican's yard we fell.The police were there before us. Our names were taken.And so we had all our work for nothing. When we came out in the street, Ned Connor went straightto the windowsill. But there was no sign of the white cat. He couldn't believe his eyes.But whatever look he gave, there below on the school wall was Ned Connor's white catholding a loud conversation with a member of his own community. Well, bad manners to you anyway fora white cat, says Ned, rubbing his shins. I'd have nearly gone without my imperial pint tonight if Iyou had a date.