"Will you just have the one more, Joseph?" The little man in the
check jacket and crumpled green shirt leaned conspiratorially
towards his companion, breathing cigarette smoke and Guinness
fumes over him. "You can't go now, just when we're starting to 
have a bit of fun!"

 Joseph glanced briefly at his watch. He was a tall, large-built man
with thick greying hair, and he wore a dark blue blazer and neatly
pressed grey trousers. He considered himself to be something of a 
dandy amongst his social circle, although outsiders might have seen
him as over-dressed and rather fussy. "You're an old devil, Patrick,"
he smiled, his voice deep and steady. "I suppose that means it's my
round again?"

 Without waiting for his friend's reply, he signalled to the plump
landlady, who responded immediately. She ignored the noisy 
demands of several jostling drinkers lining the short bar of the 
Harrow Inn to come and serve him. Although in his middle years,
Joseph Wood was still a fine looking man, and he was popular with
the ladies.

 "Is it the usual, Joseph?" the landlady asked, filling a glass with rum
without waiting for the reply.

 "Sure, one of these days I'll have a shandy and you'll faint from 
the shock," laughed the big man expansively, taking the glass from
her and handing over a ten pound note. "Get another Guinness for
this reprobate here while you're at it, Maureen. And one for yourself."  

 "You should be on the television, the amount you can put away
without falling down," smiled Maureen, letting her hand linger in 
Joseph's as she gave him his change. For a moment, their eyes met, 
and he gave her the special smile that every woman he knew thought 
he shared with no-one but her. Every woman but one.

 "Aren't you going to give us a song tonight, Mr Wood?" called one
of the young men at the other end of the bar. "I've been telling my
Linda what a fine voice you have, and she says she'll believe it 
when she hears it." A short red-faced girl beside him slapped the
youth fondly.

 "Yes. Give us one of the old ones," agreed two or three others, 
and the talking died down as every eye turned towards Joseph.
 "I suppose I'll have no peace until I do," sighed the big man,
feigning unwillingness. He stood up from his bar stool. "Can you
play me something to sing to, Annie?"  

 A thin woman with a mane of deep red hair got up from the table 
she had been sharing with two female friends and pushed her way
through the crowd to a battered piano on a raised platform in the
corner of the bar. Dropping her half-smoked roll-up onto the bare
wooden floor and crushing it beneath her foot, she sat down and
began to play 'When You Were Sweet Sixteen'.

 After a few notes, Joseph started to sing. His voice, distinctive
enough when he merely spoke, brought immediate silence to the
drinkers now. Pure, and reverberating with nostalgia for a time
that had never existed, the words of the sentimental old song
soared above the acrid blue smoke and through the stale odour
of alcohol and, for a few wonderful minutes, transformed the 
busy saloon into the finest concert hall in the county. There was
more than one woman with tears in her eyes when Joseph had
finished, and two or three of the men made their way across the
room to shake him by the hand. He offered little resistance to each
of their offers to buy him and Patrick a drink, and laughed even 
more expansively than before when his old friend passed out and
had to be carried home to his cottage on the opposite side of the
village's narrow main street. Taking Patrick home was one of the
regular duties of Maureen's strapping son, Colin. 

 "Indeed you do have a lovely voice, Mr Wood." Joseph lifted
his head, which had become rather heavy since Patrick had gone, 
to see the red-faced girl Linda standing by his side.

 "Ah, it's not all that," he said, summoning up his special smile. "Come
and sit here by me, and I'll sing a song just for you. 'Tis your beauty
that will make it lovely then, not my old voice."

 "Oh no, please don't," pleaded the girl, blushing. "I'd be embarrassed
out of my life."

 "Embarrassed is it," said Joseph softly, his heavy hand coming to
rest on hers. "And what will you give me then if I don't embarrass
you?"

 "What would you like?" She pouted, perhaps unintentionally. Mr
Wood was very good looking for a middle-aged man.

 "How about a little kiss?" He moved his head closer towards hers,
oblivious to the self-absorbed groups of people around them.
Slowly, she began to lean forward.  

 "There you are, Linda," said her young man, emerging from the
public bar next door. "I thought you'd got bored waiting for me to
finish my game of darts and gone home on your own."

 "I wasn't bored at all, actually," she told him archly. Joseph had sat
upright and was staring disinterestedly at the window. "Mr Wood
was keeping me company like a proper gentleman."

 "The Harrow would be nothing without you, Mr Wood," said the
young man, nodding his head rapidly. "Old Maureen ought to pay
you for coming in here every night."

 "Less of the 'old', Dennis Nolan," snapped Maureen, bearing down
on him from behind the bar. "Get that poor girl home before her 
mother realises what time it is, and mind your manners if you want
to drink in here again!" She smiled to ensure the youth did not take
her too seriously.

 "We'll finish our conversation another day, then, Mr Wood?" said 
Linda, looking up at him from beneath her long eyelashes.

 "Oh, I'm sure we will," said Joseph, dragging his attention back to
the scene. "I'm sure we will."

 "I suppose you'll have to be going back to that lucky wife of your's
now, Joseph?" asked Maureen, as the clock struck eleven and the
bar began to empty. The Harrow was the only inn for several miles
around, and none of the villagers wanted it to risk losing its licence. 
 Joseph looked at her and blinked. "Indeed I must," he said,
suddenly attentive. "I should have been home hours ago. I'll be 
for it tonight!"

 Maureen nodded, understanding and regret mingled in her eyes.
"Take care," she murmured.  

 "Isn't he a great man," declared Colin as Joseph walked carefully
out of the door, and the young man locked it behind him. "He's the
life and soul of the whole village, yet he's never too busy to listen 
to anyone and he has a kind word for everybody. Did you see the 
way he was cheering up poor Linda Flavin when Sean went off
and left her on her own? It's not many people who'd put themselves
out for a timid little thing like her."

 Maureen was gazing wistfully at the locked door. "He was a good
friend to your father, and helped me a lot when the cancer took
him," she sighed. "It's a shame he ever married that stuck-up Tessa
O'Rawe. There's no wonder he's in here most nights until closing."
 
Joseph's three bedroom house was one of the biggest buildings in the
village, and stood in an acre of ground a brisk twenty minute walk 
from the Harrow. It was an isolated building which Joseph had
bought almost thirty years before, when his father had died and left
him enough money to do so. Although a qualified, and adept, 
electrician, Joseph had never found -- nor sought -- regular work,
and so the house was sorely in need of decoration. A building firm
in the nearest town employed him often enough to keep him 
comfortably in funds, but there was never enough money to squander
on luxuries like paint. 

 Having found the keyhole with some difficulty, Joseph opened his
front door and went inside. He felt along the wall for the switch 
and turned the hallway light on before closing the door behind him.
Then he stood there, swaying slightly from side to side. Waiting. 
After a few minutes, the landing light went on and his wife appeared
at the top of the stairs in a brown dressing gown. She stared at him
for a moment, trying to gauge his mood.

 Joseph sniffed the air exaggeratedly. "Mmm," he said loudly. "What
a lovely smell. Is it roast chicken we're having tonight? Or roast beef?
What dinner have you cooked for me after having nothing else to do
all day?"

 Tessa came slowly down the stairs. "I thought you wouldn't be
coming home," she said quietly. "When it got late, I threw it away."
 "Thought I wouldn't be coming home," repeated Joseph, his voice
instantly tense. "So you threw my dinner away and turned off all 
the lights. Perhaps you were hoping I wouldn't be coming home, 
is that it?" With that, he took an unsteady step forward and gripped
her tightly by the arm.

 "You said you'd be back early. Please let go. You're hurting me."
The woman was shivering.

 "Be back early," he hissed. "And what the hell have I to come
back for, eh. Eh?" He shook her as he spoke, making her dance
in time to his words.

 "I'm sorry, Joseph. Please don't ..."

 He threw her back so that she hit the wall. A mirror fell down and
shattered, and Tessa froze, transfixed in terror.

 "You're always sorry," he murmured, taking a step towards her.
"But you never do anything about it, do you!" He raised his heavy 
hand and brought it down in a stinging slap across her face. She
staggered to one side. "Why the hell is it that everyone else in this
accursed place is pleased to see me, and you never are?" His arm
swung back, and his knuckles struck her nose a glancing blow. It
began to bleed. 

 "Please, Joseph," she begged. Blood and tears ran down her face.
"Please let me go back to bed."

 "From the state of this place, it looks as if you never get out of bed,
you idle bitch!" he shouted. His eyes bulged, and he punched her full
in the stomach. She doubled over and fell to her knees. He started
to kick her. "Stand up, you useless cow. Stand up and get me 
something to eat." He grabbed a handful of her long dark hair and
tore at it until she dragged herself to her feet.

 "No more, please, Joseph," she whimpered. "I'm sorry. It won't
happen again. I'll go and cook you some sausages. You like those.
I got you your favourites."

 He pressed her against the wall, his hand around her throat. "In
future, you lazy bitch, I want you waiting here when I get in. I want
the lights on, and I want my dinner ready. Do you understand? Is
that clear?" He banged her head against the wall, one knock for 
each of the last six words.

 "Yes, anything you say, only please let me go. I won't upset you
any more." She could scarcely breath, and her face and hair were
sticky with blood. The stench of alcohol on his breath was the
only thing which kept her from fainting.

 "Just remember, I'm an important man around here," Joseph hissed,
as he released her. "I expect to be treated like one!" 

 She used her sleeve to wipe her face, and waited for his permission
to go. He said nothing, and she glanced fearfully up at him, 
anticipating yet more pain. And as she looked at him, he sneered 
at her. He sneered in mockery of her weakness, sneered in
celebration of the power he had over her, sneered at the terror
which had kept her his uncomplaining slave since the day after
they had married. 
 
She knew that sneer. She had seen it more times than she could 
count. It was the special smile he shared with no-one but her.