Dexie cleared a space on the table for the small lit lamp, pushing aside piles of plain-covered books and papers tied with crimson tape. Then he spread the dust sheets over the floor.

‘What do you think of this place, Scholar?’

‘I’d never leave this room if I lived here,’ I said, and Dexie laughed.

Shelves from floor to ceiling were crammed with books of all sizes – even more than I had imagined – and the air had that fusty, bookish smell I loved. I quickly counted one shelf of books – twenty-seven – and calculated roughly how many shelves were in the room. Most were law books, going on the titles, but I spotted The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon; my teacher had that too.

A large wooden crucifix hung on another wall – the same as the one in the Christian Brothers’ house, in the room called ‘The Sacred Heart Parlour’. I took off my jacket and boots. Jesus on the cross seemed to watch my every move, as if he felt sorry for me. In one fast motion, I drew my cap over my face to below my chin. No soot would get in my eyes, nose or mouth if I could help it.

Dexie fixed the cloth in front of the fireplace.

‘I’ll be next door in the drawing room,’ he said before he left. I passed behind the cloth, into the darkness, and started to climb up the flue. This was the moment I hated most. I’d never tell my brothers what I often feared – that while pushing up through the flue, the chimney might turn on me and choke me, like it was something alive. Though my nose was covered, I could still smell the fusty ashes. Holding my brush above my head with one hand, I pressed my back and feet against the flue to start moving up. My sore elbows and knees smarted. Piles of soot came loose. Thankfully this flue wasn’t too narrow.

 I heard Dexie and Cricket working on the chimney in the next room.

‘Saw that travellin’ sweep last week in Camden Street,’ said Dexie.

‘Darby Madden? He’s tall enough to remember, alright.’

‘Probably doesn’t half feed that young lad with him. Saw him stealin’ a bun from one of the stalls.’

‘So they’ve been around a few days.’

‘Yeah. Bessie Reilly said they’re lodgin’ in Mrs McGinn’s cellar.’ Bessie sold fish on the streets and was one of Ma’s friends. She seemed to know everything worth knowing within a five-mile radius.

There was a pause before Cricket spoke again. ‘Cheek of them waltzin’ into our part of town, takin’ our jobs.’

‘Can’t let them do that,’ said Dexie. ‘Especially now.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Found out from Ma last night there’s another child on the way,’ said Dexie.

‘What? When?’

‘April. And that could change things at home. Scholar …’

The voices became muffled as Cricket coughed, and I couldn’t make out what was being said after that. Ma was going to have another baby! Of course that would change things at home – new babies always did. Peggy, the youngest, was four now. We had another little brother after her called Michael, but he died before he was six months old. That was less than a year ago. Ma took it bad. The little wooden cradle Da had made for Michael still stood in the corner of their room.

‘Mrs Callan could do with it, Molly,’ Da had said a few months after Michael died.

‘Not yet, Bartle,’ was all Ma could say, and the cradle was left there ever since.

Now another baby would be rocked in it. I thought about Ma; she had complained of feeling poorly over the last couple of weeks. Hadn’t she asked Auntie Joan to come and help with the Christmas dinner? Ma, a strong woman, would never ask for help in the full of her health. I should have known the signs – she was expecting again.

Brush, scrape and loosen the soot repeated in my brain. One of my knees stung from a cut, but I tried to forget the pain and concentrate on getting the chimney as clean as I could. Tough as it was to work with my brothers, wasn’t I lucky I was with them and not with strangers? Dexie had taken his time to explain how things worked. Cricket was willing to show me the best way to climb, squeeze and clean, even to do it again when he knew I was finding it hard to take everything in.

I thought about what he had shown me and made sure that I was doing it right. The boys said Mrs Sullivan always checked their work carefully. The last thing I needed was to be called back for not doing a thorough job and, worse still, to be the reason why we weren’t hired to clean the chimneys again. But I couldn’t help wondering what had they said about me after they talked about Ma?

I became so caught up in the work and my thoughts that I almost forgot where I was. When I eventually climbed down and came out from behind the cover, who was sitting at the big desk only Daniel O’Connell himself, dipping his pen in the inkwell. He peered at me over his little spectacles in the soft light of the gas lamp. He wore a deep-red, shiny dressing gown with a matching nightcap pulled over his brown-haired wig. I often wondered about his wig, if he wore it at home or only when he was out and about.

Here was the man who had led the campaign for Catholics to have the same rights as anyone else, the man who was the first Catholic Member of Parliament. We had paid our penny every week to help his work, and hadn’t Da attended some of his huge outdoor meetings where thousands of people gathered? To think I was in a room with him on my own! Although I knew there was a chance that I’d meet Daniel O’Connell this morning, I hadn’t thought about how I should be if it happened. I did the first thing that came to mind and gave a deep bow.

‘Come, come, young man, no need for that!’ he said.

I stood up straight and watched him finish the word he was writing and press the blotting paper over it. He had added a heap of folded newspapers to all the documents on the table. Removing the pair of spectacles from his nose, he folded his arms. ‘Good morning to you!’

‘Good morning, sir,’ I said. I wasn’t sure if I should continue working or stand and talk properly.

‘Leave that a minute,’ he said, as if reading my mind. ‘I’ve met your brothers before, but you must be new. What’s your name?’

‘Hugh, sir,’ I said.

‘Hugh O’Dare?’ he repeated. I could hardly believe he spoke my name. ‘And what age are you?’

‘Twelve, almost thirteen, sir.’

‘Only two years younger than Danny, my youngest son. Hugh O’Dare … I’ve heard of you from the Christian Brothers. Brother Maloney is your teacher, is he not?’

‘He is, sir.’

‘You’ve a rare talent for arithmetic, I believe.’

‘Well …’ I was trying to think of what to say.

‘From what I hear, you have indeed. That’s a great omen for your future. You’re keen to get ahead, I’m sure?’

‘I am, sir.’

‘And you’re doing a bit of work during the holidays?’

‘No, sir. I’ve had to leave school ’cause my father broke his arm.’

‘Broke his arm? I’m sorry to hear that. But you’ll be returning when he’s better?’

‘That’s the plan, sir.’

‘Delighted to hear that. Your talent’s a gift from God to cherish!’ He paused, his eye drawn to the sack lying near the fireplace. ‘And tell me, young Hugh, did your father ever consider using one of those machines for cleaning chimneys?’

I looked at him, wondering how best to answer. I couldn’t think of anything to say other than the truth. ‘They’re very dear, those machines, Mr O’Connell.’

Daniel O’Connell knew what I meant when I said that; we could never afford to buy one.

‘The reason I asked you is that poor boy in Stoneybatter – I’m still not the better about hearing what happened to him.’

‘Bob O’Leary?’

‘Yes. You knew him?’

‘No, sir, but my father knew his master.’

‘The poor child. Shocking, shocking.’

Bob O’Leary, a nine-year-old climbing boy, died at the end of November. He was working in a house over on the far side of the city, where he climbed up one flue but became confused and chose the wrong flue to come down. All the coaldust dropped into a fire below, blazing up the chimney. The poor lad never stood a chance. I started work the following week and couldn’t sleep with the nightmares I kept having about Bob dying in the fire.