The Story of Mrs. Clohessey's Coffee Table

Mrs. Clohessey's Coffee Table

Martin Clohessey picked through the mess in his parlor. The day is January 16th, 1919, an unseasonably warm day for January, in the 40s.

Missus, ha'e you iver seen such a daft state ov affairs?

"Surely, no, Mr Clohessey," his amiable but perplexed wife answered.

"Here we be, in our second floor flat, up to our ankles in molasses!"

"I told you Copp's Hill was too hard by Commercial Street to make a christian family a proper home!" She added.

Daft, he muttered, we must be daft, to live so close to the US Alcohol Company's holding tank, with 2 million gallons of molasses in it! If it had let go any harder, their house would be gone. If ol' Honey Fitz was still the mayor, he'd have had 'em all in irons.

Outside, the firemen were hosing the sticky goo off the cobbles with seawater from the dock near Old Ironsides. The foam reached almost to their window.

" Look at the work table in the kitchen!" The molasses drew a fetid stripe halfway up the legs, the highwater mark of the sweet tsunami.

"We'll niver get the smell from the wood, woman, let's hurl it out the window with the rest."

"But my own dear mother gave it to me, Martin."

"It will smell 'til Beelzebub ice skates!"

"The top of the table is pure, Martin. Can't you cut off the bottom of the legs, like you did with little Martin's high chair?"

"Woman, have you had a nip? What kind of a daft work table would we be havin', twenty inches from the floor? Only the wee people and street urchins are that small."

The tear in her eye brought him around. Out came the bow saw, and the last ten inches of the legs went out with the rest.

"We could place it in front of the sofa, Martin, and when you and your friends are puffin' out your chests over the Red Sox, you could place your tea cups on it."

"You know, the Red Sox won the series again last year, and they're sure to win it again this year, with or without the Ruth fella, but I'll derive no pleasure from it at all. Not if I have to read about it in the Globe, smellin' like porto rico rumslops. And speakin' of rumslops, the destruction of a man's belongings is thirsty work. How about a wee nip for a workin' man, lassie?"

Just then, the church bells began to toll, and the firemen paused from their labors, and lifted their heads like dogs with a scent.

"What the divil?"

The newsboy walked by the window, crying the news-" Nebraska votes to ratify the 18th amendment! Prohibition is here!"

"Perhaps coffee would be better, Martin. Here, on our new table."