Frankie leaves home for London

Frankie’s departure for London grows out of a household conflict that has become physically dangerous and a schooling arrangement he can no longer endure. His first flight to Dublin ends in a reluctant return home; a second attempt to resume school also fails. When he leaves again, John and his sisters help him cross to England, where the unsettled years that follow eventually lead to education and a professional career.

Violence and the First Flight to Dublin

The break begins with Frankie’s conflict with his father, Francis (Frank) McGahern. After his father attacks him, Frankie fights back, knocks him to the floor, and holds him by the arms. Agnes beats Frankie around the head with a brush while shouting. At first, the episode seems almost absurd to Frankie: he imitates Agnes’s blows and his father’s groans and shouts, laughing uproariously. The laughter gives way to fear only when his father later makes dark hints and threats.

Frankie is sixteen, nearly seventeen, and almost fully grown when he arrives at John’s school in Dublin. He has hitchhiked through the night and early morning but has been unable to find John’s address. John introduces him to the teachers, who welcome him with tea and sandwiches, then explains how to reach his lodgings. By the time John returns from school, Frankie has made friends with the landlady and is resting. The welcome offers temporary shelter, but does not resolve the danger or the conflict awaiting him at home.

Frankie stays for two days. John takes him back on Friday evening, and they agree that he will give both home and school another try. John believes Frankie is quick enough to manage his examinations and has little more than a year to go before his Leaving. Frankie says he has been thinking about England; John argues that he can still go after finishing school. At home, Agnes is hostile, saying Frankie has let everyone down. John argues that he needs encouragement rather than being cut down, but his appeal has no effect. His father leaves the room, and John’s hope that Frankie might stagger to the end of his schooling is faint.

A Return to School That Does Not Hold

John later arranges for Frankie to return to school with a clear slate, provided he keeps it clean. Frankie is sheepish as well as defiant, and agrees to go back the next day without much enthusiasm. Francis calls John a fool, predicts that Frankie will come to nothing, and says that he will eventually end up in a mental hospital. The arrangement wins little time. Frankie and his father remain at war inside the house, while Frankie gets into trouble at school again and comes close to expulsion.

One morning Frankie sets out for school but hitchhikes to Dublin instead. By evening he has reached Monica and Margaret, the narrator’s younger sister, with whom he goes to stay. He has already written to Rosaleen and is resolved to go to London. This second flight turns an earlier conversation about England into a definite plan. John offers to rent a flat where the two brothers could live and send Frankie to school in Dublin, warning that he would expect him to study. Frankie considers the offer, then breaks down in tears. He tells John that he is sick of school and studying and cannot bear it any longer; he is going to London. John sees that Frankie is too disturbed and restless to settle under his care, or anyone else’s.

The Crossing to England

Rosaleen has received Frankie’s letter and has room for him. She agrees to meet him at Euston when the early morning train arrives. The next evening, John, Margaret, and Monica take Frankie to the boat at Dún Laoghaire. His sisters cry as they buy his ticket. John talks his way aboard and explains Frankie’s situation to the purser, including that he has never been away from home before. The purser gives Frankie a small room beside his office and promises to ensure that he catches the London train at Holyhead.

Rosaleen meets Frankie at Euston. Within a week he has found work in a large office block in the city. The departure is therefore not simply an escape without a destination: Rosaleen’s letter, lodging, and welcome give him an immediate point of arrival. Yet the careful arrangements for the crossing cannot guarantee that the life beyond it will be easy or settled.

Restlessness, Education, and Later Success

Frankie’s London life proves rockier than his first letter home suggests. He spends several unsettled years around the city before returning to night school. Francis remains sceptical, doubting that Frankie will return to school or make a success of anything, even while hoping that he is wrong. That judgment is disproved by Frankie’s subsequent achievements. He gains his GCE at night school and passes the examinations for a degree in accountancy with ease. His natural mathematical ability supports further, demanding qualifications.

Frankie moves from accountancy into management, runs a number of factories and small businesses around London, and eventually becomes Financial Controller of BBC Radio. The distance between his father’s prediction and this career gives the departure its longer significance: leaving home initially removes Frankie from a violent, controlling conflict, but it does not produce instant stability. His progress comes through a less direct route, after years of difficulty and a return to study. The episode thus ends not at the gangway or the train to London, but in the reversal of the future Francis had imagined for him.