Lyrics Bobby Bare – Brian Hennessey
Text:
Brian Hennessey sat back and let the gypsy read his palm
When he saw her eyes grow wide and wild and dark
And she whispered through her toothless gums and clutched him by the arm
She said, «Boy, I fear I see the devil’s mark.»
Brian Hennessey just laughed and pealed the ten-spot from his roll
‘Cause he’d never ever known the taste of fear
But he wondered why the summer nights should suddenly turn cold
As the gypsy’s words come ringing in his ear.
«You can run, you can hide, Brian Hennessey.», she cried
«But you can’t escape the fate that’s in your hand.
And say how does it feel to have dealt your final deal?
Go on lay down Brian you’re a dying man.»
Brian Hennessey walked through the doors of the Dining Dog Saloon
Where he stopped to have his nightly glass of gin
And the one-eyed scar-faced stranger a dealing blackjack in the gloom
Winked his ghastly grey glass eye and dealt him in.
Brian watched in fascination as the stranger’s fingers flew
Why he’d never seen such cheatin’ done before
And his hand closed round a handle of his snub-nose 32
When the gypsy’s warning come to him once more.
«You can run, you can hide, Brian Hennessey.», she cried
«But you can’t escape the fate that’s in your hand.
And say how does it feel to have dealt your final deal?
Go on lay down Brian you’re a dying man.»
Brian Hennessey just folded up his cards and walked away
Holding back the rage that burned his soul
And he stopped to have some coffee at the Mockingbird Cafe
But that slender blue eyed waitress was his goal.
And a few words from his silver tongue soon turned her flutty head
She said, «My husband’s out of town, you need not fear.»
On her pillows he saw written bright and clear.
Oh, you can run, you can hide, daring letters clear and wide
Said you can’t escape the fate that’s in your hand
And say how does it feel to have dealt your final deal
Go on lay down Brian you’re a dying man.
Brian Hennessey he stumbled down the stairs into the street
And from that day on he changed his wicked life
And he never drunk or gambled and he never dealt no dough
And he never touched another fellow’s wife.
And years later he met the gypsy when his days were almost done
He said, «Ha, ha, I beat your curse don’t you know.»
But when she saw the frightened, trembling, withered wretch that he’d become
She said, «Brian, you died twenty years ago.»
«Because you ran and you hid that’s exactly what you did
But you didn’t escape the fate that’s in your hand.
And say how did it feel to have dealt your final deal?
Go on lay down Brian you’re a dying man…»
