his shadow on the wall was stretched and birdlike , and as the whiskey flowed shadow imagined it head of a huge waterfowl , beak long and curved , and it was somewhere in the middle of the second glass that mad sweeney himself began to throw both details and irrelevancies into ibis 's narrative ( `` ... such a girl she was , with br**sts cream-colored and spackled with freckles , with the tips of them the rich reddish pink of the sunrise on a day when it 'll be bucketing down before noon but glorious again by supper ... '' ) and then sweeney was trying , with both hands , to explain the history of the gods in ireland , wave after wave of them as they came in from gaul and from spain and from every damn place , each wave of them transforming the last gods into trolls and fairies and every damn creature until holy mother church herself arrived and every god in ireland was transformed into a fairy or a saint or a dead king without so much as a by-your-leave ... mr. ibis polished his gold-rimmed spectacles and explained-enunciating even more clearly and precisely than usual , so shadow knew he was drunk ( his words , and the sweat that beaded on his forehead in that chilly house , were the only indications of this ) -with forefinger wagging , that he was an artist and that his tales should not be seen as literal constructs but as imaginative re-creations , truer than the truth , and mad sweeney said , `` i 'll show you an imaginative re-creation , my fist imaginatively re-creating your fucken face for starters , '' and mr. jacquel bared his teeth and growled at sweeney , the growl of a huge dog who 's not looking for a fight but can always finish one by ripping out your throat , and sweeney took the message and sat down and poured himself another glass of whiskey .