Dublin (93 page)

  "You're not to worry about this stupid business," he said to the glover firmly. "MacGowan's told me what they did. I can get the charges dropped, though she'll be given a warning, of course.

  She must expect that." He looked at Tidy a little more severely now. "If you have influence over this young woman, you should persuade her to be more careful in future." The alderman's dark hair was grey at the temples nowadays. It added to his authority.

  The interview now being over, as far as Doyle was concerned, he smiled pleasantly to indicate that Tidy was free to leave.

  "They're getting married," his wife gently intervened. "He's going to apply for the franchise.

  And now he's afraid…"

  Doyle paused and pursed his lips. He turned to Tidy and asked him a few questions about his position in the glovers' guild, about the girl and her family.

  Then he shook his head. He had long ago learned that if there was bad news to impart, the kindest thing was to do it quickly.

  "I think they'll turn you down," he said frankly. "They'll say your wife is Irish."

  If the old prohibitions against Irish dress were still enforced in the Pale, the franchise of Dublin itself was certainly supposed to be reserved for the English, and the city fathers were rather strict about keeping the Irish out. More subtle was the question: who's English and who's Irish?

  MacGowan, for instance, was Irish by name and Irish by ancestry. But the MacGowans had been important craftsmen in the city since the days of Brian Boru. Respectable Dubliners for centuries, they counted as English, and MacGowan had the freedom. Amongst the city councillors, you wouldn't expect even to find any Irish names at all; yet a rich Irish merchant named Malone had reached such wealth and prominence that he had even become an alderman. His Irishness had simply been ignored. Conversely, the Harolds had sternly upheld English rule against the Irish in the Marches for generations; but in the opinion of the Dublin aldermen, some of the Harolds had recently become a bit too wild and Celtic in their ways, and one of them had just been refused the freedom. Perhaps the reality was best expressed by Doyle himself when he trenchantly observed in committee one day, "People are English if I say they are."

  Cecily Baker might have an Irish mother, but nobody would have bothered to question her Englishness if it hadn't been for today's event. Doyle could quash the charge, but she had drawn attention to herself; people would talk, and when Tidy came up for consideration in the committee, some busybody would be sure to know and to raise the matter. It would not be liked.

  Tidy was only a modest fellow from one of the lesser craft guilds and had no powerful backers; his betrothed was running around making a nuisance of herself in Irish dress. He'd never pass. Doyle didn't know Cecily, but it seemed to him she couldn't have much sense, and he privately wondered if young Tidy mightn't do better. His bleak glance at his wife said as much.

  "He loves her," she said gently. "Couldn't we do something?"

  Do something? Do what? Tell the aldermen of grey old Dublin that Henry Tidy loved Cecily Baker and should be given the freedom of the city? He gazed at his wife affectionately. That's probably just what she would do, he thought. And get away with it, too. But it wasn't so easy. If he really put his mind to it, he could probably manage to get young Tidy the franchise. But even a powerful man like himself had only so much goodwill he could call upon. He still had to obtain the freedom for his own daughters. Should he really be squandering his precious goodwill on account of a girl young Tidy would probably be better off without?

  "They might be as happy as we are," said his wife sweetly, as if answering his thoughts.

  Would Tidy really find the warmth, the tenderness, the generosity of spirit that he had known? Children, relations, friends, and now even this glum young fellow and his silly girl-his wife drew them all into the circle of kindness that she had made of their home. He shook his head and laughed.

  "You are involved in this, too, you know." He gave his wife's shoulder a little squeeze. "Cecily Baker must be made to understand that she may never repeat her behaviour. She must be a model citizen. If she transgresses again," he gave his wife a hard look, "it would hurt my reputation and my ability to help my own family. So please be certain that she means to reform." He turned to Tidy. "I can't promise you anything, but I'll speak for you." And now he gave the young man an even sterner look. "If you marry this girl, be sure you can keep her in order. Or I shall cease to be your friend."

  Tidy promised gratefully that he would do so; and kindly Dame Doyle went in person to see Cecily the very next day.

  Spring passed uneventfully for the Walsh family.

  It was during the summer that Margaret noticed that her husband was worried.

  One reason for this was obvious. The spring weather had been fine enough, but the summer had turned into a disaster. Cloudy days, cold winds, drizzle; she couldn't remember a worse summer; and it was already clear that the harvest would be ruined. Everyone looked gloomy.

  It would be a poor year for the Walsh estate.

  It was during July that she guessed there was something else on his mind. She could always tell when he was worried: he had a little trick of locking his fingers together and staring down at them. But she knew it was best to wait for him to tell her about it, and about a week before the festival of Lughnasa, he did so.

  "I've to go down into Munster shortly," he announced.

  The request that he would undertake the legal affairs of a monastery down in Munster had come as a welcome surprise a few months earlier. The fees would cover the shortfall from the bad harvest, and Walsh had been busy with the monastery's affairs in Dublin in recent weeks. He had reached the point now, he explained, where he needed to spend a little time down at the monastery itself.

  "You think I won't be able to manage while you're away?" she asked, teasingly.

  "Not at all." He smiled ruefully. "I expect you'll be glad to have me out of the house for a while." He paused. "But I don't want you to say where I'm going."

  "I'm not to say you're down in Munster?"

  "It might be misunderstood."

  "And why," she asked, "is that?"

  William Walsh was a careful observer of the political scene. He was still hoping to get a seat in Parliament; but the last seven years had not been an easy time to become involved in politics.

  Superficially, the situation in Ireland looked the same as usual. The king was far away; the Butlers and the Fitzgeralds were still rivals for power, and the Fitzgeralds, as always, were the stronger. But there was one subtle difference.

  Walsh had remembered the story Doyle had told about King Henry when they met at Maynooth, and the warning it contained. It had been only a year afterwards that something of Henry's character had been exhibited when Kildare and his royal friend had had a falling out. The cause had been a complex legal matter concerning the Butler inheritance: Henry had taken one view;

  Kildare, in Ireland, had flatly contradicted him. And soon afterwards, Kildare had been called by Henry to England, and a great English nobleman was sent to govern Ireland in his place.

  Walsh had been quietly cultivating his relationship with Doyle ever since their friendly exchange at Maynooth, and it was during one of their conversations in Dublin that the alderman had enlarged on the theme he had discussed before.

  "You have to understand," he remarked, "that underneath all the royal splendour, Henry is like a spoilt child.

  No one has ever told him: no.

  If he wants something, he thinks he should have it.

  Thanks to the huge fortune his father's loyal councillors left him, he's been able to build new palaces and engage in some foolish expeditions on the Continent. All in search of glory. He'll soon empty his treasury. His father had to bend with the wind-he forgave Kildare over the Simnel business, and let him govern Ireland because nobody else could. The father was pragmatic; the son is vain. And if Kildare contradicts him or makes a fool of him, he can't stand it. His friendship, as I've already told you, is worth nothing."

  Yet while Walsh suspected that the alderman was probably right, he also believed that the Fitzgeralds would continue to get their way; and events seemed to bear this out. After little more than a year, the great English nobleman had begged to be recalled. "You'd need a huge army and a ten-year campaign to bring English order to this island," he told the king. "You're better off leaving it to Kildare." Henry didn't give up so easily. He put Butler in charge. But as usual, the Fitzgeralds soon made it impossible for the Butlers to govern. There were numerous incidents. One of the Talbots, a good friend to the Butlers, was even murdered by Kildare's own brother. There was nothing for it: last year Kildare had been sent back to govern Ireland-on condition that he cooperate with the Butlers in the administration. Of course, it was all done in the best face-saving manner. Henry clasped him to his chest; the two men swore eternal loyalty and friendship. Henry even gave his friend one of his own cousins as an English bride. But his eyes were not smiling. And for their part, the Fitzgeralds were not deceived. "He'd like to destroy us, but he can't," they concluded. They weren't alarmed. They'd been surviving English kings for generations.

  To William Walsh, it seemed that his loyalty to the house of Kildare was likely to work to his benefit now. Indeed, the chance of a parliamentary vacancy had recently arisen and he had hopes that, with Fitzgerald support and the goodwill of a number of important men in Dublin, including Doyle, he might well find himself in Parliament shortly. But one still had to be careful. Very careful. And never more so than at present. For the latest rumours he had heard in Dublin frightened him, and with good reason. They concerned Munster.

  When reports from spies, that the Fitzgeralds were sending envoys to his enemies, had begun to filter through to the royal council in England, King Henry at first could scarcely believe it. "What the devil," he wanted to know, "are these damnable Fitzgeralds up to now? It looks to me," he added ominously,

  "like treason."

  In fact it was the other great Fitzgerald lord, Kildare's kinsman the Earl of Desmond, down in Munster, who had sent the envoys to the King of France; and it was not quite so strange as it seemed. With its ancient trading links to France and Spain, the province of Munster had always looked after its own interests overseas, and the earls of Desmond had been known to send representatives to France and the court of Burgundy since Plantagenet times.

  In this case, however, King Henry was right to be suspicious: for what Desmond had actually agreed, in a secret treaty, was that if Tudor rule in Ireland became too unpleasant, he would transfer his allegiance to France and seek her king's protection. To Desmond, accustomed to generations of old Irish independence down in his Munster lord ship, this might be cheeky, but it was still business as usual. To Henry, Desmond was a subject, and his embassy looked like treason. When Henry challenged Kildare about the reports, the Irish magnate laughed it off. "Desmond's a strange fellow," he told him. "I can't answer for everything he gets up to in Munster." "You'd better," the king let him know, "because I'm holding you responsible." That had been some months ago, and in Dublin, at least, the matter seemed to be dormant.

  But recently Walsh had heard another and even more disturbing rumour. There were still members of the Plantagenet dynasty at large. Most preferred to stay out of trouble, and out of England. But it was always possible that one of them could be used by a foreign power to mount an expedition against King Henry, like the invasion of Lambert Simnel against his father. It was something Henry dreaded. So when Walsh heard the rumour that the King of France was now planning such a challenge with one of the Plantagenets, he could be sure of two things: that the Tudor king would be suspicious of anyone who went to see the French-loving Desmond; and that he would be sure to have spies in Dublin and the other ports watching out for people travelling to Munster.

  "The trouble is," he now explained to Margaret, "not only do I, a lawyer who's had favours from the Fitzgeralds, have to go down into Munster but part of my business there is to see the Earl of Desmond himself."

  "Must you go?"

  "I really have to. I've been putting it off, but the business can't wait."

  "What can I do to help you?"

  "I shall go straight to the monastery. With luck I may even be able to see Desmond there. But I shan't say I'm going into Munster, and I don't want you to say so either. If anyone asks, which they won't, just say I'm up in Fingal.

  On no account say I'm to see Desmond."

  "I won't," she promised.

  By the second week in August, it should have been harvest time. But there was no harvest. The stalks in the fields were brown and sodden. Summer had collapsed. Recently, however, a strange, damp heat seemed to have been building up in the atmosphere, and even in the ground. Out in Dublin Bay, under the grey sky, the sea looked whitish and sullen, like milk in a pan before it swells and froths over. As the groom had remarked to Joan Doyle that morning, "It isn't this time of year at all."

  Joan and her husband had gone down to Dalkey three days earlier. The village had not changed its overall shape much in the last century and a half, but the Doyle's fortified house had been joined by half a dozen similar merchant forts belonging to important traders and gentry, including the Walshes of Carrickmines, who wanted to take advantage of the deep-water harbour. Doyle would go down there from time to time to check the storehouse or supervise the unloading of a cargo, and Joan would usually accompany him. She enjoyed the intimate quiet of the fishing hamlet below the hill.