Shamrock Green (6 page)

At the time of the strike, a year ago, however, John James Flanagan had paid off most of the casual labour and informed the drivers they must leave their vehicles ‘tidy' at the end of each duty. The drivers had held a meeting on the gravel where the charabancs were parked but Flanagan had sent men round to break it up and had even turned up himself, just as the drivers were dispersing, to issue his ultimatum. All his life, it seemed, Gowry had been faced with choices that were no choices at all but, like Flanagan's law, boiled down to ‘Take It or Leave It.' He needed the work, though; he needed the wage. He couldn't even politicise the issue or carry the case to the union headquarters in Liberty Hall, for Flanagan was no government lickspittle but a good God-fearing Dublin businessman who made generous contributions to the nationalist cause.

The sun had gone down behind dark bands of cloud and tomorrow there would surely be rain, and trippers bound for Tara would have a misty wet ride and see little of the fabled landscape. Gowry didn't care; wet or dry, he would be paid.

The electric lanterns that Flanagan had installed cast wan shadows on the gravel. Gowry was last man in. The other drivers had done their bit with brush and bucket and had trotted off to the pub.

He leaned his brow on the window and stared out at the backs of the houses across the pad, at the faint glow in the sky that the city released like a gas. He had no particular desire to go home, except that, with luck, he would have Maeve's company at supper and a grateful kiss for the sweets he had brought her. He had no urge to get back to Sylvie, though. In the past year or so the Shamrock had become less of a home to him than the houses in which he lodged when he was on the road. There he was known, liked, and made welcome as only Irish folk can make you welcome.

Sighing, he put on his tunic, shouldered the brush, hoisted up the bucket and went down the aisle to the door. He put one foot on the gravel. Someone grabbed him and slammed him against the side of the bus. He flailed out with the bucket, then, recognising his brother, sagged back.

‘For God's sake, Charlie! Are you for scaring me to death?'

‘Is the tackle still on board?'

‘She told you, did she? I thought she would.'

‘Never mind who told me,' Charlie said. ‘Where is it?'

‘That,' said Gowry, ‘is for me to know and you to find out.'

His brother was coiled tight as a watch-spring and for an instant he thought Charlie was going to punch him.

‘What have you done with our bloody guns, Gowry?'

‘They're safe.'

‘Where?'

‘Where you can't get your paws on them.'

‘Why are you doin' this to me?'

‘I'm not doin' it to you, Charlie,' Gowry said. ‘I just don't want you or the old man usin' my wife's place as a dump for arms.'

‘Sylvie didn't object.'

‘Did you give her a chance to object?' Gowry said.

He had argued the toss with Charlie and the old man often enough in the past but this was the first time he had really taken a stand. He was well aware that nationalism had become a substitute for all the things the family had never had or that the old man had frittered away, all the things he'd been told were unworthy of decent Irishmen when, in fact, they were not unworthy at all, merely unattainable.

‘You're lucky it's me,' Charlie said. ‘If they'd sent Turk he'd have cut you up by now.'

‘Cut me up? Cut me up for what?'

‘Stealin' our weapons.'

‘Weapons you stole from the volunteers in the first place?'

‘You haven't sold them, have you?'

‘No, of course I haven't sold them. What do you want with rifles?'

‘What everyone wants with rifles,' said Charlie. ‘To claim back what's ours. You know the old saying: one Protestant with a rifle is better placed to express his opinion than a Catholic without one.'

‘You're not a Catholic, Charlie.'

‘Home rule, without partition, is what I mean.'

‘I see,' said Gowry. ‘Are you willin' to pay for freedom with your life?'

‘If necessary, yes.'

Charlie jerked his hands from his pockets and waved them about. Any moment now he would pepper the night air with clichés that Gowry had heard a thousand times before.

‘I threw them into the sea.'

‘You did
what?
' Charlie shouted.

‘Off the cliffs, into the sea.'

‘Ow, ow, Jaysus, Jaysus!' Charlie hopped like a flea on a griddle. ‘What've you done, Gowry? Jaysus, what have you done?'

Gowry laughed. ‘No, I didn't throw them into the sea.'

‘You pig, you bastard!'

‘They're hidden where nobody will find them.'

Charlie had always been a bad-tempered tyke and lacked a sense of humour.

‘Tell me then, tell me now or I'll send Turk to—'

‘When the time comes, Charlie, when the time comes.'

‘The time's now.'

‘The time is not now,' said Gowry. ‘My God, man! We could all be at war with Germany before we're much older.'

‘You're a damned Tory swine, Gowry. You always were. Tell me where you've hidden those guns or—'

‘Or what?'

‘I won't be able to answer for your safety.'

Gowry said, ‘Is it a threat I'm hearing now?'

‘It'll be more than threat if Turk has his way.'

‘This is not the time to go baiting the British government.'

‘You know nothing about what's going on behind the scenes.'

‘Do I not? Well, this I do know: there will never be enough compromises to satisfy you. Dear God, Charlie, don't you ever get tired of bargaining for more and more concessions?' Gowry said. ‘To hell with politics. I'm going home.'

‘All right,' Charlie said. ‘How much?'

‘How much for what?'

‘How much will it cost for you to tell me where those guns are hidden?'

Surprised, Gowry said, ‘I'm not in the business of selling weapons, Charlie. I removed the guns from the Shamrock because I don't want you or the old man doing something you'll regret afterwards.'

‘There'll be no regrets,' said Charlie. ‘We're not all cowards.'

‘Aye, you've called me that often enough,' said Gowry. ‘Look, I've told you a thousand times, I'm tempted to support you with my heart but I can never support you with my head.'

‘Just tell me where the guns are, Gowry?'

‘The guns are safe. They'll stay hidden until you give me a valid reason for handing them back.'

‘Is that your final word?'

‘That's my final word.'

Gowry started off towards the kiosk.

In the window of the box Roddeny's big round face was buttery in the overhead light. Roddeny was a Sinn Feiner and his dislike of Protestants legendary. There was never a cheery goodnight from Frank Roddeny for Gowry. Charlie, however, would linger and blow off steam to Roddeny before he left and tomorrow it would be all over Flanagan's that he, Gowry McCulloch, had come out in his true colours at last.

‘He said this is what you'd do,' Charlie called out.

Gowry stopped, turned. ‘Who did? Dada?'

‘Never you mind who,' Charlie said. ‘He's got your measure, Gowry, and he says for to tell you there are plenty other ways to skin a cat.'

‘I don't know what you're blathering about, Charlie.'

‘You'll find out soon enough,' Charlie said. ‘You'll live to rue the day you ever crossed the brotherhoods.'

‘I doubt it,' Gowry said, grinning.

Then he turned in his keys and logbook and went home.

*   *   *

On that first afternoon they had done nothing but kiss. There had been no intrusive tongue, no roving hands. He had seated her on the end of the bed and had leaned forward and kissed her on the lips. His lips, though tasting of whiskey, were dry. He had kissed her three times, letting the last one carry the message of his intentions, so that when she came again she would know what to expect.

She was trembling when she climbed the spiral staircase for a second time. She knew that he had put the onus on to her and had already transferred any guilt that might accrue, even, she thought, the manner in which she would yield to him, the speed, the tempo at which she would plunge into an affair that would probably end in tears.

The door was ajar.

She could hear the clash of the keys of the typewriting machine, a furious noise, like a factory loom. When she pushed the door open and said, ‘It's me,' he stopped typing. He lifted his hands from the keys and held them high the way the concert pianist at the Tivoli did when he finished a difficult piece.

Fran didn't look at her. He continued to stare down at the paper that curled over the bar-lock, smiling to himself, though whether the smile was for her or at what he had written Sylvie had no way of telling.

She took off her bonnet and cape.

They were pearled with the rain that had come sweeping in over the hills that early morning and that fell steadily now, sifting down upon the city. The room smelled differently in the rain, not dank but musty.

‘What are you doing?' she said.

‘Waiting for you.'

He took a cigarette from an ashtray and inhaled smoke. He lifted a glass and finished the whiskey in it.

‘You look lovely,' he said.

‘Thank you,' Sylvie said.

The paper curled over the bar-lock was covered in dense paragraphs. There were other papers on the table, thin sheaves tabbed with steel paperclips. The whiskey bottle had hardly been touched. Fran wore a collarless shirt, sleeves folded back and crimped with broad rubber bands. The bandage on his left hand was grubby and a little frayed.

‘Is it raining still? Are you wet?'

‘I am,' she said. ‘My hair.'

‘Ah, the rain has a lot to answer for,' Fran said.

She seated herself on the end of the bed.

She watched him open a small cupboard under the cabinet. He moved briskly as if the act of typewriting had restored lost energy. He brought out a towel, thick-pelted and spotless. He opened it across his hands and offered it to her.

‘You do it,' she said.

‘May I?'

‘Yes.'

Many men had tried to woo her into bed. The commercials were forever at it, especially when they had the drink on them. They would croon to her, make goo-goo eyes, beg her to go upstairs with them. Some were fine-looking men, handsome in a shabby way, others big, red-faced and vigorous. She had laughed them all away. She was not unsatisfied with Gowry.

In the hope of making another child he had kept her going, beating away on her with metronomic regularity. Gowry was a silent lover and not as ardent as Forbes had been. When Gowry was inside her she seldom got carried away. With Gowry there were no surprises, only the same monotonous little signals that would end with him upon her – and hardly a kiss now, hardly even a kiss.

She shivered when Fran touched her.

He brushed the towel across the fine hair at the nape of her neck. She could feel his fingers through the nap of the towel, touching her as lightly as a mayfly lands on water. He moved behind her and knelt on the bed. She could feel the springs yielding, hear their pliant little plaint. He slid the point of the towel downward under the collar of her blouse.

She shivered again and said, ‘Yes.'

He uncoupled the hook from the eyelet and, flattening his fingers, traced the line of her bare shoulders. He pressed against her, chest, thighs, his chin touching her curls. ‘I hear the detectives came to see you yesterday?'

‘Yes.'

‘One with a grey moustache?'

‘Yes.'

‘Vaizey: he's the boss.'

‘They found nothing.'

‘I didn't expect them to,' Fran said.

‘Someone told them there were guns in my house.'

‘Ah, that's how it is these days. Nobody's safe from wagging tongues.'

‘Was it you?'

‘Me?' He was amused, not offended. ‘Why would it be me?'

‘To bring me back. To frighten me.'

‘Are you frightened?'

‘No.'

‘Were you frightened when Vaizey turned up?'

‘No.'

‘Where did your husband take the rifles?'

‘He won't tell me. He won't tell anyone.'

‘I expect he won't,' said Fran Hagarty. ‘He has his reasons, no doubt.'

She felt his fingers work the row of four small buttons that dropped below the stitching of the collar. She wore only a summer camisole beneath the blouse. He opened the back of the blouse and touched her again, his thumbs pressing her spine.

‘Is your wound healing?' Sylvie asked.

‘I haven't looked.'

‘I will look later.'

‘Aye,' he said.

‘I'll change the dressing.'

‘Please.'

‘Later.'

‘Yes, later will do.'

He slid the blouse from her shoulders. He slipped one hand beneath the camisole and caressed her breasts. She had small, sensitive breasts and felt them stiffen as he continued his expert fondling. She lay back against him, head on his chest, and his fingers found her, nimble fingers that sparked sensations as dazzling as the charges of current that crossed the wires above the tramway lines.

She reached back with her arm and brought him down, his mouth upon her mouth, his tongue touching hers. He pressed his lips together, formed a small, moist bud from his tongue and rubbed it against her lips. He pulled her back along the length of the bed and pushed her arms out by her sides, then, pinning her in that position, kissed her openly again, and again.

‘I won't hurt you,' he murmured. ‘I promise I won't hurt you.'

‘Please,' she said. ‘Please don't.'

But somehow she knew that he would.

Chapter Four

Complacency might have set in earlier if it hadn't been for the war, the war and the character of her lover, Fran Hagarty, who was too complex and inconsistent to permit her to take her pleasures lightly. He was a writer by profession but trailed behind him – much as she did – a chequered history of foolishness in dealing with the more obvious aspects of reality.