An Irish Hostage

by Charles Todd

  Arthur did a low flyover of what was supposed to be our landing site, and I could see there were quite a few rocky patches in the green grass, as well as a wall of gray stones flecked with white that enclosed it. Even from here it appeared to be a smaller expanse than I’d pictured.

  I heard Captain Jackson swear, and knew he too was expecting something flatter, more level for our landing.

  Just as we turned for our final approach, a hare, flushed from cover, darted in a zigzag pattern toward the little copse at the end farthest from the house and outbuildings, and a flight of doves took off from there in panic.

  Still, the Captain put us down with such skill that I turned my head and smiled at him.

  As we swung around and taxied back toward a break in the rock wall, he shouted, “There is no welcoming throng.”

  He was right. From my perch in the aircraft coming in, I had seen the house, the lawns, the outbuildings and stable block, even rows of trees that appeared to be an orchard. In a small paddock behind the barn a pair of donkeys grazed, unperturbed by our swooping over their heads as we turned. But they were the only living things in sight. No people. No one busy in the stable yard, no one sitting under the trees that dotted the lawn. No one opening the door and rushing out to greet us. In the gardens to one side of the house there had been a long, ribbon-bedecked table with a good many chairs on either side of it—where had all of their occupants gone?

  “Are we early?” I shouted back.

  “Not at all. Just on time, actually.”

  After a moment of hesitation, I said, “Well, we can go over and knock at the house door. They may be inside, with all their guests. I’d like to change before meeting them.”

  He cut the motor, and there was a sudden silence. In the small spinney of trees behind us, I thought I heard a dove cooing as the birds settled back into the trees.

  Climbing into the aircraft, I’d stepped on a particular part of the wing, then a small bit of metal, then swung my leg over into the forward seat, blessing my mother for suggesting that I wear my riding clothes to fly. But getting out of the deep pocket that was my seat and swinging my leg back over the edge so that I could reach the first step down was another matter. I could hear Captain Jackson laughing as I finally got myself on the rim of my seat and made my way to the ground.

  Then we started walking toward the stone wall. Instead of a gate, there was actually more of a stile, and as we climbed over, Captain Jackson said uneasily, “I don’t like this, Bess.”

  Neither did I, for in spite of the sound of the aircraft, no one had come to the door of the house. But I said brightly, “For all I know, they’ve gone to the church, and the service lasted longer than they’d expected.”

  He didn’t answer.

  Walking on toward the farmhouse, I listened but couldn’t hear voices at all, then the donkeys brayed, and I jumped.

  The Captain said, “Let me go first, Bess.”

  Lengthening his stride, he moved ahead.

  The three-story house was rather plain, no ornamentation except for the corners, where stones were inset at different lengths, and a long window with an oval top set inside the flat pillars that created the appearance of a columned porch.

  As Arthur reached the house and walked up the graceful steps to the door, he paused.

  I noticed it too. No sound of voices from the open windows.

  Then he lifted his hand and knocked at the door.

  We could hear the knock echoing inside.

  And then a window opened above us on the first floor, just to the left of the oval window.

  A woman with iron-gray hair poked her head out. I couldn’t judge her age. Sixty? Seventy?

  “And what is it you’re wanting?” she demanded, staring down at us. She was dressed in severest black, and her expression was anything but friendly.

  Surely she’d heard the aircraft overhead?

  “Hallo,” I said with a smile. “I’m Elizabeth Crawford, Eileen’s bridesmaid. I’ve come for the wedding.”

  “More English!” She slammed down the window and disappeared from our view.

  We were left standing there.

  “I don’t like this at all,” Captain Jackson said again in a low voice.

  Finally, the door opened, but it wasn’t the woman we’d seen just now. Instead it was a young girl of about fourteen, and she stared at us warily. With, I realized, some anxiety in her eyes.

  “Hallo,” I said again, and repeated what I’d told the woman.

  “Nobody’s here,” the girl said quickly. And then she repeated it. “Nobody.”

  “Where is Eileen?” I asked as she began to close the door.

  “The police station,” she replied, casting a glance down the lane, before quickly swinging the door shut in our faces.

  “Bess. Let’s go back to the aircraft. I’ve enough fuel to get us back to Bristol. Whatever it is that’s wrong here, I think we’re wiser to get ourselves out of it.”

  “I don’t even know where the police station is. In the village, I should think. Perhaps we ought to wait. It could just be a formality, something to do with the wedding.” We were in Ireland—I had no idea how they managed things. But where was the much-vaunted Irish hospitality?

  “We ought to leave,” he persisted.

  “I’ve come all this way,” I replied quietly. “A few more minutes won’t matter—”

  I broke off as the door opened again. An Englishman stood there, frowning down at me. He was dressed not in uniform but in casual country attire, but I didn’t need a uniform to recognize an officer in the way he carried himself.

  He was of medium height, fair, with a kind face. I put his age at thirty-four or -five. But I noticed too that his blue eyes were hard. I’d seen many men, survivors of the trenches, with that same look, as if what they had been through had taken something from them.

  “You must be Miss Crawford,” he said, holding out his hand. “Ellis Dawson. I was Michael’s commanding officer in France. And now his best man. Welcome to Ireland.” But there was a wry twist to his mouth as he said the last words, and I was sure he couldn’t possibly mean them.

  We shook hands, and I presented Captain Jackson.

  “I thought I heard an aircraft a few minutes ago. Was that you?” He looked at Captain Jackson’s cap and the goggles he’d pushed to the top of his head. I’d left mine in my seat.

  “Yes. Sir.”

  “I don’t see how you managed on that meadow. I told Michael that, but I don’t think he’d had much experience with landing aircraft.” He remembered his manners. “Come in. Please. I know there’s cold water in the kitchen. This way.”

  “Where is everyone?” I asked, still standing on the steps outside. “I had expected to see Eileen—”

  Major Dawson took a deep breath. “It’s rather complicated. They asked me to stay back. But the truth is, I don’t think they wanted to parade me around in front of everyone in the village.” He grimaced. “Mind you, I was just as glad to keep out of it.”

  “Out of what?” Captain Jackson said, remembering suddenly to add, “Sir.”

  “Michael is missing.”

  “What?” Captain Jackson demanded. “The groom?”

  “The groom?” I said at the same time, like an echo.

  “Yes. They’ve gone to the police station, the lot of them. Well, that’s what it’s called, but I don’t think it’s more than a room in one of the shops. Michael was here last evening—he’s staying at the pub in the village. But he’d come for dinner and then said good night and left. This morning he was to have had breakfast with us. You may have seen the table set out on the back lawn. And he didn’t come. By noon, it was decided to send for help. Only there’s no telephone. And so they walked down. All of them. To lodge a complaint. I was to stay here in the event he came back. But he hasn’t.”

  We were still standing there, on the steps. Major Dawson opened the door wider. “Best to come in.” He looked down the lane that must lead to t
he village proper and the church. “There’s no one here but me, one of the bride’s grandmothers upstairs, and the kitchen girl. We can talk inside.”

  Captain Jackson opened his mouth to refuse but I was already stepping over the threshold. He had no choice but to follow. And as soon as we were clear of it, the Major shut the door.

  We followed him into the front room, which appeared to be the family parlor. It was rather plain, a dark blue wallpaper on the walls, dark furnishings, and a painting of the Virgin over the mantel. I realized as I drew closer that it was actually a framed copy from a news cutting. There was a cross over the door we’d come through, and in the corner, oddly enough, an old spinning wheel.

  “I’d offer you some refreshment,” the Major was saying. “But I don’t think the girl would provide it. She’s frightened.”

  “But what has really happened?” I asked. “Where is Michael?”

  “I’ve no idea. But according to something I overheard, he’s not very popular around here. He was in the English Army, you see. The Irish Guards. And I don’t know if it’s the Irish who took him or the English.” He rubbed his eyes with his hands. “It’s been rather tense around here. And not just this morning.”

  “Why would the English want Michael?” Captain Jackson asked.

  “He’s been seen in the company of some suspected troublemakers. Irish rebel sympathizers. Two of them are Eileen’s cousins, for God’s sake, and one of them has come out of hiding for the wedding. I shouldn’t be surprised if the English think Michael knows something that could be used to find where the rest of Terrence Flynn’s followers can be found. I’ve been warned to leave, myself. But I came to support Michael, and I won’t abandon him now.”

  “Who warned you?” I asked.

  “The old woman upstairs, for one. The bride’s grandmother. She’s a rabid supporter of the Rising. Her grandson—Flynn—was active in it. How he escaped hanging I don’t know. Michael told me he was seriously wounded, and some friends got him out of Dublin before the whole rebellion collapsed. The Army never found him. I’ve also been told he was going to give the bride away, since her father’s dead. That could be what the Army’s after—laying their hands on him.”

  “Is Michael in danger, do you think?” Captain Jackson asked, frowning. “And if he is, can the local police do anything about it? Or will they?”

  “God knows. If I were you, I’d get that aircraft out of here and head back to England.”

  “I can’t leave Eileen like this,” I said.

  “I don’t know that you can help her,” the Major replied soberly. “Truthfully, your presence could make matters worse.”

  I turned to the Captain. “You must go. Talk to my father. See if he can find out if the English do have Michael. The wedding invitation is in my desk in the house in Somerset. It has everything you’ll need to know—his name, his mother’s name.”

  “I am not about to leave you here,” he replied stubbornly. “Your parents would never forgive me.”

  “The Major is staying. I’ll be all right,” I told him, just as stubbornly. “And if Eileen’s cousin Terrence Flynn is indeed attending the wedding, he’ll see to it that I’m safe. He promised.”

  “Bess—your father—”

  He broke off as we heard the front door open, and footsteps into the passage. At the same time a voice from upstairs called down to whoever had arrived. It was loud enough that it reached us clearly, with all its venomous force.

  “Well, Missy, and you’re seeing what happens to those who turn their backs on their country. You thought it a fine thing to heal the enemy, you brought another traitor into this house, and now you’re reaping what you sowed. No, don’t look at me like that, your father would be turning in his grave, he would, if only he only knew—”

  The front room door was flung wide, someone whirled in and slammed it shut behind her, and then her hands flew to her ears, covering them against the vitriol pouring down the stairs.

  It was Eileen. When she turned around, eyes wide in her pale, drawn face, to find witnesses to her shaming, I saw a mere shell of the friendly, laughing shipmate on board Britannic.

  Her gaze swept over me, then flew back. “Bess!”

  It was an anguished cry. The next thing I knew she was in my arms, sobbing as if her heart was breaking, and I had a fair idea that it truly was.

  Her voice muffled against my shoulder, she said, “I am so grateful you are here—I had nowhere else to turn.”

  Over her shoulder, I saw Captain Jackson was looking down, doing his best to give us a modicum of privacy in such a small room. The Major was staring hard at the painting of the Virgin, as if he’d never seen it before and found it engrossing.

  I soothed her as best I could and soon had her sitting beside me on the bench by the cold hearth. Her hands were gripping mine, as if she feared that should she let them go, I might vanish.

  “Tell me,” I said. “Quietly and calmly.”

  And after a struggle to keep her voice steady, she managed it. Falling back into the familiar routine of a nurse reporting to Matron.

  “Michael only came home a month ago. We’d set the wedding day while he was still in France, expecting him to be demobbed sooner than most, since he was Irish, but with one thing and another, he was delayed. Then he stayed awhile with his mother and sisters—she’s not been well, and he was afraid she’d not be coming to the wedding.”

  She looked away, embarrassed, and I realized that Michael’s mother might not wish to come to a wedding where Eileen’s grandmother was present.

  I said gently, “Was she proud of her son’s service? Or did she feel it was wrong of him to enlist?”

  “His mother was a widow—his sisters were still at home. She was grateful for the allowance she received from the British Army. There were many Irish families who depended on that allowance. And they were terrified that the Army would stop it after the Rising. That’s another of the problems here, you know—a good many people were against the Rising. Until the court-martials and the firing squads, and others carried off to prison camps in Wales. That changed their point of view. But yes, she was proud of him, and then fearful for him when he came home.”

  “But he got there safely.”

  “Yes, thank God.” Quickly resuming her account, she said, “All was well at first. He’d been careful, you see, traveling in his own clothes, not his uniform. Who was to know? But someone did. He’d not been here a week when the whispers began, and the next thing we knew, my grandmother was telling the world they were true. Wicked old woman that she is. Then on the heels of that, Major Dawson arrived. And the whispers turned dark. There were things said. Coming out of church. In the pub. The shops. You never saw who it was, just a voice. Cowards that they were. He was worried about his mother getting to hear about it and worrying. But you see, we aren’t planning to stay here in Ireland. He’s already found work. We thought people might forget in a few years, and we could come back again.” The last words came as a wail.

  The handkerchief I’d given her was soaked with tears, and as she wept again, Captain Jackson quietly handed her another.

  I waited, and finally she was able to go on. “I told my family and he told his. We told the priest. Please let us marry, with our friends and family about us, and we’d leave. That’s all we asked. Just to the end of the week, and we’d be gone. And all was quiet for two or three days. We should have known—we should have seen why they were quiet—they were taking the time they needed to plan. And last night, leaving here after dinner, Michael vanished. Not even his cap left behind, nor a shoe. I watched him out of sight on the lane, but he never reached the pub. When we went to summon the police this morning, someone in the crowd shouted, ‘No need for the constabulary. He’s dead, darlin’, and good riddance.’”

  Her voice broke again. “He can’t be dead, Bess. He can’t. We waited. Four years apart, and him at risk of dying any day in the trenches. We thought God was with us, because he survived. But my ow
n grandmother hates him and says terrible things about us. There was no Rising in 1914 when we went to help England fight the Germans. Michael wasn’t the only Irishman who took the King’s shilling. We thought it would prove to London that we were willing to die for England. As every good Englishman had done, enlisting. And in the end, London might see that we were worthy of Home Rule.”

  Hadn’t the Suffragettes done much the same, bargaining with London? We will suspend our fight for the vote and do all we can for the war effort. Afterward, in return, we expect to have the issue of voting rights for women addressed.

  Only, unlike Eileen and Michael, the Irish hadn’t waited for the end of the war. In 1916, the hotheads—or heroes, depending on where you stood in the matter—had risen up and fought for what they wanted. And been brutally crushed. There was already talk in London about creating an occupying force, if the Irish didn’t settle down. But executing the leaders of the rebellion had turned Irish feelings too bitter to settle down at all.

  Eileen was imploring now. “No one wants to search for Michael. No one will help me, because I was willing to marry him—a traitor to Ireland. You must see, Bess, that you’re my best hope.”

  I said, “Eileen, I don’t know the countryside—the people who might be involved—anyone I dared to trust.”

  She shook her head vehemently. “You can learn. I’ll help you.”

  I sighed. Politics could be cruel and heartless. And I was afraid, with the tensions in Ireland, that it could also be deadly. What had my mother said about travelers being killed?

  Major Dawson cleared his throat. “Eileen. Let me travel to Dublin and find someone with a cooler head who can get to the bottom of this. It’s only Thursday. There’s time. Besides, one man’s taunt isn’t the truth. I refuse to accept that Michael is dead. And so should you.”

  “Then where is he? Why doesn’t he come home?”

  “You must be brave, for his sake,” Major Dawson told her. “Someone must have an answer.”

  “I’m trying,” she said, “but it’s awfully hard, when even Father O’Halloran is against us. You’d think God would be impartial.” There was anger in her voice now.