Emmet took a drink. He felt his racing heart slow down. “I’m not saying it will be easy.”
Liam nodded. “Look, the rioting in Belfast happens every year when all the Orange parades come out and trample around. You know there’s more going on there than just British presence in the city. There are men who consider themselves Irish who play along with that malarkey. It’s the Protestants against the Catholics there, so whether you like it or not, they are a different situation.”
Emmet had calmed down again. “Fair enough.”
“Tell me what the latest news is with the football. Did I hear that Owens blew out his knee?”
They turned the conversation to sports, leaving the more contentious subjects alone. They left the pub when it closed, each taking his separate way home, leaving Emmet to think.
Why did I get so angry with Liam? I could have punched him.
Emmet relived the conversation and realized how defensive he had been when he thought that his dream was being mocked. His long-held vision of a united Ireland living in peace was a part of him.
It’s like Liam was making fun of the vision and therefore making fun of me.
• • •
Emmet and Sean walked together along North Circular Road towards Croke Park. They’d eaten in the Arthur Conan Doyle and opted for a half-hour walk to work off the meal.
Emmet had his hands stuffed into his jacket pockets. “You’d think it was January instead of the twenty-first of November, it’s that cold.”
Sean laughed. “We’ll get you jumping up and down at the match. You’ll soon warm up.”
Emmet nodded. “True. It promises to be a great game. We’d better step it out if we want to be there in time for the kick-off.”
Sean lengthened his stride to keep up. “You’re right. We don’t want to miss a minute of Tipperary’s great victory over Dublin.”
Emmet snorted. “Ha. You’ll be lucky.”
As they got close, they had to press close to the walls of the shops to let a convoy of troops drive past.
Sean frowned. “What are they up to?”
Emmet turned to watch them drive south towards the canal end of the park. “Could be they’re still nervous after all the hue and cry from Kevin Barry’s execution.”
Sean shook his head. “Barry’ll go down in history as a martyr for the cause and it was grand that so many rioted in support, but that was three weeks ago. I don’t believe they’d be out in force like this because of that.”
There were other men walking along as they were, and Emmet called out to one who cursed at the passing vehicles. “What’s going on? Do you know?”
“It’s probably because of all the shootings this morning.”
Emmet and Sean looked at each other. They had been together studying before going out for lunch. Even at the pub they had taken a table in a quiet corner and hadn’t spoken to anyone other than to place their orders.
They hurried to catch up to the man. They walked on either side of him and Emmet prompted him. “We haven’t heard the news. Tell us.”
“Jaysus, you must be the only two in Dublin who don’t know. Collins ordered the execution of somewhere around thirty British agents.”
Sean crossed himself. “Good God.”
Emmet’s eyes were wide. “Here in Dublin?”
“Aye. All over the city.”
Sean stopped. “I should get down to the paper.”
Emmet looked at the gate of Croke Park. “Come to the match until half-time and then we’ll both leave. Maybe I can be of some use running copy to the editors or some such.”
Sean hesitated and then agreed. “Right. We’ll go down to the south end so we can slip out easily at half-time.”
They made their way past the ticket sellers and wove their way around to the stands near the canal end of the park.
Sean looked at his watch. “Three-ten and the match not started. This lot would be late for their own funerals.”
Emmet pointed. “They’re starting now. Half an hour late isn’t too bad by Irish standards.”
They cheered along with everyone else when the match finally got underway at three-fifteen. Much later, Emmet remembered that they enjoyed ten minutes of exciting football before he heard the first staccato rat-tat-tat.
Sean stood to see what was happening. It was three-twenty-five.
A volley of shots thundered from the turnstile entrance. Emmet didn’t need to stand to see armed men pouring into the park. The crowd started pushing and running towards the far end gates. Panic, pure panic flamed through the crowd with a life of its own as the gunfire continued.
Sean fell over, crumpling heavily on top of Emmet. Emmet grunted and nudged Sean to move, but his friend lay heavily against him. Pushing the weight off, he looked into Sean’s face and saw the staring eyes. Emmet groaned. “Oh God, oh God, oh God. Sean. Come on Sean, wake up.” Emmet’s mind flashed back to the vision of his father when he saw the bloom of red spreading across Sean’s chest. But Da was all right. Sean will be too. And then Emmet knew this was different. The wide-open eyes told the story. He put his shaking fingers to Sean’s neck. Nothing. No pulse. Emmet groaned, stunned, gathering close and rocking his friend’s body in his arms. The rifle fire seemed to go on and on, but Emmet was frozen where he was. Others were hunched down in the stands. Fathers lay on top of their children as they tried to protect them with their own bodies. Women screamed and clung to each other.
And then it was over. The gunfire stopped after long minutes of shouting. Emmet heard someone shouting over and over, “Cease Fire! Cease Fire!”
At the other end of the park shots continued for a few seconds after the south end had stopped. The screaming and moaning continued.
Emmet laid Sean’s body down, stood up and others followed suit. He took one last look at the young man, who moments earlier had been cheering and laughing. Forever after Emmet would see Sean’s broken, blood-stained watch stopped at three twenty-five.
There was nothing he could do for Sean now. To his left two women were clinging to each other, bleeding. Below him a father raised himself and cradled his crying son. To his right a man sat holding his head in his hands, moaning. Emmet moved off to see to one of the women on his left who was sobbing, blood pouring from one arm.
He felt unnaturally calm. He heard his own voice as if it came from someone else. He took his handkerchief and wound it around her forearm which had a large gash. “All right, you’re all right now.”
Emmet gently shook another woman who was sitting close to the wounded woman. “Come, now. Your friend needs you. See to your friend now.”
He moved on when he saw the dazed woman shuffle close to her friend and wrap her arm around the woman’s shoulder.
Emmet moved among the wounded, trying to help as he could. On the field, a crowd of people surrounded two players. He heard a cry go up. “Hogan! They’ve killed Hogan.” The Tipperary team ran to see to their fallen captain, but it was too late for him. Like Sean, there was nothing to be done for him.
The next hours passed in a blur. By dusk the park had been cleared out and Emmet made his way to the offices of the Freeman’s Journal, which was the newspaper where Sean had worked.
The office was in chaos with the stories of the earlier shootings of the British agents, and now the massacre at Croke Park.
Emmet found the editor to give him the news. “Mr. Hooper, I’m sorry to tell you.” He stopped to take a deep breath, the words sticking in his throat. “Sean Flynn is dead.”
Patrick Hooper stared at him, running a hand through his thinning hair. “What happened?”
“We were at Croke Park.”
“Dear God. And you were with him, son?”
Emmet nodded. He didn’t trust himself to speak. He closed his eyes for a second and the vision of Sean’s bloody watch loomed before him. He opened his eyes, and shook his head to clear the image.
Hooper put his hand on Emmet’s back, propelling him into his office. He push
ed Emmet onto a hard-wooden chair and then went around to his desk, pulled open a drawer and took out a bottle of whiskey. He poured out two shots into empty tea mugs and handed one to Emmet. “Here. Get this down.”
Emmet took the drink and swallowed it without stopping. He coughed and felt the blood rushing to his face.
Hooper sat down across from Emmet. Tell me what happened.”
Emmet opened his mouth to speak and then Hooper held up his hand. “Wait.”
He stood up again and went to the door of his office. “O’Dowd. Get in here with your notebook.”
A reporter came trotting in and sat in the other chair.
Hooper introduced them. “He was there. Tell me your name again?”
“Emmet Ryan.”
“I’ve seen you around here, haven’t I?”
Emmet nodded. “I sometimes work here part-time. Copy boy.”
“Right. Okay, go ahead.”
Emmet just stared at Hooper for a moment. “It’s my fault. He wanted to come here, but I convinced him to go until half-time. It’s my fault he’s dead.” His eyes burned, and he blinked rapidly.
Hooper held up his hand. “This is in no way your fault. Take a breath and tell us everything.”
Emmet coughed and then started from the beginning as the reporter scribbled notes on Emmet’s impressions, starting from when they saw the convoys going past. Retelling it brought him some peace. Putting himself into the role of journalist helped to distance himself from the events. He spoke dispassionately about the father clinging to his crying son and the woman whom he had bandaged.
Hooper and O’Dowd interrupted with questions for clarification, but otherwise let him tell it at his own pace.
Finally, when they were through, Emmet stood. “I need to reach his family. I don’t know how to do that. I should send a telegram.”
Hooper shook his head. “You’ve done enough now. We’ll do that. He worked here. We’ve got the information on file somewhere. It’s time for you to go home.”
Emmet nodded. Yes. I’ll go to Ashbourne. Being with family is the only way.
Chapter Seven
Dublin, March 1921
Emmet left his room on Wynnsward Park at six o’clock in the morning on Monday March 14th. It took him just over half an hour to cycle up to the north end of the city and, by then, the crowds were already gathering outside Mountjoy Gaol. He chained his bike to a post on the grounds of the Mater hospital and navigated his way on foot around the high stone walls of the prison until he could see the imposing granite-block front gates. He waved his official Freeman’s Journal identity card and people grudgingly gave way until Emmet stood just to the right of the heavy black wooden doors. He saw guards peering out of the narrow, barred windows on either side of the doors. An armoured car was parked nearby, and troops stood, helmeted and with bayonets fixed, ringed along the front walls.
Women and some men too, were already sobbing. Everyone waited for the official announcement, but the crowd knew that the six prisoners were expected to hang this morning.
A man next to Emmet sucked the last of his cigarette, holding the burning end pinched between his thumb and forefinger. He dropped the butt, grinding it with unnecessary pressure, as if imagining he was stomping on one of his enemies. He picked a fragment of tobacco from his lip and flicked it away before nodding to Emmet. “Any chance for a reprieve, do you think?”
Emmet blinked, feeling his eyes burn. “Unlikely, I fear.” He couldn’t help himself then. He needed to talk. “I know one of them.”
“Do you?”
Emmet nodded. “We’re in the Literature and Historical Society at college. Frank Flood. He’s only nineteen.”
The man put his hand on Emmet’s shoulder. “He’s young. They may pardon him yet.”
“Please, God.”
The crowed continued to build and Emmet was separated from the man. He hadn’t asked what brought him there. I should be asking questions; making notes. He couldn’t bring himself to it. He stood, more and more squeezed as more people arrived and pressed forward.
Emmet looked at his watch again. Eight-twenty-five. A cry was raised as the gates opened. Quiet! Quiet! The noise level rose as people kept shouting for quiet.
A man in a suit read out the news. All six IRA volunteers had been hung for their activities in various ambushes. The announcement was as brief as it could be. Emmet shook his head. The man didn’t detail again that Frank Flood was captured on the 21st of January when he along with four others attacked a lorry load of police in Drumcondra. There was no need, since the papers, including the Freeman’s Journal, had been full of the news and would print it again after today’s executions.
The piece of paper trembled in the official’s hand as he read the brief announcement and then he scurried back inside, the gates slamming behind him. No one pounded on the gate. No one turned on the troops. Instead, there was a palpable sadness. A low moan washed through the people and became a swell of sound as the tears of the relatives mingled with the taking up of a rosary.
Emmet fingered the beads in his own pocket, tears sliding down his cheeks unashamedly. His heart seemed to throb in harmony with the prayers. The image of Frank; the sharp parting in his fair hair, and the ever-present half smile, filled his mind.
The troops began to nudge and push against the crowd. “Go home now. There’s nothing for you here.” Little by little the people left the area.
By the time Emmet retrieved his bicycle, the paper boys were already out, crying out the news of the executions, along with the instruction issued by the Labour movement for a general strike as protest. Emmet was amazed at the quick action. He was just a copy-boy so hadn’t realized that everything was ready to go the moment the announcement was made that the hangings were done. The papers also called the day a national day of mourning. As Emmet pedalled his way home, he watched as the city ground to a halt. The buses came to a stop, bewildered and angry passengers pouring out onto the pavement. Shops put up their shutters and closed. Even the pubs closed their doors.
A surreal quiet settled over the city as the citizens went home, locking doors and windows as they waited to see what would happen in retaliation for the hangings.
Emmet went to the office of the Journal and pounded on the door to be admitted. He found the editor, Patrick Hooper, looking harassed in shirt sleeves and tie askew.
In response to Emmet’s offer “Can I help?”, he was put to work running copy up and down the stairs from journalist to editor and back again. He made cups of tea and even went to the home of one of the staff to have the man’s wife make up a plate of sandwiches.
By seven in the evening, Mr. Hooper told Emmet to go home. “You want to be home well before the nine o’clock curfew, young man.”
“Yes Sir.” Emmet didn’t argue. He climbed on his bicycle, his legs feeling wobbly with exhaustion. He rode through the strangely silent streets, passing armoured cars and British troops as though travelling through a nightmare-induced landscape.
He had the best of intentions to write in his journal when he got home. Instead, he barely made it up the three flights of steps to his bed-sitting room, pulling himself along using the handrail. He sat on the edge of his bed to yank off his boots. I’ll just lie back for ten minutes and then I’ll make myself a cup of tea. The image of Frank Flood, pounding his fist on the debating society’s podium as he emphasized his argument, was the last thing Emmet saw.
I’ll carry your message on, Frank.
Chapter Eight
Dublin, March 1921
Emmet leaned forward, his hand cradling his pint. He had to speak up over the noise in the busy pub but the Gravedigger’s on a Friday night was always packed solid. “I’m telling you Liam, with Michael Collins in for de Valera, Lloyd George and all of the British Parliament will soon be on their heels.”
Liam sat back shaking his head. “Forget it. He doesn’t stand a chance.”
Emmet sighed. “You’re always so negative. Betw
een Collins and Arthur Griffith, they can be very persuasive.”
Liam balled his fist as it rested on the table beside his glass. “How can there be any hope of negotiating with the likes of those who just executed the six Volunteers last week?”
Emmet nodded. “God, it was appalling. I went out to Mountjoy Gaol in the morning. There were thousands and thousands of people, I mean forty thousand. I’ve never seen a massive crowd like that. It was truly awful, Liam.. When they opened the gates and announced the executions, there was a wave of crying. I can’t describe it any other way. A huge tidal wave of tears.” He hesitated because even now he got choked up at the memory. “I was friends with Frank Flood.”
Liam nodded in sympathy and then crooked his mouth. “They got more than they bargained for when the general strike and day of mourning were called. I was with the Third Battalion on March 14th. We went out that night, close to the nine o’clock curfew. We had orders to attack any police or military target we could find.”
“Jaysus, I didn’t know you were a part of that. Were you part of the ambush on Great Brunswick Street?”
Liam put his finger to his lips. “I’m alive.” He crossed himself. “But I can tell you that I saw civilians mowed down by the Vickers machine gun that the Auxiliaries had in their armoured car.”
Emmet bit his lip. “What a bloody business. Every day brings another shooting. People are afraid to go about their daily business. I write the stories, but it seems so futile. That’s why I’m pinning my hopes on Collins with the negotiations. I have a good feeling about it. Just watch.”
With a shake of his head, Liam changed the subject. “I’d rather watch that girl over there.”
Emmet turned to see a stunning girl with red hair cascading in waves down her back. Emmet turned to face Liam. “She’s gorgeous. Will you go and have a word?”
“No. No point. I’m not interested in starting anything. I’m never sure where I’ll be from one day to the next.”
Emmet swivelled again to take a quick look as the girl took two half pints of Guinness back to a table where she sat with another girl.
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