by Leon Uris
So the Irish dog refused to lie still and the Brotherhood was alive. As quandary replaced arrogance (and the information officer was replaced as well) news of our revival reached into every corner of the land. Dublin Castle became our greatest recruiter as Sixmilecross changed from a defeat to a bizarre kind of victory. We'd lost the guns but we'd gained the ear of the nation and, perhaps, thousands of willing men.
*
Robert Emmet McAloon a rumpled old legal wizard who had been an intimate of Desmond Fitzpatrick, inherited the full responsibility of republican matters after the latter's demise. He jumped into the breach but ran into a stone wall.
The governor of Mountjoy Prison advised him he was under orders to keep the Sixmilecross prisoners isolated and allowed no visitors, even legal counsel. The whereabouts of Conor Larkin was kept secret. All that we knew was that he was alive and the only information we were allowed to get to him was that Shelley was safely out of Belfast.
Robert Emmet McAloon was a tactician of rare acumen and had struggled too long in the backwaters of anti-Irish law to be dismayed. For three weeks no action was taken on his petitions to the court As he pressed the word came down from the Four Courts, the home of British justice in Ireland, that habeas corpus had been suspended in the case. The court cited several of the more than one hundred coercion acts they had enacted against the Irish during the nineteenth century.
Robert Emmet McAloon then switched to a different tactic. The British were still smarting over the incident and wanted to regain their dignity. Brotherhood Council members also held high positions in the legally accepted Sinn Fein Party and moved forward with plans to use Sinn Fein as a front to unleash a plethora of orators to beat the drums, boil the pot, raise funds, gain national attention, indignation and sympathy for the Sixmilecross men. As a street corner speaker, Atty Fitzpatrick had few peers and she was tuned up and ready.
Shortly after Sinn Fein announced a series of public protest rallies, Sir Lucian Bolt arrived from England bearing the title of special prosecutor for the Attorney General's office. Bolt was no friend of the Irish, having authored some of the most repressive legislation against us during his time in Commons. He was to be feared in republican circles. McAloon reckoned that the government had finally worked out a policy in the matter and Sir Lucian Bolt would soon be getting into contact. . .. He was right, as usual.
*
Brendan Sean Barrett was slipped back into Ireland where we felt he would be safer, and along with Dan Sweeney, Atty and myself, we became the Brotherhood's liaison to McAloon on Sixmilecross. After Bobby's first meeting with Sir Lucian we convened in the elegant library of a safe house in Ballsbridge. Robert Emmet was never far out of the courtroom in spirit and paced before us as though we were a jury on the make.
"I have agreed for the moment," he began, "to call off the public protest meetings."
Atty groaned discontent.
"Sir Lucian is obviously fishing about for a deal. On the way here I was allowed to visit the seven in Mountjoy unofficially. Small wonder they didn't want us to see them earlier. They've been brutally tortured."
Brendan Sean Barrett and Long Dan showed no emotion at the revelation. It was an old story to them.
"They've been hooded, forced to stand at attention against the wall, spread-eagled, for periods of up to twenty hours without food, water or toilet facilities. The Gorman chap sported some nasty cigarette burns. Gilroy had been urinated on several times and McDade had been forced to run barefooted through a corridor of broken glass. The lot of them reported being fed something which caused vomiting and hallucinations."
"Old but reliable methods," Sweeney said.
"Of course they were played off one against the other. They had nothing to give in the way of information except the name of the one man who seems to have gotten away. They knew nothing except that Kelly Malloy recruited them for the job and Kelly is dead."
McAloon plopped his seventy-year-old frame into an overstaffed leather chair and went into instant disarray.
"What about Conor Larkin?" I asked.
"Apparently he's not at Mountjoy. They promised to let me see him in due course. I'm telling you this because I have agreed for the moment that your pen will remain silent, Seamus, as well as your lungs, Atty."
"What do you reckon the government is up to?" Dan asked.
Robert Emmet McAloon leaned forward in the chair and pinched at the flab on his neck, then held his forefinger aloft. "I make it that the British want to quiet this down and avoid public inflammation on three counts. Point number one," he said, grabbing his forefinger and wiggling it. "Nothing will benefit the Brotherhood so much as a bitter court trial and a long prison sentence. Agreed?"
We did.
"Point two," Bobby continued, adding his middle finger. "The situation in Europe. Wouldn't you think so, Brendan?"
He nodded. "A land war in Europe is inevitable," Brendan Sean Barrett continued. "Britain has just concluded the triple entente with Russia and France to counter the alliance of Germany and Austria-Hungary. As we know, one of Britain's ancient justifications for the occupation of Ireland is that we straddle their sea lanes, they are an island and our geographic location makes us necessary to their defense."
"Precisely," McAloon interrupted. "It can be a phobia with them. They envision, no doubt, an enlarged Irish Republican Brotherhood flirting with the Germans to obtain arms."
"What's the difference?" Barrett mused. "We'll go to the Germans when the time is ripe whether they wish it or not."
Bobby threw his arms out wide. "Well, they're sitting around a long mahogany table playing these little games, refusing to accept the inevitability of the situation and figuring out how to delay it as long as possible."
"Point number three?" Atty asked.
"Point number three," the barrister continued, "and this might be the most practical point of all. As we know, the Protestants in Ulster have been arming for years. Obviously, this is the basket the British want to put their eggs into. The defense of this vulnerable British flank should be in the hands of loyal subjects, right? On the surface they can't publicly approve Ulster gun running without giving the same consideration to the south. It's a tacit approval, one in which they turn their backs, close their eyes and cover their ears. They want Protestant Ulster armed as a hedge against Home Rule crisis and a war in Europe. For the moment they want to play a game of acting evenhanded. If they give the Sixmilecross people severe prison sentences they will be faced with counter-demands to do the same to the gun runners in Ulster."
"In other words," Atty said, "slap us down and hound us in our smuggling efforts but allow it to slip through up north."
"That's it," Robert Emmet McAloon said, "that's it precisely." He stretched his legs to their limit on the floor, tucked his hands behind his neck and stared at the ceiling as though it held an audience. "It is my considered opinion that Sir Lucian Bolt is prepared to go for mild sentences, say a few years, in exchange for our keeping quiet over the condition of the prisoners and halting public meetings."
A long silence of digestion ensued. Atty would be deprived of her public stage, her thing of glory. As for me, I was plainly selfish in wanting to spare Conor twenty years behind bars. The brunt of it fell on Dan Sweeney, who was faced with the organizational task of the Brotherhood. On the surface it seemed that he would want public protests and to harvest a rush of new recruits. Yet it was Sweeney made the strongest case of all for restraint. Heavy recruitment at this stage of the Brotherhood's development would leave it terribly vulnerable. Staffs, commands and units had not yet been formed. There were no procedures established to screen applicants. It would be too simple a matter for the British to load up our ranks with informers.
What could we do with several thousand men at this stage? We had no weapons to train them with or even enough safe places to carry out such training. Dan was convincing. We would lay ourselves wide open by taking in too many people before we had set up proper foundation
.
"We've got to build slowly, man by man," Dan said. "Every new recruit at this time must be a reliable piece of personnel. When we get ten good men in Cork, ten in Derry , ten in Galway, then we can branch out to units. I have to go along with Bobby and have him strike a bargain with Lucian Bolt."
With Atty, Dan and myself in accord, we turned to Brendan Sean Barrett, who had remained quiet during much of the discussion. He was sour, perhaps beyond his time and purposefulness and I can't say as I felt a tad of human warmth from the man.
"Obviously, I'm outvoted," he said sarcastically.
"What's on your mind, Brendan?" Dan growled.
"This country is destitute. The labor strikes collapsed because we're too beaten and downtrodden to make a stand. There's a desperate need for consciences to be stirred. We have the moment in our hands. If we don't grasp it, it may take a long time coming again, if ever."
"And I still think it's premature," Dan retorted. "Open our ranks now and the British will infiltrate and crush us in a month."
Brendan Sean Barrett held up his hands in surrender as we nodded to McAloon to make a deal with Sir Lucian Bolt. Barrett's life had been a defeat, so one more wouldn't matter. He got up first, made toward the door, then turned.
"Tell me, Bobby, and you, Dan, when did you learn it?"
"What?" They asked in unison.
"That an Irishman can sit down and negotiate an agreement with the British and not get fucked."
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
As Robert Emmet McAloon went into conference with Sir Lucian Bolt I became immersed in trying to piece together the events that had led up to the ambush at Sixmilecross. I was not kept waiting long.
Terry O'Rourke, a teammate of Conor's on the Boilermakers, showed up looking for me at my newspaper one morning. Terry was from a republican family of long standing and knew of my friendship with Conor.
Conor was the admired leader among the Catholic lads on the club and after Sixmilecross they got together to try to figure out what had happened. When they did Terry was sent as an emissary to me. My republican leanings were no secret. Without putting it into words, Terry felt that I would get the story to the Brotherhood.
Doxie O'Brien, as well as Duffy, had been the informers. Duffy O'Hurley had blurted out what had been doing during one of his regular drunks. Doxie as well as another Catholic on the team heard it. On another occasion Terry himself overheard Duffy and Doxie arguing over his continued participation.
Doxie had a chance of a lifetime; fame and fortune went with the Sydney rugby job. It hung in the balance, depending largely on how well the Boilermakers played and if they went through with an Australian tour. Doxie was desperate to get the position, which depended greatly on the whim of his sponsor, Sir Frederick Weed. It was so tempting Doxie was willing to do anything to curry Sir Frederick's favor and "prove" himself.
Apparently Doxie had traveled to Derry and delivered Duffy an ultimatum. In the end Duffy was convinced he had to go to Sir Frederick and tell him everything in return for special consideration.
All of this seemed to add up, for Doxie was under heavy protection and his family already moved to Australia. Part of the accord between McAloon and Sir Lucian Bolt was a provision restraining the Brotherhood from seeking vengeance.
While the rest of the Sixmilecross people waited in jail, Duffy and Calhoun had entered guilty pleas and received sentences of under a year. It seemed obvious that they would also be resettled in a remote place.
The final agreement shaped up along the lines that Bobby had figured. Excluding Conor, who had not been contacted yet, the Sixmilecross men would plead guilty and receive one- to two-year sentences under less stringent articles of one of the coercion acts. In exchange, the Brotherhood would not pursue public sympathy, not avenge the informers, and this included a pledge from me not to write about it.
In a manner of speaking it was a backhanded compliment to myself. The British had never forgiven me for my-Boer War concentration camp articles. No one knew for certain if I was a member of the Brotherhood but there was no mistaking my sympathies. They had enough respect for my pen to keep it silent Of course, Conor was being held hostage to assure that silence.
For the moment, both sides seemed satisfied. The existence of the Brotherhood was public knowledge and both parties got the time they vied for. Brendan Sean Barrett was right about one thing. We would deal with the Germans for arms when we were ready and the British had lulled themselves into believing the Irish problem would disappear as they had believed it in the past.
We were called together again by Bobby and when we convened we found him in a quandary. He had been given permission and made the attempt to see Conor Larkin but Conor refused to speak to him. A wrench had been thrown into the agreement and no one knew exactly why.
Dan was angry and spilled out sorely over his doubts about Conor.
"Sure, he's been a good man," Sweeney argued, "but he's too much of a loner and if truth be known he's got other failings I've been worrying about as well."
"Just a minute, Dan," I said. "If there's something going on inside him, you can bet he's thought it out with great care."
"The Brotherhood has sent him a lawyer and he's refused to see him. That's disobedience of an order. He's no right to take decisions like this on his own. I want to know what the hell's going on."
Brendan Sean Barrett's face wore a look of wisdom. "We all have a suspicion what's in his mind, don't we, Dan?" he taunted.
"I've a notion and he'll screw us up royally if he tries to pull off something on his own. Don't give me none of your studious shit, Barrett, this is an organization with a code and discipline and he's going to obey."
"Now we've a problem," I interrupted. "It was you, Dan, who told us something we've longed to hear and wanted to believe since we were kids. You spread on the horse shit as thick as Conor's ma spread butter on my bread. "Don't be afraid of the butter," she'd say. Well, Dan, are you getting afraid of the horseshit you spread … you know . . . one man's ability to endure is worth an entire army? You know, Dan, the martyrdom soliloquy. Quote Long Dan Sweeney our idol, The British have nothing in their entire arsenal or imperial might to counter a single man who refuses to be broken, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.""
"I hear you, Seamus, I hear you. You know fucking well that I have to wear more than one hat in this organization. At times when I'm standing before new men I have to make an attempt to inspire them. But day in and day out I'm the pragmatic organizer of a secret army. Our rolls will be filled with martyrs soon enough. At this moment we're not in a position to start up a fight."
"Sure, I don't know about that," the caustic Brendan Sean Barrett retorted before I could speak. "Dan, you're telling us it will start when you've got your units organized, trained and armed and your plans on the board. Dan presses his magic little button and says those immortal words . . . "Lads, commence the rising That's not how the Fenian Rising started, was it, Dan?"
"I know how it started and I know how it ended for the two of us."
"What makes you think it will be different this time? With all our dreaming and scheming and secret meetings and gun smuggling, we'll only be able to put a few thousand men out on the street. We're not going to do it without the weapon that a single man carries in his heart. That's what we're facing with Larkin and that's what we're afraid of. I'll tell you when it's going to start, Dan, not sooner, not later. It will start when one man alone has decided he's had enough."
We consumed this, trembling. Sweeney brushed at his white hair in uncharacteristic nervousness and all we could hear was Robert Emmet McAloon tapping his eyeglasses against his teeth, waiting for our decision.
"Atty?" Dan asked.
"It seems to me the British have made themselves a good bargain by silencing us. I agree with Brendan that we ought to stand up and scream while we have the opportunity and while the people are eager to listen."
Dan uncorked an audible sigh, looking from one to the other
, completely outvoted. He closed his eyes and nib bed them with the heels of his hands as he spoke. "I appreciate your views. As chief of staff, I cannot take a position contrary to what I consider to be the safety of the organization. My decision is to instruct Bobby to see if the British will allow Seamus to visit Conor in the role of an old friend. Seamus is to convey the message that Larkin is to enter a plea of guilty along with the rest of the men. If he refuses, the Brotherhood is no longer bound or responsible to him." He looked up. "Is it your intention to overrule my decision?"
We swallowed hard, then accepted his ultimatum uncontested.
"All right, Bobby. Tell Sir Lucian we agree. An attempt will be made to convince Larkin. If he doesn't go along he is outside the accord."
*
A military staff car drove me out of Dublin into County Kildare to the secret place of Conor's incarceration. In a little over an hour we passed through the guard post of the British military camp at the Curragh. After a personal shakedown I was placed in an empty room in the disciplinary barrack and waited. It had been seven weeks since Sixmilecross.
As the door gave way and Conor was prodded into the room my heart waged war between tears of relief and tears of sorrow. He was manacled about the neck, waist, wrists and ankles.
"Hello runt," he rasped, sliding along the floor with a limp from one of the bullets. His left arm and shoulder were still heavily bandaged and in a sling from the other bullets which had entered his back. His eyes had sunk to ringed sockets, his beard and hair were caked and matted and the bones of his cheeks protruded. A ton of flesh had wasted from his body.