1916

by Morgan Llywelyn

  “It will be as soon as you enlist.”

  “I shan’t.”

  “But you must! It’s your duty.”

  “My duty? Is it my duty to kill men I don’t hate on behalf of a government I have every reason to hate?”

  She stared at him blankly.

  “Once again Britain is asking Irish men to serve as cannon fodder. And for what? So another commemorative arch can be erected in Stephen’s Green?”

  She put her hands on her hips and looked at him as if he were a naughty child. “I’m ashamed of you, Ned Halloran. My brothers are already in the army. Where’s your patriotism?”

  “I’m more patriotic than you know.”

  “I don’t believe it. If you were, you would enlist so I can be proud of you.” She pouted prettily.

  For once the effect was lost on Ned. “Can you not be proud of me anyway?” They were close to a quarrel, but he could not give in to her on this; it was central to who he was. “I’m already a soldier, Mary; a member of the Irish Volunteers.”

  “Redmond’s National Volunteers are the real soldiers,” she insisted. “He’s going to have them all enlist, I read it in the Times. That other lot are nothing but rascals and rebels, like the people who read Sinn Féin. How can you associate with them?”

  “Because contrary to what you may think, they are fine men. They have pledged their lives to make Ireland free.”

  “Free! I don’t know what you mean. I’m perfectly free now.”

  “Are you content to be a second-class citizen in the land where you were born?”

  Her eyes flashed. “I’m not a second-class anything, Ned Halloran! I will not stand here and be insulted by a man who’s afraid to fight for his country.”

  Though a muscle twitched in his jaw, he struggled to keep his voice calm. “My country is Ireland, and I’m defending her the best way I know how. Please listen to me, dearest, and try to understand.”

  She clapped her hands over her ears. “Don’t call me dearest! If you won’t join the army you’re a coward, you’re a dreadful coward and I don’t want anything to do with you!” She whirled and ran from him.

  Ned started to follow her.

  Stopped.

  Stood motionless.

  At that moment he saw a fork in the road of his life as clearly as he saw the graveled path in front of him. He could obey the impulse to run after Mary and make up with her. It would mean giving in, because she would not accept anything less, but afterward they could go on as before. Sundays with Mary. A white dress and a veil. A cottage on Howth and a baby in her arms.

  Or he could take the other road. He could go on without her.

  On a knife edge, the future balanced.

  Ned stood alone in the sunshine. And all at once, in the quietness of his soul, he knew.

  Something tore inside him.

  His eyes followed Mary’s diminishing figure with aching regret. They came from the same land, the same race, even the same faith. Yet there was a gulf between them he could not bridge.

  He could never make her understand what he felt. His dreams threatened hers. Mary would always cling to the status quo, fiercely protective of what she saw as security. In that respect she was closer to the Ulster Unionists than she was to Ned Halloran.

  Had he loved Mary with his whole heart it might have been enough to overcome their differences, allowing him to accept her loving, unthinking tyranny. “Anything for a quiet life,” many an Irish husband said over his pint in his favorite pub.

  But that was the trouble. Ned’s heart was already fragmented. Too large a part of it was committed to Ireland.

  IN New York, Alexander Campbell paid a call on a man he was certain he could trust.

  “I have a problem,” he said. “I expect your help.”

  When he had explained the situation he was told, “I cannot do this myself, Sandy, or allow it to be traced to me in any way. But I can give you the name of someone who knows someone who…”

  “Yes,” said Alexander. “Yes.”

  EVERY Tuesday morning, Father Paul O’Shaughnessy made his pastoral calls in the area north of Saint Xavier’s. The neighborhood was less affluent than the rest of the parish but still respectable. He had no reason to be on his guard as he walked past the entrance to a narrow alleyway—until a trio of roughly dressed men leaped out at him.

  They grabbed his shoulders and shoved him into the alley. “What do you want?” he protested. “I have no mon—”

  One of them hit him in the mouth. “Shaddup, ya idol-worshippin’ bastid.”

  The priest’s astonishment lasted only an instant. Then something ancient and savage rose up in him, something he had never suspected. With a shout of rage he crashed a fist into the man’s jaw.

  The next moment he was staggering backward with badly bruised knuckles. Before he could recover the other two threw him to the ground amid the trash cans. One can was knocked over; the metal lid rolled with a clatter down the paved alleyway.

  Paul was strong, but these were men who earned their living through hard labor. They set to work beating him with practiced expertise. The only sounds in the alley were hoarse grunts and the thuds of fists hitting flesh. Paul fought back with grim determination only to be knocked flat again.

  He drew up his knees and then lashed out with both feet, catching one man in the groin. There was a howl of agony.

  The next thing he knew he was being stomped.

  He heard bone crunch as a sheet of white-hot pain tore through him. He lurched up, and for a moment almost succeeded in throwing them off.

  Then someone hit him over the head with a bottle.

  Blessed oblivion enfolded him.

  When Paul came to he was disoriented and violently nauseated. Every breath was agony. He lay helpless until a butcher’s assistant making a delivery found him and summoned aid. But before it arrived, the darkness swallowed him again.

  THE bishop, a stout, asthmatic man with a big pale face like a looming moon, visited him in the hospital. “You’re lucky to be alive,” he wheezed. “Concussion, broken ribs, a bruised kidney—who did this to you, Father Paul?”

  “I didn’t get a good look at them. But they were dressed like dockworkers. I suppose they meant to rob me.”

  “Do you have any explanation for this?” The bishop held out a crumpled piece of paper. “The police found it pinned to your clothes.”

  “Keep your fucking papist hands off the wives of decent men,” someone had printed in thick black letters.

  Chapter Thirty-three

  ON the sixteenth of May, Henry Mooney left the Independent offices for a private meeting with one of his contacts. In past months his articles had become more moderate. Instead of criticizing Dublin Castle he was adopting a more conciliatory tone, which Ned attributed to the imposition of censorship. At the same time Henry was exploring and explaining the nationalist movement, sculpting every sentence with the precision of a poet.

  When one of the other reporters called “Copyboy!” that morning, Ned dutifully trotted over to collect the story. He already had a sheaf of copy in an oilskin pouch ready to be carried to the printing plant, but he automatically flicked his eyes over the latest typewritten page. Then he gasped. “Seán McDermott’s been arrested!”1

  Several men glanced up. “What’s that you say?”

  “He made an antirecruiting speech in County Galway. The British claim it was ‘calculated to endanger the Realm,’ so they’re going to bring him back to Dublin tonight and put him in Arbour Hill.”

  “That’s the military detention barracks,” one of the reporters pointed out. “So at least they’re acknowledging that the Volunteers are legitimate soldiers.”

  Ned asked, “What will happen to MacDermott?”

  “He’ll be tried and back in his cell by dinner tomorrow.”

  The thought of lame, brave, merry Seán MacDermott locked in a prison cell made Ned wince. “Is that a foregone conclusion?”

  The man rolled an e
ye at Ned. “It’s British justice, lad. MacDermott’s Irish, that’s his real crime. He’ll go to prison right enough.”

  Ned struggled with his conscience, then for the first time broke the rule of confidentiality. As soon as he could get away he sped to 75A Parnell Street.

  When Tom Clarke heard the news his lips tightened over his teeth. “Bloody bastards. Since Seán doesn’t have any family in Dublin I’ll send my wife to visit him as soon as he’s been sentenced. They’ll let her in, I expect.”

  “I’d be glad to go,” Ned offered. “He’s my friend, too.”

  “Best not. You don’t want your name on a subversives list in the Castle, do you? I’ve already warned Katty—not that anyone could stop her from doing something once she’s set herself to it.”

  “What’s she done now?”

  Clarke’s eyes twinkled. “The little darlin’ is so angry about seeing the Union Jack all over the city that she’s bought a lot of green, white, and orange ribbons and made up badges like the ones Clan na Gael wear in America.”2 He reached under the counter and held up a sample. “She’s offering them at a penny apiece. Yesterday I sold a hundred out of this shop alone.”

  Ned bought one of the badges and pinned it to his jacket.

  At Seán MacDermott’s trial, testimony was offered by people who had heard his speech in Tuam. Two reporters for the local newspaper had been present and had written down his words. Both agreed that his most inflammatory statement was “Irish patriotism is condemned as a crime. We are told that the only honorable patriotism is that which sends Irishmen to die in an English war. Is this not obscene?”

  Their testimony was not admitted.

  He was convicted as a result of evidence given by a member of the Royal Irish Constabulary.3 The man claimed to have made a “mental note” of everything MacDermott said in Tuam. Though he could quote nothing, he assured the court it was highly seditious. The sentence was six months in prison, subsequently reduced to four.4

  The authorities were arresting hundreds of suspected nationalists and charging them with everything from making inflammatory statements to immoral behavior in a public place. Even an unsubstantiated accusation could be enough to put a man behind bars, thus giving him a police record that might be used against him later.

  “They’d love to get me,” Tom Clarke told Ned, “but I don’t give them the slightest excuse these days. I’m not making any more public speeches, and I never leave my shops or the house unattended. I wouldn’t put it past the police to plant something incriminating.”

  For every Union Jack flying in Dublin, Kathleen Clarke made a tricolor Irish badge. Even Dublin Castle dared not arrest a woman for sewing ribbons. Her little badges began to appear openly on the streets. Some men wore them on their lapels; some women pinned them to their hats.

  The majority, however, remained indifferent to the urge for independence. Like Mary Cosgrave, they wanted things to stay as they were. They had grown up under British government and British law; whatever education they had received had been heavily influenced by the British educational system, even if their teachers were Irish Catholic. Censored newspapers assured them daily of the glory and ultimate triumph of the empire.

  Besides, “The divvil ye know is better than the divvil ye don’t know,” as the shawlies said.

  When Prime Minister Asquith dissolved his Liberal Cabinet on the nineteenth of May and formed a new Coalition Ministry, the plain people of Ireland saw little relevance to themselves.5 Only one item excited any strong reaction.

  Sir Edward Carson was named Attorney General and given a seat in the new cabinet.

  The foremost enemy of Home Rule, a man who had openly defied the imperial law against gunrunning and marched heavily armed men through the streets of Belfast, had been rewarded with one of the most influential positions the empire could offer.

  The implications were clear. A number of people who had supported John Redmond’s Parliamentarians promptly joined the Sinn Féin Party instead. But it was no longer the patient, non-violent Sinn Féin of Arthur Griffith. This was a party increasingly committed to the doctrine of physical force.

  TO Ned’s surprise, Síle had become his confidante. After the first time they made love, time and circumstance had combined to keep them from physical intimacy again. Sex was something she did elsewhere. Ned tried not to think about that.

  But they could meet. And talk. They could talk on a personal level available only to people who have shared their bodies.

  When he called on Tom Clarke he left messages for her, and sometimes she left messages for him. They met when they could, and he found himself telling her things he had never told anyone.

  She never criticized, never judged, simply listened with a gift for attentiveness that equaled his own. Confidential information was sacrosanct, but Ned could share his personal fears with Síle without feeling unmanly. Her own honesty was liberating.

  “There was a time after the Titanic when I felt invulnerable,” he told her. “I had survived, you know? It was like a gift from God. But after Bloody Sunday that wore off. Now sometimes I lie awake at night and wonder what I would do in a real battle. Would I be brave? Or would I turn and run?”

  “No one knows what they’ll do until the moment comes, Ned. We are one sort of person in our heads, and somebody else in real life. I don’t think you would run, though. You couldn’t live with yourself if you did that.”

  “Some people think men are cowards if they don’t enlist in the British army.”

  Síle gave a hard, scornful laugh. “Some people think a lot of goddam foolishness.”

  MEMBERSHIP in Redmond’s National Volunteers was declining sharply. A combination of enlistment in the British army and general demoralization was taking its toll. For some a deep resentment of Britain was translating into a pro-German attitude. The tragedy of the Lusitania was not forgotten, but centuries of tragedy caused by British imperialism weighed heavier.

  Francis Sheehy-Skeffington was arrested for campaigning against military recruitment.6 He went on a hunger strike and was released after nine days. Even the most callous judge could see no harm in the gentle pacifist, but he had a police “jacket” now, an incriminating file that would follow him the rest of his life. Dublin Castle fully appreciated the value of such files.

  Meanwhile, the Irish Volunteers were gaining in strength. Coordination of resources became imperative. Although the constitution of the IRB did not provide for a Military Council,7 the executives quietly created one around the three Volunteers who had been working on the insurrection plans.

  Because he was not a member of the Brotherhood, Eoin MacNeill was neither informed nor included.

  Initially the Military Council was composed of Pádraic Pearse and Eamonn Ceannt, with a place held for Joe Plunkett when he returned from Germany.8 They were in almost daily consultation with Tom Clarke, and through him with Seán MacDermott in Arbour Hill, both of whom were on the executive committee of the IRB. Clarke also relayed messages to Clan na Gael, in the States, using Irish stewards on Atlantic liners.9

  WHEN Plunkett returned to Ireland in June he was ill and spitting blood.

  His sister Geraldine sent for Ned. “We need you to give his report to the others,” she explained, “because Joe isn’t able for much talking right now.”

  “Will he be all right?”

  “If he’s good and stays in bed as the doctor wants. You know Joe, though; it’s hard to keep him down. Ask his friends not to call until I send word, will you? He simply must rest.”

  After spending an hour with Plunkett, Ned went straight to Saint Enda’s. Pádraic Pearse was in his study, updating student records. His first question to Ned was about Plunkett’s health.

  “His family’s worried about him, but Joe assures me he’ll be on his feet again soon.”

  “How does he look?”

  “Desperately pale and thin. Both he and Sir Roger fell ill in Germany.10 Joe says the situation there has grown very confused.
Sir Roger feels that Clan na Gael gave his venture only halfhearted support and ultimately turned against him, which made the German Foreign Office suspicious. The officials are courteous enough on the surface, but there is all sorts of skull-duggery going on behind the scenes. It sounds like an Erskine Childers spy novel. Joe says Sir Roger’s become morbidly depressed.”

  “I now think this German venture may be a serious mistake,” Pearse said. “After the Lusitania was torpedoed I was ill for days.11 What sort of people are we dealing with? The Germans destroyed hundreds of innocent lives simply to intimidate and terrify. They’re no better than Oliver Cromwell. For the sake of Ireland, we must set a better example.”

  Pearse was staring down at his folded hands. “We must always be sure of the moral rectitude of our acts, Ned,” he went on. “There is absolutely no justification for wanton butchery, no matter how many men claim otherwise. And given human nature, there are always some who will.

  “Remember this: any good cause can be subverted for a wicked purpose. The more noble the cause, the more ignoble will be its subverters.”

  “I shall remember, sir,” Ned promised.

  Pearse drew a slow, deep breath, then looked up. “Have you anything more to report?”

  “Joe says Sir Roger’s had almost no luck forming an Irish brigade in the prison camps. Perhaps fifty men out of all he’s spoken to have shown any interest. Now John Devoy’s asking him to abandon the idea altogether.”

  “It’s just as well,” said Pearse. “How could we trust men who have taken an oath to fight in the British army, then are willing to break it to fight against the British? This whole business…” He clucked his tongue in disapproval. “Sir Roger did succeed in persuading the German chancellor to issue an official statement of support for Irish independence. That’s something, I suppose. But the Lusitania has destroyed my faith in German honor.”

  “Where does that leave Sir Roger?”

  “That’s a good question, Ned. He is claiming one other success. The weapons Childers brought us are of wretched quality, as you know. The Mausers are obsolete; Tom Clarke tells me they were made for the Prussian forces of 1870. And the ammunition that came with them consists of explosive bullets. Such bullets are against all rules of civilized warfare; I won’t allow them to be given to our men. We desperately need more weapons, and Sir Roger has obtained a promise of them from the Germans. Perhaps by September.”