Her heart sank.
The boy’s face brightened. ‘If I see him, who will I say was asking after him?’
‘Victoria,’ she whispered.
By late afternoon people were coming into the Union filled with accounts of what was happening in the city. Victoria realized some of it was rumour, but she listened to all they said. The troops were apparently beginning to walk the streets and there’d been some shooting. The rebels were commandeering houses and shooting down on the soldiers from the rooftops. People were scurrying about trying to buy provisions – bread, milk, meat – before the military reinforcements arrived. After that, the fight would begin good and proper, they said. Dublin was still full of looters, they said, and there were still no police to be seen. Victoria could see for herself the spoils of the looting – children wearing coats too big, their mothers in new shoes too small, babies in brand new prams. She wondered if Bridie and Micko had been among them, but somehow she didn’t see Bridie stealing, no matter how desperate she was.
By evening she was exhausted. The head nurse told her to go home.
‘You’ll need all your strength for tomorrow,’ she said, ‘once the casualties start coming in.’
Victoria nodded. She left the ward and made her way out through the front archway and onto the street. She debated whether to walk by St Stephen’s Green. After the incident yesterday, when the rebels tried to commandeer Valentine’s car, the thought frightened her. But she had to find Brendan.
‘Miss Bell.’ A voice startled her. She had almost walked headlong into Cathal O’Malley. She stared up at him. He looked thinner than she remembered, his face drawn, and his back slightly bent.
‘A girl like you should be at home where ’tis safe,’ he said.
In spite of herself she smiled. ‘You sound like my papa.’
Cathal smiled back. ‘I suppose I do. But your family will be worried about you. No matter, I’ll escort you home now.’
‘I’m not going home. I’m going to St Stephen’s Green. There’s someone I have to find.’
‘What? Why?’ Cathal studied her, a look of understanding crossing his face. ‘Ah, I see the way of it. This boyo you’re looking for, Brendan Lynch, is patrolling over there.’
Victoria looked at him in shock. ‘How . . . how did you know?’
‘I know Brendan well. He’s talked to me about . . . well, about things. He was gutted, poor lad, after the two of you separated.’ He put up his hand to stop Victoria’s protests. ‘’Tis none of my business what went on between the two of ye. That’s up to yourselves, but you’re a foolish girl if you go looking for him now.’
Victoria began to cry. ‘I can’t help it,’ she said, ‘I’m still in love with him.’
Cathal’s face took on a faraway look. His voice was gentle when he spoke. ‘Ah, sure isn’t love the most foolish of things, and aren’t our hearts just as foolish to follow its lead?’
Victoria smiled and put her hand on his. ‘Will you help me find him, Cathal?’
Cathal nodded. ‘I will. But not tonight. I have to be back for a late shift. We have hardly any doctors at all. I will see you here at the Union tomorrow. He linked her arm in his. ‘Now will you walk back to your house with me and promise to go inside and lock the door and stay there for the night?’
‘I promise.’
Rosie sat leaning against the chimney on the roof of the Moore Street house holding a rifle on her lap. The weapon belonged to a young Volunteer who had been lying on his stomach on the roof, aiming at British soldiers down on the street below. He had handed it to her when she brought him sandwiches and water and had crawled behind the chimney to take his refreshment. The rebels had taken possession of the rooftops along Moore Street, breaking through walls of adjoining houses to open a clear path from one end of the block to the other, up and down both sides.
Rosie fingered the rifle absent-mindedly as she gazed down at the people scurrying along Moore Street, some dragging children, others carrying bread or baskets of food. They ducked hurriedly in and out of doorways, crossed the street to avoid soldiers and occasionally chanced a glance up at the rooftops where rebels lay in wait. She saw a soldier fall, and watched as his comrades raced to his aid, dragging him into the safety of a nearby doorway. She wondered where Valentine was. She had not thought of him in months but now, as she watched the soldiers, she could not help but see his face. Could she shoot him, she wondered? Maybe, she told herself, but only in self-defence.
All evening the metallic cracking of continuous rifle fire had filled her ears. Now, in the open air, the noise was louder and more urgent. Ambulance sirens blared across the city, mixing with the rumbling thunder of armoured army vehicles. Bricks fell off old chimneys, rattling down to the street. A stray bullet shattered the glass of a nearby window. An old man’s head appeared in the opening as he launched a string of curses down on both the rebels and the soldiers. Rosie began to cough. The smoke had locked in her throat and the heavy, humid air had made it hard to breathe. She gave a small shiver. When the weather was like this the memory of the humid night at Foley Court with Micko was never far away.
She handed the rifle back to the young man and crawled around the chimney, carefully making her way over the roof tiles and in through the skylight that led into the attic. A ferocious heat slammed into her as she found the staircase and made her way down to the kitchen. The house was filled with people coming and going – some heading for the rooftop, others gathering in the living room to talk. She recognized leaders of the Volunteers, Citizen Army and the Brotherhood, League members, journalists from the Sword – all of them making a great commotion. They talked about the fact that the orders for the uprising were countermanded by one of the Volunteer leaders due to a communication mix-up. As a result, the number of men who showed up was greatly reduced. Cathal’s house had become an informal headquarters for the exchange of information.
She was slicing bread for more sandwiches when Cathal appeared beside her. She peered up at him anxiously, as always assessing his health. He looked worn out. She dropped the knife, led him to the table and urged him to sit down.
‘Stay there,’ she said, ‘until I bring you some food.’
Cathal sank down wearily on the chair. ‘I can’t stay long, darlin’,’ he said, ‘I have to get out and see how the lads are doing. They’re taking a lot of fire across the city. ’Tis my duty to go.’
‘It’s your duty to save lives too, Cathal,’ she said. ‘You can’t be doing both. You haven’t the strength for it.’
Since the uprising had begun she worried about Cathal constantly. She tried not to think of the danger he faced every time he went out to check up on the Volunteers. She had almost lost him once, she could not bear the thought of losing him again.
Cathal smiled weakly. ‘Ah, sure I’m not for going after the British Army single-handed. But I trained these lads, Rosie, I need to be sure they’re doing all right. I’m worried for them. I can’t abandon them. I don’t want to see harm come to any of them.’ He sighed and bit into the sandwich she set before him. ‘None of us expected the bloody army to put up such a fight. Sure can’t they see these are only young lads . . .’
‘I understand you feel a responsibility for them, Cathal. I do. But you’re only one man. And you are a doctor first.’
She did not add, ‘And besides, you’ll be safer at the hospital.’
‘Aye, I was a doctor first, but I lost the right to call myself that a long time ago.’
He bowed his head. Rosie bent over and hugged him. ‘How many casualties at the Union?’ she asked, changing the subject.
‘What? Oh, not so many now, but ’twill get worse. I feel it. The army has dug in. They’ll be bringing out the heavy artillery before long. And Pearse and Connolly are not for giving up any time soon. They took a gamble, and now they have to live with it. They’re brave boys, the lot of them.’
Rosie made no reply. She sat down beside him and sipped a cup of tea. Rosie had joine
d the Cumann na mBan, the women’s auxiliary, some months before, along with the Butler sisters and other women. She had learned how to shoot a rifle and was ready to do what she could for the rebellion. Cathal had taken to calling her his ‘darlin’ rebel’ and she had laughed. But now that the Uprising had begun she was no longer sure what she thought of the gamble the rebel leaders had taken, especially with reduced manpower as a result of the communications blunder. Many of those boys would be killed before it was over. Maybe even Cathal. She sighed. It was one thing to talk about being willing to pay the price, but when it was being paid in front of your eyes in bloodshed and death, you had to question if the end was really worth that price.
‘I saw young Victoria today.’ Cathal’s voice interrupted her thoughts. ‘She’s beyond at the Union saving lives when she could be barricaded inside her fancy house on Fitzwilliam Square. More power to the wee lass, she’s braver than I would have thought.’
Rosie swallowed hard. She was reluctant to praise Victoria out loud, but deep down she felt a tender pride in her old friend.
‘She wants me to find Brendan Lynch for her. Says she needs to see him. They had a bad fight. But she says she still loves him.’
Rosie forgot the momentary pride she felt for Victoria and remembered instead the quarrel they had over Brendan. She was convinced then that Victoria had just been using Brendan. So how had things progressed to this?
‘Surely Brendan would never have let himself be seduced by her,’ she said aloud.
Cathal laughed. ‘I would say they seduced each other. Love is a queer thing, Rosie – as you and I both know. Anyway, I plan to find the lad tomorrow night and bring him to her house – the aunt is away with her fancy man, I gather.’
Rosie shot to her feet. ‘No! It’s too dangerous, Cathal. For all of you. You owe Victoria Bell nothing.’
‘She’s your friend, Rosie.’
‘I won’t stand by while she manipulates yet another person to do her bidding.’
‘She’s bound and determined to find him, regardless of what I do. I’d rather be there to protect the both of them.’ Cathal stood and put his hand on Rosie’s arm. ‘Sure she’s only a lass, Roisin Dubh, like you, but she’s innocent, she’s not a born rebel like yourself.’
Rosie drew her mouth into a tight line. She was angry with him, but she knew he would do what he wanted.
‘I just don’t understand your priorities, Cathal.’
He looked at her, a trace of sadness in his eyes. ‘Ah, Rosie, that’s just your stubbornness talking. Love should always be our priority – ’tis the only thing we can ever count on.’
He took her hand. She looked up at him, tears stinging her eyes. ‘My priority is you, Cathal O’Malley. It’s you I love.’
‘Ah, sure I know you do, Rosie. And I love you, darlin’. So let’s not begrudge young Victoria her love for Brendan.’
After he left, Rosie sat back down at the table, lost in thought, indifferent to the hubbub of people that continued to stream in and out of the kitchen. She had been mean and selfish and she was ashamed of herself. Maybe Victoria was right when she had told her it was time for her to stop blaming everyone else for her troubles. Perhaps she had been too quick to judge her friend when it came to Brendan. She sighed. She had allowed such pettiness to destroy her friendship with Victoria, but she must not let it destroy her relationship with Cathal. It was time to let such feelings go before they destroyed her as well.
She rose and made another batch of sandwiches and brought them up to the roof where yet another young rebel bravely faced paying the ultimate price for what he believed in – love of his country.
When the sun came up on Wednesday the people of Dublin arose and crept to their windows. What they saw caused relief in some, and fear in others. The British military reinforcements had arrived. A battalion of weary-looking troops, some smooth-faced as schoolboys, tramped up Sackville Street under a hail of bullets from the rooftop rebels. The rebel rifle fire was met with the ricochet of machine guns. By noon, the sound of cannon fire echoed from the River Liffey as a gunboat shelled Liberty Hall where rebels were garrisoned. Machine-gun fire erupted from behind the windows of the stately Shelbourne Hotel, raining down bullets on the rebels dug into trenches on St Stephen’s Green.
And yet for many Dubliners the scene resembled more a pageant than a war. Few had taken the threat of an uprising seriously although the Volunteers had been drilling openly on the streets of Dublin for weeks. How could a rag-tag group of poets and teachers and clerks and farm boys transform overnight into citizen soldiers able to stand up to the British Army? It was quixotic at best and deadly at worst. And thus many Dubliners basked in the afternoon sunshine on their front steps or in their gardens and watched the skirmishes as they would a holiday parade. Their relative ease of passage on the streets on Monday and Tuesday had lulled them into a state of denial. Even the occasional sight of the dead body of an unfortunate civilian lying in the street failed to rouse them.
By Wednesday evening, however, the atmosphere became more sinister. Fires broke out throughout the city. Ambulances carrying the wounded screamed on their way to hospitals. The noise of British machine-gun fire and shelling reached a deafening crescendo. Foodstuffs had run short and people scurried furtively through the streets in search of bread and milk, trying to avoid being caught in crossfire. Many were turned back by soldiers attempting to maintain a curfew. The rebels at the General Post Office held their positions from behind sandbagged windows, returning fire for fire with the army.
It was against this growing danger that Victoria hurried arm in arm with Cathal from the Union to Fitzwilliam Square. The hospital was in turmoil throughout most of the day as more and more injured were brought in by the ambulances. Some were soldiers, some rebels, but most were civilians. All of them were badly injured. The few doctors present had to make life and death decisions on whom to operate. They worked feverishly to complete the procedures while the lights flickered with every boom of cannon fire. Victoria was pulled into the operating theater to assist even though she had only scant experience. With the staff shortage, there was no choice. At first she felt she might vomit at the amount of blood she saw and smelled, but took several deep breaths and forced herself to concentrate on the job at hand. No sooner did she allow relief to fill her than another patient was wheeled in. They saved three of them, but lost the last one. She didn’t know if he was a soldier, rebel or civilian, but it didn’t matter. She wandered out of the operating room in a daze.
It was dark when she left the hospital and stood inhaling the warm evening air. She realized then that she had hardly thought about Brendan or Valentine, except for a hurried inspection of each injured man who was brought in. Now her anxiety flooded back. Would Brendan even agree to see her? As if in answer to her thoughts, Cathal appeared beside her.
‘I’m sorry it’s so late,’ he said, ‘but I had an awful time getting Brendan out of St Stephen’s Green. The army have locked themselves in at the Shelbourne Hotel and they’re raining bullets down on the lads.’
Victoria gasped and put a hand on his arm. He shook it off. ‘We’re all right,’ he said, ‘but we don’t have much time. Your boy Brendan is below at Fitzwilliam Square. The maid let him in. He’s waiting for you. Come on now.’
Relief surged through her. ‘Thank God,’ she whispered.
The noise of gunfire seared her ears as the two of them came closer to St Stephen’s Green. The Shelbourne hotel, which faced the Green, was bright with the flame of bullets. Every now and then a bullet found its mark and a cry pierced the darkness. Victoria flinched and held on tighter to Cathal. He led her around the perimeter piled with cars and carts and pieces of timber, and on down to Fitzwilliam Square. There, the darkened streets were quiet, but no less sinister. Cathal stood to make sure she was in the front door and then disappeared.
Brendan met her in the hallway.
‘Brendan,’ she whispered. ‘Oh, Brendan, thank God you’re alive.�
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‘Aye, so far.’
They stared at each other for a long moment. She watched him wrestle with the anger that he still obviously felt towards her. But as she watched, the hardness in his eyes disappeared, replaced by a soft faraway look. It was the same transformation that happened each time he had taken up his fiddle to play. She let out a sigh of relief and moved closer to him.
‘I’m sorry for what I said, Brendan, about the uprising . . .’
He put his finger on her lips to quiet her. ‘No more of that now, darlin’. You only spoke the truth. At the time I took it as a betrayal of me, but after a while I understood. You’re afraid for your brother and your family and your home. If I were in your shoes, sure I’d feel the same. I still love you, and as long as you love me that’s all that matters.’
‘I do, Brendan, I do.’
He buried his lips in her hair. He reeked of sweat and dirt but she didn’t care. She pulled him closer. His lips moved over her brow and cheeks and then met her mouth. His kiss was hungry and hard.
She felt a quiver of fear run through her. She had never seen him this intense, not even in the old days at Ennismore when he had resented her as one of the gentry. There was an urgency in his voice she could not ignore. At length she reached out and took his hand.
‘Let’s go upstairs.’
When she closed the bedroom door behind them, Brendan took her by the shoulders and kissed her so fiercely she eventually had to push him away in order to regain her breath. She was keenly aware, as must he be, that this was the first time they had ever been truly alone. She sat down on the bed and patted the coverlet. ‘Sit here,’ she said.
He unbuttoned and removed his uniform jacket, loosened the collar of his shirt and rolled the sleeves up to his elbows. She tried to ignore a sudden urge to touch the dark hairs that sprouted on his forearms. He leaned back against the pillow. He put his arm around her as she lay back beside him and began to talk.
The Girls of Ennismore Page 28