The Music Makers

by E. V. Thompson

  The shouts about her died away.

  ‘Can he walk yet?’ asked the ex-prizefighter.

  ‘No. He’ll have to be carried – and he’ll need someone to look after him properly for a week or two.’

  ‘We can’t take Dermot with us! We’ll find it difficult enough to take care of ourselves in the mountains.’

  ‘Would you have the soldiers find him, then, Eoin Feehan? Let them give him the choice of dying in prison, or recovering so that they might hang him? Oh no, Dermot goes with you – and I’ll come along myself to make certain he’s properly looked after.’

  ‘You can’t do that, Kathie,’ Tommy Donaghue protested. ‘It wouldn’t be decent for one girl to be up there with so many men – and who would look after me?’

  ‘You’ll get by. No doubt Mrs McCabe will give you a meal or two. As for being decent, I’d be less than that if I stayed here doing nothing while Dermot died up in those mountains for lack of care. You go and tell the fishermen to get their boats in the water while I help Mrs McCabe to get Dermot ready.’

  Norah McCabe was no more taken with the idea of Kathie going to the mountains than was Tommy Donaghue.

  ‘It would not be right, Kathie. Besides, Dermot is not fit enough to go anywhere just yet. We’ll find somewhere in the village to hide him.’

  ‘There is nowhere in Kilmar where the soldiers won’t look,’ insisted Kathie. ‘If you keep him here, you’ll be sentencing him to death yourself. I know Dermot shouldn’t be moved, but it’s his only chance and I am going with him to see that it isn’t wasted. It’s the only way, Mrs McCabe, really it is. You see, I feel I am as much to blame for what happened as any of the men who went on that raid. I had been goading Dermot for weeks, telling him that the Association was able to do nothing but talk. If only I’d had more sense, Dermot wouldn’t be lying wounded now. I must go with him; I owe him that.’

  ‘But what about Liam, Kathie? What shall I tell him when he comes home?’

  For the first time, Kathie’s resolution faltered. Then she looked directly at the other woman.

  ‘Tell him the truth, Mrs McCabe. Tell him why I am going to the Wicklow mountains – and tell him I won’t come home until Dermot is able to come back, too.’

  High in the Wicklow mountains, on Christmas Day, Nathan Brock led the small band of Kilmar outlaws through wooded valleys and up gorse-covered slopes until they eventually arrived at a wild remote area of tumbled granite ridges, springy heather-carpeted uplands and coarse-tufted peat bogs. Here he suggested they should set to and construct dug-out cabins, roofing them with peat turfs cut from the bog about them.

  Nathan Brock had decided to bring the party to the mountains himself when he learned that Kathie and the wounded Dermot would be travelling with them. Had he not made this decision, he knew that such an inexperienced and handicapped group would never reach the safety of the mountains undetected.

  ‘You’ll be as safe here as anywhere,’ he said, looking across the empty miles to where a solitary hen-harrier beat its lazy progress above the heather, in search of an unwary bird or small mammal. ‘The soldiers rarely find their way into these parts.’

  ‘But how will we live?’ asked Eoin Feehan. ‘There is nothing up here.’

  ‘You will have to follow his example,’ said Nathan Brock, pointing to the harrier, which suddenly plummeted to the ground in a tumbling dive. ‘Hunt. If things get too bad, you will find fish in the rivers, and food can always be stolen from the soldiers who camp near the towns. There are farmers, too, and they are sympathetic toward men on the run from the English – but be careful how you approach them. Thieves and cut-throats also hide in these mountains, and the farmers have their own ways of dealing with them.’

  ‘It sounds a real home from home,’ commented Dermot, smiling weakly between shivers. He had stood up to the journey well enough, thanks to Kathie’s constant bullying of the men who took it in turns to carry him, but he could not get warm. The cold up here in the mountains worked its way to the very marrow of a man’s bones. It was as persistent as the mist that lived upon the high ridges.

  ‘Before we think of doing anything else we’ll get a fire going,’ declared Kathie firmly. ‘The rest of you can stamp around to get warm; Dermot can’t. As for food, we’ll have to make do with salt fish for another day or two until someone organises the hunting.’

  ‘What a way to spend Christmas Day,’ complained one of the Kilmar men. ‘You would have thought the soldiers might have waited for a few more days.’

  ‘They no doubt expected to catch you off guard,’ said Nathan Brock.

  ‘And so they would, had it not been for you,’ said Kathie. ‘How long are you staying with us, Nathan?’

  ‘Only until tomorrow. I will show some of you the nearest roads and farms and then I have a call to make before I return to Kilmar.’

  ‘Your wife and children, Nathan?’

  ‘Yes.’ The big man grinned like a child anticipating a church party. ‘They are in the poor-house at Rathconard, only a couple of miles from here. I have decided to take them back to Kilmar with me. There are a few derelict cottages on the hill behind the village. I can do one of them up and Liam has said there will always be work for me, either helping him with the fishing, or helping Tommy Donaghue on his trips to Gorey.’

  ‘He’ll need all the help you can give him now,’ said Dermot. ‘And I would like to think you were there helping him and Ma.’

  ‘Right now we’d better be helping you,’ said Kathie. One of the Kilmar men put a flame to a small pile of furze and twigs as she and Nathan Brock helped Dermot to the shelter of a rock. Gratefully, the wounded fisherman held his hands out to the crackling, spitting fire.

  ‘With any luck you’ll not have to be up here for more than a few months,’ said Nathan Brock. ‘Unlike the constabulary, the Army has a short memory. Soldiers come and go quickly in Ireland and the new ones seldom take over old troubles. They make their own soon enough. Now, while you two get yourselves warm I’ll show the others where to make the dugouts. When they are completed you’ll be as comfortable as fleas on a dog up here.’

  He set the Kilmar outlaws to working hard, hoping to make the most of the few remaining hours of daylight. Temperatures would drop rapidly at nightfall and it was wise to have some shelter from the strong westerly winds which ripped across the exposed mountain slopes stripping bushes and bending trees.

  ‘I would be happier if he were staying with us,’ said Kathie to Dermot as she watched the big man bullying and cajoling. He made the men put up low turf walls among the granite outcrops, taking advantage of the natural landscape for shelter and concealment.

  ‘And I would be happier if you returned to Kilmar with him,’ commented Dermot, repeating the words he had said to her on a number of occasions since they had left the fishing village. ‘This is no place for a girl.’

  ‘We will discuss it when you are well.’

  ‘What is your reason for coming away with us, Kathie? If it was Liam lying here wounded, I could understand it, but I don’t believe you did it for me.’

  ‘There has been nothing said between me and Liam,’ declared Kathie quickly. ‘I am as free as anyone else to do just as I please. We are all members of the same association and I didn’t join just to pass the hat around at meetings.’

  ‘But a woman living up here among so many men is bound to create difficulties, unless….’

  Dermot fell silent, and Kathie looked at him with a puzzled frown on her face. ‘Unless what?’

  ‘Unless you marry me.’

  Kathie did not know whether or not he was serious, and she did not want to know. Standing up from the fire, she said, ‘This mountain air has blown away your senses, Dermot McCabe. I’ll start some fish cooking while you still have enough wits about you to eat.’

  Watching her walk away from him, Dermot himself wondered why he had made the offer of marriage. It was not something about which he had been thinking. But he did not regret having made
the proposal. If Kathie had accepted him, he would have been proud to marry her.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Nathan Brock set off for the poor-house at Rathconard late the following afternoon. He had done all he could for the Kilmar fishermen and now he was his own man once more. A man with a family and hopes for the future. A happy man. He would get news into the poor-house tonight, and tomorrow his wife and the boys would meet him outside the town. Then they would all go on together to their new life in Kilmar. It was not the soft turf alone that put a spring in his steps.

  It was easy enough to pass unnoticed, even when he reached the old military road that had been built for the soldiers involved in putting down the 1798 uprising. It was a bitterly cold day and the few people he saw had their coat collars turned up about their ears and their heads down against the wind.

  He arrived at the outskirts of Rathconard before it was quite dark and huddled in a ditch at the side of the road, impatiently waiting for the slowly advancing darkness to settle over the town. When he was satisfied that he could not be recognised, Nathan Brock climbed from the ditch and made his way through the near-deserted streets to the poor-house.

  But even here his suspense was not over. He hid in the shadows near the poor-house door for more than half an hour before he saw an old woman, bent against the wind, approaching.

  As she turned in to enter the dimly lit doorway, he slipped out from his hiding-place and took her thin arm. Her immediate reaction was to snatch it free but, as gently as he could, Nathan Brock guided her to the shadows beside the doorway.

  ‘It’s all right. It’s all right, mother. I’ll not hurt you. I want you to do a small favour for me, that’s all. Do you know Shelagh Brock?’

  He released the old woman’s arm but stood between her and escape into the poor-house.

  ‘Eh? You’ll have to speak up. I’m a bit deaf.’

  The last thing Nathan Brock wanted was a shouted conversation here in the centre of Rothconard, but it seemed he had little choice. This old woman might be the only person entering the poor-house that night. He raised his voice as much as he dared.

  ‘Shelagh Brock and her two boys. Do you know them?’

  She cupped a hand to her ear and stood slack-jawed before him, lips drawn back from toothless gums.

  Nathan Brock was unable to stifle his exasperation and, throwing away all attempts at caution, shouted his question in the old crone’s ear.

  ‘Do you know Shelagh Brock?’

  ‘Shelagh Brock? Mrs Brock, d’you mean?’

  Nathan Brock nodded his affirmation, elated at his belated success.

  ‘She’s not here, me dear. She’s gone.’

  ‘Gone? Gone where?’

  The old woman shrank back from him, having no difficulty in hearing his last two shouted words.

  ‘She’s left. The master put her out.’

  The old woman shook her head until she saw that the angry man in front of her was waiting for a reply. Her brow wrinkled and she thought hard.

  ‘I don’t know…. A month, maybe more.’

  ‘Where did she go?’ Nathan Brock had hold of the old crone’s arm again, but seeing her wince in pain he hastily let it drop.

  ‘Where does anyone go when they leave this place? The lucky ones are carried to a grave. The others …? I don’t know.’

  ‘Then you had better stay outside for a while, mother. I am going in there to find out a thing or two.’

  Anger had taken the place of discretion. Pushing past the old woman, Nathan Brock strode to the door of the poor-house and flung it open. Inside he entered a long ill-lit corridor with dormitories on either side. There was a strong smell of unwashed bodies and boiled cabbage. The sound of spoons scraping against earthenware bowls came from beyond a door at the far end of the corridor. When Nathan Brock opened it he found himself in the poor-house eating-room.

  The large gloomy room was hopelessly overcrowded, with inmates packed shoulder to shoulder at long wooden tables, a bowl in front of each of them. Those at the nearest tables to the door looked up at him with a dull interest. Nathan Brock recognised the resigned expressions on the faces of every one of them, men, women and children. Here, in this room, were Ireland’s failures – and each of them was thoroughly defeated. Even the smallest child accepted that life owed him nothing at all.

  ‘What do you want?’ The question was shouted across the room at Nathan Brock by a thick-set balding man who wore a dirty green waistcoat over a colourless shirt, and knee-breeches that rode over thick grey woollen socks.

  ‘I am looking for the master.’

  Those listening heard only the softness and none of the menace in his voice.

  ‘You’re looking at him. If you’re thinking to find a place in here, you’re out of luck. I turn a hundred away every morning. Away with you and shut that door as you go, I haven’t got money to spare on heating.’

  ‘I am not after lodging in your poor-house,’ said Nathan Brock. ‘I am seeking Mrs Brock.’

  The poor-house master gave a derisive snort. ‘You won’t find her here. I turned her out. It’s hard enough finding room for genuine distress cases, without harbouring the wives of criminals.’

  Peering short-sightedly across the room, the poor-house master asked, ‘Who are you, anyway? What do you want with her?’

  ‘I am her husband.’ Speaking as quietly as before, Nathan Brock advanced determinedly across the room toward the other man. ‘Unless you can tell me where she has gone I intend cracking your head for you. A man who turns out a woman and her children in winter has no right to be in charge of a poor-house.’

  The poor-house master backed away across the room, feeling his way with one hand behind him, not daring to take his eyes from Nathan Brock. As he went, he mouthed noiselessly, until the words escaped, his voice as high-pitched and squeaky as a young girl’s, ‘Seize him! Take him! He’s a wanted criminal.’

  Not one inmate moved. Even the spoons were stilled as the occupants of the room watched the unusual scene before them. Never before had anyone challenged the life-or-death authority of the poor-house master in this famine-hit area.

  ‘Seize him, I say! I’ll give a reward to the man who takes him,’ the poor-house master squeaked as he backed away, trying to keep a table between Nathan Brock and himself.

  One man, braver or more foolish than the others, moved to stand up just ahead of the ex-prizefighter. Placing his big right hand on the top of the other man’s head, Nathan Brock sat him firmly back on his seat and in so doing almost pushed the pauper’s chin through his breastbone.

  With a quick agile move that scattered startled inmates and half-empty bowls, Nathan Brock vaulted across the long table, causing the poor-house master to scurry hurriedly behind another.

  ‘You won’t get away with coming in here and terrorising people who can’t defend themselves.’

  Nathan Brock said nothing and, as he circled the table, the poor-house master tried a new plea.

  ‘I was only doing my duty when I put Mrs Brock out. I have to obey the rules laid down by the Board of Guardians. They say that the families of convicted criminals must not be housed here. I had to send your wife away.’

  ‘When was I convicted?’ Nathan Brock’s voice hissed angrily at the other man. ‘Or are you judge and jury of all men now?’

  The two men stood facing each other, separated only by the width of the table. With a swift movement that took the poor-house master by surprise, Nathan Brock swept the people at the table aside and, gripping the edge of the table, heaved it over, scattering pots and bowls. The paupers on the far side scrambled away as the heavy table came over on them. Stepping through the confusion, Nathan Brock reached out and grabbed the front of the poor-house master’s shirt with his good right hand. With his left he cuffed the squealing man into silence.

  ‘Where did my wife and boys go?’ he demanded.

  ‘I don’t know. How could I? I have more than enough to do looking after the inmates here with
out following what happens to those who leave.’

  ‘I have no doubt you make more than your share of profit out of doing it.’

  They were standing beside a small table upon which stood a huge cauldron, half-filled with lukewarm soup. It was water-thin, and the smell rising from it gave evidence that the vegetables used in its making had been in an advanced state of decomposition.

  ‘How many others have you turned out to die?’ asked Nathan Brock. When he had first burst into the eating-room to seek out the poor-house master he had wanted only to feel the man’s neck between his hands and choke from him his reasons for turning out Shelagh and the two boys. Now the violent anger had been soaked up in the silent misery about him.

  The poor-house master’s eyes had not left Nathan Brock’s face and he, too, had seen the black anger ebb away. ‘I do my duty as I see it,’ he declared. ‘No one can do more.’

  ‘Do you eat your own disgusting food, too?’

  Nathan Brock banged the cauldron, disturbing its contents, and a foul aroma escaped from it like gases from a bog.

  Some of Nathan Brock’s anger returned. The poor-house master was given money enough to purchase better food than this.

  Gripping the other man’s hair, Nathan Brock bent him double and dunked his head into the soup. He held it there until the man began choking, thrashing the air desperately with his arms. When he thought the poor-house master had swallowed as much of the foul concoction as a man could reasonably take, he withdrew the man’s head and allowed him to fall to the floor where he lay choking and retching.

  Looking about him, Nathan Brock saw smiles on the faces of the inmates of Rathconard poor-house for the first time. But he was in no mood for humour. Somehow he had to find Shelagh and his two boys. It was a near-impossible task. There were hundreds of thousands of starving women and children on the roads and byways of Ireland.

  The thought that they might at this very moment be lying somewhere out there, cold, hungry and desperate, hit him harder than any physical blow and he reeled blindly out of the room, crashing along the corridor and into the street outside.