The long walk home was a fraught affair. Sporadic shots in the distance offered proof that a hunt was under way, and on one occasion a sudden tumult of baying dogs almost gave him a heart attack. But they weren’t as close as he feared, and it was only the darkness—almost complete now that the moon had set—which actually slowed his progress. The birds were singing by the time he reached the outskirts of Huy and carefully worked his way round the still-sleeping town to the house of his Belgian hosts.
Mathilde had agreed that he should leave for Holland as soon as that was practical, but both of them knew that their work that night was likely to delay matters, and with a wait of unknown duration in order he found himself back in the familiar space between roofs. At least it wasn’t as cold as it had been in the winter.
During the first day, Yvette Deflandres brought him regular bulletins: all three bridges had been destroyed; Mertens had been the only casualty among the saboteurs, but two other Belgians had been shot by the Germans, allegedly for fleeing when challenged. So far the Germans had not taken hostages, as they had elsewhere in similar circumstances.
But they were moving heaven and earth to find the perpetrators, as Mathilde told McColl on the following afternoon. They were all over the valley, hundreds of them, searching houses and farms, questioning anyone out on the roads. Even if the trains started running again, things would need to calm down before McColl could safely venture out.
With no new books to read, he started rereading the old ones. Thanks to himself and the others, there weren’t any trains to watch.
In London, Easter Saturday was warm and bright, fluffy white clouds in formation dotting the deep blue sky. After treating herself to bacon and eggs at a café on the Clapham High Road and forcing herself to peruse the war reports, Caitlin took a walk in the park and reread the latest letter from Brooklyn. Aunt Orla had lots of news, both national and domestic, from Mexican rebel Pancho Villa’s invasion of the United States to the latest in the long line of Caitlin’s old school friends who had beaten her to the altar. Though the tone was unremittingly cheerful, there was a hint of wistfulness somewhere in the mix, as if her aunt had finally realized that the life she had wanted for Caitlin, the one she herself had given up, might come at too high a cost.
Caitlin sat there on the bench listening to the birds in the blossoming trees, wondering if it really was time she went home, if only for a couple of weeks—her editor would surely agree to that. She had been telling herself it was the job that kept her in London, and to some extent that was true, but there were other jobs, other stories. If Slaney was right, those Americans opposed to joining the war would need all the help they could get over the next twelve months.
No, it was Jack who was keeping her here, the fear that he might turn up the moment she was gone. If she was here to welcome him back, they could have some time together and then go their separate ways again.
She didn’t think he was dead, though that was always possible. They’d broached the matter in Dublin and thought of asking Cumming to let her know if Jack was killed, but after a little more thought that hadn’t seemed such a great idea. McColl had promised to think of something else, and probably he had. So no news was most likely good news.
She got up from the bench and started walking back across the grass. On a sunny day like this one, the women in black seemed sadder than usual, and each day there seemed to be more of them.
As she passed her landlady’s door, it suddenly swung open and the woman in question thrust an envelope toward her. “Delivered by hand,” her landlady said. “About half an hour ago. He had a Galway accent,” she added with a Connemara native’s condescension.
Caitlin opened it in her room, unsure whether dread or excitement was the appropriate response. The single sentence was all in capital letters, scrawled with a green colored pencil. KATHLEEN BRENNAN HAS RETURNED FROM AMERICA.
It took the Germans six days to repair the damage, the first train passing through Huy early on Good Friday morning. McColl and Yvette Deflandres were downstairs, Eric on duty in the roof space, when Mathilde arrived twenty-four hours later with the bad news. “Jules has been arrested,” were her opening words. Jules was the man who had fixed the charges on one of the other bridges.
“When?” Yvette asked.
“Late last night.”
“He won’t tell them anything,” Yvette insisted.
“He won’t want to. They’re using truth drugs now, so he may not have a choice.”
“Then what do we do?”
“Nothing,” Mathilde told her. “He doesn’t know about you and Eric. You only need to start worrying when I’m arrested,” she added, trying to make a joke of it. “But you’re leaving today,” she told McColl, “and not for Namur. You’re going home. Liège today, then over the border to Maastricht. There should be a train in half an hour. I’ll go with you to the station—a romantic send-off will look less suspicious. I’ve got nothing to lose,” she added when McColl tried to dissuade her. “I’ll be organizing my own exit next.”
In the event, Huy Station was strangely devoid of German or local police, the train was on time, and all he got was a kiss on the cheek.
“Safe journey,” she said.
“And you.”
Half an hour later, the train inched across the bridge they’d built to replace the one he’d blown up. The river below was still partly dammed by sundered rolling stock, but the locomotive had been taken out and away. It was hard not to admire German efficiency where engineering was concerned, and McColl found himself wondering whether six days’ worth of canceled trains was worth three lives.
He recognized the ticket inspector who got on at Flémalle, but not the German who accompanied him. As he watched them work their way down the carriage, he considered his chances. If Jules had talked, then McColl’s papers would give him away, and he would either have to go quietly or do something very rash, like pulling out the Webley and jumping off the moving train. The thought of the latter sent a painful twinge down his recently broken leg.
Play it by ear, he told himself. Stay calm.
When they reached him, he smiled at the Belgian and tried not to notice the German’s fierce stare. The Belgian returned his papers with a smile; the German looked disbelieving but followed his colleague on to the next.
McColl sat back with a mental sigh of relief. They were only twenty minutes from Liège, so another inspection was unlikely.
The line crossed the Meuse on a long bridge, then hugged the right bank through the series of coal-mining villages on the southern approach to Liège. Longdoz station seemed full of Germans, but the Belgian who checked his ticket and papers there hardly bothered to look at them. Clutching the copy of Comédie Humaine that was supposed to identify him, McColl began slowly traversing the concourse. He was about halfway across when a slim, dark-haired woman in her thirties materialized in front of him and warmly embraced him. “I am Monique,” she said, taking his arm and steering him out onto the busy Rue Grétry.
She led him north across the two river bridges and into the heart of the city, saying nothing but keeping a grip on his arm. She had a serious, almost stern face, which seemed slightly at odds with her rose-scented perfume.
“Where are we going?” he asked once the Meuse was behind them. The sun had sunk below the buildings now, and it was rapidly growing dark.
“To a bar,” she replied. “It’s not far.”
A few minutes later, they entered the Café de Tongeren, a large, smoke-filled room lined with booths and lit by flickering gaslights. It was crowded with early-evening drinkers and smelled of sweat and beer.
Monique looked round the room, failed to find the face she was seeking, and guided them to an empty booth. When the waitress came over, she ordered beer for him and pastis for herself.
While they waited for their drinks, McColl examined the clientele. It was overwhelmingly male and seemed
mostly composed of neatly dressed clerks stopping off on their way home from work, though one table was occupied by young men in workers’ overalls. There was also a solitary man at the bar who kept throwing stares in his and Monique’s direction. He was around forty, stocky, with a thin mustache, and obviously fond of himself. McColl hoped the stares were for his companion, who had her eyes glued to the door.
A German captain walked in, his shoulders glistening with raindrops. Much to McColl’s surprise, he exchanged greetings with several Belgian customers. He seemed particularly friendly with the stranger at the bar, which increased McColl’s suspicions, so he asked Monique if she knew who the stranger was.
“He’s been hanging round here for several weeks. He says his name is Delors, but no one knows who he is.”
That didn’t sound good. “How long do we wait?” he asked her.
She shrugged. “Another half an hour?”
“Do you know who we’re waiting for?”
“Yes,” she said simply, keeping her eyes on the door. She hadn’t touched the pastis.
Another five minutes had passed when the second German came in. This one was wearing a military police uniform, and the only greetings he received were a drop in the level of conversation and a bevy of hostile glances. Apparently unperturbed by these signs of unpopularity, he stood by the door scanning faces, found the one he wanted, and advanced across the sawdust floor to the table with all the young men, where he hovered over a tousled-haired boy with a strikingly beautiful face.
“Papers!” the German demanded.
The youth offered them up. His smile looked like so much nervous bravado.
The German examined the papers and seemed to find nothing amiss, but as one hand returned them, the other shot out like a striking snake and turned back the young man’s collar. On the inner face, two safety pins were visible, side by side at a slant.
Still gripping the collar, the German yanked the boy to his feet. “You come with me,” he said in passable French.
“Do nothing,” the woman whispered to McColl, as if she feared he might intervene.
The idea had not occurred to him, but it had to the man called Delors. He walked across to the German and politely asked for a word.
As the other man turned toward him, Delors’s arm jerked upward. After making a few feeble gropes at the knife now buried in his chest, the German fell back across the nearest table, splintering wood and cascading glass.
The German captain was having trouble freeing his gun from its holster. After shouting, “Jean, get out of here!” Delors picked up a convenient bottle and smashed it into the side of the German’s face. “Now!” he added, since Jean was still rooted to the spot.
Needing no third bidding, the young man vanished through the door. Delors took his time pulling the knife from the dead German’s chest and wiping it on the man’s uniform before taking his leave at a stroll.
“Come,” Monique told McColl, “we must go. The police will be here in a few minutes.”
It was no longer raining outside.
“This way,” she urged him, heading downhill, just as two uniformed Germans hove into sight farther up. “Run!” she ordered, hitching up her long skirt to do so.
McColl obeyed but was not surprised when the Germans shouted “Stop!” It might have been wiser not to draw attention to themselves, he thought as the first shot whistled a few feet wide, gouging slivers of stone from a house façade.
Ten yards ahead Monique was already turning a corner. He took it a few seconds later, skidding on the rain-greased cobblestones as another bullet zinged harmlessly past. The new road was empty of people, barely lit, and lined with small workshops. She ducked between two of these and raced off down another short alley, which ended in an archway. McColl was slowly losing ground, his leg beginning to throb, but he managed to reach the end before the Germans came into view.
A square lay on the other side of the archway, with a church on one side, restaurants and shops on the others. A fountain sat in the middle, surrounded by small trees and benches. Best of all, it was crowded with people. The woman hurried him across and pulled him down beside her on one of the rain-soaked seats. After taking a bright red scarf from her pocket and wrapping it around her head, she snuggled into the crook of his shoulder, filling his nose with the scent of roses.
He liked the perfume and briefly contemplated buying a bottle for Caitlin. Briefly because he didn’t think there’d be much time for shopping.
Across the square the two German policemen appeared. After looking this way and that, one started forward only for the other to call him back. “It’s not worth it, Fritz,” McColl murmured, imagining what the German had said.
With admirable synchronization the two men spun on their heels and vanished back up the alley.
Monique sat up straight. “So far, so good,” she said in a less than confident tone.
“What now?” he asked.
She just stared into space for a moment, then seemed to make up her mind. “We must get you inside. Come.”
They headed away from the square and zigzagged their way down several dark streets. McColl’s leg felt worse with each stride, and he was about to beg a few moments’ rest when they reached their destination, a fairly anonymous house in one of the city’s older quarters. The woman who opened the door was clearly not happy to see them but was welcoming nevertheless. Once inside, McColl leaned back against the door while the two women talked. Monique was promising that it would be for only one night.
She turned to him. “You will stay in the cellar,” she said. “It will be safer for everyone.”
“It’s not very comfortable, I’m afraid,” the other woman said. “But I will bring you some food and water.”
Monique took him downstairs. The cellar was almost bare, with a damp earthen floor, but at least it wasn’t cold. She walked across to the only window, which looked up toward the street. “If the Germans find you, you must say that you broke in,” she said, forcing the window open and then closing it again. “And I’m afraid there won’t be any bedding—if the Germans found you with blankets, they would know that you got them from the people upstairs.”
“I’ll be fine,” McColl told her.
After his hostess had brought down bread, jam, and water, both women left, bolting the cellar door behind them. McColl ate the food, found an empty paint tin to piss in, and sat down with his back to the wall. Rain was drumming on the window and, hopefully, keeping the Germans indoors.
There were quite a few army officers lining the deck of the Dublin boat, men on leave from their units in France, expecting a week or more’s rest and recuperation in the bosom of their families. As the boat edged into the Dún Laoghaire dock, Caitlin found herself feeling sorry for them, especially those in obvious need of convalescence—the country that awaited them would not be the one they expected. They might have a few days’ grace—no date had come with her tip-off, and the Holyhead evening papers had carried no hint that a rebellion was already under way—but Caitlin had heard whispers of “Easter” more than once in the corridors of Liberty Hall.
The inspection shed looked much the same. A couple of uniformed policemen were sharing a joke in one corner, a probable G-man scanning faces with bored eyes and a cigarette drooping from his lips. If Dublin was in the throes of an insurrection, the news had not reached Dún Laoghaire.
Was it a false alarm? The clock in the hall said it wasn’t yet nine, so there was plenty of time. She remembered that the Volunteer and ICA exercises usually started late in the morning, and she guessed that these would serve as cover for a rising. As one Liberty Hall man had told her back in March—“Someday this will be for real.”
On Sunday the trains into Dublin were few and far between, and it was gone half past ten when she arrived at Tara Street station. Outside, the streets seemed quiet, with only a few families enjoy
ing the traditional Sunday-morning stroll along the Liffey. Caitlin walked across Butt Bridge, under the shadow of the railway arches to the end of Lower Abbey Street, and down to Liberty Hall.
There were no men milling outside, but the young men guarding the doors did seem unusually edgy and wouldn’t admit her without permission from inside. Luckily for Caitlin, Maeve McCarron was there. As they walked up to the Cumann na mBan office, several open doorways offered glimpses of silent men sitting in chairs or standing by windows. Everyone seemed to be waiting.
“The Military Committee are meeting in the commandant’s office,” Maeve explained when they reached their destination. “They’re deciding whether to go ahead.”
“Why?” Caitlin wanted to know. “I assumed it was on.”
“Yesterday I did, too. It’s been mad these last few days. First it was on, then off, then on again. And now it’s off again—Eoin MacNeill has revoked all the mobilization orders.”
MacNeill was the Volunteer leader. “Why? Did he get cold feet?”
“No, we can’t accuse him of that. He only discovered a few days ago that a rising was planned.”
“Oh, my God. I always assumed . . .”
“So did everyone,” Maeve agreed. “But the Military Committee thought it prudent not to tell him. People like Tom Clarke were afraid he’d say no.”
“And he has.”
“Yes, but the committee are furious, and I think they’ll go ahead anyway.”
“Doesn’t MacNeill have a lot of supporters, though?”
“Sure he does. But the feeling is that once the whole thing starts, no one’ll want to miss out.”
Caitlin shook her head. “That seems like a terrible gamble.”
Maeve smiled. “It always was.”
“I suppose so.” Caitlin walked over to the window and looked out at the empty square. She was about to ask how long the meeting had been under way when a distant chorus of cheers echoed through the building.
“I’ll go and see,” Maeve said. “You’d better wait here.”
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