1798

by Joe Murphy

  Fr Murphy stepped away from the man and turned to Tom, saying, ‘This day spells our doom, Mr Banville.’

  Tom felt a cold vice grip his heart at these words and he asked, ‘What should we do, Father?’

  Fr Murphy looked at him levelly, ‘We do what we can, Mr Banville.’

  Tom let out a long, shuddering breath. He lifted his eyes to a sky slowly filling with the amber wash of the falling sun and thought of the collapse of his world. He thought of the fields around Arklow, strewn with the dead and dying. He thought of the alleys and laneways of New Ross, stinking charnel houses in the heat. He thought of the barbed ring that was suddenly thrown around his county, cutting them off and sealing them in. But most of all he thought of his dead brother, rolled into a pit, unnamed and unremembered. He thought of all this, closed his eyes and strangled the racking sobs that threatened to shudder from him.

  CHAPTER 22

  Evil Ascendant

  Mrs Abigail Brownrigg sat in her drawing room with all the poise and haughtiness of a mother cat. She sat on the edge of her familiar, highbacked armchair and balanced a cup and saucer in her right hand. Every angle of her bearing was stiff and the wrinkles about her mouth were gouged even more deeply than usual. She would not be swayed.

  In front of her, Elizabeth Blakely stood, arms akimbo, and said, ‘I am going up and you cannot stop me, Auntie.’

  Mrs Brownrigg’s left eyebrow arched in surprise, ‘I should mind my words a little more carefully, child. This is my house and if I desire you locked in the pantry for the afternoon, then so shall it be. The fact of the matter is I do not wish you to intrude in that room and that is the end of this debate.’

  Elizabeth would not be put off, however, and she frowned sullenly.

  ‘Don’t pout, girl,’ snapped her aunt. ‘It makes you look like you are concentrating. Deep thoughts are fundamentally unattractive in a lady.’

  Elizabeth’s eyes narrowed and she retorted, ‘You may be my aunt, but the devil himself could not keep me from that room.’

  Mrs Brownrigg raised her teacup to her puckered lips and delicately sipped from it. She placed the cup back onto its saucer and smiled.

  ‘Nonsense,’ she purred. ‘Why must you be so melodramatic? Your presence in that room would be positively indecent.’

  Beneath the whip of her aunt’s scorn, Elizabeth felt herself redden. An itching tide of heat climbed up from the hollows of her collar bones and seeped in an ever-rising wash of colour beneath her chin. Behind her eyes, her mind burned with incandescent anger.

  Elizabeth spat, ‘This may be your house, you old crone, but I’ll be damned if I allow you to keep me away as though I were some foolish girl or a bould child!’ And with that she whirled from the room.

  Mrs Brownrigg took another sip from her teacup and said into the empty air, ‘It appears as though the girl has some backbone after all.’

  Out of hearing and with the gushing thunder of blood in her ears, Elizabeth Blakely mounted the wooden steps leading to the upper floors of her aunt’s gloomy townhouse. At the turn of the landing a large grandfather clock, the twin of the one in the drawing room, loomed like a grim sentinel. The slow swing of its pendulum, so graceful and unremitting, seemed to mock her erratic, ragged breaths.

  She stormed up the last few steps and turned left down the corridor. At its end a dark, varnished door led to a box room. Elizabeth paused here for a moment and smoothed the front of her dress taking a long, deep breath. Then, quietly, she opened the door and slipped inside.

  The room was illuminated by a single small gothic window that looked out onto the gardens at the rear of the house. A stillness lay upon the room, a tranquillity that seemed to cocoon this place away from the hellish parade of the macabre that Wexford, day by day, was becoming.

  In one corner a narrow bed was placed and on it lay a man’s body. The right side of the man’s head was wrapped in a red-smeared bandage and a similar one, though less stained, was wound about his left shoulder. The man lay quite still, and his skin was damp and pale. Only the tremulous fluttering of his closed eyelids gave any hint that life still resided in him. On the floor beside the bed was a basin of pinkish water, droplets beading the naked wood of the floorboards. Beside it a bowl of half-eaten soup slowly congealed in the summer heat.

  Elizabeth approached softly and stood looking down on the wounded man and in that instant he opened his eyes.

  For the briefest of moments a smile played across the man’s lips and his pallor seemed to lift somewhat. Then a sudden realisation appeared to seize him, snapping his grey eyes into a panic and sending spasms through his muscles.

  ‘Elizabeth,’ whispered Dan feebly. ‘Why are you in New Ross?’

  Then, as though the effort of these few words had sapped him of what strength he had, his voice died away and his eyes began to slide shut once more. For long minutes Elizabeth sat on the edge of the bed and gazed at him with helpless angst.

  At last, Dan’s mouth opened and, though his eyes remained closed, there was a familiar timbre to his voice. For the first time in days there was a lucidity about him, a hint of awareness.

  Hoarsely, he asked, ‘Where am I? What of New Ross?’

  Elizabeth smiled and lifted her hands to wipe away the tears that sluiced down her cheeks. Shakily, she replied, ‘You are at my aunt’s house in Wexford, my darling. You are safe. Do not concern yourself with New Ross.’

  Dan’s eyelids pulsed and opened, his gaze seeking her face and finding it floating only feet away from him. Sighing almost in contentment he whispered, ‘You are so beautiful.’

  Grinning now and still trying to stem the flow of tears, she chided, ‘Flattery is a despicable way to induce me into troubling you with news, Mr Banville.’

  Dan smiled back at her, moment by moment feeling strength growing in his limbs, ‘You know me too well, Elizabeth. How long have I been here? Tell me that at least.’

  Elizabeth frowned then and sniffed away the last of her crying before saying, ‘This is the 11th of June. You have been here four days. All the while drifting in and out of fever.’

  Dan blinked in astonishment and made to sit up before being prevented by Elizabeth’s hand placed gently on his chest. Her joy at seeing him move in so determined a fashion was tempered by the knowledge that energy enough to sit up would surely be followed by energy enough to heft sword and pistol. Since they had brought him here, bloodied and feverish on the back of a broken door, he had seemed nothing but a shell, a mewling, boneless thing, squirming in the grip of infection.

  Dan swallowed and lifted his right hand to touch first his wounded shoulder, then the side of his head and finally gripped her hand in his. ‘Four days? What happened to me? How goes the Rising? Is Munster risen?’

  Elizabeth’s frown deepened and she shook her head. ‘I will have no more of Risings in this house. You were wounded and brought here. That is all you should know. You need to convalesce, not go dashing off again.’

  Dan nodded and eased himself down onto his pillows.

  Elizabeth smiled then and rose to her feet, saying, ‘I shall have Molly prepare you some more soup. You have eaten next to nothing over the last few days.’

  Dan’s stomach rumbled at the very mention of food and he said, ‘That would be nice. Thank your aunt for me. She had no reason to shelter a croppy under her roof.’

  To Dan a fleeting darkness seemed to pass across Elizabeth’s face before she answered, ‘She had very many reasons, my love.’

  Dan waited until Elizabeth had left the room, listening as her footsteps receded down the corridor and padded down the stairs. Then, wincing with the pain in his shoulder and with his head filled with silent, throbbing thunder, he swung his legs out of the bed. He was weak, his muscles quivered with every motion, but the dull ache of broken bones was absent from his wounds. His scalp had been lacerated to the skull, of that he was sure, and his damaged shoulder was in agony. He lifted his left arm carefully and found that, apart from the darts o
f pain that screamed out from the wound, he could move his arm quite freely. Flesh wounds, he thought. And still he could not recall how he had come to receive them.

  Like a tottering foal he got to his feet and was startled to find that he was naked. For a moment he wondered who had undressed him and tended to his wounds. Surely not Mrs Brownrigg? Feeling ridiculous and embarrassed, he wrapped a sheet about his waist and made his way, one slow step after another, to the door leading onto the landing. It creaked softly as he opened it but the corridor outside was deserted. A high window at the end of the corridor gave onto the street below.

  Grimly, moving like an old man, Dan made for this window and undid the latch. Leaning out over the street, he watched people go by, willing for someone he knew or who was obviously a United Irishman to pass.

  After five agonising minutes, a young man approached from the direction of the Cornmarket. He held a pike in his left hand but his right arm was cradled in a dirty grey sling. Dan thought he recognised him from the day spent camped at The Three Rocks, a day that now seemed like months ago.

  As the lad drew closer, Dan called, ‘Here, chap! Up here!’

  Dan was appalled at the dead-leaf rasp that his voice had become and was not surprised that the young pikeman did not hear him as he continued obliviously up the street. Desperately, Dan tried again, ‘Up here, boy!’

  This time the youthful rebel paused and looked up, frowning. When he saw Dan, a half-naked man, swaddled in bloodied bandages, waving at him from an upstairs window, he took a startled step backward.

  ‘Do you know me, boy?’ called Dan from his lofty position.

  The lad blinked before replying, ‘If it wasn’t for the bandages I’d say you were Captain Banville. But, sure, everyone knows you were kilt in New Ross.’ He swung his right arm in its sling, ‘Sure, I was nearly kilt meself. You’re looking well for a dead man, sir.’

  Dan nodded bleakly, ‘You can tell everyone that I am very much alive. Now, listen. Go find Thomas Cloney or one of the other captains. Tell them to come here and ask for me as a matter of urgency.’

  The young insurgent raised his eyebrows and said, ‘I could get Captain Dixon for you. He’d be better than one of them Protestant ones, anyway.’

  ‘Not Dixon,’ snapped Dan, and in those two words all of his old baritone authority came flooding back. ‘Not Dixon. Anyone else but him.’

  Shrugging, the young man said, ‘Yes, Captain,’ and hurried off down the street.

  Dan closed the window and shambled back to his room, feeling an unaccountable wave of fatigue wash over him as he did so. Now, he thought, if only I could find some clothes.

  Some hours later, Dan was stirred out of a doze by the sound of voices floating up from downstairs. The taste of the soup Elizabeth had brought and spoon-fed to him still remained, savoury and delicious in his mouth.

  He sat up as the voices resolved themselves and became clearer. One was Elizabeth, the other seemed to be the silken tenor of Thomas Cloney.

  ‘You will not, sir!’ Elizabeth’s voice was raised to just below a shout.

  Cloney replied in emollient tones, ‘My dear Ms Blakely. If Dan wishes to see me, then I must insist that I am allowed to. He is a fellow officer in the United Irish Army and I am duty-bound to see to his needs.’

  ‘Mr Cloney,’ snapped Elizabeth, ‘Daniel is wounded and convalescing. The very last thing he should experience is agitation and excitement. He should rest without disturbance or news of calamities.’

  Cloney replied now with a hint of iron in his words, ‘Madam, I am aware of the wounds your Daniel has suffered. It was I who had him taken out of the bloody streets of New Ross and removed to your presence, where I thought his chances of recuperation might be increased. He spoke of you often.’

  There was a pause then, broken at last as Elizabeth said more calmly, ‘If it was you who rescued him, then I owe you a debt that I shall find impossible to repay. If you wish to see Daniel, then you may, so long as you give me your solemn word that you shall not upset him.’

  Louder now, as though already on the stairs, Cloney replied, ‘I shall do my best, Ms Blakely.’

  Seconds later, Thomas Cloney knocked softly on the wood of Dan’s bedroom door and quietly pushed it open. He beamed as he saw Dan sitting up and grinning back at him.

  ‘Dan!’ he exclaimed and crossed the room in three quick strides, plonking himself down on the side of Dan’s bed as though it were a favourite armchair.

  ‘Thomas,’ greeted Dan, ‘I am glad to see you. Maybe you can tell me something of substance without resorting to treating me like a child.’

  Cloney shook his head good-humouredly, ‘Ms Blakley wants only to see you well. You are a lucky man, Mr Banville.’

  He glanced at the bandages wrapped around Dan’s head and shoulder and added, ‘A very lucky man.’

  Nodding, Dan replied, ‘How did I come by these, Thomas? There is a hole in my memory.’

  Cloney sighed and pointed to Dan’s wounds in turn, saying, ‘Grape shot. You had come to tell me of John Kelly’s wounds and stepped out in front of a nine-pounder. Fortunately for you the majority of the blast was absorbed by my luckless Bantry men. You had your head split and hole bored in your shoulder but the injuries themselves were not that severe. Fever was your greatest enemy.’

  Dan frowned then, ‘What of John Kelly?’

  Cloney shook his head sadly, ‘He lives. He was brought to his sister’s house here in town but his leg is badly mangled. The sawbones want to chop it off but of course he’s having none of it. He has a bullet lodged in the bone.’

  ‘And what of the battle?’ asked Dan. ‘Did we take the town?’

  Cloney paused for a moment and a heavy silence fell down around them before at last he said, ‘We are straying onto ground that I promised Ms Blakely I would not cross.’

  Dan was leaning forward now, his shoulder protesting, and he seized Cloney by the lapel of his green jacket. ‘I have spilled enough blood for the cause of Ireland to be able to stomach some bad news, Thomas,’ he said. ‘Now out with it, for your expression and your reluctance have already told me half the truth.’

  Cloney flung a surreptitious glance toward the closed bedroom door before continuing in a soft rush of words, his voice pitched low, ‘We had the town won and the garrison was in retreat across the Barrow where the Kilkenny men were to surprise them. No ambuscade was set however and they rallied and flooded back into the town. Our men were exhausted and sick with fighting and could not hold them back. We left behind us three thousand dead and wounded.’

  He shook his head morosely, ‘We had no answer to their cannon. They turned the streets into a butcher’s window.’

  Dan felt a horrible sensation creep over him. Rasping, he asked, ‘What of the army now? What of my men? Who leads them?’

  Cloney looked uncomfortable as he leaned forward, supporting his forearms on his thighs, ‘Most of it has dispersed. Some back here to Wexford Town. Some have simply gone home. We still have a substantial force in the field on Lacken Hill, enough to threaten the garrison if they decide to come out. Seán Rouse led your corps out of New Ross. They are in good order. You trained them well, Dan.’

  Dan grinned wanly but then frowned as Cloney turned and sighed hollowly before continuing, ‘I returned here this very morning from a raid on the village of Borris. We had entertained some hope of capturing arms there, but the soldiery and yeos have invented a new and cowardly stratagem. They will not give us open battle. They fly before our pikes and make strong points from slated houses. Without heavy cannon, we cannot dislodge them.’

  Dan’s expression was souring by the moment and he asked, ‘What of the Northern Division? They have surely taken Arklow. What of my brother?’

  At this Cloney looked stricken and Dan whispered, ‘Good God Almighty, Thomas. What has happened?’

  Cloney, his eyes on the floorboards and his voice cracking, explained, ‘Arklow is held by the Crown. The Northern Division was thrown
back. Their losses, though, were not as great as ours and they are still in the field in some numbers. But I fear it is only a matter of time before they are forced to retreat to Vinegar Hill.’

  ‘And Tom?’ asked Dan leadenly.

  ‘There I have good news,’ he said. ‘Some of the Enniscorthy lads with me at Borris listed the officers that were now prominent in the north of the county. Your brother’s name was amongst them.’

  Dan sighed with relief, ‘That is indeed good news. What do the English do now?’

  ‘They sit behind their fortifications and gather their strength,’ growled Cloney. ‘They refuse to come out and fight us and we cannot drive them from their redoubts. Until they are in sufficient strength to destroy us utterly they have simply set a ring of bayonets around the county, biding their time. Unless the French arrive soon we cannot hope to hold out for much longer.’

  Dan was nodding solemnly and said, ‘Mr Harvey will see that something is done. He has surely learned the lessons of New Ross.’

  Cloney coughed in discomfiture and, rising to his feet, he crossed the little room and stood with his back to Dan, one arm braced against the pointed apex of the window frame, his gaze directed out onto the gardens beyond. He was silent for a moment and then spoke rapidly, ‘Mr Harvey has resigned as commander-in-chief. General Roche has taken overall command.’

  Dan was perplexed, ‘Surely this is good news, Thomas? General Roche is a very able commander and some might consider him more able for our current situation.’

  Still with his back to Dan, Cloney answered, ‘It is the circumstances in which Mr Harvey resigned that are so very hard to relate, Dan. There was … unpleasantness … in the aftermath of Ross. The soldiers butchered our wounded and, whether in reprisal or out of some native spite, some of our men at Scullabogue burned a barn full of a hundred Protestants to the ground. Men, women and children. Mr Harvey seemed broken by it.’

  Dan’s face grew deathly pale. Struggling for composure he stammered, ‘But how? Surely there must be some mistake, some exaggeration by our enemies?’