‘So the little boy sat, not knowing what to do, not having the strength to bury them on his own. So he set fire to the hovel he had called home. I buried them in fire, Kate. My flesh. My blood. All of them. Remember that day in Connemara? You asked me where they were buried and I didn’t answer? They were under the stones, Kate. That little square of stones I walked around. That was their grave. All my family, together.’
She wrapped her arms around him and began a story of her own. Of another boy she had seen one night in the fire of her Lincolnshire home. A child encircled by flames, his small face cursed by innocence, wondering who was to blame for the pain of dying so young and forgotten. His image had scorched her with a scar as vivid as any wound from a firebrand.
She told of how often that boy had entered her dreams, of the night when she was in the final throes of her fever and how he had held out his hands and saved her.
‘Am I that little boy, Kate?’
She did not answer. She pulled him tight towards her and kissed him again many times and, cloaked within the soft warm mist, they were joined.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Daniel Coburn was a man of many colours, a revolutionary mired in contradictions. Like all Irishmen, the ’98 rebellion was scorched into him like a branding iron. Wolfe Tone, O’Neill, Emmett, Monro, Fitzgerald and Father Murphy were among his many martyrs and the slaughter at Vinegar Hill and the barbarity of the Gibbet Massacre were the founding of his deep hatred for the English. When he was eighteen he had walked thirty miles from Connemara to Daniel O’Connell’s monster meeting in Clifden. Like the many thousands there that day he was inspired by this man of fine words and grand vision. It was the young boy’s baptism.
Coburn the child had survived one famine. Coburn the man was now living through another far more tragic one. It swept aside all past values. The whole pyramid of Irish life had been precariously balanced on the potato crop. That base had collapsed and a whole new way of life had to be devised.
He had a vision of the peasantry rising as one, raising the green flag in armed rebellion, an agrarian revolution that would herald the birth of a new social order. Up and down the country he had preached it again and again. The future of Ireland lay in the absolute possession of the land, the Irish sole owners of Ireland’s soil. He took to it with a passion, as fervently as a man adopts a new religion. It was his shibboleth and he never wavered.
He was encouraged by events beyond both Ireland and England. The dawn of universal liberty was now being trumpeted throughout Europe and Continental governments were falling like dominoes. The French ruling elite had been overthrown yet again. In a bloodless revolution, another republic had been proclaimed, and King Louis Philippe had fled across the Channel to Dover in disguise. Insurrection in Sicily had forced the monarchy to concede a new and democratic constitution. There was mass rioting and barricades in Vienna and Prince Metternich was obliged to become another exile in London. The people of Milan drove their Austrian rulers out of the city and raised improvised banners declaring its autonomy. Further south, the Venetians had fought their own military, seized their garrison and arsenal and demanded self-rule.
The republican victories throughout Europe were seen as Ireland’s own and the Irish cheered them all and none cheered louder than the Young Irelanders. Bonfires were lit on the highest hilltops from Donegal to Munster, from Wicklow to Killrush. Crowds in the streets of the towns and cities carried banners celebrating the triumph of Europe’s dispossessed.
Coburn was convinced it would set off an Irish explosion, certain that the fuse that had been burning imperceptibly for centuries must now detonate. He decided that his tour of the counties, his meetings and his speech-making were over. The message had been spread far and wide and there was not a man or woman in Ireland now that did not know of the Young Irelanders and not one among them who said they would not rally to the cause. Now was the time for deeds. The providential hour should not pass if the people were to be liberated.
The landlords would be targeted. They would be made to live in fear. If some had already fled to the safety of England, then their bailiffs would suffer on their behalf. Their lordships’ mansions would be torched, their livestock slaughtered and taken as food. No estate would be safe and there would be no exceptions.
Coburn made ready his campaign. English newspapers would no longer ridicule the Young Irelanders and their aspirations with cartoons and make-believe stories. They would now have something real and harsh to report.
The ship was a clear sharp silhouette against the moon’s light on the water. She was out from Wexford, bound for the French port of Cherbourg, carrying a cargo of corn and flour. At the mouth of the river Slaney the wind failed, and her sails dropped. So her master decided to bottom her on the South Slob mudflats and wait for the tide to rise.
Word of it came quickly to Coburn from men who had loaded her the previous day. Three hundred and eighty sacks of grain were in her hold.
‘We take. We give,’ said Father Kenyon. ‘We are the men in the middle. A few sacks will keep more than a few alive. It’s a gift from God.’
‘We’ll need carts,’ said Duffy.
‘I’ll get the carts,’ said Meagher.
‘And curraghs,’ Coburn said.
‘I’ll have them, too.’
‘Daniel. Will we kill?’ asked O’Brien.
‘Only if I kill first,’ Coburn replied. ‘You will wait for me to strike. It may not come to that.’
‘We will take a gun each then?’
‘No! I will take only mine. If I have to use it, then we are lost. They’ll hear it on shore and we’ll have no time to escape them.’
‘Haven’t you forgotten something?’ the priest asked.
‘Tell me,’ said Coburn.
‘I shall,’ said the priest. ‘What will you do if you can take all you want? Where will you hide sacks of grain hereabouts? The Redcoats will take every cottage apart, even the tumbled wrecks. They’ll turn every sod of turf and every stone too. Have you thought of that, Daniel?’
‘Then don’t hide them on land,’ said Meagher. ‘We can drift the curraghs to Gerry Cove on Beggerin Island. Only our own people know of it. Let’s keep the sacks there until the searches are over. Then we can give the grain out to the people, little by little.’
‘And we will hold off the day,’ said the priest. ‘Well done, Meagher.’
‘You will not come on this one, Kate,’ said Coburn.
‘I will,’ she replied.
‘You will not come.’
‘I will too!’
The tide was flowing out to sea. Soon it would be slack water and an hour later the water would begin to rise again and soon the ship would be on her way. There was no time to haggle. What they had to do they had to do quickly.
The current turned on itself under the lee of the mudflats and carried the three curraghs out without effort. Only light pulls on the oars were needed to bring them close to the ship. Its black tarred hull towered above them. Its sails were tied and there was no movement on deck, only the soft rattle of the rigging and the slap of water against the planking. At the stern, her name was painted in large white letters: Jackdaw.
Coburn, Meagher and O’Brien pulled themselves up on the aft anchor line. Duffy and Kate followed them.
‘Who’s there?’ They saw a lantern swinging and the shadow of a man standing by the hatchway. He shouted, ‘Have you come to take my ship?’
‘No, sir,’ Coburn replied. ‘We have come for a little of your grain. Our people are starving. I’ll ask you not to resist. We will not cause you harm. Just a few sacks is all we need. You’ll not miss them.’
The captain came towards them, a short, broad man with a beard flecked with grey. He was wearing no topcoat or cap. He held a mug of tea in one hand, the lantern in the other.
‘Is your gun loaded?’ he asked.
‘Why else would I carry it?’ Coburn replied.
‘You will get ten years transportation for
that.’
‘And death for you if you try to take it from me.’
‘I have men asleep below. I have only to shout.’
‘Then I will shoot you,’ said Coburn.
The captain hung his lantern on a hook at the mast. ‘Must I die for a few sacks of grain?’ he asked. ‘Must you hang for it?’
‘We can both live,’ Coburn answered. ‘You are taking food from our land, food from our people.’
‘What use is raw corn to you?’
‘One ear of corn, one handful of flour will save a life. What I’ve come to take will save a hundred families. It belongs to them. Think of them, Captain. Think of them’.
He needed no reminding. He had been sailing to ports along the Irish coast all his working life and had never been far from the wretchedness of the poor. He was no stranger to their miserable lives. In this past year of famine he had been forced to witness what no decent man should be asked to bear. The images would never leave him. The howling of the hungry in Tralee as they watched barrels of herring and sacks of barley being loaded, bound for a foreign port. How bodies were left rotting in the snow in Westport because the ground was too hard to bury them. How he had shot the dogs eating them until he had no cartridges left.
He needed no reminders. He held out his hands, palms open.
‘I have no gun,’ he said. ‘Put yours away and take what you want. As much as you can carry.’
‘You trick me,’ said Coburn.
‘No trickery, my desperate friend. Take it. The rats will take more than you can carry by the time we get to France.’
‘I will want twelve sacks,’ said Coburn. ‘We have three curraghs at your side.’
‘Then pull back the canvas and open the hatches. Send two men down and two to haul.’
‘And when we’re down there, you will call your men?’
‘No! But the choice is yours. And make it fast. There’s a breeze up and I’m waiting on the tide.’
He unwound the rope and threw the end into the hold. ‘Do it now or go.’
O’Brien and Meagher went into the hold. Duffy took the line.
Coburn called to Kate. ‘Take my gun and pray the captain is a cautious man.’
She stepped into the light of the lantern. Only then did the captain show surprise.
‘Lord above!’ he exclaimed. ‘So this is the lady all England is talking about. And here you are, on the deck of old Jackdaw. Will anyone believe me when I tell my story? I doubt it. But here she is, the Dark Rosaleen.’
‘My name is Kate,’ she said. ‘I go by no other.’
‘Whatever name you go by, you are exactly how they say you are.’
He moved a step forward to see her better. She stepped back out of the light.
‘Captain. Stay still. Don’t let me use this.’
‘You’ll have no cause to. I’m not an Irishman, Kate. Like you, I’m from England, from Kent. But I’m pleased to have met you and I wish you luck.’
Twelve times the rope was lowered and twelve sacks were lifted from the hold. Soon the curraghs were full and low in the water.
‘Why have you done this, Captain?’ Coburn asked.
‘Must you ask?’
‘Do you have a name?’
‘Not one you have to know. But Jackdaw’s my ship.’
‘How do we thank you, then?’
‘You have no need. But go now. Once you are away, I will have to send a man ashore to raise the alarm. I’ll say there were twenty of you, each with a gun. I’ll have my story.’
‘You are a Christian man, Captain. You have saved many lives. They will not know of you but I will never forget.’
The tide had turned and the current was flowing inland by the time the curraghs were within sight of Beggerin. The rebels heard the ship’s horn and a gunshot. The captain had raised the alarm, as he said he would. Now he would have to wait for the military to come aboard and he would have his story and many of their questions to answer. His sailing would now have to wait another day and another turn of the tide to take him and his cargo to France.
It was Meagher who brought it to Coburn. He had torn it out of the Cork Examiner: a newspaper report on yet another series of brutal evictions. It might have passed unnoticed by them except for the name of the landlord.
‘Kate,’ Coburn called to her. ‘I think you know this man.’
‘And who might that be?’
‘Edward Ogilvie.’
He held out the newspaper cutting. She took it and her hand was not still. It was a name from another age, swallowed up in the mishmash of the past where fond and hateful memories jostled with each other. Could she ever forget him, the repugnant half-sir and his bullwhip, the jeering face, the smell of whiskey on his breath, the stench of his sweat, Eugene and blood on her skirt?
‘I see he’s still remembered, Kate,’ said Coburn.’ You’re in a bit of a tremble. Sit by me.’
She read the report. Then she let it drop to the floor.
‘What is he to you, Daniel?’ she asked.
‘He is a landlord to me. He is the enemy to me. Did you not read it all?’
He picked the cutting off the floor. Meagher and Duffy, who were sitting across the large kitchen in Dromoland, came closer.
He read it aloud.
From the estate of Mr Edward Ogilvie, MP.
This past week, three villages of Castletown, Coppeen and Enniskeen were tumbled and all tenants evicted with the help of a company of the 49th Regiment. They were turned out in the depth of winter, being denied clothes to carry or any provisions. It was a night of high winds and storm and their wailing could be heard from a great distance. They made shelters of wood and straw but Mr Ogilvie and his drivers pulled them down. They stood bewildered looking at the ruins of their homes and their few possessions being trod into the mud. They pleaded with Mr Ogilvie but he ordered the soldiers to drive them off. Three hundred persons, including pregnant mothers and their children in various stages of starvation and nakedness, wandered away not knowing where they were going. Some were too weak to crawl. They were dead by morning.
‘Meagher brought it to you,’ Kate said. ‘Why?’
‘Do you need to ask?’
‘Will you go for him?’
‘I think we will. He was not meant to be first on the list but he’s put himself there.’
Meagher spoke. ‘Daniel, think more on it. Let’s not be hasty. He’s a member of the English Parliament. It’s a high risk for us. Let’s go for a lesser man. He can wait. We’ll have him when we’re better at it.’
Coburn looked across at Duffy. ‘And you? Is he too big for us?’
‘I think Meagher’s right,’ Duffy replied. ‘It’s a good distance away and remember we can’t be sure what help we’ll have there. It’s not a place we know.’
‘Shall we wait for O’Brien?’ Meagher suggested.
Coburn looked to Kate. ‘And what of you, my Rosaleen? How soon do you think we should pay Mr Ogilvie a visit?’
She took his hand. ‘If we are together, Daniel, we must decide together.’
‘Yes!’ He nodded. ‘That’s right, Kate. We’ll wait for William.’
O’Brien returned and it was agreed. Ogilvie was indeed a big target and a dangerously important one but Coburn argued that that was exactly why he should be the first to be attacked. It would be a sensational coup for the Irish and a shock to the English.
Meagher started on his journey to Ogilvie’s estate the next day. He would find out how close the nearest military garrison was to it, map out its geography, establish how well it was guarded, how many servants lived in the mansion, and how often Ogilvie was in residence.
He would take soundings of his tenants and gauge what support he could expect from them. They would be suspicious of him. Strangers were not welcome anywhere now. Too many were paid informers or agents of the landlord and the constabulary. But Meagher had his ways. He was a handsome young man with a ready wit and persuasive charm and the maid servants in t
he mansion were also young. He would need his guile. He would need to be patient.
Within the week, he returned to Dromoland. He sat with Coburn, Kate, O’Brien and Duffy at the long oak table.
‘He’s been busy doing a lot of clearing. The three villages are bare and there are more tumblings to come. They say he means to turn his land over to sheep and bring in Scottish shepherds and that by the end of the year, there’ll not be an Irishman left there.’
‘Did you find out if he is there every day?’ asked O’Brien.
‘They say he stays in the house all weekdays but he’s away on Saturdays and Sundays. No one seemed to know where.’
‘He’s not on his own?’ said Duffy.
‘He has two girls serving in the house. There’s a man, his butler-cum-groom and a fetch-and-carry young lad. They all live in. That’s all. His agent lives some miles away at Macroom.’
‘What of the military?’ O’Brien asked. ‘Did you see them?’
‘I saw their barracks. About two miles from the house, towards Enniskeen. Fusiliers. I’d say about fifty of them.’
‘You’ve done well, Meagher.’ Coburn shook his hand. ‘Tell me, do the servants ever leave the place?’
‘Not when I was watching. The gates are some way from the house and there’s only one path to it. I never saw them on it.’
‘Then we can’t torch it,’ said Duffy. ‘Not if they’re inside.’
‘We’ll find ways,’ Coburn said.
‘The problem is how we put in the fire,’ said Meagher. ‘There are shutters at every window. It’s a fortress. Ogilvie knows he’s at risk. I watched his man put up the boards every day just before dusk. If we’re going to torch him it’ll have to be while it’s light and that’s not a good thing.’
‘When is dusk?’ Coburn asked. ‘What time will that be?’
‘It will be dark around four.’
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