‘A Japanese hawk!’
‘That’s right, looking quite upset too.’
‘Upset?’ She seized upon the word.
He looked at her with surprise. ‘Well, there’s normally two of them,’ he explained. ‘They lose about three-quarters of the value if one is gone. I spoke to him, nice man, knew me straight away; called me by my name. And I said to him, “Well, it will happen, you know, Father. There’s always one gets broken.”’
‘And what did he say in reply?’ asked the Reverend Mother.
‘He looked even more upset. He was peering at it, you see. “There’s a chip out of the beak, too,” he said, sort of talking to himself, and then he turned away and went down the stairs and asked the young woman if could see the manager. He was still wandering around when I left. Exchanged a few words with people. Everyone seemed to know him. More returning their greetings, than talking, but he seemed to be examining all the goods on sale. He looked very troubled, though.’
The Reverend Mother brooded on this after Dr Scher had left to check on the elderly nun. It didn’t make sense. Why on earth should Dominic worry about a damaged Japanese hawk? He had been the most unworldly of men. And yet at the back of her mind there was something about an Arita Japanese hawk. Where had she heard the expression before? And then she roused herself. It was recreation hour for the nuns and she made a habit of appearing for the first five or ten minutes of this.
But for a long moment she stared down at her potatoes. How awful if they were stricken by blight. She was relying on them to feed some of the poorest and thinnest of the children. Perhaps a lump of butter in the centre of each one if she could persuade the manager of the Savings Bank to extend her credit a little. One of the butter stalls in the market might be persuaded to donate unsalted butter that was nearing the end of its storage life. That, she thought, would be worth trying. She paced the length of her potato patch. One half of her brain was anxiously scrutinizing them for signs of the dreaded blight, but the other half was busy with the spectacle of Dominic, on his last full day of life, wandering around the antiques shop and looking distressed.
And where had she heard of a Japanese ceramic hawk, a blue Arita hawk?
FOUR
W.B. Yeats:
‘Hearts with one purpose alone
Through winter and summer
Seem enchanted to a stone.’
Eileen stared in a puzzled way at the letter from the Reverend Mother. She had been glancing at it from time to time throughout the afternoon, but it did not enlighten her. A summons from her former headmistress was probably of significance. The convent was always available to a past pupil like herself for advice and even as a place of refuge, but Reverend Mother Aquinas, while she might have sympathy with the Republican aims to form a united Ireland, firmly deprecated the methods of the rebels. She would not summon her unless she had some purpose. She had made it very clear that she thought Eileen should sever all connections with an illegal organization. Was this going to be another attempt to persuade her to change her mind?
But Eileen found it impossible to give up the connection with the Irish Republican Army. It was, she thought sometimes, as though she were frozen in time by a spell, like one of the fairy princesses whose stories her mother used to relate to her. She could not plan for the future, could not move on until the whole island of Ireland was a republic. It seemed to her that the treaty, allowing England to retain six northern counties of Ireland, was a disaster. Every right-minded patriot had a duty to fight against those who supported that treaty. There could be no softening, no yielding, until the whole of Ireland was a republic. Outwardly, she was a respectable office girl, working for a printing works, but night after night, she penned articles passionately arguing for a united Ireland and then turned them into pamphlets or even sold them to newspapers. I’m now eighteen years old, she said to herself rebelliously, as she redrafted an auctioneer’s leaflet, hammering away efficiently on the battered typewriter. I can make up my own mind what I do with my life. In any case, the Reverend Mother, in giving her a choice between Saturday at nine in the evening, or Sunday at the same time, had not given her much of a choice. Saturday night was impossible, as there was a late-night performance of The Mikado musical. The Sunday performance was earlier, but on Sunday her Republican friend, Eamonn, was coming into the city to see the show and then to spend the night in Eileen’s mother’s house.
‘You’re looking very serious. Not worrying about your stage performance, are you?’ said Jack coming in for his last task of the day. Jack was a compositor, very skilled, and totally oblivious to whatever he printed. Words that sang to Eileen were just a series of letters to him as he worked with astonishing speed, picking up the individual letters from a type case with his right hand, and setting them into a composing stick held in the left hand. When Eileen had first arrived, she had been bemused by his skill and had spent any spare moments watching him as he set the letters from left to right, and upside down. From time to time, when business was slack, Jack had shown her how to do it, and now, slowly and painfully, she had learned to compose a page.
‘Never know, you might want to set up an underground press,’ Jack had said with a wink and Eileen had even managed to print out a few poems that she had written and presented them to her mother as a birthday present. Now she took up the letter from the Reverend Mother again. What did the woman want? Your advice, it said. That seemed somewhat unlikely. There was no way in which Eileen would dare to give advice to the Reverend Mother. It was normally the other way around. And yet, this was a woman who did not prevaricate. If she said that she needed Eileen, then she did need her. Perhaps she would go after all.
‘It’s Sunday,’ she said to Jack, frowning. ‘I just need to be in two places at once. The show doesn’t end until nine o’clock and someone wants to see me at that time.’
‘Well then, they’ll just have to wait, won’t they?’ said Jack. ‘But you told me that your boyfriend with the motorcycle is coming to see the show on Sunday. Why don’t you get him to give you a lift? It’s just as well to be careful, you know. A lot of funny people around these days. Wouldn’t like a daughter or a granddaughter of mine to be meeting someone at nine o’clock on her own.’ He cast a suspicious glance at the envelope on her desk.
Eileen giggled for a while after he left. It seemed very funny that the elderly compositor thought that Eamonn, a member of the IRA, would form a good protection for her against Reverend Mother Aquinas. It was a good idea, though. Eamonn on his motorbike would be across the bridge and down to St Mary’s of the Isle in under five minutes. It would give a good excuse to the other members of the cast for her to rush away so quickly after the performance. She had only to say, ‘my boyfriend is waiting’ and all would be explained. ‘Would you be able to come to the show on Monday as well as Sunday?’ she asked when they met at the entrance to South Terrace for her lunch break. ‘I’ll have to rush off on Sunday. The Reverend Mother wants to see me. But on Monday we’d have plenty of time to ourselves. Peter Doyle gave me another ticket the other day. I think that he was probing a bit, wanting to know who my friends are.’ She frowned a little when she thought about Peter Doyle, but said no more until they had finished lunch in nearby Pembroke Street and were walking along beside the river. By this time, the early edition of the Evening Standard was selling on the streets, with paperboys shouting out the news about a murdered priest. ‘A Scandalous Atrocity’; ‘Beyond Absolution’; ‘Priest Murdered’; ‘IRA Involvement Suspected’.
Eamonn gave a disgusted exclamation, but she hushed him. One never knew who was listening. She could understand his anger, though. It was true that most crimes these days were automatically blamed on the Republicans. When a murder was committed, it was assumed that the Republicans were guilty.
‘Do you know anything about the killing of Father Dominic?’ asked Eamonn when they were alone together, walking along Lapps Quay. He had not said anything other than idle chat right through their lun
ch – Eamonn was always very careful – but she had known that there was something on his mind. ‘They’re blaming us for it, as usual, but that’s not true,’ he added.
‘I just read the article in the Cork Examiner blaming the Republicans, but they are always blaming the Republicans for every crime. No one would really believe something like that.’ Eileen looked at him anxiously.
‘I’m not so sure.’ His dark eyebrows were knotted and his grey eyes were fixed on a ship coming slowly up the river to where a line of would-be dockworkers, all hoping to get a few hours’ work in unloading the grain, stretched back down the quay. ‘Every story like that loses us ten supporters. Bet it’s the Anti-Sinn Féin Society. They might have done it purely to discredit us.’
‘Not likely,’ said Eileen. ‘Why Father Dominic? Much more likely that they would murder someone that the Republicans have condemned. Like the Bishop of Cork. Anyway, I’ll keep an ear out tonight. I’m not sure that you’re right, though. I haven’t heard anything yet that would say these musical society people belong to the Anti-Sinn Féin Society, although I’ve been listening as hard as I can ever since you got me to join.’
‘They must do. That girl on the exchange was positive that it was that English fellow, Peter Doyle, who rang the Examiner to say that the Republicans burned down Shanbally House. She said she knew him well, because she works three days a week in the bar in the Imperial Hotel on the South Mall and Peter Doyle and his friend have lunch there nearly every day. They’re all Protestants, aren’t they? They’d be very likely to belong to the Anti-Sinn Féin Society. You just watch yourself and take care. We want evidence, but we don’t want anything to happen to you. Remember that.’
The intensity of his dark gaze was almost frightening. Eileen felt that a lot depended upon her. It was easy to plot against people who were just names on a sheet of paper. Not so easy to spy upon people who had been kind and welcoming to her, who had praised her singing voice, who had taken care to dress her in flattering clothes, and who had shown trust towards her. She nodded solemnly at Eamonn’s words, but hoped, with all sincerity, that he was wrong and that she would not be the cause of any executions.
‘I’d better be getting back,’ she said aloud. ‘I don’t want to be late. It’s always busy at the printers on Friday afternoon.’
Eileen examined her face in the mirror behind the stage of the Father Matthew Hall before the rehearsal. Friday night was an important night, always a full house and they usually had a quick run-through of the more important songs before the main performance. Although it was not yet seven o’clock, the room faced east and already was evening-dim. It was a good place to lurk. No one, she hoped, could suspect her of listening into conversations, as she slowly removed her small, head-hugging hat and patted into shape the sharp lines of her newly bobbed hair. She wasn’t sure whether they had heard her come in or not, but she thought that they had not. She had recently invested some of her precious salary in a pair of rubber and canvas shoes. Sneakers, they were called and although they were not very suitable for the wet and often flooded streets of Cork city, they did allow her to move noiselessly and to overhear things that might confirm the suspicions of her friends in the Republican Army.
‘No one will suspect you,’ Eamonn had said when he persuaded her to go for the audition. ‘And they do need another soprano. Didn’t you read all that stuff in the Evening Echo? That letter from the clergyman’s wife saying that she was taking her daughter away from Rochelle School because the headmistress had wanted to put her on the stage? And there were loads of other letters from parents, most of them saying that it was all right to have them in the chorus with their friends, but they shouldn’t be in one of the principal parts. You just practise that song ‘Three Little Maids from School’, turn up, give them a performance and they’ll have to take you on, no matter what they are up to. They should be delighted to have you and if they’re not, if they refuse you, well then it means that I’m right about them.’
They had taken her on; the show was opening in three days’ time, but whether they were as delighted as they said was a question that she had not solved. Sometimes, when she paused to tie a shoelace, or deliberately dropped something on the floor, Eileen felt that they were getting suspicious and she began to feel a little uncomfortable.
‘I think that Peter Doyle might suspect me,’ she said to Eamonn on one of their evening meetings. ‘He jokes with me, just like he does with everyone else; but I can see his eyes examining me.’
‘Probably fancies you,’ said Eamonn, but she could see that he was worried. ‘But if he does suspect you, it shows that we’re right and that this musical society is part of the anti-Sinn Féin movement. I might be able to get hold of a pistol for you,’ he added.
‘No, they won’t do anything to me. They’re just a pack of play actors; I’m a match for them any day,’ said Eileen disdainfully. ‘And I certainly don’t want to arouse any suspicions by going around with a pistol. One of the women or the girls would be bound to catch sight of it when we are changing into our costumes. I just have to be careful when I am trying to listen in.’
She was thinking about Eamonn’s suspicions while she hung up her coat and lingered for a while in front of the mirror. Despite her brave words, she felt slightly nervous. The Anti-Sinn Féin Society were reputed to be ruthless. A young republican, a boy of only seventeen years old, was tortured until he revealed the names of those who had taken part in a recent raid. Still, others ran greater risks. She couldn’t back out now.
And then she heard her name. Said quite softly, but said in a voice that did not belong to any of her fellow actors and actresses who all spoke with what she called ‘posh’ accents. This was a singsong Cork accent, southside of Cork, she thought. Gently and carefully, she prised the door open, just an inch and peered cautiously through it. Now she could hear the voices of the two men standing beside the window.
‘I understand that you’ve been making an enquiry, sir, that you left a photograph of a young lady at our station. The inspector asked me to call and to say that we do recognize the girl, the lady in question, but there is no actual criminal conviction, no reason for us to involve ourselves.’
Eileen moved a little further out from the ladies’ cloakroom. Station, inspector, what was going on? And photograph? They had taken a photograph of her the other day that had puzzled her. Jonathon Power, the man who acted the part of Ko-Ko, had taken it. She had wanted to dress in her Pitti-Sing costume, but he had insisted on her wearing her ordinary street clothes, just removing her stylish cloche hat. All the rest of the cast had their photographs in the window of the hall, but they were dressed for their parts in The Mikado. He had come up with some nonsense about her being a new member of the cast, and so they wanted one for their records, but now she understood and she froze with apprehension. There had been a time when the police had suspected her; when there had been a wanted poster with a blurred photograph on it displayed on lampposts and in post offices. No one could recognize her with a degree of certainty from it, but after that daring jailbreak, the name ‘Eileen MacSweeney’ had been in the paper as one of the suspects. What a fool she had been not to change her name, not to realize that first thing everyone in Cork did, on meeting a new acquaintance, was to find out who their parents were and where they came from. ‘Breed, seed and generation’ as her mother would say.
‘Well, that’s all right, then, sergeant. Very good of you to come around. Very grateful.’ Peter Doyle’s voice held its usual affable, easy-going tone. ‘Must say goodbye now. We are just going to do a quick rehearsal, just run through a few songs, you know.’
‘Perhaps I could stay and listen, sir. I’m very fond of these shows, especially Gilbert and Sullivan.’
Peter’s laugh was a little forced as he and the policeman walked together down the hall. ‘Stay if you like, but this won’t be too interesting. We don’t even have the orchestra; just manage with a gramophone for rehearsals. Come on everyone, I just want
a quick run through of the main songs. There were a few hesitations last night and it ruins a song if you miss a beat.’
There was a note of tension in his voice. Perhaps it was the presence of a member of the Civic Guards had put him out. He had not reckoned on this public appearance, probably thought there would be a discreet visit to his shop, at some time when Eileen would not be around. Now he seemed to be looking for a quick distraction.
‘Anne, my darling, let’s go through the duet, will we?’ He placed a kiss on Anne’s cheek, deliberately making a loud, smacking sound with his lips as he did so.
He was overdoing everything tonight. Eileen’s eyes went to Robert Beamish. He and Anne Morgan were supposed to be engaged. She wore his splendid ring, but now Peter Doyle was fondling and holding her much more tightly than usual and when it came to the lines: ‘And, to mark my admiration, I would kiss you fondly thus—’, the stage embrace turned into a passionate kiss. Anne Morgan’s colour rose. She was blushing, her cheeks turning a bright crimson. Robert Beamish took one step forward, the Garda turned towards him, his attention caught by the sudden movement. Robert stepped back again, his mouth tightened into a thin line. His colour was as high as Anne’s as he watched. The pair fell into each other’s arms, singing: ‘This, oh, this, He’ll/I’ll never do’. The second embrace lasted a long minute. Eileen looked on with interest. She thought that it was only the presence of the Garda which stopped Robert Beamish from punching Peter Doyle. Anne was behaving like a fool, in her opinion. Robert Beamish was a much better looking man than Peter Doyle, very tall and very handsome. And everyone in Cork knew that the Beamish family were very rich. Robert, when he gave up this rowing business that now occupied most of his time, would be found a good job at the brewery. Peter Doyle, well, no one knew much about him. An Englishman who owned a shop. Not in the same league as Robert Beamish. If Anne Morgan really wanted to give up teaching, then she was going the wrong way about it.
Beyond Absolution Page 5