Irish Crystal

by Andrew M. Greeley

  There was a large stack of foolscap on the deal table in front of him. He laid his pen aside and rose to shake my hand.

  “Writing a revolutionary proclamation?”

  “Just so. We must have a public record of the reasons for deeds which will necessarily be bloody”

  Try as I might, I couldn’t see Bob Emmet shedding anyone’s blood.

  “Will you win?” I asked.

  “Oh, I think we will. We have a very good chance. The present rulers are quite incompetent. Their spy system has fallen apart. They don’t expect another rising for a half century We will surprise them and sweep them before us. There are pledges from the neighboring counties of enough men to capture Dublin the first night. Then the other counties will rise.”

  “And the French? Are they coming?”

  “I have every reason to think they are. My brother Thomas has spoken with Bonaparte himself. Arthur O’Connor is interfering as he always does, but he too expects a massive French force will land in late summer, perhaps in Waterford, which will bring them very close to Dublin.”

  “Will Tom accompany them, or Naper Tandy or Wolf Tone in a French uniform?”

  “I doubt it, though if he does, he won’t be drunk like Naper Tandy was … Tom is planning to transport himself and his family to America to begin life again. He has decided that his days as a revolutionary are over …”

  Bob hesitated.

  “I can’t say that I blame him.”

  He started to say something, paused, then described how there would be no lack of weapons for the Rising. There were several armories working in the city, right under the nose of the Castle. They were making pikes and munitions and fuel for rockets. Blunderbusses would arrive shortly, weapons convenient for carrying under one’s coat. They would fight the Yeomanry and the English army as equals.

  I was skeptical. I had heard that the new Lord Lieutenant and First Secretary were easygoing gentlemen who believed that Ireland was thoroughly pacified. They devoted much of their time to enjoying the life of English royalty The commander of the army, General Fox was thought to be something of a clown. There was no one on the island like Lord Cornwallis, who may have ruled with a gentle hand but ruled nonetheless.

  Yet, for all the truth of the laziness of the Crown, the army was still professional and the Yeomen still ruthless. Bob might take them by surprise. Yet often unprepared, the English were usually brutally efficient in destroying the military pretensions of Irish amateurs.

  He poured me a small glass of poteen-“against the cold of your ride back to Carlow” Then he got to the point of our conversation.

  “You have been close to Miss Curran, have you not?”

  “We are acquainted, Bob, but I would not say closely.”

  “A very lovely woman,” he murmured.

  “I have every intention of becoming a priest,” I replied cautiously. “However, she is certainly a striking beauty.”

  “Would it surprise you if I say that it is my intention to make her my wife after this wretched business is over?”

  He was asking if I would object.

  I wouldn’t, but I would.

  I was destined for the priesthood. I had no rights on Sarah, no claim on her, no grounds to object. Yet I had known her first. I was courting her, however remotely and uncertainly before Bob had ever met her.

  “It would not surprise me. On the contrary such a plan merely indicates your usual good taste, in women as in everything else.”

  I meant every word. Yet my heart beat faster.

  “If I should die in the Rising”-his face flushed as it did so often-“I hope you would see your way clear to taking care of her. John Philpot Curran, as you know, is a fine lawyer, but a rather defective human being, thinks only of himself and his public persona.”

  That request I had not expected. I stammered in response.

  “I will of course discharge such a task as best I can. I fear that I lack the resources and, given my commitment, the uh, freedom to do so completely.”

  “I would not expect that,” he said awkwardly “I ask only that you care for her within your own limitations … I do love her very much … But I love Ireland too.”

  “Maybe you should forget the Rising and invite Mistress Curran to join you and your brother Thomas in America.”

  He smiled ruefully.

  “Believe me, I would very much like to do just that. However, like you I have prior commitments.”

  “You think you will die, Bob?”

  “I would be a fool if I did not admit that possibility … If I do, and I promise you this, I will die in such a way that it will not be a meaningless death. I will leave a sentiment that Ireland will never forget … Thank you for stopping by. I hope to see you at Easter.”

  On the cold and rough coach ride back to Carlow Town, I considered the conversation, though I tried not to. Bob was a romantic fool. He and Sarah should elope immediately and escape both Ireland and John Philpot Curran. His chance of surviving this cockamamie rising he had fantasized into existence were thin. If he were not a fool, he would not have permitted himself to fall in love. Ireland was a wet and rocky and unfeeling island. Sarah was a lovely young woman. There ought not even be a choice between them. Now he was drifting like the Liffey to the sea towards almost certain death. He was offering Sarah to me, if I wanted her.

  Of course I wanted her.

  But I also wanted to be a priest, of that I had no doubt. I realized that Sarah might not approve of his offer to me if she knew about it. Yet if she did want me, how could I reject her?

  I was doing very well in my studies at Carlow and the faculty were pleased with me. No one knew about my activities in the Rising of 1798. Nor did they even suspect my relationship with Bob Emmet. There was some discussion of sending me to Rome to finish my theology training. I resisted because I wanted to be Irish in my training. I wasn’t anxious to be a bishop. I told my own bishop and he just laughed.

  “You’re a bit of a republican, aren’t you?”

  “With all due respect, milord, the butchery here in Wexford a few years ago suggests that Risings don’t work.”

  He nodded wisely.

  There had been a fierce street battle in Carlow Town during the ’98. That was the same year the college opened. Most of the seminarians were militant republicans, great admirers of Father John Murphy, who led the Wexford forces at Vinegar Hill-and was hung for his troubles. Like all the local clergy I know even now, they were on the side of their people and hence against the English. I steered a middle course. Only when the Irish were very well organized, had effective commanders, and could count on help from the outside, should they even attempt a rising. Some of my classmates assured me that everyone knew the French would land before the summer. I said that I would believe the Frogs would keep their promises when they really did.

  However, during the Easter Holidays, when I rode the abominable Carlow Coach back to Dublin, I observed signs of preparations in the countryside in Carlow and Wicklow and on the edge of the Dublin mountains. Small groups of rough-looking men walking along the roadside with serious frowns and no apparent destination—Whiteboys, perhaps, but much more public about it than they should be. I would not have suspected anything unless I knew what was afoot.

  A Castle spy, and there had to be such in County Tick-low at least, might not have smelled trouble. So far, Bobby’s Rising was a secret-as it would be until the day of the Rising. As usual the fighters would come down from the mountains, always reserving the right to return if they didn’t like the smell of things.

  The spies could still do a lot of harm, however.

  I paid my respects to the Currans in their house on Westmoreland Street. Sarah seemed happy to see me, though she was clearly very anxious. We talked about ordination and my possible trip to Rome. Once again, I had no sense that she was attracted to me.

  She remarked that Mary Anne Emmet Holmes was ill with tuberculosis and was not expected to live much longer. A fierce youn
g woman, she had sneaked into Kilmainham Gaol and into her husbands cell when he was a prisoner there after the Rising of ’98. She wouldn’t leave and the English were afraid to throw her out. Her courage and energy, however, were not protection against the White Death. The elder Emmets were already dead. Only Thomas, Addis, and Robert were still alive, and Thomas had already migrated to America, the only survivors of twelve children. The thought crossed my mind that Sarah had lost all but one of her siblings to the same plague, including a twin sister. Their mother had left the family when she was eleven, unable to live any longer with John Philpot’s cruelty. Yet perhaps Sarah would be the Tom Emmet of her family Despite her worry about Bob, she exuded health and vitality

  “Good decision on Tom’s part,” John Philpot Curran announced, puffing on a big cigar, whose stench filled the whole drawing room, and sipping from his jar of whiskey. “America is the place to be if you want a peaceful society without bloody battles every couple of years.”

  “They had their own revolution, which ended only twenty years ago,” I said.

  “But they have their own country”

  “Because they took it, sir.”

  “Do you think Ireland can take it, young man?”

  I hated his pomposity. A marvelous lawyer and in his own way something of a patriot. But he would never take risks for Ireland. Even his brilliant attempt to save Lord Edward was little more than self-aggrandizement.

  “Only if someone like Rochambeau comes with a force the size he took to America.”

  “You think it would be better if the French ruled Ireland instead of the English?”

  “No,” I said. “I wouldn’t want Frogs swarming over the countryside. They’re an immoral people.”

  Curran laughed, then belched. Sarah smiled because she knew whom I was quoting.

  She shook hands warmly with me at the door and enveloped me in her smile. Though I knew it was really a smile for Bob, it remains with me even to this day.

  17

  “Teach says I’m verbal,” Socra Marie informed Estelle Curran, on whose lap she was sitting. “She means I talk a lot. I say that me da says I got it from me ma.”

  The Currans, looking like they had just been released from jail, were in our parlor, apparently engaged in a relaxed conversation with the good Nuala Anne (in jeans and a Trinity College sweatshirt). The two white hounds had arrayed themselves on the floor in their friendly/protective mode. Tea and soda bread were available on an end table. For a moment I thought I was in a cottage in the West of Ireland. All that the scene lacked was the acrid smell of peat fire.

  The Currans, devastated but resilient, were somehow more attractive than they had been at the dinner. Nuala seemed to have changed her mind about them too.

  “Aren’t John and Estelle after asking us for our advice?” Nuala said, a warning note in her voice that said, just sit down and be quiet Dermot Michael.

  I did both.

  The mutts thumped their tails on the floor in a low-key greeting to the titular alpha male of the house.

  Our daughter rubbed her eyes.

  “Nap, Ma!” she demanded.

  “This one goes down real quick, like,” she said, scooping up Socra Marie. “I’ll be right back … Dermot, you look like you’re perishing for the want of a sip of tea. Why don’t you pour yourself a splasheen?”

  We had followed the plight of the Currans in the various media for the last several days. John Culhane had provided more background information. There wasn’t much doubt in the minds of the journalists that they had ordered the torching of their own house on the river.

  Emerging from the Customs Hall at O’Hare—surely one of the antechambers of hell—they encountered a mob of angry, screaming journalists who had to get clips for the five o’clock news. The vultures had swept aside the Curran family, despite Jack’s efforts to protect his parents, and closed in for the kill.

  “What was the insurance on your mansion?”

  “What will you do with the money?”

  “How do you respond to the charges of arson?”

  “Was it a terrorist attack?”

  “Why did you leave town so suddenly? Was it so you wouldn’t be in the house when it blew up?”

  John Curran put on his lawyer-outside-the-courtroom face.

  “We’ve just returned from Italy. We don’t know what happened to our home, which we dearly loved, and whose destruction breaks our hearts. We can hardly comment until we learn more of the facts.”

  That wasn’t enough for the five o’clock news. The vultures followed them as Jack and Gerry Donovan led them to a waiting limo.

  “Why did you want your house destroyed?”

  “Do you know that the FBI suspects you hired the arsonists ?”

  Two suits waited at the door of the limo, waving their warrant cards. I noted with some relief that they were not our old friends Gog and Magog. They were hoping, no doubt, to pry loose some remark that could be interpreted as obstruction of justice. The vultures pushed them aside.

  The Bureau was already involved in the case on Monday morning, John Culhane had reported to us, eager to take the case away from the Chicago Police Department on the grounds that there was a possibility of terrorism. The CPD refused to yield jurisdiction. He confirmed that the Currans’ departure was a sudden decision, which left open two possibilities: they had the great good fortune to escape murder or they knew what was about to happen and were guilty of arson. The United States being what it is today, they were assumed to be guilty until they proved themselves innocent. Both the United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois and the State’s Attorney for the County of Cook held press conferences at which they promised thorough investigations. The Currans, in the company of their son, son-in-law, and a phalanx of lawyers—including my redoubtable sister-in-law, who looked like she was having the time of her life, faced two days of questions from the cops and the Feds.

  The government never says that there are no grounds for criminal charges. It doesn’t arrest you, it doesn’t convene a grand jury. It lets you swing in the wind. Spokespersons for both jurisdictions informed the media that “no decision has been made about convening a grand jury.”

  The ineffable Ms. Hurley fired back in a statement.

  “Both the federal government and County of Cook know that they have no evidence at all of criminal behavior. The Feds intruded because they wanted publicity, and the locals had to fight back. We hope that now the games are over the Chicago Police Department will get on with the serious business of finding who destroyed that beautiful old home and endangered the entire neighborhood.”

  “Do you anticipate grand juries?”

  “No more than I anticipate a World Series between the Cubs and the Sox.”

  While we were waiting the return of the woman of the house and I was sipping my splasheen of tea and destroying altogether a plate of herself’s soda bread, John Curran asked me, “Cindy Hurley is your sister, isn’t she?”

  “I’m usually identified as her brother, indeed her little brother.”

  “She really is a terror,” Estelle said admiringly.

  “Actually, she’s a very sweet young matron who just doesn’t happen to like cops or prosecutors.”

  The Maeve inched forward and extended her head so that it was available for petting. I obliged. She rumbled contentedly, a wolfhound’s equivalent of a purr.

  “I assume that they don’t have any evidence against you?”

  “Only that our home blew up when we weren’t in it.” John Curran sighed. “Apparently in the world of the prosecutors, that’s grounds for suspicion. I’m happy I stayed out of that world and even happier that your sister did not.”

  “As we were telling Nuala Anne, Commander Culhane told us that his investigation might take a long time. So he hinted that we should contact you people …”

  “That was a wise hint.”

  “Is she psychic or something?” Estelle asked.

  “In Irelan
d they call it fey and she is that. More to the point, she is very, very smart. Moreover, as long as I’ve known her, she has never failed to solve a mystery … I’m the spear-carrier.”

  The woman of the house thundered down the stairs, the Good Witch of the west riding in on the wind.

  “Och, Dermot Michael Coyne, haven’t you destroyed the soda bread altogether?” .

  Without waiting for me to say that there was almost as much more where that came from, she sank into her presider’s chair and turned to our guests.

  “That one never objects to going to bed, then bounces out like she’s the recharged Energizer Bunny.”

  “We had a son like her, my last pregnancy, one we hadn’t planned. Of course we loved the poor little kid. The doctors at Children’s said he would not survive, but we wanted them to try. He didn’t make it …”

  Her eyes filled with tears.

  “They say”—there were tears in her husband’s eyes too—“that they’ve improved the chances lately. But our guy wouldn’t have made it even today.”

  “The real challenge,” I said ponderously, “is finding ways to bring such pregnancies to full term.”

  “So now he’s a little angel”—Nuala too was weeping now—“taking care of you and protecting you and maybe himself whispering that you should come visit us.”

  We were silent as we digested that bit of Connemara piety.

  “Commander Culhane said you were better than any private detective he knows.”

  “And we don’t take any pay,” I added.

  “And aren’t we from the neighborhood,” me wife added. “And ourselves endangered by the fire!”

  “I don’t know what more I can tell you,” John Curran said. “Our kind of legal practice doesn’t make one the kind of enemies who would do something like this.”

  “You can never tell what some crazy people might think,” Estelle added. “You can make enemies without realizing it.”

  “That’s certainly true.”

  “And our children might have made enemies, though I hope not. We often had family dinners on Saturday night at the old place.”