Irish Gold

by Andrew M. Greeley

  N.

  –– 29 ––

  November 15, 1920

  I’ll never sleep at night again. I’ll always feel that man’s hands on me. I’ll always see those two other men when O’Kelly pointed the gun at their heads. It was so horrible I don’t want to write about it.

  Yet I must write about it because I now have proof that your brave man Daniel O’Kelly is an agent for the Brits, not the kind of proof that Liam Tomas, the eejit, would believe but proof enough.

  A fortnight ago, me Aunt Mary, whose husband Joe keeps the public house at the cross in Oughterard, sent a note to me ma to ask if they could have the loan of me for a week and their young woman going off to visit her mother in Sligo.

  I like Aunt Mary and Uncle Joe so I was happy to go up there, especially since some of the men of the flying column are hiding in the farms outside of Oughterard and meself not setting eyes on Liam Tomas for almost a month.

  Well, worse luck for me, Liam Tomas wouldn’t come into town because he was under orders not to show his face until the IRA moved to its next plan of action. My friend Mick Collins has the Brits on the run all right, though people are saying they have him on the run too because the IRA are running out of ammunition.

  I wish the war would be over and Ireland would be free and the Brits go home and Liarn Tomas and I could be together for always.

  Wishing won’t make it so. I pray too and light candles every morning at Mass. Maybe that will help.

  Yesterday was a good summer day, a few clouds and blue sky, and we perishing with the heat in the pub and Uncle Joe gone to market in Galway. Late in the afternoon, the whole world still and peaceful and only a few men in the pub. I heard a motor car pull up outside. There’s not many motor cars in this part of County Galway these days with everyone worried about the lads and the Tans. So I peeked out the window and, glory be to God, wasn’t it the Tans themselves, in their black trousers and their tan coats, looking like they owned the whole of Ireland?

  “ ’Tis the Tans,” I whispered to Aunt Mary, who is only ten years older than I am and easily frightened.

  “The Holy Saints preserve us,” she shrieked. “They’ll murder the lot of us.”

  “We must keep calm.” I hugged her. “Tell Joe Pete to sneak out the back way and go out in the woods by the lake and tell the lads that we’re being invaded.”

  Daniel O’Kelly has told them not to attack until they receive the new plan of action, unless there’s a provocation. I said to myself, sure, if the Black and Tans invading Oughterard is not a provocation, nothing is.

  And themselves shooting down innocent civilians all over Ireland, even Catholic seminarians, and burning others alive.

  They didn’t come in to the pub right away. Instead they walked across the street to Maeve McManus’s little tobacco shop, swaggering like they were the Black Watch or the Highland Guards instead of a bunch of mercenaries and criminals and soldiers of fortune.

  I was pretty sure from watching them that they had already the drink taken. It was going to be a long night in Oughterard, let me tell you.

  One of them takes out a pistol and smashes Maeve’s window with its butt. Then they go into the shop and the next moment out comes poor old Maeve and herself falling flat on her face in the dust and laying there like she’s afraid to move. I reach down in me drawers and make sure I can pull out me knife quickly if I have to.

  Then they throw little Tommy, Maeve’s grandson who helps her out, into the dust too and one of them comes out and kicks Tommy two or three times, and himself only a little gosson about ten years old.

  By this time I’m praying something fierce to the Mother of God to send the lads in a hurry.

  The Tans strolled down the street, smashing windows, beating storekeepers, stealing whatever they wanted.

  “Mother of God, protect us!” Aunt Mary screams as they smash our window. Then they push into the pub.

  The first thing I notice is that all but one of them, and himself a sergeant or something important, are young fellas, no older than our lads out in the hills and the hedges. I don’t have much time to think about it, but I do wonder what war does to young men to make them join the Tans after it’s over. Uncle Joe says that maybe it’s the only job they can find.

  “Bring us your best whiskey,” shouts the sergeant, “and none of that Irish piss either.”

  They all laugh and sit around two of the big tables. As meek and quiet as turtledoves, don’t Mary and I bring them two bottles of scotch, the last two bottles we have?

  “Would you look at this?” One of them grabs for me. “Two Irish cunts, isn’t that nice now?”

  I dodge him this time and meself wondering what will happen when they have more of the drink taken.

  Mary is already crying.

  “Where are your men?” another shouts at me. “Out in the hedges with them Irregular bastards?”

  “Me Uncle Joe has gone to Galway for the market,” I says, trying to sound real bold and confident, but I’m petrified altogether.

  “Isn’t that nice for us?” And they all laugh.

  “Would you look at the tits on that one?” The sergeant points at me. “She should be fun, what do you think, men?”

  They laugh again. They’re still just talking but I’m thinking that if they keep on talking that way, they’ll talk themselves into something.

  All the time I’m praying as hard as I can.

  “The older cunt has a neat little ass.” A blond boy sneers, trying to pinch poor Mary. “What do you say, shall we bugger her?”

  They all howl at that and Mary is sobbing now.

  There’s no mercy in any of them. I keep telling myself that today. They showed no mercy; no mercy would be shown to them.

  They continued to drink and to smash the pub, breaking glasses and bottles, spilling stout and whiskey on the floor, and wrecking the bar and shattering the mirror of which Uncle Joe was so proud into a million pieces. Mary’s near hysterical now. She won’t listen to me when I tell her that we can’t lose our nerve.

  I’m making sure I can pull me knife out real quick when I have to.

  I’m also noticing that the sergeant fella is looking at his watch a lot. They’re expecting someone else. Regular British army? There’s not many of them around here, afraid as they are of the lads ambushing them. RIC? They’re even more afraid of being executed by the IRA if they collaborate with the Tans.

  My heart sinks at that thought. Haven’t they sacked a few towns already to teach the wild Irish a lesson?

  “Well, Sarge,” says the young blond one. “What do you say? We’ve messed this town up pretty well. Why don’t we have some fun with these two cunts? It’s a shame to waste them on the Irish who wouldn’t know what to do with a woman if they had one naked and on the flat of her back and her legs pulled apart.”

  “Or”—another one sneers—“on her belly with her ass in the air!”

  Mary starts begging them not to hurt her and meself reaching for me knife.

  “You boys have done a good day’s work,” he says to them. “What harm would there be in a little romp?” He glances at his watch. “But make it quick.”

  Two of them grab each of us. Mary is screaming and I’m shoving and kicking and reaching for me knife.

  “Do it outside,” says the sergeant. “Let the people who are peeking out of their doors see what His Majesty’s troops do to Irish cunts.”

  They drag us outdoors, and meself squinting in the bright sunlight and still kicking and fighting as best I can. I can’t get at me knife.

  They tear off Aunt Mary’s skirt and throw her on the ground. She’s screaming like a frightened seal.

  One of them, the young blond boy, holds me while the other rips me blouse and pulls off the top of me shift. The boy that’s holding me tries to grab my breast with one hand, so I finally pull out me knife and shove it in the other’s stomach, real hard. He lets out a yell of surprise and grabs at the knife.

  “She’s stu
ck Harry,” yells the sergeant. “Kill the cunt.”

  Then I hear shots and I think I’m murdered and meself not even saying an Act of Contrition.

  The face of the man I stuck with the knife explodes into a mass of bone and blood and little bits of flesh and his blood spurting all over me skin and skirt. The boy behind me sort of sighs and lets go. I look around and see great globs of blood on his tan uniform.

  I’m vomiting all over the place and meself not even noticing it. I try to draw a deep breath and gunpowder fumes choke me and I vomit again, worse this time.

  Then I feel Liam Tomas’s arm around me and him whispering soft words.

  “It took you long enough to come,” says I, and myself vomiting yet again.

  He wraps me tattered clothes around me real gentlelike and says. “Glory be to God, woman, you’re a desperate one with the knife.”

  He meant it well, poor dear man, but what he said made me vomit once more and with nothing left to come up.

  In a few minutes, I managed to pull meself together so I could take notice of what’s happening.

  Three of the Tans are dead, the two that had been playing with me and one of those who was trying to get on top of poor Mary, who is clinging to Maeve McManus and sobbing something desperate. The sergeant and the other Tan are tied up with three Lee-Enfields pointing at them. Liam Tomas has routed them with only three other of the lads.

  “What will we do with them, Liam?” says me brother Tim, and himself real nervous because, I’m thinking, this is the first time he’s ever shot a man up close.

  “We’ll wait till the commandant comes,” says me man, real calmlike, and “then we’ll have a court martial. They were caught in the act of abusing civilians. That’s punishable by death.”

  I can see that both the Tans are terrified. The look in their eyes says that they know they’re going to die, but they’re still hoping for some miracle.

  Then who comes ambling down the road, whistling a music hall song, but your man Daniel O’Kelly himself?

  “Well,” he says with his big smile, which I’ve always thought was fake, “I can see that you men have used commendable initiative in my absence. Well done, Captain O’Riada.”

  “Thank you, sir.” Liam salutes him like he’s in a parade in Sackville Street in Dublin, and meself never seeing a parade in Sackville Street and never even being in Dublin.

  [Translator’s note: Nell Pat later crossed out “Sackville” and wrote over it “O’Connell.” However, she must have done that after she migrated to America because the name of the street was still Sackville at the time she wrote this diary entry. I looked it up. I also learned, however, that most Dubliners were already calling it O’Connell for twenty years because the Dublin Corporation had changed its name but Dublin Castle had reversed the decision. But the news apparently had not got out to the West. I looked that up too. No extra charge.]

  I’ve been noticing that the sergeant looks relieved to see the commandant appear and that O’Kelly is avoiding the Tans’ eyes.

  So that’s who he was waiting for! Daniel O’Kelly is in with the Tans! They came here to meet him. They couldn’t keep their hands off the town or off us and spoiled the rendezvous.

  “What should we do with these two, Captain?” O’Kelly asks himself.

  “We should have a proper court martial, sir. They’re guilty of crimes committing during war that are punishable by death.”

  “You’re quite right, Captain.” He pulls out his big Mauser and waves it at the sergeant, tormenting him with it. “Absolutely correct, in theory. However, we’re not in a theoretical situation, if you take me meaning. The flying squad will have to fly”—he points the gun between the man’s eyes—“because the Regulars will be up here in no time when they hear what’s happened, unless GHQ orders us to stop them. So I think summary judgment is the indicated action, don’t you?”

  “Yes, sir,” says Liam, kind of uncertain like.

  “But, O’Kelly, you can’t—” the sergeant cries out.

  O’Kelly grins and pulls the trigger. The Tan drops to the ground like a calf that’s been hit in the head.

  “Oh yes, I can.” He turns the gun towards the other man. “Wouldn’t you say, Corporal, that I can?”

  He shoots him too.

  The look on his face tells me that he enjoyed it more than he would making love to a woman.

  “All right, men.” He puts his gun back in his pocket. “We’d better clear out of here.” He raises his voice. “You townpeople, you didn’t hear anything, you didn’t see anything. The constables will ask a few questions and leave you alone.” The doors around the square open up a wee bit. “If you hear that the Regulars are coming, get out of town and hide in the hedges or on the farms or even on the lake. They’ll burn some of the town but they won’t chase after you because they’re afraid of us.”

  “Sir,” says Liam, real polite, “may I have permission to bring Nell Pat back to her family?”

  O’Kelly glances at me, like he’s surprised to see me and meself standing there, still shivering and holding the pieces of my clothes together. “Sure, you shouldn’t be up here, Nell Pat.” He leers at me. “You’ll be getting yourself in serious trouble someday if you’re not careful, won’t you now? Permission denied, Captain. There’s a war on and we’re under orders to prepare for a new campaign. Unless I miss my guess, today’s work will bring the Regulars out in force, which provides us with an excellent opportunity, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Yes, sir,” says Liam, his eyes filled with agony.

  “I can take care of meself just fine,” I scream at the two of them, “and yourselves such fine examples of Irish manhood!”

  “But, Nell—” my Liam pleads.

  “Follow your frigging commandant,” I shout at him, and using a word I’ve never spoken before in my life, though I’ve thought it a lot of times. “I don’t care if I never see you again.”

  Later, when I’m riding home on me pony in the moonlight, I pray to the Mother of God to obtain forgiveness for what I said. What a terrible thing it would be if those are the last words he hears from me and I never do see him again!

  So I sob in Ma’s arms and try to sleep and I can’t. So I get out of me bed and write down these lines.

  Tomorrow morning I will light a candle at Mass for the man I killed yesterday. Wasn’t the look of death on his face before he was shot?

  I’ll pray for the repose of his soul every day for the rest of my life.

  Now I have to look around and find meself another knife.

  –– 30 ––

  “AREN’T THESE the final letters between Mick and Kitty?” herself informed me the next day.

  “Are they now?”

  “Haven’t I said that they are . . . and stop imitating the way I talk.”

  “Can’t help myself!”

  “Gobshite bastard,” she said, totally rejecting my plea. “Now listen to this one. . . .”

  “Would you be wanting to read them to me now?” She made as if to sock my jaw; the blow became a quick caress at the last minute.

  My heart jumped a couple of times. Dear God, she was beautiful!

  “Would you ever fock off?” She adjusted the book and began to read. “He wrote this one in early April. You can tell the strain has taken its toll.

  “My dearest Kitty,

  “Things are rapidly becoming as bad as they can be and the country has before it what may be the worst period yet. A few madmen can do anything. Indeed they are just getting on the pressure gradually—they go on from cutting a tire to cutting a railway line, then to fire at a barrack, then to fire at a lorry and so on. But God knows I do not want to be worrying you.

  “Are you going to Nobber for Easter? Or are you going anywhere? I am most awfully anxious to see you and quickly and this week is going to be a bad week for me by the look of things. I am anxious about you. I wonder if you’re writing even today—Yes? No?

  “May God bless you.

&
nbsp; “Fondest love,

  “Michael.”

  “He wrote to someone else that he had signed his death warrant when he signed the treaty,” I said. “He knew what would happen.”

  “The poor dear woman could only dream of a quiet life with him after the Troubles were over. Sure, there would never have been any peace if he had lived. But she didn’t understand that. This next one is in July, just a month before he died.

  “My own darling Michael,

  “I went to bed last night about 9 o’clock and, of course, I couldn’t sleep, so I was talking to you and my heart ached with longing to have you with me. I was ‘madly, passionately, in love with you,’ to use your own words, and I understand these feelings now, and I feel that I’m blushing now because I tell you. But sure you know and we both know and remember Greystones and all the other wonderful times.

  “Then I went through all the stages of the future until I came to the kind of matter-of-fact stage when we are so used to each other that it would be uncomfortable, cold and something gone wrong, if one or other of us were not there. We mightn’t admit it, but it would be a natural sort of feeling. We would wake up in the middle of the night and not be able to sleep peacefully, because there was that something, something not exactly explainable. Now, sure, I wasn’t building castles in the air with those dreams. Is that not what will happen? And I forgot to tell you that I decided last night that it was the matter-of-fact stage I like best, I think.

  “I think I am really continuing last night’s little romance today. Of course I couldn’t tell you here all the nice things I said last night to you, all the love and everything I gave you or will give you, and I found myself promising you faithfully that I’d never have a real row, nor fall out with you at all (now don’t laugh, because I’m real serious), if you are not too rough and don’t hurt me when we are just playing, just fooling, and a few other little ifs.

  “I hope to see you soon. It’s three weeks yesterday. A very, very long time, but God is good.

  “All my love,

  “Your own,

  “Kit.”