by Jodi McIsaac
“Ta.” Nora accepted the dress and unfolded it.
“Mother will send us another for you,” Pidge said. “Poor Nora, you’ve lost everything, haven’t you?”
Nora thanked the wardress again. “I’m going to go change,” she told the others, pushing past Jo into the corridor. She clutched the bundle to her chest as she made her way back into the gloom of the West Wing.
There was nothing to do but wait . . . and pray.
Chapter Seventeen
Excitement danced through the air the next morning. “What’s going on?” Nora asked the girl in the cell next to hers after roll call. She stamped her feet on the ground in an effort to warm them up.
“Delivery day,” the young girl told her. “I’m dying for some cake, and my mother promised she’d send me a new crochet hook.”
Nora visited the lavatory, then stuck her head in Pidge’s cell, but it was empty. She went to the East Wing and started the long walk up the stairs to the third floor, planning to look out the windows while the others were distracted with their packages. The same questions that had burdened her all night still ran through her head. Had Miss Wilson gotten the camera out of Kilmainham? Were the pictures of her wounds being developed this instant? Where was Thomas?
The third-floor windows were almost vacant, with everyone waiting for their letters and packages down below. Nora stood on the table and looked out, soaking in the view. A few people were gathered by the river, looking up at the windows. One of them was a small boy in a cap. When he saw Nora, he yelled, “Is Dorothy MacKinnon there? Can you fetch her?”
“I’m here,” came a breathless voice from behind her. The skinny, red-haired girl gave Nora a quick smile as she stepped down to make room. “Ronan!” Dorothy yelled.
Nora wandered out of the cell and along the corridor, thinking again of Thomas. She hated to admit it to herself, but she had been hoping to see him down by the banks of the river, looking for her. Don’t be daft. If he got away, he’ll not be coming after you.
“But where are you?” she whispered. The wounds on her head itched, and she pressed her hands against the scarf the doctor had given her. Restless, she wandered back toward the staircase, where she met Pidge.
“There you are!” Pidge said, her eyes dancing. “Come on, our parcel’s arrived.”
“Our parcel?”
“From Ma! I opened it already, and she’s sent some things for you. I’ve got it all up in Jo and Lena’s cell. They’ve got a lamp, and we’re using it to make tea.”
Jo and Lena, a plump young girl with cherubic blond curls, were so caught up in examining the contents of their own packages that they barely noticed when Nora and Pidge arrived. A tin cooking pot was balanced on a gas lamp affixed to the cell wall.
“She’s sent us some of my clothes—you can share, o’course,” Pidge said. “And some biscuits and strawberry preserves. And my sketchbook. Did you know I’ve a fair hand at drawing? Rosary beads, obviously. Pencils, notebooks, everything we need to be comfortable. Well, as comfortable as possible in this dungeon.”
“Whiskey?” Nora asked with a grin.
“As if that would make it past the censor without a bribe!” Lena exclaimed, looking up from her embroidery set. “My mother sent me a birthday cake last month for my sixteenth, so she told me in the letter, but the cake never arrived. Ate it himself, I’m sure, the pig.”
“How long have you been here?”
“Three months,” Lena said, her chin held high. “And I’m still as stubborn as ever.”
“Here you go.” Pidge passed Nora a box. Inside was a tin of tea, a tub of salve, two colored scarves, and a white envelope with Nora’s name on it in thin dark ink. The seal had already been broken. Nora unfolded the letter.
Dear Nora,
I am so sorry this has happened to you while you were staying with our family. I feel that perhaps we have been thrust together for some reason only known to our Lord. Pidge’s letter to me was largely blacked out, but I’ve heard the talk and can guess the rest. It seems we are in your debt once again.
I know they have a doctor there in the jail, but I have sent along some of my own salve, which I’ve used for many years on the injuries that have come through our door.
We have still had no word of your friend, I’m afraid. I will write if I hear news.
I hope you will forgive me, but I went through your things, in the hopes of finding some personal effects that might comfort you in your imprisonment.
Nora’s eyes staggered. She gripped the letter tighter and angled it away from the other girls.
I think they will be better left here for the time being, but I hope we can talk soon. I must admit I am most curious. Until then I will not mention it to anyone.
You have shown great courage in the short time I have known you, Nora. Continue to be strong, both for yourself and for Ireland. Look after Pidge. I do worry about her.
Yours,
Kathleen Gillies
Nora folded the letter with shaking hands and slipped it back inside the envelope. Then she tucked the envelope inside her dress, next to her thumping heart. Mrs. Gillies knew—or at least suspected—her secret. How would she react? Would she think Nora was a spy? A witch? A lunatic? It seemed impossible that she would believe the truth, though the letter had sounded almost . . . accepting.
“What did she say?” Pidge asked. “Did she have word of—”
“No,” Nora said quickly, pretending to take great interest in the other contents of the box. “She just wanted to make sure I was well. Wants me to keep an eye on you, too.”
Pidge snorted. “That’s what I thought! There’s not much trouble I can get up to in here!”
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” Jo said. “Remember, Lena, how much trouble Anne Callaway first caused when she got here?”
“Wrecked her cell and barred the door,” Lena said. “Made so much noise they banned letters and packages for a week, for all of us! She ended up getting a month in solitary.”
“They tried banning our parcels last month as well, just because we wouldn’t be their charwomen and clean the corridors. We got them back by going on hunger strike,” Jo said proudly.
Nora raised an eyebrow. “How long were you on strike?”
“Less than a week until they caved and gave us our parcels back,” Jo said. “And sent the convict women in to do the cleaning.”
“Did everyone do it?” Pidge asked breathlessly, as though they were discussing a daring fashion trend and not group starvation.
“No, less than half of us,” Jo said with a wrinkled nose. “Lena didn’t, did you?”
Lena shook her head. “Not worth dying for parcels and letters, in my opinion. If it would stop the treaty, then maybe I would. But even then, I don’t think I’d have the strength.”
“What was it like, Jo?” Pidge asked.
“Awful. I thought I was going mad after the third day. I’d not be in a rush to do it again. But there’s a certain solidarity in it, you know?”
Pidge nodded soberly, as though she perfectly understood.
“Is that why the women in the hospital wing are striking? They really think they can overturn the treaty that way?” Nora asked. She’d always viewed hunger strikes with a sense of horror, but if it could help prevent partition . . .
To her surprise, Jo laughed. “Goodness, no. They just want their freedom. We’re unjustly imprisoned by a false government, after all. At least, that’s what they keep saying.”
“But they must be suffering horribly. The doctor said they’ve been on strike for nearly three weeks.”
Jo sobered up. “Yes, I imagine they’re having a very hard time of it at this stage. Won’t be long before they get released, no doubt.”
“You know, I remember hearing loads about it the first time Mary MacSwiney went on strike, last year. There were protests and everything. But I’ve not heard so much about it this time,” Pidge said sadly. “Do you think, if there were more of us . .
. ?”
“Let’s just . . . wait,” Nora said quickly. “Let’s see if releasing our story leads anywhere.”
Raised voices in the corridor distracted them. Jo went to the door and peered out. “What’s going on?” she called down the hallway.
“Dorothy MacKinnon’s signed the form,” someone called back.
Nora moved toward the commotion. From the railing she could see the young red-haired girl who’d stood at the window with her this morning. She was clutching a small carpetbag to her chest and crying. There was a guard on either side of her. Jeers and shouts of “Traitor!” echoed off the walls from the women who were now crowded around the railings.
“She was talking to someone out the window this morning, a child . . . ,” Nora said.
Jo nodded. “Her brother. He’s had a hard time of it, to be sure. She’s the only family he’s got left. Still, I wouldn’t be able to live with myself. They’ll stand me before the firing squad and pin a white cloth to my chest before I’ll sign the form.”
“But surely you could just sign it and then go back to work for the Republic, couldn’t you?” Nora asked. Perhaps people took oaths more seriously in this decade.
“Sure, and some have done just that, but when they get arrested again, they’re either thrown into solitary or sent off to the NDU. North Dublin Union makes this place look like a palace.”
“Here comes Mrs. Humphreys,” Lena said. “Let’s ask her what happened.” But before they could blurt out any questions, Mrs. Humphreys jerked her head toward Jo’s cell door and marched inside. Nora’s heart sank. This was not a good sign.
“Miss Wilson was caught taking the camera out,” Mrs. Humphreys said in a hushed voice as soon as Jo closed the door.
“What? How?” Nora asked, aghast.
“I thought you might be able to answer that. It was your man O’Reilly who caught her. Seems to me someone must have tipped him off.”
Nora’s cheeks burned with indignation, and she fought to control her voice. She wanted to tell them everything she had done for the cause of the Republic, then dare them to call her a traitor to her face. “Fuck you. I told you, I don’t know the man. This was my idea. Why the hell would I want to sabotage my own plan?”
The other women stared at her in shock.
“God! Does anyone have a fucking cigarette?”
Lena reached into her pillowcase and drew out a small tin, from which she produced a cigarette and a book of matches. She handed them to Nora wordlessly.
Nora kept her eyes on the flame as she lit the smoke. Then she closed them and took a long draw, imagining she was smoking behind her old school in Belfast—before her life had been ripped apart. The others remained silent. “So, what happened to her?” Nora asked.
Mrs. Humphreys cleared her throat. “She was released from her duties. The camera was confiscated. It will be a few days before they develop the film, no doubt, if they do at all. They already know what’s on it.”
“The letter?”
“Also taken.”
“Fuck.”
“Miss O’Reilly, I must tell you we don’t tolerate such language. Obviously, you are upset, but—”
“Aye, it’s grand. It was just . . . this was my one chance.”
“Your chance for what?”
“To do something about this fucking—sorry—war.”
Mrs. Humphreys inspected Nora through narrowed eyes. “I’ll take your word for it. I suppose it could have been someone else who informed on us . . . and I mean to find out who.” She cleared her throat and addressed the other women. “We’ve had a few new arrivals, so I’ve updated the new prayer schedule. It’s posted down by the yard, but Jo and Lena are on from nine until eleven p.m. this week. Nora and Pidge, you drew the short straw. Two until four a.m.”
“What prayer schedule?” Pidge asked, looking thoroughly confused.
“We keep a twenty-four-hour vigil for the hunger strikers, Miss Mary MacSwiney and Mrs. Kate O’Callaghan,” she said sternly. “And you are expected to visit them once a day. I’m surprised the other girls haven’t told you.”
Jo and Lena looked at their feet. “There’s been a lot going on,” Jo said.
Mrs. Humphreys huffed. “Well, we tried, and I don’t fault you for it, Miss O’Reilly. Perhaps you’ll come up with another idea. We’re still Republicans, even in here.”
After she left, Nora sank down onto Lena’s bed and took a final draw on the cigarette. She snuffed it out on the bottom of her shoe.
“Cheer up, Nora. It was a good idea,” Lena said.
“Probably wouldn’t have worked as well as we’d hoped, anyway,” Jo said. “If the people don’t care about Kate and Mary starving themselves, then they probably wouldn’t care about one of us being beaten.”
Nora looked up at her. “You really think that?”
“Ah, Nora, don’t look that way. Who knows, maybe that photograph would have done some good. But now we won’t know either way.”
Nora stood up. “I’ll think of something else.”
“Sure, you can think about it at two in the morning while you’re at prayers,” Lena said with a giggle.
“Do they really expect us to pray for two hours?” Pidge asked, shaking her head.
“We cheat a bit. Lena does the first hour while I do the second,” Jo said. “I mean, I don’t think God minds, does he?”
“I’m sure it’s just fine by him,” Nora said. “There weren’t any visitors sitting with the hunger strikers while I was in with the doctor. Are we supposed to just pop in?”
Lena and Jo shared guilty looks. “Well . . . it’s getting hard to see them. There was this horrible spell when they were vomiting all the time. Poor Kate looks more like a doll each day. Sometimes they moan—they can’t help it. It’s just . . . difficult to see them like that, is all, when we’re out here eating cakes and playing games.”
“I can imagine,” Nora said. The mood in the room was morose.
“Enough of this depressing talk. Here, will you sign my new autograph book?” Pidge asked.
Nora took it from her. Was this one of the books in the display case in the Kilmainham of the future? They traded books and spent a few moments writing in them and exchanging idle gossip.
Pidge was strangely withdrawn. “You all right?” Nora asked after a few minutes.
“It’s just . . . We can’t sit here, drinking tea and playing whist, while our men are being executed and the treaty is forced through an illegitimate parliament.”
“You’re right, we can’t,” Nora said firmly. “That’s why we tried to get our story out. I meant it. I’ll come up with another plan, there must be—”
“I have a plan.”
“What?”
“I think . . . I’m going to join the hunger strike.”
“Ah, Pidge, you don’t know what you’re saying,” Jo said. “I’ve done it, remember? It’s not an easy task.”
“I didn’t say it would be easy! It hasn’t been easy on Kate and Mary, has it? But it works. Nell Ryan, Maud Gonne, Kitty Costello, they all got released, didn’t they?”
“Yes, but think of how they suffered!” Lena said. “They had to carry them out on stretchers, and they were brought straight to hospital.”
“Nora, surely you agree with me,” Pidge said, her eyes pleading. “You’ll join me, won’t you?”
Nora hesitated. Would two more hunger strikers really be enough to turn the tide? “I don’t know, Pidge. It doesn’t seem . . . enough, somehow, if that makes any sense.”
“Not enough? What more could we do than lay down our very lives? You’re not afraid, are you?”
“I’m willing enough to die for Ireland, if that’s what you’re asking. But if what Jo says is right, and no one seems to care about what Kate and Mary are doing, what makes you think they’ll care about you? How d’you think it will change anything? The most you can hope for is release, and then what? You’ll be so weak and sick you won’t be of any use to the Republ
ic. You’ll be free—but for what?” The thought of Pidge’s healthy figure wasting away, week after week, was horrible to imagine. Look after Pidge, Mrs. Gillies had written.
“It’s solidarity, that’s what it is,” Pidge said. Pink blotches were forming on her pale cheeks.
“Have you ever actually been hungry? For more than a few hours, that is?” She shut her eyes, trying to block out the memories. Emaciated men, women, children trickling into the refugee camps. People dropping dead by the side of the road, only to be carved apart by vultures. “I’ve seen people starve to death. It’s the worst way to die, Pidge. We know they’re thinking of executing one of us. What if they decide to let one of us die of hunger? Are you willing to take the chance, just for the sake of solidarity?”
“I’m surprised at you, Nora. For all your talk of being a revolutionary . . .” Pidge glowered at her feet.
Nora couldn’t blame her. Ten years ago, she’d have felt the same way. “If it would change things, then I’d be the first to do it. But you’re right: I don’t want to starve myself just to be released and sent to hospital for weeks. I want more than freedom from this jail. A hunger strike won’t achieve that.”
“Then what will, Nora?” Jo asked softly. Pidge was still avoiding her gaze.
Nora shook her head. “I wish I knew.”
Nora spent the rest of the day getting a feel for the routine of Kilmainham. She understood Pidge’s frustration—she felt it herself—but if the memory of the H Block prisoners in the Maze had taught her anything, it was that the British were more than happy for Republicans to starve themselves to death. It had never seemed a particularly effective tactic, considering the cost, but she could tell Pidge was still thinking about it. The younger girl spent most of the afternoon in her cell in the West Wing. Nora watched her chew her biscuit at lunch slowly, methodically, as though savoring every bite. They didn’t speak of it again, but something had changed between them. It made her feel strangely lonely. Her thoughts flitted from Thomas to Mrs. Gillies’s letter to the Brigidine Sisters . . . and finally to Eamon. He’d been a reluctant revolutionary if ever there was one. He would have scoffed at the idea of going on hunger strike, she was sure of it. He had been far too practical for such things.