“Have you lost your bloody mind, Eileen?” he said. “Sure it’s only a fecking name. There’s more serious business in this world to be worrying about.”
My brother Paddy came over to me and took my hand. “Aoife’s a nice name, Eileen,” he whispered. I pulled him close to me, but I could not stop shaking.
“Ah, she’s just emotional,” said Theresa. “They say a lot of women get that way after a birth. She’ll get over it.”
But she was wrong. I would not get over it. It was a small betrayal, I know, but it is the first betrayal that hurts the most. It is the first betrayal that slays innocence and leaves a scar that is never forgotten. Just as a physical scar fades with time but can still be felt when fingers are laid ever so softly over the place where it was, so too with the emotional scar of betrayal. I sensed there would be more betrayals to come. My poor heart had set up a lookout for them. And there would be more scars. And in time, there would be so many scars to be avoided that there would be no place left to touch.
I WENT BACK to my job at the mill. When I refused to leave Aoife with his mother, James sighed and told me to suit myself. I found an elderly neighbor who was delighted to keep the child. James kept working as well. It was best not to draw attention to ourselves, he said, and I was happy enough to be living on his wages so I could keep building my own savings. The savings account, in my own name, was my one piece of independence I was not giving up.
After Aoife was born, I hardly went out on any assignments for the IRA. Things had become very dangerous. But there was a part of me still yearned for the excitement of it. I admit that it fueled my resentment toward the child. Not only was she forcing me to give up my dream of reconstructing the past, but she had also forced me out of the action that I had come to thrive on. I sighed as I looked at her—what kind of a mother would I be if I already resented the child in my life? I prayed it was only a passing mood. When Aoife was a bit older I would go back to the fighting, I told myself. In the meantime, in spite of James’s objections, I continued to go to the meetings.
“WELL, IT’S A great night for Ireland,” boomed P.J., holding up his glass and grinning at all of us. We were gathered in the room above the Ceili House. It was a May evening in 1920, and word had come down that the Unionist politicians had lost the majority of their seats in elections in Londonderry. It was the first time an election had been held in the United Kingdom under a system of proportional representation, and the Unionists had the shock of their lives. The new councillors pledged themselves to the Irish Republic proclaimed by Dáil Éireann.
“We have Derry back in our hands again,” shouted P.J., his face red with excitement.
“There’ll be quare trouble now,” Fergus muttered.
“Och, can you not take pleasure in the news?” shouted P.J. “Do you always have to be the wet blanket?”
“I’m just saying,” said Fergus, scowling.
“He’s right,” said Terrence. “They won’t take this lying down.”
James was silent. I could see the thoughts racing through his head. He was never one to rush to judgment. He was weighing things, as he always did. Then I saw the set of his jaw, and I knew what he was going to say before he opened his mouth.
“We’ll need to be prepared.” His voice was calm and quiet. Everyone turned to look at him. “You may expect to see battles raging in the streets. It’s not just the UVF and the RIC and the army that will be in it. Every feckin’ Prod in the North will be fancying himself a vigilante.”
“There’ll be hooliganism on all sides,” put in Terrence.
“Aye, but the Prods still have the numbers and the power on their side,” said James. “We’ll need to have eyes in the backs of our heads. And there’ll be trouble in the mill before long, mark my words.” He shot a look at Terrence as if to say, “You’re not the only boyo with advance information.”
The thud of the lookout’s rifle on the attic door startled us. We stopped talking and stiffened, holding our breath. Then, like clockwork, we shot into action, clearing away the maps and documents and the extra tumblers and cups. James and his men dove through a small trapdoor at the top of the stairs. P.J., Fergus, Terrence, and I spread ourselves around the table, trying to look natural. The door opened and boots scraped on the wooden stairs.
“Ah, sure good evening to yourself, Sergeant Hamilton,” said P.J. in his sweetest voice. “Will you and your man join us for a bit of refreshment—or is it against your orders?”
Sergeant Hamilton and his man were with the RIC—the Royal Irish Constabulary. There were no strangers around Newry. Everybody knew everybody.
“You know fine well it’s against orders,” said Hamilton, an overweight, red-faced man, sweating from the effort of climbing the stairs. “What are youse doing here?”
P.J. smiled. “We could ask you the same thing, Sergeant. As for my friends and myself, we are taking a break from the commotion downstairs. We’re so popular our fans won’t leave us alone for a minute, so we come up here to clear our heads.”
Hamilton sniffed. He knew P.J. was lying, but what could he do? He walked around the room, hitting his baton against the walls and the floor. “I hear youse spend a lot of time up here,” he growled.
P.J. nodded. “Aye, we do so.”
Hamilton completed his inspection. Terrence and I looked down at the table, but Fergus watched the men as they prowled around the room. I could see he was sweating. Hamilton came to a sudden halt in front of him.
“Fergus Conlon?” he snapped.
“You know fine well who I am,” muttered Fergus.
“Stand up, then. We have orders to take you in for questioning.”
“On what charge?” cried Fergus.
The younger policeman snickered. Hamilton shot him a glare. “We don’t need charges. Suspicion is enough. Up with you now!”
Hamilton grabbed Fergus’s shoulders and heaved him to his feet.
“We can do this with or without handcuffs. I don’t suppose you’d want your… er, fans to see you led away like a criminal.”
I thought Fergus was going to spit in his face. Instead he said, “Feck you,” and walked toward the door. We watched in silence as he went. Then he turned to us.
“Save my place,” he muttered through clenched teeth.
“Take your time, lad,” said P.J. “Sure we can do without you for one night.”
We sat in silence as they trundled down the stairs and slammed the attic door shut. At last James and his men crawled out of the trapdoor. Then, out of the blue, Terrence blessed himself and murmured something in Latin. I had never seen him do that before. Maybe he had been a priest after all.
P.J. must have known what I was thinking.
“We’re going to need more than God on our side, Terrence.”
AFTER THE SCENE at the Ceili House, James was proved right. Things became more troubled all around. Street violence spilled over from Belfast and Derry into Newry. The curfew was ignored, and you took your life in your hands if you were on the streets after dark. Fergus had come back but was very tight-lipped about what had happened. His face was covered in bruises and his arm bandaged. There was a fury in his eyes I had not seen before. What he told James I don’t know, but after that James seemed to take him more into his confidence. James no longer shared as much information with me as he used to. He said it was best for my sake and the child’s. I knew better. It was just another way of letting me know I was not his equal, never was, and never would be.
After the troubles escalated, James was often away overnight, so when he didn’t come home one night in June, I didn’t worry. Aoife was in one of her crying moods, and I was preoccupied with her. I went to work at the mill the next day expecting to see him, but there was no sign of him. Shields came over and asked me where he was. I gave him a wise answer.
“How should I know? Women are supposed to let men go about their own business, aren’t they?”
He scowled. “Don’t get cheeky with me, lassie
. Production’s behind. I need to know where he is.”
“He’s sick,” I said. “He’ll be back tomorrow.”
But he wasn’t back tomorrow or the next day. I talked to some of the lads in his squad. They were tight-lipped. “He’s away, Eileen,” was all they would say.
“Sure I feckin’ know he’s away,” I shouted. “I want to know when he’s coming back. I have a child to feed.”
But they were silent. I supposed James was out on some secret assignment. My disappointment about being left out turned into anger. I was steaming mad. How could he go off and leave me and the child and not a word? I worried, too, about how long Shields would hold open his job. A week went by, and on the Monday next when I went to the mill, I saw a strange fellow kneeling down repairing a spinning frame. I marched up to him.
“Who the feck are you?” I demanded. “That’s my husband’s job!”
He leered at me, two yellow teeth protruding from his gums. “It’s mine now, lassie. Your husband’s loss—fine woman like yourself. Charlie Fagan at your service.” He bowed like an oul’ eejit and tried to take my hand. I pulled it away and walked straight into Shields’s office.
“What’s going on?” I demanded. “Why is that eejit out there?”
Shields fixed me with a stare. His face was stone. “I have a factory to run,” he said, “and James Conlon is off about his own business. Now get you back to work, or there’ll be no job for you, either.”
At first I had been so angry, it had not even occurred to me that James might be in danger or, God forbid, even dead. But as time went on, I began to fear the worst. My anger subsided and worry set in. Every noise, every knock at the door, sent me jumping. Aoife was anxious, too. She cried nonstop. Then one night I heard a scraping at the back door. I was afraid to open it at first. I stood in the dark listening, my heart pounding. Then I heard my name.
“Eileen!” came the whisper. “Eileen, let me in, for God’s sake.”
Shaking, I opened the door. There was James, stooped on his knees, a two-week growth of beard on his chin, his clothes in tatters. He looked like the devil. If I hadn’t known it was him, I would have been looking down at his feet for the cloven hoof.
My relief turned immediately to anger. “What in the name of God?” I shouted. “Where the feck have you been?”
“Let me in, Eileen,” was all he said. “I’m famished with the cold.”
As he sat warming himself by the fire, he told me that he had been on the run from the Constabulary since a job had gone badly astray.
“We were to kidnap Lord Brooke,” he said, “but the oul’ bastard got a tip we were coming and set up the alarm.”
“Lord Brooke,” I breathed. “Is it mad in the head you are?”
James grinned—a weak imitation of his old smile. “Sure you have to be bold, Eileen,” he said. “Anybody less would be hardly worth the trouble. Anyway, we’ll get him one of these days. He’ll be enjoying bread and water soon enough.”
Lord Brooke was one of the men who had called for the formation of the Ulster Special Forces to combat the nationalist activity. The worst of this group were the B-Specials, Ulster volunteers who numbered, some said, one hundred thousand strong. As far as I was concerned, they were thugs with a free license to kill and maim.
I bathed James’s bruises and pulled thorns from his bare feet. I made him strong tea with a shot of whiskey and gave him a blanket. He sat by the fire and sipped his tea. He looked up at me with those misty gray eyes of his that always softened my heart.
“I’m sorry, Eileen,” he said. “I’ve given you a lot of trouble, I know. But it’s all for a better—”
“Stop,” I said before he finished. “I know what you’re going to say. But I don’t believe it, James. How can abandoning your wife and child be for the better? I don’t give a feck what you say about the cause of Irish independence. Your place is here with me and your daughter.”
James looked surprised at the mention of Aoife. It was as if he had forgotten she existed.
“How is she?” he whispered.
“A holy terror,” I replied. “Just like yourself. She’s been raising ructions since you left.”
I couldn’t resist a small smile. James smiled, too, and reached for my hand.
We made love that night—sweet and hungry and anxious. Later, as I lay in his arms, I found myself thinking back over my life. How had I ended up here? Here in this bed with this man of passion and moods, a man with his own demons? If I had been looking for security and safety, James Conlon was the worst choice I could have made. And yet something in his restless nature had called to me; I recognized my own self in him. And together we had created a restless, rebellious child. Tiredly, I turned away from him and fell into sleep.
James was awake before dawn. I got up with him and made tea. We sat at the wooden table in the small kitchen, a gray light creeping through the window.
“What now?” I said. “Shields gave away your job.”
“I know,” he said. “I can’t go back in any case. There is too much to do.”
“But, James,” I blurted out, “for God’s sake, what if we can’t win this way? Isn’t it enough we have made headway in the elections? Surely in time the political process—”
I stopped as soon as I realized I was repeating Owen Sheridan’s words. It was the first time I had expressed any doubt, and it surprised me as much as it did James. He grabbed my wrist.
“It’s not over, Eileen. Not until we have a united Ireland. Too many good lads have died for it.”
He took a swallow of his tea and went on more gently, “Do you want us and Mary Margaret to live the rest of our lives in a place where we are treated like dogs, where we have no rights at all, where we have no jobs and no say in the government? In a place where the Ulstermen march with their drums banging in our ears, and give their righteous speeches ridiculing our religion? Is that what you want?”
For once I ignored his use of the child’s other name. “No,” I said. “It isn’t. But for God’s sake, James, why do we have to be the ones to make all the sacrifice?”
He looked at me solemnly. “Somebody has to, Eileen.”
He got up and put on the clean clothes I had washed for him. “I have to go now,” he said. “I’ll try to get money to you when I can. Kiss the child for me.”
He kissed me lightly on the cheek, took up the packet of sandwiches I had made for him, and was gone. I sat for a long time staring after him, until Aoife’s wails finally stirred me.
14
I saw James only once in a while after that. He came to the back door like a thief in the night, always looking like a cat dragged through a hedge backward. He was a far cry those days from the dandified James I had first met. I would clean him up and make him sandwiches. It occurred to me then that I had become just like the women I had complained about to Michael Collins: relegated to making sandwiches while the men fought. James brought money on occasion, and I never asked where he got it. It was well enough deserved, I thought, given the sacrifices we were making. But still and all, money was scarce, and without my job we would have been out on the street. I could no longer add to my savings account; in fact, I worried that one day I would have to draw it down. I kept to myself at the mill, avoiding Shields and keeping my mouth shut. The new fellow in James’s job did his best to get my goat, but I stared him down, and he finally gave up.
Word of the Troubles filled the newspapers. Killings on both sides were reported, and Belfast appeared to be in a state of near riot. It was no time to be Catholic in the North, and certainly no time to be an opinionated one. I prayed for James and cursed the Ulstermen.
I suppose I knew at some point they would come looking for him. One night in late August, an almighty rap on the front door made me jump straight up in bed. On cue, Aoife started bawling. I grabbed her from the cot and went downstairs, carrying her in my arms. Two uniformed men stood on the doorstep. B-Specials, the bastards, I thought as I recognized th
eir uniforms. They had their rifles drawn, and one was pointed straight at me and the child.
“Is this the house of James Conlon?” barked one of them. “Is he here?”
“He’s not.”
“When was he last here?”
The one that was doing all the talking was a big, burly customer with a head on him the shape of a bullet, pointed on top.
“He’s not been here,” I said. I was defiant, and I knew it was not good for me.
He angled his rifle and pushed it against my neck. I felt the cold, raw steel against my skin. He pushed me backward, and I almost lost my balance.
“No lies, missus, or you’ll get what’s coming to you. You can go to jail or worse for harboring a criminal.”
“Youse are the criminals,” I spat.
A younger fellow stood beside him, laughing under his breath. “She’s got a mighty mouth on her, Georgie,” he said. “Maybe we should teach her a lesson.”
Aoife squirmed in my arms and bawled louder.
“Shut that child up,” said Bullet Head, pushing me farther back on the doorstep.
I opened my mouth to shout at him, but a voice from the shadows startled me into silence.
“Leave the woman and child alone, Campbell,” he said. “Back away now. And lower your rifles, the both of you.”
Owen Sheridan stepped into the light. He wore a British Army captain’s uniform, and his voice was soft as a kiss. They minded him, though, the two of them backing away, growling beneath their breath. He stared at me, shock evident on his face. So he was here by chance, I thought. He had no notion this was my house.
He took off his peaked cap. “I apologize for my men, Mrs., er…?”
“Conlon!” I snapped.
He knew rightly who I was, but I guessed he did not want the bullies to know that. He looked straight at me, his eyes bright in the lamplight.
“I will need to ask you a few questions about the whereabouts of your husband. May I come in?”
Patricia Falvey Page 18