In Dublin’s City

by Rhys Bowen

  With a reluctant look up Sackville Street, I climbed back into the cab, which proceeded down Grafton Street with its busy shops and restaurants, coming out eventually to a lovely leafy park ringed by elegant Georgian buildings.

  “Here we are, miss. Shelbourne Hotel,” the cabby said, eyeing me with interest. Clearly he wasn’t sure that I belonged at such a grand establishment as the Shelbourne and was waiting to see what I did next. As I was paying him, a carriage arrived and disgorged a lively group of passengers, the women dressed in the height of fashion with ostrich plumes dancing in jaunty little hats.

  “That's the trouble with servants, isn’t it?” one woman was saying loudly in strident upper-class English tones. “Simply unreliable, darling. Now I’ve no idea what I’m supposed to do.”

  “Come and have lunch with us and forget all about it,” a second woman suggested. She turned to a distinguished white-haired man beside her and laid a dainty hand on his shoulder, “Shall you be lunching with us, Reggie? I shall be devastated if you refuse me.”

  “How could I refuse you anything, Grania? You know I’m completely bewitched by you,” he said.

  With that they passed into the building. I stood watching them go. I couldn’t possibly follow them in, could I? I was painfully reminded that they belonged in a place like the Shelbourne, whereas I was an interloper. I was as far removed from them as from the man in the moon. Then I decided that such humility was quite unlike me. I’d not been known to hang back in deference to my betters,- in fact, most of my life I had been scolded for having ideas above my station. I wanted that cabby to see me making my own grand entrance, and, what's more, I didn’t want to find myself paying for luggage that wasn’t mine. Miss Sheehan had promised me an extra fee for taking care of her trunks, but Miss Sheehan had not proved herself to be completely reliable so far, had she? So I plucked up my courage, instructed the cabby to hand my bag to the bellhop, and went in through the front door.

  “May I help you, miss?” the young man at the reception desk asked in a not-too-friendly tone. I could see him sizing up whether I was respectable enough, of the correct class to be crossing his vestibule. I mentioned the trunks that had been shipped there in my name and asked if they had been collected yet. At this his face became friendly.

  “Miss Murphy? We’ve been expecting you. Your room has been held for you all week.”

  “My room?”

  “We were instructed to hold a room for you. Your luggage is inside, awaiting your arrival. Have you more bags to be collected?” He glanced down at the small valise at my feet.

  “There must be some mistake,” I said. “I was not proposing to stay here myself. I was merely carrying out the wishes of a friend to have luggage shipped here in my name.”

  He looked perplexed now. “You’re not planning to stay in Dublin after all? Will you not be needing the room then?”

  “I may be staying in Dublin, but I’m afraid the Shelbourne may well be a little too expensive for my pocket book,” I said.

  “But the room is already paid for,” he said. “Two weeks in advance.” “Paid for? Who paid for it?”

  “I have no way of knowing that, miss,” he said. The look he was giving me hinted that it was none of his business to inquire into such things, and I suddenly realized that he thought I was here for some sort of illicit tryst. The thought was so absurd that I had to smile.

  “It would probably be my employer in America who set the whole thing up for me,” I said firmly.

  “Probably,” he agreed. “Would you like to sign the book, and then I’ll have one of the boys show you up to your room.”

  As I signed the book beside my name I realized that I was registered here as Molly Murphy. If anyone was tracing me, it was as good as waving a flag from my window and shouting, “Here I am.”

  “Let me get your key, Miss Murphy,” the clerk said. He was about to hand it to me when a man came up to the counter, literally brushing me aside.

  “Still no messages for me?” he demanded.

  “I’m afraid not, Mr. Fortwrangler,” the clerk replied.

  I dared not look at him.

  “And still no word where Miss Oona Sheehan might be staying?” “No word at all, Mr. Fortwrangler.”

  “I just can’t understand it. She can’t have vanished into thin air, can she?”

  “I’m sure she has plenty of friends and family in the country,” the clerk said patiently. “She may not want her whereabouts to be known.”

  “Look here,” Artie Fortwrangler said. “There's a twenty-dollar bill for the guy who finds her for me. Spread the word around, won’t you, Freddie?”

  “I will, Mr. Fortwrangler, now if you’ll excuse me, I have to get this young lady up to her room.”

  Artie Fortwrangler left me without even a second glance. I let out a sigh of relief. He didn’t recognize me without the wig and makeup. But he was clearly staying at the same hotel. It might be wise to stay wellaway from him in future. The clerk snapped his fingers and my bag was whisked before me up a broad staircase to a grand room on the first floor overlooking the green. It would have been more delightful if the floor had not again been littered with those large trunks.

  “You don’t exactly travel light, do you, miss?” the bell boy said.

  “I’m holding them for a friend,” I said. “I had hoped she would have arranged to pick them up by now. Is there somewhere we could store them, do you think?”

  “I’ll ask for you,” he said, accepted my tip and disappeared.

  I was left with the obstacle course again. At the very least I should have asked the boy to drag the trunks into a corner. I attempted to do so myself. As I yanked it down the edge of the carpet onto the parquet I heard a distinct clunk. Clothing would make no such noise, so what on earth was in there? I tried to open the trunk, but it was one of the ones that was locked. By now I was well and truly curious. I tried every key I could lay my hands on—the wardrobe, my train case, and at last, in desperation, my hairpins. Suddenly I heard the lock click, and I lifted the lid. A lovely coffee-colored silk ball gown lay neatly folded. I lifted it out. Below it the next layer was tucked neatly into a blanket. I opened that up and found myself staring down at a layer of rifles.

  Eighteen

  Iwas finding it hard to breathe as I rummaged beneath those first rifles and found more of the same, each layer wrapped in a blanket. The whole trunk was full of guns. When I removed the dresses from the unlocked trunks I found that both had false bottoms and they too contained rifles and ammunition.

  For a moment I wondered whether Miss Sheehan was a crook, and then, of course, I began to suspect where they were destined. I had come across Irishmen in America supporting the cause of the freedom fighters back in the old country by sending over money and guns. It had never crossed my mind that Miss Sheehan could be such a patriot. A cowardly one, however, I decided. It was I who would find myself in hot water if the guns were discovered, since they had been sent across the country in my name. And she was safely on the other side of the Atlantic. It did cross my mind to wonder if she knew about the guns or whether we were both being used by outside forces. Then I decided that she knew very well. Why else would she have jumped ship right before it sailed. Why else would she have had the trunks shipped in my name?

  I’ll call in the authorities, I thought, bristling with indignation. I’ll let them know the truth. That whole business of trading cabins had nothing to do with unwanted admirers, it was all a hoax to make me do her dirty work for her. I paced up and down in a height of agitation. I didn’t want those things in my room a minute longer. If the policeraided now, I’d be hauled off to Dublin Castle and likely as not be facing the hangman's noose.

  But then when I calmed down a little, I sat on the edge of my bed to think. There was a possibility that I’d still find myself under suspicion if I turned to the police. I was possibly still a suspect in the murder of Rose McCreedy. In their minds the rifles and the murder might be linked—mayb
e they were linked somehow. I paused to consider this new twist. I had always thought that Rose had been killed by someone who mistook her for Miss Sheehan, and I had thought that that someone would be a jilted lover or spurned admirer. But what if Rose knew more than was good for her? That meant that these were people not to be trifled with, one of whom had paid for my hotel room, someone who would not take it kindly if I betrayed him or her. I had no wish to end up like Rose.

  And it would only be my word that the trunks were destined for Oona Sheehan and she, safely across the pond, didn’t have to answer any of their questions. I would be seen as a junior lackey who had lost my nerve.

  There was also the matter of patriotism. I was all in favor of home rule, wasn’t I? And every home rule bill had been defeated in the English parliament, which seemed to indicate that our freedom wasn’t to be won by peaceful means. But did I really want to encourage violence? The killing of innocent people? Soldiers, policemen, even bystanders?

  I got up and paced again. This was a decision for which there was no right answer. I found that cold sweat was trickling down my forehead. A good Irishwoman would want the English out of her country, wouldn’t she? Hadn’t I grown up with no cousins or aunties or grandparents because my whole family had been wiped out in the potato famine while the English landowners did nothing but hasten evictions and burn cottages? And if I alerted the police to these guns, then maybe I would be responsible for bringing down a whole network of freedom fighters and thus delaying the Irish cause for years.

  I decided to do nothing for now. Someone might come to pick up the trunks. I’d ask no questions, tell no lies and, get on with my own life. The rifles were none of my business. I was here to find out what hadhappened to Mary Ann Burke. I closed the trunk again, hearing the lock click back into place, then carefully replaced the layers of dresses over the false bottoms in the other trunks, spruced myself up, and went downstairs. My hotel room had been paid for, I had money to spend, and I was going to have a darned good meal in the dining room. The maftre d’ could tell, with that uncanny sense they seemed to possess, that I was not really the right class of person to be dining at the Shel-bourne. He didn’t exactly sniff, but he led me to a table behind a potted palm tree, with his nose in the air. This suited me just fine. I could observe and not be observed.

  The merry party that had arrived just before me were seated at a big table at the center of the room, still talking and laughing with the ease of those born to the upper class. The elegant lady in the fashionable costume was holding court, telling an amusing story that held her table-mates enthralled.

  “You are quite wicked, Grania,” one of them said, when they had finished laughing.

  “Not I. I am merely relaying the words of one with more wit and talent than I,” she said. “You’ll be coming to the opening tomorrow night, I’ve no doubt. Then I’ll introduce you, and you’ll meet him for yourself. He's going to be the talk of the town, I’ll wager.”

  “And anything you take a wager on has a remarkable way of being a winner, as I sorely remember from last year's Grand National,” one of the men remarked.

  “Ah, well, I do know my horses,” the lady replied.

  “You certainly ride divinely.”

  “You are such a flatterer, Dermott.”

  The young man leaned closer. “So tell me, Grania. What do you think of Mr. Yeats as a dramatist? A poet, I agree, but will his play be a torment of dreary Celtic poetry?”

  “It stars the delectable Maud, my love. Can you not endure dreary Celtic poetry for her sake?”

  The young man sighed. “If one must, for the sake of art, then one must. But to tell you the truth, I’d rather be at the Music Hall, watching the cancan.”

  “You always were a philistine, Dermott.”

  “I resent that deeply. I thought that fellow Quinlan's work was splendid. Sent quite a shiver up a fellow's spine.”

  “There will never be another Cullen Quinlan,” Grania said. “A great loss.”

  The mention of this Cullen subdued them, and they ate in silence while I studied the menu and ordered brown Windsor soup, roast beef, and Yorkshire pudding, and finished it off with bread-and-butter pudding. New York cuisine had a lot that was good about it, but you’d have to go a long way to beat good Irish beef and bread-and-butter pud!

  After I had eaten I went to Reception and inquired about theaters in the city. I told the clerk I’d a mind to take in a good play tonight. If Ter-rence Moynihan had been a poet and playwright, then his name might be known among the theater crowd.

  “Theaters? You’re spoiled for choice,” the clerk said. “There is a delightful musical at the Gaiety and a very good rendition of Mr. Dick-ens's A Christmas Carol at the Olympic. On the other hand, if your taste runs to the more highbrow, you’d better wait until tomorrow night when a new play opens at the Ambassador, written by none other than Mr. Yeats, the poet. His new Irish Literary Theatre, you know. And you won’t be at all surprised to hear that Miss Maud Gonne is in the leading role.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  He leaned closer. “The whole of Dublin knows that he's sweet on her, but she won’t have him. He proposes and she turns him down, over and over. That's what the crowd will be going to see tomorrow, not the beauty of his words, but the sparks flying between them.”

  “At the Ambassador, you say,” I said.

  He nodded. “And in the meantime tonight, go and enjoy yourself at the Gaiety. I hear the play was a smash success on Broadway in New York. Oona Sheehan was the star over there. She stays here sometimes, you know. What a vision of loveliness she is.”

  “She stays here, does she?” I asked. “Has anyone been here asking for her recently?”

  “Why would they do that? The whole country knows when she comes to visit. They wouldn’t need to ask for her. We have a line of young men waiting hopefully for her all around the green.” He smiled.

  I wasn’t going to get any further on that tack.

  “Tell me,” I said, “have you heard of a playwright called Terrence Moynihan?”

  He grinned. “I’m not the person to ask about playwrights. I wouldn’t know Shakespeare from Oscar Wilde, except that one of them died in jail.” He laughed at his own joke.

  I bade him good day and went out into the street, wondering who might know about Terrence Moynihan. The priest in Tramore had called him poet, playwright, orator, and patriot, if I remembered correctly. Someone in intellectual circles in Dublin must have encountered him. And the most intellectual circle that I could think of would be Trinity College, just a stone's throw away up Grafton Street. As I approached it, I was again struck by the sheer beauty of those buildings. Carefree young men drifted between them, not even noticing how lovely they were. I walked around the railings and was about to enter through the main gate when a porter in black uniform stepped out of the gatehouse and stopped me.

  “Where do you think you’re going, miss?” he asked.

  “To ask the college professors questions about a playwright,” I said haughtily.

  He laughed. “That's a good one. You know as well as I do that no females are allowed on college property. Nor will there ever be, no matter how hard they try. Go on then. Off with you.”

  Seething with righteous indignation, I had to retreat. I knew little about universities, but I had assumed that this was the twentieth century and women were no longer barred from places of higher learning. It seemed I was wrong. I stomped off, muttering and at a loss what to do next, and almost collided with a young woman.

  “I see you’ve encountered the ever-civil watcher at the gate and been rudely repelled,” she said, with a twinkle in her eye. She was petite but by no means delicate looking, and she spoke with no trace of an Irish brogue.

  “I only wanted to speak to one of the professors,” I said. “I had no idea that women would be barred from entering in that manner.”

  She laughed. “They’ll fight the admission of women to Trinity with their dying
breaths,” she said. “Fortunately, we have crusaders on ourside, campaigning with equal ferocity to have women admitted. Miss Alice Oldham is our greatest champion. Have you met her yet?”

  “I’ve only just arrived in Dublin,” I said. “I live in America these days.”

  “Where women have greater freedoms?” she asked. “We are still denied the vote,” I said. “Still not allowed to enter a saloon.”

  “Then you’re equally oppressed,” she said. “And presumably you haven’t had a chance to attend a meeting of the Inghinidhe na hEire-ann.”

  “The what? I’m afraid I don’t speak the Irish language.”

  “The daughters of Erin. It's a society for the promotion of women and all things Irish, founded by Maud Gonne.”

  “The actress?” How strange that the same names kept cropping up.

  “Acting is the least of her talents,” the young woman said. “She has great visions for the future of Ireland with an educated and liberated womanhood standing side by side with the men.”

  “Then I should most like to attend a meeting,” I said.

  “I’ll be happy to introduce you next time we meet, if you are still in Dublin,” she said.

  “I’m only on a short visit,” I said, “but I’d certainly like to come to a meeting with you if I’m still here.”

  “My name is Alice. Alice Wester.” She held out her hand.

  “And I am M—Mary Delaney.” I only remembered the alias at the last moment. “I’m pleased to meet you, Miss Wester.”

  “Call me Alice, please. Within the Daughters of Erin we are all sisters alike. Queen Mab will be delighted to welcome you.”

  “Queen Mab?” I asked. “Wasn’t she the queen of the fairies?”

  “Indeed she was, but this one is living and breathing and mortal, and one of the leaders of our organization—although who she really is, I couldn’t say.”