The Bogside Boys

by Eoin Dempsey

  “I know he has his prisoner rehabilitation program, his outreach with ex-loyalist paramilitaries. I know he was in once too, back before you went inside.”

  “He does his thing, and I do mine. We’re twins, but we’re not attached at the hip. He’s taken his path, and I’ve taken mine. He doesn’t concern himself with my business.”

  “And what about you? Are you going to set up your own prisoner rehabilitation program? Are you reaching out to UVF butchers?”

  “Pat has his way of helping the community and I have mine. He knows nothing of what I do. He doesn’t want to. We both want the same thing - peace and justice for the people of this province.”

  “Peace.” Tony shook his head as if the word was a curse he’d caught a child using. “There’s too much talk of peace these days. Our masters in the IRA are talking with your brother’s lot in the SDLP. Sinn Fein has recognized the government in the south and their candidates are standing in elections. It’s all a distraction, a waste of time and energy. That’s what my mission is, Doherty, to wake up the Catholic people of this province, and to bring the other Irish, the people in the south, back into a war they’ve dismissed as an irrelevant irritation. The Protestants and the Brits don’t understand anything but brute force. That’s the reason I asked to meet you on Rossville Street. I wanted to remind you of what we’re up against. I wanted you to be in the place where they murdered your father and all those other poor delusional marchers in 1972.”

  Hot, bare anger poured through Mick as he listened to Tony speak of his father. Mick stared out at the darkened street in front of the car and thought of how disturbed his father would be that those who worshipped at the same altar of insane violence that killed him were holding him up as a martyr. Mick bit down on his lip so hard he almost drew blood. Tony seemed not to notice, wasn’t looking at him and kept on talking.

  “Until our final victory, there’s no place for peace in this struggle. Peace without victory is surrender,” he continued, taking a long drag on his cigarette. His gravelly voice was harsh, every word delivered as a denunciation. “And if I can instill that thought in people’s minds then I’ll be remembered fondly by future generations of republicans.”

  “So what do you intend to do?” Mick asked. Just sitting in the car with this man was enough to make him feel changed. He’d met hundreds of IRA men in his life. Some of them were vicious killers, some of them were misguided young men with sincere intentions and pure hearts, but he’d never met anyone quite like Tony Campbell. The level of hatred in him was frightening to behold, as if it was all that sustained him, was all he had to live for. Mick wondered about his life outside the IRA. Sean had mentioned that he had a child, a three-year-old girl, with an ex-girlfriend. It was hard to see him as a father, impossible to imagine him showing love or compassion. Yet Sean had told him that he saw his daughter every day, that he was an excellent dad. It just didn’t seem to fit.

  “I intend to give this generation what it needs,” Tony continued. He was finally looking at Mick, his eyes two black marbles in his face. “Your generation had Bloody Sunday, and we’re eternally thankful to those martyrs who died that day.”

  Mick had to hold himself back. His father died for nothing. He knew that. The memorials were kind and it was heartening to know he’d not been forgotten but all his father’s death, as well as the deaths of the other people that day, had promoted was more violence, more death and despair, more broken lives and heartache. But people like Tony Campbell would never accept that, would never accept that his father had never intended to die that day on 1972, and wasn’t killed because of his religious beliefs or the love he felt for his community. Meaning only existed where and when it was inferred and that’s what made the idea of martyrdom so dangerous. All that had happened that day was murder and the men who’d murdered his father would never see the inside of a jail cell. The only justice was moving on, striving for a better life, and in the rejection of the insane violence that had killed him.

  “My generation had the hunger strikes,” Tony continued. “And the outpouring of national sympathy that occurred after that. What this generation needs is something to pin our colors to, and something to inspire young people throughout the country, north and south, to get up and join the cause. That’s what will bring us the final victory. You can mark my words.”

  Mick was almost speechless and just stared back at the void of Tony’s eyes. No feeling was perceptible there, and he knew that if Tony discovered his true intentions there would be no mercy.

  “You want to inspire the people of the south to join the war, to bring them in on a full war footing?”

  “That’s what it’s going to take to finally win this war. I’ve heard whispers of a ceasefire within the ranks of our fellow IRA volunteers. The hard truth of it is that they’re getting soft. They’re too old. They’re living in the past. Our bombing campaign now is little more than an irritant to the politicians in Stormont and Westminster. We need to take it upon ourselves to escalate this conflict into a full-scale war, to clear out the negative elements in our communities and to finally win after twenty years of treading water.”

  Mick supposed that Tony’s ‘negative elements’ were the Protestants, the hardcore loyalists at a minimum.

  “I couldn’t agree with you more. We need to bring this war to the population at large, the people avoiding it here, the people down south, the immigrants abroad. We could garner huge support from America. They seem to realize the nature of things here.” Mick felt the smile come to his face. His acting was good. “Its refreshing to hear a man with big ideas, who’s not willing to sit back and let the status quo rule. It’s men like you who began this struggle, who won the freedom in the south they now take for granted, that we have to earn. These are the types of ideas that people like Padraig Pearse and James Connolly had, sentiments of the kind Robert Emmett or Wolfe Tone first came up with. These are important ideas, and I’d love to be a part of this, to be there as history is made, or perhaps even to play a part in it.”

  Tony stubbed out his cigarette and turned to face front again. “I’m flattered that you’d mention me in the same breath as Irish republican heroes like Pearse and Connolly, Wolfe Tone and Robert Emmett, and I’m glad that you can see that it’s those type of ideas that I’m aspiring to. People within the IRA will call me a dissident or a separatist. Some may even call me a traitor for going behind my superiors’ backs in planning this, but when they recognize this as the inciting incident for our generation, the incident that leads to the transformation of our struggle, they’ll be erecting statues to me all over this country.”

  Mick did his best to swallow the shock inside him. “What are you planning to do?”

  “There’s no need to quibble over the details, not yet at least, but rest assured that this is going to be happening soon. Provisions have been made and the process has begun.” Tony turned to him. “I’ve enjoyed meeting you, Mick. You’re exactly what my brother said you were: a committed republican, not bound to the existing power structures within the IRA, someone willing to do whatever it takes to advance our cause.”

  “I’m glad we see eye to eye,” Mick said, proffering a hand which Tony almost crushed as he shook it.

  Tony reached past Mick to open the passenger door to the street. “This is where we part ways. I’ll be in touch. Don’t leave town in the next few weeks, but more importantly, don’t talk to anyone about anything you heard tonight. I despise touts, Mick, more than the Brits, more than the loyalists, more than anything in this world.” Tony’s eyes burned like black coals as he spoke, each word a threat.

  “You and me both,” Mick answered, but his words stopped there. He stepped out of the car and onto the street. Tony stared at him for another second from the car before reaching over to shut the door. The car started and Tony drove off, the headlights scything through the darkness as he went. Mick stood still for a few seconds after he’d gone, his only movements that of his breathing. He had to tell
someone, Pat, the RUC, the IRA leadership, someone. The IRA would never approve of the type of mission Tony was talking about. Even they had their limits. Surely they’d stop him, but what if someone told Tony who’d leaked the information to them about the operation? And he had no details. He couldn’t go to the RUC with stories of a massive operation to escalate the war, he’d be laughed out of there, and the news would be just as likely to leak back to the IRA as if he’d gone to the leadership themselves. If he told his active service unit leader or someone higher up in the Derry brigade, Tony would find out and once that occurred his life span would be measurable in hours. Tony Campbell was the type of psychopath who volunteered to kill informers, who’d torture them just for his own pleasure. He could drop out, just pretend that he’d never had this meeting, but then what if Tony’s fantastic plans came to fruition? It was impossible to see his plan of bringing the people in the south into a massive, full-scale war to determine some future victory, but Mick had no doubt that a lot of people would die. It was probably a bomb, much like the type Tony had used to kill the British soldiers on the Buncrana Road in March, an operation lauded throughout the IRA as exemplary. Tony was a skilled killer. That much was beyond any doubt.

  Mick began to walk. He had no idea what to do and, without Pat to confide in, felt half a person. Pat’s house was about ten minutes walk away and, without making a conscious decision, he began to make his way toward it. The pressure behind his eyes was building, his brain felt set to explode. He couldn’t do nothing. This was what he and Sean had rejoined the IRA for. Maybe Tony wouldn’t even want Mick involved, maybe he’d just read about the operation the day after it happened, see the news reports on the TV. Maybe he’d never see Melissa again. Maybe all this time, since he'd gotten out of jail, had been wasted. He knew he couldn’t tell Pat; telling him would only endanger him, yet he longed to give into selfishness and reveal his secret life to his brother.

  He walked on, the street lights above him pouring yellow light onto the quiet streets below. Mick tried to listen for his father’s words, attempted to search his mind for his father’s voice, but it wasn’t there. He was thankful his father had met Melissa, even if it was only hours before his death. Somehow that had always validated her further in his mind. No other woman could ever come close to knowing him the way she did. But he couldn’t make her love him, couldn’t make her reciprocate the feelings he knew he had for her. He’d always known, had just tried to block them out. He felt the absence of her and wished beyond anything that she would have been waiting for him when he got home, that he could slip into bed beside her, making sure not to wake her as he flicked the light off and settled down to sleep. It didn’t seem too much to ask.

  He found himself at Pat’s front door, not quite sure how he’d gotten there. It was almost eleven o’clock, but the light in the front room told him his brother was awake. He couldn’t account for the half hour since Tony had dropped him off. It was only a ten-minute walk to Pat’s house. The time had just evaporated, just as whole years of his life had disappeared, had faded into nothing like ripples expanding in water. They’d meant nothing, not even to him, had only been leading to this. Mick tapped on the living room window and stood back to wait for a response. The curtain ruffled and he saw an inquisitive look on Pat’s face as he looked out. Pat opened the front door for his brother a few seconds later.

  Pat’s initial happy expression changed as soon as he laid eyes on him and Mick knew he’d have to tell him something. “How are you doing? You don’t look so great, is everything OK?”

  “Yeah, I'm all right.” Mick pushed past his brother and inside the house. The television was on, but there was no other sound. Mick went into the living room without another word and flopped down on the couch.

  “Can I get a drink?”

  “Of course,” Pat replied and went to the cabinet in the corner, taking out a bottle of whiskey with two tumblers. He poured a couple of fingers into each before handing one to Mick. They clinked their glasses together before each took a sip.

  “So, what’s going on?” Pat inquired. “I’m always happy to see you, but I wasn’t expecting you at this time on Monday night, looking like that.” He pointed. “You were fine this morning.”

  Mick ran fingers through his hair. Coming here was a bad idea but staying away was impossible. Escape was out of the question now.

  “I’m fine. You were right; there is a girl. A woman. There’s a woman in my life.”

  “Somehow it doesn’t seem like things are going well.”

  “Not really. It’s complicated.”

  “One of the great things about being your own boss is that you can stay up late on Monday nights listening to your brother’s women problems without the worry of coming in late the next morning - I’ve got time.”

  Mick pushed out a heavy breath and raised the tumbler to his mouth. The whiskey seemed to fire his throat as he swallowed it back.

  “Yeah, the girl’s Melissa Rice.”

  Pat’s face fell almost to the floor. “Melissa Rice from when we were kids, who was on the march on Bloody Sunday with us?”

  “That’s her. I can’t seem to shake her.” He grinned, trying to force a laugh that wouldn’t come. “I met her again last September. She was in my college course. Monday nights with Melissa soon became the highlight of my whole week. It must sound ridiculous now.”

  “No, of course not. Is she available? I thought a girl like her would have been married off long ago.”

  “Divorced, with a son. He’s fifteen or so, maybe fourteen. She doesn’t mention him much. We talked about everything but him.”

  “Are you seeing her now?”

  “No,” Mick took another sip of whiskey. “It’s much more pathetic than that. We chat, every week. We’ve met up after class for coffee for the last eight or nine weeks in a row. I haven’t even kissed her.”

  “But…”

  “But I love her, and class is over now. The exams are next week and I don’t know if I’m ever going to see her again after that.” Mick shifted in his seat, suddenly uncomfortable. He longed to tell him about being in the IRA, about Tony and his insane plan to plunge the city back into the bloodbath of the early seventies once more, but he couldn’t and it was destroying him inside. “I’m pretty sure she has feelings for me, although she hasn’t said it. She said she needed time. I gave her my number.”

  “She’ll call you, don’t worry about anything, little brother. She knows a good thing when she sees it. It’s difficult for her, with her background, and your history, but she’ll come to you. Mark my words.”

  “There’s something else – she’s leaving, going to college in Dublin or London. She’s not sure yet. Her son, Jason’s going with her. They’re all set to leave in the next few months.”

  Pat sat back in his seat, taking a long sip of the amber liquid. “She’ll come to you and when she does, you should go with her. New place – new start. There’s too many ghosts here, too much history dragging us back. I sometimes wish I could live in a place with no memory, where the reminders of everything I’ve seen and done in my life aren’t all around me every day. You should go. Everyone here deserves a chance to start over, and this could be yours.”

  Chapter 24

  Weeks drifted past with nothing from Tony. Sean assured Mick that his brother had been complimentary in the brief mention that he’d given their meeting on that Monday night in Bogside. Speculating on what Tony might have been planning became a near obsession. Sean thought that he might have been planning to assassinate a loyalist politician. Perhaps James Molyneaux, the leader of the Ulster Unionist Party or even Ian Paisley, the more radical and substantially more hated leader, and founding member of both the Democratic Unionist Party and the Free Presbyterian Church. But that didn’t seem possible. Getting to either of those two men, the most powerful unionist politicians in Northern Ireland, seemed beyond the capabilities of Tony Campbell or indeed any IRA man. Killing one of them, particularly Ian P
aisley, would enrage the loyalist population and would be a call to arms for hundreds, if not thousands, of disaffected Protestant young people all over the province. Mick didn’t think that even Tony Campbell would be audacious enough to attempt that. He guessed that Tony’s attack might be on the Guildhall, the seat of the local council in the city and the symbol of Protestant domination. The 300th anniversary of the siege of Derry was coming, a massive event for the Protestant, male-only, Apprentice Boys of Derry society, and the unionist community that supported them. Tension during that march in 1969 had caused the Battle of the Bogside. That had led to the formation of Free Derry and the arrival of British troops in Northern Ireland, which most people recognized as the beginning of the Troubles. Hitting that would be equally insane, and be just as likely to ignite smoldering hatreds and lead the province into a firestorm of violence. He’d told no one and neither had Sean. It was their responsibility alone.

  The summer sun was bathing the city, illuminating everything as spun gold as Mick walked home from work. He thought back to the night he’d told Pat about Melissa. Pat had asked him about Melissa several times since, but the truth was that there’d been little to tell. She’d been there at the exams, but somehow they’d regressed. They didn’t speak and hadn’t spoken since. Seemingly it had all been too much for her – not that he could blame her for taking the easier option. How could she tell her son, a young boy from Waterside, that his new stepfather would be a convicted IRA terrorist? Melissa knew the circumstances of his time in jail, of course. She knew the real story but would that matter? People still remembered the killings and would remember his name. Finding out who he was wouldn’t be difficult, but living with him after that certainly would be. The time they’d had together had been a beautiful distraction, but only that. He’d sacrificed his own happiness many years ago. It seemed a high price to pay for the folly of youth.

  It was a Monday night. Mondays didn’t seem the same anymore, and probably never would be again. The flat was empty, and he didn’t want to be alone, so he drifted into a pub, took a seat at the bar and sat there among strangers for a couple of hours. Just a few cursory words about what was on the television and the weather outside constituted conversation as he sat there. It was awful, but still preferable to the loneliness of his apartment. He should have called over to Pat. He could have played with the kids and sat down with them to dinner, but somehow the feeling of always being with someone else’s wife and children was beginning to weigh on him. It seemed like his chance had passed. It seemed that his only worth now was to disrupt Tony, to be a protector of people who’d likely as not openly despise him, and who’d certainly never show him the least bit of gratitude. He picked the beer off the bar and finished the rest. The barman glanced at him, but he got off the stool, shaking his head. This had to end. He needed to get over this. There was still life left to live and still causes to fight for. The night air was warm and sticky against his skin as he stepped out, the light of the sun still high in the June sky. It was almost nine o’clock, almost their time. He thought back to the last time he’d seen her. The pathetic wave she’d given him had told him all he’d need to know. They only saw each other once on each of the two nights the exams had lasted. That was it. No tearful goodbye or painful breakup, only the void left inside him, only the useless love for her he still felt with every passing breath.