A Whispered Name

by William Brodrick

Though Muiris and Róisín wouldn’t give a second thought to the British or their laws, a shameful death would still crush them. They wouldn’t pay their taxes, but they’d be mortified if dragged to court on a summons.

  ‘What shall I say to them?’ asked Father Maguire.

  Flanagan thought for a long time. The candle was guttering. Bricks danced overhead, the meandering salt lines bright and unreal.

  ‘Tell my father I’ve returned to the land, and my mother that I saw wonderful things beforehand … unimaginable things. That I heard a nightingale on a summer’s evening. And tell Mr Drennan I died a rebel.’

  It wasn’t quite the protest the old Fenian would have dreamed of, but to his own mind Flanagan had made a stand nonetheless: in this place of chance and brutal uncertainties, he had chosen the manner of dying: and it had purpose; it had a meaning.

  ‘Seosamh?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Don’t hold out any hope. There’s nothing to be done. No one can help you now. I’m sorry to speak like this …’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Mr Moore has lost his senses, and when he returns to them he’ll understand what you’ve done.’

  Lisette. Did Lisette understand why he’d come with Owen Doyle, of all people; why he’d brought him to her? He thought of the hair he’d only touched once. It had been so very soft. This was a longing the matchmaker well understood. It was his business. ‘A man has need for a companion, Seosamh,’ he’d said. ‘Don’t be carried away with books.’ Beetle eyes, he had. ‘There’s flesh and there’s paper.’ A gambler he was, on horses and all four-footed things that crawled upon the earth. Flanagan hadn’t known his father had made soundings, that the matchmaker had been to see the fields. When Flanagan had walked down to the slip, the barley had been lush with promise. Did Lisette understand? Did she understand that Flanagan had gambled the trial, and lost, but won in another way?

  ‘Father?’

  ‘Yes, son?’

  ‘Will you ask Mr Moore to visit Lisette? I think he can explain to her why I came back; and maybe she can explain why I ran away. Would you do that for me, so?’

  ‘That I will.’

  Outside boots fell hard on the flags, coming closer. A lone marcher came ahead. The sentry stamped his foot. A rifle butt struck the ground. Orders were spoken with brittle authority. Keys rattled.

  ‘Father?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I’m frightened.’

  The priest’s grip was so tight that Flanagan’s knuckles crunched.

  ‘They’re early,’ said Father Maguire, thickly.

  Both men swung around on the bed and stood up as the door banged open. The candle flickered, casting light upon an officer. His Sam Browne belt glistened. A cap’s nib covered the forehead and the eyes were black.

  ‘Flanagan, out.’ It was Captain Chamberlayne’s voice. ‘I have no intention of using this firearm,’ he observed, holding a Webley & Scott with two fingers as though it were wet and sticky, ‘but I shall happily despatch you if you behave in a manner remotely unbecoming a member of the eighth Battalion. The same stipulation applies to you, Father, though I appreciate yours is a Divisional appointment. Either way, is that understood?’

  Flanagan flung a look to Father Maguire but he, too, was baffled.

  ‘I said, OUT,’ repeated the Captain, leaning against the wall, eyes lifted high.

  Flanagan walked up the steps, his left hand gripping his trousers. At the top the sentry moved to one side, his rifle lowered, the bayonet blade dull in the moonlight.

  ‘He’s more windy than I am, Flanagan,’ said the Captain by his ear, ‘so I wouldn’t scare him if I were you. Stop right there.’

  Flanagan’s eyes rapidly became accustomed to the night. The moon was high and nearby cloud shone with the same silver radiance. Ahead of him stood a line of men shoulder to shoulder … none with a helmet or cap. His heart beat viciously and the muscle in his bladder fluttered. ‘Can I relieve myself?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ said the Captain. ‘Take your time … in fact, I think I might join you.’

  After a short trip into a shadow Flanagan was back before the sentry with the lowered bayonet. Captain Chamberlayne appeared at his side, pistol once more held between two fingers. He swayed slightly and said, ‘Private, the men here gathered represent the interests of your battalion. They are the proud remnants of your section. With others they will play the Lancashire Fusiliers, but they will do so in your name. Now they wish to receive your handshake.’

  Each of the men who’d waited near Black Eye Corner for Flanagan’s return came forward and took his hand: Stan Gibbons, ‘Pickles’ Pickering, Tommy Nugent, ‘Chips’ Hudson, and the RSM, Francis Joyce. Mr Chamberlayne handed round cigarettes and then his lighter scraped, the flame revealing each face.

  ‘Have your got your head around the off-side rule yet, Joe?’ asked Pickles.

  ‘Sure, it’s a crazy notion,’ pouted Flanagan. ‘Ruins the game’s flow.’

  The banter ground to a halt. No one else could speak. They stood huddled and awkward, blowing smoke, tiny red lights whipping through the darkness.

  ‘Listen, Joe,’ muttered Joyce, ‘none of us think you left your mates. We don’t know what you did, but you were never a slacker, and never a deserter.’

  The rest added their strong agreement, thumping Flanagan’s shoulder, shoving his back, the rough gestures of desperate friendship.

  ‘You went off-side, mate,’ quipped Stan.

  They laughed and Captain Chamberlayne nodded at the RSM. The men shook Flanagan’s hand again and, before he could think of anything to express the scale of his emotion, they were dark shapes heading away from the school.

  ‘I know you’ve made a vow of some kind,’ said the Captain, ‘but this may ease things in the hours to come.’ He reached into his jacket and pulled out a bottle of whisky. ‘Start drinking at half past four. That’s not advice. It’s an order.’

  Flanagan took the bottle by the neck. ‘Thank you, Sir,’ he muttered. Not that far away he could just make out the road cutting through the flat fields towards the abbey. Joyce and the others were a bulk of huddled shadow upon it, crawling towards the camp; but another shape moved, opposite the school gates; a figure stepped out from behind a wall. Whoever it was didn’t budge another inch. He just watched.

  ‘Sir, would you pass on a message to Mr Hammond?’ said Flanagan.

  ‘Yes. What is it?’

  ‘Tell him there are lots of Flanagans in the army.’

  Turning his back to the silver sky and the moon and the range of stars, Flanagan descended the steps. When the cellar door had been locked shut Flanagan could just hear the Captain addressing Corporal Mackie. ‘Remember what I said. This didn’t happen. I may be drunk, but the RSM and his boys are sober, and they can be very nasty this side of no-man’s-land.’

  Father Maguire tipped the candle to drain the wax and the flame spread along the wick, lifting the light. Flanagan, feeling unsteady and bewildered, sat down on his side of the table. They each looked at the bottle between them: ‘Old Orkney’. An officer’s brand.

  ‘Well, now,’ said the priest, his mind made up, but seeking permission. ‘Do we break our vow?’

  Flanagan heard a crashing in his mind as Mr Drennan clattered down the steps to kick down the door. He imagined an almighty scuffle with the sentry, and the Fenian rising victorious with the keys held high. ‘Now is the time, boy,’ the phantom said. ‘You have brought the pink lands to their knees, now drink to their everlasting destitution.’

  ‘No,’ said Flanagan, no longer frightened – at least not in the same way. ‘I leave it to Mr Moore.’

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Pity the Disordered Mind

  Army HQ was located behind ornamental gates and at the end of a sweeping drive: a manorial dwelling with several weathervanes black against the night-blue sky. They were all pointing in different directions. Sentries positioned at both the gates and by the huge front door check
ed Herbert’s name and purpose, the last refusing him entry until a Colonel in full uniform appeared, bustling with importance and exhaustion in equal measure. On hearing Herbert’s demand he refused to disturb the army commander, be he known to the family or not. Instead he woke up the senior staff officer, a Major General, who eventually stood before Herbert resplendent in burgundy slippers and a capacious dressing gown, the hairs on his legs standing proud as if they were scared of the body from which they grew. Rousing him had not been a wise move.

  ‘What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing?’

  ‘It is a matter of the utmost urgency, Sir.’

  ‘Damn your urgency. Your appearance is a disgrace.’ His greying hair stood on end too.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Your boots … your buttons …’ He couldn’t speak any more because of his indignation. ‘What rabble do you come from? Which regiment—’

  ‘It’s all right, Lionel,’ said a voice with studied patience. ‘Send him up.’

  Standing at the top of a magnificent staircase, blocked by his outraged staff officer, was the General himself, one hand on the balustrade. He, like the Colonel at the door, was still in uniform, though the jacket was open revealing his braces – a deplorable state of affairs that would have broken Lionel had he turned round to honour his master’s voice. Instead he glowered at Herbert’s cuffs and collar, snorted, and marched through a pair of double doors held open by a mute Captain who closed his eyes as the wind swept past.

  ‘Take a seat,’ said General Osborne, closing his office door and pointing towards a hearth lit by a fire burned low. ‘It’s safe now, the lion is back in his den.’

  Herbert had met his army commander several times, but only two occasions stood out as important now: the first was at Sandhurst before receiving his commission, the second was at Keswick when his parents had decided to show Colonel Maude what they were made of. The General hadn’t changed in the slightest since that last encounter. His lower jaw seemed slightly advanced, suggesting a constitutional determination; the pencil moustache highlighted an uneven mouth; hair parted in the centre showed precision as his crowning trait.

  ‘You said your errand is of an urgent character?’

  ‘Yes, Sir.’

  The furnishings were limited to the essentials: a desk with a black ledger in the middle; a large oval dining table covered with Intelligence Reports; another desk to the right of the General’s, occupied by a typewriter; and a variety of chairs, closely arranged by the fireplace, into one of which Herbert slumped while the General poured them both a large glass of whisky.

  ‘Your father is well?’ said General Osborne.

  ‘I hope so, Sir.’

  ‘Your mother?’

  ‘She too, I hope, is well.’

  ‘You’ve been back to see them?’

  ‘No, Sir. I won’t go home until the war is over.’

  The General handed him the glass, but drew back just as Herbert was about to take it. ‘I think you ought to visit them. The winning is not immediately in view.’

  Herbert gulped the whisky and the General sat directly facing him, legs crossed.

  ‘How can I help you?’ General Osborne’s face barely moved. The effect was of a man wholly concentrating on a decision made or yet to be made, all other impulses subordinate to the mental processes involved; no gesture was wasted; his gaze was both calculating and assured. In his mid-fifties, he was much the same age as Herbert’s father, though the regiment had only held on to one of them.

  ‘Sir, I sat on a court martial,’ said Herbert, leaning forward in his seat. ‘The man was found guilty and condemned to death. The sentence was confirmed and he will be shot in three hours. I think this is a mistake.’

  General Osborne made no movement – either to stop or continue the argument – so Herbert pressed on.

  ‘Sir, I have got to know this man. He is a dreamer. A man of susceptibility. I believe he’s been rattled by what he saw at Messines last June. He was very shaken by the other side’s casualties. And now it’s as though he’s lost his wits while apparently remaining sane.’

  The General permitted himself a trace of a smile and instantly Herbert knew that he was thinking of Lionel. But his eyes were grave and unfeeling, his intellect locked on to Herbert’s submission. ‘You are speaking of the Irishman?’

  ‘Yes, Sir.’

  ‘He talks of the island he comes from as though it were a land of make-believe, somewhere his mind has run to, away from the ghastly realities of front-line duty. He’s mesmerising to listen to and somehow he dredges your own memory, stirring your own sense of loss, whatever it might be, and he brings you back to what you’d rather forget –’ all this was true; it had caused Herbert pain, and on that account he’d cut short every conversation, wanting to know more, but scared that Flanagan would undermine his own resolve – ‘but I’ve come to think, Sir, that he’s not fully responsible for his actions – not then, not now, not any more.’

  ‘This is the soldier who may or may not have gone to Étaples with another Irishman?’ The General looked at Herbert’s glass, and Herbert noticed that it was empty – he had no recollection of having tasted anything, though his throat was burning.

  ‘Yes, Sir, and that is the point, Sir; this Irishman, Flanagan, is no deserter. He did go to Étaples with a kinsman. But he was not avoiding any special duty. He was fulfilling another kind of obligation –’ the General took Herbert’s glass – ‘a duty recognised by a disordered mind, Sir.’

  The General poured Herbert a larger whisky than last time. His own stood untouched on a graceful three-legged table.

  ‘Sir,’ said Herbert, ‘Flanagan took someone to Étaples who’d twice been condemned by an FGCM and spared the ultimate sanction.’

  The General produced a handkerchief from his pocket, saying, ‘Yes, and twice I’d recommended that he be shot.’

  ‘Sir, that other soldier was not a man.’

  ‘Really?’ The tone was even, not mocking.

  ‘No, sir, he was a boy. Someone who should never have put on a uniform.’

  General Osborne’s face remained expressionless for a very long time. Revealing nothing of his thinking, he said, ‘Was this Flanagan medically examined?’

  ‘Not that I’m aware of, Sir.’

  ‘You say you got to know him? That you spoke with him about his island?’

  ‘Yes, Sir, I did,’ replied Herbert, not daring to show any eagerness.

  ‘In your judgement,’ asked the General, reaching for his glass, ‘would it have made any difference to the trial if he had been so examined?’

  Herbert didn’t want to reply: because it would involve him closing the one door that had just begun to open. But the truth was, an examination by Tindall back then would have achieved nothing. Just like an examination now would not change the direction of the machine moving towards Flanagan. All that Tindall would conclude was that his patient was completely sane, as normal as any other man in the regiment. But in that, he would have been wrong. Blinking rapidly, his mouth aflame, Herbert acknowledged that he, himself, was the man who’d lost his senses … along with Duggie, Chamberlayne, Joyce, Elliot and the Major General in his pyjamas. Flanagan had recovered his wits. His was not a make-believe world. It was the world no one else dare look upon or think about – ironically what they were fighting for, what each side was fighting for, shorn of someone else’s imperialism and, what did that ranting teacher call it? The politics of tenure?

  ‘No, Sir,’ said Herbert. His throat burned and again he saw an empty glass in his hand. ‘There is nothing medically wrong with Flanagan. He was in complete control of all his faculties.’

  ‘He is sane, then?’

  ‘Yes, Sir, he is completely sane.’ It sounded like an unforgivable offence. The world had turned upside down and Herbert’s mind reeled. We will shoot a man at dawn for having rushed headlong towards his humanity; for having reclaimed it from the barbarity of war and the monstrous scale of killing.
‘But he took a boy out of the war, if that is madness.’

  General Osborne had still not tasted a drop of whisky. He held the glass more like a prop in a serious drama, a gentleman who’d never taste the real stuff for fear he might fluff his lines. ‘Why have you come to me?’

  ‘Because you are a man who gives unworthy men a second chance.’

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Father Andrew, the Prior, called the meeting because he believed strongly in communal discernment when resolving a problem. Sometimes, in Larkwood’s life, these gatherings simply traversed the obvious (to the irritation of all) but at others, a breakthrough would take place, often through the surprising contribution of someone judged insensitive to the matter in hand. And so a week after Anselm’s return from Bolton, the Prior invited Sarah and David Osborne to Larkwood. He wanted them to be present when Martin Reid shared the outcome of his research into the background of John Lindsay. They were also members of the loose community that had gathered around the trial of Joseph Flanagan.

  For the meeting Anselm prepared a fresh dossier. All the participants were given a copy and brought to the large parlour. There were two bottles of water on the table but no glasses, an unfortunate Gilbertine touch to what might have been a fairly impressive performance. Anselm brought with him the Manual of Military Law as a kind of relic, conscious that no one was likely to open the cover.

  The Prior thanked everyone for attending. ‘I seek your patience and your help,’ he said, eyebrows bristling, his gaze roving and kind. ‘We’ve come to an understanding of the past. Perhaps it is flawed. If so, correct us. We don’t know what step to take next. If you can, guide us.’ He raised a hand to Anselm.

  Anselm began towards the middle of the story.

  He began with the first certainties of the matter: Joseph Flanagan had left his section at or about midnight on the 26th of August escorting a wounded officer. By 1.45 a.m. he’d reached the Regimental Aid Post and by 2.00 a.m. he’d set off on the return journey.

  Anselm unrolled the map showing the Ypres Salient and the disposition of the British troops. ‘We also know that a soldier named Doyle, a private in The Lambeth Rifles, was with his unit immediately behind the Northumberland Light Infantry, and that he and his comrades were due to follow through the assault when the order was given. Doyle, however, lost both his nerve and his senses, seemingly at the last minute. He was noted to be absent at roughly one a.m. I say lost his senses because he didn’t run backwards and neither did he head sideways … he went ahead, drifting – I imagine – directly into the return path of Flanagan.’ Anselm pointed to an imagined spot, somewhere between the British front line and Black Eye Corner. ‘I picture a very frightened and disorientated individual, not least because this runaway had nowhere left to go. He was, I imagine, just waiting to be caught.’