by Aubrey Flegg
‘But, Paddy, the walls are too steep. There’s a danger of a fall,’ said Father. ‘Our plan is –’
‘Stuff and nonsense! What sort of men are you? This is the safest quarry in Tipperary. Can’t you walk out from the bottom through the cut if a fall is going to happen?’
‘But how can you know when a fall is about to take place? The rocks don’t tell you!’ asked Mr Parry incredulously.
‘But the goats do, the goats do!’ said the old man triumphantly.
‘Goats?’
‘Yes, goats. They live all over the tips above the quarry. If a fall is going to happen, after heavy rain maybe, the goats go off up the mountain. They know. All we do is keep an eye on the goats! We weren’t too scared to work down there before, why should you be now? The sweetest slate is there and with the sap in it too.’
So that was old Paddy’s line – rely on the goats to give a warning so the men could escape out through the cut. Katie knew Father would never agree to that. It was just too risky. There would be a lot of talk before Father would persuade Paddy though – and the men would follow Paddy. The talk was getting technical: safe angles of slope, faults and joints. Also, Katie was feeling uneasy. It wasn’t just the drop at her feet, it was the feeling of being watched. She scanned the hill above and then turned towards the cut. She stiffened. The man in the trench coat was still there. What is more, at that moment he lowered the pair of field-glasses he’d been watching them with and turned. Katie stood riveted. Where she had seen that coat before? He began to climb the hill, a black dog trotting at his heels. Then it all came back: at Uncle Mal’s – and the dog had been in the barn. A second man appeared beside the first and she turned to look at him. As she watched he turned too and she saw his profile clearly; it was Seamus! Now, what was Seamus doing there, she wondered, with a stab of resentment. Seamus should be here helping Father, and not … but a new thought struck her … where were the guns? Was it possible they were somewhere nearby?
Mr Parry was describing in detail how the quarry could be made safe and a new start made, but Katie’s mind was racing. There was a place, a secret place, that she and Seamus both knew about where things could be hidden. The quarry would keep. Those guns were like a thorn in her side now. Where was Dafydd?
CHAPTER 11
Gunpowder
Dafydd was standing at the quarry edge, his mouth open in amazement. Katie pulled him back, afraid he might absent-mindedly walk into the abyss.
‘What are you doing – catching flies?’ she laughed.
‘Goats!’ he said huskily. ‘Goats, Katie! Is he mad?’
‘No, it’s a fact.’ Katie couldn’t help laughing. ‘Come on, I’ll show you.’ She grabbed him by the arm. She wanted to see where the man in the trench coat was going, but Dafydd hesitated.
‘Maybe I should stay with Dad? What are they talking about now?’
‘Flying pigs perhaps,’ said Katie, remembering guiltily that Dafydd wanted to be a quarry-man. But she wanted him with her. ‘Come on, I want you to come with me, I’ll show you the goats.’ She led the way around the end of the quarry and up on to the slippery pile of waste slate. ‘Sligins, we call them,’ she panted over her shoulder.
They reached the crest of the tip-heap above the quarry, where there were the remains of a narrow-gauge railway, with wobbly lines and rotten sleepers. A steep little valley, filled with trees and bushes, was hidden between the tip-heap and the open mountain behind. Katie scanned the valley and the mountain slope; there was no sign of the man in the trench coat. Could he be in the trees?
‘The goats are usually in here,’ she said as she skated down the slope and ducked into a goat-sized green tunnel through the bushes. She could hear Dafydd following behind. There was a strong smell of goat and the path was soft with droppings. She had pressed on past some rocks, when a stifled exclamation came from behind her. She turned, and Dafydd was pointing up the rocky crag beside them, his eyes popping, to where, looking down at him, was an enormous billy goat, his china-man’s beard tucked into his chest.
‘Will he attack?’ Dafydd whispered.
‘Of course not,’ Katie replied hopefully. ‘We’ll just walk on quietly. You’re lucky,’ she said over her shoulder. ‘That’s the king of the goats. Usually all you see is old nanny goats.’ There was no reply. She turned, but Dafydd seemed to be on his knees worshipping the goat, his head in a crack in the ground.
‘Come on,’ she called. ‘He’s not an idol! And he may not be idle either.’ She was anxious, and in awe of the huge goat which was looking down at Dafydd curiously. She wanted to get on and the paths seemed to have changed since she and Seamus used to come up here. She ducked into one of the green tunnels. Dafydd was saying something but it was too narrow and prickly to turn, so she pressed on. After a while she found a place where she could stand up and cast about her, to get her bearings. Dafydd caught up.
‘Katie –’ he began.
‘There’s a little house in here somewhere which Seamus and I found years ago,’ she interrupted. ‘It’s where the young goats gather. I thought you’d like to see it. We weren’t able to get into it then, perhaps we could now.’
‘I ought to tell Dad about that crack, where the goat was.’
‘Oh, I thought you were praying to him. Do that later. There’s cracks everywhere. Let’s keep quiet while I see if I can find the place.’
The house, when she found it, was little more than a shed deeply buried in brambles. The goats, however, had opened tunnel-paths into it and there was an open space about the front door. It was a lot smaller than she had remembered and there were no goats there now. Neither was there any sign of the man in the trench coat. The walls of the house were made of huge blocks of slate and great slabs formed the roof. Katie wondered why it had been made so strong, like a small fortress. The door was made of iron and was held in place by a rusty padlock. She examined this carefully, disappointed that it was rusted up; it hadn’t been opened for years. There were no arms here.
Dafydd emerged from the bushes, looked at the house and said, ‘I know what that is.’ But Katie didn’t reply. She was looking for a stone to hit the padlock with.
‘This should do it,’ she said.
Dafydd looked up as she raised the stone.
‘Stop!’ he yelled in alarm, but he was too late. With a clang like a church bell the padlock spun off into the bushes. Katie lost her grip on the stone and jumped back as it crashed at her feet.
‘Why stop?’ she said. ‘Look, that was a wallop for you!’
‘Just don’t hit anything else,’ pleaded Dafydd. ‘I’m taking my boots off.’
Katie, puzzled, laughed and said, ‘You’ve been a good Frog today. You may keep your boots on.’
‘You don’t know what you nearly did!’ said Dafydd as he struggled with his laces. ‘That’s a magazine.’
‘Like the Illustrated London News?’
‘No, Miss O’Brien, not a picture magazine but a magazine that goes bang when girls hit it with stones. It’s a store where they kept gunpowder for the old quarry. Nobody is allowed to wear nailed boots, or carry matches or smoke, or hit things with huge rocks, in case they make a spark and blow everybody up.’
‘I bet there’s no powder in there now. Let’s look.’
‘Should we?’
‘Why not? It’s Father’s now anyway.’ Katie waited while Dafydd picked his way fastidiously through the goat droppings. The hinges squeaked and sprinkled them with rust as they pushed the door in. It was pitch dark inside.
‘I wish we had a candle,’ said Katie.
‘No you don’t,’ reminded Dafydd. Slowly their eyes adjusted to the dark. The shed was disappointingly empty. Some wooden boxes were aligned along one wall, one of which contained what looked like a spool of rope. There was a heap of sacks against the far wall. Katie pulled at these, then jumped back.
‘Spiders!’ she said in disgust.
Dafydd came forward. ‘There’s a barrel under here.’ H
e tipped the sacks off in a cloud of dust.
‘Careful, those spiders look explosive,’ said Katie.
The barrel had a wooden lid. Dafydd lifted this off and peered in. He dipped in his hand. ‘It’s half-full,’ he said.
‘Half-full of what?’
‘I don’t know – feels like sand – it could be gunpowder, for blasting in the quarry.’
‘It can’t be any good,’ said Katie. ‘It must be here since before the war.’
‘I don’t know if gunpowder goes bad, but this is as dry as summer’s dust. We could try a bit.’
‘Bang!’ said Katie hopefully.
‘No, more like fizz I think, but not –’
Katie grabbed Dafydd’s arm. ‘Shhh. … What was that? I thought I heard something.’ They both listened. She could feel the pulse racing in Dafydd’s arm. Then she heard the sound again, clearly, coming closer, paws on leaves, heavy crashing and panting. She wanted to get to the door to slam it shut but her legs wouldn’t move. It was like one of her dreams, only worse. Then she saw it, bounding along their trail – black, baying. She gasped, and then gulped. It was not baying at all but whimpering. It was a real dog and it was lost. It looked at them in startled surprise. Dafydd said, ‘Poor dog,’ but Katie hushed him. ‘But why, look, he’s lost,’ said Dafydd indignantly.
‘Let him go,’ whispered Katie. ‘I know who he belongs to. I don’t want this place to be found.’ A sharp whistle rang out from the hill above. The dog’s head shot up, and away it crashed in the direction of the sound. They waited till the noise had died away. Katie let go of Dafydd then.
‘Gosh, that gave me a fright,’ said Katie.
‘I thought you liked dogs.’
‘Not black ones.’ She paused. ‘Look, Dafydd, I should have told you before coming up here. You remember, last night, Seamus wouldn’t say where they’d hidden the stuff they’d captured from the barracks in Nenagh?’
Dafydd nodded. ‘Guns and ammunition, he said.’
‘Yes. I’ve been trying to think where they might have hidden it. Remember, Seamus was their guide! Now, why did Seamus clam up when he came to that part of the story? I’m sure it was because the hiding place is somewhere near here. Then, just now there was a man in a trench coat talking to Seamus down by the quarry, the same man that you heard talking up at Uncle Mal’s. I saw him set off up here, and he had a black dog with him. I was sure then that this was where they’d hidden the stuff, but then the lock was rusted up, so the arms must be somewhere else. I wish I hadn’t made so much noise.’
‘So, it was nothing to do with the goats?’
‘Look, Dafydd, I’m sorry, I should have said.’ Katie felt suddenly ashamed. ‘I know you want to be a quarry-man, I shouldn’t have taken you away. We’ll go back down now, I shouldn’t have involved you.’
‘I don’t want to be a quarry-man, that’s Dad’s idea … I want to be a reporter, or a mountain climber. I want to go back to school and become a genius, but that would disappoint Dad, wouldn’t it? He’s a slate man through and through,’ Dafydd sighed. Katie looked puzzled and was about to say, but your Dad thinks it’s you that’s pushing to become a quarry-man, when Dafydd went on, ‘What if you find the arms, or ammunition, or whatever? What then?’
‘I’ll tell Father about the guns, I suppose. He’ll know what to do, but he’s got other things on his mind at the moment. I just don’t want him discovering them by accident, or anyone else getting to use them. And now there’s this gunpowder. I don’t want Seamus’s crowd knowing about this either, God knows what they might use it for. I’d … I just thought it would be fun to search together.’
‘It would have been nice to have been told,’ said Dafydd as he laced up his boots.
They had some trouble finding the lock where it had landed in the brambles. It was so rusty, however, that they were able to force it back into the closed position without it being obvious that it had been opened.
Another short, goat-sized tunnel led them out to the back of the tip again. Katie jumped a narrow ditch, climbed to the top of the tip and turned to look back up the hill over the trees where the magazine was hidden. Had the man gone up or down? she wondered. He seemed to have a way of disappearing. She waited for Dafydd who had stopped and was grubbing about in the ditch.
‘Where are we?’ he called.
Katie turned. She could see the last of the men leaving the quarry yard and disappearing down the hill, on their way into the quarry. There were no cables safe enough to carry a man now; they would enter through the cut. ‘Directly above the quarry,’ she said. ‘Come on, they’re gone down into the quarry now. Dad has opened the cave, let’s go,’ she said, jumping with impatience.
‘Hey, don’t jump or you’ll start the whole thing sliding.’
‘Ah, go on with you, the place is riddled with cracks. The goats are still in there, so we’re all right. I’m going on.’ She ran along the buckled railway tracks again, keeping well away from the frightening drop into the quarry below. Dafydd was scrambling urgently up towards her.
‘Katie,’ he called, ‘you must come and look,’ but Katie was not going back. She paused where a little iron hand-truck lay on its back, wheels in the air. ‘Let’s get down and see how Father’s getting on,’ she said. ‘Come on, it will be quicker if we run down the fields.’ She raced off, losing any reply of Dafydd’s in the clatter of slates as she skated through the sligins to the field below.
CHAPTER 12
Traitor!
Katie crossed the road between the farm and the quarry yard where she had seen Paddy stop to mop his brow and went on downhill at a run, circling the tip heaps that spread like a skirt below the buildings of the quarry yard. Soon she could see where the tip parted to reveal the cut, an awesome crack in the side of the mountain and the only way into the quarry floor by foot. A small stream ran down it, and beside this was a footpath littered with blocks of slate that had fallen in from the walls above. Katie looked up apprehensively. A chill air met her and she remembered talk at home of men being killed while working in the quarry. She wondered with a shudder if their ghosts would mind this sudden intrusion on their peace.
As she emerged on to the quarry floor the towering walls appeared to be closing in on her. Opposite her was a black cave-like opening in the vertical quarry wall. She could see the last of the men disappearing into it now. Dafydd came up behind her.
‘Come on,’ she said. ‘They’ve opened the cave, and I’ve never been inside. Years ago they tried mining the slate here underground.’
‘Katie, don’t go. I don’t like it,’ said Dafydd, pointing up. ‘It’s just under all that waste we were walking on … and look there’s a wet line all along the rock face …’
But Katie wasn’t listening. ‘The cave has always been walled up before. Seamus and I tried to open a hole once to get into it but the stones were too heavy for us.’
‘But it’s not safe, Katie, I know about these things,’ said Dafydd with sudden authority.
‘Don’t be silly, the men are all in there. Stay if you like.’ She was beginning to be irritated by him.
Someone had left candle stubs on a slab outside, but there were no matches. She took a candle in any case and ducked in. Inside, the darkness was total. She groped forward, feeling along the walls until the passage opened out. There she stopped, hoping her eyes would adjust. To her surprise, Dafydd bumped into her.
‘Might as well all die together,’ he muttered.
At that moment a point of light appeared ahead as a match flared. Then the flame became two, then four, then more as the men grouped to light their candles from the next flame.
‘Beautiful,’ Katie heard Dafydd whisper. The gallery where the men were gathered was larger than she had expected. The points of light moved and wavered in the dark, sometimes showing up a face, sometimes glistening on the rock surface. Katie didn’t want to go further. Somewhere just in front of her she sensed there was someone standing, like her also without a ligh
t – no point in asking him for a match. Then Father’s voice broke the silence, magnified by the echo of the cavern.
‘We are agreed then. It is good slate, but too expensive to mine underground like this. We are directly under the pile of waste we saw the children climbing a moment ago. All we have to do is push that waste down into the old quarry and start working from above. Once and for all, I vote that we clear the tip where we saw the children climbing just now and start again.’
‘What?’ Paddy Scully’s voice rose in indignation. ‘And you are asking these men to throw down from the hill all the waste we sweated blood to bring up the mountain! You must be mad, Eamonn O’Brien. You won’t get any of my money for that, I can tell you. And, I’ll tell you too, without my help you’ll never teach the lads their skills – with or without a hook on your hand.’ That was unkind! There was an indignant murmur.
Katie stared in fascination at the shift and movement among the points of light. Even as she watched, they showed as two clusters, one about Paddy and the other about her father. She could see Old Scully’s face clearly – he had found a block of slate to stand on so the candles threw their light upwards, grotesquely, on his face. But the group about her father was growing. This was a sign, surely, that they were coming over to his side?
Suddenly, out of the darkness just in front of her, a voice barked out: ‘Go back to England where you belong, O’Brien, and die for king and country if you wish.’
Katie lurched back against Dafydd, who steadied her.
‘There’s work to be done in Ireland before we start sweating for your profit and gain. We have a war to win. Now, lads, get out of here before it’s too late and fight as you did against the English and against the ‘Tans. Help us now to rid Ireland forever of the curse of English rule!’
The darkness moved in front of Katie. She put out a hand in a futile effort to stop the man, but he brushed past her while his voice still echoed in the darkness.
