A Winter of Spies

by Gerard Whelan

  Da looked very worried. ‘It might be nothing,’ he said. ‘It just might be nothing.’

  Jimmy spoke for the first time in a long while. ‘And it might,’ he said, ‘be a slip.’

  Da nodded. ‘It might be that too,’ he said. ‘Either way, I don’t like it. We have to get word to Simon about this.’

  He looked at the clock on the mantelpiece. It was the only thing they’d kept from their former home, Ma’s heirloom that had looked so out of place back in their dingy slum room. It had been stopped for years then. Here, repaired and lovingly cleaned, the clock seemed at home.

  ‘It’s happy here,’ Jimmy had told Sarah once. She’d laughed at the idea of a clock being happy. It was the sort of mad thing Jimmy said sometimes. It came, she thought, from reading too many books.

  ‘It’s still hours till curfew,’ Da said. ‘I’d best go look for Simon.’

  ‘James …’ Ma said, reaching out a hand. Da turned and looked at her, but didn’t move closer. Ma’s hand hung in the air, looking somehow both frightened and lonely.

  Sarah saw that her news had changed everything. Da might say the man could be harmless, but he didn’t believe it. Neither did anyone else.

  ‘We’ll be grand, Lily,’ Da said to Ma. ‘We’ll be very careful, and we’ll be grand.’

  ‘And if we’re not?’ Ma said. She looked almost angry. Sarah sensed that this was an old, private discussion between Ma and Da. It was as though the rest of them weren’t even there.

  Da didn’t answer the question.

  ‘If we’re not grand?’ Ma asked again. ‘What then?’

  Da stood up. ‘If we’re not grand,’ he said stiffly, ‘then we’ll have done the right thing. We’ll have kept our honour.’

  It was exactly the sort of thing that Sarah had been thinking before. Now though, with her mother’s frightened face in front of her, honour seemed less important. For the first time Sarah actually began to think about some of the things that could happen if Da were caught.

  Da looked around the room. ‘I’m going to Ringsend to look for Simon Hughes,’ he said. ‘The sooner he hears this the better. If Mick comes, tell him to wait for me. I’ll be back before curfew.’

  After the front door closed behind him nobody said anything for a while. No-one even moved. Then Ma brought her hand crashing down on the table.

  ‘Damn men,’ she said. ‘And damn honour. I’m sick of it.’

  9

  WATCHERS

  ‘THAT’S THE YOUNGER ONE,’ Sarah said. ‘His name is Fowles.’

  ‘Maybe it is,’ Simon Hughes said mildly.

  It was Sunday morning, and Simon was crouching by the window of Josie and Sarah’s bedroom, overlooking Northumberland Road. The lace curtain hid him from the street. He’d been there for two hours, and this was his first sighting of either of the new neighbours.

  Fowles walked jauntily down Ryans’ path. He carried his cane, and was dressed in a well-cut suit. His wide-brimmed hat was perched at a jaunty angle on his sleek hair.

  ‘Quite the little dandy,’ Simon Hughes muttered under his breath.

  It was odd to have a man in your room. Jimmy came in there, of course, and even Da, but that was different. Josie, flustered, had raced upstairs when she heard that Simon wanted to use their room. She’d frantically tidied up the nightdresses and stuff that usually lay around the place. When Ma had brought Simon up the stairs, and seen how neat and tidy the room was, she’d looked like she was going to say something. But instead she’d just given Josie a wicked smile. Josie had blushed scarlet.

  ‘There’s no need for you to stay with me, you know,’ Simon said to Sarah after Ma and Josie left.

  ‘I want to,’ Sarah said. She was feeling guilty for last night’s nasty thoughts about him. Really, his moustache was quite dashing. It must feel funny to have a thing like that growing on your face, though. Sarah tried to imagine it, but couldn’t.

  Fowles turned out the gate and walked towards Ballsbridge.

  ‘The other one’s older, you say,’ Simon said.

  ‘Older, and English.’

  Really, you could tell nothing from the way people spoke. The Irishman next door might be a British agent, and here was Simon, the gunman, who spoke with a Cockney accent. He’d grown up in London – his father, who was Irish, ran a pub there.

  ‘Simon?’

  ‘Mmm?’ Simon said. He was still looking after Fowles.

  ‘Do you actually know Michael Collins? To talk to, I mean.’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘What do you call him?’

  Simon looked at her. ‘What?’ he said.

  ‘Do you call him Minister, or General, or what? Or just Mr Collins?’

  Simon laughed. ‘Mostly,’ he said, ‘we call him Mick. Or when we’re talking about him we call him the Big Fellow.’

  ‘Is he nice?’

  ‘He can be. He’s a laugh sometimes. And sometimes he’s not funny at all. But why ask me? Your dad knows him as well as I do. Better, maybe.’

  ‘Da? Da knows Michael Collins?’

  ‘Yes. And now stop asking me questions. In fact you can go down and ask your mother to make me a cup of tea.’

  ‘But what if Mr Moore comes out? How will you know him?’

  Simon smiled at her. ‘Sal,’ he said gently, ‘you tell me the Ryans are two old ladies. They have two ex-military men living with them now. One is gone out. If your Mr Moore comes out, I think I’ll be able to recognise him. Unless, of course, he’s dressed up as an old lady.’

  The Ryan sisters had been absolutely mortified when the Conways – ‘low slum people,’ as Sarah had overheard one of them say – had moved in. In fact, they’d never liked living next door to a house that was partly let out; they felt it lowered the tone of the neighbourhood. Then the Ryans’ own fortunes had taken a turn for the worse, and a well-bred, respectable young man had swindled them out of their savings. They’d been forced to let out part of their own house. Sarah had been quite pleased at this turn of events, knowing how shamed the snooty sisters would be. Now she tried to imagine Moore, with his neat moustache, dressed in the antique clothes of the sour old Ryan sisters.

  Sarah giggled. Really, Simon was fun. Josie could do a lot worse than encourage him.

  True to his word, Da had got back before curfew last night. Simon, he said, would be up first thing after curfew tomorrow. Da and Mick would be in work. The Conway women must give Simon whatever he needed. Sarah had no idea of what that might be, but felt thrilled anyway: maybe she couldn’t carry guns, but she could still take some part in things.

  She was glad that she’d taken Simon’s gun that time. It had been dangerous and foolhardy, but it had made her feel very good. She’d done her bit. Now that she knew how things stood, of course, everything was different. Now she’d do her bit by being careful. And if girls were best for moving weapons, surely they were good for moving messages too? Sarah had images of herself bringing important documents to Michael Collins himself.

  Sarah found Ma in the kitchen, already making tea. Ella and Josie had gone for a walk in Herbert Park.

  ‘Simon wants some tea,’ Sarah said.

  ‘I guessed he would,’ Ma said. She’d recovered quickly from her outburst last night, but Sarah hadn’t forgotten it. She’d seen the mask of calm taken away from her mother’s face, and seen what lay beneath.

  She thought of the troubles Ma had been through – the Great Strike, the years of poverty, the war, the Rising. Through it all Ma had kept the family together, even when her husband was off being shot at in a war where millions died. And now things had turned out well, and she might have expected a little happiness. But instead her husband and her brother were both up to their eyes in even more dangerous business, and the comfort she’d finally found for her children might be snatched away again.

  Sarah understood Ma’s worries, but she didn’t feel the same way. She had only to think of Da now for her heart to swell with pride. But that glimpse of Ma’s feel
ings last night – not just what she said, but the pain in her voice when she said it – had confused Sarah. Ma and Da both wanted the best for their children, but in this matter it seemed there was a gulf between them.

  She stood by the table and watched Ma go through the simple movements of making the tea. She felt a stab of love for this woman who had done so much for her. But then she heard feet coming quickly down the stairs, and Simon Hughes came in.

  ‘Here, Sal,’ he said. ‘I’ve seen your Mr Moore.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Yes. And you’ll see him too, I think. He’s coming up your path.’

  As he turned to go back up the stairs, Sarah saw him reach inside his coat for his gun. She was already in the hall when the knock came to the front door. When Sarah opened it Moore was standing on the step.

  ‘Ah,’ he said. ‘Good morning. Sarah, isn’t it?’

  ‘It is, Mr Moore.’

  Ma came to the door, and Sarah introduced her to their visitor.

  ‘Actually,’ Moore said, ‘I hoped to see Mrs Breen again.’

  ‘The Breens live in the basement,’ Ma said. ‘Sarah, why don’t you bring Mr Moore downstairs?’

  Sarah didn’t want to go anywhere with this man who might be a British agent. Then she thought she might find out more about him if she did go.

  ‘Come on, Mr Moore,’ she said. ‘Only I hope you haven’t had your breakfast. Mrs Breen will stuff you with tea and cake.’

  She was surprised to hear her own voice sounding so cheery. Maybe she was getting better at lying. That would be useful.

  She tripped down the steps with Moore on her heels. She could feel his presence loom behind her all the way down to Breens’.

  PART 3: COGS AND WHEELS

  10

  A DEAD DETECTIVE

  LATER THAT DAY JIMMY AND SARAH WALKED IN SACKVILLE STREET, Dublin’s grand main street. It was a mild evening, and there were lots of people out. Even the presence of so many Tans and soldiers didn’t discourage the crowds. It had been eerie at first, when the sudden increase of armed men in the streets had come. After a while, though, your mind sort of got used to it. It was a case of having to: you couldn’t stay locked up in your house all the time.

  Jimmy talked to Sarah about the times when they’d lived nearby. She suspected he was trying to take her mind off things, but it was interesting anyway. Jimmy told her how he’d seen the mobs looting here during the Rising, and the Lancers charging the Post Office. He talked about finding the street in flames as he tried to get home with food he’d found in Ella’s house, where they all lived now.

  Much of Sackville Street had been rebuilt since that time, though the Post Office itself was still only a shell. Sarah tried to imagine what it had been like to live here then, but she couldn’t. She remembered being dressed in clothes that were always ragged no matter how often Ma patched them. She recalled days when all she’d thought about was hunger, and other days when all she’d thought about was cold. She remembered the smell of the tenements. It was only a few years ago, but mostly her memories of that time were dim. It was as though her mind didn’t want to remember.

  Tonight Da had sent them out of the house with orders to be home before eight. News of Moore’s visit had upset him. Earlier, in the basement flat, Mrs Breen had filled Moore and Sarah with cake and talked about Ireland in the old days, before all this unpleasantness. Sarah had watched Moore keenly, but she’d seen nothing openly suspicious. Sometimes she caught him looking strangely at her. It was odd, but not proof of anything.

  Still Da fretted. It would be foolish to panic, he said, but more foolish not to be concerned. He could take no chances. Martin and Simon were due back this evening to discuss things. Da didn’t want the children around while they were talking.

  Sarah had really wanted to stay. She wanted to know all that was going on. But Jimmy had urged her to come out with him. ‘The less we know,’ Jimmy said, ‘the safer for everyone.’

  Another time Sarah might have argued, but now she didn’t feel like giving Da more trouble. And it was nice to go walking with Jimmy. She was fond of her brother, even if he was a bit dry sometimes. When he was in a mood like tonight’s he was good company, full of interesting stories. Even if he was just trying to distract her, she didn’t mind. In a way, she wanted to be distracted.

  ‘Look,’ she said to Jimmy now. ‘There’s Hugh Byrne.’

  Byrne was walking across Sackville Street towards them. He was looking beyond them, and he was smiling a big smile. Sarah had never seen him look like that before.

  ‘If we meet him,’ Jimmy warned her, ‘don’t say hello unless he does. He might be working.’

  Sarah was annoyed that he felt the need to remind her. But you couldn’t take any chances with these things, she supposed. In any case Byrne went by without even seeing them, and was immediately lost to sight in the strolling crowd.

  ‘I never seen him smile like that before,’ Sarah said.

  They walked on.

  ‘Did you ever hear Da talk about the police charges here during the Lockout?’ Jimmy asked.

  ‘He don’t talk much about them times,’ she said. ‘Sometimes I wonder if he forgets them.’

  ‘He remembers them too well,’ Jimmy told her. ‘He’s just afraid sometimes that they’ll come back. He looks on this as the same fight, you know.’

  ‘But this is against the British.’

  ‘There’s plenty of British people just like us, Sal. They read about the Tans in their newspapers and they’re disgusted. Their government thinks as little of ordinary British people as it does of us.’

  Somewhere close ahead of them there was a sudden disturbance in the crowd. There were two flat cracks that they recognised as pistol shots. A woman’s voice screamed. Jimmy clutched at Sarah’s arm, but she was already pushing through the crowd.

  ‘Sarah!’ Jimmy said. ‘Come back!’

  But Sarah paid no heed, and he lost sight of her. He pushed after her. As he did he had a sudden, unwanted memory of a younger, smaller version of himself pushing through a crowd in Mount Street. He’d reached the front of that long-ago crowd only to find himself watching a bloodbath: the army charge on Mount Street Bridge. He hadn’t realised till then that bullets could actually blow lumps out of people, or that blood really could flow like water – if enough of it was spilled. It was a scene Jimmy tried never to think about, and part of the reason he looked for distraction in books. Da wasn’t the only one with things to forget.

  He saw Sarah’s straw hat in front of him, and grabbed hold of her arm. She’d stopped moving. They were both part of a circle now that surrounded a man lying in the street. He was a middle-aged, respectable-looking man with grey whiskers. His hat had fallen off his balding head and was lying upside down in the gutter. His feet were beating a pattern on the cobblestones, and at first it looked as though he’d had some kind of fit.

  A spray of liquid was coming from the man’s neck. Sarah frowned in puzzlement. The spray reached several feet into the air, and came in pulsing bursts. She’d never seen anything like it. The liquid looked black in the light of the streetlights; but then a drop fell on her hand, and when she held her hand up to look she saw that it was red. Suddenly Sarah realised that the liquid was blood. Looking again at the man, she felt her gorge rise. Now she could see a dark wet stain spreading on his cream-coloured waistcoat too. The spray of blood hit a woman’s skirt and she shrieked and pulled back.

  ‘The poor devil,’ Jimmy said quietly behind Sarah. ‘He’s shot in an artery. He’s a dead man.’

  The dying man was making weak movements to pull something from under his overcoat. When the hand came out it was holding a long-barrelled revolver, but it flopped uselessly down on the street. A little murmur ran through the crowd at the sight of the gun.

  The man groaned. A pool of blood was spreading round him where he lay. Nobody went near him; nobody wanted to get bloody. Then several Tans came bursting through the crowd, pushing people roughly out
of the way with loud curses in their foreign accents. One man objected to the way a Tan pushed his wife, and the Tan turned around and punched him in the face. The man’s wife led him away, staggering.

  Two huge constables from the Dublin Metropolitan Police arrived. One of them bent to the dying man, but he was pulled off by another man in a topcoat and wide hat who’d followed the Tans. The other DMP man pulled off his helmet and ran his hand back through his grey hair.

  ‘Ah, lads,’ he said in a thick country accent. ‘It’s Detective Reed.’

  The man in the wide hat stood up and said something to one of the Tans. He pointed at the shot man with the cane he was carrying. When Sarah saw his face she shrank back against Jimmy. Jimmy held her protectively; he thought she’d just been shocked by the scene. When Sarah turned and walked away he was at her heels. But once they were outside the circle of silent watchers Sarah turned and grabbed his coat.

  ‘Jimmy,’ she said, ‘did you see that man? The one with the stick?’

  ‘A detective or something,’ Jimmy said.

  ‘It’s Moore’s friend,’ Sarah said. ‘It’s Fowles!’

  Jimmy looked at her, his mouth pursed tight. He took her arm again. ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Of course I am!’ Sarah said.

  ‘Right,’ Jimmy said. His voice had a decisiveness that reminded her of Da’s. ‘Home,’ he said. ‘We have to tell Da. We’ll take a tram. Walk as fast as you can, but don’t run.’

  Then he set off at a pace Sarah could hardly keep up with. She was in a daze. She kept thinking of that pumping spray of blood. It was like water in a fountain. This was violent death. This was the reality behind the newspaper reports of Volunteer attacks which she’d always cheered. Her own body felt suddenly frail. Was that all humans were – were they so easily damaged? She thought of the cold face of Fowles. Then the memory of another cold face came into her mind, a face she’d seen lately looking happy. She stopped walking. Jimmy turned to her impatiently.