by Clio Gray
He was about to hand Malloy the article for explanation, before remembering that Malloy was practically illiterate, barely able sign his own name in a wiggly line. Malloy saw the motion that was quickly withdrawn and took advantage of the others being distracted by their quick-fired argument about how much the ring was worth and how many muskets it could buy them for the next battle, even if it could not provide for this.
‘It’s the stringy bit that’s the thing,’ Malloy said quietly to Kearns, screwing up his face in concentration, making the black line of his eyebrows even thicker and more menacing than usual. ‘I just can’t remember exactly what he said about it, only that it could pass on messages, messages no one else could read. But he said he told Greta. We need to get it to Greta.’
Mogue Kearns shrugged slightly and picked up the khipu – not that he had any idea that was its name – folding it gently back inside its piece of paper.
‘Well then,’ he said, just as quietly, ‘if that’s the case, then that’s exactly what we must do.’
21
TO THE WINDMILL ALL
The small figure of Greta Finnerty was walking fast along the narrow lanes and byways that roughly followed the passage of the River Slaney. She’d already passed Killurin, Ballyhogue and Brownswood and knew she’d not far to go.
She would have been running if she’d been able, if she’d had the breath, if her legs didn’t feel heavy as quern-stones; if only her boots had been better fitting and hadn’t rubbed up an army of blisters upon her heels and toes making every step an agony, making her grit her teeth every time she came down upon a stone. She was thankful it wasn’t raining, that the night was but a shadow of what it could have been later or earlier in the year, that her way was still faintly visible by the fading light of the summer solstice sun.
She was terribly anxious that she wouldn’t get there in time, no matter how fast she went and cursed herself for not leaving sooner, for hanging on so long in Rosslare right until the last moment. She’d wanted to have good news for the men on Vinegar Hill that the French really were coming, the masts of their battleships thick as a forest and in sight of shore. But they hadn’t been, and now she was panting with the effort of moving so fast, the blood and water from her burst blisters gathering in the heels and toes of her boots, soaking through her socks, an unpleasant squelch with every step.
She glanced up at the sky, saw that the true darkness of the night would soon fall. She could make out the glimmerings of pale stars against the welkin and felt suddenly insignificant and tired, wanting nothing more than to rest up, snooze for a few hours in a ditch, beneath a hedge or hayrick. She did not, for she knew that stopping would be the end, and so she grimaced, eased the straps of her backpack with her fingers, regretting the bare fact that she couldn’t risk taking out her shuttered lamp, not with Crown Forces in the area, closing in even now upon the Hill, when a person could be shot down or bayoneted for the small crime of carrying a light through the night.
Oh God, but her feet really hurt now, and although she clenched her jaw and balled her fists she couldn’t stop the tears from running down her face with the pain. Yet still she went on, could just about make out the thread of the track as it wound its way between hedges, alongside farmyards, her heart pounding every time a pig stirred at her passing or a cockerel thought to spread its wings at the lightness of the night, or some sheep moved out from the mufflement of its flock as her foot kicked a stone as she scurried their sleeping by. And then at last, at last! She saw the flattened hump of Vinegar Hill in the distance where it slouched its small height above the village of Enniscorthy, the tall black line of the windmill on top.
Just a little farther, she kept repeating in her head. Just a little farther.
She wasn’t entirely sure what would happen when we she got there bringing the bad news that the French weren’t coming after all, or at least weren’t coming quick enough to give them any aid. But surely, she thought, if she got there good and early they’d have time to skidaddle it away from the Hill. They must have escape routes planned and surely would understand that to run away and fight another day was better than to stand and fight a hopeless fight.
Greta was no newcomer to the rules of battle and knew a bad bet when she counted up the odds, and Vinegar Hill was the worst of the lot. Greta thought suddenly of Myles Byrne, up there on the Hill, the boy she and her brother had grown up with in Ballylusk, working alongside him in the tattie fields every October, her tagging along as Myles and Joseph went fishing in the rivers around Monased; young Myles, who had become a man and the hero of Bunclody to boot, even if he was only eighteen. The same age Joseph would have been if he’d not been killed.
Greta looked up once again at the sky and saw it had changed, become lighter instead of darker, and realised with dismay that the sun must already be nudging its way back up from the horizon. She must have been walking, walking, walking, right through the blackest part of the night without her knowing it, wondering if it was possible that her head had fallen asleep and been dreaming while the rest of her body had just gone on, plodding its way one more yard, one more furlong, one more mile, without her being aware of it. It must have been so, because when she looked up again she saw that she was really close, and only a spit away from the hill, only a few more miles to go.
And so she pushed herself on, pushed herself harder than she’d ever done before, closing every yard with grim determination, counting them out in her head to keep herself awake, keep herself focussed. She counted out the yards, counted down the miles, going from four miles down to three, from three down to two, two down to one, when she was almost on the straight lines of the farmers’ fields as they fenced their way up the back slopes of the Hill, clearly seeing the paths that snicketed through the gorse and scrub-line at its base emerging out the other side, all heading to the same place, all leading towards the top and the flatland and the windmill stretching up into the sky.
She stopped, some unknown sound catching her ear. She cocked her head and listened: soft sounds all around her, carried on the slight breeze of the coming morning, an enemy army sleeping just the other side of the hill from where she stood. She could smell their fires, the oil they’d used to lubricate their muskets and guns, the rank odours of too many men and horses gathered together in a single place. And worse, the sounds were changing as she listened, for this army was beginning to yawn and stretch; there was the splashing of water, the pissing of men, the gentle snorting of their horses responding to their masters’ touches, the soft snicks of metal as saddles were lifted and strapped, uniforms straightened, weapons loaded, canons checked.
Panic now, Greta understanding that soon they would begin to mobilise in earnest, begin to swarm around the base of the hill, cutting her off from above. Only a few precious minutes left for Greta to break from the path and forge her way straight up the Hill towards the rebel forces the fastest way she could; only minutes left to pass her message on; only minutes left for any of them up there to have any chance of escape.
All on her.
All on Greta Finnerty, and she was heavy with the weight of it, tears prickling at her eyes, fear moving her small legs in her boy’s trousers and her too big boots, on and on and on.
22
DECISIONS MADE
DEVENTER, HOLLAND
At the very top of Hendrik Grimalkin’s tall, thin Hollandish house were several small rooms sited beneath the eaves, Ruan assigned one, Caro another. Needless to say, to Ruan’s mind at least, Caro had got the better one, the one that looked directly over the wide promenade of the Singel and the slow moving loop of the lagoon beyond. Not that Ruan complained. They’d been here a few weeks now and he’d learned to kow tow with best of them.
After their little talk in Grimalkin’s study Ruan had come wise to the man: treat him like a schoolmaster, like the one in charge, and Hendrik was happy. It didn’t come naturally to Ruan, but he stood in front of the small mirror on his small washstand and practiced ing
ratiating expressions. Apparently it had done the trick, with Hendrik at least, who had finally consented to traipse him off to several of the banking companies and lawyers in Deventer, one of each agreeing to do the necessary.
Ruan had been expecting to walk into Deventer a man in dire need and walk out the next day as one with the world laid out at his feet; but that had been far from the case. The letter from the Servants stating Golo’s death had to be verified; more letters sent to confirm its authenticity; yet more pushed out to Golo’s lawyers in Glasgow asking for a copy of his Last Will and Testament and to his bank to see if they could meanwhile free up any monies for his ward. Nothing for Ruan to get his hands on until the entire charade was performed and executed to the lawyers’ satisfaction on both sides of the water.
Until then he was stuck with the Grimalkins and at their mercy. One word from either could see his entire venture sunk like a stone. He might have Hendrik on side but Louisa was another matter entirely. The little sneakit Caro had only the previous day produced a letter of his own, signed by the abominable Brother Joachim and his blasted Abbot, asking that Caro be released from Ruan’s service into their own, if they saw fit to take him on. And of course Louisa – the dried up, childless, old stick of a woman that she was – grabbed the chance with both hands.
Caro was the absolute bees knees as far as she was concerned, as loaded with goodness and promise as those bees’ knees were with pollen. Caro was like a pig in shit, and wasted no time sucking up to the woman, spending most mornings with her in her kitchen helping out, carrying her bags back from market, tasting everything she cooked and declaring it as nectar beyond compare.
It made Ruan queasy to think on it. On the plus side it meant that when his money came through, when Golo’s estate was finally ceded to him lock, stock and barrel, he’d be as free of Caro as he would be of the Grimalkins, the only thought that kept him going. Until then he had no choice but to bide here, compliment old Louisa as best he could, pretend interest in Hendrik’s work at his blasted library where Hendrik spent the most part of his time.
If mirrors on washstands could speak, Ruan’s would have had a great deal to say about his practiced ingratiating smiles and platitudes, but also the invective – if inventive – speeches he would pour out onto the Grimalkin household once he was finally able to leave.
Ruan was entirely right about Louisa’s dislike of him. She tried to hide it, would not stoop to being low and mean while he was a guest in her house, but he got under her skin nonetheless. Every smile he graced her with seemed like a simulacrum, every compliment accompanied by a snide backhander.
These potatoes with cheese are wonderful, Mrs Grimalkin. They’re not quite like we had back at home, but they’re good all the same.
You keep your house so clean and tidy, Mrs Grimalkin. I’ll bet you know every mouse by name.
He didn’t seem able to help himself, and the moment she thought of him she began to grind her teeth: so smug and self-righteous, believing he had the moral high ground because he’d been dealt a bad hand. She had to concede that it undoubtedly was a bad hand – no one would wish such disaster on anyone – but he had his way out. Her husband would make sure of it, if only to get the excrescence that was Ruan Peat out of their household as soon as possible.
Young Caro had been through the same experience on the Collybuckie as Ruan had, and far, far worse in earlier years, as she was beginning to understand through unguarded comments, unspoken fears, like when he jumped every time a large man in the market covered him in shadow. What that lad had suffered hardly bore thinking about and yet here he was, in her home, still the brightest pipkin in the apple barrel.
Ruan was right about another thing too, and that Caro was fast becoming the child she’d always wanted but never had, not in all the eighteen years she’d been married to Hendrik. It hadn’t been a bad marriage by any means, Louisa being of the firm belief that the welfare of her household and husband were her sole duties in life, and one she had never deviated from. She went to market every morning – a duty now enlivened immeasurably by Caro coming with her – and to her church for early mass on Fridays and Sundays. It was a habit her husband never tried to discourage, despite his belief – privately held, but widely known – that God, if any such Being existed at all, would surely not choose to confine Himself to designated buildings but would spread Himself instead throughout every nook and cranny of His Glorious Creation without need of being pinned down by the likes of Louisa and her priest.
He lived his life his way and allowed her to do the same, which was far more than many husbands would concede, and Louisa was truly grateful for it. Her one failing to Hendrik being that she’d not produced a child to carry on in his footsteps – many false starts, followed by as many miscarriages, not a single one going to term – her body now past the age when that failing could be corrected. And then Caro dropped into their lives – a startling, staggering child – sent to them by Joachim, Hendrik’s father, of all people. A gift from the Servants, and therefore a gift from God. Finally an answer to the prayers she had been sending up with the incense at her church for nigh on twenty years.
A gift from God.
Since Caro and the despicable Ruan Peat had been beneath her roof Louisa had neglected attending her weekly Sewing Circle, when she and several other women met up at her neighbour’s house two doors down along the Singel for a chat, a few cups of tea or hot chocolate, maybe even an alcoholic beverage or two if one of them had a birthday or something special to celebrate. And by God she had something to celebrate. A few days previously, when she and Caro had been chopping vegetables to put into the pickle pan, he had laid down his knife.
‘Can I ask you something?’ Caro said.
‘But of course you can,’ Louisa replied happily, going on with her chopping. Just having the boy here at her table invigorated her, made her feel ten years younger.
‘Do you like having me here?’ Caro asked. He didn’t raise his face, couldn’t meet her eyes, kept staring numbly at the shreds of cabbage and cauliflower lying next to his abandoned knife.
‘Caro, of course I do! Don’t you know that?’
The beating of Louisa’s heart moved up a pace, fearing he was missing his life at sea – no matter how bad it had been – or worse, that he maybe wanted to go with Ruan off on the adventures Ruan could hardly stop talking about, once he was free. They’d had word that very morning from the Scottish lawyers saying they accepted the veracity of Golo Eck’s death, his Last Will and Testament on its way. The coincidence was too much to bear. She put down her knife and looked over at Caro, his head still bowed.
‘You’re welcome here for as long as you like,’ she said quietly, ‘and I want you to stay, Caro. I truly do.’
She held her breath. Caro didn’t move for a moment, then pulled a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket, trying unsuccessfully to flatten it out before holding it out to her. She took it and read it through, one hand going to her throat, fingers taking hold of the small cross she wore about her neck, for here was proof her God existed, right here. She dropped the contract of obligation Joachim had so carefully drafted to release Caro to the Grimalkins’ care if he so chose and they agreed, moved around the table and hugged Caro to her, feeling his skinny arms clasping about her waist in return.
‘You and me,’ she whispered, kissing the top of Caro’s head. ‘You, me and Hendrik. A family. We’ll be unstoppable.’
23
BATTLE SWORN
The darkness did not linger, nor the insubstantial dawn as the longest day of 1798, the 21st of June, came on too fast for the men on the Hill, their fear growing with every inch the sun slid up from the east. The stink of sweat was all-pervasive and they spoke in hushed tones as they checked their few hundred working muskets again and again, and that their paltry gunpowder stores were dry and easily accessible, their pikes evenly weighted, their pitchforks and bayonets sharp and bright.
The only sounds came from the grinding of s
oapstone against blade and tine, and the gentle susurration of linen and wool as the women hugged their children to their skirts in and around the windmill, listening to the incongruous gaiety of the larks scattering themselves high in the sky above them without a care in the world. Their men rounded their shoulders, rolled their necks, ears straining for the slightest sounds of movement from down below. Waiting was all any of them could do now, their resources far too limited to assume direct attack, defence their only option.
Several men had it on their minds to disembark early, take their women and children down the back-slopes of the Hill, get them to safety or at least the possibility of it. The women proved stronger than the men who were bending and would not hear of it, believing in the cause just as surely as did their menfolk and instead kissed their husbands, made their husbands kiss their children, then tried to squeeze themselves further inside the windmill, hide themselves within its sturdy walls, praying altogether that all would turn out for the best.
And then the enemy awoke.
Those garrisoned on the Hill heard it first as a rustling, as if the wind were sifting through a pile of fallen leaves. It was the sound of many men moving, of splashing water on their bodies, getting into battle-dress, breaking down their makeshift tents. A different, more menacing kind of sound came soon after: a jingling that lifted into the air as horses were saddled, guns and canons mounted onto carts, the hitching of harnesses.
Looking down through the morning, and the slight mist that still clung in gentle swathes to the lower slopes of the Hill, the remnants of the United Irish could see only hints and glimpses of the English lines as they began to snake out to east and west away from their barracks in Enniscorthy and began their encirclement of the Hill.
