Ossian's Ride (12 page)

“And now, Mr. Sherwood, to raise a rather different matter. I would be glad to hear the terms of your association with the girl out there.”

I told him that I knew very little of Cathleen. I told him about our meeting in Longford, about our flight across the bog. There was no harm in this, since it was known to Houseman. I left out all mention of Michael.

The canon still studied his fingers.

“For a young man of your undoubted intelligence, you must realize that this is very unsatisfactory.”

“The truth is not always sensational, sir.”

Now he looked up with his placid smile. “You know I think I will go over and ask the girl a few questions. She may be able to tell a straighter story.”

“She can tell you nothing different, because I have told you the truth.”

“Well, well, I shall soon find out. It will do no harm to put a few questions.”

Now he smiled. “In fact I shall quite enjoy an interview with such a very charming young lady.”

I would readily have made a cheaper bargain with the devil than that of Faustus. I would have asked nothing more than to drive my fists repeatedly into that insincere, smiling face. But Tiny was lounging there within a yard of me.

It was maybe three minutes after the canon had left the room when I heard the first of Cathleen’s screams. Tiny lounged against the door, still with a cigarette lightly held between his lips. Every muscle of my body screamed to attack him, but I knew it to be worse than useless. He was simply waiting. His chance had come, and now he would break me. Desperately I looked for some weapon. There was an iron poker in the grate. As if he read my thoughts, Tiny moved away from, not toward, the poker. He wanted me to go for it.

It lasted for perhaps half an hour, perhaps only twenty minutes. The canon returned, his face flushed. The “trouble” had come and gone and I had failed miserably. True, it would have been futile. True, all our chances of escape would have gone. True, I had behaved for the best in the long run. But I had been afraid.

They brought in the supper, and forced me to sit down and eat it with them. I was nauseated as I somehow swallowed the stuff. But I had no alternative, for it was still a little too light outside to suit my purpose.

“I can see you do me a grievous wrong, Mr. Sherwood,” said the canon in a rich, winy voice. “You imagine me to be a man who gives way to cheap, vulgar passions.”

I made no reply, so he went on. “I do not like my guests to be impolite, Mr. Sherwood.” He nodded, and the gorilla came forward to fetch me a vicious slap across the face.

“I fear that is scarcely as refined a gesture as I could have wished,” the voice went on. “Not so refined as my own methods, Mr. Sherwood, but no doubt effective for all that.”

This was the beginning of the fury that swept through me. The sickness was gone now, replaced by the same cold, shaking fury that had overwhelmed me on the road to Longford. I shivered in spite of the fire behind my back.

“Come, Mr. Sherwood, let me hear you say that you are indeed glad to hear of my restraint. Let me hear you say it!”

Again there came a stinging blow. I must have been very white, and was now trembling quite openly. These symptoms were misinterpreted.

“Tiny! Take the lily-livered poltroon outside before he pukes all over the table.”

The monster seized me by the coat, and hauled me violently and roughly from the room.

“Must get to the lavatory,” I moaned, twisting somehow free from his grasp.

Once in the open air I made off along the stone pathway that led to the lavatory, the monster padding softly behind. I must explain that twenty yards or so from the cottage there were three upward concrete steps. I took these very quickly, knowing that Tiny would also accelerate his pace. It was now tolerably dark and I had to judge the position of his head by the light from the inevitable cigarette.

As he came up to the last step I unwound my body rather in the style of a discus thrower. My right arm was rigid and horizontal, palm downward. With all the weight of my 160 pounds behind it, and with a madman’s added strength, the bony edge of my hand hit him right across the windpipe, a tremendous judo chop. He went down without a sound, for the throat muscles were untensed. Overbalancing, he struck his head a deep, dull blow on the rocky ground. He was quite silent when I reached him. In this he was lucky, for there is not the slightest doubt in my mind that had the wretch been conscious I would have battered him to death on the sharp edge of the steps.

Even as it was I could only restrain the mad rage that consumed me with the greatest difficulty. My hands trembled violently as I sought and found the bunch of keys. Now all I had to do was to create a serious diversion. Then I could release Cathleen, and we could sneak away together in the Chevrolet. And I had just the right means for creating a diversion.

I found my pile of stones and uncovered the two whiskey bottles. They were just as they should be. Then I moved stealthily toward the uncurtained parlor window. When I was some fifteen feet away I flung the first missile with every ounce of strength I could muster. The effect was incredible. The bottle went through the upper left corner, carried clear across the room, bursting on the opposite wall. Petrol was sprayed over the room, some into the fire, and in no more than a second the whole inside was a holocaust. Realizing that this was far more than a diversion, I threw the second. It went clean through the middle of the window. That would be the last cocktail the canon would ever drink.

One of the keys fitted the square concrete building.

“Hello, Deirdre, are you all right in there?”

“Me hands are fastened,” she whispered.

The fiend had left her tied across a sort of truckle bed, and it was some minutes before I could free the ropes in the black darkness. From her sobs I realized it would be easier for the girl to recover in body than in mind. She cried out as I rubbed her wrists to bring back the circulation. Then I put my coat around her shoulders and helped her out into the open air.

“Where are they?” she asked.

The cottage was now burning fiercely.

“That’s their funeral pyre, my dear.”

“You mean he’s dead!”

I squeezed her arm. “He won’t bother you again for sure.”

“Thank God,” and I realized with a shock that she meant exactly what she said.

I was anxious to be gone, for there was no sense in delay. The fire might be seen from the valley with possible complications—I had no wish to meet a car ascending the mountain road. It was improbable that the gorilla would recover his senses for many an hour to come, but there was no telling with such a creature.

The electrical circuits on the Chevrolet were new to me, and it wasn’t easy to join the right wires—I had no flashlight. While I fiddled with the thing, Cathleen sat huddled on the front seat. After what seemed an aeon I got the engine started.

I found the mountain road very trying. The automatic transmission seemed to be pulling the car the whole time, instead of serving as a brake down the steep slopes. But like a man restored to prosperity, luck was again on my side. At all events I reached the main road safely.

The next priority was to get away from the immediate neighborhood, and then to get some food for Cathleen. The best thing would be to strike the Cork-Dublin road at Mitchelstown. I hated to do this because of the obvious risk, but there was no alternative, for only on the main road was I likely to find a cafe or restaurant.

I stopped just outside the small township of Kildorrery. But then I saw by the lights of the large transport cafe that it would be impossible to take Cathleen inside. Her face was puffed with the ill treatment she had received and her eyes were red. So I brought a substantial pile of sandwiches and a couple of cups of strong coffee out to the car. Cathleen drank the coffee and ate a sandwich under protest.

Luck was again on my side, for we managed another ten miles or so along the main road without being stopped by a patrol car. Then I made a complicated zigzag to the south, through Killawfllin and thence onto a smaller road to the west of the Nagles Mountains.

Soon I found a place where the car could be driven off the road into a small wood. This was the right place to stop. We transferred to the spacious back seat and settled down for the night. By a kindly providence we were both dog-tired, and we both managed to get a fair amount of sleep. Toward morning it grew rather cold, so the engine had to be started and the heater switched on. I didn’t mind using up the last of the petrol, since I had no thought of taking the car any further.

We ate sandwiches for breakfast by the light of a graying dawn. Cathleen’s appetite had improved so markedly that her physical recovery clearly would not be long delayed.

Our destinies were now closely interlinked, so there seemed no point in continuing to hide my real objective. When I had finished my tale she said very simply, “If it is beyond the barrier that you are going, then I will come with you. I am very tired of the life on this side.”

We were now perhaps twenty miles from the Boggeragh Mountains, a mere twenty miles from I.C.E. territory. Before we set out I searched through the car and made one important find, a pair of binoculars, which I stuffed into my pocket. Alas, my rucksack was now no more.

So it came about that we set out together over the low hills to the west.

We took the first five miles quite slowly. The ground sloped gently downward toward the Mallow-Cork road. Luckily we struck the road near a point where it was possible to buy simple provisions—bread, cheese, butter, matches and apples. With a bit of string and a modicum of topological ingenuity it was possible to convert my long-sleeved sweater into an impromptu rucksack for carrying the food. It is strange how helpless one feels in wild country without some means of carrying provisions in a more or less effortless way—to attempt carrying in the hands is, of course, useless, and even the capacious pockets of an Irish jacket eventually reach saturation.

By now, Cathleen was walking much more strongly. Even so, it was clear that the journey to the “Barrier” must take two days, fifteen miles the first day, leaving the last five for the second day. In the midafternoon we chanced on a grassy hollow and stopped there for a rest. I was in need of rest, for a reaction from the previous evening was now strongly upon me. Probably for this reason I suddenly had a compelling desire for Cathleen. When I took hold of her she made no protest. But this is really a personal matter, out of place in an intelligence report, so I will say no more of it.

There were two smaller roads, both running roughly north and south, to be negotiated. A couple of miles farther on we found a tumble-down shepherd’s hut. It was not an ideal place to spend the night, but at least it did not possess the squalor that a more complete building might have had. The walls were intact up to a height of three feet or so and there was grass on the floor.

While Cathleen collected a pile of heather to lie on, I set about sealing the walls against the wind by plastering the space between the stones with soft turf from the bog. Then we had a great stroke of luck. With the coming of darkness a mist enshrouded the moor. It would now be safe to light a fire. Nearby there was a considerable pile of dry cut turf, of the sort than can be seen everywhere throughout the west of Ireland. Very soon we had a large warming blaze, and we ate a simple, pleasant supper beside it.

The mist stayed down, which was good. It enabled the fire to be kept going throughout the night for one thing. For another, it would now be vastly easier to sneak across into I.C.E. territory. I had abandoned my first idea of crossing during the night with Cathleen. This would be too strenuous. The mist gave us all the advantages of a night crossing anyway.

We pushed along steadily throughout the morning, choosing our route by compass the whole time. The ground rose steadily to a height approaching two thousand feet, which was a sure indication that we were on the crest of the Boggeragh Mountains. By lunchtime I was convinced that we must be across the “Barrier” already.

While we were eating, ragged patches appeared in the mist. At first I didn’t realize our incredibly good fortune. It was only when the mist cleared for the second time that I noticed the huge turning aerials. They were about six miles away to the west, mounted on a tongue of high ground to the south of the town of Millstreet. The binoculars taken from the Chevrolet revealed their nature and purpose.

I cursed myself for a fool not to have guessed that I.C.E. would guard its border by radar, in much the same way that the British guarded their island during the late war. Just as we detected the entry of enemy aircraft, so I.C.E. was detecting the entry not simply of aircraft, but of people too. Of course, it was a much harder technical problem to pick out a slowly moving person from a mass of ground reflections, but it was a problem that would easily be within the reach of this fantastic organization.

“I’m sorry, my dear, but we’ll have to turn back,” I said to Cathleen. “We’ll surely be caught if we go on.”

When I explained, she said, “It’s to work inside the barrier that I’m going, I care not whether I am caught or no.”

“But they’ll simply throw you out again, instead of letting you stay and work.”

“Knowing what I know, I do not think so.”

Looking at her as she then looked, hair fluttering in the same breeze that had blown away the morning mists, I did not think so either. Saint Peter may turn her away from the gates of Heaven, but I do not think so.

“They certainly won’t let
me
in, my dear.”

“That is likely enough. It would certainly be a great mistake for you to go on.”

I was too amazed and aghast at the thought of our parting to make any reply.