The Hawthorns Bloom in May (20 page)

The first time Sam and Mickey had to stop on their way out of the city was when they encountered a half-constructed barricade surrounded by small boys, who appeared to be enjoying themselves thoroughly. The moment they stopped, they climbed up the wheels and into the empty back.

‘Will you lot go home
now
,’ the irate officer shouted to them as he reached up to Sam’s window for the piece of paper he held out to him.

The boys paid no attention to him whatever, but Sam was pleased to see the cheering effect of Commandant McDonagh’s piece of paper on the
harassed officer. He smiled at them, asked if they’d been delivering supplies, if the position at Jacob’s had been secured and what other activity they’d seen on their way out of the city.

Sam let Mickey describe the arrangements at the biscuit factory. Despite his close encounter with two rifles and a pistol, he’d managed to observe both the deployment of snipers in the two towers which dominated the route north from Portobello Barracks to Dublin Castle and the setting up of a first aid post and a kitchen by one of the women’s groups.

When the officer handed Sam back his authorisation and waved him on, the small boys, refused to get down from the lorry. Mickey waved his arms furiously at them, shouted abuse and got nowhere.

Sam turned off the engine, walked slowly round to the back of the lorry, stood looking at them and said nothing. He went on standing there till first one, then another, climbed down. A small group of older boys remained firm, unwilling to lose face in front of the younger boys already on the ground.

‘Have you boys ever been to Drogheda?’ Sam asked in a conversational tone.

Heads were shaken, No’s were spoken.

‘Well, ye’re in the right place for goin’,’ he said, smiling agreeably. ‘Drogheda’s my next stop. Mind you, it’s a fair step back. You’d hardly foot it before dark.’

The boys took the hint and a few minutes later, they were on their way.

There were no more barricades, but the road was blocked by a lorry unloading a group of men carrying rifles and pickaxes as they ran close by the railway line going north. Waiting patiently for the lorry to move out of the way, they saw the first of the men make their way across to the railway line. Some began digging up the lines, others began excavating shallow trenches.

‘Heavy work that,’ said Sam, as they set off again, managing to pick up speed as the traffic became lighter and the delays fewer.

Despite the brilliant sunshine and the warmth of the afternoon the draught through the missing windscreen rapidly froze them both. Halfway to Drogheda, Sam drew into the side of the road to let them warm through and put on their jackets.

‘Boy there’s some heat in that sun,’ said Mickey, shivering with cold.

‘Aye, it’s great. Ye can feel it doin’ ye good,’ Sam agreed, as he turned his back to get his shoulders warm. ‘Maybe we should warm our coats before we put them on. The heat might last longer,’ he said suddenly. ‘My Ma use to do that when we were wee. She’d warm ours in front of the fire before we went to school,’ he went on, as he spread theirs on the rough grass by the roadside.

‘What’s happened your sleeve, Sam?’ Mickey
asked, as he looked down at the garments on the sun-warmed grass.

Sam bent down, puzzled by a burn mark that hadn’t been there when he put it on.

‘Hold on a minute, Mickey,’ he said, climbing back up into the cab. ‘I think I know what did that.’

He took out his penknife and levered a bullet from the wooden panel behind their heads.

‘There you are,’ he said, dropping it into Mickey’s hand. ‘D’you want it as a souvenir? It might just as well have been in your head or mine.’

‘Aye an’ what woul’ our childer do without us, Sam? Your eight and my five,’ he said shaking his head in distress.

Sam began to pull on his coat, for there was a long journey still ahead and he was sure they’d have to stop again to get warm.

‘I’ll tell you what, Sam. I’ll say nothin’ to my missus, if you’ll say nothin’ to yours.’ Mickey said suddenly.

Sam nodded agreeably. It had never occurred to him to tell Martha.

‘What’ll we do with that?’ Sam asked, puzzled that Mickey was still staring at the bullet so intently.

‘I’ll tell you what, Sam,’ said Mickey quietly. ‘While you’re drivin’ over the bridge at Drogheda, I’ll throw it in the Boyne an’ we’ll never say another word about it. No one will be a bit the wiser.’

The journey back to Richhill took longer than either of them had reckoned, the cold eating into them savagely as the sun went down and the sky paled into dusk. A meal in Newry warmed them, but it was no more than a brief respite, for they’d barely thawed out by the time they had to be on the road again. By the time they got back, unlocked the factory gates, put the lorry away and locked up again, it was a clear, star-filled night, the temperature dropping like a stone.

The two men parted at the foot of the access road, bidding each other goodnight in few words, silent with fatigue and cold, as they mounted their bicycles to cycle home. Sam put his bicycle away in the barn, picked up his torch to light him across the yard and pushed open the door into the silent kitchen. He switched off the torch and sat down by the stove to take off his boots. There was still a little warmth from the stove and a smell of cooked food lingered on the air, but he hadn’t the energy to stir the fire and make tea. For a few minutes, he just sat, listening to the tick of the clock and the distant rumble of Joe’s snores.

‘Lord you are there at my going out and my coming in.’

The words came again and echoed in his head. From somewhere nearby he heard a barn owl call. Immediately, he thought of Sarah and her old, childish fear that the owls cried because someone had hurt them.

He got to his feet, put his boots in the cupboard and pushed his feet awkwardly into his old shoes. As he put his hand on the door latch, holding it carefully so that it wouldn’t make a noise and wake the children, he remembered what he’d not been able to remember in the early morning. Sarah was in Dublin at this very moment, with wee Helen and Hugh, on an Easter visit to their Aunt Lily.

Sarah opened her eyes in the darkness. A narrow shaft of sunshine, bright as the beam from a torch on a moonless night, spilt through a tiny gap in the heavy velvet curtains and cast a shimmering patch of light on the faded wallpaper at the far side of the large, high-ceilinged room.

‘Another lovely day,’ she thought, smiling to herself as she turned on her side. ‘How lucky we’ve been so far.’

She lay, warm and comfortable, as the shapes of Lily’s furniture began to emerge, the tiny spill of light now reflecting from the frame of a handsome watercolour of Currane Lodge. She liked this house, its well-loved contents, its worn but still beautiful carpets, the velvet curtains with their tasselled ropes, the small pieces of delicate china that Lily liked to spread around on every available surface.

The pretty cups and saucers collected over the
years used to worry her when the children were younger, but not now. At eleven, Helen was more careful with them than Lily was herself. As for Hugh, nearly two years older, he simply removed the delicate objects to a safe place when he needed somewhere to spread out his books.

She lay listening to the unfamiliar sounds of Dawson Street. It was so strange to hear traffic go past the door. Even when her father or Alex turned the motor outside the gates of Rathdrum, the sound was so far away, it was absorbed by the lime trees in the avenue, overlaid by birdsong in the garden, or by familiar noises from the kitchen.

This morning the traffic was already busy, although the house itself was still silent. She could hear footsteps and the jingle of a harness and the creak of delivery carts. Any moment now, there would be a perfunctory knock at the door and Lily’s girls would appear. Maureen, the elder, would fling back the curtains, tell her what a grand morning it was, then show her sister Bridget where to put the tray with her morning tea. A beautiful, dark-haired girl with the sweetest of tempers, Bridget had been placing her tea tray on the same bedside table every morning since they came, but she never showed the slightest sign of being bothered by her sister’s bossiness.

She stretched out a hand and picked up the bedside clock. Although her eyes had adjusted
to the dimness of the room, she couldn’t see the figures, but something about the movement of that bright beam of sunshine made her wonder if it was later than usual. At that moment, there was a discrete knock at her door.

‘Come in.’

She sat up in bed and reached quickly for her dressing gown. The draughts which had plagued the house when first they’d visited were much reduced, but there was no heating upstairs and the room was very cold, despite the brightness of the late April morning. To her great surprise, it was her uncle who came in.

‘Morning, Sarah. Sorry to trouble you,’ Sam said, pulling back an edge of curtain so they could see each other. ‘We have one or two problems about going to Fairyhouse today. Lily has a migraine and is still in bed and we seem to be without Maureen and Bridget.’

‘You mean they’re not in the house?’ Sarah asked, aware now that it
had
all seemed unusually quiet.

‘No, no sign of them. Breakfast is laid, but they did that last night as they always do. But that’s all.’

‘They went to a dance last night,’ Sarah said helpfully. ‘I know that, because they told me it was at Liberty Hall and I wondered if Brendan might be singing, but I’m sure they came back as I was going to sleep.’

‘Yes, they did,’ he agreed, nodding. ‘I was reading in the sitting room but I heard their voices on the stairs. I’ve been up to their room. Beds made, all tidy. No note.’

‘How strange,’ Sarah said, perplexed. ‘Oh, but poor Lily, Sam. Is her head a bad one?’

‘Mostly eye-strain I would think,’ he said reassuringly. ‘She would sit sketching in the full sun yesterday with the light off the sea. You know how bright it was. She says she just needs to sleep it off. It was when I went down to fetch her a cup of tea, I found the birds had flown.’

‘Well, we can make our own breakfast,’ Sarah said easily, ‘but it’s very strange.’

‘What about Fairyhouse?’

‘Oh we can’t possibly go and leave poor Lily, Sam,’ she protested.

‘She says she doesn’t mind a bit, she’ll be asleep. She doesn’t want the children to be disappointed.’

‘No, Sam. We’ve had a lovely time and been out so much, we’ll just have a quiet day here,’ she reassured him. ‘Helen is sure to want to go and feed the ducks. I can take them both for a walk this afternoon.’

‘Well, whatever you think. I admit I could do with some breakfast.’

Sarah laughed. Sam had the look of a man who’s been up and about for some time and more than ready for something to eat.

‘Right. If you wake Helen and Hugh I’ll be down very shortly and we’ll see what we can do.’

Breakfast was rather more difficult than Sarah had expected. There was neither bacon nor eggs, very little butter and only two rather tired-looking ends of baker’s loaf. The smaller one was distinctly mouldy, but the larger one could probably be saved. With careful cutting and trimming she reckoned she could produce six slices for toast.

There was half a jug of milk in the larder and the coronation tea caddy was half full, but when she tried to light the stove, she discovered there was no gas. The sitting-room fire was still smoking, but Hugh rearranged it to accommodate the kettle and used the elderly brass bellows to good effect. While the tea brewed Helen and Hugh made toast on the now red fire.

There was no marmalade either, but there was a new jar of damson jam which Rose had sent with a Simnel cake as a present to Lily.

‘The baker usually delivers on a Monday morning,’ said Sam, as they cleared away breakfast. ‘The milkman should have been here. He brings the butter and eggs as well. I think I’ll just go out and buy a paper and I’ve letters to post. Have you any?’ he asked, raising an eyebrow.

Sarah smiled back and blushed slightly. She’d spent most of the previous evening writing to
Simon. ‘Yes, I’ll fetch it for you,’ she said smiling. ‘Are you sure Lily is all right?’

Reassured that Lily really did want to be left to sleep, Sarah found a paper bag for the mouldy bread and asked Hugh whether he would like to come with them to feed the ducks. To her surprise, he said he would. Remembering you needed a key to come in by the front door, she collected one from the drawer in the hall table before they all stepped out into the loveliest of spring mornings.

‘Ma, this is even nicer than going to the races,’ said Helen happily. ‘I didn’t think trees in a city could look so beautiful,’ she went on as the three of them walked briskly down Dawson Street and crossed the road into St Stephen’s Green.

‘They’re digging trenches,’ said Hugh in amazement, as they came through the northern gate and headed for the pond. ‘You can’t do that in a park,’ he protested, ‘even if you are on manoeuvres.’

Sarah looked around at the uniformed figures moving purposively backwards and forwards. They were all armed and wearing ammunition belts. An officer was giving orders and a number of trenches were underway between the shrubbery and the railings.

‘Look, Mama,’ Helen gasped, ‘a lady with guns.’

Sarah followed her gaze. She was quite right. Standing under the memorial archway at the far
side of the park, a tall woman wearing a dark green uniform with trousers, surveyed the scene. From time to time, she waved her arm imperiously at a number of young girls who were carrying bags and bundles towards a small summerhouse where some older girls were unpacking them. Stuck into her belt were two pistols.

‘Look, there’s Mr Kearney, Mama. He looks very annoyed,’ said Helen urgently, dragging her eyes away from the woman with the pistols.

‘Well so would you be if someone started digging up your park,’ said Hugh sharply. ‘He’s responsible for damage to the place. He’s not just here to look after the ducks.’

Mr Kearney, by now an old friend, was working his way towards them. He stopped to speak to a young man in uniform sitting on a summer seat, his arm round a pretty girl, watching the trenches being dug. Already some of the ones just behind the railings were large enough to accommodate three men. More men were arriving all the time.

‘Oh, let’s ignore them,’ said Helen firmly, pulling her bag of bread from her pocket as she strode forward to where the ducks stood by the water’s edge preening themselves or floating lazily on the sparkling water.

As she put her hand into her bag, a shot rang out. The ducks at her feet rose in a flurry of noise and flapping wings that startled her. She stepped
backwards so quickly, she nearly fell over, the bread dropping at her feet. Sarah was just about to suggest they should leave when Mr Kearney appeared at their side.

‘I’m sorry, ma’am. I must ask you to go,’ he said, shaking his head angrily. ‘Ye might get hurt when the military gets down from the Castle to clear this lot out. They should be shot,’ he said furiously. ‘An’ me with five sons fightin’ in France. I’m ashamed of them. Ashamed.’

‘Mr Kearney, will they shoot your ducks?’ Helen asked desperately, her voice cracking slightly as she tried to stop herself from crying.

‘They’ll have to shoot me first, miss,’ he said firmly. ‘Now don’t worry. They’ll be all right. A day or two and we’ll be fine again,’ he said encouragingly, as he hurried away to speak to other people walking in the sunshine watching what they thought was yet one more manoeuvre.

It was now just after noon, the trees spreading pools of deep shadow at their feet. They retraced their steps across the park, crossed over the road and made their way back up Dawson Street. As Sarah put the key in the door, a series of explosions echoed on the still air. The loud detonations were followed by some erratic gunfire. They went inside quickly and she went straight upstairs to make sure Lily was all right. The heavy shutters on her bedroom closed firmly against the light, she was
fast asleep and didn’t stir as she quietly opened and closed the door again.

Back down in the sitting room, Hugh was mending the fire, Sarah had just taken her jacket off when she heard a cab draw up at the door. Looking out through the sitting-room window, to her amazement, she saw Sam get out carrying a newspaper.

‘Sarah, the fools have risen,’ he said, as he strode across the pavement to meet her at the open door. ‘Go up stairs and pack as quick as you can. Get Helen and Hugh to help you. The sooner I get you on a train going north the better. The cab’s waiting for us.’

Seeing how distressed he was, Sarah asked no questions, but simply ran upstairs and packed up her possessions with all the speed she could manage. Helen packed her own things in record time and helped Hugh to do the same.

Downstairs again, her arm aching from manoeuvring the heaviest suitcase, Sarah could see the cab driver was having trouble with his horse. Fidgety and difficult, it was reacting to the sudden bursts of firing from St Stephen’s Green and somewhere nearer at hand. Sam and Hugh were trying to load the small suitcases into the oscillating cab, Hugh hampered by his short stature, Sam by his bad shoulder.

‘I’ll say your goodbyes to Lily when I get back,’
Sam called to Sarah as he saw her pause at the front door. ‘There’s not a moment to be lost,’ he added, as he came back, lifted the heavy suitcase and half carried, half dragged it to the waiting cab. Sarah ran to help him, then went back and closed the front door as Helen and Hugh got into the cab ahead of her.

‘What’s happening, Uncle Sam?’ asked Hugh coolly, as the cab lurched forward, the horse now trotting enthusiastically away from the kerbside. ‘Is it a rebellion?’

‘Yes, you could say that, Hugh,’ said Sam, equally coolly.

Sarah looked out of the cab window. It was fifteen minutes since they’d heard the explosions, but the streets were still full of people going about their business as usual. With the midday sun pouring down, cabbies passing in the other direction had taken off their jackets and were driving with their shirt-sleeves rolled up.

It felt so normal a Spring day, and yet, she felt sure Sam had the measure of the situation. She looked at him hopefully as they bowled along. He was pale and very tense, but covering his anxiety for the most part. She was aware that he mightn’t wish to say much in front of Helen and Hugh.

‘I posted your letter, Sarah,’ he began suddenly. ‘But I’m not sure when Simon will get it,’ he said, keeping his tone conversational. ‘As I came out of
the GPO, it was taken over by the Irish Volunteers. I couldn’t quite believe what was happening, so I stayed to watch. Padraig Pearse came out and read a proclamation,’ he said, taking a folded sheet from his pocket and offering it to Hugh who began to study it carefully.

‘He and James Connolly shook hands and Connolly said he was happy to have lived to see the day,’ he continued. ‘The Volunteers then knocked out all the windows and have barricaded themselves in. There’s a splendid green flag flying, a fair amount of random firing going on and I now know where Maureen and Bridget are,’ he said, peering out of his window again to see what progress they were making.

‘Oh Sam, no. Surely not.’ Sarah said, horrified at the thought of the quiet, gentle Bridget shut up behind the barricaded windows.

‘Yes, I saw them going in. A detachment of the women’s group, Cuman na mBan,’ he said flatly. ‘You ought to approve, Sarah. Don’t you always advocate women playing their part? No discrimination and all that?’

‘Of course I do, Sam,’ she said firmly, irritated by his tone. ‘But I don’t approve of
anyone
taking up arms and killing other people. I may not be a Quaker myself, but I agree with them that killing is not the best way of solving problems. But I can’t bear the thought of poor Bridget in there,’ she ended anxiously.

‘Will they get killed?’ said Helen, a dangerous waver in her voice.

‘What about Maureen?’ said Hugh, speaking at the same moment.

But neither Helen nor Hugh got an answer to their question. They heard a high-pitched neigh from the horse as the cab stopped with a jolt and began to rock backwards and forwards as the horse jittered uneasily on the cobbles.