Betrayal (33 page)

And make mischief, was it, behind the dear doctor's back, and him the saint he was? ‘Ah, and sure you can, but 'twill take my mind off the loss of my dear departed brother and give me something to do. Now it will, I say. It will.'

To argue would not be wise. ‘Let's have a cup of one of your teas, then. The blackberry, I think. The scones I made are not nearly as good as your own, but all the same I'd like you to try them.'

The swans and the Brants hadn't seen a particle of that flour. All of it had gone into making fake sticks of dynamite, but making the exchange would be the hardest part, though with William away, her caring for the pony would be excuse enough to visit the stable.

‘M'am, are there soldiers watching the house?'

‘Not that I know of. Why should there be?'

‘'Tis what I've asked myself.'

‘Did you see any of them?'

‘That I did. Robbie, being the dog he is, found them out and they told me, now they did, I do declare, that I was to keep that dog locked up.'

‘I see.'

The breath had gone right from Mrs. Fraser. ‘The doctor mustn't stay away m'am. He must come back.'

They had their tea, with Robbie choosing to lie at Mrs. Haney's feet.

‘M'am, is there something you would like to tell me? I'm not of them. I never was, nor my mother and father or my brothers. Parker … now Parker was, but that was over and done with long before they ever came to leave that blessed gelignite at his farm.'

‘He was a good man, Mrs. Haney. I liked him very much.'

‘That you did, now you did, and given time, I'm certain you'd have come to know us all.'

‘Mrs. Haney, tell me whatever you can about the O'Bannions.'

Kevin, was it? ‘Two strapping boys up to no good under the hand of a drunken, rebellious father near twice the age of his poor young wife, and she so swollen up with them, she died in the cowshed and left those boys to him.'

‘Did they have relatives in the west, in Donegal perhaps?'

Donegal was it now? ‘Who among us haven't kin in the far corners of the earth? Ireland is the leaving-us country of them all.'

‘But Donegal, Mrs. Haney? An island perhaps?'

Islands was it now and herself being led by the nose yet letting it happen as two sisters would? ‘I mind there was one sprig of that family living in the northwest, I do. Inishtrahull it was, and them scratching what living they could from the stones and the sea, but they was all moved out years ago. In 1928 it was, and the place a terrible ruin by then.'

‘Did Kevin ever go there for a visit?'

And her using that one's first name while fingering the rim of her saucer as a young girl would under watchful eyes. Caution would be best. ‘That I wouldn't know. Now I surely wouldn't.'

‘But it had a harbour?'

‘A cove of sorts, with a loading boom to snatch the little boats out for fear of them being dashed to pieces on the rocks.'

‘It's very stormy there, is it?'

Lord save us but she had a powerful interest. ‘M'am, you're not thinking of going there, are you?'

‘No. No, I … I just wondered.'

About storms and seas and places to land a boat. ‘Sure and it's the worst of places for mean weather I ever did know, save for that Tory Island which is off to the west of it. But I was only a girl then. Just a slip of a thing, I was, me hugging my china doll and everyone so terrified the ship would go to pieces on them rocks and we'd all be drowned to death, we would.'

‘I didn't know your family had once thought of emigrating?'

‘Haven't all of us thought of getting out? Mother would have none of it after us fetching up on that blessed island. Sick, she was so sick we saw the inside of her toenails. Ship's biscuit and all.'

‘So you came back home.'

‘And my father died of a broken back the very next year to the day, it was. The day, m'am, and me only ten years old. Ten, I was. You'll have me crying, you will. Me who thought I was wrung dry of it all them years ago.'

And didn't Mrs. Fraser reach across the table now to lay a hand on her own? Ria blinked away the tears of forgotten times. ‘Them scones are quite satisfactory, m'am. Now they are, I say.'

‘Be the friend that Parker was to me.'

She had meant it too. ‘Friend it is, for surely this old house must be a lonely place for a young woman like yourself.'

The sun came out in midafternoon and Mary took Robbie for a walk on the leash. From the road atop Caitlyn Murphy's Hill there were breathtaking views all round but nowhere was there a sight of Jimmy and his men.

It had been good to get things straight with Mrs. Haney. One felt one had overcome a major difficulty and had acquired God on one's side, if that was ever possible. Good, too, to know that Kevin O'Bannion must be thinking of Inishtrahull as a rendezvous.

Good just to be out walking with Robbie. The wind ruffled his fur. Shelties were such handsome dogs, so perfectly proportioned, but Robbie was something extra special even then. No wonder Hamish loved him.

‘What is it, Robbie? Can you smell them?'

He barked three times in quick succession, short, sharp barks as a sheepdog would, he facing intently off to the north-northeast, to a copse on the side of a lesser hill, down among the hedgerows and the green, green fields.

‘They can't want you around, can they?' she asked, saddened that it could only be true. ‘No one will try to contact me as long as you are here to give them away.'

Jimmy would have men hidden everywhere he could. Starting across country in the opposite direction, she had the thought they'd run into others and that it would be best to avoid them if possible. Jimmy'd be cursing Robbie and wishing he'd been kept at Mrs. Haney's or had gone away with Hamish and Caithleen, custom's regulations or no; the war, or no.

As always the fields accepted her. There'd been flax grown here, and in summer the blue of its flowers had been like no other. A good farm with rights of passage for herself and Hamish because it was land they had leased to Mr. Makepiece O'Fenlan.

And there it was: Thackeray again.
The Virginians
, then the Shelbourne where the great writer had once stayed, and now another connection she'd entirely forgotten: William Makepeace Thackeray. Had it meaning for her?

The leash tightened as they approached the far corner of the field. There were fieldstones in the lowland wall, bramble bushes along it, and hawthorn, and there it was again. Another coincidence—was that it only? Kevin O'Bannion and herself meeting in the ruins near the school, red berries and thorns, the same things here?

Robbie barked. ‘Robbie,
sh
!' She yanked on the leash. Pointing, he stiffened. ‘
Hush
, do you hear me?'

Following the hedgerow, they soon came to where it cornered at the road. She could see the stable quite clearly now, could see the top of Caitlyn Murphy's Hill.

‘Mrs. Fraser, get that bloody dog out of here.'

Robbie didn't just bark. He let the world know about it, she yanking on the leash and pulling him back on to his hindquarters as Jimmy stepped from cover, the leash slipping from her. ‘Robbie, no!'

He darted in to nip at Jimmy's heels and leap for the crotch, got a good hold of the trousers, snarled, pulled …

‘Sergeant, see to this bloody dog!'

A savage kick was given, Robbie bending almost in half only to land on his feet and go right back into the fight, she yelling, ‘ROBBIE, NO! IT'S ALL RIGHT. HE WON'T HURT ME.'

A bayonet flashed. He yelped, squealed, quivered—lay there in the grass panting, not knowing what had happened to him.

‘Mary, I'm sorry. The dog …'

‘You bastard!' she screamed as she fell to her knees to take him up and hold him. Blood had gushed out as the bayonet had been withdrawn, and no matter how much she tried to wipe it from his fur, it wouldn't stop. ‘Robbie … Robbie, please don't die. Hamish will come home. He'll need you then more than ever.'

‘Mary, leave him. Sergeant, see that she's taken back to the house.'

‘NO! Don't you dare have anyone “see to me.” I'll take him home myself.'

After dark she moved the dynamite and buried Robbie in the garden where she'd first hidden it. She built the bomb, and when that was done, vomited into the bathroom sink, partly from the nausea the gelignite brought, partly from fear.

Wiping her mouth on the back of her hand, she forced herself to look in the mirror, but could see only a person she loathed—threw her head forward, smashed it and the glass not once but twice, said, ‘Forgive me, darling,' the blood spattering the basin and her hands. ‘Oh God, I've been such a stupid fool.'

‘You've hurt yourself,' said Trant.

‘I walked blindly into a door. I was drunk. Look, I don't give a damn what you think of me, Major. Your people killed my husband's dog.'

Best, then, to affect a deferential air. ‘He got away all right? He and the girl?'

She faced him across the desk, hadn't yet been told to sit down. ‘You know damned well they did. We didn't even have a decent chance to say good-bye.'

‘Then I think I should tell you, that your husband will be staying in Scotland for a while.'

‘What's that supposed to mean?'

She was furious with them. ‘Make of it what you will. That more books?' he asked, distracting her as one must now and then, and she was distracted, oh my yes.

‘Of course it is.'

But not wary enough. The books would be clean. No hidden messages, not today. ‘Like your library work here, do you?' he asked.

‘If you wish me to stop, I will.'

‘No. No, nothing like that. The colonel would most certainly wish you to continue your valuable work.'

‘Then may I get on with it?' Trant wasn't looking directly at her, but concentrating on her bandaged forehead. He touched his lips as if in thought.

‘In a moment, yes. Please sit down. What I have to say won't take long.'

A girl, a young woman in uniform, came in with some papers for him to sign. After he'd done this, Trant glanced up at her. ‘Ask Miss Sanderson to come in, would you, please, Corporal Bridgewood. She'll want to be present.'

The Sanderson woman had been waiting out in the foyer: a thoroughly brutal looking forty-year-old who'd been taking a last drag at a cigarette and had then pinched the thing out, the build of less than medium height and chunky, the hair a tired shade of disinterested brown.

‘Mrs. Fraser, this is Miss Maureen Sanderson. Maureen, Mrs. Mary Ellen Fraser.'

The grip was that of a man, the eyes not blue, not grey.

‘Maureen's one of ours, Mrs. Fraser. As I was only just saying, Maureen, we won't keep her long, will we?'

‘Not long, Major. A matter of a few minutes.'

‘Good. Now, Mrs. Fraser, events have taken a turning here. You know, of course, that certain members of the IRA are still on the loose and haven't yet attempted to collect the explosives they parked in the stable loft of yours.'

Could he please just get to it?

‘We have reason to believe they have made contact with some of the prisoners.'

‘Not through me.'

Could she lie so fiercely and still be brash about it? That cut on her forehead showed abrasions all around the bandage—a good three inches across and two in width. A nasty, nasty thing. Bulged a bit, too. ‘Our informants tell us there is another tunnel. The prisoners do have a plan to escape and have expended considerable effort in this regard.'

Their informants … ‘If so, I've overheard nothing of it.'

‘Oh? We rather thought you had, didn't we, Maureen?'

The woman had found another cigarette and was lighting it. ‘Major, I know nothing more of any tunnel than the rumour you told me the last time I was here. The men wouldn't talk about a thing like that in my presence. They'd be …'

‘But they talked about Bauer and the others, didn't they?'

Letting him fluster her would do no good. ‘Major, I told you about them.'

‘About Bauer, yes, but not about the others.'

It had to be asked and he'd forced her to. ‘Is Bauer still allowed to walk around in there?'

‘Of course. Is there something the matter, Mrs. Fraser? I thought I told you we needed the names of all of those who were responsible for the hanging of that man?'

‘Hans Schleiger.'

‘Don't tell me you've been holding out on us?'

‘I
don't
want to be killed, Major.'

‘Then cease to go in. Stop if you wish and I'll tell the colonel it's all off.'

He wouldn't, not really, and she could see this, was sickened by the thought. ‘Look, I really don't know if Schleiger was involved. I … I shouldn't have said that.'

‘Mrs. Fraser, are you carrying anything into Tralane that you shouldn't?'

‘Of course not. Why would I?'

‘That would constitute an act of treason, would it not?'

Did he have to hear her answer? ‘Yes. Yes, of course it would.'

He'd not even sigh, would just let her have it. ‘Then you'll have no objections if we look a little further. Corporal Bridgewood will accompany you and Miss Sanderson. That is all for now.'

‘Major …'

‘I said that was all, Mrs. Fraser. Please try to understand there's a war on.'

The room was just across the foyer and one that he must use for interrogations. A plain table, two wooden fold-up chairs, a brown metal wastebasket, an ashtray and a window …

It was the Sanderson woman who said, ‘Please empty your bag on the table.'

‘And if I don't?'

‘We'll do it for you.'

For the life of her, Mary couldn't remember why she'd snatched her handbag at the last and brought it along. She seldom did unless she was having her period, hadn't had that in a while …