Friend or Foe Read online

  ‘Wanted a word, Madigan,’ he said. ‘On your own.’

  ‘Don’t start anything,’ Gerry warned the other boy.

  ‘It’s OK, Gerry,’ said Jack quietly. ‘I can handle it.’

  ‘Fine,’ said Gerry, moving off and leaving Jack alone with Phelim.

  Jack wondered what Phelim was planning, and he tensed himself, ready for action if need be. In the weeks since their fight they had stayed out of each other’s way – if anything, Jack felt that maybe Phelim respected him for standing up for himself. Then again, maybe the bigger boy wanted revenge for his split lip and had been biding his time to lull Jack into a false sense of security.

  After Da being so understanding about the fight, Jack really wanted to avoid another incident, and so he kept his tone neutral when he spoke. ‘So, what is it you wanted?’

  Phelim said nothing for the moment, and Jack realised that he was waiting for the boys nearby to leave. Phelim stared hard at a couple of them, and they quickly got the message.

  Jack balanced himself on the balls of his feet, hoping to avoid trouble but ready in case Phelim tried to catch him unawares with a blow.

  ‘I’ve been thinking,’ said Phelim.

  ‘Yeah?’ answered Jack. The other boy’s tone wasn’t aggressive, but Jack stayed on guard, wary in case Phelim tried to trick him. He could see a tiny mark where Phelim’s lip had been split, but he shifted his gaze to his eyes, ready for any hint of an attack.

  ‘I’ve been thinking,’ repeated Phelim, ‘about what Giller said.’

  ‘Giller said a lot of things.’

  ‘About Christmas. And the season of goodwill. And I thought … maybe we should bury the hatchet.’

  Jack was dumbfounded. Could this be some kind of ruse? He stayed on the balls of his feet, still ready to react. But Phelim seemed to be speaking sincerely.

  ‘I’m still against the British Army and the DMP and all that, but … well, I shouldn’t have said what I did about your cousin.’

  Jack stared at him, amazed and not knowing what to say.

  ‘So when Giller said Christmas is a time to right wrongs, I thought … maybe we should just accept we’re on different sides and leave it at that. OK?’

  Jack was still wary, but he nodded. ‘OK.’

  ‘We don’t have to pretend to be pals. But … well, we could try to get along.’ Phelim tentatively reached out and offered a handshake. ‘What do you say?’

  Jack hesitated for a moment, then remembering what had been said about goodwill and peace on earth, he held out his own hand and shook Phelim’s. The bigger boy held his handshake for a moment, then nodded in farewell and walked out of the classroom.

  Jack stood unmoving. Earlier he had marvelled at life’s unpredictability, but this was the most surprising thing of all. He smiled to himself, wondered what other surprises lay in store, then gathered his schoolbag and left the room with a spring in his step.

  ‘It’s simply appalling, girls,’ said Miss Clarke, ‘that the Ku Klux Klan has been revived in Georgia.’

  It was coming to the end of the history lesson, Emer’s final class of the day, but as usual the teacher had made the subject so interesting that Emer wanted the class to go on.

  ‘The Ku Klux Klan is violently opposed to black people, Catholics, Jews and immigrants,’ said Miss Clarke. ‘So what does history teach us about dealing with such a threat?’

  Joan raised her hand.

  ‘Yes, Joan?’

  ‘That we try to see their viewpoint, Miss?’

  ‘Normally that would be the case. As, for example, when I went to Emer’s concert that was run by Conradh na Gaeilge. If you don’t mind me using that as an example, Emer?’

  ‘No, Miss,’ said Emer.

  ‘As an Englishwoman, I don’t necessarily agree with the stance taken recently by Conradh na Gaeilge,’ continued the teacher. ‘But I went to Emer’s concert – at which, may I say, Emer, you played very well.’

  ‘Thanks, Miss,’ answered Emer, surprised but pleased that her piano playing had found its way into a history lesson.

  ‘As I say, I went to Emer’s concert and exchanged views with many people afterwards – some of them moderate Irish nationalists, some of them fervent nationalists. That, girls, is a healthy thing, where people of differing opinions exchange views and try to see each other’s standpoints.’

  ‘So why can’t we do that with the Ku Klux Klan, Miss?’ asked Joan.

  ‘Because some things are just so wrong they mustn’t be indulged. You can’t have a reasoned argument with somebody who would lynch a black man – brutally hang him from a tree – simply because of the colour of his skin. Some wrongs are so blatant they must be firmly rejected.’

  Just then the bell rang to mark the end of the school day, and Miss Clarke closed her folder. ‘To be continued, girls,’ she said. ‘Class dismissed.’

  There was a flurry of activity. Emer and Joan packed their schoolbags, then left the classroom together and sauntered down the corridor.

  ‘So what was Clarkie really like at the concert?’ asked Joan. ‘Did your mam and dad think she was mad?’

  ‘No, actually, they thought she was great.’

  ‘Really? Even though she’s English?’

  ‘They’re not against ordinary English people, Joan. Just the ones who rule us.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘It was all very polite, and herself and Dad agreed to disagree about the Volunteers. But she was all in favour of Conradh na Gaeilge promoting the Irish language, so that went down well.’

  ‘Adults are weird!’ said Joan. ‘You can never tell what they’ll do. Oops, Creeper alert!’

  Emer looked up to see Sister Assumpta approaching down the corridor. The two girls courteously greeted the nun, who nodded in acknowledgement as she passed.

  ‘Look at the face on her,’ whispered Joan. ‘It would stop a clock!’

  ‘Yeah. Not exactly in the Christmas spirit, is she?’

  ‘Well, that’s the thing,’ answered Joan. ‘Maybe she is, in her own way.’

  Emer looked at her friend curiously. ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘Marie Gogan saw her giving half a crown to a beggar in town.’

  ‘Really? Half a crown?’

  ‘Yeah. Marie was shopping with her mother, but Creeper didn’t see her. And there was this old man begging, and he had only one leg. And Creeper stopped and gave him half a crown. So maybe she’s not all bad.’

  ‘No,’ said Emer thoughtfully. ‘So she makes our lives a misery in here, and she’s dead generous outside. You’re right – adults are weird!’

  Jack watched carefully as Da filled his pipe with tobacco. He wanted to make his move while Da was relaxed, and he was always at his most approachable when sitting in the armchair by the fire with a good pipe going. Ma and Sheila were at the living-room table, putting the finishing touches to an elaborate hat they were making. Maureen and Mary were out, Una was reading the newspaper, and Jack was carefully painting the railings of his fretwork model of the Custom House.

  ‘A new cinema has opened on Sackville Street,’ said Una, reading excitedly from the paper. ‘It’s called the Carlton, and it will hold six hundred people.’

  ‘You’re a divil for the cinema,’ said Da as he struck a match, then he puffed away to get his pipe going.

  ‘Why not?’ said Una. ‘Myself and Mary work hard. After a week making shells, we’re entitled to some entertainment.’

  ‘God forbid that you wouldn’t be entertained!’ said Ma, looking up from her hat-making with a grin. ‘I don’t know what I did for entertainment at your age when there were no cinemas.’

  ‘Times change, Ma,’ answered Una.

  ‘They do,’ said Da, ‘and not always for the better.’

  ‘Ah, Da, that sounds like a real old man’s thing to say!’ said Sheila with a laugh.

  As the eldest and most sensible of Jack’s sisters, Sheila could get away with saying things that the rest of them couldn’t, and
Jack watched now as Da smiled benignly.

  ‘Sure, I am an old man,’ he said. ‘Well – almost!’

  The pipe smoke had a sweet, comforting smell, and Jack sensed that now was the moment to make his request. ‘I was wondering, Da,’ he said, putting down his paint brush.

  ‘Were you now? And what were you wondering?’

  ‘Ben and Gladys and Joan and Emer are all going down to Monasterevin to a Christmas fair. Emer’s uncle lives there, and they’re going down on the train, staying overnight with the uncle and coming back the next day. Can I go too, please?’

  His father took the pipe from his mouth. ‘I don’t know about that, Jack.’

  ‘Please, Da. This time it’s nothing to do with Conradh na Gaeilge or the Volunteers, it’s just a Christmas outing.’ Jack suspected that his parents felt bad about refusing him permission to sing in Emer’s concert, and he hoped now that they might balance things out by letting him go.

  ‘Why would you want to go to Monasterevin?’ asked Una.

  ‘Because my friends are all going, and it would be great fun.’

  ‘And what adult is in charge?’ asked Ma.

  Jack thought it was encouraging that Ma wasn’t rejecting the proposal out of hand. ‘Mrs Davey will bring everyone to the station,’ he said. ‘We’d travel down on the train, and Emer’s uncle would collect everyone at the station in Monasterevin.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘I’d love to go, Ma. Please, can I?’

  His mother looked across to where Da sat at the fireplace and raised an eyebrow in enquiry. Jack held his breath as his father put down his pipe.

  ‘I don’t want to be a killjoy, Jack,’ he said. ‘But like I told you, our new Inspector is very strict. “Fraternising with undesirables”, he calls it.’

  ‘In fairness, Da,’ said Una, ‘you could hardly call the Daveys undesirables!’

  ‘Not as neighbours, no, of course not. But politically …’

  ‘But politics hardly comes into it, Da,’ said Sheila. ‘It’s just a group of kids going to a Christmas fair.’

  Jack had been just about to make the same argument. But Da respected Sheila’s responsible approach to life, so Jack decided it would be better to say nothing and let his sister make the argument for him.

  ‘And besides,’ continued Sheila. ‘The Inspector will never know. Like Jack said, it’s nothing to do with the Volunteers. It’s just a group of friends going down the country for one night.’

  Jack felt a surge of affection for his big sister. He turned to look at his father.

  For a moment Da said nothing, then he breathed out resignedly and nodded. ‘All right then. But keep it to yourself, Jack. Don’t broadcast to all and sundry that you’re a guest of the Daveys, all right?’

  ‘I’m sworn to silence, Da! Wild horses wouldn’t get it out of me!’

  The others laughed, then Jack thanked his parents, gave Sheila a grateful nod and went contentedly back to painting his model.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Emer thought Monasterevin was wonderful. It had a fascinating network of waterways and bridges, with the River Barrow, the Grand Canal, the Great Southern Railway and the Portarlington branch of the canal all coming together in this small County Kildare town.

  Emer’s uncle Peadar and his wife, Gertie, had no children of their own, but they made Emer and her pals feel really welcome. They lived in an old house close to the lock-keeper’s cottage on the canal. Emer had enjoyed her friends’ excitement earlier in the day when the nearby lifting bridge had allowed a barge to cross the Barrow, the boat suspended high above the river on a narrow stone aqueduct.

  As part of the Christmas fair, coloured lights had been installed along Monasterevin’s streets, attached to the walls of the tall canal warehouses. Now as Emer looked out the window of her uncle’s cosy kitchen at the night sky, a swirl of snowflakes was falling, giving the streets a fairy-tale quality.

  Emer cradled a mug of homemade broth in her hands as she turned back to her friends, who were all seated at the kitchen table. Uncle Peadar and Aunt Gertie had retreated to the parlour with Mr Cronin, a local bargeman and a friend of her uncle’s, leaving the five friends to sing songs and tell ghost stories around a crackling log fire. Even the novelty of drinking soup from tin mugs instead of the more usual soup bowls made the night seem special. Emer had suggested to Jack that they might extend their circle and ask Gerry to join them for this trip, but the other boy was working flat out selling Christmas trees door-to-door with his uncle.

  ‘Wouldn’t it be brilliant if the snow got heavy and we had it for Christmas?’ asked Gladys as the falling snowflakes lightly dusted the gaunt branches of the trees outside the kitchen window.

  Jack nodded in agreement. ‘Yeah, like you see in the Christmas cards.’

  ‘I’d rather if it snowed in January, when we’re back at school,’ said Joan.

  Ben looked at her in surprise. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because the pipes might freeze, and we’d get off school! It’s no good if they freeze when we’re on holidays.’

  ‘So that’s your Christmas wish – that the pipes freeze?’ asked Ben.

  Joan laughed. ‘No, that’s my January wish!’

  ‘We should all pick what we’d like if there was no limit and we could each have one wish come true,’ suggested Emer.

  ‘Has it to be something that could really happen, though?’ asked Gladys.

  Ben looked at his sister. ‘She just said there’s no limit.’

  ‘I know, but I’m just asking … Is it dream stuff, like being a queen, or is it a wish for something real?’

  ‘It can be anything you like, Gladys,’ answered Emer. ‘So who wants to go first?’

  ‘Why don’t you go,’ suggested Jack, ‘seeing as it’s your idea?’

  Emer considered it for a moment. ‘I think I’d like to live in a castle on the Rhine for a year. And then come back to find Ireland was an independent republic!’

  ‘Come on, that’s two wishes, Emer!’ said Ben.

  ‘OK, well you can limit yourself to one!’

  Ben looked thoughtful. ‘Eh … my wish would be to be a professional cricket player.’

  ‘Good choice, Ben,’ said Jack.

  ‘And what about you, Jack?’ asked Emer.

  ‘I’d be given a private tour by the Commissioner behind the scenes in Scotland Yard.’

  ‘Brilliant. And Gladys?’

  ‘I’m not certain. But I think I’d like to visit my pen friend in Wales.’

  ‘That’s a really boring wish!’ said Ben.

  ‘No more boring than you and your aul’ cricket!’ answered his sister.

  ‘And what about you, Joan?’ asked Emer.

  ‘I’d like to inherit a chocolate factory!’

  The others laughed, then Emer looked up as her Aunt Gertie came into the room.

  ‘OK, it’s getting late. Time for bed,’ said Gertie.

  ‘Ten more minutes?’ asked Emer. ‘Please?’

  Aunt Gertie laughed. ‘All right, miss! Ten more minutes, then bed for everyone.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Emer. She looked back at her friends and winked, happy to savour every last minute of this magical winter’s night.

  Jack sat up in bed, trying not to make a sound. He was sharing a bedroom with Ben, and they were directly above the parlour. The old wooden boards of the bedroom floor had some gaps, and Jack could see shafts of light from the room below. More importantly, he could hear Emer’s uncle Peadar and his friend Mr Cronin through the floor, and their conversation had made him sit up attentively.

  Ben had drifted off to sleep within minutes of their candle being extinguished. Normally Jack had no trouble sleeping either, but the combination of a strange room and an action-packed day was keeping his mind active. The train journey to Monasterevin had been great fun, and Jack had thoroughly enjoyed the Christmas fair, which featured carol-singing and food and drink stalls with free samples. Rather than being sleepy after a busy d
ay, however, he had tossed and turned for a long time. But now he was wide awake.

  It hadn’t come as a surprise that Emer’s uncle Peadar was a nationalist – after all, he was the brother of Mr Davey, who was a captain in the Volunteers – but Jack had still been fascinated when he first heard Uncle Peadar and Mr Cronin discussing the delivery of a secret consignment of ‘supplies’. It was clear that the two men thought they weren’t being overheard, and it sounded increasingly to Jack as though the supplies were for the Volunteers.

  He remained stock still in his bed now, afraid that any movement might alert the men in the room below. In truth they were probably too caught up in what they were doing to be listening out for sounds from the bedroom, but Jack didn’t want to take any chances.

  Just then there was a tapping on the window of the parlour below, and Jack heard Peadar saying, ‘That’ll be him’. This was followed by the sound of a chair being pulled back as Emer’s uncle rose from his seat and made for the hall. Jack heard the front door creaking open and being gently shut, and then Mr Cronin greeted the newcomer as he came into the parlour.

  ‘Good man, Dinny,’ he said. ‘Everything go well?’

  ‘No hitches,’ answered the man called Dinny.

  ‘Where are you moored?’ asked Peadar.

  Jack suspected that Dinny must have transported the secret consignment to Monasterevin by barge, and he listened carefully for the answer.

  ‘In the shadows at the far warehouse.’

  ‘Right, let’s get it safely stowed away,’ said Peadar.

  The men started for the hall again. Jack remained unmoving, but his mind was racing. What was the right thing to do? The easy solution would be to say nothing and try to go back to sleep. But that would be a coward’s way out. Should he try to alert the local police? But that would feel like a betrayal, especially after having eavesdropped in a house in which he was a guest. And besides, he couldn’t say for certain that the supplies were weapons or ammunition. Unless I check it out.

  Jack bit his lip, unsure what to do. Then he followed his instincts, slipped back the blankets and swung his feet out onto the floor. He would need to be fast to keep the men in sight, but he couldn’t risk waking Ben. Moving quietly but swiftly, he pulled his trousers and sweater on over his pyjamas, slipped his feet into his shoes and quickly tied the laces.