The Lambs Read online

  ‘Don’t worry, he’s dead to the world with a drink in him,’ said Mary, patting the space next to her. ‘Now come here and talk to me.’

  ‘It must be hard for her,’ Flynn said.

  ‘It’s hard on all of us,’ she replied. ‘It must be terrible for him, buried over there away from his kin.’ She squeezed Flynn’s hand, looking into his eyes. ‘Will you visit his grave for me?’ There were tears in her eyes. Flynn pulled her close and she nestled her head on his chest and sobbed. He nodded. ‘You will take care of this one too?’ she finally said, looking at her brother sprawled in his chair beneath a tartan picnic blanket.

  ‘I’ll try,’ he replied awkwardly, desperate to avoid making promises he couldn’t keep.

  ‘And take care of yourself or I’ll kill you,’ she added, giving him a peck on the cheek. He kissed her, pulling her close, feeling the warmth of her body through his clothes. ‘I suppose I’d better be getting to bed myself,’ she finally said, doing nothing to end their embrace, letting him smooth her unruly blonde hair. He closed his eyes, blotting out the world as she snuggled up closer, wriggling in his lap, making him stir.

  ‘Mary …’ he began but her lips cut him off. When she finally left him, he sat gazing at the fire’s dying embers, unable to sleep as he listened to the old building creak. Her scent lingered on his skin, her taste on his lips, and when he finally closed his eyes her image was behind them. Being so close made him warm. Then he remembered the war, waiting for him across the Channel. Gallagher farted, filling the room with a terrible stench. Flynn didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

  By morning the smell still lingered so he opened a window to freshen the air.

  Gallagher let rip another thunderous fart. ‘Gas! Gas! Gas!’ he chuckled like a naughty schoolboy before nestling deeper into the folds of his blanket.

  ‘Has something died in your arse?’ gasped Flynn. ‘You need pulling through.’

  It came to something when city air smelt good. He could smell the Thames as well as the arsenal. It was peaceful, quiet even, save for a painfully emaciated horse in the street below struggling to pull a milk float. All the good horses were gone.

  BANG! Both soldiers jumped as the children’s door exploded inwards disgorging a jumble of squealing kids that crashed into Gallagher’s seated form. Janet stood in the doorway, balancing Daisy on her hip. ‘Tea?’ she asked.

  Breakfast was frugal; tea and toast supplemented by a large tin of plum and apple jam ‘organized’ by Gallagher from the QM’s store, which Davey ate straight from the tin with a spoon. He’d ‘organized’ some tins of bully beef too, but it was the slab of dark army chocolate that truly sent the children into wide-eyed rapture. Conversation was scarce. Time passed too quickly and it was with great reluctance that the two men gathered their kit to leave. Gallagher gave the children thruppence each before self-consciously stuffing a ten-bob note into Janet’s hand.

  ‘I’ll try and send you something,’ he said, making Flynn think of his father’s fiver still unspent in his wallet.

  ‘If it were done when ’tis done, then ’twere well it were done quickly,’ Flynn announced, quoting Shakespeare. It was a habit in awkward situations.

  ‘Don’t worry, he’s always talking like this,’ explained Gallagher as they strolled through the streets to the station. Despite their company, Flynn felt alone; like a man taking the short walk to the gallows, each step a step closer to the inevitability of an inescapable fate.

  ‘I’ll write,’ she reassured him, squeezing his hand. He clung to her like a drowning man on flotsam. She was crying; fat, salty tears as if already mourning him. They kissed. The war had changed everything; no one noticing such a public display of intimacy. Then they parted and he trudged reluctantly to the waiting train, their separation seeming so final. Flynn tried to look like he wasn’t going to cry and Gallagher pretended not to notice.

  CHAPTER 8

  December 1915, Golden Harp public house, Kilburn, London

  Few saw beyond Mick Collins’s boyish charm and cheap brown suit to see the dedicated revolutionary. That suited him fine. Like all members of the secretive Irish Republican Brotherhood, Mick had spent ages cultivating influence amongst the city’s Irish diaspora and wasn’t keen to be seen in the company of men wearing the king’s uniform; even if one was his cousin in the back of a smoky pub. Anonymity suited him.

  ‘Where I come from a man is taught to be … er … cautious about who he talks to,’ Mick said warily, his thick west-Cork brogue fresh off the ferry untainted by five years of London life, as he handed his cousin Aiden Collins a pint of Guinness. He was smiling, his listless hazel eyes flitting to his cousin’s wizened companion. Fallon made a discreet gesture. Mick paused, ignoring his own drink, his cigarette flaring before responding, partially satisfied that the man was also a member of the IRB.

  ‘Maybe it’s you who should be asking what I could do for you?’ suggested Fallon before taking a draught of stout, draining a third with a loud deep swallow.

  ‘And what would you do for me?’ replied Mick.

  ‘Tiocfaidh ár lá,’ Fallon said in his native Irish, sitting back smugly. Mick raised an eyebrow, surprised that a Dubliner would be Gaeilgeoirí, a native speaker.

  ‘Our day will come,’ he repeated in English.

  ‘Aye, and when it does, me and Aiden here are perfectly placed to do our duty and help free the old country from the English yoke,’ replied Fallon.

  ‘So says the redcoat,’ Mick quipped.

  Fallon bridled at the barb. ‘I’ve my orders,’ he sneered.

  Mick simply smiled, betraying nothing that went on behind his hard, dark eyes. ‘It’ll not be long before there’s another rising, what with the war and all, and when it comes there’ll be plenty of lads in the Dubs who would be willing to come in with us and help. I’ve heard talk of an Irish Brigade being raised from the boys taken prisoner by the Germans at Mons and the like.’ Mick said nothing. He’d heard the rumours too that Sir Roger Casement, the renegade ex-British Diplomat and co-founder of the Irish Volunteers, had travelled to Germany to try and raise an ‘Irish Brigade’ from amongst Irish prisoners of war. He’d also heard it was a failure, attracting less than sixty recruits to its ranks: hardly a brigade at all.

  ‘What’s that to me?’ Mick asked, playing his cards close to his chest. He didn’t trust Fallon, just another revolutionary wannabe. Ireland was cursed with them, men who could neither hold their drink nor their tongues, sending too many good men to England’s gallows.

  ‘My division, the 16th Irish, leaves for France this month,’ said Fallon, sliding a tatty envelope across the beer-stained table towards him.

  ‘And why would I be interested in that?’ asked Mick.

  ‘In there’s everything. Movement orders; timetables; supply dumps; the lot. It wasn’t easy to get but if we moved quick we could get a few rifles and ammunition for the cause. Who knows, maybe Jerry would be interested to know too,’ replied Fallon before sitting back and draining his glass. He banged the empty glass down smugly, causing a lull in the hubbub, and drinkers turned their shadowy faces to peer through the fuggy air at the fuss. Mick didn’t mind. The Golden Harp may well be down at heel, shabby even for a backstreet pub, but it was safe Fenian ground and that was all that mattered.

  A hulking shape loomed from the shadows. ‘Is everything all right there, Mick?’ asked the man, cradling a dark polished shillelagh in his brawny arms.

  ‘We’re just grand, Charlie,’ Mick said, waving the man away, then he smiled. ‘Tell you what, Charlie, would you fetch us a couple more drinks?’ Charlie nodded and slipped slowly back into the smoky gloom. The envelope remained untouched on the table. Mick didn’t even look at it, feigning disinterest as he weighed up the odds of this being some sort of Special Branch set-up. The Brits were always looking for fellas willing to sell out their countrymen; they were the bane of his life. He was naturally cautious. ‘I might know someone who knows someone,’ he eventually said, s
lipping the envelope into his inside pocket.

  ‘Knows someone who knows someone, what kind of eejit do you take me for?’ Fallon snapped. Mick resisted a reply. He’d been warned about Fallon by his contacts in Dublin. He’d been a good man once, ruined by drink. Now he was a liability. ‘Look, sonny,’ Fallon sneered. ‘Either you’re for sticking it to the Brits or you’re not, so stop wasting my time,’ he slurred, worse for the drink. Mick’s cigarette flared and for a second Aiden thought he saw his cousin’s jovial façade slip, revealing the cruelty within, and he realized that if looks could kill, the old soldier was already snug in his grave.

  ‘Slán abhaile. We’ll not meet again,’ said Mick. He chose his words carefully – safe home – a phrase used by Irish-speaking Republicans to speed the English on their way. The irony wasn’t lost on Fallon as he sat in the king’s khaki.

  ‘Your gobshite cousin’s telling us to piss off,’ snapped Fallon.

  ‘I’m wishing you a safe journey home, that’s all,’ explained Mick, all smiles once more. Aiden relaxed, reassured by his cousin’s words.

  ‘Sure you are,’ growled Fallon dangerously, his fists balling as Mick scraped back his chair. Fallon lurched to his feet, swaying after a hard day in his cups. Ruefully Collins shook his head and turned to go, ignoring Fallon’s rheumy eyes on his back as he strode through the swirling tobacco fog. For a second Aiden thought Fallon would go after him but he was distracted by the two glasses of stout that Charlie plonked down on the greasy, beer-stained table. Licking his lips, Fallon slumped into his chair, knocking back half a pint of Guinness in one deep, open-throated swallow.

  ‘Leave the punk go,’ muttered Fallon but Aiden ignored him, following his cousin. He caught up with him by the door.

  ‘Marty’s a good man, Mick,’ he said.

  ‘Maybe, but how do you know ye can trust him? He’s a drunken eejit now, whatever he was, and you’re better off shot of him,’ said Mick.

  ‘But he got you the division’s movement plans,’ added Aiden.

  Mick sighed, giving his cousin an indulgent look. ‘I’ll tell you what, keep the drunken eejit out of my way until I’ve had a chance to take a look at these; see if they’re any use. If they are, well, I’ll be in touch. Slán go foil, Ade,’ he said, pulling on his coat as a wailing air raid split the night. ‘Ach, if it isn’t them bloody Zeppelins!’ he muttered, flicking up his overcoat collar against the chill. Then he was gone, leaving Aiden alone in the dark.

  CHAPTER 9

  31 December 1915, Ploegsteert, Belgium

  It had been warm in the train, huddled together in the cattle wagons, leeching heat from each other, but now, outside, the night was raw. Even the fillings in Flynn’s teeth seemed to ache as he jumped from the carriage, stretching his stiff limbs as the battalion coughed and spluttered into something resembling a long khaki slug next to the railway line. Gallagher wiped his nose on the back of his greatcoat sleeve, red-eyed from lack of sleep.

  ‘Are we downhearted?’ someone shouted, trying to rouse the Irishmen’s spirits with a song, but the lack of response spoke volumes. Then it started to rain. He could hear the RSM venting his ire on someone. He wasn’t sure who he feared most: the RSM or the Germans. The sky rumbled like approaching thunder.

  ‘There’s a storm coming,’ Doyle grumbled, pointing at distant flashes.

  ‘That’s not thunder,’ growled Devlin as he strolled by, leaving Doyle to slip into sullen silence beneath the weight of his pack, his eyes drawn to the flashes like a moth to a candle flame. Predictably, it started to rain and by the time they reached their destination, a cavernous barn, they were soaked. Flynn didn’t care. He was tired and wanted to sleep so he buried himself in his sodden greatcoat, closing his eyes. The cold seeped up from the ground into his bones. He sensed movement, opening his eyes. Two little round eyes like jet beads stared into his. They were close, disturbingly shiny, even in the gloom, and he felt something soft brush his nose. It was a rat: a large, smug, fat, self-satisfied rat. Nose twitching, head cocked, it studied him from its plump haunches, smoothing down its greasy fur with its paws before gnawing one of Flynn’s leather ammunition pouches.

  ‘Jesus Christ,’ he muttered as he swept the plump, cat-sized rodent from his kit, sending it skittering like a drunk across the hard dirt floor, pursued by Spud, who disappeared through a hole in the wall in hot pursuit of his plump prey. Flynn sat up, rubbing his extremities. Propping himself against the damp wall, he fumbled for a cigarette with numb, gloved hands. The gloves, woolly, thick and brown, were a Christmas present from an unnamed Maryborough schoolgirl, along with a pair of warm socks encasing his feet. They were cold and heavy, like lead.

  It had been a bleak Christmas, their first out of Ireland, and whilst food had been plentiful no amount of tinned stew could make it any less miserable or distract him from thinking about Mary. She’d written, of course; her loopy, childlike handwriting doing nothing to ease his misery. She’d sent him a picture too, which he slipped in his wallet, to keep it safe. Gallagher had got a fruit-cake – his mother was known for her fruit-cakes – and he guarded it like the crown jewels from his comrades’ envious stares.

  He watched Spud haul the rat’s plump, limp corpse back through the hole, dragging it towards where Carolan lay, peering from his groundsheet. Spud looked pleased with himself, if dogs could look pleased, and his scrawny tail whipped furiously as he dumped his kill next to Carolan’s head, tongue lolling as he patiently awaited his master’s response. Flynn took a slug of water from his water bottle, sluicing the brackish fluid around his mouth before spitting it onto the dirt floor.

  ‘Go easy with the water, Corporal Flynn,’ chided Devlin, who was already up, making tea over a small, evil-smelling kerosene stove. Nearby, Mahon sat bulling his boots to an inappropriately glossy shine whilst Devlin poured a steaming stream of dark-brown liquid into a battered enamel mug just as Flynn joined him.

  ‘You may talk o’ gin and beer when you’re quartered safe out ’ere, an’ you’re sent to penny-fights an’ Aldershot it; but when it comes to slaughter you will do your work on water, an’ you’ll lick the bloomin’ boots of ’im that’s got it,’ said Flynn. Devlin looked at him blankly. ‘Kipling; Gunga Din.’ Devlin thrust a steaming mug into his gloved hands. Even through the wool the heat burned his palms but he resisted the temptation to hold it by the handle, masochistically savouring the warmth leeching into his palms. It was hot and sweet, laced with condensed milk. He could have sworn there was rum in it. Devlin smiled.

  ‘Don’t mind him, Sarge, he goes all poetic on us every now and then,’ said Gallagher. ‘Do you like Kipling, Sergeant?’

  ‘How would I know? I’ve never kippled,’ retorted Devlin with a grin.

  ‘Very funny,’ Flynn groaned between mouthfuls of sweet, hot tea, amazed that no one had gone ‘Boom! Boom!’ Gallagher held out his empty mug, an expectant smirk plastered across his face.

  Devlin shook his head. ‘Am I ye brew bitch now?’ he grumbled, sloshing a liberal dose of the steaming brew into Gallagher’s mug. Flynn noticed that Devlin treated him and Gallagher differently now they were NCOs, realizing that all the time Devlin, Mahon and now even himself were simply playing the parts expected of them by officers and men alike. It was a game.

  ‘It looks like we’re just in time for tea,’ said Captain Murphy with Lieutenant Callear in tow. Instinctively, Flynn and Gallagher braced up, feeling suddenly uncomfortable in the officers’ presence, but Murphy gestured for them to stand at ease. Flynn was wary of officers even if Murphy was all right. Officers were usually bad news, full of bright ideas like ‘Let’s go stick it to the Hun’, and Flynn had a sinking feeling that it wasn’t going to be a quiet New Year.

  ‘Any news, sir?’ asked Devlin, handing the officers a mug of tea each. ‘The boys are getting bored sitting around.’ He knew what to say; how to play the game. Murphy slurped his tea, his dark eyes fixed on some distant point, mulling over both tea and response in equal measure.
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br />   ‘The general thinks it’ll do us good to have a wee taster of trench life before we get a sector of our own so we’re going into the line for a few days. Plugstreet’s pretty quiet right now so I doubt we’ll come to any harm.’ Devlin started draining his tea. ‘No, no, Sar’nt, no need for that, we’ve plenty of time. Make sure the lads have some hot food inside them; it may be their last chance for a couple of days. I want everyone formed up outside in full kit at nine ack-emma sharp! We’ve got some trench stores to collect and we need to bomb up but with a bit of luck we’ll be in the line in time for a spot of luncheon, eh?’ Murphy said. Flynn felt his heart sink. Mahon nodded, breathing on the toecap of his boot before renewing his efforts to buff up the shine. Something in the old NCO’s eye told Flynn he shared his reluctance despite his studied, calm demeanour. Devlin flicked away the last dregs of tea before stowing his mug in his knapsack, suddenly serious. Somehow, the distant rumble of the guns seemed ominously louder than before.

  ‘Well, this is it at last,’ gasped Gallagher, rubbing his hands with glee.

  ‘Yes, this is it,’ muttered Flynn, wondering if he and Mahon were the only ones having reservations.

  ‘Well?’ growled Devlin, reverting to type. ‘Ye heard the captain; we’ve a war to be getting on with!’ The officers smiled politely, finished their tea and left. Breakfast was tasteless – fuel, nothing more: a greasy mess of some sort of pork fritter and scrambled reconstituted eggs. Gallagher drowned his food in brown sauce. Flynn chewed mechanically, forcing the slimy lumps down with gulps of cold tea. Cronin, pale and waiflike as ever, seemed relieved. Flynn had never seen the boy so happy, as if he truly relished the prospect of entering the line. Spud sat proudly atop his rat watching the cacophony, tail wagging furiously as Father Doyle passed by, patting his scruffy little head before moving on to a corner of the barn where he had erected a makeshift altar and was quietly hearing confessions. Ignoring the priest, Flynn delved into his tunic pocket, feeling the hard wood of the rosary his mother had given him. It wasn’t that he wasn’t religious; he just couldn’t be bothered putting in the effort of being devout. He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d recited a decade, let alone the whole sequence of prayers he’d been forced to learn as a child.