The Lambs Read online

  ‘How long do we stag on?’ Flynn asked.

  ‘I’ll yank the cord once when it’s time to come in, you yank twice to say you’re coming. The password’s Cúchulainn. Jerry’ll not get his mouth round that one,’ said Devlin, smugly.

  ‘And you think a load of Dubs and English fellas can?’ asked Flynn.

  ‘Then ’tis just as well I’m here and ye’re out there,’ replied Devlin as Flynn and Cronin shed their leather equipment and caps. They waited as someone moved the timber and wire knife-rest barring the end of the sap before slipping off into the darkness. It was a starry night. The cord led to a gap in the wire wide enough for a man to crawl. Flynn felt like Theseus following the thread in the Minotaur’s labyrinth as he slithered into no-man’s-land followed by Cronin. They ended up in a painfully shallow scrape behind a meagre burr that left Flynn feeling painfully exposed, his guts like water. He tried not to puke. Cronin, on the other hand, looked disturbingly calm; unpleasantly at home where they lay.

  ‘Get a grip,’ Flynn silently chided himself, seeing monsters flit amongst the creaking wire and shadows. Another pale green flare whooshed skywards. He froze, fear icing his bones. Never volunteer for anything. The flare fizzled out. Darkness seeped back, overwhelming his brain. He shifted his weight. He could feel the warmth of Cronin’s body next to him smelling of soap. Time became meaningless. Crunch! ‘What was that?’ Flynn hissed, sure he could see something; a movement deep in the wire. Cronin eased off his safety catch. It clicked gently. The noise stopped. He eased his rifle into his shoulder; his breathing even, measured, controlled. Sweat streamed down Flynn’s face as the Very pistol’s butt slipped into his hand and he inched it from beneath him. Crunch! He raised the pistol, heaving back the hammer with both hands. Crunch! Something loomed from the dark. ‘Shit!’ squealed Flynn, his voice skipping up an octave. Panic pulled the trigger, sending the red flare ripping across the ground on a flat trajectory. There was a scream. One of the shadows erupted in a shower of sparks. Cronin fired, sending a white flash jabbing through Flynn’s skull, deafening him. He fired again, and again, and again. Flynn’s ears were ringing, his nose bleeding. He rose to his knees, rifle loose in his hands; his head was spinning. There was a bright flash, then darkness.

  When he opened his eyes it was light. His face hurt and he groaned, closing his eyes, and for a fleeting moment he imagined he was back in Dublin recovering from a terrific hangover. It wouldn’t be the first New Year he’d begun in pain. He opened them again. He was in the trench. It wasn’t a hangover. He was disappointed. There were boots next to his head. He was on the fire step. ‘You’re still with us, then?’ said Gallagher. Flynn struggled to sit up. ‘Easy there, big fella,’ Gallagher said, easing him back down. ‘I thought you’d copped it.’ There was a dressing on his face. ‘You’ll have a cracking scar, you jammy bugger,’ Gallagher added. ‘The colleens’ll love it.’ There was genuine envy in his voice.

  ‘What happened?’ Flynn asked.

  ‘Christ knows what happened. One minute everything’s cushty and the next Jerry’s everywhere. If you hadn’t got that flare off when you did they’d’ve been all over us. There was shite everywhere; a proper fireworks display. Harry Mason copped it and that Kay fella,’ Gallagher explained, looking dog-tired.

  ‘So ye’ve finished yer nap, then?’ said Devlin, forcing a weary smile. His face was pale and pinched, betraying the emotional strain of the night’s exertions. ‘Ye can thank young Cronin for your skin. He brung ye in,’ he added, waving vaguely towards Cronin, who was sitting like a grubby elf cleaning his rifle. He looked up, smiled and then carried on working contentedly, humming tunelessly. Devlin handed him a water bottle. ‘This’ll put the hairs on ye chest,’ said Devlin. Flynn took a swig; it seared his throat. ‘Whoa there, that’s none o’ ye southern shite; that’s a decent drop of medicinal Bushmills, so go easy!’ laughed Devlin, retrieving the canteen.

  ‘Where the heck did you get whiskey from?’ Flynn asked.

  ‘Could I not be having a wee tint, Sarge? After all, is it not New Year’s Day?’ interjected Gallagher, licking his lips, his eyes large and childlike as he watched the sergeant replace the stopper. Devlin sighed, rolling his eyes as he unplugged the bottle once more. Gallagher grinned, snatching the canteen with trembling hands before taking a long pull. ‘Well, then, fellas, here’s to 1916,’ he declared with a wry grin.

  CHAPTER 11

  St James’s Park, London

  Mary folded Flynn’s letter, a talisman in her slim, discoloured fingers, its whiteness dazzling against the sulphur-stained yellowness of her flesh as if it somehow brought her closer to him. The newspapers called the girls in the munitions factories ‘munitionettes’; it made them seem more glamorous somehow than canaries, which was what most called them because of their waxy-yellowed complexion, the by-product of handling so many dangerous chemicals. At least none of her teeth had fallen out. Not yet, anyway. She sat back, letting the sun’s warmth play on her skin, half-hoping it would give her back her natural colour. It was Sunday, her day off, and somewhere a brass band thumped out yet another patriotic tune. People were singing and for a fleeting moment she squinted at the sun, wondering if somewhere over in France Flynn was doing the same: sharing a moment, bridging the gap on a quiet afternoon. Unfolding his letter, she read it for the umpteenth time, consuming Flynn’s spidery, thoughtless scrawl. It was the words this time, not the chemicals, that made her sick and no matter how often she read it, no matter how much she mumbled prayers to the Virgin Mary, the words remained the same. He’d been wounded. A scratch, he said, but she couldn’t help worrying. She sat back, leaning heavily on the park bench, toying with the letter, when she heard voices nearby: Irish voices.

  Her eyes were drawn to a group of soldiers in hospital uniforms; invalids out of Milbank military hospital enjoying the park’s clean air. Some were in wheelchairs, limbless detritus of some distant battlefield, others hobbled along, the click-clack of their crutches echoing from the tarmac pathways, herded benevolently by stern-faced nurses in crisp, starched uniforms. Mary couldn’t help thinking there was something painfully familiar about one brown-haired soldier. He limped along, head down, leaning heavily on a walking stick that he held in one gloved hand, curled like a claw. She felt her stomach tighten. It couldn’t be? One of the nurses paused, looking puzzled as she broke into a run, shouting ‘Mick!’

  ‘Aren’t we all Micks here, darling?’ called a ruddy-faced Irish Guardsman, sweeping his cap from his ginger hair in a sweeping cavalier bow, referring to the regiment’s nickname. ‘What brings a Dublin girl to this mucky old town?’ he added, exposing his tombstone teeth. The others had stopped too, ribbing the jilted redhead as she ignored him, swerving past after the one who kept limping on.

  ‘Mickey!’ she gasped, placing her hand on the soldier’s arm. He stopped and turned, exposing scarified flesh snagging his mangled mouth into a sneer. The left side of his face was gone, the eye covered by a patch. The right side was flawless, unmistakable. His right eye was a well of sorrow and infinite sadness. He turned to go but she didn’t release his sleeve. ‘Is it you, Mickey?’

  ‘Mary?’ he whispered. His voice was like the rustle of dry leaves as he took in her sallow, jaundiced complexion. There was a hint of brandy on his breath.

  ‘Is everything all right, Private Gallagher?’ asked a slim young nurse, her officious English plumminess grating on Mary, despite the woman’s obvious concern.

  ‘Yes, it is. This here is my sister,’ he replied. The nurse spared Mary a cursory look before rejoining her charges. Mickey sighed, unsure where to look; words somehow stuck in his throat.

  ‘They said you were dead,’ Mary said quietly as she touched his cheek. He shrank back.

  ‘Look at me, I’m a monster. What good am I to my Janet now? She’s better off without me,’ he said, his voice hoarse.

  ‘Holy Mary Mother of God, Michael Gerald Gallagher, you’re a bloody great eejit!’ He cocked his head, looking puz
zled. ‘Janet’s lost without you!’ A tear rolled down his cheek. ‘We’ve got to tell her the army was wrong; tell her you’re alive!’

  ‘No!’ he snapped, his eye wide in panic.

  The nurse looked back. Heads turned.

  ‘What about the wee ones, Davey and Lizzie and Daisy?’ she asked, taking his gloved hand. It was stiff and immobile beneath the dark leather.

  ‘Daisy?’

  ‘Aye, Daisy. She’s like a doll; all curls and big eyes. She’s the spit of her ma,’ she said, leading him gently by the hand to a nearby bench. They sat down. He was silent. ‘They sent Janet her letters. They said they found them on your body. That’s how they knew it was you. What happened?’ she asked.

  He looked at her. Where to begin? He took a deep breath and then spoke. ‘It’s a terrible thing is a battle, Mary, full of noise; full of screaming and dying and the guns …’ His voice trailed away. It was all there, inside his head. Just saying it brought it back: the smells; the sounds. She squeezed his hand. He was shaking. ‘We tried to stop them at Mons but there were too many of the buggers, wave after wave of them. Someone must have found my coat cos I lost half my kit when we pulled out. They dogged us all the way, day after day, never giving us time to rest. Then we got orders to stop, to turn and fight. Christ knows where we were. I was in a ditch, firing and firing and firing. It was slaughter. Then next thing I know I’m stark bollock naked in a ditch with some bastard trying to bury me! It was a miracle, they said, a bloody miracle, so they fixed me up as best they could. Couldn’t save me leg; Fritz already got the other bits.’ He held up his gloved hand, touching the eye patch. ‘Good thing I’ve a spare, eh?’ he joked weakly.

  ‘So why didn’t they say you were alive?’ she asked.

  ‘When I came to I had no idea who I was. It wasn’t just me devilish good looks that the shell took. It took my memory too. No one knew who I was. I didn’t know. I guess they must have found Janet’s letters in some other fella’s pockets, the one with my coat, and assumed it was me. By the time I knew differently, it was too late …’

  ‘I don’t understand. What do you mean too late? Too late for what?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s better this way, Mary.’ He looked up; the other soldiers were in the distance now. ‘I best be getting back,’ he said suddenly, levering himself awkwardly to his feet. ‘Please, Mary, don’t say anything to Janet. Promise me.’ She opened her mouth to speak. ‘Please.’

  Reluctantly she nodded. ‘I promise,’ she said. Then she asked, ‘Will I be seeing you again?’

  He turned, round-shouldered, the weight of the world pressing on him. ‘I’ve an early shift at the factory this week, so what if I meet you here the evening after next, about six, by this bench?’ He nodded, then hobbled away. She watched until he vanished from sight, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. Everything had changed. Mickey was alive. It took her an hour to summon up the strength to leave, as if walking away would somehow put a lie to what had just happened. By the time she got home it was late.

  ‘Did you do anything exciting?’ asked Janet.

  ‘Not really,’ replied Mary, trying to avoid Janet’s gaze.

  ‘You were a long time doing nothing much, then.’ added Janet, placing a cup of tea down on the table in front of her sister-in-law before sitting down opposite. ‘You look exhausted.’ Mary could feel Janet’s eyes on her. She played with the tea, sipping occasionally in the somewhat awkward silence. ‘I’m off to bed, then,’ Janet finally pronounced. Mary remained silent. Janet rose and ambled to the door, pausing, her hand hovering over the brass knob. ‘You’re hiding something, aren’t you?’

  Mary looked up suddenly, eyes wide in alarm.

  ‘W-what makes you think that?’ she stammered, almost spilling her tea.

  ‘You met someone today, didn’t you?’ Janet said, smiling sympathetically.

  ‘How could you even think that, with my Kevin wounded and all?’ Mary bridled.

  ‘Come off it, Mary, what difference does that make? Good luck to you, I say; they work you too hard in that flaming factory as it is! You should jack it in while you can. Just look at you, worn thin. So why shouldn’t you live a little? For all you know your fella’s already dead,’ Mary blanched ‘so for God’s sake don’t go ending up wasting your life like me, waiting, always waiting … and for what?’

  ‘You shouldn’t go talking like that, Janet!’ Mary snapped.

  ‘Mary, just cos you want something don’t mean it’s gonna happen, does it?’

  ‘You can’t go giving up on Mickey like that. He’ll come home; you’ll see. I just know he will.’

  Mary felt awful and over the next few weeks her behaviour did little to make Janet think she hadn’t found another man – but she knew she couldn’t tell her about Mickey. She’d promised. Then she had an idea.

  ‘We used to come here. She was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen. So slight and fragile and she thought me so handsome in my uniform,’ he reminisced as they sat on the Chelsea Embankment watching the tugs and tenders wend their way up and down the busy Thames. Mickey seemed happier; easier with his words as he talked about Janet and how they met.

  ‘Janet still needs you, and the wee ones,’ she said.

  Mickey sighed.

  ‘They’ll be discharging me soon, then what? Soldiering’s all I’ve known and now … and now, what good am I to anyone? Maybe if I sent money? I know a fella in the pay office who could make it look like she was getting a pension,’ he offered. ‘How could I expect her to spend the rest of her life looking after a cripple?’

  ‘Because she loves you, you great eejit!’ Mary averred. ‘And you still love her. I’ll tell you what, how about I fetch Janet and the weans over to the park next Sunday? We’ll have a picnic. You could see them …’ He looked scared, blinking back the threat of a tear. ‘They’d never know you were there if you stayed by our bench, the one where we met in St James’s. Then you could see they’re all right.’ His heart thumped against his ribs. ‘She’s a little darling, is wee Daisy.’

  ‘All right then, but they mustn’t know I’m here. Promise me, Mary, you’ll not tell them,’ he said, looking down at her with his clear blue eye.

  ‘That’s settled, then,’ Mary said, smiling. ‘You just make sure you’re by our bench at one o’clock next Sunday, that’s an order!’

  ‘Aye, ma’am,’ he replied, chopping off a mock salute. It was the first time she’d seen him smile.

  ‘Now let’s get you back to hospital before they set one of those wolfhounds of a posh English nurse on me,’ she laughed, taking Mickey by the arm. She had a plan.

  Janet wasn’t keen when she suggested a picnic but the children loved the idea, squealing with excitement.

  ‘It’ll probably be heaving with rain, so why go all the way to St James’s Park?’ Janet asked. ‘Wouldn’t it be easier just to go to the common? Besides, the tube ain’t free. Lord, I’ve barely got the money for the rent.’

  ‘Whist, woman, will you stop worrying yourself over trivia! It’ll do the weans good to get some fresh air. I’ll pay the tube fares,’ Mary insisted. ‘London’s a grand city, the capital of the greatest empire the world has ever seen, Janet, and who knows, you may even have fun!’

  Narrowing her eyes, Janet looked from Mary to the expectant faces of her children. ‘Sod the flaming empire, it ain’t done me no good,’ she grumbled.

  ‘Please, Mummy, please,’ wheedled Lizzie, backed up by Davey whilst Daisy simply gazed at her mother with huge, saucer eyes, sucking her thumb.

  ‘Oh, all right, then,’ relented Janet. Resistance was futile. Mary smiled, tousling Lizzie’s wayward auburn hair. ‘I don’t know what you’re up to, Mary Gallagher, but Lord help us I know you’re up to something.’

  That night Mary didn’t sleep, tossing and turning in her narrow bed, and by Sunday she was a bundle of nerves. It was threatening rain by the time they reached the park but by some miracle it held off. It would be Easter soon and the last thin
g they needed was yet another washout bank holiday weekend. There was a band adding cadence to the strollers’ gait.

  ‘That’s what your daddy used to do,’ Mary told Davey as they watched khaki-clad Lifeguards ride down Horse Guards Road to change the guard outside Horse Guards Parade.

  ‘Will you stop filling the boy’s head with such nonsense? Mickey isn’t a donkey walloper, he’s Irish Guards, not the flaming Household Cavalry!’ Janet corrected her.

  ‘You said is, not was,’ replied Mary, taking Janet by the hand. Together they crunched over the red gravel road to the fountain at the edge of the park. Davey hoofed his football over the grass, breaking free to chase after it. Janet spread out a musty old Stuart tartan travel rug that had seen better days, and started laying out their meagre feast. There were potted meat sandwiches and some plum jam ones too. Mary had acquired a pork pie from somewhere and there was a flask of strong sweet tea. It was all Mary could afford but if the look on little Lizzie’s face was anything to go by it was good enough. She glanced at the bench. Mickey was meant to be sitting on it, but it was empty. There was no sign of him. The buzz of an aeroplane overhead distracted her, drawing her eyes upward. She had no idea what kind of aeroplane it was; Flynn would have known. She could see the pilot waving as he swooped over the park. Then Mary saw a figure in uniform, silhouetted by the sun; a shadow on the edge of the path. Watching; waiting. He leant heavily on a walking stick, watching Davey enthusiastically if somewhat inexpertly chase his football around the grass. Her stomach knotted. Without looking up, Janet dispatched Lizzie to fetch her brother to eat. Davey sent the ball wheeling awkwardly into the air. It bounced twice, landing awkwardly at the shadow’s feet.