Transcriber’s Notes:
Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
Additional Transcriber’s Notes are at the end.
* * * * *
IRELAND IN TRAVAIL
* * * * *
TO E. A. N. AND G. M. L.
* * * * *
IRELAND IN TRAVAIL
BY JOICE M. NANKIVELL
AUTHOR OF “THE SOLITARY PEDESTRIAN”
AND SYDNEY LOCH
AUTHOR OF “THE STRAITS IMPREGNABLE”
LONDON
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W.
1922
* * * * *
_All rights reserved_
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. 47--AGENT (S. L.) 1
Called up--Another acquaintance--Below the
surface--Through a window.
II. WE CROSS TO DUBLIN (J. M. N.) 10
On board--After curfew--We arrive.
III. I COME ACROSS 47 (S. L.) 17
Stephen’s Green--On the stroke--Cumann na
mBan--Good advice.
IV. FINDING A ROOF (J. M. N.) 27
Mrs. Slaney--We take a flat--Au revoir.
V. WE SETTLE IN (J. M. N.) 34
Mrs. Slaney indignant--We dine.
VI. WE MAKE ACQUAINTANCES (J. M. N., S. L.) 38
A Beau Brummell--Signs of the times--An
introduction--Money for nothing--A tram
ride.
VII. THE BIRTH OF SINN FEIN (S. L.) 48
The beginning--The Celtic revival--The
Phœnix--Capital _versus_ Labour--Murder
gang--Bad to worse--Black-and-
Tans--Disturbed areas--Reprisal.
VIII. AUTUMN WEARS OUT (S. L.) 66
The game of bluff--Passers-by--Wanted
men--Templemore--Our mutual friend--Hard
at work--A lonely life.
IX. THE HUNGER STRIKE (S. L.) 81
The great fast--A Dublin funeral--The
night watch--A mysterious visitor--Kevin
Barry--November ends.
X. BLOODY SUNDAY (J. M. N.) 94
Terrible news--A Sunday
evening--Unhonoured and unsung.
XI. AFTERMATH (S. L.) 101
In full cry--In the crowd--A chance
meeting.
XII. VISIT TO A TOP STORY (J. M. N.) 109
Watching and waiting--Money for
nothing--Au revoir.
XIII. FROM THE HOUSETOP (S. L., J. M. N.) 116
The Central Hotel--A brief haven--A top
story--Down below--Lies, all
lies!--Loyalist and Republican--The
first raid--England’s market garden.
XIV. AN AT HOME (J. M. N.) 133
A Christmas box--Old Meg--Curlewed--A
Unionist.
XV. HEIGHT OF THE TERROR (S. L.) 142
Day by day--Building a Republic--President
De Valera--The pendulum--_Irish
Bulletin_--Reprisals--The gods must laugh.
XVI. THE MINISTER OF PROPAGANDA (J. M. N.) 156
A piece of news--An innocent man--Real
dotes.
XVII. CAPTURE OF A CABINET MINISTER (J. M. N.) 162
Mrs. Slaney is uneasy--Open, the
military!--Harbouring rebels--His tea.
XVIII. WINTER WEARS OUT (S. L.) 170
Spreading the news--A
Republican--Propaganda--Waste!
Waste!--Day and night--The City ambushes.
XIX. MRS. O’GRADY’S FOREBODINGS (J. M. N.) 183
Mrs. O’Grady is prudent--Enter Mrs. Slaney.
XX. TO DUBLIN CASTLE (S. L.) 189
Raided again--A new acquaintance--A
find--A late call--The journey done.
XXI. INSIDE THE CASTLE (S. L.) 200
To bed--The Auxiliary at home--Into the
fire--Thirteen at table--An outing.
XXII. LOST: A HUSBAND (J. M. N.) 211
A strained situation--Gelignite!--Next
morning--Dublin Castle--In the
maze--Room 13--F Company--Found.
XXIII. LAST WEEKS OF WAR (S. L.) 229
Spring and peace--The Customs
House--The Auxiliary Cadets--A brisk
affair--Ballykinler--Under the
whip--Mrs. Slaney indignant.
XXIV. THE COMING OF SUMMER (S. L.) 244
Corner-boys--Hands up--Erskine
Childers--The phantom army--In Phœnix
Park--The old order changeth.
XXV. THE EVE OF PEACE (J. M. N.) 257
Ambushed--Only another
ambush--Patriots--The final raid--To
rack and ruin.
XXVI. THE TWELFTH OF JULY (S. L.) 268
North and South--King William--The great
day--The trysting-ground--Patches of
splendour.
XXVII. TRUCE (S. L.) 279
Changed times--The final settlement--The
last of 47--Dail Eireann--Leave them
there.
XXVIII. LAST OF IRELAND (J. M. N.) 291
An avatar--Good-bye to Ireland.
XXIX. LOOKING BACK (S. L.) 297
Hag-ridden--Two alternatives--The hopeful
present.
* * * * *
IRELAND IN TRAVAIL
CHAPTER I 47--AGENT
In the wonderful August weather of 1920, my wife and I were in our
London flat sighing for cooler places. The season had come to an end
with less than its usual glory, and for days taxis and growlers,
topheavy with luggage, had been carrying fleeing Londoners to country
and to sea. The holidays had begun; but England, still limping from the
late war, had lost the holiday spirit: indeed the world was restless as
if it had come through painful convulsions to kick spasmodically for a
while. We were restless too.
Ireland was one of the world’s sores. It was near at hand. Should we go
and see for ourselves? The middle of August had come, and we could not
make up our minds.
On the hottest of those mornings I wandered into Hyde Park, and where
the riders turn their horses about, on the very last chair of the row,
leaning forward, rubbing his chin on his stick, I came across 47--Agent
of the secret service. He had seen me coming along, and patted the
next seat in invitation as if we had met yesterday.
“I thought you were at the other end of the world.”
He answered, “I’m here.”
How I met 47; how it came about that he revealed his secret to me;
how it was that we became friends, has nothing to do with this story.
Sometimes I saw a lot of him; sometimes he passed out of my life for a
year.
Before I had known 47 six months I had learned this, that a secret
service agent, if he is to be more than a common spy, what the French
term a _mouchard_, a fellow who gleans his news among servant girls and
the like, must have something of a statesman’s vision to carry him on
his way. He must have that sense of the future which lifts him beyond
the individual and the matter of the moment to think in nations and
down centuries. Thus is lessened the pang he feels as he bruises the
individual, as the vivisectionist tortures the beast that beasts and
men shall be freed of pain.
“Come to dinner to-night,” I said. “We are always talking of you.”
“I’m crossing to Ireland to-night.”
“Ireland? Are you working there?”
He nodded. “I’m going to make a beginning. All the fellows who are
resting have been called up. Things are going from bad to worse.”
“Are they worse than the papers make out?”
“They are bad enough. I’ve not seen for myself yet; but the Irish
Republican Army has grown into a moderately disciplined and fairly
numerous fighting affair, and seems to be getting bolder. Thousands
of the young men belong to it. They don’t wear uniform, and those who
aren’t known to the military and police, and so aren’t on the run, live
as ordinary citizens until they are called on for some stunt. They’re a
secret organisation, and we ought to be the people for them.”
“Are you glad to be off?” I said.
“Damn glad,” he answered. “I’ll be able to see for myself. One man
tells you the country is in the clutches of a murder gang, and the
next that some nobler spasm convulses it. All the same I hear work in
Ireland is trickier than Continental stunts. On the Continent you have
the majority of the nation indifferent to you, and only the official
part to circumvent; but in Ireland they say half the nation is waiting
to give a man away.”
“Why didn’t you come and say you were off?”
“I got orders this morning.”
“We have been thinking of having a look at Ireland. My wife’s
interested in adoption work, and wants to start it over there. We can’t
make up our minds.”
He looked round. “You?”
“Both of us. D’you think we’d find it worth while?”
“Probably. Why not come over? You’re people with nothing to do.”
“If we do, we’re going to be strictly neutral,” I said. “We want to
meet the other side.”
He nodded. “It’s not always easy. That’s what a good many want to do.
You may do it if you stay neutral.”
“We’re going to do it.”
“Then make up your minds. You’re sure to run across me if you come to
Dublin.” He looked at the watch on his wrist and said, “I must go.” But
he did not get up.
“You’ve got the pip,” I said.
“I’m glad to be on the road,” he answered, rubbing his chin on his
stick again; “but it’s a solemn business.” He became suddenly very
stern. “An agent requires a better courage than a soldier’s. Once he
enters enemy country he does not hear a word in favour of his cause.
The very newspapers he must read denounce the Government whose servant
he is. Day after day he wages his lonely war.
“The man I meet at the Hibernian Hotel at twelve o’clock to-morrow
is to be my ‘cousin,’ as we call it. It is my privilege to pour into
his ears all my troubles, and he will do his best for me. Once a day,
once or twice a week as may be arranged, he will appear at this place
or that place at such and such an hour to take my information. This
information he will pass on to another man, and this third man is the
link with Dublin Castle.
“My wife and I will have no other loyal acquaintances, no other person
in sympathy with us. While the Irish situation stays as it is we
shall have only each other to lean on. Now and again we may pass an
acquaintance in the street, and we shall go by without a word, without
a nod. How many times must we join in the laugh against us? How many
times must we sneer when we love? How many times must we applaud when
we scorn?”
He looked in front of him and said in a low voice, “Betray once more,
47, that a traitor may be destroyed. Deny once again, 47, that a liar’s
mouth may be stopped. Listen this time, 47, that some one else shall
listen no more. Stifle your humanity. Fight your lonely fight.”
He got up, nodded, and departed.
I returned to lunch and told my wife I had come across 47. She was
thrilled now at the idea of Ireland, and when lunch was over we had
nearly made up our minds. I had to leave her in the evening, it was the
case of a theatre, and as I walked out of that same theatre, somebody
was at my side. He was the only other secret service man I knew; the
introduction had come through 47. Such is life.
He was resplendent. The background of lights and women and motors
purring at the kerb was just what he wanted. We strolled back together
along Piccadilly, and he was in his best vein. He asked after my wife,
and from her he got on to women in general. He began to philosophise
presently and said:
“You can’t beat a really good woman.” Then he shook his head. “But
most women are the devil.”
“Not all.”
“Most.”
He drew up his lip like a dog.
“I remember once in Vienna there was an actress, an agent of the
Austrian Government, who was so dangerous that one after another of our
fellows had to pull out half-way because they were losing their heads.”
He nodded and went on showing his eye-tooth. “But one day there came
along an agent less susceptible than the others and--he broke her neck.”
“One of her unlucky days?”
“Yes, he broke her neck.”
There was a pause.
“The clock was over there. This agent looked at it, and it had long
gone midnight. She had been home from the theatre some time. The supper
things were on the table: supper was over. She was standing in the
middle of the room, and when she heard him coming up behind, she leaned
back bored for an embrace. She was unused to a refusal. She had in mind
to suck this man dry and afterwards toss him away like an empty wine
bottle. She put her head back, smiling. He slipped his arm round her
neck and--it’s not difficult if you know the way.”
This man had the most wonderful personality in the world. He grew more
and more splendid all the time.
“He who runs may read. In our service a man receives certain payments
for his harassing life. The agent lives two lives at one and the same
time. He lives the life of the citizen, pays his milk bill, shops with
his women friends, breakfasts, lunches, dines, and all the time he is
living a second life below the surface. He sees the moves in the war
raging about him; he remarks man after man go down. There is no cry.
These are the deaths that never get into the papers. If recorded at
all they are recorded as accidents or found dead. He sees the messages
passed at the street corners, and the friend strolling at his side
sees one man giving another a light. He sees this wanted man go by, he
sees that sign put up, he asks himself why is this man here, what is
that woman doing there? And his friend recognises only the beggar girl
whining on the doorstep, and the cabman flourishing his whip.”
We were passing under a street lamp. He had become magnificent. His
eyes were shining. He had swollen like a pouter pigeon.
“When the time comes for us to leave the service we cannot. We are
offered rest, we are offered peace; at last has come opportunity
for our stretched nerves to recover. But we must continue to be _au
courant_ with affairs. So nearly every agent dies in harness.
“But, of course, besides receiving payment, an agent pays for this
life. He makes payment in several ways. One way is that he finally
comes to believe nothing, to trust nobody. He weighs up what his
best friend says. And another payment is that the life brings a man
in the end to neutral feelings. He is cold sometimes--yes. Wet--yes.
Tired--yes. Even a little depressed sometimes. But not elated. Never
surprised.
“It’s fifteen years since I was surprised.”
And then at Hyde Park Corner, the place where I had last seen 47, he
was gone, and I was left to stroll home alone.
My wife was still up.
“I’ve just met our other friend,” I said, shutting the door.
“What does he say?”
“He’s going over in a day or two. He was at the top of his form.”
Then I gave out what I had been given, and she listened with her eyes
jumping out of her head. Her mind, and accordingly my mind, was made
up half-way through. At the end she jerked upright in the armchair and
cried--
“But let’s go and see for ourselves, and I’ll try and get my ‘Baby
Exchange’ going. Let’s.”
“By all means.”
This was very late at night or very early in the morning.
Now it is time to ask if the world possesses one true history book.
History can only be approximate, for events are without limit, and man
is limited. Each observer of Irish affairs has been watching Ireland
through the windows of his temperament and his opportunities, and
where a man has seen this thing, his neighbour has seen another.
Humbly, then, we put down what we have to tell, endeavouring to fill
these pages with the spirit of the times rather than with a tedious
list of events.