One March morning Mrs. Slaney rapped at the door. Himself was out. I
put down my pen with a sigh.
“I see you have ‘engaged’ on the door,” she said cheerfully, “but I
must come in for a moment to tell you something. It’s very bad for you
to sit writing like this, you should be out in the sun. We don’t get
much sunshine as a rule at this time of the year.”
She shut the door, walked over to the sofa, and lowered her voice.
“I’ve let the hall flat,” she said. “I had to come and tell you.”
“But you let it yesterday?”
“I know ... but”--she rustled with excitement--“but I am writing at
once to put those people off. On second consideration, it is most
unsuitable. They are so young and only just married, later on it might
mean a baby, and I have to consider my other tenants, you and your
husband, for instance. You remember I asked you before I took that
musical man upstairs. There’s a great art in making a household run on
oiled wheels.”
“You’re pleased with the people coming to-day, then?”
She hesitated, and then she said, “I must tell you. I trust you. I know
you won’t talk.” She must have thought I looked puzzled, for she went
on nervously, “I’ve let the hall flat to Mrs. Fitzgerald.” She paused
to see the effect of her words. “Mrs. Desmond Fitzgerald. Her husband
is Minister of Propaganda. Now I feel that I’ve done something for
Ireland! No one will take her, they are so afraid of raids; but I made
up my mind at once.”
“Mr. Darrel Figgis has made this place rather popular with the
Black-and-Tans. Is it wise from Mrs. Fitzgerald’s point of view?”
“Of course it is. I met Mr. Figgis only yesterday, and he told me he
was sure the house wouldn’t be raided again.”
“How on earth can he tell?”
“Mr. Figgis has a wonderful brain. I think he’s the brains of the
movement myself. Besides, I’m not afraid of the Black-and-Tans. I’m an
Irishwoman. Look at the sacrifices Irishwomen have made. Mr. Fitzgerald
isn’t going to live here. He’s coming sometimes after dark for meals.
Mrs. Fitzgerald and the baby will be here. I don’t want the people
upstairs to know who she is. After all, Fitzgerald is a common enough
name. They can think she’s a widow.”
“There’s a baby. I thought you wouldn’t have a baby?”
“But this baby is a grown baby. It’s eleven months old, and its mother
says it’s a very good baby, it makes no noise at all.”
“Of course, one can only prove that.”
“There’s one other thing.” Mrs. Slaney moved uneasily. “It’s about
the baths. You and your husband have always had as many baths as you
wanted. We must make a little difference in that rule now, and treat
you like the others. This weather you can’t want more than two baths a
week. Perhaps in summer we can make some other arrangement.” She went
on to the Minister of Propaganda. “Poor man, he will be delighted to
get a flat where he can have his meals in comfort. He’s been on the run
for a long time now. It’s shameful an Irishman should have to live like
that. I shall soon get to know Mrs. Fitzgerald, the baby will be the
link; and I shall hear everything that is going on. I must go and write
my letter.”
When I spoke to Himself about it afterwards, he said, “I suppose those
people will be all right here. I wouldn’t like to go bail. Since the
last raid men always seem hanging about. I suppose they give the house
a look up now and then. The less we know about things the better.”
But we were not the only people in the house with forebodings.
A week later, when Mrs. Fitzgerald had already been settled in a day
or two, the door opened cautiously and Mrs. O’Grady, dustpan in hand,
came in with the air of a conspirator.
“The mistress is after setting the hall flat,” she said mysteriously.
“I know. I thought they had been in a day or two.”
“It’s bad luck she’s bringing on everybody. She’s always that
frightened she’ll not be noticed. She’ll be noticed now. Never fear,
the Black-and-Tans will be burning the place down one night.”
“Mrs. O’Grady, what do you mean?”
“She’s not telling you who’s in the house, not she. She’s a mean, mean
woman, and it’s black trouble she’s bringing on us all. Well I know
it. I do say to O’Grady of a night that your husband, mum, is the only
gentleman as has been in this house since the Captain left as had these
rooms before you, and he wasn’t any great gentleman so as to speak. She
doesn’t know how to treat nice people when she does get them. She’s set
her flat to Desmond Fitzgerald, that’s what she’s after doing.”
“Mrs. O’Grady!”
“I do be going blind, but not so blind; and it’s himself as had his
pictures in the papers not long ago. God help him. It’s on the run
he’s been ever since the Sunday shootings, though a more innocent man
never drew breath I’m hearing those who know say. It’s the mistress
will bring trouble on him if he sets a foot in this house. It’s ‘Mrs.
O’Grady,’ she’ll be saying, ‘hold your tongue or I’ll get shot iv ye.’
But she’ll tell. There’s not one person she’ll meet that she won’t
tell, she’ll be that swollen with pride.”
“You’ve seen him?”
“Indeed and I have. He comes on his bicycle after dark, and he knocks
and she lets him in. Did ye hear the set-to with the mistress and Mrs.
Fitzgerald over the key last night? Now she won’t give Mrs. Fitzgerald
a second latchkey, and himself there standing on the steps of a night
with all the Black-and-Tans in Dublin looking at him. I’ve seen him
indeed; but I wouldn’t know him, for he’s that quiet he won’t look at
ye, and he’s muffled up round the neck that ye can’t say what’s his
eyes and what’s his chin.”
“Well, let’s do our parts and not talk.”
“And who should I be talking to? There’s only O’Grady and Polly, who’s
sharp enough herself for a young girl, God save her, and on Sundays I
go to my sister regular, and she so full of her own troubles that she’s
no time for mine. Will you be wanting your tea now?”
“No, thank you, Mrs. O’Grady; I’ll make it myself later.”
“And what would you be doing that for at all? I’ll be wetting my own
tea when I do go down, and I’ll do yours at the same time and send it
up by Polly.”
Mrs. O’Grady was about to withdraw when she waxed enthusiastic.
“The baby, he’s a dote!” she exclaimed, “a dote, and exactly like his
father, and there are two beautiful boys away at school, real dotes.
There’s a photo of them on the mantelpiece. My legs are run off me this
minute what with the mistress upstairs and Mrs. Fitzgerald downstairs,
and it’s extra she’s after charging for the flat; but it’s no extra
she’s after giving me.”
“Well, I hope they’ll be all right.”
“Indeed, mum, and I don’t like it, not at all, at all. Only the other
morning, when the luggage was outside the door, three men passed and
looked down into the area, and Polly says they were Black-and-Tans in
civies.”
“Rubbish, Mrs. O’Grady, they couldn’t know already.”
“Couldn’t they?” She tossed her head. “Couldn’t they?” she repeated
darkly. “There’s trouble coming to this house, and don’t you forget it.”
She gave a sniff and departed.