At Swim, Two Boys - Jamie O'Neill [186]
“Maybe I would.”
“The Volunteers are our friends now. You want to remember that.”
“Then why am I pinching a gun from them?”
His captain watched him a moment. He gave the paper back. “Could be some of them are more friendly than others. Dismissed.”
MacMurrough rapped on the door of a shed. An inquiry was hailed and he answered his name. Hurried movement inside, nails hammering into wood. Eventually bolts withdrew and the door opened a pinch. It was daylight outside, but whoever it was shone a hard torch in his face.
“All right.”
MacMurrough squeezed in the door. “I understand you have a consignment for Ferns.”
“You’re early.”
“Yes, we are rather. Less difficulty finding the place than anticipated.”
“We?”
“Yes, my aunt. She’s waiting in her motor-car. Eveline MacMurrough.” He still had a hand at his head, shielding his eyes. “Look here, is that light necessary?”
The torch flicked off, and MacMurrough saw it was indeed a gloomy interior. Sort of railway sort of shed. He believed he recognized the man. He had been one of the customers in that peculiar tobacconist’s his aunt had recommended. With sly humor they had watched him, and with that same humor the man watched him now.
“I have the order checked for you,” he said. “Glad to say everything present and accounted for.”
“Well, if you would point me to it, I shall be off.”
The man shone his torch on a bench at the back. There were three wooden boxes, long boxes marked crudely in red, Piping. It was evidently the lid of one of these MacMurrough had heard being hammered. “Are they heavy?”
“I think you’ll manage.”
MacMurrough humped them to the car, one at a time, lifting them over the Stepney wheel, and on to the rear seat.
“Do be careful, Anthony. If you only knew the bother they have caused getting them.”
“What are they, Aunt Eva? As though one couldn’t guess.”
The man held the door while he returned for the last box. He was leaning to lift when he heard the distinct catch of a bolt pulled back. He quickly glanced. Poking from some crates, point blank, a rifle, aimed at him.
It was a situation in which only the rifle was familiar. A Mauser, MacMurrough noted, and an ancient one at that. He had frozen in mid-hump. He could make out hands, fingers, arms in the shadows, but no face. He saw the bolt lifted and pushed home. Snatch. The finger cocked. MacMurrough was thinking how extraordinary to be lured to this out-of-the-way place when she might have had him shot anywhere. The finger pressed. His eyes were closing. The finger pressed, till—crack. Fired dry. Nothing. The face lifted from the sights. White teeth, a chip off the middle, Doyler grinning from the dark.
MacMurrough threw the box in the back of the car. “Drive,” he told his aunt.
“I had every intention.”
“Now. Get us out of here.”
They were out of the docks area and its wretched slums, and people in the streets had ceased pointing at the lovely motor. MacMurrough’s fright communicated in a resentment toward his aunt. “Really, Aunt Eva, you cannot continue in this way. I will not tolerate any more these manipulations. If you wish me to run guns with you, have the decency to ask. You must surely know by now I am entirely under your thumb.”
“I really don’t think—”
“No, you really do not think. When will you learn that rifles are dangerous toys? Most especially in the hands of children.”
“I really don’t think,” Eveline repeated, “those constables ahead are directing traffic.”
MacMurrough looked. They had crossed the river and were coming towards Trinity. The flow of traffic had slowed almost to a standstill. Four policemen advanced down the line. They carried carbines. “No,” he agreed. “They are checking the vehicles.”
“We have been betrayed.”
“How can you know that?” But already he was thinking: Doyler. Stupid vindictive renter. I’ll wring his neck for him.
“Perhaps now you will understand the need for secrecy.” She pulled out her traveling-glass and actually checked her face powder.
“Turn the car,” said MacMurrough.
“There are more behind. And if I judge by their absurd hats,