Princes of Ireland - Edward Rutherfurd [277]
Perhaps it was inevitable that one day he would be tempted to go further. The thought had occurred to him in the past, of course, but he probably would not have attempted it if MacGowan had not shown himself so skilled at managing the people at Dalkey. By the time that the opportunity—a truly splendid opportunity—had presented itself, MacGowan had convinced him that he could pull the business off successfully and safely. Yet even so, the powerful merchant had hesitated. The risks were large. Had he been caught in his usual skimming of the customs dues—and proving this would have been difficult anyway—he risked little more than a reprimand and a payment to the authorities. He might not even have lost his office. But this wholesale smuggling was another matter entirely. For a start, it meant involving not just his own man, but the whole of Dalkey. Discovery would have serious consequences: loss of office, a hefty fine, perhaps worse. The profit, the customs due on three entire shiploads of valuable goods, would be huge, but he was a rich man anyway and had no need of the money. So why did he do it?
He’d asked the question of himself, and he thought he knew the answer. It was the risk. The difficulty and the danger of the thing were what really appealed to him. No doubt his distant Viking ancestors would have felt the same way. It was a long time since the powerful, saturnine merchant and city father had had any real excitement. This was an adventure on the high seas.
The planning and logistics had been formidable. The three ships had to come from different ports, meet off the southern coast of Ireland, and proceed together. The goods had to be unloaded with incredible speed, in the dark; and then they had to be hidden and later on distributed for sale in several markets, without arousing suspicion. It was only after all these complex problems had been provided for that the huge difficulty had arisen—the sudden appearance of the squadron in Dalkey, to keep watch on the coast. As soon as he had reported this, MacGowan had assumed that the plans would have to be aborted.
“I suppose it’s over,” he had said to Doyle sadly, and had been surprised when the merchant had calmly responded, “Not at all.”
In fact, Doyle had rather enjoyed the extra challenge. How could he persuade the squadron to leave Dalkey? By convincing them that the enemy they were seeking was actually going to strike somewhere else. The castle of Carrickmines had been the obvious choice. But the merchant’s genius lay in the way it was done. It had been MacGowan who had put Tom Tidy into his mind originally, when he had warned him that the carter was the one person in Dalkey who would not be a party to the smuggling. “If he even guesses what’s going on, he’ll go straight to the authorities,” he had warned Doyle. “I’ve got to get him out of Dalkey for a while.”
“Let us use Tidy to do our work for us then,” Doyle had told the astonished young fellow. It had been Doyle’s idea that Tidy should be followed when he went into the church to pray, and that he should overhear the conspirators planning the attack on Carrickmines. “You must pretend to dissuade him from telling anyone, if he comes to you for advice, as he probably will,” Doyle had instructed MacGowan. “That way, he’ll never dream that you’ve set him up. And if what you tell me about his character is correct, then our friend will go to the authorities anyway.”
So it had proved. Both MacGowan and Doyle himself, when he had been called by the Justiciar, had played their parts to perfection. The plan to raid Carrickmines had been believed; the squadron had been withdrawn; the coast was clear