Redemption - Leon Uris [120]
“Liar!”
“Sorry, Jeremy…really sorry about this,” Mal said breathing shakily.
“Liar!”
The two thugs sealed Jeremy off and pushed him back.
“Continue, Mr. Palmer.”
“Molly and I did it a lot of times. Lot of times. I’d give her your schedule and when you were in class we’d slip up to your flat and…and did the shagging.”
“Mr. Coleman,” Swan said.
“Same here, Jeremy. At my place. Half the team’s fucked her.”
“You’ve been a laughingstock,” his brother reminded.
Cliff Coleman started to go into detail when Jeremy went for the wastebasket and vomited until his eyes and nose ran and he coughed up lines of mucus.
Roger and Christopher went at him with heightened rage and outrage as the classmates were whisked out. Jeremy went hysterical until he collapsed and was dragged to his bed and went on until he deflated to quivering moans.
“You’ll survive,” Roger said, “but I’ve had my fill of your childish, disastrous behavior. I’m taking you over now, Jeremy. Do you understand!”
“Yes…F-F-F-Father.”
“Christopher is returning to Oxford to finish his year. As for you, Donaldson has arrived to pack you up. You are out of Dublin, here and now. I see no further need to educate you. When Christopher’s term is over, the two of you will do your service in the family regiment. Christopher will return to Oxford after he obtains proper rank. As for you, you will remain in the service until I see fit. Do we understand each other?”
“What do you want of me, Father!”
“Sons!”
“I’ll see to everything, Father,” Christopher said.
“I know you will, son, I know you will. You, Jeremy, will be in your brother’s care. I’m off to the manor to see your mother. In order to avoid a scandal we will make a suitable arrangement with Miss O’Rafferty. In fact, after what she has done to you, we think it quite generous. You are not to see her again. Is that clear, Jeremy?”
The boy writhed on his bed in agony.
“Is that clear, Jeremy?”
46
Frederick Weed was at his draftsman’s table on the far side of his office. It was good to see him there again. The Admiralty was pressing hard to develop underwater craft comparable to the German U-boats, and there was a lot of catching up to do.
His secretary entered. “The Red Hand has just passed through Portadown, Sir Frederick. She should be in the yard within the hour.”
“Go down and meet the train. Bring Lady Caroline to my office directly.”
“Very well, sir.”
Weed left the drafting table and went back to his desk. There was a lot of catching up to do with Caroline as well. Bad seeds had bloomed after the Sixmilecross ambush. The humiliation by the Irish Republican Brotherhood gunrunning on his private train would go with him to his grave.
Sir Frederick had suffered a minor stroke in the aftermath of the uproar. Considering his advanced age and hard style of life, his recovery was rather amazing.
What hurt him more than the hazing in the press and the laughter from the pubs was the ambivalent behavior of both Caroline and Jeremy.
They had been gladly used by this Larkin—whose Machiavellian deceit had constituted the lowest form of treachery! He had used them! Instead of rallying to Weed, the two of them remained quiet. At times, Weed felt that Larkin had cast an evil spell over them. Oh, once or twice they referred to his treachery, but never very convincingly.
It came back to him once that Jeremy had tried to steal his way in to see Larkin in prison. Well, he bloody well put a stop to that! Caroline, her father suspected, may have been seriously emotionally involved with Larkin.
A strange family standoff ensued. Volumes of buried thoughts lay in volumes of unspoken words. Did indeed they forgive Larkin’s dastardly behavior? Sir Frederick balked at putting the question to them directly. For the first time in his life, he feared the answer.
So, he had a quiet little stroke and Caroline and Jeremy patched things over with him, but the great bombast and love between them was now missing. From the raucous laughter over Jeremy’s piss-up at