Redemption - Leon Uris [314]
Martin hacked out a silly nasal laugh as he arched his body back.
Caroline looked at her dance card at the same instant Lieutenant Landers bowed before her.
“Why don’t we take our dance out on the balcony,” she suggested.
An unusually decent night greeted them. Over the way stood the Protestant cathedral, smaller than the real ones in France and England. Everything in Dublin was half-sized, except for the Guinness Brewery.
“Give us a hug,” Caroline said. “I know how difficult it is for you to write notes, but thank you for the telephone calls. It can be maddening trying to get through from the west.”
“Ah, it’s not much better in New Zealand.”
“How was your journey, Rory?”
“The west of Ireland is magnificent.”
“We try to keep anything of worth in Ireland a secret so we Anglos can have it for ourselves.”
“It was a good place to go, for many reasons. I found I hadn’t spent all my tears over Gallipoli. I miss my pals fiercely. Jeremy, beyond fiercely. I suppose given time I’ll be able to control things enough to carry on with my life.”
“I see you’re wearing captain’s pips. Does that mean you’re staying in Ireland?”
“The General has agreed I can leave when I feel I must. He’s trying to lure me, inch by inch.”
“Which one of the lovely ladies has captured your heart, Lieutenant Landers?” Caroline asked.
“You,” Rory said.
“Good, then you see us home,” she said.
“Caroline, you’ve been too magnanimous about the townhouse. I was planning to bunk in at the barracks.”
“Indeed you will not!”
“I appreciate everything, but I don’t want to be a nuisance.”
“I promise you I won’t attack you in the middle of the night.”
“Well, I mean, suppose you’re having company or a dinner or something?”
“Rory. Will you treat it exactly as Jeremy and Christopher did?”
“You really mean that, don’t you?”
“I do. Gorman will be over for the weekend. The three of us will do up Dublin, if you’re off-duty.”
“Grand. Caroline, tell me it’s none of my business, but are you the least bit interested in Llewelyn Brodhead?”
“Yes, I am,” she said, “interested and serious. Dead serious.”
82
Caroline Hubble never came down from her bedroom without looking the best she could look on that given day. She was attired in a pale blue dressing gown and wore her hair long. She poked through a stack of legal and business work in the solarium of the Merrion Square townhouse as Rory made a late morning appearance.
“Good morning, Prince Charming,” she greeted him.
“I didn’t realize that dancing was so much exercise.”
Caroline rang for the butler. She smiled as Rory laid on a sheepman’s breakfast for himself. “…And a rasher of bacon, Adam.” Turning to Rory, she said, “It’s unnatural to simply sit down, ring a bell, give an order, and there it is.”
Rory sensed a very subtle shift in Caroline’s demeanor, a bit of firmness, a new aspect to her otherwise constant sweet nature. She poured herself a cup of tea, chewed into her toast, and adjusted her glasses.
“I say if it looks like a kiwi, runs like a kiwi, quacks like a kiwi, and lays eggs, then it’s a kiwi.”
“I’m a kiwi all right. Question is, have I laid an egg?”
She found the paper she wanted. “Canterbury District, the South Island between Oxford and Kowai Bush. The Landers farm was purchased by Liam Larkin, proprietor of Ballyutogue Station in 1907.”
Be cool, lad, he told himself. Across the table sat someone who could be as dangerous as a hangman.
“Am I under arrest?” he said at last.
“If you want to know how I got this, Jeremy wrote to me. I’ve known from the minute you walked into Rathweed Hall.”
“That’s not true, Caroline. Jeremy would not break a trust.”
“You believe that?”
“I know it,” Rory said. “You might not like the next line, Caroline. Jeremy intended to become a republican.”
It confirmed her suspicions. Jeremy was born with that soft Irish nature and Conor Larkin was his god. His disaster with Molly, his hatred for his father, his inability to set in comfortably with his own caste all pointed to it. Still, on hearing it, it rocked her, even though she had suspected as much.