Redemption - Leon Uris [76]
And then came the painful part of his logic. Atty Fitzpatrick on the Supreme Council of the Irish Republican Brotherhood was no less than a stroke of genius.
“What do you want me to say?” Des asked with unusual weakness. “What I’ve been doing in the legal field and with legislation and what all the orators and writers have been doing has been child’s play, fun and games. No one really gets hurt. Ah, but the Brotherhood. The time has come, dear Ireland, to start spilling a bit of blood. What shall I say? My wife’s role in all the rhetoric ends with a curtain call at the Mechanics’ Theatre? It’s been a blast, lads, but not with my wife, you don’t. What arguments would you like to hear from me, Atty? We’ve shyte on our kids enough without having Mom swing from the gallows. Please, give me an argument to present.”
“Christ, Des, you are trying to make me feel treacherous.”
“When is enough, enough? Haven’t we given enough to the movement without this?”
“Then say no.”
“I’d rather give you plain unadulterated family reasons to back off.”
“I never took you for a paper tiger, Des.”
“Stop that. Trouble with us Irish is that we are too damned intoxicated by the way we’ve hit this century running. But this will be no Boer War. Those British bastards have owned us for seven centuries, and it won’t be the first time we’ve tried to settle it with a fight. Every time we’ve staged a rising it’s ended up in a disaster. What makes you think this will be any different? This country is infested with fanatical Englishmen and even more infested with lily-livered paddies who will continue to do the dirty bidding for the Brits at the drop of a quid and a government job.”
“Thanks, Des, thanks awfully. I really needed to be primed up on this. I’d all but forgotten.”
“Atty,” he croaked, “have mercy. Up till now, with all our shenanigans we have been able to live without fear in our daily lives. As of the minute you put your hand on the gun and Bible, fear is in. Fear for Theo, for Emma, for Rachael. Fear of who is looking at our house from over the road. Fear of who is stalking us.”
“Then say no, Des.”
“No to what? Exit the Fitzpatricks, finest fair weather soldiers Erin ever had. Soon as we tried to stuff a few pistols in Atty’s brassiere, they cut and run…live in London or some such, don’t they?”
“Stop beating up on yourself. Both of us were heading for this from the day we were born.”
“Stop…think…. It boils down to one thing and one thing alone—is it worth our three children?”
“Shall we wake them up and ask them?”
“Well, why bother to ask me? Your mind is made up.”
Atty burst into tears, a strange sight and sound. Des let her alone and paced. “The Irish Republican Brotherhood,” he moaned. “Well, won’t I be a busy old scut working out legal defenses for that crowd.” He stopped and held the thick velvet drapes whose feline texture somehow managed to soothe him during his storms. “Two thousand rifles in a Bradford colliery pit. Good God, it’s come to this, has it? And the illusions I’ve lured myself into, prancing about in the old courtroom, spitting out hemlock-laced words at those wigged clowns. One could almost talk himself into the feeling we’d be able to run the Brits out of Ireland without bloodshed.”
Atty stopped her crying abruptly. “Well?”
“If I were Long Dan Sweeney, I’d sure as hell want you on the Supreme Council of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, and that’s for a fact, now.”
“Will you give me your blessings?”
“Of course,” he said quietly. “But I have new doubts and new fear.”
“So do I. Des, I’ll tell you what I believe. If the children were to learn in later life that I turned down the Brotherhood out of concern for them, they’d never forgive me. We have raised them to stand for something.”
“Aye,” Des said, “so it is.” Des then plunged darkly into his stack of briefs and Atty excused herself.
She lay awake torturously counting off the minutes, listening to Des mumble