Passport to Peril

Nineteen

The gnarled little old man did not demand details. The bare outline of their story, told by David in a hushed whisper, was enough to redden the old man’s face with righteous fury. “Sure, and they’re the very spawn of hell,” he said. “And masquerading as a priest in the bargain. Faith, Patrick drove the snakes out of Ireland and now they’re after coming back!”

“Can you get us out?”

“I could.”

“Will you?”

“I will, but they’ll only be coming after you. That such children of the devil should be in Ireland! In Tipperary!”

“What can we do?”

The man’s eyes twinkled, and he instantly looked years younger. “Tell me,” he demanded, “could you hold out for another hour?”

“Easily.”

“And would you live to see these jackeens get their due?”

“How?”

“Why, I’ll call some of the boys around. They’ll be sleeping, but our boys wake easy. And every man has a gun, and some more than guns. They’ve all the odds on their side now, but we can even the odds a wee bit.”

David said. “Those are professional assassins out there. They’re probably all good shots and used to this sort of thing.”

“Oh, and is it professionals they are!” The little man drew himself straight up and puffed out his chest. “And are our boys such amateurs? And wasn’t I in Barry’s column myself, and in on the fun at Macroom? And wasn’t young Fergal O’Hara up fighting in the Six Counties ten years ago, and him only twenty-six years old this month? And didn’t Seamus Finn blow up half of Liverpool in 1940 with a bit of gelignite and an old alarm clock? Ah, it’s not such amateurs the boys are, lad. We’ve no uniforms and no aircraft, but we’re the Irish Republican Army, and if the rascals want a fight they’ll be after having one soon enough. We beat the Tans and we fought the Free Staters and we’ll be fighting in the North if we have to, and if such filth as them can shoot straight and fast, why, we can shoot twice as straight and twice as fast. And with Mauser pistols and Sten guns and such as will make their weaponry nothing at all. Professionals they are, are they? And in an hour’s time they’ll be so that they’ll never practice their profession again, not this side of hell. You wait here for me. Take my Mauser pistol, give them a spraying now and then. And I’ll be with you in an hour’s time, and may God wither my right arm if Mick O’Sullivan ever dodged a fight if it was a right one.”

He was back in considerably less than an hour. They heard him moving quickly but quietly at the rear of the cave, and then he coughed his dry warning cough, paused, coughed again. Then he appeared in the firelight. There was another gun in his hand, larger than the Mauser pistol, and his worn cloth cap was pitched at a rakish angle.

“I gathered up eight of the boys,” Mick O’Sullivan said. “Eight good boys, and Paddy Dugan was after coming too, but his heart’s been troubling him and I told him we had plenty of men. Now keep a good ear open, lad. The boys are taking their positions now, and Seamus Finn’s down on the road, slashing their tires so that they won’t be making their escape in their autos. Listen for the hoot of an owl, then a pause, and then the hooting again. That means that everyone’s where he ought to be, behind the hedgerows and the thickets, guns and spotlights at the ready.”

“Will eight men be enough?”

“When it’s our boys,” O’Sullivan said, “three would be enough. But how could I let the others miss out on the fun, and all of them lads I’ve known for years?”

They waited, silent now. Then they heard the hooting of an owl, and silence, and the hoot repeated.

“The boys are ready,” O’Sullivan said. “And it’s for me to give the signal.” He flattened out on the floor of the cave, inched forward, his Sten gun out in front of him, his finger on the trigger. “Stand clear,” he advised, “but you’ll want to watch the show. The Molotov cocktails first, to give us some light to fire by. And to shake up these ‘professionals’ of yours. A bit of flame does that, you know. Scares them so that they don’t know where to shoot first.”

O’Sullivan inched forward. There was a moment of utter silence, and then his thin old voice rang out over the countryside like a bugle.

“Up the Republic!”

And the slaughter began.

It was no battle. It was a rout, a massacre. The instant O’Sullivan’s cry broke the stillness of the night, the fields erupted in violence. The bottles of gasoline came first, showering over ditches and hedgerows with bitter accuracy, exploding, brightening the fields with flames. Then shots rang out — the chatter of automatic weapons, the deadly blasts of rifles and handguns. Mills bombs, homemade canisters of destruction, hurtled down on Farrell and his men.

A man — the thin-faced man, the mugger from London — rose screaming and ran into the night, his clothes in flames. O’Sullivan fingered the Sten gun’s trigger and sent a stream of bullets climbing the man’s back from his belt to his head. The scream died in a throaty gasp and a thin man sprawled dead on the ground, his clothing still flaming.

From all corners of the field the shooting went on, a furious barrage of destruction. Farrell’s men were firing back but did not know where to shoot or what to shoot at. One was on his feet, his hands high over his head, shrieking that he surrendered. A Mills bomb arced through the air and landed at his feet. He looked at it, hypnotized, still screaming, then tried to back away. The bomb blew off both his legs.

“Surrender,” O’Sullivan said scornfully. “They’ll be prisoners of war, will they? The fires of hell they will.”

There would be no surrenders, no prisoners. Ellen watched, transfixed, as the merciless destruction continued. She saw a heavyset man break into a run, watched as gunmen on all sides picked him up as a target. It was Koenig. Bullets tore at his legs, his body. They ripped into him from all directions, and he seemed to be dancing like a puppet on strings, miraculously staying on his feet.

“And why are they wasting bullets?” O’Sullivan demanded. “It’s only the gunfire that’s keeping him on his feet. He’s been long dead, he has.” As he spoke the words, Koenig toppled and fell.

A high-pitched scream. Another figure broke cover and ran toward the road. Again the guns spoke, and as they found their mark Ellen saw that it was a woman. Koenig’s woman.

“That there should be a woman in such business,” O’Sullivan said. “Who would have thought I’d see the day that I’d be shooting women? Or that I’d see the day that women came into the fields with guns.”

Gradually the staccato of gunfire died down. Flashlights played carefully over the terrain. Men in long jackets and caps came into view, moving through the battlefield, making certain that none of the spy gang were still alive. Ellen heard soft moaning off to the left and saw a young Irish boy walk over to the source of the moaning. His flashlight revealed a man on his back, blood pouring from a wound in his side, his head cradled in his arms. The boy put his pistol to the back of the wounded man’s head and blew his brains out.

And Mick O’Sullivan said, “You’ll come out and meet the boys now. And have a look at these ‘professionals,’ such as they were. Eight of us, and did you ask if eight would be enough! Two of us could have done the job and done it right. Professionals!”

David held her arm. They walked back and forth over the fields, studying the wrecked bodies of the men who had planned to kill them. They found Koenig and his woman and the long thin man, but they did not find Farrell. His body did not turn up.

“He never escaped,” O’Sullivan insisted. “No man escaped. But one of the bombs could have taken him, and there’d be too little left in one piece to know it was him. There’s none of them escaped, and ye may count on it.”

Ellen swayed. It was over, they were going to live, they were all right now...

“Ye’ll meet the boys. Ellen Cameron and David Clare they are, and here are Seamus Finn who slashed their tires, and Fergal O’Hara. And here’s my own son Sean, and a good boy he is. And Jimmy Davis” — he pointed to the boy who had blown out the brains of the wounded man — “and just seventeen he is, and never fired a pistol at a man before tonight, and how well he did I’ll not soon forget.” Jimmy Davis glowed with pride. “And Tom Behan and Sean Cassidy and Peader Killeen. And now we’ll go round to Fergal’s house. You’ll be hungry, not eating the whole day and night, and you look to be needing a touch of poteen. And the boys will have a taste from the jar, I know.”

There was laughter from the men.

“We’ll be after having a hooley,” O’Sullivan said. “Fergal’s mother has the food cooking for ye already, and the jars out on the table. It’s a victory celebration, do ye know.”

She couldn’t help it. She had held it back too long, and now there was no need to fight it any longer, no need at all. Her legs sagged and her shoulders heaved and she collapsed against David, fell into his arms, crying and crying, crying like a baby. It was all over and there was nothing to worry about and she couldn’t stop crying to save her soul.

The men turned away, embarrassed. And David held her, firmly but gently, held her tight in his arms until the crying stopped.