‘I’m not going to tell her this evening. It can wait until the morning.’
‘One other thing, Francis,’ said Johnny, looking at the tiny harbour, ‘don’t you think our friend the Major should mount a guard here too? The buggers could escape in a boat and nobody would know where they’d gone.’
After dinner that evening Powerscourt outlined part of his plan. ‘First thing in the morning, Major,’ he began, ‘could you send a couple of chaps up to the front door with a white flag. They’re to deliver this letter and wait for the reply.’
Lady Lucy was looking anxious. ‘And what does the letter say, Francis?’
Powerscourt pulled a sheet of the hotel’s finest notepaper from his pocket. ‘It says,’ he began to read, ‘“Lord Francis Powerscourt and Johnny Fitzgerald propose to call on your leaders at eleven o’clock this morning. They will not be armed. They suggest that a truce should be in operation from the receipt of this letter until the end of the meeting. Please give your reply to the man who brought this letter. Yours, etc, Powerscourt.”’
‘Spot of chinwag never did any harm in these circumstances,’ said the Major. ‘Mind you, the way these Paddies talk you could be in there till dinner time at the earliest.’
‘Expect we’ll be lectured about our desertion of the Irish cause for the King’s shilling,’ said Johnny gloomily. ‘There’s no fanatic as fanatical as a young fanatic, especially if they’ve been educated by the bloody Christian Brothers.’
‘And what are you going to say to them, Francis?’ Lady Lucy sensed there was something her husband was not telling her.
‘I’m going to try to point out to them,’ said Powerscourt, ‘that their position is hopeless. They’re outnumbered and outgunned for a start. In any fight they’re going to lose. I don’t think I’ll put it quite like this, but they have a choice between a bullet at Butler Lodge and the rope on the gallows. If they give themselves up peacefully, we will ensure that the authorities treat their cases with sympathy.’
‘I don’t think Dennis Ormonde would see it in quite those terms, Francis,’ said Johnny. ‘If he had his way, they’d be stripped and tied to those punishment triangles at the Octagon in Westport and flogged until their blood was running down the street.’
‘Well, he’s not here,’ said Powerscourt realistically. ‘We are.’
‘I’ve been thinking about the problem with the fillies,’ said the Major, looking suspiciously at a large glass of Irish whiskey. ‘Do you think we could mount a raid in the night? Get a couple of chaps inside, shouldn’t be difficult, find the ladies, whisk them out. Blast the rest of them to hell first thing in the morning.’
‘It’s worth considering,’ Powerscourt replied diplomatically. ‘Once we know the results of the meeting we will have to review all the options left. That would certainly be one of them.’
There was a full moon shining over Killary Harbour and the little garden of the hotel. Powerscourt and Lady Lucy were leaning on the wall, looking at the water, dark grey, almost black. A couple of fishing boats were pulled up on the shingle near the quay. The mountains to their right were dark and menacing. Somewhere up there, Powerscourt said to himself, the two ladies were spending another night in dangerous captivity. Did they know there was a rescue mission just five short miles away, eager to devise a plan that would restore their liberty?
‘How do you think they’ll be bearing up, Mrs Ormonde and her sister, Lucy?’
‘I expect they’ll be managing, anybody who can cope with Dennis Ormonde should be well equipped to handle anything.’
Powerscourt laughed.
‘I’m more worried about you, to be honest, Francis,’ Lady Lucy went on.
‘Do you think you’ll be all right, going to confer with these people?’
‘I’m sure I’ve talked to worse in my time,’ said her husband, wondering if now was the moment to give her the whole picture. He decided against it. As he fell asleep that night, realizing that the deadline, so long awaited, was about to arrive, he wondered if this was the last night he would ever spend with Lucy sleeping by his side.
14
Lord Francis Powerscourt delayed his breakfast as long as he could. He spent a great deal of time shaving. He pottered about in the bedroom for so long that Lady Lucy was quite stern with him, saying he should come along to breakfast now and stop daydreaming like one of the children. The Major interrupted them during the kippers. ‘Had to borrow a hotel sheet for the flag of truce, Powerscourt. Told the hotel fellow we’d make it up to him. Expect we’ll be charged some giant bill in recompense. My chaps are just about to totter off now. Back soon, I hope. Do you think these peasant people will recognize a flag of truce? Just thought I’d ask. Tough luck on my men if they don’t. Never mind. Tally ho!’ With that, Arbuthnot-Leigh strode off to the stables to supervise the troopers’ departure. Powerscourt and Lady Lucy had moved on to the toast and marmalade now. Suddenly Powerscourt could bear the deception no longer.
‘Lucy, my love, there’s something I’ve got to tell you. I meant to tell you yesterday but my courage failed me.’
As he told her Powerscourt thought he could see the tears forming in her eyes, then she fought them back. Her family, the Hamiltons, he remembered, had been soldiers for generations. Her first husband had been a soldier, lost with Gordon at Khartoum. Now, he knew, she was thinking about losing another one. ‘I’ll be perfectly safe,’ said Powerscourt. ‘It may never happen. I’ll come back. I promise you.’
He took her hands in his. She was sobbing now. ‘Just let me go to our room alone for a few minutes, Francis. I’ll be back. Just a few minutes.’
She took the key from the table and went off. Powerscourt wondered, not for the first time, if he was doing the right thing. Johnny Fitzgerald appeared, took one look at his friend and fled. The waiters began clearing the breakfast things away. Powerscourt looked at his watch. The two troopers should be at the house by now. He wondered if the two ladies would be able to watch them come, messengers from another world, a world they had left behind.
Lady Lucy came back, looking more cheerful. Powerscourt marvelled at her courage. It was nearly half past nine.
‘Powerscourt, Lady Powerscourt!’ The Major was back, slightly out of breath. ‘Good news. Our lads are back. The meeting is on for eleven o’clock.’
‘What happened exactly?’ said Powerscourt.
‘Might have been an exchange of invitations to afternoon tea in Tunbridge Wells by the sound of it,’ said the Major cheerfully. ‘My chaps ride up, waving white flags vigorously as if they had just relieved Mafeking. Redheaded Paddy answers the doorbell. Disappears off to find Head Man Paddy or maybe Head Boy Paddy – why are they all so bloody young, for Christ’s sake – and comes back inside a minute. “That’s fine,” he says. “Truce. Ceasefire.” Then he closes the door. That’s it.’
‘Good,’ said Powerscourt, part of whose brain had been hoping the meeting would be rejected. He had told the army man the details of his plan the night before. ‘If, for whatever reason,’ he had said finally, ‘I don’t come out and the kidnappers do, follow them, follow them all the way home or wherever they are going to. Unobtrusively, of course, but all the way.’
‘Of course,’ the Major had replied. ‘Let’s pray it doesn’t come to that.’