There was a pause. “You’re a liar.”
“So are you,” David shouted back. “Now cut the games. You want the film, and the passport, and us, you come get them. No deals.”
“We’ll starve you out.”
“Maybe.”
“Or we’ll hurry things up with tear gas.”
“If you had tear gas you’d have used it already. Forget it.”
Another roar of laughter. Farrell was insane, she realized. Absolutely insane. Even now, temporarily frustrated, he was enjoying himself immensely. It was all life and death, but he was happy as a child with a new toy. It was all a game to him.
“We’ll get you when the sun comes up, Clare. We’ll have you trapped then, and we’ll be able to see.”
“So will I. You want to lead the pack, Father? I never shot a priest before.”
More laughter. More shots sounded out, but fewer this time. Again the bullets were all wide of the mark.
“David?” Her voice was a whisper. “Do we have a chance?”
“I don’t know.”
“You sounded so sure of yourself.”
“He wants us to beg. I won’t give him the satisfaction.”
“What he said...” She didn’t want to ask the questions but forced herself. “Will they be able to starve us out? Or will we fall asleep after a long enough wait?”
“Maybe.”
“David...”
“They can’t stand out there with their guns forever. Someone has to pass by sooner or later. The longer we hold out, the longer we stay awake and alert, the better a chance we have.”
She nodded, her teeth clenched. How very brave he was, she thought. He had managed such a confident air of defiance with Farrell, shouting at the false priest with assurance in his voice. And all the while he had known that the situation was virtually hopeless—
“Make sure the fire is going,” he said suddenly. “Hug the wall and go back to it. I scattered it somewhat, but it should be burning. Add a little more wood to it.”
“Why?”
“If we have to give up, I want the passport burned. And their precious microfilm. I don’t want them to have it.”
She swallowed. She was going to cry now, she knew it, she couldn’t help it. But she swallowed, and the tears stayed back.
She said, “Shall I burn them now?”
“No.”
“In case there’s no time...”
“No.” He took her hand. “If we get out of this alive, we’ll want to be able to turn that film over to the right people. Besides...” He laughed, and for the first time in her life she knew what gallows humor really meant. “And besides, they’ll never let you back into the States if you lose your passport.”
When the noise first came from deep in the rear of the cave, she thought it was some small animal burrowing around there. But the noise came closer, slowly closer, and she could tell that it was a man making his way into the cavern. She huddled close to David, and he turned to cover the rear of the cave with his pistol.
“If there’s a back entrance...”
“We can still cover it,” he said.
“Can we?”
There was a dry cough behind them, out of sight. The cough was repeated. “Hold your fire,” a soft voice said. The words barely carried to the front of the cave.
And then, from the darkness, a man emerged. He was not more than an inch or two over five feet tall, and his old face was deeply lined with wrinkles. Black hair peppered with gray stuck out from beneath a ragged cloth cap. He wore an ancient tweed jacket that reached almost to his knees, and in one hand he held an odd sort of gun, larger than a pistol, smaller than a rifle.
“Ah,” he said, his voice no more than a whisper. “Sure, and it’s a fair Donnybrook, by the sound of it. What, and only two of you, and such a lot of them outside?” He shook his head sadly. “I thought it could be some of the boys, but ye aren’t faces I know, nor Irish by the look of ye. And if I’m not prying, could you be after telling me the nature of the row?”
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.”