Conor, you oversized drink of water get in here,” McGee sang out. “My St. Patrick’s Day speech is ready.”
“Another great oration?”
McGee smiled, feigning modesty. “Perhaps. Let’s just say it is enhanced with invincible logic and incredible artistry. Do you want to read it?”
“If I can be of help.”
McGee thoughtfully toyed with his walking stick and said, “Actually, no, you can’t. You’ll be there tonight. You can hear it with the others.” Conor was a little insulted.
“You’ve better things to do,” McGee said. “I’m going to have a nap. Spend some time with your raven-haired friend. I hear there’s a pretty good parade in town today.”
Conor smiled.
“Have some fun,” D’Arcy McGee said. “Life’s too short.”
ST. Patrick’s Day. Now it was the Irish Catholics’ turn to parade along the slushy Ottawa streets. When Conor was young and still upriver in March, every St. Patrick’s Day someone would magically produce a bottle, or ten, and a toast to Saint Paddy would become a drunken frenzy. He would hide away during those hours. When he returned to Ottawa to live year-round, he turned his back on Irish festivities, but now he wanted to share the spectacle, to take in the excitement—to belong. He also wanted to show Meg the difference between celebration and condemnation. This was a parade they could watch without venom.
He wondered whether his father would be there. He hoped so.
Conor had pinned a green ribbon on his jacket. A touch of Ireland. He was thinking he might soon be able to afford a better jacket. He’d heard there was a new Irish tailor in town. Maybe he could get a deal.
WHEN Conor and Meg left the boarding house, he didn’t sense a threat in the group of boys hovering nearby, nor did he notice that they followed them. But Meg did, and she clung to his arm.
PATRICK Buckley was the parade’s grand marshal this year. Macdonald’s driver had a stable full of horses, and he provided them for the parade. The week before, a man named James Whelan had approached Buckley and asked if he could help. Buckley didn’t know him, but Whelan’s red beard and heavy accent were good Irish calling cards. He needed someone to ride a horse at the back of the parade, so he welcomed the help. He even named Whelan a parade marshal and invited him to the banquet that night.
A parade marshal—it made Whelan proud. And it made him think of his new friend. Marshall—he never said what his first name was—had begged off. He said he was too busy to attend the parade, but he urged the tailor to participate.
THE St. Patrick’s Day Parade was certainly less earnest than the Orange victory march. More of a quick Irish jaunt and off to the pub, thought Conor. Mid-March was still chilly in the “arctic lumber village.” It seemed the gentlemanly thing to do to put his arm around Meg to keep her warm.
He nodded to Buckley leading the parade, and Buckley nodded back proudly. It was a real honour to be grand marshal. Conor greeted a few people he knew. But there was no sign of Thomas. He noticed Polly the washerwoman, though, dressed in a bright green dress—a little too flamboyant for Conor’s taste. She had been staring at Meg, taking her in, as if memorizing her.
Polly walked over to them. “Your father’s not here. He has to work.”
“Thanks,” Conor said and quickly looked away. Polly moved on.
“That was rude of you,” Meg protested.
“I don’t like her. I think she’s”—he searched for the phrase—“a fallen woman.”
“I’m sure it’s of great comfort to her that you care so much about her virtue.”
“There’s something weird about her. She’s a busybody. And she’s too close to my father.”
Meg let the matter drop. They watched the parade pass them by, taking little note of the man with the red beard proudly riding a horse at the back, sitting tall in a long grey coat.
THAT evening, D’Arcy McGee was the keynote speaker at the St. Patrick’s Day banquet. Sir John and Lady Macdonald were seated at the head table, blending his slight Scottish accent with the room’s symphony of Irish chatter. It made Conor think that maybe he had been too harsh in condemning Macdonald for attending the Orange celebration in July. Macdonald just never missed a large party and an open bar.
The prime minister called over to Patrick Buckley, feigning an Irish accent, “Praise be to the saints, Buckley, did God ever make a man as Irish as you look?” Buckley glowed with pride.
Conor had asked Meg to join him, but she said she had to help her mother. Maybe, he thought, she’d had enough Irish for one day. Conor sat at the back of the room with members of the press. He liked sitting with the newspapermen. He didn’t have to worry about his table manners—they certainly didn’t worry about theirs—and by and large they were a convivial lot. Their conversation was irreverent and salty, and their clothes were as old as his. Conor could relax.
He watched McGee and Macdonald sitting politely together and wondered what they were talking about. McGee was sipping on a glass of water, while Macdonald was gulping down the wine. The prime minister ignored the intricate rituals of checking the wine in the light and savouring the complexities of the grape. His procedure was to fill the glass, drink the contents and fill it again. Their conversation seemed almost businesslike, not like the songs and toasts at Lapierre’s, when they both drank and talked with gusto.
Conor asked for a refill of wine. A few of the reporters were almost keeping up with the prime minister’s drinking. It was St. Patrick’s Day, after all. He told his tablemates stories of McGee and Macdonald at Lapierre’s, and recited some drinking songs McGee had written.
McGee looked down at the press table with interest. Conor O’Dea was the life of the table. Good for him.
Macdonald rose to speak and surprised Conor by saying, “I share the regret that Mr. McGee is not a minister of the Crown. Yet never was he greater or more esteemed in the affections of the public than at the present day.” That’s probably what they had been talking about at the table, Conor thought—McGee making some subtle yet clear jab about his seat in the back benches. Conor thought Macdonald spoke rather awkwardly. This really wasn’t his crowd. After a few more forgettable words, he handed the podium over to McGee.
D’Arcy McGee rose to speak confidently. “May I thank you,” he began, “for allowing me to say a word on behalf of that ancient and illustrious island.”
“Darn right,” someone yelled.
McGee smiled. It was encouragement, not heckling. And it gave him a cue to deliver his message. “For those of us who dwell in Canada,” he declared, “there is no better way to serve Ireland than by burying out of sight our old feuds and factions. That will be worth all the revolvers that were ever stolen from a Cork gun shop and all the republican chemicals that were ever smuggled out of New York.”
Conor thought the speech went well. The former rebel stated his case against Fenians without saying the word. Macdonald thought it was too inflammatory, but he kept his opinion to himself. Among parade marshals the response was mixed. Patrick Buckley paid more attention to the admiring glances Sir John A. Macdonald passed his way. James Whelan thought the references to Cork and New York were insulting. He wondered what Marshall would think. But Marshall wasn’t there.
MARSHALL—he was getting used to being called that—found the starched, ministerial collar uncomfortable. He was taking more precautions these days not to be recognized. Today, he had covered his head in a top hat, dyed his beard blond and looked the very picture of an upright, ardent young Methodist preacher. He considered his little army in Ottawa. Some would help him willingly; others would help him unknowingly.
He stiffly walked into the telegraph office and sent a message to New York. One word: “Soon.”
AT the Fenian Brotherhood’s New York headquarters, Colonel Patrick O’Hagan received the message and smiled. He dipped his pen in the inkwell and wrote General O’Neill,
I suggest that we should get our men in readiness. If we delay, then we are guilty of neglect.
Yours fraternally,
Patrick O’Hagan