GRATTAN

1771

 

OH, IT WOULD BE a grand evening, an evening to remember. The whole family was coming—brother, children, grandchildren, cousins.

“It gives me great joy,” old Fortunatus said to his wife, “that during all my eighty years and more, our family has lived without any discord. And,” he added contentedly, “I’ve every reason to hope this will continue for another eighty years.”

They were coming to see him and his wife, of course. But Fortunatus had also arranged a guest of honour—a personage of such singular interest and fascination that they were all agog to meet him—and who, with a proper sense of the dramatic, he had asked to arrive an hour after the rest of the party. “He will make, you may be sure, a remarkable entrance,” he told his wife with relish.

But even more exciting, to Fortunatus himself, was the news of another addition to the party—news that had only reached him at midday—and which caused the dear old man more joy and anticipation than he thought it proper to express. Hercules was back. “George and Georgiana will bring him. He will be here with all the others. They will all be together,” he allowed himself to say. “That is what pleases me so much.”

And now the guests were arriving.

After mounting the dozen broad steps to the front door of the house on St. Stephen’s Green, the visitor entered a stone-flagged lobby with a fireplace. Here Fortunatus, dressed in a gold-braided coat as red as his face, breeches and silk stockings that still showed a manly calf, silver-buckled shoes, and his best powdered wig, affably greeted his guests in turn.

First came his brother Terence, slimmer than Fortunatus, his face less florid, with his children and grandchildren. His first wife having died, Terence had married again when well into middle age, a widow from a Catholic family, and to everyone’s surprise had produced another son, a delightful young man named Patrick, of whom Fortunatus would happily exclaim: “Mark my words, that boy will go far.” The two brothers greeted each other with warm affection.

Soon after came the Doyles. If Fortunatus had spent years moving his family up the social world, now in his old age, he had relaxed. He was genial, even sentimental. And the fact that his kinsmen the Doyles, though rich enough to set up as gentlemen, had chosen to remain stolid Dublin merchants, with no trace of bon ton, was no reason to forget them when the extended family gathered. He was only sorry that his formidable cousin Barbara, dead seven years now, was no longer there to terrorize everyone. But here was her son, the boy he remembered her bringing to his house almost fifty years ago, a dark, rather taciturn man with grandchildren of his own, showing in the politeness of his greeting that he appreciated Walsh’s kindness in asking not only himself but all his family to the house.

His granddaughter Eliza arrived next—George and Georgiana’s eldest girl—along with her husband. He was one of the Fitzgeralds—another brilliant match that had raised the family’s social status even further. He had Georgiana to thank for that. And Fitzgerald was a very decent fellow, too. He welcomed them gladly.

Then two of his own daughters and their families. Well, he saw them often enough, thanks be to God.

But where were George and Georgiana? And Hercules? Ah. He saw their carriage drawing up outside. Without knowing he did so, he pulled in his stomach and stood a little straighter. The past, wishing to make a good impression on the future. The footman was opening the door; the butler was bowing, more deeply that he had before. George and Georgiana came in first.

Lord and Lady Mountwalsh were a very handsome couple. Everything about them was handsome. The fine Palladian mansion they had built at Mount Walsh, their Wexford estate, was handsome. The big town house they had recently acquired in the nearby development of Merrion Square was handsome. Their fortune was more than handsome.

For when not only sickly Lydia had died, very properly as she was supposed to, but also Anna, quite unexpectedly, had succumbed to a fever just before she was supposed to be married, Georgiana had been left the sole heiress of her father Henry’s fortune. And when Henry had quietly passed from life ten years ago, George had remarked to his father: “We’ve so much money that I scarcely know what to do with it.”

He need not have worried. In no time at all, a host of charming people appeared—architects and artists, cabinet-makers, rug sellers, silversmiths, antique dealers, horse dealers—every kind of huckster. Even a philosopher. “Don’t worry,” they assured him, “we’ll show you.” And making only a modest dent in his fortune, he patronised them all. Dear God, the man was loved.

Easygoing, nonpartisan—it had surprised no one when soon after building his Palladian country house, George had obliged the government enough to be raised to the peerage. And so, while old Fortunatus remained very contentedly in the Irish House of Commons, his son now sat as Lord Mountwalsh in the upper chamber, where, it was universally agreed, he was a handsome ornament.

A rustle of silk beside him: Georgiana, grey-haired but still in the full flower of mature womanhood. A soft look came into the old man’s eye. She had brought his family not only a great fortune but beauty and kindness, too, and he quite openly adored her. She kissed him tenderly on the cheek. Her two younger daughters he also greeted affectionately. But now came the moment. Here came the man.

“Hercules, my boy. Welcome indeed.” The Honourable Hercules Walsh: heir to all the family’s wealth and growing power, who had just stepped off a boat from England that very morning. Their hope for the future.

By God, the boy was good-looking. No doubt about it.

He was only twenty-two—they’d celebrated his majority down at Mount Walsh the year before—but he might have been a year or two older. He’d graduated from Trinity College, in Dublin, and was now at the Inns of Court in London. Not that he needed to follow any profession, of course, but these were useful parts of the education of an aristocrat with estates and a fortune to manage, and who would probably enter public life. He had a rather square, well-cut, manly face, which might have belonged to a young Roman general. His hair was light brown, thick, and grew forward, ending in curls. His eyes, set wide apart, were brown and even. He was quiet, though polite when he answered your questions; he smiled only when it was necessary, and he did not often seem to think it was. Clearly he thought it was now, for he smiled as well as making the old man and his wife a polite bow.

“Grandfather. Grandmother.”

But already his grandfather had turned his face towards the inner hall.

“Patrick! Patrick!” Old Fortunatus called. “Bring Patrick here. Ah, here he is.” The young man appeared, accompanied by his father. “Stand beside your cousin, Pat, so that I can look at you both together. There now. Did you ever see a more handsome pair?” he cried delightedly.

Though closely related, the son of Terence and the grandson of Fortunatus were an interesting contrast. In the great minuet of the genes, it seemed that, when each was formed, different music had played and different partners been selected. Patrick, though about the same height as Hercules, was of a thinner build entirely. His face was finer, and suggested a clever lawyer or a doctor, a man of ideas. His eyes were lustrous. When in genial company, he had a delightful, boyish charm. When listening to a serious conversation, he would incline his head, slightly tilted, towards the speaker, with a concentrated but kindly expression.

As Patrick stood beside his cousin Hercules, who had given him a brief nod, it did not escape Fortunatus that a tiny cloud had passed across his nephew’s face. It would be understandable, of course, if young Patrick, the son of a Catholic doctor of comfortable but modest means, should feel a little constrained beside his Protestant cousin, whose resources must be a thousand times his own. But generations of family loyalty weren’t to be troubled by such considerations.

“How I wish,” Fortunatus exclaimed happily, “that our dear father could be here to see this, eh, Terence?” He turned to the young men. “When our father Donatus decided I should be brought up in the Church of Ireland and Terence remain in the Catholic faith of our family, he intended that one branch should always protect the other. He himself, let it be remembered, stayed a good Catholic until his dying day, God rest his soul. And in time it will be your turn to maintain that tradition, Hercules, as I know that you will. Let me see you shake hands now. There. That’s it. Bravo.” He looked round them all, beamed, then linked his arm in his brother’s. “Come along, Terence, let’s drink a bumper of claret.” And the brothers went together towards the parlour, followed by the two young men. Hercules did not smile.

Georgiana watched it all. She liked Patrick. As for her relationship with old Fortunatus, her husband had cheerfully remarked, many years ago, “My father’s quite in love with you,” to which she had sweetly replied, “I know, my dear,” and, giving his arm a friendly tap with her fan, “so just remember that you have a rival.” The old gentleman himself, while freely admitting his affection, also had a more calculated assessment. “I love my son,” he told his wife, “but Georgiana’s got the brains.”

Time had been kind to Georgiana. Her hair was grey, but the fashion for powdered hair and wigs was convenient for the middle-aged. Her face was not much lined, and those lines she had only made her more attractive. If her eyes were worldly, they were also quizzical, and seemed, upon occasion, to contain a wonderful light.

For if there was one thing Georgiana enjoyed, it was making people happy. And as a rich woman, with a husband in the Lords and houses where she could entertain, she had ample scope to do so. Her demarches were quite disinterested. A marriage to be arranged, a family quarrel to be adjusted, a job to be found for a nice man in difficulties: Georgiana’s genius and kindness were a byword.

In recent years, her services had been particularly in demand. For decades, almost since the great days of the Duke of Devonshire, the Lords Lieutenant had usually held office only for short periods, and came to Dublin only for the parliamentary sessions. Irish rule, and therefore patronage, had been in the hands of their deputies in the Castle, and the great parliamentary managers like the Ponsonbys and Boyles. But finally, the London government had concluded, “We’re spending a fortune on the Ponsonbys and their friends,” and had sent over a clever aristocrat, Lord Townshend, to see if he could sort things out. In his fourth year in Ireland now, Townshend had quietly broken the grip of the old cliques. Patronage came through the Lord Lieutenant himself once more, and the favours became fewer. “It’s English interference,” cried the furious Ponsonbys. “Ireland is being subverted.” And not a few agreed with them. But the change of regime never troubled Georgiana in the least. She soon became Lord Townshend’s friend. And as Lord and Lady Mountwalsh were so comfortably apart from political faction, and Georgiana only asked favours for people who needed help, it was amazing what she could get away with.

“How the devil do you do it?” her husband had asked.

“Quite simple,” she answered. “Townshend prides himself on being rather honest, so I ask things out of kindness, and offer nothing in return.”

Once, when relations with France were especially bad, she even persuaded him to release a young Frenchman who’d been detained, because, she blithely told the great man, his fiancée in France would be worried about him.

“Can this do you, or me, the slightest good?” Townshend had enquired with some amusement.

“None at all that I can see,” she’d answered.

And if, once or twice, the Lord Lieutenant had secretly asked her to help him out of a difficulty, and she had gladly done so, not a soul in Dublin ever came to hear of it.

So now, as she watched young Patrick with Fortunatus, it was natural for her to wonder what good turn she might be able to do the charming Catholic boy.

But not just yet. She had another mission to accomplish this evening.

Sometimes Georgiana worried about her son. He’d been named after a friend of her husband’s, who’d been the boy’s godfather. Yet his name seemed to have decided his character. He had done everything that was expected of him, but he did it with a blunt, mechanical precision, like a general wiping out an inferior army, that was almost frightening. He played to win, and he took himself seriously. Too seriously. Perhaps it was her own Presbyterian ancestors coming out in him, she didn’t know. But something had to be done.

The solution she’d come up with was simple enough. He needed a woman to take him out of himself. She didn’t care whether it was a mistress or a wife, but if the latter, she’d have to be very carefully chosen. And just recently, she thought she’d found the very thing.

There was no greater family in all Ireland than the ancient house of Fitzgerald. Practically rulers of Ireland until the Tudors broke them, the mighty Fitzgerald Earls of Kildare were Irish princes in all but name. Two decades ago, in Dublin, it had been the Earl of Kildare who had led the development of the city into the Liffey marshland below St. Stephen’s Green by laying out Kildare Street, and building beside it a splendid mansion, like a Palladian country house, which, since he had recently been given the even grander title of Duke of Leinster, was now called Leinster House.

The Leinster family was huge and extended. But a marriage into any part of it, for the Walsh family, was a final seal on their rise from the gentry into the aristocracy; and when their daughter Eliza had married one of the Fitzgeralds who was quite a close relation of the duke’s, George and Georgiana had congratulated themselves and gone to the huge assemblies at Leinster House, as members of the family now, with joy in their hearts.

Young Fitzgerald had a sister. Not only was she therefore one of the Leinsters, but Georgiana happened to know that she was due to receive a large legacy from one of her aunts. She was doubly eligible, therefore. But this was only important, as far as Georgiana was concerned, to satisfy her son and her husband’s family. Young Hercules had a fortune already. What mattered to her was the girl’s character. She was clever, kindly, and full of humour. If anyone could turn her son into a relaxed and happy man, it might be this girl. True, that would be two of her children marrying a brother and sister, but that would not cause any more remark, in that day and age, than would the marriage of first cousins.

With the visit of Hercules, the gathering tonight provided the perfect opportunity to talk to Eliza about it. This was Georgiana’s programme for the evening.

This, and one other thing. Everyone would be wanting to speak to the guest of honour when he arrived. But she had a particular reason for wishing to do so. For there was something she wanted to ask him. It concerned her family.

Fortunatus was glad, having spent a very agreeable quarter of an hour with the various members of his family, to see Hercules standing alone. He wanted a private conversation with the young man.

The fact was that, excited though he was to see his grandson back from London, he did not really know him very well. It wasn’t so surprising. When Hercules was a small child, his grandfather had always seen him with other children; then he had often been away on the estate down in Wexford. Nor had his grandparents seen much of him while he was at university in Dublin. But undergraduates are taken up with their own lives—Fortunatus knew that. And then the young man had been anxious to complete his education in London as soon as possible. Could it be, Fortunatus wondered, that Hercules was just a little too impatient?

“We were sorry not to see more of you, my dear boy,” he began affably, “when you were up at Trinity. You made good friends and got into some scrapes there, I’m sure. Had to turn your cloak inside out a few times, eh? So tell me, how many windows did you break?”

So many of the young gentlemen at Trinity College were scions of important families that when they got up to drunken high jinks, as they often did, the authorities seldom did much about it. Since the sons of peers had to wear gold braid on their academic gowns, they would often discreetly turn them inside out before any window breaking began.

“If windows were broken, I don’t remember anyone counting,” Hercules quietly replied. In fact, although he had watched others do so from time to time, he had broken none himself.

“Ah, capital,” said old Fortunatus approvingly. “That’s the spirit. And London—you are enjoying that? Making friends? Going to plays and so forth?”

“Quite.”

“What news of our friends the Sheridans?”

It had been one of the things with which his family had burdened Hercules on his going to London, this friendship with the talented Sheridan family. After a few years in Dublin, where Tom Sheridan had run the Smock Alley Theatre with brilliance, it had burned down and nearly ruined him. Taking a leaf out of old Doctor Sheridan’s book, Tom had then gone to London, set himself up as an educationalist, and even persuaded King George to grant him a handsome pension to produce a pronouncing dictionary of spoken English, on which he was still working. His wife, meanwhile, had written a popular novel to bring in some extra money.

“The great Doctor Johnson says that Sheridan’s dictionary will be a wretched thing,” Hercules coolly related.

“Of course he does. He’s making a dictionary of his own, and he’s jealous,” said Fortunatus loyally. “And Tom’s son? Young Richard. About your age, isn’t he?”

“Younger, I believe. They say he’s already written a play.” Something in Hercules’s tone suggested that he did not really desire to have such theatrical and literary folk as family friends.

“His grandfather, Doctor Sheridan, was a man of great note, you know,” Fortunatus observed gently. “Ancient family. Used to own most of County Cavan.” He decided to change the subject. “Do you drink much?” he enquired.

“In moderation, Grandfather.”

“Probably just as well,” Fortunatus conceded. “You’ll have noticed that half the gentlemen in Dublin suffer from the gout, which is no joke when you have it.”

“In London, too.”

“No doubt. My brother and I have always been spared, but I can’t promise that the family is proof against it. Best to take a little care. Not,” he added reasonably, “that a bottle or two of claret in the evening ever did harm to any man. You’re drunk sometimes, though, I suppose?” He gave his grandson a slightly anxious look.

“It has been known.”

“In politics,” Fortunatus declared with a lifetime of experience, “a man who is never drunk will never be trusted.”

“I shall bear that in mind.”

“You know that in a few years, my seat in Parliament will be vacant. I shan’t stand again, you may depend upon it.”

Until recently, elections to the Irish House of Commons had been held only when the monarch died. It had suited the Members of Parliament well enough, since once in, they could stay in their seats without the trouble and expense of an election until they, or the monarch died; and it suited the government because, once they had persuaded or bribed a member to support them, there’d probably be no need to worry about that member’s vote again for twenty or thirty years. But even in the grand old political stasis of eighteenth-century Dublin, things were changing. Elections were now to be held every eight years. In five years, assuming he lived so long, old Fortunatus’s seat would be open to an election again.

“You’ll take the seat then, I hope, my boy. It’s a good thing for the family to be represented in both houses.” He glanced at Hercules to make sure he was in agreement. “Good. You’ll find,” he went on, “that Parliament is very like a club. We may have different opinions, but party doesn’t affect civility and friendship. We’re all very congenial fellows. Otherwise,” he gave his unsmiling grandson another quick glance, “it wouldn’t do at all, you know.” And then, quite firmly: “Not at all.”

What was his grandson thinking? The young fellow seemed agreeable enough; so why did he feel a faint sense of disquiet? Did this determined-looking twenty-two-year-old understand the tradition to which he was heir? Surely he must. His mind returned to young Patrick. Yes, the Catholic question. That was important.

“There is talk, you know,” Fortunatus continued, “of new legislation in the next session, to give the Catholics some property rights. Longer leases, at any rate. A sign of the times, Hercules. I shouldn’t be surprised in a few years—not in my time, perhaps, but certainly yours—to see the Catholics of Ireland with almost the same rights as Protestants. There’s a growing feeling in the Commons, and in the Castle, too, that we’re all better off with Catholic support.”

This was not wishful thinking on the old man’s part. The long peace of the Ascendancy had by no means taken away the old fear of Catholicism, but it had taken away its edge. There was a real sense of embarrassment in many quarters that decent gentlemen like Doctor Terence Walsh, or the solid Catholic merchants of the ports, should be treated so shabbily. Old Fortunatus smiled. “One day your cousin Patrick will take his place beside you, not just as your equal in the family, as of course he is, but in the public arena as well. That would have pleased my dear father greatly.”

Hercules inclined his head politely.

“Well, you’ve listened to me long enough, I dare say,” the old man concluded. “But I’m glad to see you friends with your cousin. Nothing can be more important than family, my boy.” Then he left his grandson to enjoy himself.

A few minutes later, however, he was glad to see that Hercules and Patrick were speaking together.

Their conversation might not have been quite what he would have hoped. All Hercules wanted was a piece of information.

“Do you know a man named John MacGowan?”

“I may do. Why?”

“This one’s recently joined a club I belong to. The Aldermen of Skinners’ Alley. You may have heard of them.”

“I see.”

You had to hand it to Hercules—he never wasted any time. Within hours of arriving from London, he’d been out in Dublin and learned that there was to be a meeting of the Aldermen, a dining club dedicated to the memory of William of Orange, the very next day. Patrick knew of the club, of course: an unusual body, since all classes of society cheerfully mixed together at its meetings—so long as you were Protestant, of course.

“I thought the MacGowans were Catholic,” said Hercules.

“I’m sure they would be, mostly.”

“This one says he’s Protestant.”

Did young Patrick hesitate?

“There are so many of them,” he replied after a moment. “It’s quite possible that some of them could have turned Protestant.”

“This one’s a grocer. Do you know a John MacGowan who’s a grocer?”

Patrick frowned.

“I believe I do. But there’s a whole tribe of MacGowan grocers, you know, all cousins. If one of them says he’s Protestant…” He shrugged. “I wouldn’t try to stop him, if that’s what you mean.”

“Hmph,” said Hercules, and turned away.

And he was still looking irritated a few moments later when his mother came up to him.

“Did you enjoy your talk with your grandfather?” she asked.

“He thinks I should help the Catholics. Give them the same rights that we have.”

“And will you do so?”

Hercules shrugged.

“Why give up an advantage?”

To this, Georgiana didn’t reply.

“Come and talk to your sister Eliza,” she said instead.

The honoured guest arrived at the appointed hour precisely. Fortunatus ushered him into the big parlour where all the family were waiting. As he entered, everyone fell silent. Georgiana was standing beside Hercules. As the visitor came in, she observed him closely.

He was a curious figure. An elderly man in a brown, homespun coat. He wore stockings and buckled shoes, but no wig. Long wisps of white hair hung down from his large, bald pate. On his nose sat a pair of half-spectacles, over which he looked benignly at the company. What a dear old man, she thought.

Mr. Benjamin Franklin was making his first visit to Ireland.

Fortunatus conducted him round the room, introducing each member of the family to him in turn, while the American shook hands or bowed his white head in the simplest and most pleasant manner imaginable. But Georgiana had seen enough of public men to notice that the kindly old eyes were also exceedingly sharp. And when he got to her, and the eyes lit up with an unmistakable gleam at the sight of her own gently swelling bodice, she smiled to herself and concluded: this clever old fellow is not as sweet and homespun as he pretends. But he’s a first-rate actor.

“Mr. Franklin has already paid a visit to our House of Commons, where he was invited to sit as a member, during a debate, and where I had the honour of making his acquaintance,” Fortunatus announced. “As to his purpose in visiting Ireland, I shall let him explain that himself in a little while.”

For about a quarter of an hour, Franklin conversed with several of the party and gladly answered their questions. Yes, he was a member of the Philadelphia legislature. Indeed, he’d been born in Boston. He had returned from America to London upon his present business, but had resided in London for many years in the past and had the warmest affection for that city. After a little while, however, Fortunatus led him to one end of the room, from where he could address them all.

When the old American spoke, it was in a very simple and friendly manner. He had come to Ireland, he explained, because he believed that their own situation here was rather similar to the case in the American colony.

“We have our legislatures, as you have yours, but they are not given the powers which, as plain free men, we should think reasonable. We can adjust local matters, but all decisions of importance are made in London, by men we never see. Troops are quartered in our towns—by London. We are ruled by government officials who are chosen and paid—by London—so that we have no control over them. Our trade is restricted and ordered—by London. It is London that controls our currency. Contentious taxes are imposed—by London. Yet in the Parliament in London that so orders our lives and our livelihoods, we have no representation whatever. We are subjects of the king, yet we are treated as something less than subjects; we are free men, yet we are not free. I should therefore say that while most of those in the American colony are well affected, they are nonetheless seeking an amelioration of these conditions.

“My purpose in visiting London,” he continued, “is to negotiate some concessions on these matters; and my hope is that if we in America and those desiring similar changes in the Irish Parliament were to act together, we might both stand in better hope of equitable treatment. For if the American colonists receive no satisfaction,” he added seriously, “then I do not know what troubles may follow.”

This speech was received with differing degrees of enthusiasm, but Fortunatus was nodding warmly.

“The party in our Irish Parliament which seeks changes of this kind—and I am often of their opinion—are rightly called the Patriots,” he declared. “For while they are steadfast in their loyalty to the king, they have an equal love for their native land. You will find many friends in Ireland, Sir.”

Lord Mountwalsh now gently intervened.

“Granted what my father has just said, is it not also true that you have been prepared to take actions, harmful to Britain, to make your point?” he enquired. “How do you justify this?”

“We refused to buy British goods, and won concessions on some unjust taxes thereby,” Franklin answered. “Now we are importing British goods again. Was that justifiable? I think so.”

“As a matter of fact,” Fortunatus remarked, “that’s exactly what Dean Swift told the Irish to do fifty years ago.” He noticed as he said it that his grandson was frowning. “So, Hercules,” he called out, “have you a question to ask Mr. Franklin?”

Though it was clear that Hercules would sooner not have been asked, Fortunatus was glad that his grandson responded in a manly way.

“The government in London would deny that the American colonies are not represented,” he said. “The king himself, and the men of the British Parliament, who have America’s interest always in their hearts, are your representatives. How would you answer that?”

“The phrase they use is that, if we lack elected representatives in London, we have, through their kindness, a virtual representation,” Franklin replied with a nod. “And a very pretty notion it is. But if we allow this, then let me make you a proposal.” His old eyes twinkled. “If we accept this virtual representation, then instead of paying taxes ourselves, we will also allow the English to pay the taxes for us; and this we shall call virtual taxation.”

This raised a general laugh, although not from Hercules.

“We have heard of the loyal intentions of the colony,” he pursued, “yet at the same time, you hint that if your demands are not met, other troubles may follow. Do you mean rebellion?”

“God forbid,” said Franklin firmly. But it did not seem from the young man’s face that Hercules entirely believed him, and so, to avoid unpleasantness, Franklin went on smoothly: “I also have hopes that our position will be well understood in Ireland because of the extraordinarily close links between our peoples. You will all know of the huge communities of Ulster Presbyterians in America now. Yet for every five Presbyterians, I estimate that there are at least two Irish Catholics also—since they are free to practice their religion without disability in America.” Here he glanced with a quick smile towards Terence Walsh and his family. “Taking these two together, it is an undoubted fact that one out of every two people in our entire American colony has come from this island. We look to you as our family, therefore.” And he smiled at them all.

This remarkable information was greeted with some surprised murmurs.

“So if there’s a rebellion there, it’ll be an Irish one,” Hercules muttered, but luckily no one except his mother heard him.

After this, the party broke into groups and people came up to Franklin, who chatted to them very amicably. Georgiana waited a little, then joined the great man while he was talking to Doyle.

“What surprised me most, I confess,” the old American was saying, was the noble scale of your capital. Your Parliament building is finer than the London Parliament.” The building that now housed the Parliament, designed early in the century by a young architect named Pearce, was indeed of a magnificence to rival the Roman Empire. “When I was in that great domed hall of your Commons, I might have supposed myself in the Pantheon, or Saint Peter’s Rome. As for your broad streets…” Franklin was lost for words.

“We have a body called the Wide Streets Commission,” Doyle informed him proudly, “whose aim is to make our thoroughfares and squares the most spacious in Europe. Have you seen our Rotunda Hospital? That’s another fine building, and the first lying-in hospital, exclusively for women giving birth, in all the world, so they say.” The merchant was always glad to point out the splendours of his native city; and Franklin was not the first visitor to be impressed by the growing magnificence of Georgian Dublin.

“But there is one other discovery I have made in this fair city,” the Philadelphia man went on, “that has given me particular delight. And that is a most excellent beverage. It is brewed by a man named Guinness.”

“Ah now,” Doyle declared, “as to that, I can give you some particular information. For my late mother Barbara Doyle, a remarkable woman, was a friend of Guinness when he first began his business. And it was she who gave him the name for his brew.”

“Indeed?”

“Well, so she claimed. And it would have been a brave man who contradicted her, I can tell you. Guinness came to her one day—this would be a dozen years ago, when he first began—and he says to her, ‘I’ve a fine dark beer I want to sell, but the devil if I can think of a name for it.’ And she says to him, ‘Well, if you want to sell to the city fathers, you’d better make sure the name will please them. So I’ll tell you what to call it.’ And he did.”

“Guinness Black Protestant Porter,” said Georgiana with a laugh.

“Guinness Black Protestant Porter, the very same,” echoed Doyle with satisfaction. “Though there’s plenty that drink it without being Protestant, I may say.”

The contemplation of the excellent brew brought the conversation to a momentary pause, and Georgiana used it to put her question.

“I wonder, Mr. Franklin, whether in Philadelphia you ever heard of some of my family. My uncle there was a man named Samuel Law.”

She was almost ashamed of it, but in the nearly thirty years she’d been married, she had quite lost contact with her father’s family. After the rift between her father and his brother John, the Ulster and Dublin branches of the family had never had any contact with each other. Her father had kept up a written correspondence with Samuel, and then his widow in Philadelphia, but she had never known much about this, and been too busy with her own family to pay much attention. So the truth was that she knew nothing about her cousins there, assuming that they still existed. “If I wanted to send a letter, I wouldn’t even know who to write to,” she confessed.

“But I remember Samuel Law the merchant very well,” Franklin told her brightly. “And I know that he had brothers in Belfast and Dublin, for he told me so himself. They are an excellent family.”

And he proceeded to give her a most encouraging account of the family—lawyers, doctors, worthy merchants, with good houses and some excellent farms in the region. “Judge Edward Law would be considered the head of the family at present, I should say.”

“How I wish I could see them,” she exclaimed. “How I should like Hercules to meet them also.”

At this last idea, Franklin looked a little doubtful. But he gladly made a suggestion.

“I shall be sending a packet of letters to Philadelphia in a day or two, Lady Mountwalsh. If you care to write a letter to the judge, and give it to me, I can promise that it will be delivered to him in person.”

It was an offer she accepted at once.

And when the party ended later that evening, and the guest of honour was escorted out, she agreed with all the rest of the family that it had been a great success.

The meeting of the Aldermen of Skinners Alley was well attended. More than forty cheerful fellows gathered in the upstairs meeting room of the city inn. As usual, the company was mixed. There was a wig-maker, two apothecaries, sundry other craftsmen and merchants, half a dozen lawyers, the operator of the Dublin-to-Belfast stagecoach, some clerks from the castle, a couple of army officers, numerous gentlemen, and a sprinkling of aristocrats, including young Hercules.

It was a convivial gathering. The Aldermen had been meeting like this each month for over eighty years, ever since the Battle of the Boyne. The business was light. A few new members were proposed and seconded, the sole qualification being that the applicant was a good fellow—and a Protestant, of course. News was exchanged. Hercules soon made the acquaintance of John MacGowan, who turned out to be a pleasant enough man, tallish, about thirty, with a receding hairline and a humorous caste of mind. Within an hour the business, which included collecting the sixpenny subscription that would pay for tonight’s supper, was completed and the real object of the evening could begin.

The feast: everything was done to form. In the centre of the long table stood the hallowed bust of King William, the Protestant liberator. Down the middle of the table were numerous jugs: blue jugs for rum punch, white jugs for whisky punch, pewter jugs for porter—Guinness Black Protestant Porter, of course. As the members sat down and began to eat, a great platter of sheeps trotters was brought in, a reminder of how Catholic King James ran away from Dublin as King Billie approached. The talk was jolly. Only when the main meal was done could the profound business of the evening begin.

That deep business began with the entire company singing “God Save the King.” After which the master of ceremonies, duly elected and given the office of Lord Mayor, solemnly rose and announced: “Gentlemen, I give you the Orange Toast.” And then, to as near as you can get to a hush when forty jolly fellows have already eaten and drunk a good deal together, he intoned the following awe-inspiring invocation:

“The glorious, pious, and immortal memory of the great and good King William not forgetting Oliver Cromwell, who assisted in redeeming us from popery, slavery, arbitrary power, brass-money, and wooden shoes. May we never lack a Williamite to kick the arse of a Jacobite! And a fig for the Bishop of Cork! And he that won’t drink this, whether he be priest, bishop, deacon, bellows-blower, gravedigger, or any other of the fraternity of the clergy, may a north wind blow him to the south, and a west wind blow him to the east! May he have a dark night, a lee shore, a rank storm, and a leaky vessel to carry him over the River Styx! May the dog Cerberus make a meal of his rump, and Pluto a snuff box of his skull; and may the devil jump down his throat with a red-hot harrow, with every pin tear out a gut, and blow him with a clean carcass to hell! Amen!”

The language of the toast said it all. Part Shakespearean English, part seventeenth-century sermon: it was Protestant, antipapist, half-pagan, triumphalist. It was serious, yet not to be taken too seriously—so long as the freedom-loving Protestants were comfortably in control, of course. It was Ascendancy Dublin.

“Amen!” they all cried. “Nine times nine!”

And now, for those with the head for it, the serious drinking of the evening could begin.

It was some way into this latter process that John MacGowan committed his indiscretion.

Hercules had his own way of dealing with long evenings of drinking. Firstly, he was blessed with a head like a rock. If he had to, he could outlast most men in a drinking session. Secondly, it was easy for him to keep a cool head, because he was secretly bored—as he always was when no useful business was being conducted. But thirdly, he had become practised at drinking less than he appeared to. In convivial company with his friends, therefore, he was less of a companion and more a cold observer than they usually realised.

During the meal, he had been sitting across the table and a few places down from John MacGowan, and had the opportunity to observe the grocer from time to time. At first, MacGowan had spent most of his time listening and smiling, perhaps a little uncertain of himself as a newcomer to the company. Hercules had noticed a few beads of sweat on the balding front of his head, and wondered whether they came from the heat or from nervousness. Gradually, however, he appeared to gain confidence. He started to chat, even to tell a joke or two, and these being well received by his neighbours, he perceptibly relaxed. He drank more; his face began to glow. From time to time, when not engaged in conversation, he looked down at the table and laughed to himself—though whether because he was a little drunk or enjoying some private joke concerning the proceedings, it was impossible to tell. When the elderly man on MacGowan’s left, having drunk his fill, quietly departed, Hercules walked round the table and took his place beside the grocer.

MacGowan greeted him with a nod, though Hercules wasn’t sure if the grocer remembered who he was. After a moment or two, he said to him casually:

“You’re in the grocery trade, I think you said. Family business?”

“Indeed it is. Several generations now.”

“You won’t mind my saying, I hope, but MacGowan being a Catholic name, I should think the family might have been a little put out, with you being a Protestant, I mean.”

MacGowan gave him a cautious glance, but Hercules smiled and returned a look of great sincerity.

“In fact,” the grocer replied with a slow nod, “it must be said that it was a Protestant who saved my family. A remarkable woman, old Mrs. Doyle: but for her, my grandfather would have been ruined, instead of which he died a very prosperous man. The business is split between us now, but it’s thanks to her that we have it.” And he fell silent for a few moments. Hercules noticed that, as he cogitated, MacGowan half closed his left eye, while his right opened very large as he stared at the table.

Hercules took a blue jug and poured punch for them both.

“Let’s drink to her,” he said.

MacGowan grew quite friendly after this. He cracked a few jokes, at which Hercules laughed companionably, and poured him more punch. The grocer’s face was growing quite red and there was a slight slur in his speech, but he kept going very gamely, with Hercules encouraging him in a friendly manner at his side.

“I wonder,” Hercules ventured at last, “whether you ever came to know a Doctor Terence Walsh.”

“Doctor Walsh?” The grocer’s face lit up with pleasure. “Indeed I do. That’s a very fine old man.”

“I quite agree. I have the honour to be a kinsman of his myself.”

“Ah, indeed?” From the slight look of confusion on MacGowan’s flushed face, it was clear to Hercules that the grocer had rather forgotten who he was.

“You’ll know his son, my cousin Patrick, then?”

“I do. I do.” MacGowan was looking a little fuddled, but delighted.

“He told me all about your being here tonight.” Hercules gave him a grin and a wink.

“He did?”

“He’s my cousin. A very good fellow.”

MacGowan gave him a confidential look.

“He told you about the bet?”

Hercules nodded.

“I wasn’t clear if the bet was made with himself, though,” he said.

“No, it wasn’t. That was with two other fellows. But he came to hear of it. You don’t think he’ll tell anyone else, do you?”

“Never.”

“He’s a capital fellow.”

“He is indeed.” He dropped his voice. “For a Catholic to get in here like this…into the Orange Aldermen themselves. What a thing to do. How much will you get?”

“Two guineas for getting in at all. Two more if I’m undetected. Then another two if I can do it next month as well.” He grinned. “So I’ve two guineas already.”

Hercules laughed. Then he got up, walked round the table to the lord mayor, and told him that they had been infiltrated.

The next few minutes were interesting. There was no precedent for such a thing, and so while they held him on the bench, and delivered a few kicks and blows to his body to pass the time, the company had to come to a decision—which, as the lord mayor pointed out, might set a precedent—as to what to do with the Catholic grocer who had dared to violate the sanctity of the proceedings and witness their secret counsels in this manner. Some of those present were very angry indeed and argued that, since there was, unfortunately, no law which could sent him to the gallows where he clearly belonged, they should at least, as decent citizens, beat him within an inch of his life. Others, their judgement perhaps clouded by drink, argued that since it was done for a bet, the punishment for the fellow’s crime, heinous though it was, might be somewhat mitigated. Hercules himself, having performed his proper service by exposing the crime, took no part in these discussions. In the end, the moderate council of the lord mayor prevailed, and they only dragged him over to the window and threw him out.

The drop onto the cobbled street was hardly more than a dozen feet, but MacGowan did not fall as well as he should have, and the landlord informed them later that he had broken a leg. But not badly: the surgeon had set it well enough. So that was the end of the matter.

At least, for the rest of the Aldermen. But not for Hercules. There was one other matter to be attended to.

The next day he went to see his cousin Patrick and asked to speak with him privately. The conversation did not take long.

“You knew about John MacGowan cheating his way into the Aldermen. But you didn’t tell me.”

“It was difficult. I’d given my word. The thing was only a foolish wager.”

“You lied to me.”

“Not exactly. I said nothing, really. I hear the poor fellow was hurt.”

“You can make all the Catholic equivocations you please, but you lied.”

“I resent that.”

“Resent it all you like, you damned papist.”

Patrick shrugged contemptuously.

“If we have to meet at family gatherings,” Hercules continued coldly, “I shall be polite. I shall not offend Grandfather. But stay away from me. I never wish to see your face again.”

And so it was, unknown to Fortunatus, that the friendship between the two branches of the Walsh family, planned by his father and cherished for eighty years, came to an end.

For Georgiana, the years that followed Ben Franklin’s visit were busy ones.

She was delighted some months after writing to Philadelphia to receive a courteous letter back from Judge Edward Law. From the tone of his letter, she had the impression that the judge was rather tickled to have a relation with such a fine-sounding title. Not only did he give her news of her American cousins, but kindly included a family tree. He also gave her an interesting account of the mood in the American colonies, which indicated that, in his opinion, the disputes between the colonists and the English government would not easily be resolved.

A year later, when news reached Ireland of the Boston colonists’ destruction of a valuable cargo of tea, another letter from the judge arrived.

 

Here in Philadelphia, the governor avoided a similar conflict by persuading the captain to take his cargo of tea back to England. But now that such a challenge has been made to London, I fear that legal retaliation will follow. And resorting to law, alas, can only make this conflict worse. I have written also to our cousins in Belfast.

 

This last sentence, she supposed, might be a gentle hint to her that, having gone to the trouble of reestablishing relations with the family in distant Philadelphia, it might be a kindness to do the same for her relations in nearby Belfast. In this case, she knew that her uncle John had had a son named Daniel, so she knew whom to write to. And indeed, if she asked herself why she had never done so, she had to confess that it was probably a fear that her Belfast relations, who were not at such a safe distance as the ones in Philadelphia, might embarrass her in some way. Having decided that this was small-minded, and having made sure that her kindly husband had no objection, she wrote a letter. But she received no reply.

The following year, old Fortunatus lost his wife, and Georgiana made a point of going round several times a week to keep the old man company. She would often find his brother Terence there, and it was heartwarming to see the two brothers sitting so contentedly together. Though he complained of nothing more than a stiff leg, it sometimes seemed to Georgiana that Doctor Walsh was not entirely well himself. Occasionally, he looked gaunt and tired. But he was obviously content to sit chatting with his brother all afternoon. And if she didn’t find Terence, then she’d often encounter his son Patrick there instead. “It’s good of the boy to come,” Fortunatus would say, “when he has better things to do.” Yet she had no doubt that Patrick enjoyed the old man’s company.

Though his father had suggested he follow in the medical profession, Patrick had chosen the wine trade instead, and was working hard at it. The more she saw of Patrick, the better she liked him. He was clever, humorous, and kind. And he was not without ambition. “I hope to make my fortune if I can,” he told her frankly. And when she asked if there was anything else he desired: “I could never change my faith, but if it were ever possible for a Catholic to do so, then I should like to enter Parliament.”

Though that still seemed a far-off hope, Georgiana was glad that there were now some small, but encouraging developments for the Catholics of Ireland. The Pope had opened the door. Some years ago, after two centuries of opposition to England’s heretic monarchs, the Pope had compromised, and King George III was now recognised by the Vatican as the legitimate sovereign of Britain. That made things easier. “And with all this trouble in the American colony,” her husband told her, “the government wants to keep every section of the community as happy as possible.” In Ireland, Catholics were excluded from every office, because the Oath of Allegiance was worded in such Protestant terms that no Catholic could possibly take it. “So we’re going to try to find a way round it,” her husband explained. The Protestant Bishop of Derry, working with some of the Catholic hierarchy, devised a new oath. Not all the Catholic bishops liked it, but others urged their flocks to take it. This might, after all, open the way to further things.”

“Will you take it?” Georgiana asked Patrick.

“I shall, at once,” he declared. And old Fortunatus was equally enthusiastic.

“This is what the family always stood for back in my father’s and my grandfather’s day: loyalty to their faith and loyalty to the king,” he reminded them. “I still pray,” he confessed to her after one of Patrick’s visits, “that you may live to see the two branches of the family—Hercules and Patrick—both in the Parliament together.”

Hercules would also go to see his grandfather from time to time, of course, but Georgiana noticed that if he came and found Patrick there, one or other of them would soon make a polite excuse and leave. Once, she asked Patrick if there was anything amiss between him and her son, but he dodged the question, replying: “We both love Uncle Fortunatus, you know.” When she asked Hercules the same thing, he answered briefly: “He has his life; I have mine.” And he refused to say anything more. So she did not pursue the matter. But I like him anyway, she thought, whether you do or not.

Her project to marry Hercules to the Fitzgerald girl had miserably failed. The girl herself, according to Eliza, found Hercules cold. His own assessment was blunt and final.

“She has too many opinions of her own, Mother, to be of any interest to me.”

Georgiana sighed. No mother wants to think poorly of her son. She would continue to try.

Early in 1775, her husband had taken her to London for a month. It had been a most successful visit. They had gone to the Houses of Parliament, heard Pitt, Fox, and Burke, the greatest orators of the day, watched Lord North, the Prime Minister, apparently half asleep in the House of Lords. “Actually,” a knowing friend informed them, “Lord North is a much cleverer fellow than he looks, but he holds the position more from a sense of duty than because he likes it.” They also spoke to numerous politicians. In the course of this, Georgiana had gained a clearer insight into the mentality of the London government concerning the Catholics in Ireland. “The fact is, Lady Mountwalsh,” a cynical government supporter informed her with a smile, “this new loyalty oath has been a deucedly good thing. On the one hand, the Catholic bishops don’t agree with each other about it. So that splits the Catholics and lessens the chance of them giving us any trouble. But at the same time, it’s encouraging Catholic recruits into the army. You see,” he explained, “for years now, about one in twenty of the troops in the British army have been Irish. They were all supposed to take the Oath of Allegiance, of course, but if they were Catholic, we just forgot about it. Now, however, with their priests encouraging them to take the new oath, we’re recruiting two or three times as many. If this trouble in the colonies turns into armed conflict—and we’re damnably short of troops—we can send these Irish off to fight in America.” He laughed. “So I’m all for Catholics at present, my lady.”

She had been around politicians for decades and was no stranger to political calculation, but when she thought of old Fortunatus and of young Patrick’s honest loyalty, and the hundreds of Catholic Irish she knew, she felt a sense of sadness and disgust at the Englishman’s shallow calculation.

The real purpose of their visit, however, was for pleasure. She had seen the latest London fashions, bought some fine silks and shoes, while George had acquired three Italian paintings in the sale rooms. But perhaps most delightful of all was the night they went to the theatre to see the new romantic comedy that had just taken London by storm.

As well it might: for The Rivals, with its almost dreamlike plot, its lively characters like Sir Lucius O’Trigger, Sir Anthony Absolute, and the novel-reading Lydia Languish—not to mention the ineffable Mrs. Malaprop, who always uses the wrong word—was obviously destined to become a classic of the stage. Even Garrick, the great actor manager, had already declared it a masterpiece. And to think that the author was still only twenty-three!

Having roared with laughter and warmly applauded, it gave Lord and Lady Mountwalsh particular pleasure to go backstage afterwards to congratulate the handsome playwright himself, none other than young Richard, Tom Sheridan’s son.

“You know how happy my father will be that the grandson of his old friend, the great Doctor Sheridan, should have succeeded so brilliantly here in London,” George said warmly. “And will you forgive me if I say that some of your language is so delicious, so brilliant, that it could only have come from an Irishman.”

Both these sentiments seemed to give young Sheridan enormous pleasure.

“I remember your father, when I was a boy in Dublin,” he cried.

“You may have known our son Hercules, when he was here in London,” Georgiana added.

“Ah yes,” said Sheridan.

The spring passed quietly for Georgiana. Then came news from America that fighting had begun near Boston. Soon afterwards, she received another letter from Judge Edward Law in Philadelphia.

 

After some hesitation, I am now inclined to what we here call the Patriot cause. My estimation is that about one fifth of our people are patriots, favouring a complete separation from Britain; two fifths are loyal to the crown, though they want reform; and another two fifths are undecided, uninterested, or afraid to commit to anything. The slave-owners in the south fear anything that might lead to a slave revolt.

I know that our cousins in Ulster, like most of the Presbyterians there, entirely favour the patriot cause and would be glad to see America—and Ireland—independent from England. I wonder if you are for us or against us?

 

After reading the letter carefully, she thought it better not to reply just yet. When her husband asked her if it contained anything of interest, she answered, “Not really, George,” and later locked it in her bureau.

A year later, the American Declaration of Independence had gone ringing round the world, four thousand troops had been despatched from Ireland to quell the colony, and news had come that dear old Mr. Franklin had gone to France to get military aid from Britain’s oldest enemy. It was just as well, she supposed, that she had never replied.

In that same extraordinary year, a more mundane event came to occupy her attention closer to home.

Hercules had found a wife. The girl’s parents, who owned a good estate in County Meath, had brought her to Dublin to find a husband, and there Hercules had wooed her and won her heart. Not that—given that she had come there expressly for that purpose and he was the heir to Lord Mountwalsh—this was a task requiring more than common sense. But he had done it, and she was exactly what he wanted.

Nobody could object to Kitty. She wasn’t the kind of beauty that everyone remarked upon, but she looked very well at his side. She had the same upbringing and outlook as scores of other girls of her class, and being still only eighteen, she clearly looked to Hercules for guidance. Once, when Georgiana asked her what she thought of the American colony’s actions, she looked at once to Hercules, who answered firmly for her:

“They are rebels, and they’ll pay for their treason.”

“Even old Benjamin Franklin?” she’d pursued.

“Franklin?” Kitty seemed uncertain who he was.

“That old devil, especially, should be hanged,” said Hercules, at which Kitty looked relieved.

“So do you prefer the country or the town?” Georgiana had then asked the girl.

But even here, Kitty had glanced at Hercules.

“Depends on the season, doesn’t it?” he had suggested to her genially.

“Yes. It depends on the season,” she had replied firmly. And Hercules had given his mother such a look that she had asked no more questions.

And since his marriage seemed to improve his temper somewhat, Georgiana supposed she should be grateful.

That same year saw another milestone in her son’s life: his election to Parliament.

An election in England or Ireland was always an interesting business. Not that there was much voting. Most of the seats were controlled by a small number of prominent citizens or by a few local landowners. The citizens would normally expect to receive something for their vote, in cash or help with their business; the landowners usually put in one of their family members, or a friend. And in all cases, naturally, the government would attempt to bribe the electors to choose a candidate who’d support the government line. In the case of the election of 1776, the government succeeded rather well.

“No less than eighteen new peerages are given out,” George told Georgiana with a laugh. “At this rate, I fear we Irish peers will soon be common as tinkers.”

As promised, old Fortunatus gave up his seat to his grandson Hercules, and the next generation of the Walsh family glided smoothly down to be launched into the waters of politics. But the weather over the sea ahead looked stormy.

The Parliament Fortunatus had left had consisted of factional interests that were loosely organised in an informal fashion. The group calling themselves Patriots, who desired more authority for the Irish Parliament, fluctuated in number, and even their leader, a fine speaker named Flood, had accepted government office not long ago. The Walsh family had chosen a moderate course. In the Lords, George Mountwalsh could usually be relied upon to support the government unless they proposed something egregious. Fortunatus, on the other hand, sitting in the Commons, had been sympathetic to the Patriot cause ever since the days of Dean Swift and the copper coin scandal. But he was a genial fellow, and the officials in the castle had always considered him a reasonable man whose vote might be solicited from time to time.

But now, suddenly, the American Revolution had bathed the world in a new and dangerous light. Out in the colony, the American Patriots—respectable landowners, lawyers, merchants, and farmers—had taken destiny into their own hands. “And what,” those who similarly called themselves Patriots in Ireland might ask, “have we accomplished by comparison?” At the very least, they decided, they should stick together and use the situation to win some real concessions. Other members, however, who might have been sympathetic to their cause, now decided that, in such a crisis, it wasn’t the time to rock the boat. As the new Parliament assembled, the government men were making clear, “If you’re not with us, you’re against us,” and it looked as if the Patriots might be isolated.

It was a Parliament that might have been made for Hercules. All his natural instincts were called upon. He was like a hound that has scented its quarry. Within hours of his arrival, he had sought out the government’s sternest supporters and let them know that, whatever his grandfather’s views might have been, he was of their party. He was for order; the Patriots were for disorder; the Patriots should be destroyed. Such enthusiasm was rare in politics.

But the Patriots were not without friends. Soon after the election, Georgiana met Doyle, who told her:

“Let the government learn from what’s happening in America, and treat the free men of Ireland better. We’re all Patriots in this family,” he declared, “and I hardly know a merchant in Dublin who isn’t.” In towns all over Ireland, the Protestant merchants and craftsmen were saying the same thing.

One day, on a visit to the Parliament building to see her son, Georgiana had been rather astonished to find him in earnest conversation with his cousin Patrick. After Patrick had gone, she had remarked to Hercules that she thought he didn’t like Patrick.

“I detest him,” her son replied, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, “but we are on the same side. At the moment, anyway.” And later that day, Patrick had called round at her house and explained to her:

“I’m organising a loyal address from the Catholic tradesmen of Dublin—pledging our support for the government and our opposition to the American rebels.” He saw her surprise and continued: “The Catholic community is doing the same in towns all over Ireland. If we want to increase our influence, this is the moment to show the government that it can trust us—the better sort amongst us, anyway.” He smiled. “So Hercules and I may not be in harmony, but we’re singing the same tune!”

But if the government was getting support from the more prosperous parts of the Catholic community, they had also gained a vigorous opponent they had surely never thought of.

Fortunatus Walsh. Well into his eighties, without a wife, without a seat in Parliament, yet with all his mental faculties, old Fortunatus after a lifetime of genial, cautious calculation had apparently decided he didn’t care what anyone thought anymore. Was he just bored, or deeply persuaded of the rightness of the cause? Even Georgiana wasn’t sure. But whatever the reason, he had no sooner quit the House of Commons than he became a passionate Patriot. Not only did he denounce the government and cheerfully declare that the American rebels were in the right, but he turned the house on St. Stephen’s Green into a meeting place for any of the Patriot party who cared to come by.

Many people were surprised. Her husband George shook his head affectionately. Hercules, however, had not been amused at all. “I have told everyone,” he informed her, “that my grandfather is in his dotage and has lost his wits.”

Georgiana continued to call on Fortunatus often, and she thoroughly enjoyed it. The house was livelier than she had ever known it before. Radical broadsheets like The Freeman’s Journal were scattered on the tables. A copy of Tom Paine’s Common Sense, advocating American independence, even arrived from the colony. The Doyles would often look in, and once they brought with them a radical Member of Parliament named Napper Tandy, who told her: “When we mobilise the trade guilds as well as our Patriots in Parliament, the castle will be surprised at what we can do.” It sounded ominous, but she also found it rather exciting. Charles Sheridan, the playwright’s elder brother, also put in the occasional appearance. He had just entered the Parliament on the Patriot side, and Fortunatus had made a point of seeking him out and bringing him round. Charles also gave her an interesting piece of news: “My brother Richard is quite determined to enter politics in England if he can make enough money by writing plays. If he succeeds, we shall have one Sheridan in the Dublin Parliament and another in Westminster.”

On another day, Fortunatus introduced a delightful young lawyer who had recently entered the Commons. A gentleman, but without the two thousand pounds needed to purchase a constituency, he’d been given a seat by a Patriot peer. His name was Henry Grattan.

She liked young Grattan at once. He had a thin, clever face. “You look like a lawyer,” she told him.

“I know,” he said with a smile. “But I must confess that all the time I was in London and supposed to be studying the law, I was at Westminster in the gallery of the House of Commons listening to the great orators like Pitt, and Fox, and Edmund Burke. Ah, what men! I studied politics there, Lady Mountwalsh, and I hope I may succeed in it, for I fear I should make a terrible lawyer.”

They spoke for some time, and as they did so, she noticed that as well as looking clever, there was a delightful, kindly light in his eye that she warmed to. “He reminds me of Patrick,” she told Fortunatus afterwards.

She had wondered if Fortunatus might be disappointed that Patrick, so much a favourite, had taken a view so opposed to the Patriot cause. But if there was any doubt about the old man’s mental faculties, he quickly dispelled it by his answer.

“No, my dear. The boy’s quite right. The Catholics should demonstrate their loyalty and support the government. Leave the opposition to us.” He gave her a shrewd look. “Remember, Georgiana, my father told us brothers to help each other by sitting on different sides of the fence.”

“You’re a cunning old fox,” she said with approval.

But about his grandson Hercules, he seemed to feel rather differently. Once, walking round to call upon George and Georgiana at Merrion Square, and finding Hercules there, he gave him a cross look and remarked:

“Young Grattan made a damn fine speech the other day.” Then adding with a sniff: “’Fraid yours wasn’t much good, though.” In answer, Hercules had made him a curt bow and withdrawn from the room, but not before his grandfather had remarked, so that he could not fail to hear: “No gift for speaking. None at all.”

The next day, Hercules had warned her: “I think it’s unwise for you to be seen at Grandfather’s house. It could embarrass the family.” A warning of which she had taken not the slightest notice.

It came as a shock to everyone, early in 1777, when Doctor Terence Walsh suddenly had a stroke and died on the spot. “He didn’t suffer,” Georgiana comforted Fortunatus. “I know, and I thank God he lived to see Patrick grow into such a fine young man,” he replied sadly. “But I’d always hoped to go first.” Half Dublin gathered for the funeral at the Catholic chapel, including several Church of Ireland clergymen; and it was certainly gratifying to see in what universal affection the doctor had been held. “I fear, however,” Fortunatus remarked to her afterwards, “that he leaves no great fortune behind.”

In the months that followed, she was glad to see that Patrick never failed to look in once or twice a week upon his uncle, and she would often time her own visits so that she might encounter him there. She hardly liked to admit it even to herself, but she felt more at home in his company nowadays than she did in that of her own son.

Hercules, meanwhile, was starting to make a name for himself. The American war was taking a toll. The government had forbade the Irish to trade with America anymore—to the fury of the Irish merchants. But the war was depressing all business anyway. In Ulster especially, the linen industry was hit, and there were many bankruptcies. The Patriots blamed everything upon the government, and young Grattan spoke so well that he was already their rising star. But the government loyalists struck back, and of all the denouncers of the Patriots, none was more virulent than Hercules Walsh. He might not have Grattan’s genius, but in his blunt way he could make a point. And as far as he was concerned, the Patriots in the Parliament, the complaining tradesmen, and the Ulster Presbyterians who sympathised with America were all the same: traitors. When news came that Ben Franklin and his colleagues had succeeded in bringing France in to fight for America against Britain, his attacks became even more scathing. It was soon after one of his more insulting tirades that Georgiana received a letter from Ulster. It was signed: “Daniel Law.”

 

I did not reply when you wrote to me before, being uncertain what to say to you. Thanks to your government, the linen trade has been in such a desperate condition that, upon this day, the business of Law of Belfast will exist no more. Yet I read in the journal that, according to your son, I and those like me in Ulster, who still profess the honest and godly faith of our forefathers, are nothing better than traitors, and dogs to be chained up and muzzled.

I write to you now, therefore, being certain at last what I should say to you is, that I have nothing to say to you; and that this correspondence between our families, which you have seen fit to reopen, should henceforth cease, forever.

 

She put the letter down with a sigh and a sense of failure. There was no use in writing. Whatever she said herself, Hercules would be sure to make another offensive speech again. She wondered if there was something she could do for them if, as seemed likely, they were in financial difficulties, but concluded that any offer would be curtly refused. She locked the letter in her bureau, therefore, with the one from Philadelphia, and she prayed for better times.

Soon afterwards, she was able to do a good turn for someone else, however.

She had been on her way from St. Stephen’s Green towards the Parliament when, halfway along the gentle curve of Grafton Street, she saw young Patrick coming towards her in the company of a pleasant-looking fellow, a little taller than he, and who walked with a slight limp. She greeted Patrick and asked if he was not going to present his friend.

“Ah yes.” His hesitation was only momentary. “This is Mr. John MacGowan. Lady Mountwalsh.”

The taller man bowed politely and said that he was at her service; but she noticed that, at the mention of her name, the smile had died upon his face. Some people might have passed on and put the incident out of mind, but Georgiana could never quite restrain her curiosity. So, as politeness made the two men captive until she let them go, she engaged them in conversation. She soon learned that John MacGowan was a fellow Catholic with Patrick, and that his grocery business had expanded rapidly in the last seven years. “He’s gone into salted provisions,” Patrick informed her, “and though he’s too modest to tell you so himself, there are only two merchants in Dublin who export more salted beef that he does. But I must tell you that, unlike me, he is no friend of the government,” he added with a laugh.

If the government had been determined that the Irish should not trade with the rebellious Americans, now that France had joined the war, they had become obsessed with the idea that Irish merchants like MacGowan might supply the French army and navy with the salted provisions that would be so important to them. New restrictions had therefore been made. And they had not been popular.

“You don’t like the restrictions, I’m sure,” she said with a smile.

“That is true, my lady,” he said with a cautious glance at Patrick.

“It’s all right, John.” Patrick laughed. “You can say anything to Lady Mountwalsh. She hears far worse at my uncle’s.”

“The fact is, Lady Mountwalsh,” the grocer confessed, “that I have had an antipathy for the Protestant rulers of Ireland ever since they threw me out of a window and broke my leg.”

“Oh Mr. MacGowan, I am so sorry.”

“In a way,” he went on calmly, “I suppose I should be grateful. For besides leaving me with a limp, it made me so angry and so determined to succeed that I drove myself to expand the business. Had it not been for their cruelty, I’m sure I shouldn’t be where I am now.”

“I was thinking,” Patrick said with a grin, “that I should take him round to Uncle Fortunatus—now that the Patriots are suddenly taking such an interest in us Catholics.”

It had been the latest turn in the turbulent river of Irish politics, and it had been Grattan’s idea.

If the Patriots still couldn’t get a majority in Parliament, they could still pile on the pressure outside the chamber. They had most of the Protestant tradesmen. They had plenty of the smaller country gentry as well. For although the big landed interests might have concluded that this wasn’t the time to rock the government’s boat, there were plenty of lesser men and farmers who couldn’t give a damn whether they rocked the boat or not. But there remained the largest group of all, four-fifths of the population of Ireland—the Catholics. Respectable fellows like Patrick might be proclaiming their loyalty—in the hope of better treatment in future, of course—but this in no way prevented the Patriots promising to do more for them than the government would. “Free trade for Ireland. Then amend those vicious old Penal Laws, that insult every Catholic,” he now demanded. Not all the Protestant Patriots were sure about this, but Grattan had persuaded them to go along. “It’ll frighten the government,” he could point out. “It puts pressure on them to satisfy at least some of our demands.” Moral conviction, or cunning calculation? It was hard to say. But it was powerful politics.

“I’ll support the Patriots,” said John MacGowan.

The next day, she questioned Patrick further about his friend.

“I didn’t like to ask him, but how did he come to be thrown out of a window?”

Patrick gave her a brief account of the affair, leaving a few things out.

“I wonder he didn’t prosecute them,” she remarked.

“And have every Protestant merchant in Dublin his enemy for the rest of his life? He was wiser to say nothing. His revenge will be to finish up richer than most of them.”

“But doesn’t Hercules belong to that club? Did he take part in this business?”

“He may have been there,” Patrick conceded. “A lot of people were. But he had no part in throwing John out of the window,” he added to reassure her. “None at all.”

That evening, Georgiana told her husband about her encounter with MacGowan. “I feel guilty about him, George, even if Hercules didn’t do it. I wish we could compensate him. I’m sure his trade must have suffered recently,” she added. “Perhaps you could arrange something?”

“I agree about his physical injury,” he replied. “His trade, as it happens, may not have suffered. The American restrictions are unpopular, but the men in the provisions trade have had such large orders from the British army and navy that they’ve actually done quite well out of this war so far. I know some of the salted-provisions men down in Cork have been making fortunes.” He smiled. “All right. I’ll speak to some of those fellows at the Castle and see what can be done.”

The following month, John MacGowan received a large contract for supplying the British army with salted beef. Some time later, seeing Georgiana in the street, he came up to her and made a bow.

“I am well aware, Lady Mountwalsh, whom I have to thank for that contract.”

“Do you feel any better about us?” she enquired.

“No. But I feel richer,” he replied with a smile.

She didn’t tell Hercules.

“Patrick and his friend MacGowan may receive some satisfaction sooner than they think,” George told her a little while afterwards.

Grattan’s tactics had been working. The London government was becoming increasingly nervous. The war with the American colony was turning into a wider conflict, trade was suffering, troops needed to be raised: the last thing they needed was any more internal disorder. If Grattan was whipping up the Catholics, then it was time to make some concessions.

“They don’t want it to look as if they’re caving in to the Irish Patriots,” George explained. “Since the Penal Laws are similar in all three countries, they mean to make a general bill at Westminster for England and Scotland first, then extend it to Ireland as well.” But some time later, he came home one evening, shaking his head. “The English and Scottish proposals are dropped,” he informed her.

“Have the English parliament men such a hatred for Catholics?” she asked.

“No. It’s the ordinary people of England and Scotland. They’re shouting ‘No popery.’ There has been rioting in the streets.” The Irish legislation was still to go forward, however. “Burke believes he can get a modest Irish measure through the London Parliament, and I dare say we can do the same here in Dublin.”

So it proved. In the summer of 1778, the Catholic Relief Act passed through both parliaments, but with opposition. In Dublin, despite the fact that it had government support, there were still many loyal Protestants who refused to follow their usual lead, including Hercules Walsh. The relief the Act gave was limited but deeply symbolic, for in an age when land was everything, it allowed an Irish Catholic, for all practical purposes, to purchase land of all kinds and bequeath it to his heirs. Fortunatus and Georgiana went with Patrick and the rest of Terence’s family to watch it pass through the Irish House of Commons, where Grattan and the Patriots greeted the final vote with a great cheer.

The following evening, Fortunatus held a party at his house. Many of the Patriots came, including Grattan; George and Georgiana, though not Hercules; Terence’s family were all there and, a kindly thought, Terence’s old parish priest had been invited. Patrick had brought John MacGowan with him.

Georgiana had never seen the old man so excited. His face was flushed, his eyes were shining brightly, and he drank not a few bumpers of claret. He made a short, enthusiastic speech, to which Grattan made an elegant reply. And again and again, he would come over to wherever Patrick was standing and, putting his hand fondly on his shoulder, declare: “This is the beginning, my boy. This is what my dear father would have wanted.” It was, he told them all as they left, one of the happiest nights of his life.

Looking back on it, Georgiana realised, she shouldn’t have been surprised that, after such excitement, the old man had suffered an apoplexy late that night. By dawn, the whole family had been summoned to his bedside.

It was clear to them all, without the doctor saying anything, that Fortunatus was dying. His face was grey. There were little beads of sweat upon his brow, and he was breathing with difficulty. But he evidently knew who everyone was, and though he could not speak much, he indicated that he wished to say goodbye to them, each in turn. To George and Georgiana he whispered a few words of thanks; to Hercules he said nothing but managed a sort of handshake; he patted Kitty’s arm; he spoke a word or two to Eliza and Fitzgerald and allowed her to kiss him. It was the same with Terence’s family, though it was clear that he was getting very tired. He insisted nonetheless that Patrick should draw close again and, taking his hand, whispered: “So proud. So proud.”

The doctor was moving to his side now, but Fortunatus was trying to say that there was a person to whom he wanted to communicate something more. He was looking at Georgiana.

As she came to his side, he took her hand and gave it a faint but affectionate squeeze. He clearly wanted to say something, and was summoning the strength to do so. Finally, he seemed to be ready.

“One disappointment.” His voice was faint. She leant forward to hear him better. “One regret.”

She tensed, almost drew back. She realised, of course, that he must be disappointed in Hercules—in her son’s blunt and brutal nature, so unlike Patrick’s fineness. But this was not the moment to say it, and she wished that he would not.

He was gathering his strength again. He wanted to whisper something. She could not very well refuse. She leant down.

“I wish,” he whispered so that no one should hear, “that I could have been George.” And with a final effort, he managed to kiss her hand.

A flood of relief came over her so that she almost laughed. With great affection, she stooped again and kissed his cheek.

The doctor was gently but firmly pushing her to one side now. He was feeling the old man’s pulse. Georgiana moved back to George’s side. They all waited. Fortunatus suddenly started to sit up. His eyes opened very wide. Then he fell back, and they knew that it was over.

“What did he say to you?” George asked as they left the room.

“Nothing really,” she said.

“He was very fond of you.”

“Yes.”

Then, halfway down the stairs, she quite unexpectedly burst into tears.

It was several days later when the will of Fortunatus was read. The bulk of the estate, which was respectable though not large, passed to George, together with a letter recommending that, while he wished the old Fingal estate to remain in the senior male line, his son might, if he had no need of the money, distribute the excess to various members of the wider family. This, with Georgiana’s entire agreement, George did at once. There were also some thoughtful personal remembrances for various people, including a ring for Georgiana and some handsome prints for Hercules.

But there was one other bequest: some property, worth about a fifth of the total, that was left free and clear to his nephew Patrick. No one had known of this, least of all Patrick himself. But as everyone knew of his affection for the young man, who had certainly received little enough from his own father, it certainly did not occur to anyone to complain about it.

Except Hercules.

Georgiana had seen her son irritated, cold, contemptuous, even brutal before; but she had never seen him like this, and she was glad that he had come to his father’s house where only she was in the room to see it. He was beside himself with rage.

“How dare he leave those properties to Patrick?” he shouted. “They should have come to me.”

“But you have no need of them, Hercules,” she said gently. “The estate will come to you, and the fortune you’re to inherit is huge.”

“Can you not see the principle of it?” he cried. “That is Walsh property. Ours.”

“It was his own to leave. And your cousin Patrick is a Walsh, anyway.”

“Of the cursed Catholic branch, may they rot in hell!” he bellowed. “If that damned papist takes it, then he’s a thief.”

This was too much.

“You are jealous, Hercules, because of your grandfather’s affection for Patrick. You would do better to hide it.”

But to her shocked surprise, he turned upon her now with a look of terrible coldness.

“You do not understand, Mother,” he said icily. “I have no interest in what my grandfather thought of me, and never had since I was a child. As for Patrick, I despise him. But anyone who takes property from me,” he went on in a deadly tone she had never heard before, “is my enemy. And I destroy my enemies. As for Grandfather, I never wish to hear his name again.”

“He left you some prints. You’ll keep those, then, I dare say,” she retorted in some disgust.

He gave her a blank stare.

“I sold them this morning. Fifty guineas.”

Then, banging the door behind him, he walked out.

It was hard for her to feel the same affection for him after that, though, as his mother, she tried.

If Georgiana deplored her son’s personal behaviour, there were times in the months that followed when she began to wonder whether some of his political views might even be justified.

The situation in Ireland was becoming increasingly tense. Despite the Patriots’ success with the Catholic issue, nothing else had changed. The restrictions on Irish trade were still in place. While Grattan continued his blistering attacks in Parliament, his friend Napper Tandy was busy organising the tradesmen of Dublin: copying the American rebels, they were threatening to start refusing to buy English goods. “Pernicious rabble,” Hercules called them. But he had a more serious objection. “It’s one thing for Grattan to attack us in Parliament,” he declared, “but he and Tandy don’t seem to care what other means they use. Next thing we shall have people rioting in the streets.”

Just as worrying was the problem of Ireland’s defence. “France is now at war with Britain, and the best of our garrison troops have gone to America,” George pointed out. “If France should decide to invade us, we’re practically defenceless.” Parliament had voted to raise a militia, but he wasn’t impressed. “It’s an empty gesture, since there isn’t any money to pay for it.” There was talk of raising private volunteers. In Ulster, they were already starting.

Georgiana was looking out of her bedroom window early one Saturday morning when she saw them—a troop of about a hundred men, marching through Merrion Square. They wore an assortment of uniforms; some carried muskets, some only pikes. At their head rode an officer, and just behind him, proudly carrying a Saint George’s flag, marched a young man whom she recognised as one of the Doyles. They were more or less in step and looking rather pleased with themselves.

It was only ten minutes later when Hercules arrived.

“Did you see the Volunteers?” he asked. “They came past my house, so I imagined they’d come down here.”

To her surprise, despite his feelings about Fortunatus, Hercules had recently moved into his grandfather’s house. True, he had stripped out every reminder of the old man’s occupancy, and painted and repapered every inch of the place. “It suits me to be on St. Stephen’s Green,” he had explained, “and Kitty likes it.”

“They looked splendid,” she said.

“Splendid? They looked like damn trouble,” he retorted.

“But they’re all good Protestants, ready to defend their country.” After all, the Volunteers had been springing up all over the island. Protestant townsmen and country gentry alike had rallied to the cause. Whatever else his views, no Protestant wanted to be invaded by the French.

“And did you notice who was carrying the colours in that little troop? One of the Doyles, who are all thick as thieves with Napper Tandy. Don’t you see?” he exclaimed impatiently. “It’s Grattan’s cursed Patriots—only now they’re armed.”

Was it so? As it happened, she and George were dining at Leinster House that day. When they were talking with the duke before the meal, she asked him what he thought.

“I fear your son may be right,” he replied. “Personally, I doubt whether these Volunteers would be much use against trained French troops. But we can’t very well prevent them forming. So I think we should tell them we’re with them, and hope to control them as best we can.” He looked at George. “I hope I can count on your support, Mountwalsh.” The great aristocrat’s aquiline features creased into a grin. “After all, if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.”

A couple of months later, Hercules and Kitty had their first child. It was a son. Georgiana was the first one round to see the baby and congratulate the parents. Everything passed off well. She gazed at the baby for a long time.

“We shall call him William,” Hercules announced firmly. “After William of Orange.”

Only when she was safely home did Georgiana burst out laughing.

“I almost came out with it in front of Hercules,” she told her husband, “but thank heavens I didn’t. You must see the baby’s face.” For in their endless minuet, the family genes had apparently decided to show a sense of humour. “He looks exactly like Patrick.”

This happy domestic event could not distract Georgiana from the fact that life in Dublin was becoming quite alarming. Napper Tandy and his tradesmen were carrying out their threat and English goods were now being refused at the port. “The English cloth merchants are really feeling the pinch,” Doyle told her with glee. Many of the newspapers were supporting the action. The Volunteers were growing in numbers every week. They mostly had proper uniforms and insignia now, and they drilled with real purpose. They might be there, in theory, to fight the French; but there was no doubt that many of them were Napper Tandy’s men.

In the summer, Hercules made a brief visit to London. He returned looking sombre. He had met a number of political men, including Lord North, the Prime Minister.

“I never saw a man so miserable in office,” he reported. “He longs to retire and only stays because the king begs him. The American business weighs him down; half the Members of Parliament seem ready to cave in to the colonists, and it’s only the king who remains firm. As for Ireland, he despairs of us. He confessed to me privately that he wonders if it mightn’t be better to dispense with our Parliament and rule the island direct from Westminster. I can’t say I blame him.” He shrugged. “There’s no one in London with any backbone.”

Not long afterwards, he came round to see his parents, this time in a furious temper. He was holding a paper in his hand.

“Have you seen this?” he cried. It was a pamphlet. The author was recommending that, like rebellious America, Ireland should break away from Britain entirely. “He even has the impertinence to call it natural justice. And do you know who this author is? None other than a Patriot Member of Parliament, that damned Charles Sheridan.” He gave them both a bleak look. “My family still treats the Sheridans as friends,” he grumbled, “when I could have told you those people were no good.”

But for Georgiana, the event that forced her to concede that Hercules might have a point came in the autumn.

As soon as the new parliamentary session began, the Patriots were in full cry again. Once and for all, Grattan was demanding, give Ireland her own free trade and end the English controls. Meanwhile, the Volunteers held several small parades at which Patriot speeches were made. But the word on the street was that this was only a prelude.

“Wait for King Billie’s Birthday,” they said.

Of all the days in the Protestant calendar, none was more popular with the Dublin tradesmen than the anniversary of William of Orange’s birth. Each November it was celebrated with dinners and loyal speeches. So when it was announced that the Volunteers would hold a parade in front of King Billie’s statue on College Green, it was clearly going to be a large affair.

As it happened, George had gone down on business to the Wexford estate, and so Georgiana, who was curious to see the parade, asked Hercules to accompany her.

“You mustn’t go near it,” he told her. “You should stay indoors. Firstly, I don’t trust the Volunteers. And even if they behave, I don’t want you seen there.”

“I could watch them perfectly safely, and without anyone misunderstanding, if I went with you,” she pointed out.

“Certainly not. I forbid you to go.”

Perhaps, if Hercules hadn’t said that, she might have stayed away. He probably meant to protect her, but it wasn’t for her son to give her orders. So Georgiana said nothing but prepared to go. All the same, as it would be foolish for a lady to go into such a huge crowd entirely unescorted, she wondered whom she should ask to take her. And then she realised that she knew the perfect person.

She was already eagerly waiting long before Doyle arrived. The merchant was in high good humour.

“We’ve a perfect day for it,” he declared. “And I have made arrangements.”

They walked around Merrion Square, past the huge façade of Leinster House, and turned left at the corner, proceeding westwards with the grey wall of the Trinity College precincts on their right. The street was full of people going in the same direction, and soon there was such a press that she was doubly glad she had Doyle to escort her. As they passed Kildare Street and came towards the main college buildings, she had to keep close behind the merchant as he firmly made his way through the throng. When they finally came out in front of the College, it seemed to her that she would see nothing of the parade at all, for there was a cordon round the edge of the Green, and the crowd was now so thick that she could only see the upper part of the huge parliament building looming over their heads. Doyle kept going, however, and suddenly turned in at a doorway.

“A friend of mine,” he explained with a grin. And moments later they were climbing the stairs of a narrow merchant’s house, past the parlour floor and the first floor of bedchambers. They came to an upper landing, where they were warmly welcomed by a prosperous tailor and his family and ushered into a simple bedchamber, where a table of refreshments had already been set up. She was immediately given hot chocolate and taken to one of the windows, from which the family, with all their servants, were preparing to watch the proceedings.

It was a remarkable sight. The broad space of College Green had been cleared. Though there was a subdued hubbub from the crowd around its edges, it was as though the Green itself was holding its breath, waiting for the time when it must echo. In the centre, upon a high stone plinth, King Billie sat upon his horse, looking like a Roman general about to lead a triumph. Behind, the learned, classical façade of Trinity College watched impassively, indicating no doubt that it knew all about this sort of thing, while the splendid, upstart new parliament building, brash as the Colosseum, clearly hoped it was going to see some games. As for the private houses, every rectangular window seemed to have been turned into a theatre box for ladies and gentlemen, and some of the servants had even sneaked up onto the roofs.

After a while, a roll of drums and the sound of fifes announced that the Volunteers were coming.

They certainly made a fine display. The cavalry came first. There were more than a hundred of them. Red coats, drawn swords, flashing helmets sporting plumes; well mounted, too: as they clattered onto the parade ground, the crowd sent up a cheer. Then came the infantry: tricorn hats, blue coats or green coats with white cross-straps, white leggings. The men carried muskets; the officers, who also wore sashes, marched with drawn swords. Each company had its own emblem and colours; they marched in perfect formation, their drums beating a sharp tattoo as they swung round the Green to form a great hollow square on three sides of the statue. But even more striking to Georgiana was the fact that, behind the infantry, came an artillery train of half a dozen field cannon. She didn’t know the Volunteers had cannon. Whatever their intentions, they clearly meant business. “I’ve three of my sons down there,” she heard Doyle announce with satisfaction.

To the delight of the crowd, the troops performed some simple drill in perfect unison; next, the officers and colour sergeants came forward to salute King Billie’s statue and troop the colours respectfully before him. Then, upon the order, the three sides of the square alternating with one another, the troops fired volley after volley into the air so that the serried ranks almost disappeared in smoke as College Green echoed and reechoed with the din.

The smoke cleared. The Volunteers stood still as statues themselves. And then the astonishing thing occurred.

The first banner appeared in the central company, behind the statue. Raised between two poles, it was made of green cloth, carefully inscribed with Roman letters, in Latin.

PARATI PRO PATRIA MORI

Ready to die for our country. Well enough: a noble sentiment. The crowd applauded. But now the company on the left was unfurling another banner: white cloth, red letters, as well-produced as the first, but this time in English.

FREE TRADE

The crowd roared. Georgiana gasped in surprise and glanced at Doyle. He was nodding in approval. And now, on the right, she saw a third banner. Red cloth, white letters, slightly broader than the other two.

FREE TRADE OR REVOLUTION

She couldn’t believe it. The crowd was roaring even more loudly than before. Revolution? The good Protestants of Dublin? What were they thinking of? She stared at the officers in their sashes. Were they going to permit such a thing? Not only permit it, apparently, but approve. For they ordered the firing of another volley, while the three great banners were held high.

They were shouting more commands. The troops were wheeling. Led by the cavalry, they made a full circuit round the Green, flags and banners unfurled and waving above their heads. As they passed in front of the Parliament, Georgiana could see that many of its members, including her son, had come out in front of the building to watch them go by. There was no possibility that the message of the banners would be missed. Behind the troops, the ominous cannon trundled by.

As the Volunteers moved away down Dame Street towards the Castle, the crowd continued to applaud. They seemed cheerful, and there was no disorder. But Georgiana was left trying to understand: what did this all mean? Had she just witnessed the first step in a revolution?

Out of courtesy to their host, they remained some time in the house to talk, after the troops had departed. Listening to the conversation, it was clear to Georgiana that the tailor and Doyle both took it for granted that everyone they knew was a Patriot. As for the banner threatening revolution, they seemed to treat it easily. “That’ll wake up the government, I should think,” the good tailor remarked.

College Green was relatively quiet when they came out. The Volunteers had ended their parade and small groups were drifting back. Georgiana and Doyle were just about to retrace their steps past the Trinity College precincts when he caught sight of one of his sons coming from Dame Street. It was the youngest, a man of about thirty now, looking rather handsome in his sergeant’s uniform. He was accompanied by two other Volunteers, though the uniforms they wore looked slightly different from his own. Doyle waved and motioned him to come over.

Bowing politely to Georgiana, Sergeant Doyle asked her amiably if she had enjoyed their display—to which she made a noncommittal reply—and informed his father that he and his brothers intended to meet shortly at the family house. “I’m bringing these two good fellows from Ulster with me,” he also announced. “They came down from Belfast to take a look at us. So I hope we impressed them.”

The two in question seemed quiet, pleasant-looking men, of about the same age as young Doyle.

“We were impressed,” the taller of them said with a smile.

“Very impressed,” the other echoed in the same northern accent. “Good drill.”

“And the banner?” she couldn’t help joining the conversation. “Free trade or revolution? Are you planning to fight the British, like the Americans?”

The two Ulstermen looked at each other.

“Our ancestors took the Covenant,” the taller replied. “When a principle is at stake, it may be necessary to take up arms.”

“But not if it can be avoided,” chimed the other.

“No. Not if it can be avoided.” The tall man gave Georgiana a frank smile. His blue eyes looked kindly. Had she seen him before?”

“I don’t know your names,” remarked Doyle.

“Andrew Law,” the taller replied. “And this is my brother Alex.”

“I’m delighted to make your acquaintance, gentlemen. This is Lady Mountwalsh.”

The change in the two men was extraordinary. They glanced at each other, then became completely silent. It was as if they had turned to ice.

Georgiana gazed at them. That was why the taller had looked vaguely familiar. Indeed, as she searched their faces, she could see other likenesses—not striking, but clear enough—to her own dear father.

“You are the sons of Daniel Law?”

Andrew Law inclined his head just enough to acknowledge the fact, but did not reply.

She understood, of course. Yet for some reason—she did not know exactly why herself—she felt a great urge to speak with them, to know them better.

“I am sorry that our two families are not closer,” she said quietly. She did her best to sound friendly, and also, she hoped, dignified.

But if she was making a peace offering, it was in no way accepted. The two men stood there in silence, as if they were praying that God would remove her presence from them. The two Doyles looked on in some surprise. The eyes of Andrew and Alex Law remained grave. There was no hatred in them; they were too good for that. But it was clear that, like two elders of the Presbyterian congregation, they regarded her as a person not to be touched: an adulteress; even a fallen woman. She had never been treated like this before. She found it strangely disconcerting.

“Well,” said young Doyle, “I suppose we must be going.” And the two Laws, bowing politely to his father, turned away.

Doyle did not allude to the incident as they made their way back to Merrion Square, and so Georgiana was left alone with her thoughts. She felt strangely disconcerted, as if her world had been turned upside down. And as they came into the great empty space of Merrion Square, which she normally loved, her heart was heavy. Whether it was the parade, or the rejection by her cousins, or—she hardly knew what—she was suddenly overwhelmed by a sense of desolation and of loss.

Nor could she shake off this depression. If the events of that day had triggered the debilitating process, in the weeks that followed the sense of sadness clung to her, like some insidious water weed that wraps itself round a swimmer, dragging him down.

Within a month of the parade, Lord North and his government had decided that it was wiser to give the Irish what they wanted, and the restrictions on Irish trade had all been lifted. Grattan and the Patriots were triumphant. “But it will also quieten them down—and the Volunteers, too,” her husband remarked to Georgiana. Early in the spring, the discrimination against the Presbyterians was also removed. She hoped that would please the Law family in Ulster. Certainly, as the first months of 1780 passed without incident, it seemed that her husband’s assessment might be right; and as the weather began to grow warmer, she knew she should feel more cheerful. But she didn’t, and in the middle of April, George suggested: “Why not go down to Wexford? The change of scene might do you good.”

It was a pity really, she thought, how little, up until now, they had lived in the big Palladian house they had built: a month or two each summer, that was all. Often as not, they would use the more humble family house in Fingal. Perhaps it was indicative of her husband’s genial nature that, having done all that was required to raise his family in the eyes of the world, he had been quite content, instead of living in Wexford as a great lord, entertaining on a grand scale, to continue as the kindly country gentleman he really was. For her part, she was perfectly happy to live this way.

If some of the new Irish mansions were being set, like the greatest English houses, in huge landscaped parks, Mount Walsh had not yet attained such rural splendour. The house, big and impressive enough, to be sure, was fronted by open grass, with a ha-ha against the encroaching deer. But beyond that, and to each side, the woods and coppices followed straight and simple lines. The Wexford landscape around was very pleasant, though, with the open fields and modest hillocks, typical of the region, that had felt so familiar to the English yeomen farmers who had settled there.

And as the summer began, and she woke each morning to the glorious sounds of the dawn chorus, and walked out into the fields where the cows were grazing, or visited the dairy and watched the dairymaids at the milk churns, Georgiana began to experience, if not a lightening of the spirit, at least a sense of peace.

Thank God for her husband. He could not be there all the time, but he spent many weeks with her. His behaviour was perfect. If she felt moody, he would know when to leave her alone; but quietly, reassuringly, he was always there. With his broad face and kindly manner, George might not be deeply ambitious; but he was nobody’s fool, and she respected him. And when, walking alone with her down a country track, he would put his strong arm round her waist, she felt comforted, and thankful to have such a fine and understanding husband.

All the same, when he was not there, she might have been lonely. Several of the servants in the house had been with them in Dublin before; but to the people working on the estate, and to the tenant farmers, she and George were still newcomers, and seldom seen at that. She found them friendly and polite enough, in a watchful manner—for they knew well enough whose money had paid for the estate—but there were only a few with whom she was on terms of any intimacy. She was quite glad, therefore, to find that there was one person in the house who seemed to be far more lonely than she was.

Brigid was her name. She was only sixteen, a thin, pale, dark-haired creature. Like many country girls, she had been sent to work as a servant with a local farmer near her home, some thirty miles up the coast. It was a good way for a girl in a large family to earn her keep and learn to be a good housekeeper until such time, God willing, as she found a husband. But the farmer had not treated her well, and she had only been there a year when the local priest, hearing of the opening through a friend in the area, had spoken to her parents and arranged for the girl and her mother to visit the housekeeper at Mount Walsh, who had engaged her, pending Lady Mountwalsh’s approval. To work in such a fine establishment was considered an opportunity, and on being assured that it was a kindly household, the mother had left the girl there.

But she wasn’t happy. Not that she was mistreated: far from it. But Mount Walsh was too far from her home for her to make visits to her family more than once or twice a year. And though she did her work well enough, she hardly spoke a word. “She’s pale as a ghost and thin as a rake,” the housekeeper told Georgiana, “and I can’t get her to eat more than a mouthful at mealtimes.”

So Georgiana had taken the girl under her wing, used her as an occasional lady’s maid, taught her how to brush and dress her hair, and persuaded her to talk a little as she did so. She learned that Brigid’s father was a craftsman, and that she could read and write. Under such kindly treatment, the girl seemed to become a little more cheerful, and even put on an ounce or two of weight. But the unforeseen benefit of her kindness was that, because of her concern for the girl’s welfare, Georgiana had a small project to occupy her attention, and it left her feeling less lonely and more cheerful herself.

She was already feeling better by the month of July, when Hercules and Kitty came down, accompanied by little William. She was glad to have them there. If Hercules sometimes inspected the estate as though he’d be glad when his parents were out of it and the place was his, if he pointed out that he, personally, would make better use of the house for political entertaining than they seemed willing to do, she knew that he meant no harm. It was just his nature. If he warned her that several of the local gentry and farmers to whom she had taken a liking were damned Patriots—and that he had proof of it—she did not let it disturb her.

Much of the time, he was quite pleasant. Kitty, meanwhile, came into her own. Her conversation might be limited, but she was entirely at home in the country; she knew exactly how everything should be done; and everyone there, from the farmhands to the scullery maid, soon treated her with a friendly respect, as though they had known her all their lives. She’ll probably run the place, Georgiana thought without any rancour, far better than I. And watching her walk arm in arm with Hercules, clearly happy, she had to admit that perhaps Hercules had made the right choice for a wife.

But the great joy came from baby William.

He was a darling little boy; and as she was his grandmother, no one seemed to mind how much time she spent with him. Indeed, if Hercules and Kitty were otherwise engaged, they were glad that she was there to sit and play with him by the hour. Sometimes she summoned Brigid to help her, and the girl proved to be rather good with him. He was such a merry child. And he still resembled Patrick, although she was careful not to say so.

Once the cook, who had worked for Fortunatus many years ago, remarked quite innocently to Hercules: “Doesn’t the baby look just like Master Patrick did when he was that age?”

“Not at all,” said Hercules coldly.

“Ah, but you’d have been too young to remember,” she added kindly.

“He doesn’t look like him at all,” Hercules thundered, and gave the cook such a terrible look that she never mentioned the subject again. It was as well, Georgiana thought, that Hercules was not the master of the house, or the poor woman would surely have been sent packing.

For Georgiana, it was almost as if she’d had another baby herself; and the presence of the child, and the happy prospect of the years ahead while he was growing up, did much to restore her still further. By the end of the summer, George smilingly told her: “You look much more like yourself.”

That autumn, she returned with him to Dublin for the parliamentary session. There were no dramatic developments during those months. News came that the Redcoats were doing well against the American rebels in the south, and that the newly arrived General Cornwallis had crushed a southern army under Gates. “The slaves are flocking to join us, too, as we’ve promised them freedom,” George reported. Not that this news had discouraged Grattan and his Patriots. Having won concessions the previous session, he was urging an independent Irish Parliament now; but his support was limited. News came that in England, young Richard Sheridan had got himself elected to the Parliament in London. By Christmas, they had a letter from him making clear that he was already close with some of the leading opposition Whigs, “who are quite determined to do something for the Patriots of Ireland,” he wrote, “if ever we can turn out Lord North—who remains like the rock of eternity.” At the end of the spring, Kitty gave Hercules another son. They called the baby Augustus. It pleased Georgiana to think that he was probably conceived at the house in Wexford.

And it was to Wexford that she went back, with no small pleasure, in the month of May.

It was George’s idea that Patrick should accompany her. He himself had business to attend to and would not be able to come down for some weeks. Hercules and Kitty had decided to spend time with the new-born baby nearer to Dublin, at the house in Fingal. But Patrick, who had been working hard for several months without a break, had said that he’d be delighted to go down to Wexford with her for a while.

He was certainly a most delightful travelling companion. He seemed instinctively to know when to tell an amusing story and when to be quiet. Sometimes he rode beside her carriage, sometimes he sat in the carriage with her, as they made an easy journey down, passing through Wicklow in the afternoon and stopping for the night at Arklow, before leaving early to reach Mount Walsh comfortably before the evening. Once at the big house, he immediately went to greet the cook and the other servants he remembered from his childhood; the next morning, when she took him round the estate, he spoke so gently and kindly to all those he met, some in English, others in Irish, that by the end of that day, he clearly had won them all. He also paid a call on Father Finnian, the local priest, to let him know that, without embarrassing his Protestant cousins at the big house, he would come quietly to Mass during his stay. And two days later, to his great delight, he discovered that one of the local gentlemen, a Catholic named Kelly with a small estate only three miles distant, was a fellow he had known some years before in Dublin.

He also made one other discovery. The gentleman in question had an unmarried sister, a few years younger than himself. They came to call at Mount Walsh a few days later. Jane Kelly was charming, intelligent, and pretty.

“I should think,” Georgiana said after they’d gone, “that you might consider getting married one of these days.”

Indeed, there was no reason why he shouldn’t. With the modest legacy he’d received from Fortunatus, and the profits he was beginning to make in the wine trade, Patrick Walsh was well enough established to look for a wife. He was a gentleman; his father had been much loved. And as long as George and I are alive, he’ll have family connections to help him, she thought.

“You’re always matchmaking,” he said with an affectionate grin. But two days later, he paid a morning call upon his friend and did not return until after dinner.

They settled into a very pleasant routine. Once a week, his clerk would send him a messenger with a report of the business from Dublin. He would spend an hour or two on this and write a reply. Apart from this, he was at leisure.

Some days, they would pay calls in the area and entertain in return. At least once a week, she noticed, he would see the Kellys. On quiet days, he and Georgiana would go for walks, eat together, and read to each other in the afternoon. He also set to work in the library. George had asked him if, while he was at Mount Walsh, he would catalogue the books there and draw up a list of recommendations for purchases. He went about the job thoroughly. “There’s an excellent core of books which have come from Uncle Fortunatus’s house,” he told her. “You also have a remarkable collection of beautifully bound piffle.” Georgiana informed him that they had been sent by a book dealer. “Who was damn certain no one would ever bother to open them,” he laughed. “Anyway, I’m drawing up a list.” The only trouble, he told her, was that he would need to get the list fair-copied. “My own hand is so illegible that I’m quite ashamed of it. I’ll ask Father Finnian if he knows anyone,” he suggested.

He was surprised, the following day, when she brought the girl Brigid into the library and asked him to judge whether her copying might be satisfactory. He was astonished when she not only wrote a beautiful script but seemed to have no difficulty with titles in French or in Latin. “She can even decipher my hand,” he laughed, “which is the most remarkable accomplishment of all. Your father sent you to a hedge school, I suppose?” he asked the girl, and she nodded. For an hour or two each day, thereafter, Brigid was told to sit at the great library table and work on the notes Patrick gave her. Georgiana had been pleased to see, on her return, that her pale young protégé had continued to put on a little weight, and was delighted with herself for thinking of this further stratagem to give the girl confidence.

Halfway through June, George arrived. He was delighted with Patrick’s efforts in the library and thanked him warmly. He also urged him to remain, but Patrick announced that he would return to Dublin the following day to attend to his business. That afternoon, he went to see the Kellys.

He joined George and Georgiana for a family dinner that evening, however. It was a delightful meal. The three of them dined together, not in the big formal dining room, but in a small parlour. The talk was general, but it soon turned to politics, and George gave them all the latest news.

“Grattan and his Patriots are quite determined to press ahead with their demands in the next session. I’ve spoken to many of them in the last month. The independent Irish Parliament they want would still be under the king; they aren’t trying to break away completely, like the Americans; but the English Parliament would have no further say in our affairs at all.”

“But they can’t get it,” Georgiana said.

“No. In the Dublin Parliament, they haven’t the votes. At Westminster, Lord North isn’t going to give it to them. If our young playwright friend Sheridan and his Whigs ever get in, they’ve promised to do something; but there’s no chance of that at present.”

“And the Volunteers?” asked Patrick.

“Reluctant. They’ve won their free trade. Most of them don’t want the trouble of a revolution.” He paused. “Except up in Ulster. The mood there is different. The Ulster Protestants have no love for England, for they’re mostly Scots Covenanters at heart. They’d be glad to go the American way any day of the week, I’d guess.”

Georgiana thought of her Law cousins.

“For them,” she remarked, “everything is a question of principle.”

“Probably,” said George, “but they can be contained.”

When they came to the dessert, the conversation turned to a more pleasant topic.

Georgiana had been especially enthusiastic about Patrick’s work in the library, and also rather pleased with herself at finding him his assistant.

“Do tell George about Brigid,” she begged.

So Patrick gave an account of the girl’s talents.

“Her father is a craftsman, but he can speak Latin, and she even has quite a few words of it herself. Sometimes, when she is waiting for me to give her some more to do, I see her quietly reading the books—and she chooses the better ones, too! I have had a number of conversations with her. And,” he gave them both a serious look, “though she is an unusually intelligent example, she represents more of our Catholic Irish peasantry than many Protestants suppose.”

George nodded.

“It was a point my father, quite rightly, never ceased to make.” He smiled. “And now, Patrick, I have a further favour to ask you, and one which we both hope will cause you to make more visits down here. Your recommendations for the library are so excellent, I wonder if you would consent to make the purchases for us, as you see fit, and install them here. In other words, take over the library and build it up into something fine.”

“Would you, Patrick?” Georgiana added her own plea.

Patrick pursed his lips. He could not help reflecting that his labour would actually be building up a library for Hercules: not an attractive prospect. George seemed to read his thoughts.

“If I do it myself, I know the result will be mediocre. Hercules will never bother at all, for he reads little. But I’d like our generation to leave something of excellence for little William and the generations to come. It would give me—and it would certainly have given Fortunatus—great joy to think that in a hundred years or two, future members of the family would show people a noble library and say, “Our cousin Patrick is to be thanked for this.”

After that, how could he refuse?

Patrick returned at the end of the summer, when George was also there, and the three of them had a very pleasant two weeks together.

Patrick had brought with him a list of the books he had already purchased, and four large, leather-bound volumes that were to become the library’s catalogue. He spent an entire day in the library with Brigid, setting up the catalogue, showing her exactly how the entries were to be made, and checking all the entries on the list as she wrote them. At the end of this, he pronounced himself highly satisfied with her work and even took the trouble to talk to her for half an hour after she had finished, announcing to Georgiana afterwards: “You have a treasure there.”

While it would have been an exaggeration to say that Brigid had filled out that summer—for she was still thin and pale—Georgiana considered that she looked very much improved from her former state, and this well-merited praise from Patrick, she was sure, could only give the girl further confidence.

Indeed, a few days later, she came into the kitchen to find that Patrick had gone down there to see his old friend the cook. He was telling her and the other servants an amusing story. They had not observed her by the door, so she watched in silence, and it was a delight to see from all their faces that they obviously loved him. At the end of the story, there were peals of laughter; even Brigid smilingly joined in, and Georgiana realised that she had never seen the solemn girl laugh before. She quietly left, congratulating herself that, thanks to her own efforts and to dear Patrick, Mount Walsh was a happier place than it had been before.

But what about the Kelly girl? He had gone to the Kelly house the day after he arrived, and again a few days later. She invited Kelly and his sister to visit them for the day, early the following week. George performed his part as Patrick’s loyal kinsman, and seemed to get on famously with Kelly, while she discreetly praised Patrick to the girl. In the afternoon, they inspected a garden George had started to lay out, which gave Patrick and Jane a chance to walk alone together. But at the end of the day, when the visitors had gone and she found herself alone with Patrick and asked him what he really thought of the girl, his answer was rather unsatisfactory.

“I like her very well.”

“And how well is that, might I ask?” she enquired.

“I find it hard to say, to tell you the truth. It surprises me that I should find it so, but I do. We agree on many things.”

“She is Catholic.”

“Yes. Her mind, her manners, her person are altogether all that could be desired. My feelings for her are…”

“Tender?”

“Oh yes. Tender.” The thought did not altogether seem to please him.

“You are perhaps not in love.”

“Perhaps not.” He paused. “Not quite, I think.”

“Common interests, respect, and tenderness are the best basis for a marriage, Patrick. I do know that. Love often follows.”

“Indeed. Quite so.”

“Has she feelings for you?”

“I think so. She has indicated…” He hesitated. “The fact is, I find myself confused by my own feelings. I do not know…”

“There is no other?”

“Other? Oh. No.” He shook his head. “No. No other.”

Georgiana sighed. She felt sorry for the girl, but she said no more.

A few days later, they were all due to leave for Dublin. She and George rode in the big carriage, which was followed by a second cart containing two servants and several portmanteaus. Patrick rode beside the carriage with them as far as Wicklow. There he parted from them, as he wished to ride up into the mountains to visit the old monastic site of Glendalough. “I have always heard so much about the beauty of the place,” he told Georgiana, “yet to my shame I have never been there.” He promised to call upon her in Merrion Square the following week.

As they made their way back to Dublin, Georgiana turned to her husband:

“I’ve been thinking. If Patrick can’t make up his mind about the Kelly girl, there may be an even better alternative.” And she told him her idea.

“Good God,” said George.

It was some weeks before she was able to arrange a meeting, since the girl was away. The parliamentary session had started. As promised, the Patriots and their friends were issuing calls for independence, but making little headway. The party she held at Merrion Square, therefore, had a purely social rather than a political character. An elegant company was invited, including even the Leinsters. Her daughter Eliza and her husband came, but Hercules, having been told that Patrick would be there, decided to stay away. And with Eliza came the young lady.

Only a sad accident had put Louisa Fitzgerald back in play. About a year after Hercules had declared that she had too many opinions to become his wife, she had married a neighbouring landowner and they had had a daughter. Then her husband had been killed in a hunting accident, and for some time she had been inconsolable. But now she had recovered sufficiently to go out in society again; and with the use of her husband’s estate, her widow’s portion, and the inheritance from her aunt still to come, she might be regarded as one of the finest catches in Dublin.

“You’re aiming very high,” George had warned her. This was an understatement. It would have been one thing for Hercules, the rich heir of Lord Mountwalsh, to marry Louisa; but for his poor cousin to do so, decent fellow though he undoubtedly was, would cause general astonishment. And much as Georgiana loved Patrick, she wouldn’t have denied that the challenge of the thing was part of its attraction to her. But Louisa was a young widow with a mind of her own. Who knew whom she might choose? “And he is Catholic, to boot,” George had added, “when she is Protestant.”

That, of course, was another huge objection. Yet not insuperable. Georgiana had several aristocratic friends with mixed marriages. As long as they could agree about the children—who were normally brought up Protestant—the rest could all be arranged. She even knew of one man who had married twice, had three Protestant children with the first wife and three Catholics with the second.

The party was a great success. Louisa met Patrick, and Patrick was charming. A few days later, Patrick received an invitation to attend an assembly at Leinster House; and though it might be that the duke and duchess, having met him, had thought to add him to their list, Georgiana thought it more likely that Louisa was behind it. Certainly, Patrick told her afterwards, she had been there, come up to him herself, and invited him to call upon her. “Which I hope you will do,” Georgiana said. “Do you like her?”

“Yes,” he replied, and this time without any hesitation. “I like her very much.”

Still more encouraging, two days later Eliza called round and told her, “Louisa has taken a great fancy to Patrick.”

“His lack of fortune?”

“Could be overlooked.”

“His religion?”

“In itself, not of great concern. Though I’m sure she would not wish her children to suffer the disadvantages that must attend any Catholic, no matter what their birth.”

“Well,” Georgiana remarked, “we shall have to wait and see, now, what Patrick means to do.”

He duly called upon Louisa at her house, not once, but twice, in the next two weeks. Then he announced that he wished to go down to Wexford.

He departed for Mount Walsh in a cart, loaded with books for the library that he had already acquired. “He is going about our business in a most thorough manner,” George said with approval. Patrick spent a week down at the estate, and since his work in the library could hardly have taken up much of his time, Georgiana guessed that he might be spending time with Jane Kelly. Had his encounters with Louisa caused him to turn back to the Catholic girl in Wexford? Was he trying to make up his mind where his heart lay between the two? She heard he had returned, but he did not call round to see her for a while. And she might have become quite impatient for news had it not been for another event which, at that moment, swept aside all other considerations.

“We are beaten in America. Cornwallis has surrendered.” It was Doyle who came round to the door with the news. George and Hercules arrived together from the Parliament an hour later.

What did it mean? Throughout the midwinter season there was scarcely another subject spoken of in Dublin. Was the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown the end of the whole business? Would the government raise fresh troops, or was the entire colony to be lost? From the moment he heard the news, George was certain. “They haven’t the will to go on. America’s lost.” Hercules in particular was plunged in gloom. “If the American rebels have won, then the Irish rebels will follow close behind,” he decided. Certainly, in Ulster news came that the Volunteers were holding triumphant rallies and issuing demands for independence.

Patrick did not appear at the house until January, when he announced that he was going to London on business. “Also to see some book dealers on your behalf,” he told George. When Georgiana asked him if he had seen either Jane Kelly or Louisa, he answered that he had seen them both, but he was entirely evasive beyond that point. “Whatever he is up to, he doesn’t wish you to know,” her husband laughed—which, seeing that she had been so instrumental in promoting both causes, she thought very unfair. All her daughter Eliza could tell her, which she had from Louisa, was that Patrick seemed to be torn in his loyalties. It must surely, Georgiana thought, be over the question of religion.

He remained away for weeks. Was he avoiding them all by staying in London? Perhaps. Meanwhile, the Ulster Volunteers held a huge rally up in the town of Dungannon. “They’ve issued a manifesto calling for independence, and sworn not to vote for any parliamentary candidate who won’t support it,” George told her. “It’s the Covenant all over again.”

Then, late in March, came the news from London.

“Lord North and his government have resigned. The English Parliament is giving up America. King George is threatening to abdicate.” And then, soon afterwards, an ashen-faced Hercules came round.

“The king will stay; but there’s to be a new government in London. The damned Whigs are in. Your cursed friend Richard Sheridan is given ministerial office. And do you know what he has declared in the English Commons? That the rule of the English over the Irish Parliament is a ‘tyrannous usurpation.’ Those were his very words.” He shook his head. “The world has gone mad.”

Mad or not, it was clear at once to everyone that a great change was in the air. With the Whigs in power in England, and the Ulster Volunteers sending out representatives with their manifesto all over Ireland, the Patriots had never been given such a glorious opportunity before. To the disgust but not the surprise of Hercules, Grattan immediately introduced a motion into the Dublin Parliament demanding independence for the Irish Parliament under the crown. “We will share a king with the English,” the Patriots declared, “but with the dignity of a separate nation.” On the day of the great debate, Georgiana went to watch from the gallery. Grattan was sick that day, as it happened, but he rose from his bed to attend. No one, not even his enemies, could deny, Georgiana thought, that he cut a simple and noble figure as he overcame his sickness to give one of the finest speeches of his life. Members who would have voted with Hercules before, seeing that the wind was suddenly blowing the other way, voted with the Patriots now. To cheers, the motion was carried. The Irish Parliament, by a clear majority, declared its independence from England. And there was little chance that the Whigs in London, having always supported the Patriot cause before, could do anything but ratify it now. Grattan had triumphed; Ireland had triumphed. But in all fairness, it had to be admitted that Hercules was not entirely wrong when he declared:

“It’s the damned Americans we have to thank for this.”

Patrick returned to Dublin a week after the debate, and this time he did not fail to call to see Georgiana.

“You missed all the fun,” she remarked.

“I conducted some excellent business,” he informed her. “I have also shipped over a prodigious quantity of books for your library.”

“And have you come to a decision concerning the women in your life?” she asked.

“Yes,” he replied calmly, “I think so.” But he did not say more, and so she managed, with great difficulty, not to enquire further.

Two days later, he called upon Louisa. But what had transpired between them, not even Eliza could discover. Early in May, accompanied by two cartloads of books, he went out for Mount Walsh.

The English Parliament did not vote upon the Irish question until the middle of the month, and George and Georgiana remained in Dublin until news came that, as anticipated, the Whigs had given the Patriots what they wanted. Then they set out for Wexford themselves.

“By the time we get there, I’ve no doubt Patrick will have catalogued and installed all the new books,” George remarked with satisfaction.

“And perhaps he’ll also be able to tell me what he has decided about Louisa and Jane Kelly,” Georgiana added. “What do you think he has done?”

“I think he has been tempted by Louisa and her fortune, but that his conscience has led him back to the Catholic girl,” said her husband.

When they arrived at Mount Walsh, however, and asked if Patrick was there, they were told that he had left the day before. That was all they were told.

“I could scream with vexation,” Georgiana confessed with a laugh as soon as they were alone in their bedroom.

But she noticed that her husband was looking thoughtful.

“Something’s up,” he told her. “Didn’t you notice that all the servants are looking awkward?” A few moments later, he left her, returning ten minutes later. “The books are in the library, all beautifully catalogued. Everything’s in perfect order. But I’m telling you, there’s something going on.”

“Leave it to me,” she said with a smile, and went down to see the cook.

It did not take long. Only as long as it took the dear woman to lead Georgiana into the pantry, where they could be alone, and to burst out her incoherent tale. “Oh, my lady,” she began, “such goings-on.” The butler was only waiting until his lordship came down to acquaint him of the situation.

“Situation?”

“Of Mr. Patrick. And after him and Miss Kelly always seeming so respectable together…to run off like that.”

“He has eloped with Miss Kelly?”

“Oh, my lady, if only he had. If it isn’t the girl Brigid he’s gone off with, and not a word to anyone. Him such a gentleman and she…whatever she may be. And always so quiet and thin as a rake…or not so thin now, God help her.”

“He has taken Brigid? Where?”

“He’s after taking her to Dublin to live in his house. It might be to the ends of the earth, for all the good it will do the one or the other of them. But it’s to Dublin they went, sure enough.”

“You knew nothing before?”

“Never a word. Under our noses, and not one of us knew it. With the two of them up there in the library hour after hour.”

“He has behaved disgracefully,” Georgiana cried. Though in her heart she was thinking: and like a fool.

“She must have bewitched him,” said the cook stoutly. “I should have been on the watch for it.” She shook her head. “I should have known she’d be sly the day that I first looked into her face.”

“For what reason?”

“Why, did your ladyship never notice the strange green eyes that she has?”

It was true. The dark-haired girl had eyes that were green. But she had never thought much about it.