I was turning into Ballycreen Road when I saw them. Three redcoats sitting on stumps by the side of the road. I slowed as I passed them, waving to show that I bore them no ill will. They looked at me and whistled, and one of them yelled something crude. Another punched his shoulder and they roared with laughter. I was nervous but I had no reason to think that they saw me as anything other than a pretty girl on her lovely white horse, out for a ride. It was impossible to tell a rebel Irishwoman from a loyalist one by the look of her. Rebels came as Catholics or Presbyterians, and were high born, low born, farmers or academics. That was the very point of us. We wanted unity for everyone, not the divisive violent unrest offered to us by the English who meant to put a wedge between every person different from the next. I kept my head high and my eyes on the road, looking ahead for the stone houses and the dairy so that I might find the midwife.

Annie O’Neal’s cottage was down a long, winding path, past a drowsy mob of sheep. I found her around the back of her house in the herb greenhouse, picking snails from her garden.

‘What can I do for you?’ she asked, good-naturedly, her round sky-blue eyes lighting up her face, which was red from the sun. She was young, perhaps my age, but she had a matronly, serious air about her.

‘It’s my sister,’ I said, panting with exhaustion. I stayed sitting on Finn McCool, who stamped his feet on the hard earth and shook his head. ‘She’s up visiting our cousin, Mary Kelly. You delivered her young ’un George some months back, I believe. My sister’s waters have broken and we have her abed, ready to deliver.’

The small woman wiped her dirty hands on her skirts.

‘What number?’

I cocked my head at her question.

‘What number babe? First. Fifth?’

‘Oh, first. Her first.’

‘Right then,’ she said, all business. ‘I’ll wash up and you can take me with you. Can someone bring me back afterwards? My husband’s away with the cart and I have no way to get word …’

‘Of course.’

Annie O’Neal rode pressed up behind me, gripping her arms tightly about my waist. I felt sorry for poor Finn McCool who was carrying the extra weight, but he felt no slower for it and Annie was just a slip of a woman. We neared the three soldiers and my heart thudded as they stepped out onto the road and put their hands up. I recognised the fair-headed man as the soldier who had tried to force me to dance with him at the Old Inn.

‘Whoa. Whoa there,’ the rounder man cried. ‘Steady up. Where are you two going in such a hurry?’

‘My sister’s having a baby.’ I almost cried with nervous frustration at having been stopped. ‘Now! And I’ve fetched the midwife.’ I tossed my hair back toward Annie. I felt her grip tighten.

‘That’s right,’ she said.

‘Your names and places of residence?’ the tallest, meanest-looking soldier demanded, his thin moustache a slash across his face.

‘Elizabeth Gray from Gransha, daughter of Hans Gray,’ I said, adding my father’s name because he was well known to have no time or thrift for the rebel cause and was a well-regarded and landed gentleman.

‘Annie O’Neal. I live on Ballycreen Road,’ she said with barely a whisper.

‘You live there alone?’ came another voice.

‘No, with my husband.’

‘And his name?’

‘Jack O’Neal.’

‘The publican from Bangor Inn?’

‘Aye. What of it?’

‘Well, Mrs O’Neal, where might your husband have gone with his empty cart this morning?’

‘I don’t know,’ the woman stammered.

I was getting impatient at their pointless questioning. Time was slipping away and I was thinking of Brigit, knowing she would be afraid, far from home and it being her first babe and all. ‘My sister is having a baby. Can we please pass and be on our way?’ I begged.

‘Well, you see now, we’ve been waiting for Mr O’Neal’s return,’ the tall soldier said. ‘Got word he’s running pikes and muskets down from Antrim.’

‘That’s poppycock!’ Annie O’Neal snapped. I had to smile at her choice of word. It was right cocky to use such a term at the yeoman. She was a brave and bold lass.

‘We’ll have you dismount, thank you, Mrs O’Neal.’

‘She’s the midwife.’ I almost yelled at them. ‘We need her to attend a birth. Please. Can’t this wait?’

‘No, lassie.’ The redcoat with a missing button over his bulging belly grinned at me. ‘You’re free to go. There’s not much to it. Having a pup. Just tell her to push and you catch it. Simple.’

I took a deep breath, shocked at his brazen and dismissive attitude. I did not like the way he looked at me.

‘I’ll try to make it to Mary’s when I’m done,’ Annie O’Neal said unconvincingly as she slipped down the side of my horse and landed with a thud on the ground. ‘First one can take a while. Just make sure the cord’s not wrapped around the wee bairn’s neck.’

‘How do I do that?’ I asked, my voice wetting with tears.

The soldiers had lost interest in me and were circling Annie O’Neal like cats around a mouse.

‘You see, if Mr Jack O’Neal, your husband,’ the fair-haired one said, looking her up and down, ‘is running arms to the rebels as we’ve been informed, then you, Mrs O’Neal, are an accomplice and there are very harsh penalties for supporting insurgents. We’ll escort you back to your cottage and wait with you until your old fella returns.’

The leery fat one laughed, spitting something horrid onto the dirt.

I wanted to pick Annie up and ride off fast, taking her away from their questions and dark looks. But I’d identified myself and could not endanger my family. I did not look back but spurred Finn McCool into a fast trot away from them, tears falling fast over my cheeks, pooling in my ears.

‘Give our regards to your father, Miss Gray,’ a voice called from behind me. ‘We need more good loyalists like him!’

I arrived at Mary’s to find Brigit sitting up in bed with a tiny pink babe at her breast.

‘I’ve called her Isabella after our dear mother.’ She beamed and I covered my mouth in shock.

‘I missed my calling!’ Mary said from the doorway, her face flushed and slick with sweat. ‘I did more work than Brigit here. Isabella is a right impatient one. Where’s Annie?’

‘Helping the yeomanry with their investigations,’ I said as I rushed to my sister’s bedside, covering her and her baby in kisses. ‘They wouldn’t let her come along with me. She may arrive yet but all the work is done, now.’

‘She was in such a hurry,’ my sister said, fanning her flushed face. ‘Like a runaway mare.’

‘You were just desperate to meet your aunty, weren’t you, darling girl?’ I cooed down at the pink face peering out from the blankets. ‘Oh, she is grand, Brigit. Beautiful. Our mother would be proud.’

That night, before my father went down to have his dinner with the rector, I pulled him aside and told him the good news.

‘Another rebel baby to cause a fuss,’ he said gruffly. ‘I suppose she’ll be baptising it as a Catholic?’

‘What does it matter? God is God,’ I said with exasperation.

‘Watch your words, Betsy Gray,’ he said clipped me under the chin playfully. ‘It’s how you worship and how you behave when you’re out of church that matters. I can abide the Catholics up to about here.’ He smiled, pointing to a crease of wrinkled flesh on his turkey neck. ‘But for rebels, I have no time. They thirst for blood instead of order and peace. If Brigit’s Jimmy is still messed up with them, I have no time for any of them. Babe included.’

‘She called the wee thing Isabella after Mammy.’ I spoke gently and saw him baulk and take a sharp breath, but he would not meet my eyes.

‘Who does she look like?’

‘More like Mammy than you, thank heavens.’ I laughed.

He took his coat from the peg and turned to me.

‘We’ll see,’ he said. ‘I may stop in at Mary’s in the morning on my way home. Just to see the babe. It’s too soon to have been christened so the poor thing is not yet a Catholic.’

As soon as we heard Da’s cart rattle out down the gravel path to the open road, George and I went to work. My father would drink Reverend John McQuilton under his dinner table so he always spent the night in the Reverend’s guest room. First Monday of every month. My father ran his life like a hallway clock. You could read the stars by him. And so every first Monday of the month the local chapter of the United Irishmen met at our farmhouse at Gransha. I was especially excited that night because the Henry Joy McCracken and his sister Mary Ann were coming along from Belfast. Henry had only just been released from prison down in Dublin, where he’d been held for his subversive views about the English occupation. Mary Ann, who was almost a decade older than me, was my heroine of all heroines. More than Miriam in the Bible, more than Deidre of the Ulster Cycle. Mary Ann McCracken was everything I wanted to be. I had heard much of her strong will and brave fight for those less fortunate than herself. She worked tirelessly in all the poor houses.

I put fresh-cut flowers on the fancy dining table that we almost never used, placed neatly ironed throws on the sofas, tidied the wood-pile and stoked up the fire. While I was in the kitchen ladling punch from the big vat into pitchers, George came into the room, whistling. He poured himself a mug of punch and looked at me.

‘So you do fancy Will, it seems,’ he said. ‘Are you planning to settle with him or are you idling with him for play?’

‘Did he ask you to ask me that?’ I smiled.

‘I won’t say.’ He winked back. ‘But I love you both and I don’t want one of you to break the other’s heart. So I’m measuring your intentions.’

‘Oh, George.’ I laughed. ‘You are so sweet. I like Will a lot. I think I always have but I’m in no rush to walk down the aisle. Brigit’s babe is mighty fine but I’m not clucking for any of my own just yet.’

Outside I heard the crunch and creak of wheels on the rocky path leading from the back gate past the kitchen. I frowned and felt a quiver of apprehension.

‘Is that Da back?’ I gasped. ‘We’ll be flogged if he catches us out.’

‘No,’ George said, putting his mug on the window ledge. ‘That’ll be Jack O’Neal, the publican. He’s brought down a load of pikes and muskets from Belfast. I told him to come early and we’ll bury them out the back of the stables before the meeting.’

I looked at George with dismay and dropped the ladle with a clatter to the stone flagging and put my hands over my face. My heart began to race. ‘Oh heavens, no!’ The words gushed out of me. ‘George! In all the kerfuffle and fuss with the new baby, I right forgot! Oh no, no.’

‘What is it? Betsy? What is it?’

The door from the mudroom opened and I held my breath, half expecting the redcoats. But it was Jack O’Neal, a heavily bearded, stocky man. Beside him was Will Boal.

‘Have you come direct from your farm, Mr O’Neal?’ I asked Jack in a panic.

‘No, lass,’ he said. ‘I’ve come down from Belfast and stopped for tea at the Boals’ and picked up Will here. Why do you ask?’

I took another big breath and looked at the menfolk.

‘The redcoats, three of them, were on Ballycreen Road, questioning your wife.’

‘When?’ George yelled, roughly grabbing me by the shoulders. ‘And why are we hearing about this only now, Betsy?’

‘This afternoon,’ I stammered. ‘I was taking her to deliver Brigit’s babe but they stopped us and … they were going to search your cottage and ask her some questions.’

‘And you raised no alarm, Betsy?’ George shouted at me again. I could see the disbelief and fear and anger in his face.

‘Oh sweet Lord Jesus, no!’ Jack cried out, starting back out the door.

‘You can’t take the cart, Jack,’ George said in a panic. ‘It’s full of contraband! Will, quickly go around and get two good horses and take Jack to his cottage. Betsy and I will unload the cart and bury it all out back. You get to your wife, Jack, and make sure you have no pamphlets or any evidence of your involvement with the rebels. Is there anything at your house to condemn you? Anything they might have found? Jack?’

Jack O’Neal was shaking and seemed unable to speak for a moment as he frantically shook his head. ‘I don’t think so. No. I must go to Annie!’ He started to follow Will out the mudroom door when George held out a hand to stop him.

‘No, wait!’ George said firmly. ‘Let’s think this through. It might be a bad idea for you to go. They have you on a list if they are searching your property. But we need to get there fast and send folk who won’t be suspected of being rebels. We need to rethink this.’

‘I’ll go,’ I said softly. ‘This is all my fault.’

‘No, Betsy,’ George said, shaking his head. ‘I can’t let you ride at night into a potential briar-patch of yeoman.’

‘George,’ I said, still feeling the sting of his well-deserved anger, ‘it makes more sense for me to go and pretend that my sister needs the midwife. I’ll say there’s some problem with the baby. They saw me earlier in the day and let me go. And I am also the fastest on a horse. You know that.’

George sighed, deep in thought. The room was strung with invisible piano wires, tight and taut.

Will Boal looked back into the room. ‘I’ve brought the two stallions, black and white,’ he said, breathlessly, leaning around the door jamb.

That would be Fergus, my late mother’s horse, and Finn McCool. He had chosen well. They were the fastest.

‘You’re right, Betsy,’ George finally said, with a sigh of surrender. ‘Your story is solid and Will is well thought of by the establishment. I don’t like it one bit but I think you are the best choice for the job.’

‘So you and me, Betsy?’ Will nodded. ‘I just need to finish saddling the horses and we’ll be away. We’ll bring your Annie back safe and sound, all right, Jack?’

Jack swooned and I helped him into a seat. I felt awful. It was my fault. What sort of rebel supporter was I that I left a woman in trouble and raised no alarm? I had been overwhelmed by thoughts of my new little baby niece.

‘How could you forget something as important as this, Betsy?’ George growled under his breath. ‘Jack could have bumbled up to his cottage with a cartload of contraband and they would have slaughtered him on the spot! This is no game, lass. It’s life and death. I’m not wanting to chastise you but you have to understand the gravity of our mission.’

‘Don’t be too hard on her,’ Will said to George. ‘Everyone gets forgetful and makes mistakes sometimes. You, me, all of us.’

‘I’m sorry, Mr O’Neal, I truly am,’ I said, gently touching the man’s forearm, angry with myself. ‘I will make things better. I will get Annie for you. Come on, Will, let’s ride like the wind.’

‘Dia idir sinn agus an tolk,’ Will murmured and patted Jack on the back.

‘Be careful, Betsy!’ George called after us as we made our way out into the moonlit night. ‘William Boal, you take care of my sister. Any trouble and you take it on yourself and let her ride away. She is my first concern.’

As we fiddled in the dark with the straps and belts of the saddles, Will breathed deeply and I could tell he was nervous.

‘Are you up for this, Betsy?’ he asked. ‘I can’t believe George is letting you go and do this thing.’

‘I’m not a child, Will,’ I said defiantly. ‘He does not tell me what I can and can’t do. I want to make this right. I let the O’Neals down. I have to fix it. George knows I am capable and not some fluffy ornament.’ I was pleased that my brother was offering me the chance to redeem myself.

‘I don’t know another lass like you, Betsy Gray,’ he said. ‘Sometimes you scare me a little bit.’

‘Good.’ I grinned into the darkness. ‘Let’s keep it that way.’

I put a boot in the stirrup and hoisted myself into the saddle, looking back at him with a toss of my hair.

‘More to the point, Will, are you up for this?’ I asked, spurring my horse on, leaving Will open-mouthed as I called over my shoulder. ‘See if you can keep up.’

When we arrived at the O’Neal cottage it was shrouded in darkness. We lit two torches, searching the cottage and yard thoroughly.

Annie O’Neal was not there.