DECEMBER 27, 1915
26/27 ABBEY STREET LOWER
DUBLIN, IRELAND
“Are these seats taken?”
It was the Abbey Theatre’s opening night performance of A Minute’s Wait—anyone with a ticket must have known all seats were occupied for a sold-out show. But Issy knew that voice too well to overlook it. She’d been attempting to tuck back a wisp of cinnamon hair that had escaped the pins at her nape but abandoned it and looked up instead.
Sean O’Connell.
Standing in the aisle of the U-shaped balcony. The electric lights cast a glow on the clerical dress of a vicar instead of the customary white tie the other gentlemen wore. So the rumors they’d heard about the elder O’Connell brother were true. In the many months Sean had retreated from Dublin’s social circles, he’d stepped headlong into the role of clergy.
Problem was, he resembled anything but the guilelessness of the uniform.
His hair was quite smart, the burnished brown combed back off his brow in a more mature style like he’d decided to take life with a more deliberate manner, beginning with the comb. With eyes the cool sea blue he shared with his brother so direct in focus on her, it seemed they were alone in a crowded room. Seemingly indifferent to the high spirits around them, Sean ignored the sniggering of ladies in opera dresses who eyed him from a row in front. And though Issy hadn’t expected to see it again—maybe not ever—he gifted her with a smile she could only read as genuine.
The entire portrait smacked of forgiveness, and surprise triggered a flutter in her midsection.
“’Tis the first time I do believe I’ve ever caught Lady Isolde Byrne without a reply.”
“I’ve never been Lady Isolde to you, and I don’t mean to start accepting a title now.”
“Who would dare leave ye alone at the theater?”
“No one with intention of harm, I assure you.” Issy recovered, patting a gloved hand on the velvet seat back of the aisle-side chair. “This one is Honor’s, but she’s been detained for the moment. And the other was to be Rory’s, but I daresay my brother’s meeting has run late on Dame Street, so it appears we’ve lost our escort. Won’t we be the scandal of the ladies’ parlors tomorrow?”
“Well, we can’ be havin’ that, can we now? I could be persuaded to abandon my seat all the way in the back an’ join ye up here.”
“Please.” She pulled her knees back so he could scoot by her.
Sean slipped into the inner seat. And before Issy could fret over finding some measure of polite conversation, he leaned close, engaged her without a veil of awkwardness between them. Like they’d last seen each other the day before instead of six months prior.
He rolled his show program and pointed across the balcony, in the direction of a man with prominent seating in the front row. “’Tis him over there—Pádraig Pearse.”
“The leader of the Irish Citizen Army is actually here?”
Issy leaned past a lady’s voluminous coiffure in front of them, eager to catch a glimpse of the schoolmaster–turned–rebel leader whose spirited, “Ireland unfree shall never be at peace!” had impassioned masses of Irishmen at Fenian leader O’Donovan Rossa’s eulogy that summer. His words had been all over the newspapers in August, igniting a spark of energy throughout the country. Controversial or not, he was a real-life news headline in that very theater.
Pearse boasted a reserved presence that lent much more to his past as the schoolmaster of St. Enda’s boys’ school—not a fiery leader who inspired the hearts of Irishmen and-women across the country. A clean-shaven jaw and thick brow appeared as if rarely animated. He sat up straight, attentive to a lady with a remarkable lace evening gown and Gibson-girl pompadour seated next to him. As she chatted he nodded, pensive in taking in the sights while they awaited the curtain to be drawn back.
“You’re certain that’s Pearse?” Issy whispered, completely taken in.
“In the flesh.” Sean nodded. “Special guest o’ the Countess Markievicz. The older gentleman on his left is the socialist James Connolly. After him, Michael Mallin—wit’ the impressive mustache. An’ Seán Connolly will be onstage tonight—bein’ an actor with the ICA Liberty Players. Revolutionary company for our audience, I’d say. Though the unionists here would call them rebels, as they advocate for an Irish free state at all costs.”
“My mother would say there is a very fine line between conviction and rebelliousness, and both border upon the unsavory.”
“An’ what would ye say?”
Where Pearse had revealed limited spirit in his features, Connolly showed the faintest glimmer of a smile—allowing the apples of his cheeks to rise above his mustache as he turned to whisper something to the rebel leader. Pearse nodded, his gaze set on the audience below, tapping an ivory-handled walking stick against his knee as if considering what the man had said.
“That I don’t know all the facts—yet. But I aim to learn as much as I can.”
“Rumor has it Pearse keeps a sword hidden in that walkin’ stick. Want to bet on it bein’ true? We can hunt newspaper articles until we find a photo confirmin’ it. Sounds like yer kind o’ fun.”
“I don’t bet,” Issy snapped, though she had a difficult time keeping humor from her tone whenever he teased her. “It’s unbecoming for a lady—as is discussing politics in an open forum.”
“There’s a first time for everythin’. I know ye have yer own convictions. Rebellious streaks too, if I might remark without drawin’ yer ire.”
“A vicar shouldn’t speak of such things.”
“Come now, Issy. I haven’ changed all that much. I’m the same man.”
Issy huffed in play—almost like they’d fallen into their usual rhythm—but found the blush lace of her opera gown so restricting, it punished her for daring to relax at all. “I’ve heard Rory mention Pearse before as though he were some mythical figure. But does he appear more of the schoolmaster than the rebel type? I daresay he gives the impression of calm, sitting over there so unassuming.”
“Some say.”
“Who?”
“The ones who haven’t heard him speak. ’Tis said that man can cast a spell o’er a crowd faster than free pints in a pub, wit’ a supportin’ cast to match. Mallin is a ranked leader for the ICA an’ the countess works alongside. She even designed their uniforms. An’ notice—no tiara for her tonight. ’Tis said she sold all her jewelry to feed the poor after the Dublin workers’ lockout, if ye can be believin’ that. A woman leadin’ with the men. Ireland’s makin’ strides.”
“The ICA is building quite an organization. I found a newspaper article about it in Father’s library just yesterday. You don’t think it something to inspire men to ill-advised action, do you? With all the Irish uniforms parading through St. Stephen’s Green, I don’t know what to believe.”
Sean stared down at the stage, though the quick deflection of a smile in his profile said his interest was piqued by something other than the ICA’s activities.
“What is it ye were about in yer father’s study then?”
Issy lifted her chin, ignoring his quip. “Perhaps I was fetching my Sunday hat.”
“An’ ye found it nosin’ through the newspaper stack on the earl’s desk, no doubt.” Sean laughed, covering his chin with his palm like he was trying to master it and failed.
“Honestly,” she shot back, wishing it were proper to whack him with her program. “As if all I’m fit to do is thumb through the latest copy of Weldon’s. My father doesn’t mind my interest in politics.”
“Neither do I, truth be told. But ye know yer father’s under the assumption yer on the unionist side o’ the aisle—wit’ him. What will he do when he finds out his daughter sympathizes wit’ the nationalist cause an’ Pearse’s dreams of a free republic?”
“No need to wheedle about the details.”
“An’ I’m not tryin’ to force ye to be the ladies’ journal type. I’d be smart to avoid forcin’ that mold on ye. But I’d say Rory would be the one to be askin’ about affairs in Dublin. Ye won’t get much from tiptoein’ about in yer father’s study. Ye need to ask a man on the ground.”
“There you go again, feigning ignorance when you read more than I do, Sean O’Connell. I know you’ve been away from the city,” Issy said without thinking, flitting her glance down to his clerical jacket before she could stop herself. She averted her gaze to the stage in haste. “But if you won’t tell me, fine. Maybe I just will ask my brother.”
If anyone can find him . . .
Rory Byrne had become a ghost. Interest in ICA doings in Dublin seemed to have absorbed him completely.
The lights flickered, signaling showtime.
“Issy, I wonder iffen I might . . .” Sean cleared his throat as the audience chatter faded out and the first notes of the orchestra drifted in. “May I speak wit’ ye after the curtain call?”
Issy swallowed hard but presented a sweet smile over it. “Are we not speaking now?”
“I meant alone. If ye can spare me the time.”
Issy peeked out of the corner of her eye.
Sean’s gaze drifted about from balcony to stage . . . even to the program he rolled in his palms. She guessed he wasn’t ready to talk of the past, and neither was she—especially not with the man who sat next to her now.
This wasn’t the same friend from her youth. The brow that had been marked with a coltish spirit once had drawn serious lines. But then, war had a remarkable ability to remind one of weighted things. Life and death and the intertwining of both made men somber, and many a brow had been rendered humorless since the summer of 1914. Perhaps Sean was only taking on the same absence of frivolity as most others she knew in feeling grim events deserved their earnest.
The lights finally dimmed and a hush swept the crowd.
“We should—” Issy fanned her program in the direction of the stage. “It’s starting.”
“After the show then.”
“I’ll see Honor home after the play, so she’ll be with me if that’s alright? But . . . I haven’t seen her since I sat down. Where could she be?”
Her friend had scooted off to the powder room some time ago, but as the curtain drew back and lights washed center stage, scene one fully engaged . . . still the aisle seat lay empty.
“There,” Sean whispered, tipping his chin toward the balcony’s center door and the young lady who’d squeezed through it.
Honor shimmied her way through the dark down to their row and eased into her seat without a word. Though Issy expected it, Honor didn’t comment further, nor explain what had kept her. Just squared the shoulders of her evergreen gown to the stage as the actors continued their lines, ready to hold pretenses as long as she could.
“Honor McGinn, where in the world have you been?” Issy whispered, hoping neither Sean nor the theatergoers seated behind could hear.
“I told ye—the powder room.”
“Liam passed our row and asked after you. I had a difficult time explaining where his fiancée was without telling an outright lie.”
Honor’s cheeks flushed. And instead of settling in for the show or rightly offering the barest of explanations, she fidgeted with the folds of fabric at her waist.
“Whatever’s the matter?”
“Not a thing, Issy. Let’s just enjoy the show.”
Fidget. Squirm. Jostle and sigh. And then Honor repeated the sequence all over again. One thought hit Issy as she watched—a possibility that set her heart to sinking. She leaned in, heads close so she could whisper by Honor’s ear. “Is it Rory? He didn’t show up and catch you in the lobby, did he? I knew it was a terrible idea to come tonight.”
“Honestly.” Honor bit back a whispered scold in her fire-starting manner. It seemed her hair gleamed a brighter shade of strawberry blonde under the glow of the stage lights. “If I can’t be trusted to stay away from yer brother for five minutes strung together, ye must be thinkin’ I’m as weak as my father does.”
“I do not think you weak. But I do think you in love with a man who is not your fiancé, and not terribly clever at hiding it—an awkward showing for the present circumstances. You’re to marry Liam Devenish this spring, and he sits just two rows behind. How much more incentive could there be to cease in seeing my brother behind board?”
“Shhh!” Someone scolded her whispers from behind.
Issy and Honor hushed and set their spines straight, composing in unison.
Her friend’s back grew more rigid as she watched the stage, but Issy could guess what was going on inside that head of hers. Honor McGinn was engaging in the precise activity she’d been reared not to do. It was one thing to be friends with an Anglo-Irish like Issy. That the McGinn family could tolerate because of a tidy fortune and a respectable family name. But it was quite a different beast altogether for an Irish-born lady of means to marry one of them—a Catholic marrying a Protestant, and an Englishman at that . . . It just wasn’t done.
Any future for Honor and Issy’s brother was a vapor at best.
Issy reached out, slipping her ivory satin–gloved hand over to squeeze her friend’s and tugging until she looked in her eyes. Honor did look back, but sweet eyes of cornflower blue had glazed with tears.
A tiny flash of rebelliousness sparked within Issy and she leaned forward, decision made. “Come with me. I spotted an alcove in the lobby. We can steal away there until the show is over and sneak out in the crowd after. You won’t have to see Liam tonight.”
Honor’s nod was so automatic, Issy leaned over to whisper to Sean. “I must go. I beg you that we may speak another time.”
“I have a motor. I can be bringin’ it ’round if ye want to leave—” Sean had half stood with her declaration, but now sat back down as she moved to follow Honor.
Issy mouthed, “I’m so sorry.” She picked up her lace-and-bead train to hurry along.
Honor charged up the aisle, Issy hastening to keep up in tight-laced heels that punished with sharp pains in nearly every step from the auditorium, then gripping rails down the flight of stairs to the ground-floor vestibule. Once there, Honor buried her face into gloved palms and crumpled in Issy’s arms, sending them into an off-balanced tilt against the wall.
“Dearest . . . what’s this?”
Whatever this was, it was far more serious than a tear on the cheek. Honor was breaking apart.
Issy swept them into an alcove behind a green velvet curtain, just out of the lobby with ceiling lamps casting a glow onto the black-and-white tile floor, and the reflection against polished wood wainscoting on all walls. A stiff bench became their sanctuary and they melted down upon it, Issy holding her friend.
“Is this about Rory? You must know, if I had a choice it would be you as my sister. Always.” She pulled a handkerchief from her beaded evening bag and dotted the underside of Honor’s eyes. “I’m terribly sorry. I just wish there was something more I could do.”
They were true but empty words—a clumsy way of drying tears, and Issy knew it.
“Ye don’t understand . . .”
“Then help me understand, Honor. Tell me what’s troubling you. Devenish is a kind man from a respected Irish-Catholic family. That suits the McGinns, doesn’t it? Your father only wants something bright for your future. Do you see?”
“Could ye see without lovin’, Issy? Tell me the truth.”
Issy kept from speaking what would do no good to have said. She patted Honor’s cheeks with the linen square, forcing a smile she hoped would help instead of harm.
“Issy—I’m with child.”
The blood drained from Issy’s head as the shocking words sank deep. She stilled her hand, the gauzy kerchief frozen in midair.
“You’re with . . . ?” Issy exhaled as knots quick-tangled her insides and she finally dropped her hand to her lap. “And you’re certain of this?”
Honor nodded: a pitiful, chin-quivering truth.
“’Tis what kept me in the powder room—the sick is terrible. I’ve had a time in tryin’ to hide it. But I can’ much longer, an’ the season lasts through March. I don’ think I can stand the dinner parties every night. An’ when my father learns of it . . . I don’ know what he’ll do.” Honor’s cry was muted by a gloved hand she drew up to stifle it. She looked away, burying her face in the shadows.
“Have you spoken with Rory yet?”
“No . . .” Another muffled sob. Stronger. Wracking her as if it would split her in two.
Issy pressed the handkerchief into Honor’s palm and slipped her arm around to hug her shoulders, drawing her close as she sorted the thoughts pinging wildly through her mind.
“Very well—first things first. I will send a message to the ICA this night. Someone should be able to reach my brother, and I’ll demand he return home straightaway.”
“Ye cannot, Issy. Rory can’ know yet.”
“Perhaps you can come back to Ashford with me tonight then? We will not tell my parents why, but we can travel south to the castle cove and you may stay away from the city to think things through. Once in Wicklow, we will summon Rory and discuss this calmly—”
“It’s not what ye think.” Honor looked up, doe eyes piercing even through the shadows. “Rory’d never dishonor me. Not in that way.”
What a time for assumptions. “Then . . . who did, dishonor you in that way?”
In an instant the visage of Liam Devenish came to mind and fire blasted through Issy, burning from crown to toes. She shot to standing with fists balled at her sides, ready if she must to fight the world—beginning with the ill-mannered wolf in nobleman’s clothing.
“If it’s that rake of a fiancé in there, I’ll march into the auditorium and box his ears. I don’t care who is in attendance tonight—I will not let this stand if that brute has dared such a depravity!”
“No, Issy. Sit. Please.”
Her dearest friend in such a condition as this? Issy wanted to make it all go away or else fling her fist into the man’s jaw and at least feel better to land a blow he’d remember. But Honor’s pleading was everything, and she obeyed. She swept her hand beneath her gown to settle back beside her friend—though she still perched on the edge of the bench on principle.
“I’ll tell ye this once, an’ then ye must promise me not a word of it will be spoken to anyone,” Honor begged, her voice barely louder than a breath. “Promise me.”
“I promise. Of course, but—”
“’Twas the night I walked home from the Cumann na mBan women’s meetin’ in October. Do ye remember? I was kept late, helping’ wit’ the ICA pamphlets.”
Issy nodded. Of course she remembered. Her friend had suffered a fall that night . . . a bruise on her jaw . . . cut above the eye . . . and was quite shaken over the whole ordeal the next time they’d met. She remembered fussing over the state Honor had been in at tea days later.
“I had to walk through Portobello that night, near where the English soldiers are stationed.” Honor’s chin quivered and she closed her eyes for a breath, shaking her head.
Oh Lord . . . Please, no . . .
“Honor.” Issy gripped her by the shoulders, staring dead in her eyes. “You can’t mean that you were—?”
“Issy? Are ye there?”
She pressed a finger to her lips and squeezed Honor’s shoulder with the other, shushing them from saying anything further.
“We’re here, Sean.” Issy slipped around the curtain to face him, hoping that would give Honor a few precious moments to compose herself.
He stood in the back of the vestibule, several feet away. But there was no lightness about him. No heart-confusing smiles or jests. Simply the friend she knew. Steadfast, hands buried in trouser pockets, waiting for whatever she might ask of him.
“Can I help?”
“Actually, yes. It seems Honor has taken ill. I’d much prefer it if she didn’t have to wait for Father’s motor to arrive at the end of the performance. So if we may, I accept the offer of your assistance home—with utmost gratitude. She’s quite exhausted, and I fear the crowd may induce a swoon. If we could leave now, I think it best.”
“I already passed an excuse to Devenish, though I’m thinkin’ he’s goin’ to want an explanation at some point. Mine won’ keep long.”
“And he shall have one. But not tonight. If we could stop at her family’s home along the Green, gather her things, and then drive back to Ashford Manor tonight? I know it’s a lot to ask . . .”
Sean was astute enough to pick up that something was amiss but tactful enough not to comment. Whether he’d heard anything they’d said, Issy couldn’t rightly know. He shifted his gaze—a quick peek to the broken young lady behind the curtain—and simply nodded, his usual discretion locked in place. “Of course. If it’s what ye want.”
“Good. Thank you. I’ll just see to Honor and—” She turned, but the touch of his hand against hers drew her back around to face him.
He let go, almost in the same breath, and dropped his hands back at his sides. “Before we go, I’ve been needin’ to tell ye somethin’. An’ if Honor’s ill I don’ want to disturb her wit’ it on the drive.”
The cool blue of his eyes petitioned Issy to stay, and regardless of why, she was rendered defenseless. He hadn’t reached for her hand in so long. Not in that way. Not since the last time they’d spoken, when he’d asked for a future she was unable to give.
If this was the moment to bring back the failed proposal, so be it.
“All right, Sean. I’m listening.”
“I confess I crossed paths wit’ Rory days back, an’ he said ye’d be here tonight. Ye were goin’ to find out sooner or later, so I may as well be the one to tell ye . . . Levi’s bound for Ireland.”
If it was possible to be hit with two tidal waves in one night, Issy was left swimming.
She dug her fingernails into the seams of her beaded evening bag, hoping he didn’t see the one sign of how the news affected her.
Words, Issy. Find them. Say them.
“I see. And your brother will return soon?”
He nodded. “Seems a year in Brooklyn was enough for his likin’. He missed the old country more than he thought he would. Took some time for the letter to reach the island, but Levi could be on a boat an’ back to Dublin anytime now. Workin’ his way across.”
“Well. How nice it will be for your mother to have him home. He’ll stay with her, I assume.”
“Levi’s not one for the Dublin season, that’s certain. Nor for bein’ tied down under our mother’s roof in County Wicklow. But he’ll be about. Thought ye deserved a bit o’ warnin’ between Dublin an’ those castle ruins o’ yers.”
“You mean in case we should pass each other in the street?”
Mustering courage to evade Sean’s knowing glances, Issy determined to simply focus on helping her friend get home. Once there, they could both fall apart behind closed doors, instead of in the Abbey Theatre lobby with scores of patrons nibbling on their pitiful scene.
“Thank you, Sean, for thinking of it. Was there anything else?”
“If there is, it’ll keep for tonight. I’ll just bring the motor ’round.” He started off, then turned, faltering a bit. “An’ wait under the awnin’ out front, yeah? Will keep ye ladies out o’ the rain. I’ve an umbrella an’ will come fetch ye.”
The list of troubles Issy had considered at the start of the evening had been small—limited to what their social calendar might dictate for Honor’s impending nuptials. But things were now to end quite differently. For Honor. For Rory, who didn’t even know it yet. For her, as the combination of Sean’s reemergence, Honor’s news, and Levi’s return fractured places she’d thought long since healed. And for a world at war, it seemed Dublin was its own powder keg with streets and lives rigged to the fuse.
Issy was loath to wonder, as they climbed in Sean’s motor and she cradled Honor in her arms, whispering that everything was going to be alright as they chugged down Abbey Street, how their lives could have begun to unravel so quickly? And why, in the midst of such turmoil, did it feel so right to look up and find Sean O’Connell once again at her side?