APRIL 26, 1916
PORTOBELLO CHURCH
DUBLIN, IRELAND
1015 HOURS
“Issy? Ye must wake.” Sean knelt over her, patting a hand to her cheek.
He took the clerical coat laid as a cover over her and set it off to the side. Cradling her arm, he helped her to sitting. She was stiff from curling up on a wooden pew but, thankfully, could withstand the pain in her arm that seemed to be easing by the hour.
With everything shut up, doors having barricaded them in the sanctuary, it might have been the middle of the night still. But daylight brightened brilliant hues behind stained glass, telling her she’d slept through to morning. “What time is it?”
He pressed a finger to his lips, admonishing her to whisper. “Ten o’clock. Can ye stand?” He took her hand to help her up. “Was goin’ to let ye sleep longer, but . . . somethin’s happened.”
“Did Rory and Levi make it out alright?” Issy scanned the sanctuary, finding the candles still aglow, pews empty, and stained-glass walls eerily still.
“Make it out, they did.”
“Then whatever’s the matter?”
Sean led her behind a stone column in the shadows of the nave, curling his hand toward a door at the back of the church. Dropping his voice to a deadly whisper, he mouthed, “There are English soldiers outside.”
“Soldiers?”
With her instinct to flee growing stronger, Sean must have known it because he settled her with a hand blocking against the column on one side and a hand raised in caution between them.
“Shhh, Issy. There’s a captain sent word he’s seekin’ bricklayers. I don’ know why save there was an incident on the bridge last eve. The captain remembered there have been laborers offered board at this parsonage in the past, an’ he beckoned them to come straightaway. Soldiers are waitin’ to escort them, under guard, to urgent work at Portobello Barracks—right now.”
What they’d seen on the bridge flashed in her mind. “The incident on the bridge . . . It wouldn’t have to do with three Irish journalists taken into custody, would it?”
“I don’ rightly know. But somethin’s amiss. An’ I came to beckon ye to hide this instant.”
“Why? Do they know I’m here?”
He looked down at the stone beneath their feet. That sent terror to bleed through her. Sean never did that. He was always resolute. And he’d never drag his feet in delivering news unless . . .
“No, but they have Rory an’ Levi.”
“What? How?”
“Rory determined to go out to Portobello, instead of straight back to the GPO. I couldn’ hold ’em, so we devised a story ahead of time as a precaution. The soldiers caught up to them in the streets overnight, an’ they told a story of masonry work in Portobello that was enough truth it matched mine. Please believe me in that I tried. But Rory bid me to leave ye be until mornin’ an’ tell ye then. So I need ye to hide here in the church until we return.”
“We . . . Wait—you’re going with them? And return from what?”
“The group of bricklayers are bein’ taken to the barracks. I’m to accompany as clergy.”
Issy ducked under his arm, frantic in searching out her hat and camera. She found them tucked in the corner of the pew. With effort, she slid the leather strap over her shoulder, thinking that she could hide, just until the soldiers were gone, and then get a message back to the rebels at the Green that some of their men had been taken prisoner.
It was a shot in the dark, but a chance at least.
“Issy . . .”
“I made a promise to Honor—to myself, that we wouldn’t lose anyone else in this fight. And now you’re telling me that soldiers are outside ready to take you all away?”
“Ye can’t go out in those streets alone.”
“But I could have convinced Rory to come back . . .”
“Ye couldn’t have convinced him to stay any more than I could,” he whispered, taking her hand. “Rory knows that if Captain John Bowen-Colthurst is the English officer at Portobello Barracks, then that means the lieutenant under his command will be there also.”
“I don’t understand. Why does that matter?”
“Because Lieutenant Malcom Corley is the man who attacked Honor, an’ Rory’s ready to give his life to avenge hers.”
The weight of Issy’s ignorance washed over her.
How had she not known who the captain was . . . What Rory’s intentions were . . . All the time she thought her brother was helping her get to Sean, he was plotting his own revenge. One that he surely wouldn’t survive.
“It’s all my fault. I’m the one who told him the captain was there.”
“Don’ blame yerself.”
“So Levi must have known?”
“He did.”
All along, they’d both known yet given her no warning of their plans. It stirred determination anew.
“But then . . . why bring me along too? If they endeavored to enact revenge on a company of soldiers, why risk a wounded photographer holding them up?”
“Because they wanted ye to be taken care of, Issy. An’ they knew ye would be here . . .” He paused for a second, enough that she felt tenderness light his eyes. “With me.”
“Because they think they’re not coming home.”
Sean nodded, appearing quite sorry for the truth.
“Then I’m going too. I’m a bricklayer,” she vowed, wiping a tear from under her eye. “I can’t just stand here and let all of the people I love walk out that door—” She shook her head, stopping short of a declaration that might carry no weight.
It was too much to risk in a moment that meant everything.
“I’m going with you.”
“No,” he whispered back. “Yer not.”
“You said yourself there’s a group of workers going. I won’t be noticed among them. I can be one bricklayer in a nameless crowd.”
A weight in her trouser pocket reminded Issy of one thing that would allow her to blend into a line of young men workers. She slid her wounded arm from its sling. Then, retrieving the straight blade she’d held on to from the first run through Clerys department store, she placed the ivory-embossed tool in his palm.
“Sean. We haven’t time. If I’m a bricklayer, I must look like one. Please? I can’t stay in this church without you. Do not ask it of me,” she whispered, eyes entreating as she curled his fingers around the sheathed blade. “I need your help.”
Issy swept her braid over her shoulder and carefully, with her wounded arm, unwound the long rope and threaded her fingers through the waves until they were fully combed out. Turning her back to him, she swept her hair so it tumbled down, long and unbound, asking for his touch.
By the flickering of prayer candles and the hidden shadows of a sanctuary alcove, she closed her eyes and waited, asking him to enter an intimacy she’d never allowed another man before him. It took seconds—no doubt from the decision Sean was wrestling. But she held her breath, and then he was there.
In a touch that first grazed her neck, he swept her hair back, smoothing locks in his palms. And with the softest care, she felt him draw and cut, giving the first lock its freedom. The cinnamon wave danced to the ground, painting a line on the tile at her feet. And then another. And another . . . trusting, cutting, letting go, until she was shorn, and her neck was cold.
Sean came around to face her, brushed back the hair at her brow and, ever so gently, cut it so the final wave fell and what remained curled at her chin.
“I find you’ve changed, in the months you were away.” Issy met his gaze reflected through the candlelight.
“I told ye before that I’m the same man. Same convictions. Same flaws. But I was already on a path to this moment. Do ye think maybe ’tis not I who did the changin’?” He swept the errant wisp of hair so it barely tucked behind her ear. “I know I can’t hold ye back, Issy. An’ I’d never try.”
APRIL 26, 1916
PORTOBELLO BARRACKS
DUBLIN, IRELAND
1215 HOURS
The three journalists were dead.
Whether bitten by arrogance, fear to cover up the executions of innocent men, or sheer idiocy, Captain Bowen-Colthurst hadn’t the inclination to look his bricklayers in the face. Neither were they searched on their person, praise be—just surveyed for weapons under their coats. The soldiers had not inspected closely enough to discern a woman had infiltrated their workmen’s ranks. Instead, a tall, dour-faced lieutenant marched them into a barracks courtyard and supervised the work while soldiers kept watch a rifle’s distance away.
Issy kept her head down as Lieutenant Corley nursed a cig, trying as she might not to think of the towheaded evil standing paces behind her, nor how he laughed over some amusement in the background as they cleaned the blood-soaked cobblestones beneath their feet. She’d never touched a brick hammer in her life. Levi was a swift teacher, instructing her in the manner to remove areas that had been stained crimson or with bullets that had passed through the bodies of the three men and become lodged in the brick.
She’d go between wheelbarrow and tools, from wall to bricks and back again, more pretending to work than anything as they prepared lime mortar replacements. And though nerves twisted in her stomach that Corley remained close, Rory worked diligently, keeping a steady head as they splashed buckets of water to drain the blood-evidence from the stones.
They worked in silence, no more than an hour or two, as if the rifles weren’t there.
And when the soiled bricks had been piled up, tools stowed, and their lives properly threatened umpteen times, soldiers marched the stoic line of bricklayers away from the courtyard with bayonets drawn. The others employed in the cover-up had scattered once they reached the barracks gate, leaving Rory and Levi to assist Issy out.
Sean stood in his clerical collar and long coat at the barracks gate, and Issy chastened herself not to fall into his arms the instant they were free, for Corley and his men watched with a keen eye as they fled out to Military Road.
Sean swept his arm around her back as he ushered her down the sidewalk, Rory and Levi following behind. “Issy, yer shakin,’” he whispered, sending his gaze back to Rory and Levi. “What happened?”
“They killed Skeffy . . .” Issy gripped her jacket tight around her, fighting for breaths that wouldn’t hollow her out. “All three of them. We saw the bodies carried out!”
“Killed?” He snapped a look over his shoulder again.
“Too much to speak of now,” Rory said. “We’ll tell you all once we get to the church.”
“At least ye weren’t found out.” Sean squeezed his arm tighter around Issy. “At least they let ye go.”
Sean ushered their group in haste, Issy feeling herself pulled along in a fog, barely recognizing their trek down the length of Rathmines Road, up toward Portobello Bridge.
“An’ Lieutenant Corley? What say ye about him, Rory?” Sean asked, leading their party to a thin strip of road off Grove Park, along shop alleys up to the bridge.
“I know what he looks like now.”
The ominous tone wasn’t unexpected—Rory was patient in rage.
Issy prayed that once back in the haven of Portobello Church, she might speak with him. Convince him that vengeance was the Lord’s, and he could not return from crossing a line of cold-blooded murder to satisfy it on his own. She could think of little else as they cut across to the canal and hurried along the street up to the bridge.
Yes, they’d get back to the church. They’d hide in safety. And one day, it would all be over . . . and perhaps then Rory could see his future with Honor more clearly.
An armored truck blasted over the rise without warning, decimating her plan.
A plated monster with a long cylinder bed chugged up to a stop before them. They slowed along the bridge, looking across the canal to the sanctuary of the church steeple but with no way to reach it. It appeared the worst was now upon them as a pair of soldiers jumped from the back and blocked the bridge end at Rathmines Road.
Levi’s words from the night before rang through Issy’s mind; like the journalists, they, too, were on the bridge, soon to be accosted, and unarmed. But did the soldiers know they were not as innocent as the men who’d just been executed at the barracks?
They were rebels with bullets owed to them.
Sean edged in front of Issy with careful steps until they were both pressed up against a gaslight lantern and the stone rail overlooking the water. Rory and Levi stood before the soldiers, exchanging eyes-only glances, feet planted in place.
The armored truck waited like a beast before them, until a door opened and the lanky arrogance of Lieutenant Corley stepped down. The flash of a pistol caught the light, illuminating a barrel gripped in his hand.
Oh no . . .
This was no official visit; there was no unit of troops to indicate it, just a pair of soldiers flanking the devil. Whatever Corley had planned, it appeared as though someone had changed his mind, and they’d decided to silence the witnesses.
Rory was eerily calm. Levi too. They stood without word or movement, just staring down the officers blocking their path. Issy gripped Sean’s hand from behind. He squeezed her fingers in solidarity, squared his shoulders, then let go.
“Good day to ye, Officer. As clergy, may I be of help?”
“The captain bid me to check in with your workers to see that they arrive safely to their destination, Vicar. No doubt rebels are afoot, even on the bridge to Portobello Church. I cannot ensure their safety without escort.”
“A kindness, sir.” Sean clasped his hands in front of his waist as he bestowed a priestly bow. “But we are quite safe. Thank ye.”
Corley raised the pistol, training Sean squarely in his sight. Issy nearly gasped aloud, for how swift the action had turned the temperature of the encounter.
“Then I’d like to humbly request, Vicar, that you and your party accompany us back to Portobello Barracks. Immediately.”
“An’ why is that, sir? The masons have been discharged o’ their duties to the Crown. They’d like to be returnin’ to their families posthaste. An’ I to a place o’ the Lord’s service.”
“Says the captain, someone recognized the young boy there.” Corley tipped his chin in Issy’s direction.
Her breath caught in her throat. Surely they couldn’t recognize her. Not when she’d changed clothes and cut her hair . . .
“One of the soldiers here seemed to remember a similar face making tracks over in the area of the Green. If you don’t mind, we’d like to have a physician examine him, just to see that he didn’t take an unfortunate injury to the arm . . . or that his camera wasn’t damaged as he ran into a rebel garrison.”
A pale wind blew over the bridge, stirring lost papers in a swirl at their feet.
They waited, all frozen as each contemplated their options.
Issy flitted her glance from the soldiers back to Levi and Rory, who remained statues before the armored beast. All she could think was that she’d promised Honor no one would be hurt—not because of her. And if Rory didn’t come home or if Sean or Levi lost their lives in her defense, she wouldn’t be able to live with herself.
Decision made, Issy gripped her camera in front of her, willing to step out and go with them—if only it meant no one else would die. Sean seemed able to read her intention and drifted an arm back, slowly curling it in a shield to stop her.
“May God forgive me, but I’m afraid I cannot allow that, sir.”
The soldiers kept their rifles raised, though they didn’t seem to take the masons with any note of seriousness. Issy could see they knew them all to be unarmed. Why else would Corley keep his weapon raised on a vicar—a man no one would have suspected to have loyalties on either side of the conflict? His was a vow of nonviolence, and Corley’s intimidation hinged on it.
Without warning Sean pulled a pistol from under his clerical coat and raised it high. He shoved Issy down, her knees crashing to the pavement as shots rang out.
When the smoke cleared, two men lay on the ground.