Chapter Thirty-Four #2
“Tomorrow will be soon enough to start sorting this mess out. I’m taking Alfie home so that his mother can get a look at him before she expires of worry, and then we’ll see.
As for you, you’re with me until we figure out what to do with you.
You can take it for granted that the Tans know Ballyshannon Court was being used by the IRA. ”
Rynn’s chest tightened as the full implications of what the burning of Ballyshannon Court meant hit her. Not only was the
house gone, but everything in it was gone as well. The beautiful furnishings and fixtures. All the medicine and medical supplies.
Her clothes. Everything of Thomas’s that had been left behind. Thinking about it made her feel sick, so she tried her best
to put it out of her mind.
By then they were on the road. The Vauxhall was running without lights. The knowledge that Owen was choosing to drive by moonlight
rather than risk being seen and stopped by the Tans or the army or whichever of the Crown forces might be abroad in the middle
of the night frightened her all over again.
“I need to get a message to Granny and Glenna that I’m safe. If they know about the fire—”
“I’ll see to it that they get word. Tomorrow. If the Tans know who you are—and they’re outsiders so they may not, or if they
do, they may not know that Lady Thomas Dunne was once Rynn Carmichael of the village here—it’s possible that they might be
having your granny’s house watched, in case you show up.”
Rynn’s insides twisted.
“Did Mam go spare when I didn’t come home?” Alfie asked in a small voice. Rynn turned in the seat to look at him. He was lying
down still, but his eyes were open. As dark as it was, it was difficult to make any judgment about his state, but the fact
that he was cognizant enough to worry about his mother’s reaction to his absence was reassuring.
“She did.” Owen’s reply had a steely note to it. “You notice that she sent for me. And before you give explaining yourself
to her a go, suppose you tell me what the hell you were thinking.”
“I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. We were running drills—”
“Don’t lie to me. Your friend Jack told me exactly what you were doing. The group of you were moving boxes of ammunition to
a hiding spot for an IRA unit to pick up later, and this wasn’t the first time you’ve done it, either. Something I’ll be having
a word with your teacher about, if he doesn’t end up in front of a firing squad before I get the chance, which, if I were
a betting man, I’d say he will.”
“They’ll shoot him?” Alfie sounded horrified.
“They’ll shoot him. And your friends. And you, if they catch you.” Owen’s voice turned savage. “Do you know how lucky you
are to be alive? To do this, after I’ve told you and told you. This isn’t a game. This is a war, although I know you’re too young and stupid to understand what that means. But I’ll
tell you, and keep telling you, because I’ve been there. It means if you’re in it, at any time between one breath and the
next you can cease to exist. One wrong decision, one unlucky step, one bad minute and, bam, you’re rotting in a hole, and
your people are crying for you, and none of it matters anymore because you’re dead.”
“Owen—” Rynn began, meaning to add maybe this isn’t the time as Alfie shuddered and closed his eyes and shrank into his blankets.
“And you. You’ve no room to say a word.” He turned that savage gaze on her. “You’re even luckier to be alive than he is. You’ve
been putting yourself in harm’s way since the night we met. How many times have I saved your arse? This is the third time,
isn’t it? How many times have I told you that if you didn’t keep your nose out of the bloody business you’d wind up dead?
More times than I can count. And did you listen? Did either of you listen? What is it going to take to make you understand
that I know what I’m talking about, and I mean what I say?”
The farmhouse was at hand, Rynn saw. Its whitewashed brick walls shone faintly in the moonlight. Downstairs, the windows were alight—clearly Moira had been too distraught over Alfie to sleep—and there was someone standing in the shadows at the side of the yard.
A man. The darkness made it impossible to tell any more about him than that. Her pulse leaped.
“Owen.” She pointed silently.
Owen made a disgusted sound under his breath and pulled into the yard.
The man came running toward them even before Owen braked. One of the farmhands, Rynn saw when the moonlight hit him.
“Major! Oh, Major, I couldn’t stop it, couldn’t nobody stop it!” He was blubbering as he came, and gesturing behind him. Owen,
who must have understood quicker, applied the parking brake and leaped out to run past him even as Rynn saw that there were
dark mounds on the grass. Several of them, in the shadows where the man had been. Owen reached them and stopped, then moved
from one to another—
“They up and shot her! Mrs. Clary! Them bloody Tans!” the farmhand wailed.
Rynn was out of the car and running before he finished speaking as she realized that the dark mounds were bodies and one of
them, the one Owen was sinking to his knees beside, must be Moira Clary.