Chapter 25
Max and I returned home to Upper Fitzwilliam Street without incident, though more than once I swore someone was following us. This may have been paranoia, or it may have been O’s men. Either way, it only made me more determined that Max not board the ferry alone at Kingstown that evening.
We arrived to find Sidney in the bath. When he emerged to join us in the parlor, he merely shook his still wet head at my questioning look. “Don’t ask.” His gaze was riveted on the stack of documents we were sifting through.
“We found them,” I declared triumphantly, watching as realization dawned across his face.
The next hour was spent explaining and then showing him what Max’s father had managed to squirrel away.
His shock and amazement were at least equal to our own, as was his disgust at everything Ardmore had done.
“That man is a menace to humanity,” Sidney stated angrily.
“Hey, now. You don’t have to gossip about me behind my back.”
We all looked up in surprise to find Alec leaning against the doorway. Admittedly, the men were more shocked than me.
“What are you doing here?” Max asked warily, glancing down at the papers spread out across the low tea table.
“I asked Mr. Finnegan to send for him,” I explained, my voice more brusque than I intended. I still didn’t know how to feel about Alec, about what he’d done, but I knew we could rely on him. At this moment, that fact trumped all others. Besides, better the devil we knew than the devil we didn’t.
I turned to Sidney. “Clearly, you haven’t patched up that hole yet.” I’d expected to confront Alec in the garden, not my parlor, and I was slightly flustered by this development. Gathering my composure, I shifted my gaze to Alec’s. “We got him.”
“Got who?” he asked as he advanced into the room. His regard dipped to the documents, and he stumbled to a stop, comprehension lighting his face. “You mean … you found them?”
I nodded as he swiftly hurried toward the table, picking up the nearest paper.
A smile split his face, perhaps the first that any of us had dared to exhibit given the gravity of what the documents meant.
However, there was no denying we all felt at least a small portion of elation at what we’d achieved.
Considering the fact that Alec had also been with us when we’d found the key in Norfolk, it only seemed right that the four of us should be the first to view what it had secured.
“By God, you did it!” Alec exclaimed, forgetting himself in his excitement.
I glanced at Max, worried he would take offense, but a small smile curled the corners of his lips instead as he allowed himself to enjoy this moment.
“Then you’re returning to London?” Alec asked eagerly.
“Not all of us.”
This brought Sidney’s head around, as well as Alec’s, to stare at me.
“We can’t,” I reminded my husband. “Not without risking apprehension and drawing Ardmore’s suspicions.”
He understood immediately, but Alec was more difficult to persuade.
“Ardmore be damned!” he snapped, his delight swiftly turning to anger. “Then why did you send for me?”
“To show you this.” I gestured to the papers on the table. “And to ask for your help. Sidney and I might not be able to leave, but that doesn’t mean I want Max traveling unattended.”
Max’s brows snapped together. “I’m perfectly capable of transporting these documents on my own.”
“Perhaps, but if Ardmore discovers what you have, he’ll stop at nothing to see you killed and these papers destroyed!” My voice cracked like a whip, silencing all of them as I grappled for control of my temper. I softened my tone, pleading with Max. “I’ll not risk it. I’ll not risk you.”
He didn’t reply, but I knew he’d accepted the necessity of what I was saying.
I turned to find Alec watching me with a restrained expression. I wondered if he was thinking about how I’d slapped him. Shame filled me at how I’d lost control of my temper.
“I’ve got two men who can shadow Ryde to London,” he said.
“They won’t raise any flags,” he assured us, perhaps thinking of the ongoing round-up of figures with possible connections to Sinn Féin and the IRA because of the events of Bloody Sunday.
Even Arthur Griffith, the acting president of Dáil éireann, and Eoin MacNeill had been arrested the day before.
This had been somewhat of a surprise since they were considered to be pacifists and a moderating influence on the more aggressive members of the republican government.
“You probably won’t even know they’re there,” Alec told Max.
“Thank you,” I told him sincerely.
Max shook Alec’s hand and then excused himself to pack.
Sidney also slipped from the room on some flimsy pretext that he’d forgotten something upstairs.
It was obvious he was affording me and Alec a moment of privacy to discuss what had happened during our last encounter and the events that had motivated it.
I wasn’t certain I was quite ready to address it, but I also refused to leave Lord Ryde’s documents unattended.
Moving around the table, I began to gather up the papers and return them to the leather satchel.
“Verity, love, are we good?”
I bristled at his use of the endearment, though in the past I’d let it slide mostly unchecked.
“Dash it, Ver!”
I recognized he’d softened the curse for my sake as he moved to stand across the table from me.
“I know you don’t approve of my choices.
I can accept that. But they are never without reason.
” He held out his hands to plead with me, but I could not look him in the eye.
“This is war, Ver. You know this. You lived it. There is no fault in stopping spies and informants, in eliminating them if necessary. You know this from Belgium.” He threw his arm out, presumably in the direction of Dublin Castle.
“And I have done nothing to them that they have not already done to others—and worse—without fair trial. Nothing they wouldn’t do to me, if given half the chance.
They were getting close, too close, and if we had not struck first, they would have ended us all.
And ended this revolution.” I looked up at him. “You know I speak the truth.”
Perhaps, but I still struggled to accept it and everything it meant. “I need time,” I said.
Alec’s face tightened with frustration. “Time is the one thing I may not have.”
My blood froze in terrified understanding.
That was the crux, wasn’t it? Next time it might be him who was assassinated.
But there would be no state funeral. Possibly no funeral at all.
No chance to say a proper goodbye. Knowing this, I decided I couldn’t let him leave here believing I was still angry with him.
So, I swallowed and nodded. Alec’s shoulders bowed as if a small weight had eased from them.
Then, I supposed not wishing to press his luck, he turned to go, but I halted him with a question. “Is it worth it?”
His eyes gleamed with a resolve I’d once known. “The good fight is always worth it.”
Long after Alec had gone, Sidney found me standing beside the window, gazing out into the garden.
The trees and shrubberies had now all lost most of their leaves, and the ground was littered with a damp stew of vegetation.
The gardeners would no doubt come within a few days to rake them up and tidy it all away until spring.
Not that my thoughts were truly on this, but I could pretend they were when my husband joined me with a question in his eyes.
However, he didn’t voice it—a fact I was grateful for—instead broaching another topic.
“I’m going to drive Ryde to the ferry dock at Kingstown.”
“Good,” I said with feeling. He couldn’t be accosted inside Sidney’s motorcar like on the train, so that was one less thing to worry about.
“We’ll be leaving within the hour.”
I gestured toward the satchel lying on the table. “The documents are packed and ready. If I were him, I’d want to keep that on me at all times,” I added anxiously.
“I’m sure he will.”
I nodded, inhaling a steadying breath. Max was fully cognizant of how important his cargo was. He wouldn’t allow it to be taken from him. Not unless stopping any assailants became impossible.
Internally, I shook myself, refusing to entertain the possibility. I needed to think of something else. “You found the other guard? Alvin Martin?”
Sidney’s expression turned sour. “Yes. And after a few drinks he admitted he’d been bribed to be lax in his duties that evening.
” I turned to him excitedly to ask if Martin had recognized who bribed him, but by the look on Sidney’s face, I could tell the query was unnecessary.
“He claimed the man who bribed him was Harlow.”
I reared back slightly. “Was he being honest?”
He grimaced. “As drunk as Martin was, I don’t think he was capable of subterfuge.”
“But why would Harlow bribe him?” I asked in confusion.
“Maybe he didn’t want a witness to what he had to say to Ardmore. After all, it sounds as if he’d realized he’d been implicated in something illicit. Maybe he was worried about someone overhearing.”
“Then why not meet somewhere else? Like his home.”
Sidney’s expression turned grim. “I pondered the same thing. Which brought me to a different suspicion. Maybe Harlow intended to do something more drastic.”
My eyes widened. “You think Harlow intended to kill Ardmore?”
“I don’t know that he intended to take it that far. Maybe he merely hoped to threaten him. But whatever happened, it seems he provided his own killer, whether it was Ardmore or someone else, with the opportunity to escape.”
“I think I can at least confirm that Harlow meant to confront him,” I said, before relaying what Mrs. Harlow had told me about her husband’s warning and his intentions in meeting with Ardmore.