1949 (9 page)

Louise Hamilton put her hands on her hips in disgust. “What good did learning them fine manners do you? You should have invited that young man into the parlor, Ursula, and him after bringing you in a taxi on such a cold evening. I made sticky toffee pudding earlier,” she said unnecessarily. The smell of burnt sugar lingered on the air. “You could have offered him some instead of slamming the door in his face.”

“I did no such thing, Louise. I just didn't ask him in.”

“And why not? A nice young man with a pensionable job. It's time you were thinking of your future, as Mr. Hamilton remarked just the other day.”

“When I was a little girl,” said Ursula, “I dreamed I would marry Uncle Henry.”

“That's all very well, since he's not really related to you. But he's taken so.”

“He is,” Ursula acknowledged tonelessly. “Henry is taken.”

 

According to the 1926 census the Free State had the highest proportion of unmarried people in Western Europe. More than 50 percent of those between twenty-five and forty would spend the rest of their lives single. Mass emigration and a stern Catholicism that condemned sensuality and forbade sex for any reason other than procreation within marriage were largely responsible.

Finbar Cassidy was not easily discouraged. At the weekend he called on Ursula and invited her to the cinema. She meant to refuse, but it was simpler just to say yes.
We've already attended a concert together. What harm can there be in going to a film?

Outside the theater Finbar bought her a vanilla ice cream and teased her about a smear of cream on the end of her nose. Ursula's smile was so magical it made his heart leap.

Yet in unguarded moments he glimpsed a lurking sadness in the girl.

A fortnight later he accompanied her on a tour of Dublin's museums. The various collections were much as the departing British had left them, only shabbier. The government had no money to spare for items it deemed nonessential. It pained Ursula to see Ireland's cultural heritage gathering dust.
We wrested our treasures out of the lion's paw…for this?

Afterward they paused in St. Stephen's Green to rest. Sitting upright on a park bench with her hands folded and her eyes downcast, Ursula reminded Finbar of a grave, quiet child who expects the worst.

He resolved to make her smile more. From then on, whenever they went out together he regaled her with jokes and funny anecdotes. When she laughed he felt as if she had given him a present.

 

Ursula found Finbar as comfortable to be with as an old friend, but he was also, she concluded, an amiable lightweight who never entertained a serious thought. She could not imagine him being willing to die for Ireland.

Finbar Cassidy did not compare to the pantheon of heroes in her heart.

When he asked Ursula to go to Mass with him she declined. Attending Mass with a young man implied a possible future together, and there could be none. After that she was always busy when he invited her out. Eventually he stopped calling.

 

Most single Irish women—and a surprising number of married ones—were ignorant of the mechanics of reproduction. But Ursula had spent her adolescence on a farm. When neighboring farmers brought their mares to Saoirse for breeding, she had held the stallion's lead shank because no one else could control him. She had watched him mount his mares. Watched the plunging hindquarters, the thrusting, giant phallus. Smelt the heated musk. Felt passion vibrate down the lead shank into her hand.

And wondered…

 

Sometimes Ursula took out the only picture she had of Síle Halloran, a photograph of herself and Ned together. Called a “cabinet portrait,” the glossy sepia print revealed two young people uncomfortable at the camera's scrutiny, leaning against one another as if for support. When they were together a golden circle seemed to surround them, shutting everyone else out.

Ned had changed almost beyond recognition since that picture was taken. But Síle Halloran was frozen in time. Solid cheekbones. Eyes slanted like a cat's. A wide, sensuous mouth.

The little girl called Precious had overheard someone say, “That Síle's a man's woman and no mistake.”

A man's woman
.

 

On Saturday afternoons Ursula's female contemporaries went to the cinema together to weep over the latest romance from Hollywood. In the evenings they met at one another's homes for card parties and sandwiches filled with Galtee cheese and sliced celery. Mostly they talked about their husbands' faults—or about finding husbands.

Ursula accepted one or two such invitations, struggled to conceal her boredom, and never went again.

Instead she began attending the meetings of Dublin's Republican women, making friends among the generation that had taken an active part in 1916. Women like Geraldine Plunkett Dillon, Helena Moloney, and Kathleen Clarke. The gunwomen, as P.S. O'Hegarty called them.

Their dreams were Ursula's dream; they spoke a language she understood.

In her journal the adult Ursula wrote: “Maud Gonne's marriage to John MacBride collapsed. Constance Markievicz separated from her husband. There are women who need something larger than marriage. I am one of those women.”

I am one of those women
.

Ursula Halloran was consciously inventing herself.

 

5 January 1928
STALIN EXILES KEY OPPOSITION FIGURES
Joseph Stalin now holds all reins of power in the Soviet Union

2RN extended its range of offerings. As the small orchestra expanded there was more music than ever, although no songs relating to the Great War were played. They were perceived as “British”—or as too painful to the sensibilities of Irish people who had lost menfolk in that war.

Other programs included Spanish for beginners, vocal impressions of famous people, and information about the care of animals. A debate between George Bernard Shaw and G.K. Chesterton was rebroadcast courtesy of the BBC. Mrs. Sidney Czira, another of Grace Gifford's sisters, presented a popular series entitled
The Ballad History of Ireland
under the pseudonym of John Brennan. She had been a contributor to the station since its very beginning.

In May of 1928 Seán T. O'Kelly spoke heatedly in the Dáil about John Brennan. Her contract for broadcasting had been broken because one of her letters was published in the newspapers. The letter expressed her political opinions, O'Kelly said, which were not the same as his, but he strongly disapproved of depriving her of part of her livelihood for simply expressing her opinion.
¹

Ursula volunteered for every job that came up within the station and offered numerous ideas for new programs. Other women were presenting cozily domestic radio shows.
Drawing and Painting for Children
was one of 2RN's most successful offerings. Ursula's suggested programs were intended for a wider audience with a more international view. To buttress her position she quoted the editor and poet George Russell, better known as AE: “Nationalism in every country requires a strong admixture of internationalism to prevent it becoming a stupefying drug.”

Séamus Clandillon listened patiently to her arguments. Ursula had a sense of being patted on the head, like a child who has done a clever trick but is not allowed to take part in grown-up conversation. Her suggestions were not accepted.

Instead she was moved to the front of the office to greet visitors with her smile.

 

“We are going to have a new Republican newspaper in a year or so!” an excited Ursula wrote to Henry Mooney. “You should have stayed in Ireland. Eamon de Valera and several of his supporters intend to establish a daily called the
Irish Press
. They are offering share subscriptions in all the Dublin papers except the
Irish Independent
, which refused to accept the advertisement.
²
I pawned Saoirse's saddle and bought five shares myself. Your Little Business is now a woman of property.”

 

On the thirtieth of July, 1928, the Irish tricolor was raised for the first time at the Olympic Games in Amsterdam. Competing in the hammer throw, Dr. Pat O'Callaghan became the first citizen of an independent Ireland to win a gold medal in the Olympics.

When the news reached Ireland, Ursula Halloran, who hated all domestic chores, sewed in her room all night with the door locked. When she was satisfied with the result she folded a heap of fabric, wrapped it in brown paper, and slipped out of the house shortly before dawn.

Dubliners on their way to work that morning were greeted by a banner on the front gates of Trinity College, bastion of Anglicized education. Made of white cloth trimmed in green-and-orange ribbon, the banner proclaimed in bold letters: “Congratulations Pat O'Callaghan, first Olympian of the Irish Republic!” The banner was torn down, but not before a number of people saw it.

 

Hector Hamilton bought a wireless set for number 16, and Louise installed it in a place of honor in the parlor. The wet battery had to be carried to a garage for recharging. Fourpence was set aside for this purpose, saved in a jam jar on the mantle until required.

Ursula hurried home from work each day to join Louise and Hector in front of the set. While the women watched, Hector fiddled authoritatively with the cats-whiskers antenna. They crowded close to him to share the sounds leaking from the headset, which he controlled by virtue of being the man in the house. Sometimes the crackle was so loud nothing else was audible, but on rainy evenings Ireland's despised weather was an excellent conductor. Then there could be a few hours of magic.

The evening broadcast opened with a stock exchange list, brief news bulletin, and weather report. Few in Ireland knew anything about the stock exchange, but everyone was obsessed with the weather. News was the station's weakest element. Information was haphazardly gathered from the Dublin evening papers and BBC broadcasts.

At the start of one evening's program in late May it was announced that the governor-general, Tim Healy, would be giving a talk on air later. Ursula made a wry face and stood up to leave the room.

“Where are you going?” asked Louise.

“I want to be well away before Healy starts talking. He's nothing but a puppet of the British.”

“Well, I want to hear him,” declared Hector. The dentist was an unprepossessing little man teetering on the far rim of middle age, a compulsive talker who had discovered that the wireless gave him additional topics for conversation. When he had patients helpless in the chair, he could hold forth as never before.

Ursula left the room, muttering under her breath, “
Is binn béal ina thost
.”
^*

Healy did not speak that night after all. The news ran over time; even the weather would be cut short. “Ursula, come back and hear this!” Louise called up the stairs.

Ursula returned to the parlor. Hector gave her the headset just as Séumas Hughes said, “Gangs of loyalists in Belfast are putting Catholic neighborhoods to the torch. Early this morning a young mother who fled from her blazing home with her infant in her arms was stoned in the road. To the accompaniment of taunts and jeers from the loyalists, the child was battered to death together with its mother.”

Ursula related his words verbatim to the other two.

“Monsters!” gasped Louise.

“Hooligans,” said the more temperate Hamilton, “who are an insult to the name of loyalism. I cannot believe His Majesty would ever condone…”

Incandescent with anger, Ursula whirled around and ran back up the stairs.

In one corner of her room was a carefully loosened skirting board. Behind it, chiseled into the plaster, was a recess. She eased the skirting board away from the wall and reached into the recess. Her fingers touched the reassuring surface of a Mauser semiautomatic.

The gun had once belonged to Síle Halloran, who had purchased it to replace a Luger confiscated by the British. When Henry Mooney set off to report on the War of Independence, Ursula had sneaked her mama's pistol into his luggage to keep him safe.

Henry had never spoken of it to the girl, never even mentioned he had the gun or guessed where it came from. But when he packed Ursula's belongings and sent them to number 16 while she was in Switzerland, he had included the Mauser.

She knelt on the floor for a long time, holding the gun. Turning it over and over in her hands. Fascinated by its singularity of purpose.

If I had stayed with Papa in Clare I could be wherever he is now. We would be fighting together to protect our people
.

She had no doubt that Ned Halloran was in the north. Once she could have found him easily. As a wild young girl who galloped her horse across Clare with vital messages tucked into her knickers, she had been a trusted part of the IRA communications network. Between then and now lay a stretch of years. Both Ursula and Ireland had changed. The old contacts were broken.

If she asked Clandillon for time off he would give her a few days. But even if she could find Ned, he might not want her with him. She recalled all too well their last meeting. Ned Halloran was unpredictable, capable of violence.

It's a risk worth taking
.

Ursula's spirit leaped from her body and ran out into the street brandishing a pistol.

Her body did not follow. Her physical self remained in the room.

She felt like a piece of paper being torn in two.

At last she put the Mauser back into its hiding place. For a long time she stood at the window, gloomily staring down at the street. A fine mist had begun falling. The mellow light of street lamps glinted on timeworn cobblestones. Walking along the pavement was a member of the Garda Síochána
^*
doing his rounds.

The Garda Síochána had been developed from the Royal Irish Constabulary, which was disbanded in 1922. Many members of the RIC were on the organizing committee of the new police service. There was no mention of “Royal” in the title. This was to be a new police force for a new Ireland. Although some civilians joined, preferential recruitment had been given to members of the Free State army. After the Civil War the
gardai
, or guards, were distributed throughout the country to keep the peace of the fledgling state.

Their uniforms were totally distinct from those of the old RIC. They consisted of fitted tunic and trousers of navy blue worsted woven in Ireland, with a stiff collar, snug leather belt and smart cap that bore no resemblance to the intimidating spiked helmet of their predecessors.

The largest change was in the matter of weaponry. It was felt that Ireland had suffered far too much from the consequence of armed force. With some reluctance the late Kevin O'Higgins had created a separate department known as Special Branch that was trained in the use of firearms, but they were to be employed only in exceptional situations. Ordinary members of the Garda Síochána were unarmed.

Feeling eyes upon him, the young garda in the street looked up. He could see Ursula silhouetted against the gaslight in her room. He paused long enough to touch the brim of his cap to her, then went on his way.

Her eyes followed the man until he vanished into a pool of night between the street lamps.
What sort of courage
, she wondered,
must a man have to face the darkness without weapons?