The Rebels of Ireland (12 page)

“This…is…my…bed.”

“Bed?” This was a new consideration. “Is it a bed you have there?” Tadhg might despise the presumed decadence of his kinsman Brian when it came to feather beds, but at this moment, the prospect of sharing a comfortable bed rather than the hard floor seemed to him a good one. Entering now, and closing the door behind him, he made his way with surprising accuracy to the bed and stretched out his hand to where, shrinking in disgust and some terror from him, Doctor Pincher had inadvertently supplied the very space he was seeking. “There now,” he said companionably, “there's room enough for the two of us.”

And he would have fallen asleep at once beside the startled preacher if a sudden curiosity had not seized him. Who might this English stranger be who was given a chamber to himself at the wake of O'Byrne of Rathconan?

“A fine man,” he opined into the inky darkness. “There's no question, Toirdhealbhach O'Byrne was a fine man.” He paused, expecting some response, but the stranger beside him was as silent as the corpse below. “Had you known him long?” he enquired.

“I did not know him at all,” said Pincher's voice, coldly.

It was clear to Pincher that his life was not in any immediate danger from this loathsome figure. The main question in his mind was whether to get off the bed and sleep on the hard floor himself, or to remain where he was and endure the closeness, and the smell, of his presence.

“But you came to his wake from respect, no doubt,” said Tadhg. English or not, one couldn't deny that this was a proper if unusual thing to do. “Would you mind if I ask your name? Myself being Tadhg O'Byrne,” he obligingly supplied.

Why was it, Pincher wondered, that these Irish must have such barbarous names? The sound of them—Tighe O'Byrne beside him, Turlock O'Byrne the corpse below—was bad enough; their spellings, Tadhg and Toirdhealbhach, defied all reason. He placed a silent curse upon them all. He certainly had no wish to engage in conversation with Tadhg; on the other hand, if he refused to reply, it might make the creature angry.

“I am Doctor Simeon Pincher, of Trinity College, Dublin,” he said reluctantly.

“Of Trinity College?” An Englishman and a heretic, therefore. But a scholar, perhaps, all the same. “You'd be learned, I dare say,” he ventured, “in Latin and Greek?”

“I lecture in Greek,” Pincher said firmly, “in logic and in theology. I preach at Christ Church. I am a fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge.” He hoped this impressive list might reduce his unwelcome companion to silence.

Tadhg might have little use for Englishmen and heretics, but he was impressed. This was a gentleman and a scholar, a learned man who had come all the way from Dublin to pay his respects to a leading O'Byrne. Courtesy was due. He lay there in silence, wondering what he should say to such a distinguished person. And as he did so, a further thought occurred to him. Here was an important man of learning sharing a bed with him, and no doubt imagining that he, Tadhg O'Byrne, was a poor sort of fellow. He owed it to himself to let the stranger know that he, too, was a person of some account. Not his equal in learning, to be sure, but a gentleman like himself at least.

“And you wouldn't know, I don't suppose, who I might be?” he suggested.

“I suppose not,” sighed Doctor Pincher.

“Yet it's myself,” Tadhg announced proudly, “that is the rightful heir to Rathconan.”

The effect of this statement was highly satisfactory. He felt the doctor's body give a small start in the bed.

“But I understood that Brian…”

“Ah.” Now Tadhg bent to his theme. “He has it. That he has. But has he the right to it?” He paused to let the question establish itself in the surrounding dark. “He has not. It's myself that is in the senior line, you see. His family took it, but they've no right to it. Their claim is false,” he ended triumphantly.

The fact that under the very law, that ancient Irish law and custom, which he so ardently defended, Brian's ancestors had been rightfully chosen and his own rejected, the fact that as a good Irishman he had no claim to Brian's position whatever and that any good Irishman would have told him so in no uncertain terms, and the even more astounding fact that it was only under the English law, not the Irish, that the claim of the eldest son had any particular significance—all these facts had miraculously been dissolved in the blackness of the night, or rather, they had been hastily buried underground by Tadhg, like a criminal burying a body.

“So you mean,” Pincher sought to clarify, “that Brian O'Byrne does not in fact possess a clear title to this property?”

“He does not. Under English law.” He did not like to say it, but he knew that this would be the way to impress a Trinity College man. “Under the king's law, he's no right to it at all. It's myself who is the rightful heir.”

“That,” said Doctor Pincher, “is very interesting. I think,” he added after a short pause, “that I should like to go to sleep.”

And Tadhg O'Byrne, having made his point to his own satisfaction, was contented enough to fall into unconsciousness, which he did immediately. But Pincher did not sleep. He had no wish to sleep just yet. Instead, he lay there thinking. The information he had just received, if correct, was highly significant. Not, of course, that the disgusting wretch lying beside him would ever derive any benefit
from it. God forbid. But if the kindly young man who had welcomed him to his house had any sort of defective title to the property, there were legal ways in which he might be dispossessed. Pincher wondered if anyone else in Dublin knew about this. Possibly not. The value of an estate like Rathconan would be many times greater than the profits he had in prospect down in Munster, no matter how closely the oak trees grew.

He wondered how he might turn this unexpected news to his advantage.

For some time now, it had seemed to Orlando that his father was out of sorts. He was conscious of these small changes of mood because he saw his father almost every day.

Though he was sixteen, Orlando was still at home. Martin Walsh had quietly resisted the several attempts of Lawrence to have Orlando sent to Salamanca. “No, I'd rather have him with me,” he would say. “He can get a fair education from the teachers we have here. I shall teach him the law myself.” Once, overhearing an argument between his brother and his father, Orlando had heard his father declare: “Have a care, Lawrence. The government men in Dublin Castle are suspicious of foreign colleges. My loyalty is not in question, but remember that there are men in the Castle who would like to forbid Catholic lawyers to practice. They already know very well that you're a Jesuit. As it's Orlando who will inherit this estate after I am gone, it may be wiser that they don't see him going off to a seminary. It's better they see him safely at my side.” Orlando heard Lawrence murmur something in reply, but could not make out the words. He did hear his father answer, very firmly: “I think not. Speak of it no more.”

Martin Walsh usually went into Dublin to transact business a day or two each week. Quite often, he would take Orlando with him, and it was easy to see, wherever he went, how much his honest, cautious father was liked and respected.

“A lawyer,” Martin would tell him, “comes to know a great many men's secrets. But men must know they can trust him with their confidences. A lawyer knows everything, Orlando, but tells nothing. Remember that.”

Sometimes, he would genially point to a pretty girl and ask Orlando if he'd like to marry her. This had fallen into a comfortable routine. Orlando would always say that she wasn't pretty enough and tell his father he'd have to do better. Then his father would ask him how many children he wanted. “Six boys and six girls: a round dozen,” he'd say. And Martin would look pleased.

Often as not, they would call in on his sister. Anne had three girls already, and they still hoped for a boy, whom they would call Maurice. She had filled out a little since her marriage, and she was always busy with her household and her children, but in other ways it seemed to Orlando that she was still the same. Her husband Walter had proved to be a great success. The older Orlando grew, the more he liked him. A kindly, manly fellow, he was obviously devoted to Anne. Though it was certain that he would one day inherit a large fortune from his father, old Peter Smith would proudly say: “He's no need of me, though. He's already a man of substance on his own account.” Old Peter Smith preferred to spend his time out at the estate he held in Fingal, but Walter and Anne spent most of the time in the city with their children. They had a handsome, gabled house on Saint Nicholas Street near the old Tholsel town hall. The only subject that was never mentioned was the drowning of Patrick Smith. But Orlando felt sure that his sister must be happy with her life now, even so.

It would be at the end of the day, sometimes, after they had ridden back to the house in Fingal, that Orlando would notice his father looking a little tired and depressed. He supposed it might just be fatigue after the long hours of business. Martin's hair was mostly grey now. When he sat in his chair in the evening and gazed down thoughtfully at the floor, it couldn't be denied that his face looked somewhat haggard and older. Occasionally, Orlando would observe
him suddenly wince and shake his head. But then, when he rose from this chair, Orlando would see him straighten his back, take a deep breath, push out his chest, and give himself a little nod of approval. And then he would reassure himself that his father was still strong and would be with him for many a year.

It was unusual for his father to conduct Dublin business out at the house, so Orlando was surprised one evening, as they were riding home, when his father remarked: “I have received a message from Doctor Pincher. He wishes to call upon me tomorrow morning. On a private matter, he says.” Though he had only occasionally caught sight of the tall, thin doctor of Trinity College, the black image of Pincher crossing the Plain of Bird Flocks the evening before Anne departed for the seminary was still indelibly imprinted on his mind. “What did he want?” he asked his father. “I have no idea,” Walsh replied.

It was with great curiosity, therefore, that, just before eleven o'-clock the next day, Orlando watched as the single horseman, thin as a quill and dressed in black, drew up the sunlit path to the house. There he was greeted by his father, who took him inside. He wished he could have gone in with them to listen.

The two men sat opposite each other across a table. Walsh, comfortably dressed in a spruce-green doublet, looked exactly the member of the gentry that he was. Doctor Pincher was all in black, except for a narrow white collar with the thinnest possible embroidery of lace.

“I came to ask if you would act for me,” he began, “in a matter that I wish to be secret.”

“Such requests are not unusual,” Walsh answered easily. “But we have never had dealings before.”

“You are surprised, perhaps, that I should entrust such a matter to…” He hesitated.

“A Catholic?”

“Indeed.” Pincher inclined his head politely. For though he had no doubt that his Protestant faith made him, in God's eyes, the superior of the papist, Pincher could not help being uncomfortably aware that Walsh was by birth the lauded gentleman which he was not.

“I am glad to entrust myself to a Catholic lawyer, Sir,” he allowed himself a smile, “though I might hesitate to go to a Catholic surgeon.” It was not often that Doctor Pincher made a joke; but this was one of them.

Walsh did his best to smile.

“Please proceed,” he said.

“It is a question of title,” Pincher began.

His journey down into Munster had been a great success. The living with its small church and smaller house was perfect. He could preach there now and then, and put a poor curate in to take care of the daily ministry. But the land was excellent. He had found agents who would cut the trees and carry the timber down to the coast for shipment. The prices offered were excellent. It was clear to him that shipping even half the woodland would yield him a handsome profit. Nor had he had any difficulty in recommending himself to Boyle, who had already been assured by the doctor's obliging friends at Christ Church and Trinity that Pincher was, indeed, just the sort of godly man to be encouraged. He had secured the living at once. But the prospect of this God-given increase in his wealth, the new and brighter light it shed upon his life, had strengthened his faith and given him courage to aim at even higher things.