In fact, the soldiers seemed quite relaxed. ‘I suppose the threat’s over now,’ Rosie said. ‘All involved in it are either dead or behind bars. They have no reason to be alarmed.’

  ‘No, indeed,’ the friar said. ‘Nor the ordinary Dublin people either, thank God, and for all my admiration for the rebels there was much hardship and poverty during the uprising and it led to lawlessness. I’ve seen children searching the mounds of burned and bombed rubbish for anything useful, and the sweet shops and toy shops have been cleared of stock.

  ‘There was also great loss and tragedy amongst the ordinary people not involved at all. Men and women were taken prisoner by the army at Ballbridge and thirty-six people, men, women and children, were killed in a house in Haddington Road. A wee twelve-year-old boy was killed stone dead himself as he was giving a drink to a dying soldier.

  ‘I wonder if it will ever be the same,’ Father Joe continued pensively. ‘Some buildings are surely lost forever. The Hibernian Academy was burned and it had all the spring collection of paintings and other works of art, many of them just loaned. Only the good Lord knows what can be done about that. I imagine they’ll be insured. The worst of it is, they believe the curator, Mr Kavanagh, was burned to death in the building too. Then there were twenty horses belonging to Clery’s, the department store, burned to death. Only one escaped alive.’

  Rosie could imagine the terror of those horses. All animals were afraid of fire. She imagined their screams would rent the air and felt her stomach turn over with the horror of it all. Afterwards, the stink of burning horse flesh would have hung in the air. She wondered why the loss of those horses had affected her more than the deaths of human beings.

  There was silence as they walked along, each busy with their own thoughts. Father Joe branched away from the canal not long after they passed Richmond Barracks in to Cork Street, which led to Marrowbone Lane where he was able to point out the docks of the Grand Canal to Rosie before turning right into James Street. ‘It’s not far now,’ he said. ‘It’s in Inchicore Road just a little way along here.’

  Rosie nodded her head for she was too nervous to talk much and was having enough trouble putting one foot before the other when really she wanted to run the other way and pretend all this was a bad dream. But then they turned the corner and there it was, the massive structure, built of blue-grey brick. There were high walls surrounding it with coils of barbed wire on top of them.

  Rosie turned anguished eyes to the friar and her knees began to tremble. She felt weak with longing to see with her own eyes that Danny was alive, yet she was filled with fear at the thought of entering that forbidding place.

  Father Joe understood much of the thoughts stumbling through Rosie’s troubled mind and said gently, ‘Take heart, my dear. I am sure that Danny will be gladdened at the sight of you.’

  It was that thought which spurred her on, and so she took a deep breath yet she doubted she’d ever have plucked up the courage to go into that building alone.

  ELEVEN

  The door to the jail was arched and had a decoration of coiled sea serpents on the top of it but the entrance itself was fitted with a thick black grille. Father Joe pulled the bell pull and smiled encouragingly at Rosie.

  The man who came to open the door was fat and sloppily dressed, despite the uniform he wore which was stained and crumpled. A sizeable bunch of keys was attached to his belt and he used some of these to release the grille gates, opening them with a grating sound. ‘Good afternoon, Father,’ he said, ushering them into a small passage. ‘The Governor has been expecting you this long time.’

  ‘Yes, I’m sorry. I was unavoidably delayed,’ Father Joe replied. ‘I hope the Governor will have time now for a few words.’

  The man didn’t answer immediately, intent on securing the door. Rosie noticed that he first dragged the grille closed with a clang of metal and the steel door was slammed shut after it before it was also locked and barred.

  She was aware of the disturbing way the man was ogling her and she raised her chin and met his look steadily, determined not to show any reaction. Yet the whole place depressed and frightened her. She had the urge to beat on the gates and beg to be let out again into the fresh air, for there seemed little here and what there was was fetid and unsavoury.

  Before Rosie gave way to this impulse, she heard Father Joe say, ‘This young woman is looking for her husband, a Daniel Walsh. I believe you have him here.’

  The man looked at Rosie contemptuously and shrugged. ‘Might have. We have lots of prisoners here. Anyway,’ he added as his eyes slid over Rosie with scorn. ‘If she wants to visit, she’ll have to have a word with the Governor.’

  ‘Then maybe you could tell him that we’re here?’ Father Joe retorted crisply. ‘And we will ask him.’

  There was the merest of pauses before the man, sighing heavily said, ‘You’d better follow me.’

  The door the prison warder opened from the passage led to a steep flight of stairs and the two went up after the man. The power of the cloth, Rosie thought, and guessed that without the monk, she’d not have got half so far. As it was, Governor Greene said he would be pleased to see them and they were ushered into his office.

  A large wooden desk piled high with files dominated the room, with a bookshelf in one corner and a filing cabinet in the other. The governor greeted them at the door and bade them sit down in the chairs on the other side of the desk. He then sat down opposite them and asked Father Joe, ‘Have you come to talk to the groom?’

  Rosie remembered the monk saying that one of the prisoners wished to marry and he was going to officiate at the Nuptial Mass in the prison chapel.

  ‘Aye,’ Father Joe said. ‘I am doing that, all right, but I’m here for another reason too. This young woman,’ and he indicated Rosie as he spoke, ‘is looking for her husband, name of Daniel Walsh. I have reason to believe he is here?’

  ‘Let’s see, then,’ the Governor said. ‘I had a fair few in over the weekend. I haven’t the names of them all yet. Was your husband one of the rebels, madam?’ he demanded sternly.

  It was useless to deny it, to tell of his love of peace, of the charge his mother made on him to find Phelan and his own filial duty as the eldest in the family. She merely nodded. ‘Aye.’

  ‘One of those who killed and maimed and near burned the whole city to the ground, Mrs Walsh?’ the governor went on. ‘A place where decent people couldn’t go about their lives, get to their job of work, or buy food in the shops?’

  ‘Come, come,’ Father Joe chided. ‘None of this is Mrs Walsh’s fault. The family need news of him. Is he here or is he not?’

  Governor Greene looked down a list in the front of one of the files. ‘Aye,’ he said. ‘We have a Daniel Walsh here. He says his home is in Blessington, County Wicklow.’

  ‘Aye, that’s him.’ The cry burst from Rosie’s lips. ‘I’ve travelled from there today. Can I see him?’

  The governor seemed to give the matter some thought, leaning back in his chair and drumming his fingers together. It seemed an age before he said, ‘I should think that could be arranged. We have a room set aside. Come, I’ll show you the way and have your husband sent for.’

  Rosie stood up and bent to lift the basket Father Joe had placed on the floor beside his chair. The Governor had assumed it belonged to Father Joe, as he’d carried it in, but now he said to Rosie, ‘What’s this?’

  ‘It’s…it’s for Danny,’ Rosie said. ‘Some food his mother has packed from the farm and a clean shirt and jumper. I’m sure he has need of them.’

  The Governor took the basket from her and, placing it on the desk between them, peeled back the clothes laid on top. He couldn’t see all the food, but what he did see was good enough. His eyes widened with greed, his face taking on an almost lascivious look as he ran his tongue over his lips before saying, ‘You can leave this here. Visitors are not allowed to bring anything in that is not vetted. I’m sure you understand. I’ll see your husband gets the things later.’

  Rosie, looking at the man’s face, knew Danny would never even get a sniff of what was in that basket but she also knew she could do nothing about it. ‘Very well,’ she said. ‘Can I see him now?’

  She was eventually shown into a stark bare room, cut in half with a metal grid ending at a solid wooden counter that reached to the floor. On either side of the grid were set hard wooden chairs and Rosie sat down on one as the Governor indicated. She heard the click of the door as he left the room and she waited.

  Afterwards, she wasn’t sure how she prevented the cry from escaping from her lips when she saw Danny come in. He’d not shaved for a week and she’d half expected to see a beard and moustache forming. What she didn’t expect was the red-rimmed ravaged eyes, nor the split lip and vicious bruise scarring one side of his face. Nor did she expect his shambling gait, his hands manacled together, his arms folded across his stomach. His clothes were in tatters and stained with blood, sweat and dirt and a rancid smell emanated from him.

  Rosie hadn’t seen her husband for eight days, that was all. It might have been eight years, eighteen years, the change was so great. His voice when he spoke was husky. ‘Rosie, you shouldn’t have come here.’

  Rosie looked at the warder who’d followed Danny and stood by the door, his face implacable with eyes staring straight ahead, but able to listen to every word spoken. Well, she thought angrily, let him bloody well listen. ‘I had to come, Danny. We knew nothing and I was going mad with worry.’

  ‘Did Phelan make it back all right?’

  ‘Oh aye,’ Rosie said with bitterness. ‘He and Niall came home without a scratch. And your mother is killing the proverbial fatted calf as if he was some sort of favoured prodigal son.’

  ‘It’s her way.’

  ‘Aye, I know,’ Rosie said with a sigh. ‘He could tell us nothing of you. Nothing of any value for all he hung about in Dublin till the surrender. I wanted to kill him.’

  ‘I told him to go straight home. I knew you would be worried.’

  ‘Well the news he would have brought would hardly have made us worry less,’ Rosie said. ‘Oh, Danny, you’ve no idea what it was like. I love you so much and I couldn’t rest, none of us could, till we found out what had happened to you. And now to see you here like this…Oh, God, Danny. What happened to your face?’

  Danny was glad Rosie couldn’t see his bruised and battered body which was damaged far worse than his face. His eyes slid over the guard and he said with a shrug, ‘We lost.’

  Rosie didn’t pursue it. She’d seen the sideways look Danny had given and understood: she had no desire to make things worse, but she longed to put her arms around him, to put soothing salve on his bruised and grazed cheek, to look after him. It was breaking her heart to see him in such a place and in such a condition. ‘Oh, Danny,’ she said in a whisper. ‘I miss you.’

  ‘And I you. More than I can say,’ Danny replied, tears glittering in his eyes.

  Their hands on the counter moved towards the wire and their fingers touched softly beneath the tiny gap. ‘No contact,’ rapped out the warder. They sprang apart as if they’d been stung. Rosie valiantly swallowed the lump in her throat that was threatening to choke her and said, ‘Your mammy packed some things for you in a basket, and I put you in a clean shirt and jumper, but I had to leave it with the Governor.’

  ‘And that’s where it will stay,’ Danny said in a low voice. ‘But don’t worry about it. That’s the least of my problems.’

  ‘What will happen to you?’

  Danny shrugged. ‘Some of the leaders go for court martial tomorrow. They said they’ll be shot, but no-one knows for sure. When they’ve got rid of them, maybe they’ll start on us.’

  ‘Oh, God, Danny, no,’ Rosie cried brokenly for she couldn’t prevent the tears seeping from her eyes then and trickling over her cheeks. But hadn’t she faced this fact already? Even as the priest had given her hope that her husband was alive, his grave face and voice had spoken of further heartache to come. But now, to hear Danny speak of it so calmly…

  ‘Ssh, Rosie,’ Danny pleaded. ‘Don’t cry, please. I knew what I had to do and knew too that there could only be one outcome. I said that from the beginning.’

  ‘Phelan was a bloody little fool,’ Rosie said through her tears. ‘If I had him in front of me this minute, I would choke the life out of him and take pleasure in it.’

  ‘Ssh, Rosie, Rosie, don’t cry, please. This doesn’t help,’ Danny said. ‘We have to take the situation as it is. It’s you I worry about, you and wee Bernadette, and Daddy working the farm with only Phelan to help him, and Mammy fretting about me all the days of her life. These are the things that drive sleep from my mind at night.’

  ‘I can’t bear it, Danny.’

  ‘You must, because I can do nothing to change it,’ Danny said softly. He remembered telling Rosie once that she should fear nothing while he was with her. He’d promised her he’d never do anything to hurt her but now he found it hard to bear the helplessness reflected in her eyes. He shut his own eyes for a moment and then opened them and said, ‘Tell Sarah that Sam is in with me in this hell-hole, and Shay too.’

  ‘Time’s up!’

  There was so much Rosie still wanted to say. She wanted to tear down the grille and enfold her husband in her arms and tell him how much she loved him and would continue to love him till the very breath left her body.

  ‘Goodbye, Rosie.’

  ‘Can I not come again?’ Rosie asked bleakly.

  ‘It would serve no purpose,’ Danny said. ‘Go home and raise my daughter to be good and honest and upright and tell her of her father.’

  Danny was almost pulled from the room and Rosie’s last vision of him was through a mist of tears. She leaned her head on the counter and cried broken-heartedly.

  All the way back to the convent, Father Joe talked. He’d seen the sorrow etched on Rosie’s face and he knew it went too deep for her to make small talk for politeness’s sake. But he chatted away anyway as they walked back, that lovely, springtime evening.

  They were almost back in Baggot Street when Father Joe said. ‘Are you returning to Wicklow tonight?’

  ‘No,’ Rosie said. ‘Connie was certain the nuns would be able to find a room for me somewhere.’

  ‘They will, surely. You won’t be the first person they’ve sheltered,’ Father Joe said. ‘So you’ll go home tomorrow?’ he ventured, anxious that she spend no longer than she had to in Dublin.

  ‘Aye. Danny…well he doesn’t want me to visit any more. He…he says there’s no point.’

  ‘Write to him,’ Father Joe advised. ‘I’m sure he’d be glad of that.’

  ‘Aye, I will do that, Father,’ Rosie said. ‘And thank you for your kindness to me. I don’t think I’d have got so far without you.’

  The priest smiled. ‘Aye, God gives us some privileges,’ he said. ‘Now, go in and rest yourself – I’m sure you’re worn out with the emotion of today.’

  Rosie was bone-weary, but tired as she was, she didn’t want to go back to the convent just yet. She wanted to walk through the streets and see for herself the damage to the city, see what Danny had had to endure. It made her feel closer to him, somehow.

  She knew she’d probably never be allowed to wander free in this way without the priest as her escort and so she said, ‘I am tired, Father, you’re right, and low in spirits, but I have a yen to see the damage to the place and it will be what they’ll ask me about at home. Have you time to come with me?’

  Father Joe had a million and one things to attend to and had been wondering, as he’d walked back, how he’d fit them all in. But he felt sorry for Rosie and so he pushed his own concerns to the back of his mind and said. ‘I have nothing to do that won’t keep. I’m at your disposal, Mrs Walsh, and I’ll be happy to accompany you.’

  Rosie followed Father Joe as he turned away from the ‘House of Mercy’, back up Baggot Street, past the square where the army’s field gun still stood. It was silent now and guarded by soldiers who looked at them dispassionately as they passed, but didn’t challenge them.

  ‘We go up here,’ Father Joe said, turning left at the top of Merrion Street.

  As they walked on, the streets became more crowded and Rosie realised many were doing what she herself was: assessing the damage to their city. They continued up between Trinity College and the Bank of England and over the bridge spanning the grey, torrid River Liffey.

  Once over the bridge, Sackville Street was before them and Rosie was appalled at what she saw. The remains of a barricade stretched across the front of it, parts burned to cinders, so it was easy for them to clamber over. The street itself was full of rubble and charred beams, smashed roof tiles, cardboard boxes and glass that splintered under their feet. Over everything was the stench of smoke and cordite that swirled in the air and caught in Rosie’s throat when she breathed in.

  So much was destroyed and so many buildings reduced to piles of scorched and blackened masonry. And those not burned completely to the ground were locked up and barricaded to guard against looting.

  ‘See, that used to be Hopkins, a silversmiths,’ Father Joe said, pointing to a pile of masonry debris littering the pavement. ‘And that,’ he said, pointing, ‘was once the Hibernian Hotel.’ Rosie noted the buckled iron girders were the only things left of it, sticking up through the mounds of rubble.

  The Post Office was a burned-out shell. Some walls were still standing but looked as if a sudden push would send them toppling over, and many had giant holes in them. Inside were piles of debris and the acrid stink of burning lodged in Rosie’s nostrils as she looked about in amazement. ‘At one time, Dublin was burning from Talbot Street down to the Quays,’ said Father Joe, waving his hand to the right. ‘Once these used to be buildings, shops, houses; now there’s precious little left.’