"I know what I'll do," thought Shelagh, "I'll go and wash my hair."
It was frequently a remedy when all else failed. She walked along the corridor, passing the door with the words "Control Room" upon it. She could hear the murmur of voices from within. Then Nick laughed, and she hurried past in case the door opened and she was caught trying to eavesdrop. The door did open, when she was safely on her way, and glancing back over her shoulder she saw a boy come out, one of those who had been helping to uncover the cairn that morning. She remembered his mop of light hair. He couldn't be more than eighteen. They were all young, now she came to think of it. All except Nick himself, and Bob. She passed through the swing door to her own room and sat down on her bed, stunned by a new idea that had suddenly come to her.
Nick was a homo. They were all homos. That was why Nick had been sacked from the Navy. Her father had found out, couldn't pass him for promotion, and Nick had borne a grudge ever afterwards. Perhaps, even, the dates she had copied from the list referred to times when Nick had got into trouble. The photograph was a blind--homos often tried to cover themselves by pretending they were married. Oh, not Nick... It was the end. She couldn't bear it. Why must the only attractive man she had ever met in her life have to be like it? God damn and blast them all, stripped to the waist there down by that megalithic tomb. They were probably doing the same in the Control Room now. There was no point in anything anymore. No sense in her mission. The sooner she left the island and flew back home the better.
She turned the taps in her washbasin, and plunged her head into the water furiously. Even the soap--Aegean Blue--was far too exotic for a normal man to have under his roof. She dried her hair, twisting the towel round it turban fashion, tore off her jeans and put on another pair. They didn't look right. She dragged on her traveling skirt instead. "That will show him I've no desire to go around aping boys."
There was a tap at her door.
"Come in," she said savagely.
It was Bob. "Excuse me, miss, the Commander would like to see you in the Control Room."
"I'm sorry, he'll have to wait. I've just washed my hair."
The steward coughed. "I wouldn't advise you, miss, to keep the Commander waiting."
He could not have been more courteous, and yet... There was something implacable about his square, stocky frame.
"Very well," said Shelagh. "The Commander must put up with my appearance, that's all."
She stalked along the corridor after him, the twisted turban giving her the appearance of a Bedouin sheik.
"Beg pardon," murmured the steward, and tapped on the door of the Control Room. "Miss Blair to see you, sir," he announced.
She was ready for anything. Young men sprawling in the nude on bunks. Joss sticks burning. Nick, as Master of Ceremonies, directing unspeakable operations. Instead, she saw the seven young men seated round a table, Nick at the head of it. An eighth man was sitting in the corner with headphones over his ears. The seven at the table stared at her, then averted their gaze. Nick raised his eyebrows briefly, then picked up a piece of paper. She recognized it as the list with the dates upon it that had been missing from her tourist guide.
"I apologize for interrupting the haute coiffure," he said, "but these gentlemen and I would like to know the significance of these dates that you were carrying in your tourist guide."
Obey the well-tried maxim. Attack is the best form of defense.
"That is exactly what I would have asked you, Commander Barry, had you granted me an interview. But I dare say you would have avoided the question. They obviously have great significance for you, otherwise your gentlemen friends would never have pinched them in the first place."
"Fair enough," he said. "Who gave you the list?"
"It was with the other papers which the office gave me when I was put onto this job. They were just part of the briefing."
"You mean the editorial office of Searchlight?"
"Yes."
"Your assignment was to write an article about a retired naval officer--myself--and describe how he filled his time, hobbies, etc?"
"That's right."
"And other members of the staff were to write similar articles about other ex-Service officers?"
"Yes. It sounded a bright idea. Something new."
"Well, I'm sorry to spoil your story, but we've checked with the editor of Searchlight, and not only have they no intention of publishing such a series of articles, but they don't possess a Miss Jennifer Blair even among the most junior members of their staff."
She might have known it. His contacts among the press. Pity she wasn't a journalist. Whatever it was he was trying to hide would win her a fortune if it was published in one of the Sunday newspapers.
"Look," she said, "this is a delicate matter. Could I possibly speak to you alone?"
"Very well," Nick said, "if you prefer it."
The seven rose to their feet. They were a tough-looking bunch. She supposed that was the way he liked it.
"If you don't mind," Nick added, "the wireless operator has to stay at his post. Messages are continually coming through. He won't hear anything you say."
"That's all right," she said.
The seven young men shuffled from the room, and Nick leaned back in his chair. The bright blue eye never wavered from her face.
"Take a seat and fire away," he said.
Shelagh sat down in one of the vacant seats, conscious suddenly of the twisted towel round her head. It could hardly add to her dignity. Never mind. It was his dignity she hoped to shatter now. She would tell the truth up to a certain point, them improvise, wait for his reaction.
"The Searchlight editor was perfectly right," she began, drawing a deep breath. "I've never worked for them, or for any other magazine. I'm not a journalist, I'm an actress, and few people on the stage have heard of me either, as yet. I'm a member of a young theater group. We travel a lot, and we've just succeeded in getting our own theater in London. If you want to check up on that you can. It's the New World Theatre, Victoria, and everybody there knows Jennifer Blair. I'm booked to play the lead in their forthcoming series of Shakespearean comedies."
Nick smiled. "That's more like it. Congratulations."
"You can keep them for the opening night," she replied, "which will be in about three weeks' time. The director and the rest of the group know nothing about this business, they don't even know I'm here in Ireland. I'm here as the result of a bet."
She paused. This was the tricky part.
"A boyfriend of mine, nothing to do with the theater, has naval connections. That list of dates came into his hands, with your name scribbled beside it. He knew it must signify something, but didn't know what. We got slightly lit up one evening after dinner, and he bet me twenty-five quid, plus expenses, that I wasn't a good enough actress to pose as a journalist and bounce you into an interview just for the hell of it. Done, I told him. And that's why I'm here. I must admit I hadn't expected to be hijacked onto an island as part of the experience. I was slightly shaken last night to find the list had been pinched from my tourist guide. So, I told myself, then the dates did stand for something which wouldn't bear reporting. They were all in the fifties, around the time you retired from the Navy, according to the naval list which I ran to earth in a public library. Now, candidly, I don't give a damn what those dates signify, but, as I said before, they obviously mean a lot to you, and I wouldn't mind betting something pretty shady too, not to say illegal."
Nick tilted his chair, rocking it gently to and fro. The eye shifted, examined the ceiling. He was evidently at a loss for an answer, which suggested her arrow had scored a bull's-eye.
"It depends," he said softly, "what you call shady. And illegal. Opinions differ. You might be considerably shocked by actions for which my young friends and I find perfect justification."
"I'm not easily shocked," said Shelagh.
"No, I gathered that. The trouble is, I have to convince my associates that such is indeed the case. What hap
pened in the fifties does not concern them--they were children at the time--but what we do jointly today concerns all of us very much indeed. If any leak of our actions reached the outside world we should, as you rightly surmise, find ourselves up against the law."
He got up and began to straighten the papers on his table. So, Shelagh thought, whatever illegal practices her father had suspected Nick of, he was still engaged in them, here in Ireland. Smuggling archaeological finds to the U.S.A.? Or had her hunch this evening been correct? Could Nick and his bunch of friends be homosexual? Eire made so much fuss about morality that anything of the kind might well be against the law. It was obvious he wouldn't let on about it to her.
Nick went and stood beside the man with the headphones, who was writing something on a pad. Some message, she supposed. Nick read it, and scribbled something himself in answer. Then he turned back to Shelagh.
"Would you like to see us in action?" he asked.
She was startled. She had been prepared for anything when she came into the Control Room, but to be asked point blank...
"What do you mean?" she asked defensively.
Her turban had slipped onto the floor. He picked it up and handed it to her.
"It would be an experience," he said, "you are never likely to have again. You won't have to take part in it. The display will be at a distance. Very stimulating. Very discreet."
He was smiling, but there was something disconcerting in the smile. She backed away from him towards the door. She had a sudden vision of herself seated somewhere in the woods, by that prehistoric grave, perhaps, unable to escape, while Nick and the young men performed some ancient and unspeakable rite.
"Quite honestly...," she began, but he interrupted her, still smiling.
"Quite honestly, I insist. The display will be an education in itself. We shall proceed part of the way by boat, and then take to the road."
He threw open the door. The men were lined up in the corridor, Bob among them.
"No problem," he said. "Miss Blair will give no trouble. Action stations."
They began to file away down the corridor. Nick took Shelagh by the arm and propelled her towards the swing door leading to his own quarters.
"Get your coat, and a scarf, if you have one. It may be cold. Look sharp."
He disappeared into his own room. When she came out again into the corridor he was waiting for her, wearing a high-necked jersey and a windcheater. He was looking at his watch.
"Come on," he said.
The men had all vanished, except the steward. He was standing at the entrance to the galley door, the little dog in his arms.
"Good luck, sir," he said.
"Thank you, Bob. Two lumps of sugar for Skip, no more."
He led the way down the narrow path through the woods to the boathouse. The engine of the launch was humming gently. There were only two men on board, Michael and the young man with the mop of hair. "Sit in the cabin and stay there," Nick told Shelagh. He himself moved to the controls. The launch began to slip away across the lake, the island disappearing astern. Shelagh soon lost direction, seated as she was inside the cabin. The mainland was a distant blur, coming close at times and then receding, but none of it taking shape under the dark sky. Sometimes, as she peered through the small porthole, they passed so near to a bank that the launch almost brushed the reeds, and then a moment afterwards there was nothing but water, black and still, save for the white foam caused by the bow's thrust. The engine was barely audible. Nobody spoke. Presently the gentle throbbing ceased--Nick must have nosed his craft into shallow water beside a bank. He lowered his head into the cabin and held out his hand to her.
"This way. You'll get your feet wet, but it can't be helped."
She could see nothing around her but water and reeds and sky. She stumbled after him on the soggy ground, clinging to his hand, the fair boy just ahead, the mud oozing through her shoes. They were leading her onto some sort of track. A shape loomed out of the shadows. It looked like a van, and a man she did not recognize was standing beside it. He opened the van door. Nick got in first, dragging Shelagh after him. The fair boy went round to the front beside the driver, and the van lurched and lumbered up the track until, topping what seemed to be a rise, it came to a smooth surface that must be road. She tried to sit upright, and banged her head against a shelf above her. Something rattled and shook.
"Keep still," said Nick. "We don't want all the bread down on top of us."
"Bread?"
It was the first word she had spoken since leaving the island. He flicked on a lighter, and she saw that the partition between themselves and the driver was shut. All around them were loaves of bread, neatly stacked upon shelves, and cakes, pastries, confectionery, and tinned goods as well.
"Help yourself," he told her. "It's the last meal you'll get tonight."
He put out his arm and seized a loaf, then broke it in two. He flicked off the lighter, leaving them in darkness again. I couldn't be more helpless, she thought, if I were riding in a hearse.
"Have you stolen the van?" she asked.
"Stolen it? Why the hell should I steal a van? It's on loan from the grocer in Mulldonagh. He's driving it himself. Have some cheese. And a spot of this." He put a flask to her lips. The neat spirit nearly choked her, but gave warmth and courage at the same time. "Your feet must be wet. Take your shoes off. And fold up your jacket under your head. Then we can really get down to it."
"Down to what?"
"Well, we've a drive of some thirty-six miles before we reach the border. A smooth road all the way. I propose to scalp you."
She was traveling by sleeper back to boarding school in the north of England. Her father was waving goodbye to her from the platform. "Don't go," she called out, "don't ever leave me." The sleeper dissolved, became a dressing room in a theater, and she was standing before the looking glass dressed as Cesario in Twelfth Night. Sleeper and dressing room exploded...
She sat up, bumped her head on the rack of loaves. Nick was no longer with her. The van was stationary. Something had awakened her, though, from total blackout--they must have burst a tire. She could see nothing in the darkness of the van, not even the face of her watch. Time did not exist. It's body chemistry, she told herself, that's what does it. People's skins. They either blend or they don't. They either merge and melt into the same texture, dissolve and become renewed, or nothing happens, like faulty plugs, blown fuses, switchboard jams. When the thing goes right, as it has for me tonight, then it's arrows splintering the sky, it's forest fires, it's Agincourt. I shall live till I'm ninety-five, marry some nice man, have fifteen children, win stage awards and Oscars, but never again will the world break into fragments, burn before my eyes. I've bloody had it...
The van door opened and a rush of cold air blew in upon her. The boy with the mop of hair was grinning at her.
"The Commander says if you're fond of fireworks come and take a look. It's a lovely sight."
She stumbled out of the van after him, rubbing her eyes. They had parked beside a ditch, and beyond the ditch was a field, a river surely running through it, but the foreground was dark. She could distinguish little except what seemed to be farm buildings around a bend in the road. The sky in the distance had an orange glow as if the sun, instead of setting hours ago, had risen in the north, putting all time to odds, while tongues of flame shot upwards, merging with pillars of black smoke. Nick was standing by the driver's seat, the driver himself alongside, both of them staring at the sky. A muffled voice was speaking from a radio fixed near to the dashboard.
"What is it?" she asked. "What's happening?"
The driver, a middle-aged man with a furrowed face, turned to her, smiling.
"It's Armagh burning, or the best part of it. But there'll be no damage done to the cathedral. St. Patrick's will stand when the rest of the town is black."
The young man with the mop of hair had bent his ear to the radio. He straightened himself, touched Nick on the arm.
"F
irst explosion has gone off at Omagh, sir," he said. "We should have the report on Strabane in three minutes' time. Enniskillen in five."
"Fair enough," replied Nick. "Let's go."
He bundled Shelagh back into the van and climbed in beside her. The van sprang into action, did a U-turn, and sped along the road once more.
"I might have known it," she said. "I should have guessed. But you had me fooled with your cairns in the wood and all that cover-up."
"It isn't a cover-up. I've a passion for digging. But I love explosions too."
He offered her a nip from the flask but she shook her head.
"You're a murderer. Helpless people away there burning in their beds, women and children dying perhaps in hundreds."
"Dying nothing," he replied. "They'll be out in the streets applauding. You mustn't believe Murphy. He lives in a dream world. The town of Armagh will hardly feel it. A warehouse or two may smolder, with luck the barracks."
"And the other places the boy mentioned?"
"A firework display. Very effective."
It was all so obvious now, thinking back to that last conversation with her father. He had been onto it all right. Duty before friendship. Loyalty to his country first. No wonder the pair of them had stopped exchanging Christmas cards.
Nick took an apple from the shelf above and began to munch it.
"So...," he said, "you're a budding actress."
"Budding is the operative word."
"Oh come, don't be modest. You'll go far. You tricked me almost as neatly as I tricked you. All the same, I'm not sure I quite swallow the one about the friend with naval connections. Tell me his name."
"I won't. You can kill me first."
Thank heaven for Jennifer Blair. She would not have stood a chance as Shelagh Money.
"Oh well," he said, "it doesn't matter. It's all past history now."