The Blood Dimmed Tide Read online

  ‘I’m as keen on subterfuge as the next man in this business, but you must remember intelligence is my game. I deal in facts. Hard evidence. What proof do you have that Gonne is at the centre of this conspiracy? All this talk of gunsmuggling, séances and London’s most famous poet, it all sounds so mysterious and far-fetched to me.’

  A siren sounded in the street warning of a possible Zeppelin bombing raid. Dogs began yelping from back alleyways. Rogers took advantage of the distraction and called a hackney cab.

  ‘You have to remember,’ he continued, ‘that we have Gonne’s passport, which means she can’t return to Ireland or escape to France. She’s a refugee in a city hostile to her cause. I want you to keep her in your sights. Perhaps you’ll have something more interesting to tell me next week at our briefing.’

  Rogers put on his hat and made to leave, but Marley reached out and gripped him by the arm. The siren grew louder.

  ‘You should stay and hear me out.’ Marley’s teeth were clenched. ‘Gonne is a doomed woman, and that’s what makes her so dangerous. Doomed and ruthless. The perfect combination for treason.’

  ‘Let go of my arm.’

  ‘I want her arrested.’

  ‘I can’t grant you that.’

  ‘Then what is the purpose of my following her and reporting my suspicions to you?’

  ‘There is no purpose. Other than letting her know we are watching her.’

  A half-smile froze on Marley’s lips and his eyes went cold and still. Rogers glared indignantly at him. The Irishman was a night-wanderer, a double-crosser, a violent and shadowy creature of instinct. What was his motivation in helping the British? Not the fine dining at the hotel Rogers had just left, nor the warm sitting room tended to by the rosy-cheeked wife where he was headed. The Irish were the untamed animals of Europe, whatever their allegiances. Rogers was beginning to understand why so many of them ended up in the carnage of the trenches in Flanders, blindly pursuing a political ideal and the promise of nationhood. He looked back at the hotel, into the dining room filled with overweight middle-aged men who preferred their dinner rounded off with light conversation and a gentle doze.

  ‘I’ve done my duty. I’ve informed you of my suspicions,’ said Marley tensely. ‘I’ve pinpointed potential troublemakers. It’s your job to negate their potential for violence. If you relay my suspicions to your superiors I’m sure they’ll act upon them.’

  ‘I wouldn’t count on it. In the military, devotion to routine and duty very often replaces intelligence.’

  ‘Can’t you see how dangerous Gonne is?’ Marley’s face dripped with ice-cold moisture. ‘Half of Ireland hangs on her every word and regards her as the widow of a martyr. She’s the living, breathing personification of Mother Ireland, the incarnation of Roisin Dubh. With the Republican leadership gone there is no one else who can unify the militant nationalist movement.’

  Rogers leaned against the railing of the steps and drummed his fingers nervously. Marley’s restlessness had taken seed in him. ‘In unity there is strength, a truism no less valid for all its triteness,’ he remarked. ‘A coalition of these splinter groups led by Gonne could be a dangerous step towards an Irish revolution.’

  ‘And if Gonne returns to Ireland with a consignment of weapons, you’ll be the one held responsible.’

  ‘But what else can be done to deter this, other than throwing Gonne and every Irish Republican into gaol?’

  ‘I have a plan to discredit Gonne. I believe a more malleable figurehead can be persuaded to take her place, someone who would provide a focus for the disaffected Irish population, but who could be counted on not to cross certain lines.’

  ‘Who do you have in mind?’ Some of the caution had left Rogers’ voice

  ‘A poet with a penchant for spooks and stately homes − Mr William Butler Yeats. The rebels are a bunch of felons and diehards. They would embrace a figurehead like Yeats because without him they will seem a disorderly rabble to the Irish population. Nothing more than a gang of misfits and murderers. A man of letters like Yeats would make them appear civilised and principled.’

  Rogers nodded. ‘Yeats is in receipt of a pension from the King. A sum of money that is vital to his livelihood. We should remind him of where his priorities lie.’

  Marley grinned and winked. ‘I have a few acquaintances, rough fellows who could persuade Mr Yeats to cool his passions for Irish independence. A little skirmish on a darkened street would be enough to convince him he should keep his creative energies focused on wine, women and song.’

  ‘You’re speaking metaphorically of course.’

  ‘Naturally. Poetry is the language of the street.’

  Rogers thought aloud. ‘And in the meantime, Gonne must be discredited to the Catholic population of Ireland. Not only the responsible citizens of that country but also those harbouring revolutionary sympathies.’

  ‘Most importantly of all, she must be discredited in the eyes of the radicals,’ added Marley. ‘This last area requires entirely different tactics from the first two.’

  ‘What are you proposing?’

  ‘A series of letters to the British and Irish press, ridiculing Gonne for her Anglo-Irish descent, and her illegitimate daughter. The letters would point out that her father was an English soldier and that she was born in Surrey, which would make her membership of revolutionary organisations such as the Daughters of Ireland invalid. An erroneous reference to how she still receives her father’s war pension should also be included.’

  Rogers’ eyes glowed with enthusiasm.

  Marley continued. ‘And if we could hatch a plot identifying her as an informant, this would ruin her reputation in the eyes of dangerous radicals.’

  ‘Very well. You must concentrate on exposing this conspiracy and negating Gonne’s role as a figurehead.’ A touch of friendliness crept into Rogers’ voice. ‘I will make more men available to you and funds, of course. Use whatever means you deem as necessary. And get in touch with me day or night if there are any developments.’

  ‘And what about Yeats?’

  ‘Tread carefully, to paraphrase one of his poems. He has connections in high places. In the meantime, I want you to make ghost-hunting your hobby, too.’

  Marley nodded. His face was without expression.

  ‘What goes on in the afterlife will soon be the least of Mr Yeats’ worries.’

  He pulled on his black cap and disappeared into the fog.

  5

  Queen of Wands

  WHILE Yeats was busy talking to his apprentice magician in the study, Georgie waited anxiously for a signal from her new accomplice and former love rival. She was unable to sit and resume reading her crime novel, so with her sleeves rolled up, she brushed out the rugs in the sitting room and then dusted the shelves. When she heard the secret code of knocks they had devised, she rushed to answer the door, but there was no one there. The view from the doorstep was as cold and dark as an empty grave.

  She was about to shut the door, when a woman in a Red Cross uniform appeared from behind a tree and ran up the steps. With the breathless haste of a nurse attending a medical emergency, the tall, red-haired figure of Maud Gonne brushed by Georgie into the hallway.

  ‘I met a policeman at the end of the street,’ she said between breaths. ‘I thought he was going to arrest me but instead I think he followed me here.’

  ‘I’m not surprised,’ said Georgie. ‘You look like some sort of vision.’

  Maud’s hair lay in bright red ringlets and her face was powdered white. Her cheeks were pale as candles.

  Georgie embraced her and drew back. ‘You’re shivering,’ she said.

  ‘So are you,’ replied Maud, and the two women broke into nervous laughter.

  ‘Is the uniform real?’ asked Georgie, helping her off with the blood-red cape.

  ‘No,’ said Maud. ‘Just a stage cos
tume. But what a joy it is to wear with so much gloom in the air. Would you like to try it on?’

  Georgie blushed slightly. Before falling under Yeats’ spell, she had been about to start a good job at the Foreign Office. She was regarded as sensible and level-headed, if not a little dull, and it had been hoped by London’s literary circles that she might steer Yeats away from his spookiness and personal melodrama.

  ‘It’s a little late for dressing up,’ she said.

  Behind them, a floorboard creaked, and they both started.

  ‘If the authorities find me here, they’ll have me arrested, and Willie, too,’ said Maud.

  Although what she said was probably true, Georgie found her manner a little over-posed. There was something searching about her gaze as she spoke, as though she were playing to an invisible audience. Georgie ushered her into the comfort of the sitting room where they sat by the crackling fire.

  ‘Willie never appeared at the Sesame Club tonight,’ said Maud.

  ‘I guessed as much.’ Georgie’s voice tightened.

  ‘What state was he in when he came home?’

  ‘Distracted. Definitely.’ Georgie paused. ‘I’m not worried that he might be unfaithful. It’s his detachment from reality that frightens me. Sometimes he appears to completely forget where he is.’

  Gonne smiled. ‘Poor Willie, always the dreaming adolescent.’

  ‘I feel I’m married to a man who’s already attached.’ She stared at Maud. ‘Doubly attached.’

  ‘I followed him from a séance near Edgware Street. He looked frightened. There was something strange about his behaviour. Perhaps his silly occult games have become too real for him.’

  ‘No, there’s something else. Since our wedding, he’s become more and more obsessed with his supernatural investigations. Every evening, he returns home after midnight, exhausted, his hair in disarray, as though he’s been wrestling demons all evening.’

  Georgie was still trembling. Maud hugged her, and the younger woman placed her head upon her shoulder, as if they were mother and daughter rather than love rivals. They stayed like that for a while until Georgie broke the silence.

  ‘I don’t know how this madness will end,’ she whispered.

  ‘Don’t confuse madness with a loss of control,’ said Maud. ‘Willie might be a great poet, but it doesn’t mean he can do whatever he wants, or subject you to these fears. He’s a husband as well as a poet, and someday soon he will be a father.’

  For the first time a genuine smile appeared on Georgie’s lips.

  ‘It might be a good idea if the two of you were to leave London,’ continued Maud. ‘Remove yourselves from this circle of madness. A couple of months in Ireland would clear his head. His imagination is not the problem. It’s the forces that are preying upon it.’

  ‘But I fear that a trip to Ireland would make him worse. I don’t want to hear anything more about his ghosts, or ancient legends, or lost truths hidden in dusty libraries. All I want is for our marriage to work, and Willie not to be destroyed by this mad obsession with ghosts.’

  ‘Do you scold him?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Good. To keep Willie’s attention a woman must either elevate herself to the role of an ethereal presence, or become his surrogate mother. You must learn to quell your temper.’

  Georgie’s face coloured slightly with anger. ‘I won’t be an accomplice to my own subjugation,’ she said defiantly.

  ‘And that is good, also,’ said Maud soothingly.

  ‘Women have a place of honour and respect in his poetry, and the same should be true in his domestic arrangements. The same above as below, as he has written on numerous occasions.’

  Maud nodded. She watched Georgie’s eyes glance around the room, her youthful mouth curled in dismay. She was too young to understand the quiet suffering and countless daily sacrifices that underpinned many apparently happy marriages.

  ‘I love him all the same,’ said Georgie, staring earnestly into Maud’s eyes.

  ‘And what about him? Does he love you?’

  ‘I believe he does.’ Georgie lowered her eyes, determined to hide whatever doubt might be revealed by them. ‘I’m not a mind-reader.’ She looked up at Maud again. ‘He walked past me in the sitting-room this afternoon and didn’t seem to recognise me. He looked lost. Dazzled, even. I’ve noticed other changes in his demeanour. He frowns a lot. Not the frown of someone vexed with his surroundings, but a frown at himself, the way a man might frown in a room full of blind people, certain that no one can detect his irritation.’

  Maud regarded her with one of those soft full looks that melted the heart of Yeats in his youth. ‘I’m afraid that Willie has become a slave to his own vanity,’ she said. ‘This belief that the otherworld is eager to communicate its secrets with him.’

  ‘It’s more than vanity. Since our wedding, I can feel his growing despair. As if he’s had to finally give up the hopes and dreams of his youth. Embracing the spirit world has become a way of sublimating his desires.’

  ‘If that is the case, you must cut him off from his occult societies and these dreadful mediums he keeps visiting. Catch his attention when he starts babbling on about his ghosts.’

  ‘But how do I manage that?’ Georgie felt like an apprentice in the presence of a great master. She was more than twenty years younger than Gonne, and as well as youth, she had intelligence on her side, but her deference bordered on submissiveness. Gonne belonged to what was already regarded as a legendary age of Irish politics and theatricality.

  ‘You should live like Scheherazade and find a way to captivate your master with tall tales.’ Maud stared at her intensely. ‘Don’t be afraid of hoodwinking him in order to distract him from these infatuations. Remember, I speak from experience. For nearly thirty years, I have held his unwavering attention during all kinds of personal scandals and political upheavals.’

  The sound of Yeats’ raised voice in the study distracted them.

  ‘I must go now,’ said Maud.

  Georgie sprang up to hug her but Maud broke away like an actress returning to a demanding stage role.

  Before she stepped into the street, she delivered one final piece of advice to Georgie.

  ‘Remember what I said. Look out for a new ghost for Willie. A good ghost. One that will take your side and keep him in check.’

  Georgie watched her flowing figure disappear into the night. She thought how nice it would be to live like Maud and dress up in such lovely theatrical clothes, the opposite of the dowdy and virtuous garments in her own wardrobe. But then she dismissed the thought from her mind as mere attention-seeking vanity.

  6

  Six of Swords

  THE morning after I received my assignment from Yeats, I briskly made my way to the bookshops on Charing Cross Road, and amid their dusty recesses acquainted myself with the latest texts on criminology. I placed a large order for books by the French author Alexandre Lacassagne, a specialist in the field of deviant behaviour, and a pioneer regarding scientific detection techniques, as well as Galton’s guide to the classification of fingerprints, and charged them to the account of the Order of the Golden Dawn.

  The question of whether one succumbs to the irrational and its emotional storms is usually a conscious one, at least at the beginning. Recalling the events of the night before, I felt uncomfortable and anxious. I had given myself over to another world, a universe of strange spirits and haunting obligations that were beyond my understanding, blotting out the faculties of reason and common sense. Somehow, I had moved away from the role of impersonal weigher of facts, a trained investigator of the paranormal, to that of an unwilling participant in Yeats’ personal melodramas.

  It was with relief that I leafed through the latest detective manuals. I felt the breath of new ideas and opinions. The fog had lifted overnight, and the city was drenched with spring sunlight, t
he rays untangling even the gloom of the Thames, and the raggle-taggle shadows of the run-down streets. A breeze picked up. I tucked my bundle of books under my arm and felt the freshening wind of science blow alongside me, wafting away the cobwebs of superstition and fear. I thought of my friend’s dismal ghost, and realised that I now had the opportunity and tools to gather evidence that the soul lived on after the death of the body. My mission would require effort and careful observation, as well as dangerous lines of investigation, but for the first time in months, I felt the glow of intellectual excitement. In the clear reality of a bustling city morning, the enchantment of the previous evening dissolved and I was left with the image of a coffin washed up on a stormy beach and a restless sense of curiosity.

  A week later, I boarded the mail boat at Holyhead, bound for Sligo. Among the other passengers in the first-class cabins were an invalid soldier in a wheelchair helped on board by a red-haired nurse, an army major, called Blemings, accompanied by his young wife, and a tall gaunt man, wearing a black belt and cap, who stood smoking against the railings, watching everything with half-closed, inquisitive eyes.

  A watch bell tolled on the upper deck, a cold iron jangle that chimed with the rattling shackles of dozens of Irish prisoners who were being lined up on the docks with martial impersonality. A row of prison guards made the men stand in falling sleet as the passengers in steerage boarded. From the first-class deck, I watched the guards prevent the paraded men from squatting or kneeling. The prisoners were Republicans, many of them barely out of their teens. Unlike their executed leaders, they had played minor roles in the Easter Rising, and were now being deported back to their homeland where they were to be freed at Dublin port.

  Major Blemings wore a pained smile. ‘I don’t understand why the authorities can’t keep them locked up,’ he complained. ‘My advice to everyone is watch your possessions and hope the bloodthirsty ruffians don’t creep into your cabin at night to slit your throat.’

  The man in the black cap mournfully agreed in a soft Irish accent. ‘Times like these no one is safe,’ he said. The glowing ember of his cigarette was reflected briefly in his dark eyes.