The Girls of Ennismore

by Patricia Falvey

Genres: Sagas

Synopsis

Victoria Bell and Rosie Killeen are best friends. Growing up in rural Ireland's County Mayo, their friendship is forged against the glorious backdrop of Ennismore House. However, Victoria, born of the aristocracy, and Rosie, daughter of a local farmer, both find that the disparity of their class and the simmering social tension in Ireland will push their friendship to the brink...Both girls leave the idyllic Ennismore of their childhood to move to the gritty, politically charged streets of Dublin. On the cusp of the Easter Rising and the impending First World War, each girl finds herself deeply involved in the fray while immersed in forbidden romance.

Release date: March 28, 2017

Publisher: Kensington Books

Print pages: 448

Sample

The sun was not yet up when eight-year-old Rosie Killeen pulled the door of her family cottage closed behind her and stood shivering in the morning chill. Usually she enjoyed venturing out alone in the early hours, but this morning was different. Anxiously she looked around for her friend—a black and white collie with a bent ear. Only when he trotted up beside her and sniffed her hand did she begin to walk.

Taking a deep breath, she set off barefoot down over the shadowy fields with her new lace-up boots tucked securely under one arm. Cows peered over low stone walls watching her with limpid curiosity. Broody hens warbled as they squatted on their eggs, while an angry rooster, his morning call preempted, followed her for a time, pecking at her feet.

She slowed her pace as she neared the narrow, rutted road that separated the Killeen farm from the Ennis Estates. The bravery she had felt when she boasted to her ma that she could make the journey alone was gone. Now she fought the urge to turn and race back up to the safety of her cottage and kneel beside her mother as she thrust a skillet of soda bread into the big turf fire. The urge passed and she walked across the road and up to the tall, wrought-iron gate that guarded the Ennis Estates. She stood looking up at it, clutching her boots even tighter under her arm and biting her lip. Squaring her shoulders, she pushed hard against it. As it creaked open she turned to her dog.

“Go home now, Rory, there’s a good boy.”

The dog looked up at her with mournful eyes and began to whimper.

“You can’t come where I’m going, Rory. You don’t belong there.”

The gate opened onto a dark, twisting, tree-lined avenue and into a strange and terrifying world. Ghosts from stories she had heard around the family fireside leered at her from behind the gnarled beech trees—headless horsemen, howling hunting dogs, tortured souls rising from their graves. She hurried on, looking neither left nor right, her heart thumping in her chest.

As the avenue gave way to open pastureland she slowed her pace, but still she did not dare raise her head. She heard the squelch of her toes on the damp grass beneath her, the gathering notes of birds preparing for their dawn chorus, and the faint squawks of wildfowl from the distant lake. The familiar sounds calmed her a little and she allowed herself to look up. There ahead of her sitting on top of a gentle hill and surrounded by smooth green lawns stood the “Big House,” its lime-washed stone bathed pink in the pale dawn light.

She stopped. For all the stories she had heard from her family and neighbors about the Big House, she had not been prepared for its beauty. It rose three stories above its basement, its lines square and clean, its tall windows equally spaced on either side of a massive, white oak front door. It looked like something from a fairy tale. Rosie let go of her fear and allowed herself to imagine princesses inside singing fanciful songs and sipping tea from dainty china cups. Small waves of pleasure flowed through her as she stood, lost in her imagination.

Distant shouts startled her and she remembered why she had come. Reluctantly, she tore her eyes away from the house, stepped out of her imagination, and bent down to pull on her boots, carefully tying the laces. Straightening up, she tucked her black curls behind her ears and smoothed out her striped, cotton smock hoping no one would notice where Ma had carefully mended it. She took a deep breath and, remembering Ma’s directions, hurried along the path and under the archway that led to the stables and courtyard. By the time she ducked in through the kitchen door at the rear of the house her sweet fantasies had evaporated.

The heat of the kitchen slammed into her like a fist, knocking her backward. Fire roared in a massive black oven on top of which steaming pots shuddered. The cook stood at a wooden table in the center of the kitchen, shouting instructions at a young maid. A boy shoveled coal into the oven to keep the fire going. Maids and footmen rushed in and out fetching and carrying buckets and mops, dishes and linens. Gardeners hauled in baskets of vegetables, while a gamekeeper tossed a brace of dead fowl on the kitchen table. The girl watched them, fascinated.

“Who are you?” the cook shouted.

Rosie looked up in awe at the giant of a woman with black hair and ruddy cheeks who frowned down at her.

“Rosie Killeen, miss.”

“Ah, you’d be Bridie’s sister come to help out. How old are you?”

“Eight last month, miss.”

“Old enough, then. Well, don’t be standing there like a spare dinner. Make yourself useful. Start peeling them spuds.”

Rosie swallowed hard. “Yes, miss.”

At ten o’clock the house steward came into the kitchen and clapped his hands. “Everyone up to the front steps,” he shouted. “Her Majesty Queen Victoria is about to arrive. Come quickly, now. You know your places.”

The female servants smoothed their uniforms with red hands and arranged unruly hair under caps while the men dusted themselves down and stood erect. One by one they marched to the back stairs that led up into the main house. Rosie lined up behind them, but the firm pressure of the house steward’s hand on her shoulder stopped her.

“You stay here,” he said.

Rosie’s heart sank.

When the kitchen was empty Rosie looked around. There were no windows in the room or in the adjoining servants’ hall. She was frustrated. How was she going to see the queen? After all, such a prospect was the reason she agreed to come and help at the Big House—that and the four pence her sister Bridie had promised her for her work. She tiptoed out of the kitchen to explore. Minutes later she pressed her face to the small basement window in the house steward’s private quarters. She peered through the dusty panes, fingering a bullet hole in one of them.

From her vantage point, if she craned her neck enough, she could see the people assembled on the front steps of the house. A finely dressed man and woman she took to be Lord and Lady Ennis, the master and mistress of the Big House, stood together on the bottom steps. Crowded behind them were their guests, colorful as peacocks. Stretched across the bottom of the steps, to one side of their employers, were the servants arranged strictly in order of importance—the house steward standing closest to the master, and the scullery maid the farthest away.

At the clatter of approaching carriages Rosie stood on tiptoe. Gravel hopped and skittered under its wheels as the first carriage, drawn by four glistening black horses and driven by a coachman in a top hat, halted in front of the house. Her eyes followed him as he climbed down, opened the door, and extended his hand to help the female occupant alight. So this was Queen Victoria. Rosie drew back from the window in disappointment. She had imagined the queen would be a beautiful lady with a cloak of red and a golden crown. But instead, out of the carriage had stepped a fat, stern-looking old woman in a stiff black taffeta dress, and in place of a crown, an ugly lace cap. She was attended by an equally dour lady-in-waiting. Leaning on a walking stick, the old woman limped to the bottom of the steps where Lord and Lady Ennis, their guests, and servants greeted her.

Rosie was indignant. All this commotion over that oul’ biddy? she thought. You’d think she was the Pope himself. She remembered her sister, Bridie, a maid at the Big House, telling their ma how the whole place was in an uproar over the visit and how everything had to be scrubbed and polished and the servants’ uniforms immaculate as nuns’ habits. Rosie didn’t understand it at all. Then she thought of the four pence Bridie had promised her for today’s work and she grinned, dimples punching her red cheeks.

It was June 1900. Queen Victoria was making a rare visit to Ireland and had agreed to include a stop at Ennismore, which was the proper name for the Big House, in her itinerary. She was, however, only staying for lunch. Rosie counted at least six courses, all on different plates, sent up to the dining room in a contraption the servants called a dumb waiter. How could anybody eat all that food in one sitting? That amount would have kept her family fed for a month. Only when the queen took her leave at three o’clock did the cook collapse on a chair and bend over to rub her sore feet.

“Well, her majesty can’t complain we sent her away hungry,” she sighed. “From what the footmen said, she scraped every last morsel off every plate.” She laughed aloud. “Fair play to herself. She’s not fretting over her figure like some in this house!”

When she had carried out the last bucket of potato peelings and dumped them in the pigpen, Rosie stood in the kitchen and looked around. Ever since she was old enough to understand, she knew that one day she would have to go to work at the Big House, just as her sister, Bridie, had done a few years before. It was the lot of most Irish country girls to enter into domestic service at the nearest Big House and to count herself grateful for the chance. Short of entering the convent, or obtaining a rare scholarship to secondary school, there was little choice. Rosie’s ma had worked at Ennismore before she married, and her ma before her. A wave of nausea rose up inside her and she reached for a stool. She told herself that the convent would be a better choice any day than the likes of this.

“You can go now,” said the cook. “No point sitting there on your arse.”

Emboldened by her resolve never to set foot back in this place, Rosie put out her hand. “Where’s me wages?” she said, looking up at her. “Me sister, Bridie, said I was to get four pence.”

The cook’s ruddy face turned crimson. “Did ye ever hear such boldness?” she roared. “Away with you now before I box the ears off you. You’ll settle that matter up with Bridie.”

The air outside was cool and fresh. Rosie took several deep breaths and decided to take the long way home along the path beside the lake. Lough Conn was the largest lake in County Mayo and ran along the edge of the Ennis Estates property. When she was very young, her granda used to take her out fishing in a small, wooden rowing boat called a currach. He was dead now, and her da, a tenant farmer beholden to Lord Ennis, had little time for such outings. She stood at the lake’s edge and looked out over its still blue waters to Mount Nephin, which rose smoky purple on the far shore, lost in her own thoughts.

A faint movement behind her made her turn. Standing a few yards away was a girl about her own age. She had long blond hair tied with a pale blue ribbon that matched her beautiful dress. As Rosie stared at her she saw that the girl was crying. She marched up to her.

“What’s wrong with you?” she said.

“My boat,” the girl whimpered. “I let go of the string and it’s sailed away and now I can’t reach it.” She pointed to where a small object floated near the shore.

“Go in after it, then,” said Rosie. “Sure I can see it from here.”

“I’m afraid of the water,” the girl whispered.

Rosie looked at her in astonishment. She’d never met anyone who was afraid of water. She and her brothers and sister swam in the local streams without a thought.

“Did nobody ever teach you how to swim?”

“Oh, what shall I do?” cried the girl. “It was a birthday present from the queen. Oh, Mama will be so angry.”

“Ah, for God’s sake,” said Rosie, mimicking her ma’s favorite expression.

Swiftly she pulled off her dress and boots and, clad only in her petticoat, waded into the water and swam a few strokes. She retrieved the boat and swam back to the shore. “Here,” she said, handing it over to the girl.

The child looked at Rosie wide-eyed. “What’s your name?”

“Rosie Killeen. What’s yours?”

“Victoria Bell. I’m named after the queen. She gave me this for my birthday. It’s today.”

“What age are you?” said Rosie.

“Seven.”

“I’m eight.”

Rosie studied the toy boat that the girl held. It was painted blue and white and was a perfect replica of an ocean liner, the sort of toy only a rich child would own. It dawned on Rosie then that the girl belonged to the Big House.

Both girls stood for a moment locked in each other’s gaze. At last Rosie broke the spell.

“I have to be away now,” she said. Picking up her dress and boots, she fled across the green lawns, down the twisting path, out through the estate gate, and back to the safety of her own farm.

Victoria Bell watched Rosie Killeen disappear into the distance. She hugged the toy boat to her chest, ignoring the damp patch it made on her dress. She wondered for a moment if the girl was a fairy like the ones in her storybooks, but she hoped she was real. Victoria had met very few girls her own age and Rosie Killeen was not like any of them. She doubted if she was like any other girl in the whole world. What other girl would be as fearless as to strip off her clothes without a care and dive fearlessly into the lake? Victoria was fascinated. She decided then and there that Rosie must become her friend.

“Please, Papa. Please!” she begged her father the next day as she walked with him in the garden. “Why can’t she be my friend? I have no one to play with. I’m so lonely, Papa.”

Victoria gazed up at Lord Ennis, widening her blue eyes in a practiced manner that usually bore results. She knew that her papa had a soft spot for her that did not extend to her two older brothers. She had learned early how to use it to her benefit.

“Have you asked your mama?”

Victoria stiffened. The very thought of making such a request of her mama terrified her. She shook her head.

“No, Papa,” she whispered.

Lord Ennis nodded. “I thought not.”

Victoria slipped her hand into his as they walked in silence back toward the house. Without understanding why, she instinctively knew what she asked for was risky. Such a request was far beyond begging for a new toy, or to be allowed to ride with Papa on one of his prize horses, or to stay up late to watch the guests dance at the annual Christmas Ball at Ennismore. She loved her papa dearly and was suddenly anxious that her request might cause trouble for him.

When they reached the front steps she squeezed his hand. “Don’t worry, Papa,” she said. “It’s all right if you have to say no.”

Her father smiled down at her, love brimming in his eyes.

The following evening Victoria hid in the library, her eye pressed to a keyhole through which she could observe the family dining room. Normally she would not have dared take such a risk, but her encounter with Rosie Killeen had emboldened her. If Rosie could have been so brave as to dive into the lake, then she, Victoria, could certainly spy on her family. Her heart fluttered as she watched Papa lead her mother into the room, followed by her aunt and governess, Lady Louisa. She hoped against hope that her father would bring up her request and that he would prevail. After all, her mama, Lady Ennis, was in excellent form following Queen Victoria’s visit, cheerful and jubilant, unlike her normally stern demeanor. Perhaps Papa might be able to take advantage of her rare good mood.

“A triumph if I may say so,” said Lady Althea Ennis as she sat down at the dining table, beaming at her husband and sister. “I actually persuaded her majesty on one of her rare visits to Ireland to journey from Dublin to visit us here at Ennismore. I daresay no other hostess in Ireland could have achieved such a coup.”

Lady Louisa glared at her sister. “You may call it a triumph, Thea, but I can hardly believe how you were willing to embarrass the family with your scandalous letter-writing campaign, not only to the queen but to her closest associates, most of whom you did not even know. How could you have groveled so? I’m sure we are all the laughingstock of London.”

“Perhaps,” said Lady Ennis, “but we are the envy of the Anglo-Irish aristocracy all over Ireland.”

Lord Ennis grunted. “A triumph perhaps, Thea, but a very costly one.”

His wife waved her hand at him in frustration. “Must you always reduce everything to money, Edward? It’s so vulgar.”

“Vulgar or not, we cannot ignore reality, Thea. You know very well the estates are not bringing in the revenue we once enjoyed and . . .”

“Please, not at dinner, Edward,” interrupted Lady Ennis. “Such topics bring on my headaches.”

Victoria watched nervously as Burke, the house steward, and a footman served soup, followed by fish and meat courses. Her family ate in silence. Had Papa ruined Mama’s mood by bringing up money? She sighed and focused on her father as if just by staring at him she could make him speak. Please, Papa, she pleaded silently, please say something soon.

Lord Ennis had once been a handsome man, rugged and bearded, an outdoorsman whose love of horses and hunting had endeared him to his fellows who flocked to Ennismore for weekend sport. Now at fifty, his looks had begun to fade, his once-lithe figure running to fat. His thick dark hair had grown sparse, and a slight paunch now pressed against his shirt buttons. Nonetheless he retained the attractiveness of a man at ease with his place in society.

He pushed his empty plate away from him, signaled the footman to remove it, and turned to his wife.

“So have you thought about my proposal, my dear?”

Victoria held her breath.

Lady Ennis put down her fork and frowned. “It’s absolutely out of the question, Edward. I cannot believe that you are contemplating such a thing.”

“Nonsense, Thea,” said Lord Ennis. “Our Victoria has persuaded me that it is a splendid idea.” He looked up and smiled. “She’s been pestering me ever since she met the girl.”

His wife’s plump bosom rose and fell in exasperation, causing the garnet pendant that rested upon it to sway precariously. “How can you allow a common peasant girl to take lessons with our daughter?”

Victoria stifled a squeal. Rosie to share her lessons? Oh, this was so much more than she had hoped for. She squinted trying to read her mother’s expression.

“It’s what Victoria wants,” said Lord Ennis.

“And is Victoria to have everything she wants? Is her every whim to be indulged no matter what the cost, while you scold me for every penny I spend?”

“This proposal will cost us nothing. Lady Louisa can as easily teach two girls as one.”

Lady Louisa scowled at her brother-in-law.

“And besides,” he went on, “the girl is not exactly a peasant. I have made inquiries and her father is one of my most reliable tenant farmers. John Killeen is a splendid chap.”

A small cry escaped from Lady Ennis. “Killeen. Don’t we have a maid named Killeen?”

“The sister,” sniffed Lady Louisa.

Lady Ennis dropped the fork with which she was about to stab the fresh rhubarb tart the footman had set in front of her. “Have you lost your mind, Edward? And what of Louisa? Surely you can’t expect her to give lessons to the sister of one of our maids.”

Lord Ennis poured fresh cream on his tart and smiled at Lady Louisa. “I’m sure Louisa will be happy to cooperate in whatever is best for our family, won’t you, dearest sister?”

Lady Louisa glared back at him but said nothing.

“But, Edward . . .” began Lady Ennis.

Lord Ennis sighed and laid his fork down on the table. “No more, Thea,” he said in his rich, deep voice, honed from years of speechmaking in the House of Lords, “my mind is made up. The child needs company her own age now that her brothers are away at school.” He leaned closer to his wife. “I had hoped we might provide a sister for her, but that is hardly likely now, is it, my dear?”

Lady Ennis flushed. “You know very well, Edward, that Victoria’s birth nearly killed me,” she said, looking wounded.

“Not to mention what it did to your figure,” muttered Lady Louisa.

“Since she has no sibling close to her own age,” continued Lord Ennis, as if nothing was said, “and since there is no child of suitable age and class within miles, then this child—’er Rose, is it—may serve as well as any.”

He leaned back in his chair and signaled the steward to bring him a brandy.

“Our Victoria is like a high-spirited thoroughbred,” he began, ignoring the women’s groans, “she is dreamy and temperamental. I bed my thoroughbreds down with stout stable horses. The companionship calms them, and in time they perform at their best.”

“Victoria is not a horse,” snapped Lady Louisa.

Lord Ennis stood, signaling the end of dinner. “I shall speak to John Killeen. I’m sure the chap will consider it a great honor. Have the girl join Victoria when the boys return to school for the autumn term.”

Victoria could not stop herself from clapping her hands. “Oh, thank you, dear Papa,” she cried.

She raced out of the library and up the stairs to her bedroom. She could hardly wait for the summer to be over.

Lady Ennis swept indignantly out of the dining room followed by her sister. Ten years her husband’s junior, she still possessed a comely figure. Her excess pounds were cleverly encased in corsets and stays, while low-cut gowns displayed her white bosom to great effect. Her gowns, though slightly out of fashion, were well-cut and her dark blond hair impeccably coiffed.

Entering the drawing room, she sat down on a pink tufted velvet love seat, wincing as her bottom collided with its unyielding upholstered surface—she had chosen the new furniture for its style rather than comfort. She smoothed out her skirts and rang the bell to summon the house steward.

As she waited for her tea she looked around the drawing room with a satisfied smile. Despite her husband’s protests, she had insisted on lifting this one room above the antiquated shabbiness of the rest of the house. After all, the drawing room was where her majesty would be received, and first impressions were of the utmost importance. Now she took in the fresh wallpaper with its smart pale green and white trellis design, the freshly painted white moldings, and the blue velvet cane-backed chairs, all acquired within the last month. She frowned slightly as she peered at the mantel and fire surround. She had wanted marble, but the excessive cost had obliged her to make do with cleverly painted wood that, from a distance, resembled marble. She had done her best to distract suspicious eyes by displaying her prized collection of Meissen porcelain on the mantel shelf.

Meanwhile her sister, Lady Louisa, paced back and forth across the room.

“Oh, do sit down, Louisa,” snapped Lady Ennis, as Burke entered carrying a silver teapot followed by a red-haired maid bearing a tray of china cups and saucers. “You are making me quite dizzy.”

Muttering to herself, Lady Louisa perched her bony frame primly on the edge of one of the new cane-backed chairs at a considerable distance from her sister. With her brown hair pulled back into a bun, her silk, high-collared dark gray dress, and her charmless demeanor, Lady Louisa Comstock was the epitome of the very role she fiercely resented—a governess. She had come to live with her sister after several Seasons in London during which she had failed to secure even one offer of marriage. True, she lacked her sister’s attractiveness and had no sense of humor, but her worst failing was her fatal inability to flatter men. Relegated now to her place as an unpaid member of the household staff, Louisa’s prickly nature often expressed itself in open hostility.

The servants dismissed, Lady Ennis sipped her tea and turned to her sister.

“I hardly know where to begin,” she said. “I have sacrificed so much for Edward all these years, and now this! It is really the last straw.”

“What would you know about sacrifice, Thea? You have a husband, a home, social status, and security. I have none of those things.”

“Don’t start, Louisa. It’s your own fault. If only you had tried to be more pleasant to your suitors you would not be in your present predicament.”

Lady Louisa banged down her teacup, sending the saucer rattling. “If you mean by refusing to debase myself in front of slobbering, drunken fools, then I plead guilty.”

“Don’t exaggerate, Louisa. A smile here, a little flattery there, it wouldn’t have hurt you. It’s unfortunate you did not choose to take your cues from me.”

A look of scorn spread across Lady Louisa’s thin face. “I think you did more than smile and flatter, dear sister. As I recall you went out of your way to malign any other girl in whom Edward showed an interest so that you could have him for yourself. You even made up a story that sent poor Charlotte Dowling scurrying off to the Continent to comfort her supposedly sick sister just to get her out of the way.”

Lady Ennis sniffed. “I didn’t make it up. It was merely a misunderstanding. It wasn’t my fault if that silly Charlotte was gullible enough to believe it.” A shadow passed over her gray eyes. “Anyway, look at where it all got me in the end, isolated here in this backwater in the West of Ireland with a husband who holds the purse strings in a death grip. If I’d known then what I know now—I had so many other suitors to choose from. . . .”

“But you chose Edward, for better or worse.”

Lady Ennis gazed dreamily out the window. “But he was so charming, Louisa. And he made Ireland sound so romantic. Imagine my shock when he brought me to this unfashionable old house surrounded by bogs and marshes!”

“You made your bed,” said Louisa, standing up.

“Yes, and I have lived stoically with the consequences. But this latest demand of Edward’s is beyond my patience to bear.” She paused and stretched her mouth into a thin, unattractive line. “I have been determined since Victoria was born that she shall have a better life than has been afforded me. She will be brought up strictly and with the utmost care so that when she enters society her manners and demeanor will be flawless. If her looks fulfill their promise, she will become a beauty. She will have her pick of suitors, and I shall settle for no less than the well-to-do eldest son of an earl.”

Lady Ennis looked directly at her sister. “What Edward is suggesting will ruin all my plans for Victoria, and I simply will not allow it.”

“I don’t see that you have a choice.”

“I may not be able to stop that wretched peasant girl from entering this house for lessons, but once lessons are over I shall forbid Victoria to have anything to do with her. Her corrupting influence will be limited to your classroom only, and I expect you to make things so unbearable for the urchin that even her visits to the schoolroom will be short-lived. Do you understand me?”

Lady Louisa regarded her sister with pursed lips as if contemplating a sharp reply. Instead, she put her hand to her forehead. “I must go and lie down. I have the most frightful headache. Please ring for that maid to bring me water.”

Without waiting for an answer, Lady Louisa withdrew from the drawing room, leaving Lady Ennis staring after her aghast at the fact that her sister had just dared to give her an order.

Bridie shot through the door of the Killeen cottage and came to a halt in front of Rosie. “You conniving wee bitch,” she shouted, her rough, red hands resting on her thin hips.

“Bridie!” said Ma. “How dare you speak to your sister like that?”

“But she is, Ma,” protested Bridie, tears of frustration clouding her pale blue eyes. “T’was her put the idea in the girl’s head, and she did it all to spite me.”

Ma took Bridie’s arm and marched her to a chair beside the kitchen table. “Now sit down and tell us what this is all about.”

Bridie poured out what the red-haired maid, Sadie Canavan, had just told the servants about Lord Ennis’s decision.

“Sadie said Lady Louisa told her it was Victoria’s idea, but I think it was this one put her up to it.”

Rosie listened in horror. “Why would I do that?” she said. “I don’t want to go up there. I like me own school, and me own friends.” She looked up at her mother, tears gathering in her eyes. “I don’t have to go, do I, Ma? I don’t have to go if I don’t want to?”

Mrs. Killeen looked from her two tearful daughters to her husband, who sat on an old settle bed beside the huge open hearth in which a turf fire burned.

“John?”

Rosie held her breath. Surely her da would never agree to such a thing. Ever since she could remember he had sided with her, protecting her from her brothers’ taunts or her ma’s scolding. She had a sudden image of herself as a toddler sitting tearfully on his knee while he took the broken pieces of a dinner plate she had dropped and slid them behind his chair. “We’ll hide them,” he’d whispered, “so your ma won’t find them. T’will be our secret.”

Now she waited for him to rescue her again. His eyes met hers for an instant as he pulled slowly on his pipe, the white smoke encircling him. Then he bowed his head.

“If his lordship wants it,” he whispered, “I don’t know what choice we have in it, Róisín Dubh.”

Her da always called her by her full name, Roisin, and added Dubh, which he pronounced “Ro-sheen Dove.” He told her it was Irish for “Dark Rosaleen” and was another name for Ireland. It had always pleased her when he called her that. With her black hair and hazel eyes, so dark they looked brown in certain light, the name suited her. But this night it brought her no pleasure. She began to