'They burned the cottage down — gutted it,' he said savagely, unwilling to soften the blow. Her hand went to her mouth, her eyes widened. Then she clenched both hands at her sides and looked at McBride levelly. 'Who?'
'I don't know — some of your father's friends, Germans — who knows? But
'What?'
'Drummond. He's working for the other side, must have been all the time. He tried to kill us last night—' He indicated Gilliatt. 'Oh, Peter Gilliatt. He's English but not bad.' He grinned. Maureen wiped her right hand, shook Gilliatt's gravely. He saw a kind of emotional bruising behind her eyes but her face remained calm. She brushed at a wisp of hair fallen from its grip, then seemed aware of her appearance — but only slowly and unimportantly.
'What will you do?'
'Kill him,' McBride said abruptly. Maureen seemed to consider his words for a moment, then she nodded her head. 'Before he kills us,' McBride added. 'Sorry about the home.'
'Not as sorry as I am,' she returned in a way that made Gilliatt aware of his intrusion, presenting an image of a wound opening. As if to apologize, Maureen grabbed McBride's arm. He groaned and she was immediately the solicitous wife again.
'You're hurt—'
'And hungry.'
'Injuries first.'
'Yes, Mother Maureen.' She tossed her head, made him sit and then roughly pulled his sweater over his head. The strip of shirt was darkened with some dried blood, but not a great deal. Maureen looked gratefully at Gilliatt as she inspected the bandage.
'I'll cook,' Gilliatt offered. 'Where is everything?'
'Go into the shop. Seamus'll cut you some bacon, give you some eggs. Bread's in the cupboard there.'
Gilliatt disappeared back into the narrow, box-lined corridor between the living accommodation and the shop. Maureen's face immediately dissolved into a tragic mask, mouth widened and eyes narrowed.
'All right, don't take on now.'
'Everything?' McBride nodded. 'God damn them.'
She sniffed loudly and proceeded to undo the bandage on his arm, touching the stiff crusted blood on his forehead at the same time, seemingly satisfied that it could be attended to later.
'We won't be safe here,' McBride said as she washed the gash. A little streak of new blood appeared, 'Drummond wants all eight pints or more of it, and he'd use you to get hold of me.'
'What do you want, then?'
'We have to run.'
'Where?'
'We've all of Ireland, woman.'
Gilliatt reappeared with slices of bacon and eggs on a sheet of waxed paper held against his chest. Behind him, as if their conversation had summoned him, was Devlin himself, out of breath and red-faced. But his small eyes darted as if some enemy might have overtaken him even though he had hurried and be lying in wait for him in his own kitchen.
'Da!' McBride sensed the fear, the urgency at once. 'What is it, Da?'
'Michael? You're all right? There's — why are you here? They're after you, damn you, and you'll bring them here, down on my head!' Devlin glanced at each of their faces, then around the cramped kitchen. He seemed to sense impermanence wherever he looked.
'Da, I'm sorry—' McBride began.
'Maureen, they've burned the cottage!'
'I know.'
'How did you know?' McBride asked, anticipating Gilliatt's question.
Devlin immediately became cunning, his eyes narrowing further; habits of thought and behaviour were automatically reasserted. The present, however, pressed on him.
'I was told. Someone tipped me off, for Maureen's sake.'
'So, the boys are in on it, are they?' Devlin appeared reluctant to reply. Maureen, sensing the future, quickly finished re-binding McBride's arm with a clean strip of cloth. 'Are they, Da?' Devlin merely nodded.
'You'll have to get out,' he said, almost as a plea.
'We're going. The three of us.'
'What are we up against, Michael?' Gilliatt asked, a sense of superiority given him by the nationality the others shared. He knew his mood was illusory and irrelevant, but there was a coolness of mind that assisted him even as he began frying the bacon and breaking the eggs into the pan.
'Drummond, whatever Germans are here, and the local IRA,' McBride said with a grin.
'They'll not harm us, Maureen—' Devlin began, but the look she gave him made him quail into silence.
'What are we going to do, Michael?' she asked.
'Eat breakfast, dress for the outdoors — and run,' he replied, clutching her hand, pressing it. 'Don't worry.'
'I won't. I don't know why, but I won't.' She brushed his hair aside from the scalp wound, inspected it, nodded, and went to the stove, brushing Gilliatt to one side as casually as she had parted McBride's hair. Gilliatt looked at McBride, who winked.
'Who's he?' Devlin asked, fully aware of Gilliatt for the first time, it seemed.
'No one you know, Da. Now, are you coming with us, or not?'
Devlin's face adopted a look of outraged protest, which was swiftly followed by fear, then dismissal of a slow but certain kind as he looked around the kitchen again, then at McBride and Gilliatt — marking them off from himself. He shook his head.
'They'll not harm me. And Maureen would be safe here.'
'They'll use her to get me, Da. Look, I know that Drummond is a traitor. He won't want me gossiping to London about it, now will he? Maureen comes with us — she'll be safe.' McBride's face went bleak. 'Da, they'll use you, but I won't come back for you. There's not enough leverage, you see.' He did not look at Maureen, simply concentrated on the dissolving and reforming features of her father. It was as if he looked at him through a curtain of rain or tears, so vivid were the facial movements, so flurried the quick wash and movement of emotions.
'You promised!' was all Devlin could manage. McBride nodded.
'I know I did,' he said softly. 'Come with us. I'll look after you. But not here—'
Gilliatt turned away from the scene between the two men. It was too oppressively real, too naked yet private so that it made him a voyeur, an intruder. Then Devlin went out of the kitchen, banging against some of the crates and boxes in the corridor in his hurry and disbelief. McBride had disorientated him, turned around his sign- posts, ripped up his maps.
'You didn't have to do that to him,' Maureen said softly, sliding bacon and eggs onto two plates she had warmed. She brought the plates to the table, stood looking down at McBride, her face a narrow, tight mask of displeasure. 'Why did you tell him that, Michael?'
'Because it's true, Maureen. He'll be used to get to me, and I won't give myself and you up for Da's life.'
'Then why do you play God in the first place, if you haven't His determination? Oh, Michael, you make people believe in you when really their belief doesn't make a blind bit of difference to you! Why?'
He looked up at her, his face dark, slapped by her words.
'I don't know how or why I do it, Maureen. I don't know.'
Maureen moved past him, following her father into the shop. McBride began eating the breakfast in silence, and Gilliatt kept his eyes on his plate until he had finished eating. As if on cue, Maureen entered the kitchen just as McBride swallowed his last mouthful.
'He won't listen to me,' she almost wailed, her face a crumpled ball of dirty paper. Gilliatt wanted to say something soothing, knowing that she would reject any comfort from a stranger. 'He won't listen to me.' She sat down, leaning her head and arms on the table. McBride made no move to speak or to touch her, and Gilliatt disliked him suddenly.
He looked at McBride. 'He can't stay here.'
