“I cannot imagine Tellman acquiescing to being a valet,” he said to Cornwallis. “Even for a week! Least of all to me … Can I tell him about Denbigh?”
A very powerful humor flashed in Cornwallis’s dark eyes, but he kept it from his mouth.
“Not yet. I am sure when Mr. Greville explains to him the importance of your mission he will be happy to do it to the best of his ability. You will have to have patience with his inexperience as a valet.”
Pitt forbore from replying.
“Who are the guests to be?” he asked instead.
Greville leaned back in his chair again and crossed his legs. He did not need to ask if Pitt had accepted the task. Pitt had no choice.
“In order to keep the appearance of a perfectly ordinary weekend, my wife will accompany me, as would be natural on a social occasion,” he began. “As perhaps you are aware, the factions in Irish politics are not simply Catholic and Protestant, although those are the two principal divisions. There are always class divisions also, between those who own land and those who do not.”
He moved very slightly in a gesture of resignation and regret. “That used to be directly according to religion. For decades all Catholics were banned from owning property; they could only rent, and as you may be aware, some of the landlords exercised their power in the most brutal fashion. Others, of course, were the very opposite. Many bankrupted themselves trying to take care of their dependents during the potato famine in the forties. But memory is subject to great distortion, even without the added twists of Nationalist propaganda and folklore perpetuated in story and song.”
Pitt was on the edge of interrupting. He only wished to know who was expected, how many people he would have to consider.
But Greville did not permit anyone to override him when he was in command of the situation.
“And all points of view have their moderates and their radicals who at times can hate each other even more than they hate the opposition,” he went on. “And those whose families have been part of the Protestant Ascendancy for generations, and have convinced themselves it is the will of God, can be harder to move in their opinions than any old-fashioned martyr, believe me. I think some of them would welcome a den of lions, and even a good stake to be burned at.”
Pitt could hear the exasperation in his voice, and caught a momentary glimpse of the years of frustration of the would-be peacemaker. He felt a surge of sympathy towards Greville which surprised him.
“There are four principal negotiators,” Greville continued. “Two Catholic and two Protestant. Their particular points of view do not need to interest you, at least at this juncture, and I think not at all. There is the very moderate Catholic Padraig Doyle. He has fought in the cause of Catholic emancipation and land reform for many years. But he is a respected figure; not, so far as we know, associated with any form of violence. He is my brother- in-law, in fact. But I would prefer that the other participants did not know that at this stage. They might consider me unduly partisan, which I am not.”
Pitt waited without interruption.
Cornwallis made his fingers into a steeple and listened attentively, although presumably he was already aware of all that Greville was saying.
“He will come alone,” Greville resumed. “The other Catholic representative is Lorcan McGinley, a younger and very different kind of man. He can be charming when he chooses, but lives in a state of permanent anger. He lost family in the potato famine, and land to the Protestant Ascendancy. He is quite openly an admirer of people like Wolfe Tone and Daniel O’Connell. He is for a free and independent Ireland under Catholic rule, and God knows what would happen to the Protestants then.”
He shrugged. “I don’t know myself how close his ties are to Rome. The dangers of reciprocal persecution of Protestants might be very real indeed, or equally it might be a great deal more extreme in talk than in fact. This is one of the things we need to find out in this conference. The last thing we want is civil war, and I assure you, Superintendent, it is not an impossibility.”
Pitt was chilled. He had enough schoolroom memory of what the English civil war was accounted to have been, the death and bitterness which took generations to heal. Ideological war had a brutality unlike any other.
“McGinley will bring his wife,” Greville went on. “I know very little about her, except that she is apparently a Nationalist poet. Therefore we may presume a romantic, one of those highly dangerous people who create stories of love and betrayal, heroic battles and splendid deaths that never happened, but they do it so well, and set it to music, that it becomes legend and people believe it.”
His face pinched with anger and distaste—and a shadow of frustration. “I’ve seen a whole roomful of grown men weeping over the death of a man who never lived and leaving the place swearing vengeance on his killers. Try to tell them the whole thing is an invention and they’d lynch you for blasphemy. You’d be trying to deny Ireland its history!” There was bitterness in his voice and a sharp downward curl to his lips.
“Then Mrs. McGinley is a dangerous woman,” Pitt agreed.
“Iona O’Leary,” Greville said quietly. “Oh yes, indeed. And her husband’s passion stems from just such stories as those she creates, although I’m not sure if either of them knows the truth anymore. There’s so much emotion twined through it I’m not sure that anyone does, and so much tragedy and very real injustices.”
“And McGinley has no prejudice against violence?” Cornwallis asked.
“None at all,” Greville agreed. “Except its possible failure. He is willing to live or die for his principles, as long as they provide the freedom he wants. I have no idea if he knows what sort of a country they will produce. I doubt he has thought so far.”
“The Protestants?” Pitt asked.
“Fergal Moynihan,” Greville answered. “Just as extreme. His father was one of the hellfire Protestant preachers, and Fergal has inherited the old man’s conviction that Catholicism is the work of the devil and priests are all leeches and seducers, if not actual cannibals as well.”
“Another Murphy,” Pitt said dryly.
“Of the same breed.” Greville nodded. “A little more sophisticated, at least outwardly, but the hatred is the
