fight.’
Collins had brought a division of the IRA from the partitioned North down to the Curragh Camp to train under the Free State army when Ulster had become too hot for them. The northern volunteers would not agree to wage war as part of the Free State army against their former comrades in the anti-Treaty Irregulars, but had agreed to accept Free State army wages for promising to remain on the sidelines of the conflict until the IRA could once again unify and launch itself against the loyalist north as a whole. When Collins was shot dead in August, any such hopes of reunification seemed to die with him.
O’Hanley says, ‘Your contacts, Mulally and Patterson, are they the only ones guarding the shipment who are sympathetic to our cause?’
‘They wouldn’t ask any others. But they’ll sneak away and join us on the raid.’
‘And you can trust these moonlighters? Serving in the Free State army and willing to help rob a Free State bank of Free State army wages?’
‘Sure, neither of them has been paid in three weeks, and yet Mulcahy has come up quick enough with the scratch to pay them Ulster men to sit on their arses. Mully and Patto only joined the Free Staters for the wage, and since they’ve only got it now and again, they’re more than willing to help. I’ll have to throw them a few bob off the take, but they’re game lads.’
‘And tell me again why they are holding the money in a bank in Newbridge and not at the camp itself? It seems odd that they would risk holding it in a civilian bank when they could guard it more closely in a barracks safe?’
Stephen smiles. ‘It’s because they can’t trust the Northern lads not to decide to advance themselves their wages and head back home to fight. Too many rifles around a camp like the Curragh, and the Free Staters don’t trust the Ulster men, or even their own troops, not to up arms and rob the money themselves. So they keep it close enough that it’s no bother getting it, but far enough away so’s to be out of temptation to the lads in camp with guns and notions.’
O’Hanley’s lips curl in a moue of distaste.
‘All of them mired in corruption, dragged into it by the traitors of the Free State,’ he says, though he knows in his heart that his own Irregular troops are often no better. There are more than a few hardened republicans among the ranks of the Free State Army, and just as many in the Irregulars, who don’t mind or understand the Treaty, and many of them willing enough to change sides when it suits. O’Hanley has heard of men fighting one day for the Free State and the very next for the Irregulars at the battle for Kilmallock in County Limerick, switching teams and swapping tunics at the first rumour of better—or any—wages or hot food on the other side. Corruption and chaos, the twin ghosts haunting this war. And here am I , O’Hanley thinks, consorting with them freely .
‘If you must have the moonlighters, have them, but I’d rather you used our own men.’
‘Sure, we’ll need more than myself and just those boys down there,’ Gilhooley nods in the direction of the sound of swatted tennis balls through the open skylight. ‘… to take that bank.’
Those boys are only a few years younger than you, dear Stephen . And yet, Gilhooley is right. They are not experienced enough or large enough in numbers to hit even an unguarded bank on their own. A sick feeling wells in O’Hanley’s gut. It has come to this. Using his boys for the kind of robbery that is as common as calving cows in the country. Like everyday brigands instead of the soldiers of destiny they aspire to be. He thinks back to what he has written in his journal. ‘… means and methods that may seem cruel and lawless …’
‘Take whomever you need. Will your brothers go, do you think?’
Gilhooley shrugs. ‘Dinnie has a babby now. Sure, he’d come along for some peace and quiet, if nothing else. And Ray will do it for the craic, never mind a few hours
Collins had brought a division of the IRA from the partitioned North down to the Curragh Camp to train under the Free State army when Ulster had become too hot for them. The northern volunteers would not agree to wage war as part of the Free State army against their former comrades in the anti-Treaty Irregulars, but had agreed to accept Free State army wages for promising to remain on the sidelines of the conflict until the IRA could once again unify and launch itself against the loyalist north as a whole. When Collins was shot dead in August, any such hopes of reunification seemed to die with him.
O’Hanley says, ‘Your contacts, Mulally and Patterson, are they the only ones guarding the shipment who are sympathetic to our cause?’
‘They wouldn’t ask any others. But they’ll sneak away and join us on the raid.’
‘And you can trust these moonlighters? Serving in the Free State army and willing to help rob a Free State bank of Free State army wages?’
‘Sure, neither of them has been paid in three weeks, and yet Mulcahy has come up quick enough with the scratch to pay them Ulster men to sit on their arses. Mully and Patto only joined the Free Staters for the wage, and since they’ve only got it now and again, they’re more than willing to help. I’ll have to throw them a few bob off the take, but they’re game lads.’
‘And tell me again why they are holding the money in a bank in Newbridge and not at the camp itself? It seems odd that they would risk holding it in a civilian bank when they could guard it more closely in a barracks safe?’
Stephen smiles. ‘It’s because they can’t trust the Northern lads not to decide to advance themselves their wages and head back home to fight. Too many rifles around a camp like the Curragh, and the Free Staters don’t trust the Ulster men, or even their own troops, not to up arms and rob the money themselves. So they keep it close enough that it’s no bother getting it, but far enough away so’s to be out of temptation to the lads in camp with guns and notions.’
O’Hanley’s lips curl in a moue of distaste.
‘All of them mired in corruption, dragged into it by the traitors of the Free State,’ he says, though he knows in his heart that his own Irregular troops are often no better. There are more than a few hardened republicans among the ranks of the Free State Army, and just as many in the Irregulars, who don’t mind or understand the Treaty, and many of them willing enough to change sides when it suits. O’Hanley has heard of men fighting one day for the Free State and the very next for the Irregulars at the battle for Kilmallock in County Limerick, switching teams and swapping tunics at the first rumour of better—or any—wages or hot food on the other side. Corruption and chaos, the twin ghosts haunting this war. And here am I , O’Hanley thinks, consorting with them freely .
‘If you must have the moonlighters, have them, but I’d rather you used our own men.’
‘Sure, we’ll need more than myself and just those boys down there,’ Gilhooley nods in the direction of the sound of swatted tennis balls through the open skylight. ‘… to take that bank.’
Those boys are only a few years younger than you, dear Stephen . And yet, Gilhooley is right. They are not experienced enough or large enough in numbers to hit even an unguarded bank on their own. A sick feeling wells in O’Hanley’s gut. It has come to this. Using his boys for the kind of robbery that is as common as calving cows in the country. Like everyday brigands instead of the soldiers of destiny they aspire to be. He thinks back to what he has written in his journal. ‘… means and methods that may seem cruel and lawless …’
‘Take whomever you need. Will your brothers go, do you think?’
Gilhooley shrugs. ‘Dinnie has a babby now. Sure, he’d come along for some peace and quiet, if nothing else. And Ray will do it for the craic, never mind a few hours
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