Stars and Stripes in Peril by Harry Harrison Page B

was a veteran soldier even before he had joined the American army. He had served in an earlier Irish unit, the Irish Brigade of St. Patrick, which had fought in defense of the Papal States against Garibaldi. When the hostilities ended, torn by his loyalty to the Papacy and sympathetic to Garibaldi's cry for freedom, he had turned his back on both of them and had emigrated to the United States, where he had enlisted in the American army.
    The Officers' Mess was in a sturdy building that had been a farmhouse standing on the grounds where the Irish Brigade now pitched their tents. When Meagher and Clooney came through the front door they discovered that the meeting of the other officers was already under way when they arrived. It was the first Sunday of the month when all of the members of the Fenian Officers' Circle met together. This was the focal point of the revolutionary group in the army that supported the Fenian movement in Ireland. Men who were dedicated to the liberation of Ireland from British rule. But today they had another problem to consider. Captain O'Riley called out as they entered.
    "Tell us, Francis, is the rumor true that we are to have new uniforms?"
    "Not a rumor but a fact, my old son," Meagher said. "It's the new recruits you see. During the war we were a Northern regiment and proudly wore the blue of our country. Now that the war is over we are no longer just a regiment, but have grown to be a brigade. Lots of good soldiers have joined us from what was the Southern army and the mixture of uniforms in our ranks has been something wicked to see. The War Department, in its wisdom, has been considering uniform changes for some time. In the new kind of war that we are fighting, with new and more accurate guns, a more neutral sort of color of the uniform is very much in order. We have all seen what lovely targets the red British uniforms provide!"
    There were shouts of "hear, hear" and some wild whistling. Meagher held up his hands for silence.
    "Khaki, a sort of grayish brown, has been chosen. It may look a bit like mud, which is not a bad idea when you are lying down in the stuff. I, for one, am in favor of it. Anything that does not make a soldier stand out in the battlefield is a good thing. Of course we will keep our dress uniforms for important occasions, and dances and suchlike."
    "When do we get our mud duds?" someone called out.
    "A week or two. They'll let us know."
    The door slammed open and Captain John Gossen came in. His expression was black, his mien angry when he hurled his coat onto a chair.
    "Betrayal!" he said as he glowered around at the other officers.
    The usual air of good cheer and friendliness seemed to vanish in an instant.
    "What's wrong?" Meagher asked.
    "Death and betrayal," Captain John Gossen said bitterly, his manner now so different from his usual lively self. He had served previously with the Seventh Hussars of Austria, a dashing Hungarian regiment. "That miserable schoolmaster, Nagle, is in the pay of the British. Luby, O'Leary and Rossa have been arrested. The Irish People suppressed." He was talking about the Fenians in Ireland, and their official newspaper.
    "They never!" Meagher cried aloud.
    "They did," W.L.D. O'Grady said darkly. "I heard the same news myself, but I couldn't believe it. I'll believe anything about the English. I know the bastards. They'll try them in a kangaroo court—then shoot them." He did know the English very well, having once served in the Royal Marines.
    "Is there nothing we can do?" Clooney asked.
    "Little enough," Meagher said, chewing over the bad news. "Send them money—they'll need it for lawyers if there is a trial. And we will have to find a way to reorganize from the ground up. Our newspaper is suppressed, everyone taken I imagine—or on the run. If there is one informer in the organization there are bound to be others. Betrayal is in the air."
    "Aye—and right here in America, in New York City as well," O'Grady said. "Red Jim