The Soldier's Song (5 page)

This was becoming clear, even though Devereux was still circling her with his hands on his hips. His audience was getting restless and he was coming off badly against Lillian’s silent dignity.

‘So why are you here, Bryce? Trying to snare yourself a man, perhaps?’ He turned to his friends, ‘What about it, boys? Any takers? No? You see, Bryce, you can dress up all you want, but you’re not fooling anybody. What man in his right mind would go with a suffragette? Eh? I mean, just look at your father. He didn’t hang around once he’d realized his mistake. Daddy went running away to sea and never came back and who could blame—’

She cut him off short with a slap. It was so hard that his head turned half around and he staggered backwards a few steps. The crowd gasped, but Lillian made no sound as she turned on her heel and walked towards the door. Her head was high and proud, but she was barely in control of herself. She looked as if she might cry. The crowd parted to let her pass and Devereux watched her leave with his hand to his cheek, his friends looking at him as if they wanted to laugh, but were afraid to.

Billy had no such qualms. He chuckled gleefully and poked Stephen with his elbow. ‘What did I tell you?’ he whispered, ‘A Spartan woman.’

Stephen hardly even noticed. He was staring at Devereux, who was still rubbing his cheek, but laughing it off with his friends.

‘That man is a pig,’ he said.

‘Indeed and he is. But she certainly put him in his place. Did you see that smack she hit him? God, I nearly felt it myself. But what was that crack about her father? I didn’t quite catch his drift, though she clearly did. Bang! Right on the kisser. That softened his cough, didn’t it?’

‘Her father was a sea officer with the White Star Line,’ Stephen explained. ‘He went down with
Titanic.’

‘Oh?’ Billy stopped laughing and his face turned serious as his eyes darted from Devereux to Lillian, who had almost reached the door. A few curious heads turned in her direction, quite unaware of what had happened. ‘Well then, he certainly had
that
coming, the ignorant swine. All the same, I’m afraid he’s rather dished your chances of getting a dance. She won’t be back now – and more’s the pity. You couldn’t go wrong with a girl who has such a good right hook.’

Stephen wasn’t listening to him. The crowd was dissolving, the tension easing, but he still felt it coiled up inside him. His head was clear now, his muscles tense. He’d never had anything to do with Devereux but he knew what he was like. He’d heard some of the talk that went on behind his back and he knew Devereux despised him, as he despised everybody who didn’t fit into his social circle. It could as easily have been Stephen he picked on instead of Lillian Bryce, and now Stephen wished he had. He was angry. Was this what burned inside his brother? This rage against injustice? Was it that hot? But Joe had it wrong. Joe was seeking to turn the world on its head, to pull down the pillars and let the roof come crashing down. That would never happen. It was just too big, too grand a scheme for mere men to manage. Devereux’s kind would endure. They would live through storm and flood, through war and revolution. The only way to deal with them was one at a time.

The way cleared in front of him, and he picked his way through the crowd to where Devereux stood. He was still rubbing his cheek, but he was regaining his composure, holding court.

‘I knew they shouldn’t have let that Jezebel in here,’ he declared, as Stephen stepped in front of him. He was taller than Devereux, and held himself dead straight, his arms down by his side, his fists clenched. Despite the difference in height, Devereux still looked twice his size.

‘What do you want, Reilly?’ he sneered, ‘What’s the matter? Is the free food not up to scratch?’

‘My name is Ryan,’ said Stephen coldly. ‘And you’re a pig, Devereux.’

‘Oh? And you can talk,’ Devereux grinned at his friends, who were still loosely crowded around. ‘I’m sorry; did I offend you by teasing the suffragette? Well, maybe I spoke too soon. Maybe she can get herself a man after all – if she doesn’t mind taking one from the slums.’

Stephen’s voice was barely audible through the guffaws from the others. ‘You watch your mouth.’

‘Why? Are you going to make me?’ Devereux pushed himself closer, his eyes going hard. ‘Come on then, let’s have it.’ He placed his hand on Stephen’s chest and pushed provocatively.

‘I wouldn’t waste my time.’

‘Oh, well I would,’ Devereux said, and punched him low in the stomach.

It wasn’t a very hard blow but Devereux knew what he was doing, and the breath went out of Stephen in a loud whoosh as he doubled over. Pain and nausea washed up from the pit of his stomach and for a moment he teetered on the brink, thinking he might actually throw up. But then he seemed to regain equilibrium. The nausea passed and he felt cold anger driving him upright again. Devereux wasn’t expecting that; he’d already started to turn away, and only saw him out of the corner of his eye. Stephen swung back and hit him as hard as he could on his exposed left cheek. The blow wasn’t as expertly delivered as Devereux’s, but it was much, much harder. It connected with his jawbone and sent him staggering back against the table.

Stephen watched him go down and felt the first stirrings of triumph, mingled with disbelief. Then something heavy hit him in the back and he went down himself, falling to the floor under a welter of bodies.

After the heat and press of the ballroom, the cool air of the patio felt refreshingly clear. There was a stone seat near the doorway and Lillian sat there for a few moments, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. She was glad she’d got out before the tears came. She hadn’t cried since – well, since the White Star man came to tell them her father’s ship was lost.

Even then she’d managed to hold it in. She’d known the moment she saw him standing on the doorstep. He was a little nondescript man in a grey raincoat, but she’d known before he ever opened his mouth that something dreadful had happened. Still, she kept her composure. She showed him into the sitting room and offered him tea, and sat with her mother and sister as he told them the ship had struck an iceberg and sunk. When he finally explained that her father was not among the survivors, that there was no hope, none at all, the other two had broken down crying, but not Lillian. She had asked the questions that needed to be asked. Was there a body? What about the funeral?

Afterwards, when she was alone in her room, she cried for her father. She cried until the tears wouldn’t come any more. He’d been away at sea for most of her life, but that made the time he was home all the sweeter, and she’d grown used to waiting for him; the pleasurable anticipation, the knowledge that every voyage out had an inevitable return. But not this voyage. To think he’d died alone and cold in the water was almost more than she could bear. The man said he’d done his duty; remained calm, helped people and probably saved lives, but that was small comfort to her. Small comfort, too, to know that she’d behaved as he would have wished – the calm one, the rock in the midst of the storm.

But damn Devereux for . . . Damn his impertinence! She was trying to calm herself, but she knew she was in a proper state. Her hand was still smarting from the slap – though she wasn’t sorry about that. No, she was only sorry she’d let it get that far. She should have just walked away when she saw him coming. At least she would have saved herself the embarrassment.

In fact, she thought, she should never have come. And she wouldn’t have, either, if Sheila hadn’t kept pestering her. She’d been dying to go ever since she first heard about it, and Mary D’Arcy’s birthday party was the talk of the town. She couldn’t believe Lillian had an invitation and wasn’t going to use it.

‘But
everybody’s
going, Lillie.’

‘That’s because everybody was invited, Sheila. It’s only showing off they are.’

‘But you
have
to go. You’ve known her since she was small. Sure, didn’t you go to school with her?’

Lillian just smiled and said she’d see. The truth was that she didn’t have fond memories of going to school with Mary D’Arcy. She would much rather have stayed at school in England, but her father’s posting there had come to an end and they had decided to move back home to Dublin. So, at the age of thirteen, Lillian had found herself in a new school, a head taller than any girl in her class, and with an unmistakable trace of London in her accent. She was an easy target for Mary D’Arcy and her gang of privileged harpies. They called her lanky first, and then spotty because of her freckles, and mocked her accent, telling her it belonged to neither one place nor the other, but in the middle of the Irish Sea. Then she was specky for her glasses, and finally, teacher’s pet, brainbox, know-it-all.

Recalling this litany of names did little to calm her down. In one sense the party was just what she’d expected from Mary; showing off her privilege, shoving Daddy’s wealth down everybody’s throat. Oh, she was better at it now, more subtle by far, but she was still a spiteful little bully.

But what was done was done, and no point in crying about it now. She tried to think what to do next. She’d left her sister inside – and her good shawl too – but wild horses wouldn’t drag her back in there to fetch them. Not while that ape Devereux and his friends were still at large. She should go now, go home and get out of it. Her sister was old enough to make her own way home and she could come back for the shawl in the morning. But that wouldn’t do. A cup of cocoa and a book in bed? That would be running away. But she wouldn’t go back in. She would wait. She would . . . Oh! What was she thinking? Sitting out here in the dark, sulking. Pride is your sin, girl, she chided herself. What were you like with that poor Ryan boy? Giving him the eye one minute and then looking away like Cleopatra when he smiled at you. You need to make up your mind, or you’ll be left. And now you’re starting to sound like your mother.

She stood up and wiped her eyes with her handkerchief, but she still couldn’t make up her mind what to do. Go home or go back in? She was about to sit down again, when there was the sound of a commotion from inside. The band had not yet resumed playing, and the peace of the patio had barely been disturbed by the low hubbub of polite conversation and the occasional peal of laughter. But here was a confused thunder of feet coming to the doors. They burst open and a knot of young men staggered out, wrestling with something between them. She recognized Richard D’Arcy’s voice coming from behind them, sharp and shrill and raised to an angry pitch:

‘Get him out! Get him out!’

And they threw down their bundle on the flagstones before turning back and pulling the glass doors behind them.

For a moment she just stared in disbelief at the dishevelled figure as he pushed himself up on all fours.

‘Oh my goodness,’ she cried, hurrying over. ‘Mr Ryan? Are you all right?’

He was so dazed that he flinched when she put her hand on his shoulder. She drew back and looked at him uncertainly, horrified when he turned his face up to her and it was streaming with blood.

‘Miss Bryce?’ he said groggily, and tried to get to his feet. ‘What are you doing here? I mean, I thought you’d gone home.’

‘I was about to,’ she admitted, watching him with some concern as he finally got up and stood swaying on his feet. ‘But never mind me. What on earth happened to you? Your face – your nose is bleeding.’

‘It probably looks worse than it is,’ he said, and winced as a sharp pain stabbed through his ribs.

‘I doubt that, somehow.’ She took him by the arm and guided him over to the bench. ‘Here, sit down and let me have a look at you.’

The light spilling out through the doors showed blood trickling over his lips and one eye already starting to swell. And from the way he grimaced as he sat down, she knew there was more that she couldn’t see. She pulled her handkerchief from her sleeve and dabbed gently at his nose.

‘Those were Devereux’s friends, weren’t they?’ she said. ‘I recognized a few of them from the rugby team.’

‘I think so. I didn’t get a very good look at them. They came at me from—Ow!’

‘Oh shush, Mr Ryan. And hold still.’ She took him by the chin and continued dabbing, though more gently. ‘Really, you’re the last person I expected to see fighting. I thought you had more sense.’

‘Well, you started it.’

‘I did not!’ She felt herself blushing to the roots of her hair. Alfred Devereux was being very disagreeable. I simply gave him a piece of my mind.’

‘Yes, and so did I.’

‘Oh, no.’ Lillian stopped dabbing and looked him squarely in the good eye, ‘Mr Ryan, don’t tell me you picked a fight with Alfred Devereux on my account.’

‘Well, not just on your account. As you said, he was being very disagreeable . . .’

‘But look at you,’ her gesture took in not just his battered and bleeding face, but the ripped sleeve of his jacket, and the collar of his shirt torn away from its studs and splashed with blood. ‘Look at you. Your suit is ruined, and your face . . .’ A gush of blood had run from his nose, over his lips, and was starting to drip from his chin down the front of his shirt. Lillian tried to wipe it up as best she could but her lacy little hankie was already soaked through. ‘Oh, for God’s sake, Mr Ryan. A handkerchief? Do you have a handkerchief? This one is no use.’

He pulled the handkerchief from his breast pocket and handed it to her. She quickly folded it, wiped away the worst of the gore, and then pressed it under his nose.