To repay Desmond's visit to Elvira the Hackler and pacify her own curiosity, Atty went to the Four Courts to watch his performance in a small but far-reaching case.
Using his robes like a toreador, his wig askew, Desmond played fox and hounds with Justice Lord Barwell until the judge was finally compelled to engage the young barrister on basic grounds of Common Law.
"Common Law," Barwell fumed, "was not in place nor was it recognized as the law of the land until centuries after the annexation of Ireland was a fact. I don't give a hoot, Mr. Fitzpatrick, if the conquest of a neighbor is even arguable. The joining of England and Ireland was accomplished prior to the acceptance of Common Law as the law of the land...period."
"But, m'lord," Desmond answered, as though he were watching Atty Moore from eyes in the back of his head, "the conquest of Ireland was illegal prior to Common Law."
"Nonsense," the judge retorted, aggravated that he had been baited into the discussion. "Ireland was ceded to England by the Vatican. Your Vatican."
"Indeed, m'lord," Desmond shot back before Barwell could close the subject, "history records that Nicholas Breakspear, the son of a priest, went on to become the only English pope in history. He took the name of Hadrian IV and gave the land of Ireland to Richard II in 1159 for the purpose of amassing kingdoms for his sons."
"I don't care who the devil gave Ireland to England, and it could have been to pay his gambling debts for all I'm concerned. A papal bull issued by Hadrian, whether he was English or Mongolian, legitimizes our presence here centuries before the adoption of Common Law."
"Exactly my point, m'lord."
"What point?"
"Hadrian could not give Ireland to England because he did not own it."
"I appreciate your attempt to revise history, Mr. Fitzpatrick, but we are at the point of wasting the court's time and patience. Popes have been giving lands away since time immemorial and what's done is done.
"I agree, m'lord," Desmond answered quickly and tenaciously. "But it has been proved...I repeat, proved...that all land grants during the reign of Hadrian IV, including granting Ireland, were forgeries. These grants have always been contested, and the Vatican itself-the Vatican-had declared these grants as forgeries and, therefore, invalid. May I go on, m'lord?" And he did so without waiting for an answer. "In 1440 the papal aide Lorenzo Valla proved, beyond doubt, that the document granting Ireland to England was a forgery."
The judge laughed. "Now just where did you get this stunning bit of information, Mr. Fitzpatrick? Perhaps an editorial by Griffith in the United Irishman, or maybe in some hidden vault under St. Peter's Cathedral?"
"No, m'lord. In the London Public Library. So you see, one can legally conclude that England never owned Ireland and conquered it under a forged document. Therefore, all laws passed against the Irish, as well as all attempts to force a union with the Irish, are illegal."
"Historical precedent, our centuries of presence here, outweighs any argument you have set forth. You are free to believe your fantasy, but not in my courtroom."
"But, m'lord, once science solves a mystery, an ancient mystery, it is no longer an ancient mystery but a new truth."
"Religion is a subjective force, not scientific law. It cannot be revised," Barwell concluded. "All right, Mr. Fitzpatrick, your arguments fail to present anything compelling regarding the case before us. The prisoner murdered one of Her Majesty's revenue collectors. In your petition you agree that the prisoner, one Mr. Fogarty, is indeed guilty of the aforementioned crime."
"Yes, m'lord. Mr. Fogarty has refused to wear prison clothing or adhere to prison regulations imposed on common criminals. He is a soldier and, thus, a prisoner of war. Mr. Fogarty bore arms against your revenue collector because he does not recognize your rule of his land and he bore them as a soldier of his own country against yours and is entitled-"
"That will be all, Mr. Fitzpatrick."
"Sir, I wish a ruling on the principle of Victor's Validation-that is, you have no rights in Ireland except those imposed upon us through use of arms."
"Bravo!" Atty shouted from the rear.
"Remove that personage," the judge said without looking up. The gavel banged. "Mr. Fogarty's petition is denied. He is a common murderer."
Desmond Fitzpatrick walked back to the table and lifted a thick bundle. "I have similar petitions for twenty clients who are now serving prison terms. None of these prisoners committed murders, but they do not wish to wear prison garb. I wish a ruling that the wearing of prison garb is restricted to murderers exclusively."
Wham! went the gavel. "See me in my chambers, Mr. Fitzpatrick."
"All rise," cried the tipstaff as Justice Barwell snarled his way from the courtroom. Lawyers for the Crown really wanted to avoid Fitzpatrick in the courtroom. This often made them settle civil matters in his favor out of court.
While the military and political and governmental and industrial powers of England held their own against the Irish, some bright young chaps like Desmond Fitzpatrick were making inroads through the use of the law.
Desmond and Atty entered Jury's dining room to a round of applause and wended their way through handshakes and congratulations until they were secluded in a backroom booth.
Des made a hasty dispatch of a double Irish whiskey and allowed the rumble of battle to subside. Atty had not realized until she saw with her own eyes what a brilliant man he was. Good Lord, setting up poor Barwell on nuances of a faked papal bull then striking home at the heart of the matter, prison uniforms.
"Des, why is the prison uniform fight so vital?"
"Because we are establishing that the common criminal and the Irishman who fights for Ireland's independence as a unique nation separate from England are two different men. By granting a republican prisoner-of-war status, the English would recognize that the Irish have a right to challenge their presence here."
A second drink done in, Des heated up to the subject. "The grand strategy which is emerging is that the revival of the old language, the old sports, the speeches, and the plays defines us as a people different from the British. Our first line of attack is that Irishmen are Irishmen are Irishmen are Irishmen.
"The second flank of the attack is the Irish Party in the House of Commons, which also says that the Irish are a separate people. Meanwhile," he said with finger pointing skyward, "we attack in the courts. We do this by turning their own law on them."
"We're not going to talk them out of Ireland, Des."
"Yes, but for the time being, our only ammunition consists of words. We have been able to fend them off from destroying us as Irish because of our way with words, deprecating them, laughing at ourselves. But as we know, sticks and stones may break their bones, but words will never hurt them. Soon, Atty, the third line of our attack will have to merge. Military action."
"The Irish Republican Brotherhood," she said.
"The Brotherhood. Armed warfare. You see, if we can establish that the Irish are different, then the Irish have a right to their own army. The Brotherhood will either be that army or lead that army." Desmond turned to the menu in his hand, looked up at Atty, and said, "Nothing looks good on the menu, but let's eat anyhow. Unless...you let me eat the icing off you. You look magnificent."
And so it went, two revolutionaries in a curtained booth. Both intense, handsome people with fires in their bellies and courage to waste. One was male, one female, and in that instant they recognized that difference, as England was different from Ireland, in a manner of comparison.
"Shouldn't we be a couple?" Des asked forthrightly. "That is to say, I detest short women, particularly ones who like to kick big men around. And your good self? I've watched you incinerate the chaps as though they had been struck by lightning."
"Well, I always thought that when the right lad came along there had to be more to it than my height," she said.
"We have much more than height," Des said. "We have Ireland."
"Good Lord, you are such a romantic, Des. What girl wouldn't tremble at your words."
Des took her hand softly. "I didn't think you cared for sentimental shenanigans."
"I suppose I don't," she agreed. "I once knew a romantic Irishman, but he had to find true love in Canada. The others only seem to get romantic when they are blasted."
Des kissed her hand and tilted his head so as to look into her eyes, not directly, but obliquely. "I'm blasted. I'm blasted from the trimming I gave his lordship today. I'm also blasted from four divine Bushmills. And, alas, I am blasted from the sight of you, Atty. You are ravishing beyond fantasy. Besides, everyone in all branches of the movement think we make a smashing couple. So, what about it?"
"Why, Des," she cooed, "give me some time to think about it."
"How long? I'm very busy."
"That's long enough," she said.
"Settled. Then, we're a couple, or some such."
"Yes, I think that's what they call it."
"By Jaysus, that calls for champagne."
"How about a kiss, instead?"
"How about both?"
There was a kiss, a fine, stalwart kiss. Irishman to Irishwoman. In later days there would be lovemaking, Irishman to Irishwoman.
Since Jack Murphy had gone, Atty had chatted up the occasional lad and left her bedroom door open. She knew it was not fair to compare a new lover to those four days with Jack at the fishing lodge. However, the experience did tell her what was attainable. She had the range, the substance, and the daring, and she tried to make the best of the man she had to work with. No one could ever again take her like Jack Murphy, she believed, not even Desmond Fitzpatrick.
Atty pondered why two people, otherwise so intelligent and attractive, could reduce themselves to clods when it came to lovemaking. Was it an Irish affliction, the subject of barroom banter, that an Irish lad would crawl over ten women to get to a bottle of Guinness? What about intelligent people? How could a man like Desmond Fitzpatrick, so utterly profound in a courtroom, so literate, so worldly, reduce himself to perfunctory shallowness in a bedroom? How could this aspect of life be so horribly mismanaged in an entire society?
Atty also pondered Atty. Did she excite more than superficiality? Had she sniffed too much religious smoke of sin? What were the forces that combatted nature itself, that made a man and a woman who loved each other become strangers in that moment?
Desmond and Atty did make a smashing couple. The apparent lack of a wild and wondrous sex life seemed to be compensated by what they really craved, the electric charge they set off that played from one to the other, that bucked up their resolve as they plunged into battle as Celtic warriors.
They were two self-contained gladiators, gamecocks, always at the ready. They did not want to be caught without their swords, shields, body armor, and helmets...not even in bed. Except on the odd occasion.
Had not Ireland disdained all things of a royal nature, surely Desmond and Atty Fitzpatrick would have been crowned the king and queen of the republicans.
They had a private sanctuary on the fourth story of their Georgian home at 34 Garville Avenue, a warm and even sensuous library with a turf stove where they spent endless time, often until daylight, speaking of the next day's tactics and long-term strategies.
There were, indeed, small affections, patting of hands, perfection of behavior in public, the occasional adoring stare. And the bed. Somehow the bed was a place to collect all the thoughts properly before falling off. He didn't like to hold her, and she never melted into him. Des sprawled, she wrapped up mummylike. When they did meet, the touches were kind and automatic but from distant planets. Each could almost hear the other thinking of tomorrow, at times almost with a smell of smoke coming from their grinding minds.
There were times when Des needed her comfort, her mind, her words. Comfort didn't include her beautiful round, rich body.
To be sure there was a bit of lust. Quick and meaningful, but once done, never dwelt upon. A pause to release those stuffed-in mystery feelings. Once the compulsion was satisfied, they regrouped for the rent-and-rate strike in Cork or Kerry and the joust at Four Courts.
They seemed content. Their long talks in the library were at the heart of what really mattered. If either sensed something lacking, they did not seem overly concerned. Both gloried in each other's victories, shared each other's sorrows, enjoyed each other's stunning good looks, and supported the combined focus of their life's worth.
Atty had not met a man like Des. The memory of Jack Murphy remained vivid, often at the most unusual times and places. Maybe, she pondered, Jack Murphy didn't even really happen. As the passage of time defused reality, her memories became more misty. She realized that the simple experience with Jack would never be repeated. Life was nearly complete now, except for that one void, but it was overcome by the zeal of the mission. And God knows, Atty did adore Desmond Fitzpatrick.
17.
As there were legendary people in Derry and Donegal and also legendary mythological people, the mothers of Ballyutogue and all up and down Inishowen Peninsula and surrounding counties as well had a saying for their sons. "When you are old enough to support a beard, may you be half the man as Kevin O'Garvey."
During the famine, his da was caught stealing food and hanged, and the O'Garvey cottage tumbled. Kevin's ma, with five young wanes including himself as the oldest, tried to get into the workhouse in Derry, even though the workhouse terrified them. After the fourth straight potato crop failure, there was no room even at the workhouse.
The entire family, save Kevin O'Garvey, died in the fields with their mouths green from eating grass, and he became an orphan. It was said, not totally in jest, that you could count all the orphans who survived the great hunger on both hands and toes and have three fingers and a toe left over.
As fortune had it, Kevin O'Garvey was twelve and the Earl of Foyle's agents took him and a number of other orphan boys to a poor farm, integrated into the grand scheme of things.
The grand scheme, never spoken, was to turn the famine into a means of thinning out the Catholic population through emigration, disease, and hunger. Once a family was evicted, the cottage was destroyed by a team of eight horses dragging a huge tree trunk through it.
The boys on the poor farm were sent to clear rocks and prepare the old fields for cattle pasture. During the height of the famine, cattle and many crops poured out of Ireland from the large estates.
The boys on the poor farm were given ether to sniff so they could labor long hours in a state of euphoria. By age fourteen, Kevin O'Garvey was also familiar with the taste of poteen, and he was an accomplished thief and smuggler.
Toward the end of the famine, O'Garvey escaped to the misery of Bogside in Derry and became a crafty pickpocket, like a player in a Dickens novel.
He was in and out of the borstal a number of times and realized that his life would soon be over unless he educated himself out of trouble.
Mr. Henry, a keen Protestant solicitor and barrister, had to take his turn representing the young Catholic criminals and was impressed by Kevin's knowledge of law and his sharpness of mind. On a flyer, Mr. Henry convinced the court to allow him to take O'Garvey as his apprentice.
It was a brilliant move on Mr. Henry's part, because O'Garvey's wizardry lessened his own work. On the other hand, Mr. Henry lived to regret his apprentice's talent. Over time, Kevin O'Garvey became one of the few Catholic solicitors in the region and a festering splinter under the Crown's fingernail.
Kevin O'Garvey became a tireless battler for Catholic rights both on the land and in the city. He became head of the Land League in that part of Ulster and was instrumental in slowing down the indiscriminate evictions and some of the outrageous practices against the croppies-one hundred percent interest on loans...impounding the livestock of a debtor...inflated seed prices for planting. Aye, the peasants were hostage to a catalogue of injustices refined over a half-dozen centuries.
In his work in the Land League, O'Garvey saved God knows how many farms. He caught the eye of Charles Stewart Parnell, who was at the head of a rising new Irish Party bent on divorcing Ireland from England.
O'Garvey's urban base was the Bogside of Derry jammed with the overflow of those who had fled the land and were too weak to emigrate. Most of the large Anglo land owners had more decent pig sties than the Bogside.
Loaded to the gills with unemployed, Bogside fed cheap female labor into the shirt factories. Of these hellholes, none was more terrible than Witherspoon & McNab, owned by the Earldom of Foyle. This place and the linen mills of Belfast were the sewers of the Industrial Revolution.
In 1885, the great breakthrough came allowing the Catholic farmer to vote for the first time, and, with Parnell's prodding, O'Garvey stood for the House of Commons. This was a most dangerous time because Kilty Larkin, the old chieftain of the croppies on the peninsula, croaked right before the election. A last-second decision by Tomas Larkin to go to the polls with his boy Conor at his side gave O'Garvey the victory.
Over the years Kevin O'Garvey continued his wonderful work from his office in a rundown but proud Celtic Hall where a Gaelic revival was budding. As his power grew in the British Parliament, Kevin O'Garvey lived for a single moment...to be made chairman of a select committee that could investigate the Witherspoon & McNab shirt factory and blow its stench over the British Isles.
On the other side of town Andrew Ingram had an equally impressive rise until he finally ran a school district from Strabane to Dungiven, including Londonderry.
To the establishment, Ingram was a pain, with his Scottish Presbyterian liberalism. His daring selection of curriculum and books kept the preachermen in a righteous tizzy and the Orangemen gnashing their incisors. Ingram had the necessary ingredients going for him to spike their noise. He was courageous, moral, brilliant, and had the Countess Caroline Hubble as his chief supporter. On matters of culture and education, Caroline Hubble was a major force in the west. Many a time Roger Hubble was simply overruled by his wife in these matters.
Andrew Ingram's eye-opener came with nothing less than a compact with a superconservative churchman, Bishop Nugent, in charge of the diocese of Derry. The Bishop was embedded in concrete in the protection of his monopoly over Catholic education. Nor did the Bishop care much for Kevin O'Garvey. Nonetheless, people with dissimilar views had to get along with one another as a matter of mutual survival.
Ingram, with the support of O'Garvey and Caroline Hubble, convinced the Bishop to allow higher education to the brightest of the Catholic students. In the dim future, they hoped to be able to found a public college in the region and wanted it filled with as many Catholics as Protestants. It was so stunning an idea that Nugent put his toe in the water and gave it a try. It was the first viable move to give equal advantage to girls and to keep Bogside children in school before they became child labor in the factories, and soon Andrew Ingram had forty of the brightest youngsters in Bogside being trained for college.
School budgets and a raft of mutual interests brought Andrew Ingram and Kevin O'Garvey into an intimate and enlightened relationship, one enjoyed immensely by both men.
When Conor Larkin left Ballyutogue, he ended up in Derry and was taken in by Kevin who, among other things, was his godfather. When the ugly realities of Derry became apparent and Conor planned to move on, a desperate Kevin O'Garvey sought out Andrew Ingram.
18.
1895.
The Londonderry Guildhall, a Neo-Gothic frosted cake of a building, lived in two worlds. It was set between the River Foyle and Foyle Street. From the south window in Andrew Ingram's office one could see two of the Earl of Foyle's principal enterprises, a distillery and the infamous Witherspoon & McNab shirt factory. From Andrew's rear window he saw the Earl's control over shipbuilding, repair, and ironwork, the Caw & Train Graving Yard.
Directly over Foyle Street from the Guildhall was Shipquay Gate leading into the old city, the most perfect example of a medieval fortified town in the British Isles. The wall was beautifully intact, complete with its double bastion holding the old Roaring Meg cannon. The walkway atop the wall was a veritable Reformation Via Dolorosa with platforms for pitching pennies down on the Catholics in Bogside.
The problem for Roger Hubble was that all this Foyle business and the city itself had a Catholic majority and lay in County Donegal.