the Savage Day - Simon Vaughn 02 (v5) Read Online Free PDF Page B

her right hand a square, flat case which she placed on the bar.
    'Pick him up,' she said.
    The injured boy's companions did as they were told, holding him between them while she examined the hand. I poured myself another Jameson and joined the group as she opened the case. The most interesting item on display was a stethoscope and she rummaged around and finally produced a large triangular sling which she tied about the boy's neck to support the injured hand.
    'Take him into Casualty at the Infirmary,' she said. 'He'll need a plaster cast.'
    'And keep your mouth shut,' Binnie put in.
    They went out on the run, the injured boy's feet dragging between them. The door closed and there was only the silence.
    As Norah Murphy reached for the case I said, 'Is that just a front or the real thing?'
    'Would Harvard Medical School be good enough for you?' she demanded.
    'Fascinating,' I said. 'Our friend here breaks them up and you put them together again. That's what I call teamwork.'
    She didn't like that for she turned very pale and snapped the fastener of her case together angrily, but I think she had determined not to lose her temper.
    'All right, Major Vaughan,' she said. 'I don't like you either. Shall we go?'
    She moved towards the door. I turned and placed my glass on the counter in front of the barman, who was standing there waiting for God knows what axe to fall.
    Binnie said, 'You've seen nothing, heard nothing. All right?'
    There was no need to threaten and the poor wretch nodded dumbly, his lip trembling. And then, quite suddenly, he collapsed across the bar and started to cry.
    Binnie surprised me then by patting him on the shoulder and saying with astonishing gentleness, 'Better times coming, Da. Just you see.'
    But if the barman believed that, then I was the only sane man in a world gone mad.
    It had started to rain and fog rolled in across the docks as we moved along the waterfront, Norah Murphy at my side, Binnie bringing up the rear rather obviously.
    Neither of them said a word until we were perhaps half way to our destination when Norah Murphy paused at the end of a mean street of terrace houses and turned to Binnie. 'I've a patient I must see here. I promised to drop a prescription in this evening. Five minutes.'
    She ignored me and walked away down the street, pausing at the third or fourth door to knock briskly. She was admitted almost at once and Binnie and I moved into the shelter of an arched passageway between two houses. I offered him a cigarette which he refused. I lit one myself and leaned against the wall.
    After a while he said, 'Your mother - what was her maiden name?'
    'Fitzgerald,' I told him. 'Nuala Fitzgerald.'
    He turned, his face a pale shadow in the darkness. 'There was a man of the same name schoolmaster at Stradballa during the Troubles.'
    'Her elder brother,' I said.
    He leaned closer as if trying to see my face. 'You, a bloody Englishman, are the nephew of Michael Fitzgerald, the Schoolmaster of Stradballa?'
    'I suppose I must be. Why should that be so hard to take?'
    'But he was a great hero,' Binnie said. 'He commanded the Stradballa flying column. When the Tans came to take him, he was teaching at the school. Because of the children he went outside and shot it out in the open, one against fifteen, and got clean away.'
    'I know,' I said. 'A real hero of the revolution. All for the Cause only he never wanted it to end, Binnie, that was his trouble. Executed during the Civil War by the Free State Government. I always found that part of the story rather ironic myself, or had you forgotten that after they'd got rid of the English, the Irish set about knocking each other off with even greater enthusiasm?'
    I could not see the expression on his face, yet the tension in him was something tangible between us.
    I said, 'Don't try it, boy. As the Americans would say, you're out of your league. Compared to me, you're just a bloody amateur.'
    'Is that a fact now, Major?' he said softly.
    'Another