Read Online A Winter of Spies by Gerard Whelan - Free Book Online Page B

nothing. Trying to talk sense to Sarah when she was in this mood only made her worse. She had trouble sitting calmly at the best of times, unless she was with Mrs Breen. Perhaps they should have gone with Ma and Ella down to Breens’ instead of waiting here.
    Sarah went to the window and looked out. A soft rain fell in the dark street outside. It was still hours till curfew. Josie watched her sister with a carefully hidden half-smile – she didn’t want her thinking she was laughing at her. Jimmy had told her about what Sarah had seen, and how upset he suspected she’d been. It was always a shock tosee what you’d dreamed of. Still, there was something very funny about Sarah when she was like this, the way she seemed almost to vibrate with impatience. She was, indeed, as Ma and Da often said, an impossible child.
    â€˜You know why they sent us away,’ Josie said finally. ‘They need to talk freely now.’
    â€˜Hmmph,’ Sarah said, tossing her head. It was the same as ever – one side of her understood perfectly, but another side was just too excited. People were watching her family, maybe plotting to arrest her father. Downstairs Da and Mick and Simon Hughes and Martin Ford were discussing what to do about it, and meanwhile she was being kept out of the whole thing – she, Sarah, who’d discovered the entire plot!
    â€˜Why do men think they’re the only ones can talk about important things?’ she demanded. ‘They wouldn’t even let Ma stay on.’
    â€˜Ma didn’t want to stay,’ Josie said. ‘As well you know. She doesn’t want to know anything about this. And Ella would get the vapours just listening.’
    â€˜Still,’ Sarah said, as she always did when she had no answer to an argument. She went back and threw herself on the bed and sighed. She kept picturing the dying detective in her mind, but each time she’d force herself to think of something else. Her impatience was as good a distraction as any.
    Jimmy was in his own room – reading, Sarah didn’t doubt. Lately he’d started to quote lines of poetry at her. He had a lot of time for that old fellow, Yeats, whom she’d seen around town a few times. The poet was a long, stooped man with a vague and distant look in his eyes. He wrote poems about fairies, of all things. Sarah couldn’t imagine that a man like that would have any sensib le comments to make on life.
    It baffled Sarah that even Jimmy could be patient. They’d come home with the news about Fowles barely an hour before. All of the family had been in the kitchen, Martin Ford and Simon Hughes too.
    â€˜Are you certain it was Fowles?’ Simon had asked them.
    Sarah didn’t like being doubted. ‘Haven’t I eyes in me head?’ she’d said tartly.
    â€˜Aye,’ Martin Ford said. ‘And a mouth too.’
    Sarah didn’t like that. He was always dismissing her – they all were. They’d only let her help with the gun that time because they’d had no choice.
    â€˜I’m surprised you noticed,’ she said.
    Martin Ford scowled at her. ‘Your mouth? Sure how could I miss it,’ he said, ‘and it swinging between your two ears like a skipping rope?’
    Sarah had felt her fury rising. Jimmy saw it, and grabbed her arm: Martin Ford might be a brave man, but he’d never seen Sarah in a fury. She was quite capable ofthrowing something at him, and her aim was good.
    â€˜It was him, Simon,’ he said.
    Simon Hughes had just nodded. Martin Ford, forgetting himself, had sworn a single terrible swearword that had never been spoken in their kitchen before. Sarah reddened and waited for Da to say something to him, but Da said nothing. Ford caught himself and apologised, then looked across the table at Simon Hughes.
    â€˜This couldn’t happen at a worse time,’ he said.
    â€˜There’s no good time for a thing like