Pullrany and the higher crown of Corraun beyond; there was Alice’s Harbour Inn beside the car park, the barricade, the white buildings across the bridge on the island, a group of men standing there, heads close together, talking intently. Presently, the major returned to his radioman and inquired:
“Have the patrol boats taken up position at the Bulls Mouth and Achillbeg?”
The radioman, a pimply young man with nervous manners, bent over his microphone and, in a moment, said: “They’re in place, sir, and one’s coming down from the Bulls Mouth to pick up the islanders’ small boats.”
“Good,” the major said. “We don’t want any boats left over there to tempt them into leaving.” He sighed. “Damned stupid mess.” He strolled back to the armored cars then and told a sergeant: “Better get the men deployed. No one enters or leaves, except the medics, of course, and they’ll be coming by helicopter.” The major went into Alice’s then and he could be heard inquiring if there was any coffee.
Some two kilometers back up the road toward Mulrany, three squads of soldiers under a lieutenant finished setting up a row of tents in the lee of the hill that commanded the narrow, salty moat separating Achill from Ireland proper. A sandbag emplacement with two machine guns had already been installed on the slope above the tents.
When the tents were up, the lieutenant instructed a corporal: “Take your squad and notify all the locals they’re to stay close to home; no wandering about and no going over to the island. Tell them it’s a quarantine and nothing more.”
On Corraun Hill’s 526-meter peak, about four kilometers south of this position, more soldiers had piled sandbags onto a section of an old castle ruin, forming a shelter for two twenty-millimeter cannon and four mortars. It began to rain while they were positioning the mortars. They spread shelter halves over the weapons, then huddled in their waterproofs while a colonel standing slightly below them peered through binoculars at Achill.
“A lot of moving around over there,” the colonel said. “I’ll be happier when we have their small boats and the water closed to them.”
One of the soldiers above him ventured: “Colonel, is it a bad sickness they have over there?”
“So I’ve been told,” the colonel said. He lowered his glasses, scanned the emplacement, fixing his gaze finally on a tall sergeant who stood somewhat apart. “Get some shelters up, Sergeant. And you’re to look sharp. Only the medics are to enter that place and no one’s to leave.” “We’ll not let so much as a fox through, sir.”
Turning away, the colonel took long-legged strides down the slope to a jeep waiting on the narrow track below the emplacement.
As one, the soldiers he had left behind looked across at Achill, the island of the eagles, which no longer were there. It was a brooding landscape in the rain, a speckling of white rocks and buildings against the greens. The few roads cut gray ledges around the hills and the ocean was a deeper gray below. Slievemore and Croaghaun thrust almost into the clouds toward Achill Head’s outer cliffs. It was a place turned in upon itself and the men looking across at the island could feel the simmering mood of the land. Generations of men and women had brooded passionately there on the wrongs done to Ireland. No Irishman could fail to sense that thing smoldering there, the sullen hopes of all those who had perished for “The Irish Dream.”
“It’ll be a scurrying-around time for the priests,” the sergeant said, then: “Now, men, you heard the colonel. Shouldn’t we be raising some shelters?”
Far below this position and at the Achill end of the bridge where the town street became the highroad to the island’s interior, Mulvaney’s Saloon Bar had begun to collect a crowd of local residents and a few tourists. They hunched against the rain, hurrying from cars and bicycles into the bar’s steamy interior
“Have the patrol boats taken up position at the Bulls Mouth and Achillbeg?”
The radioman, a pimply young man with nervous manners, bent over his microphone and, in a moment, said: “They’re in place, sir, and one’s coming down from the Bulls Mouth to pick up the islanders’ small boats.”
“Good,” the major said. “We don’t want any boats left over there to tempt them into leaving.” He sighed. “Damned stupid mess.” He strolled back to the armored cars then and told a sergeant: “Better get the men deployed. No one enters or leaves, except the medics, of course, and they’ll be coming by helicopter.” The major went into Alice’s then and he could be heard inquiring if there was any coffee.
Some two kilometers back up the road toward Mulrany, three squads of soldiers under a lieutenant finished setting up a row of tents in the lee of the hill that commanded the narrow, salty moat separating Achill from Ireland proper. A sandbag emplacement with two machine guns had already been installed on the slope above the tents.
When the tents were up, the lieutenant instructed a corporal: “Take your squad and notify all the locals they’re to stay close to home; no wandering about and no going over to the island. Tell them it’s a quarantine and nothing more.”
On Corraun Hill’s 526-meter peak, about four kilometers south of this position, more soldiers had piled sandbags onto a section of an old castle ruin, forming a shelter for two twenty-millimeter cannon and four mortars. It began to rain while they were positioning the mortars. They spread shelter halves over the weapons, then huddled in their waterproofs while a colonel standing slightly below them peered through binoculars at Achill.
“A lot of moving around over there,” the colonel said. “I’ll be happier when we have their small boats and the water closed to them.”
One of the soldiers above him ventured: “Colonel, is it a bad sickness they have over there?”
“So I’ve been told,” the colonel said. He lowered his glasses, scanned the emplacement, fixing his gaze finally on a tall sergeant who stood somewhat apart. “Get some shelters up, Sergeant. And you’re to look sharp. Only the medics are to enter that place and no one’s to leave.” “We’ll not let so much as a fox through, sir.”
Turning away, the colonel took long-legged strides down the slope to a jeep waiting on the narrow track below the emplacement.
As one, the soldiers he had left behind looked across at Achill, the island of the eagles, which no longer were there. It was a brooding landscape in the rain, a speckling of white rocks and buildings against the greens. The few roads cut gray ledges around the hills and the ocean was a deeper gray below. Slievemore and Croaghaun thrust almost into the clouds toward Achill Head’s outer cliffs. It was a place turned in upon itself and the men looking across at the island could feel the simmering mood of the land. Generations of men and women had brooded passionately there on the wrongs done to Ireland. No Irishman could fail to sense that thing smoldering there, the sullen hopes of all those who had perished for “The Irish Dream.”
“It’ll be a scurrying-around time for the priests,” the sergeant said, then: “Now, men, you heard the colonel. Shouldn’t we be raising some shelters?”
Far below this position and at the Achill end of the bridge where the town street became the highroad to the island’s interior, Mulvaney’s Saloon Bar had begun to collect a crowd of local residents and a few tourists. They hunched against the rain, hurrying from cars and bicycles into the bar’s steamy interior
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