The Emerald Key - By Christopher Dinsdale Page 0,5
to the small farmhouse before Jamie could stop him. Ryan approached the captain who had struck the woman.
“I saw this woman collapse. Is everything all right?” he asked.
“Must have had a dizzy spell, Father,” chuckled the captain, eyeing the young, hooded priest. “Fainted right here in front of me.”
“Funny how that happens, especially when something crashes into your face … like this.”
Ryan was deceptively strong for his thin frame. His balled fist crashed hard into the cheek of the captain. The soldier’s head snapped back so quickly that he flew through the air and landed in a heap on the dirt road. The other soldiers hollered in rage at the attack and were on Ryan like a pack of hounds. Ryan elbowed the nearest one hard in the chin and kicked out at the other. Off balance, his boot only grazed the soldier’s ribs and the remaining two redcoats threw him to the ground and began pummelling him.
“Ryan!”
Jamie couldn’t believe this was happening! He rushed to his brother’s aid.
Fists were smashing into Ryan’s face and chest. Jamie leaped at the nearest soldier, tackling him hard and sending him sprawling along the ground. The uninjured soldier left Ryan writhing in pain and turned to face Jamie. Jamie was preparing to defend himself when his head suddenly exploded in a sea of stars. He crumpled to the ground beside his groaning brother. The captain had recovered enough to grab hold of his rifle and club Jamie’s head with its wooden butt, knocking him out.
“Is this priest the one that attacked me?” he asked, pointing to Ryan while touching the growing welt on the side of his face.
“Yes, sir.”
“Filthy friar. He should be shot here and now for breaching his own vows to God.”
A soldier held up his rifle and aimed it at Ryan’s heaving chest. “Just say the word, sir.”
“You can’t shoot a priest!” interjected a third. “You’ll be damned for all time!”
The captain paused at the thought and took a moment to contemplate the situation.
“All right, we won’t kill him.”
The captain brought his rifle butt down on the back of Ryan’s head, bringing his moans to a sudden stop. The two unconscious priests lay together, as still as corpses in front of the terrified family. The captain looked out to the shimmering harbour and watched a tall ship raising her sails.
“I do hate to waste a life. My friend is an officer on board the Carpathia. The ship is scheduled to leave this evening for Quebec. What do you say we do our part for God and teach these young priests a valuable lesson? Take the tall one down to the harbour and give him a one-way ticket to Canada.”
“Isn’t the Carpathia better known as the ‘Floating Morgue’, sir?”
He chuckled. “Yes, I do believe that is the one. That’s why its fare across the ocean is so cheap … so few actually survive the crossing. It should give our good friar here a lot of practice giving the last rites to the passengers who die along the way.”
While two of the soldiers picked Ryan up by the arms, the third looked into the satchel draped across his chest.
“No money in here, Captain. Just an old, dusty book. And it’s all written in that nonsense Celtic. Must be a monastery book.”
“I don’t see any reason to deny him his studies. Perhaps he’ll learn the lesson of turning the other cheek in matters that do not concern him. Now, hurry him down to the harbour. I don’t want the priest to miss his departure.”
“And what of the other lad?”
The captain took hold of the reins of the ox, then looked back to the terrified family huddling around their groaning mother.
“Make sure that you tell the lad everything that has happened,” he shouted back to the family. “This young priest can help spread the word to any other clergy in Ireland who dare intervene in the affairs of the British Empire. His authority is limited to what happens within the church and Heaven above. Tell him Britannia rules supreme everywhere else!”
Chapter 2
Coming to, Jamie moaned as he reached for the back of his head. Something in his hair was warm and sticky. Touching it, then bringing his hand to his face and finally managing to open his eyes, he saw the clotted redness of his own blood. His strange surroundings slowly came into focus. Something cool and damp was pressed against his forehead.