Free The Blood Dimmed Tide by Anthony Quinn

newspaper reports, I’m sure. The whole of Ireland is a powder keg waiting to be set off by the meddling of naive Englishmen and vengeful Germans.’
    Sweat trickled down my neck.
    ‘Were there any other passengers from first class in the hold?’
    ‘No.’ My lie was too quick and it made him pause.
    ‘What are you reading?’ A faint contempt threaded through his voice. ‘William Butler Yeats? Now there’s an extraordinary poet.’
    ‘What do you mean?’
    ‘Not many poets take an annual pension from the King, and then campaign to have his kingdom overthrown.’
    ‘Mr Yeats’ political beliefs aren’t that simple,’ I endeavoured to explain. ‘He has told me he doesn’t know which lies heaviest on his heart. The tragedy of Ireland, or the tragedy of England.’
    ‘And is that because of his poetic soul, or is he just muddle-headed?’
    ‘You’re trying to needle me. Mr Yeats is a friend of mine and a confidant.’
    ‘I’m only needling to find the truth. If Mr Yeats is your confidant, then what has he confided in you?’
    A darkness squirmed in his eyes. A pitch-black, wriggling darkness.
    ‘You’re travelling to Sligo?’ he asked.
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘To visit a paternal aunt,’ I lied.
    ‘You’ve been there before?’
    ‘First time.’
    ‘I’m baffled.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘Why a young Englishman would suddenly decide to make his first trip to Ireland at the most dangerous point in six hundred years of occupation.’
    ‘I’m not interested in history.’
    ‘Then you’re not equipped to visit Ireland. History will surround you. And the hatred it has spawned. When this storm abates, you should take a good look at the coast. What civilisation exists is centred on the estates of English landlords, and even their substantial mansions and castles face out to sea, away from the forbidding land. The sea is their point of contact with the rest of the Empire, their all-important escape route.’
    He lifted the book of Yeats’ poems, and felt its heft.
    ‘I’m not a literary critic, just a fellow Irishman. But tell Mr Yeats he should have the good sense of his compatriots Wilde and Shaw, who wear their nationality lightly, and dramatise the world they know, rather than spinning one out of their boyhood imaginations.’
    When I did not reply, he stared at me.
    ‘You’ll find out soon enough that the real Ireland is nothing like Yeats’ portrayal. It has grown cruel and savage beyond belief.’
    He handed me back the book. It fell from my grasp onto the deck, spilling its contents across the wet boards.
    ‘What do we have here?’ said Marley, lifting Rosemary O’Grady’s letter and the newspaper clipping. He gave them a furtive caress and read their contents with growing interest.
    ‘This is not my province at all,’ he murmured. He examined me closely. ‘I take it you are going to bring this letter to the attention of the Sligo police?’
    Before I could reply, water came surging over the bow of the boat, forcing us to retreat below deck. The momentum of the waves rocked the boat back and forth in steep, sickening arcs. Overcome with seasickness, I slumped against a bulkhead. My stalker swung himself alongside.
    ‘Tell me, what are you doing with this letter?’
    I felt my stomach dangle above the bottomless depths of the ocean, and then the motion of the boat hitting a sudden swell hurled it upwards again.
    ‘It was given to me,’ I said weakly, ‘by the Order of the Golden Dawn. The society has sent me to investigate her death.’
    He handed me back the letter and news report. We took advantage of a brief lull in the boat’s pitching and staggered to the dining cabin, where the major, his wife and the Red Cross nurse were deep in conversation. I sat on a bench and pressed my head against the cold porthole. They were discussing English perceptions of Sligo, and my ears pricked at the mention of Yeats’ name. I tried to quell the surges of nausea sufficiently to concentrate on