The Soldier's Song by Alan Monaghan Read Free Book Online

she wouldn’t have, either, if Sheila hadn’t kept pestering her. She’d been dying to go ever since she first heard about it, and Mary D’Arcy’s birthday party was the talk of the town. She couldn’t believe Lillian had an invitation and wasn’t going to use it.
    ‘But everybody’s going, Lillie.’
    ‘That’s because everybody was invited, Sheila. It’s only showing off they are.’
    ‘But you have to go. You’ve known her since she was small. Sure, didn’t you go to school with her?’
    Lillian just smiled and said she’d see. The truth was that she didn’t have fond memories of going to school with Mary D’Arcy. She would much rather have stayed at school in England, but her father’s posting there had come to an end and they had decided to move back home to Dublin. So, at the age of thirteen, Lillian had found herself in a new school, a head taller than any girl in her class, and with an unmistakable trace of London in her accent. She was an easy target for Mary D’Arcy and her gang of privileged harpies. They called her lanky first, and then spotty because of her freckles, and mocked her accent, telling her it belonged to neither one place nor the other, but in the middle of the Irish Sea. Then she was specky for her glasses, and finally, teacher’s pet, brainbox, know-it-all.
    Recalling this litany of names did little to calm her down. In one sense the party was just what she’d expected from Mary; showing off her privilege, shoving Daddy’s wealth down everybody’s throat. Oh, she was better at it now, more subtle by far, but she was still a spiteful little bully.
    But what was done was done, and no point in crying about it now. She tried to think what to do next. She’d left her sister inside – and her good shawl too – but wild horses wouldn’t drag her back in there to fetch them. Not while that ape Devereux and his friends were still at large. She should go now, go home and get out of it. Her sister was old enough to make her own way home and she could come back for the shawl in the morning. But that wouldn’t do. A cup of cocoa and a book in bed? That would be running away. But she wouldn’t go back in. She would wait. She would . . . Oh! What was she thinking? Sitting out here in the dark, sulking. Pride is your sin, girl, she chided herself. What were you like with that poor Ryan boy? Giving him the eye one minute and then looking away like Cleopatra when he smiled at you. You need to make up your mind, or you’ll be left. And now you’re starting to sound like your mother.
    She stood up and wiped her eyes with her handkerchief, but she still couldn’t make up her mind what to do. Go home or go back in? She was about to sit down again, when there was the sound of a commotion from inside. The band had not yet resumed playing, and the peace of the patio had barely been disturbed by the low hubbub of polite conversation and the occasional peal of laughter. But here was a confused thunder of feet coming to the doors. They burst open and a knot of young men staggered out, wrestling with something between them. She recognized Richard D’Arcy’s voice coming from behind them, sharp and shrill and raised to an angry pitch:
    ‘Get him out! Get him out!’
    And they threw down their bundle on the flagstones before turning back and pulling the glass doors behind them.
    For a moment she just stared in disbelief at the dishevelled figure as he pushed himself up on all fours.
    ‘Oh my goodness,’ she cried, hurrying over. ‘Mr Ryan? Are you all right?’
    He was so dazed that he flinched when she put her hand on his shoulder. She drew back and looked at him uncertainly, horrified when he turned his face up to her and it was streaming with blood.
    ‘Miss Bryce?’ he said groggily, and tried to get to his feet. ‘What are you doing here? I mean, I thought you’d gone home.’
    ‘I was about to,’ she admitted, watching him with some concern as he finally got up and stood swaying on