himself between the bear and Molly. But Mick was backpedalling too.
The crowd had seen it all before and mostly started thinking of dinner, all except one fellow who walked up to the big bloke and clapped a hand on his shoulder. The bear whirled around, unsteady, stopping as he recognised the uniform and the voice.
‘Sarge?’ he said.
‘Show’s over, eh, Jack. Time to go home.’ The big bloke cast an uncertain glance at his tormentors.
‘They don’t know, Sarge. They got no bloody idea how Caleb copped it.’
‘No.’ The sergeant spoke softly. ‘But these jokers are going home right now, aren’t you?’ he asked.
Joe, Molly and Mick nodded in unison. Surreptitiously Joe let go of Molly’s hand.
‘I reckon you should too.’
The sergeant waved them away, steering the big bloke up the street.
‘Maureen’ll have a nice stew for tea, I’ll bet,’ he encouraged.
The singletted bear cast them one final glare before, sheep-like, he followed. They all breathed easier. Not quite what they’d hoped. Took the edge off the fun, though secretly, Joe was glad.
‘I’d have gone a round with him!’ Mick skited.
‘Wouldn’t have lasted a half,’ Joe answered. ‘One belt from that bloke would knock you to the other side of Christmas.’
‘Well,’ Molly breathed. She turned, tripped on her heel and, for the second time in a quarter of an hour, landed with a surprised yelp, flat on her bottom.
‘You all right, Miss?’ called a soldier from an open window at the front of the Land’s Office Hotel. It was the lodger. His enquiring face pale, yet friendly. He seemed older than his looks belied, in his early twenties, but his dark hair was beginning to grey, as was his well-groomed moustache. Molly guessed he had honest eyes, though she hadn’t fully decided yet.
‘I’ll be for takin’ a quick sit down’s all, thanking you,’ she replied curtly. Molly took Mick’s hands as he helped her up. She patted down her dress while Joe scooped up her fallen floppy cotton hat.
‘Can’t help a maiden in distress? Pity!’ the soldier winked and raised a half-empty beer glass in salute. Mick scowled as the fellow drained it and picked up another from the three on the table in front of him.
‘Sounds like we’re in for a bit of fun tonight, Miss?’ the soldier continued amiably, nodding down the street towards the sounds still issuing from the Domain.
‘Bloody red-raggers! Ought to be ashamed.’
‘Ashamed of what?’ Mick demanded as he strode between Molly and the Digger at the window.
‘Ignore it, Mick,’ Joe whispered. But his mate was stoked-up hotter than the boiler on the Ipswich Express.
‘Ashamed for their disloyalty to King and Country, that’s what,’ the soldier continued. ‘There’s thousands of us Loyalists fighting in Europe while at home these damned Socialists white-ant the war effort.’ He stopped a moment to drink.
‘And what would you know about Socialism?’
Joe tried to divert the fire away from Mick. The soldier finally noticed the rosettes fluttering on each of the three chests stuck out before him.
‘Pah!’ He spat dismissively, not wanting to ruin his last drinks arguing with hardheads. He took a long swig of beer and ventured nothing further.
But Mick was primed to go on with it whether Joe, or this bloke, wanted to or not.
‘You’re such a slave you think getting killed for the bloody bosses is striking a blow for freedom! What’s freedom if you’re dead? You’d be better taking a leaf out of the Irish book. The bosses won’t give you freedom any more than the English’ll give freedom to the Irish – we have to take it!’
‘The Irish!’ The soldier spluttered beer froth over the table.
‘They deserve the same we give all traitors! The firing squad’s too good for ‘em!’
Mick puffed out his chest like a rooster about to crow.
‘I’ll be Patrick Doyle,’ he enunciated every word clearly. ‘That is an Irish name. And this,’ he said pointing over his shoulder at Molly. ‘Is my sweetheart, Molly Pearce. That’ll be another Irish name. And these colours,’ he continued pointing at the rosette on his chest, ‘are the colours of the Irish. And you,’ he yelled in the Loyalist’s face, ‘can bloody well take that back right now or by the sweet lovin’ Jesus … !’
Mick raised his fists.
It was for Molly’s sake the Digger backed down. He’d faced death enough times to know if a threat was worth the effort. This half-smart guttersnipe didn’t worry him one iota. But there was a lady present, one he recognized from the boarding house, and he didn’t need any trouble there. He composed himself.
‘Now look, son, I didn’t …’ he began.
‘Don’t you “son” me, mate.’
Mick advanced, fists still raised before him. Warily the soldier watched him. Joe knew the look on Mick’s face all too well: this wasn’t about his mother, or the Irish Martyrs, it was about Molly – he was sick of extricating Mick from jealousies of Mick’s own imagining – the fellow had only enquired, innocently enough, about Molly’s welfare and now look where they were headed.
‘If you had the choice between pulling your head in right now or finding out if we know how to fight, what would it be?’ Joe asked the soldier. Mick relaxed knowing Joe was still there. The soldier gazed at Joe, trying to figure out what his game was.
But Joe focussed on Mick. He knew his face would be tightened into that ready scowl, three furrows deep above his pugilist’s nose. His cleft chin thrust forward, eyes glittering with that unnatural blue that seemed poached from another body and fixed in the face of someone old before his time. Joe had seen it in a hundred bloody blues they’d been in together. He placed a hand on Mick’s shoulder.
‘Pick a fight you know you’ll win,’ he murmured.
‘So we just leave this Loyalist dog off his chain?’ Mick sneered. ‘He doesn’t scare me!’
‘He’ll have ten mates if he’s got one, all full of last drinks and primed to go,’ Joe soothed. ‘We’ll see him soon enough up some dark alley. Besides,’ he added, ‘you told Babushka you’d bring Molly home before dark, didn’t you.’ Mick softened at that.
‘When we meet him again, we’ll make sure we’re ready,’ Joe whispered.
‘Just watch your mouth, son!’ Mick growled at the soldier, spitting out the word “son”. He lowered his fists as Joe pushed him towards Molly on the opposite footpath.
‘Feisty little Fenian aren’t we?’ the soldier dismissed the bit of unpleasantness and turned back into the bar to laugh with his mates.
‘Come
