The DI turned to Macken. ‘Go speak to them. Be firm. They’ve made their point, but they must disperse immediately. I hope they’ll listen to one of their own.’
Aye, there’s the rub, thought Macken, as he trudged towards the barricade. Someone is taking a perverse pleasure having the likes of me escort an Orange march.
*
One face at the barrier looked familiar, so Macken headed that way. He paused at the boulders to allow his presence to be felt. Everyone, deep down, has reason to fear the police. Macken slowly looked along the line of faces. Most avoided his gaze, as he willed their anxiety to grow into something he could use to dominate them – to let one man overcome a mob. They just need a nudge, he thought, from overt truculence back to grudging respect and then compliance. Almost there…
‘Jaysus, he came all this way and forgot what he had to say!’
Macken heard sniggering.
‘Don’t worry, we’ve room for one more round this side,’ said the familiar face, mocking him. ‘It’s about time you deserted that shower of Orange bastards!’
Macken realised his bubble had been burst, lanced by a sharp thrust of ridicule from someone with a nose for weakness. He consoled himself that if they were laughing, it eased the tension.
He opened his hands in a gesture of conciliation. ‘Hello, lads. Who’s running this show?’
The looks turned stony once more. The answer was another taunt. ‘I thought it was you, Sergeant Macken. Are you here to negotiate?’
More laughter. It was the sneering way he said ‘negotiate’ that reminded Macken of who he was.
They’d met a few weeks before, when he had been playing away for his local football team against some notorious bruisers. Size and toughness are significant assets in the knockabout combat into which Gaelic football can descend. Macken had both. But they had only begun warming up when he had become aware of pointing and discussion on the touchline.
When it came, the tap on the shoulder had been from his own shamefaced captain. The home team were objecting to Macken’s presence under Rule 21 of the Gaelic Athletic Association. It barred members of the Crown forces from taking part in GAA events. A gesture of defiance against the oppressor. Macken’s job was common knowledge, but no one had made a fuss before. Sure, there was no harm in being on good terms with the local policeman. And if you were on bad terms, then a game of football or hurling was the perfect opportunity to knock his block off.
Macken remembered that it had been the skinny martinet looking down on him from the barricade right now who had clung to the rule book that day. Bottom lip out, finger wagging, he’d rejected any offer to ‘negotiate’ – a word apparently so despicable that he’d spat it rather than say it.
Macken had departed the field, shoulders slumped, without complaint. He’d not wanted to embarrass his protesting teammates, who’d been decent enough to turn a blind eye to his status themselves. He’d been left on the sidelines, wondering where he belonged, watching a bad-tempered football game quickly turn dirty.
*
Better get on with it, thought Macken. ‘You’ve made your point, lads. Time to move before things get nasty.’
‘That sounds like a threat. Jolly by name, but not so jolly when it comes to his own kind. We know whose side he’s on.’
He must be a schoolteacher, thought Macken. Derision is his way of keeping control. But behind the bluster, not so sure of himself maybe? Too keen to pander to the back of the class. Time to find out if he can take it as well as dish it out.
Macken permitted himself a small smile, squared his shoulders and stared the schoolteacher in the face. The man blinked uncertainly, twitching bags under his eyes that sagged with the weight of past disappointments.
‘Away and chase yourself,’ growled Macken. ‘I’m making the rules today.’
His tormentor flinched, suddenly more quarry than hunter. But before Macken could press home his advantage, a stone hit him between the shoulder blades. More clattered off the nearby boulders.
Macken couldn’t very well hide behind the barricade, so he ran, feeling ridiculous, arm over his face, back through the hail to the police line.
‘I’m afraid they got impatient, Sergeant,’ said the DI. ‘You seemed to be getting a bit pally with the other side.’
‘Sir, you told me to talk to them.’
‘Sergeant, your job is to move them.’
The marchers finally had the excitement they’d come for. They bombarded the barricade from behind the police. The defenders popped up to hurl catcalls and a few stones back. These barely reached the feet of the constables in front. Macken suspected the men on the roadblock were waiting till the Orangemen came closer.
‘Sergeant, prepare your men to charge.’
‘Sir, what about these boys behind us? They started the stone-throwing. They’re using us as a shield.’
‘Sergeant! Your men are under attack from that mob!’
‘With respect, sir, the first officer to be attacked was me, from behind our own line. We can defuse this, but we need to move back out of range.’
But the decision had been made. Perhaps it was the thudding of the Lambeg drum, so loud and resonant it seemed to be inside everyone’s head. Or the fear that failure to act would be seen as cowardice. The DI ordered batons to be drawn.
‘Sergeant, lead your men!’
Christ, thought Macken, I don’t want to be a policeman any more. He drew the polished ebony from its case on his belt, raised it above his head and shouted, ‘Charge!’
*
Macken’s cry was the cue for an even bigger volley of stones from the Orangemen behind him. The line of policemen became the shape of an arrowhead. Like geese in flight, no constable wished to reach their destination before the leading bird.
Behind them rushed the delighted horde of camp followers. The bandsmen came too – fifes tucked away, drummers still sounding a ragged rat-a-tat-tat. And on came the sober-suited official brethren. Some had discarded their jackets, rolled up their sleeves and pocketed their precious collarettes, the better to get stuck in. Those still clinging to notions of propriety wore expressions of grim concern rather than glee. They advanced with the air of reluctant school prefects, the stout sticks or umbrellas with which they had tapped out their route now raised as clubs.
At least the penetrating rhythm of Big Jim Courtney’s Lambeg had stopped. Big Jim was unharnessing himself, the better to batter rebels with his fists. Two older Orangemen stayed behind to guard the Lodge’s fringed banner – its scenes of past atrocities against the Protestants of Ulster a warning never to weaken in future.
*
The
