Read Shamrock Green for Free Online Page A

candles that split when it struck the floor and sent waxy missiles skittering about the officers’ feet.
    â€˜Mam, Mameee, it’s the peelers,’ Maeve shrieked, and galloped off upstairs with Ames in hot pursuit.
    â€˜She’s a child, a kiddie, are you for shootin’ her too?’ Jansis said.
    Vaizey ignored the servant. He gestured again. A second detective, no less muscular than the first, flung open the door to the dining-room, then, finding the room empty, lumbered down the corridor opening one door after another. Under the skirt of his trench-coat he carried a holstered revolver.
    Scuffling and shouting came from above. Ames appeared out of the gloom holding Maeve, kicking and squealing, in front of him, his arms about her waist. Sylvie was right behind him, beating at his shoulders with a dustpan. When he reached the hall he flung the girl from him, then, rounding on Sylvie, caught her wrists, broke her grip on the dustpan and swung her down into the hallway too.
    â€˜Good morning to you, ma’am.’ Vaizey lifted his hat. ‘I apologise for the intrusion but I’m afraid we have our duty to do and cannot be hindered in doing it.’
    â€˜Duty?’ said Jansis. ‘Terrorisin’ women and children, do you call that duty?’
    Vaizey addressed himself to Sylvie. ‘You know what we’re looking for, of course. We have good reason to believe you are hiding illegally imported arms.’
    â€˜Hah!’ Sylvie exclaimed. ‘So that’s it, is it?’
    She helped Maeve to her feet and put the girl behind her. There was the clatter of utensils being tossed about in the kitchen and a draught around her ankles indicated that the door to the yard had been opened. She remembered everything that Fran Hagarty had told her yesterday in the room in the tenement in Endicott Street and she was alarmingly calm, possessed not by a sense of outrage but of engagement. She said, ‘You’ll find no weapons in my house.’
    She was relieved that Gowry was not at home. Gowry would have admitted the officers straight away and condoned their right to search the premises, would, in other words, have co-operated. She was also relieved that Mr Dolan had toddled off for his daily survey of the harbour, for she knew that weakness was more dangerous than principle when the peelers got on your back.
    â€˜I have no guns here and no truck with men who use them,’ Sylvie heard herself say. ‘I’ll thank you to inform your bully-boys that if they lay another finger on my daughter I’ll complain to the commissioner in person.’
    Vaizey said, ‘We’re empowered to inspect your premises, you know.’
    â€˜And manhandle young girls?’ Sylvie said. ‘Maeve, stop crying.’
    â€˜Brutes!’ Maeve shouted. ‘Bastards!’
    â€˜For a young girl,’ Vaizey said, ‘she has a nasty mouth. You’ – he pointed at Jansis – ‘take the girl and yourself into that room and wait there until I call you.’
    â€˜I will not be taking orders from—’
    â€˜Do as he says, Jansis,’ Sylvie told her. ‘I’ll deal with these people.’
    Muttering under her breath the servant led Maeve into the sitting-room and closed the door. Sylvie glanced along the shiny river of linoleum into the kitchen. There were pans on the floor, a bucket, a broom and a mop. Through the open door at the back she could make out a detective poking about in the hen-run.
    â€˜I hope he’s not interfering with my chooks,’ Sylvie said.
    â€˜Chooks?’ said Vaizey.
    â€˜Chickens,’ Sylvie said. ‘My hens.’
    â€˜He’s just doing his job. He won’t harm your – chooks.’
    Vaizey took her by the elbow. She was tempted to yank her arm away but, capitulating, let him guide her to the alcove under the stairs.
    â€˜Look’ – Vaizey’s breath smelled of tobacco –