Cannonball

Chapter Thirty-One: Burning the King

Soaking her twisted ankle in a bowl of hot water, Rosemary sat back in her chair taking in her home that only a few hours earlier had been turned upside down by Campbell and his men. 

Ada and Polly had helped put everything back to normal, ensuring that the overturned mess disappeared and left no sign of what had transpired that day. 

Tommy had disappeared once Polly had brought Kathleen home, he said no word of what was going on in his mind but Rosemary knew her husband better than he knew himself sometimes. 

The look in his blue eyes was enough to tell her that Tommy would not be giving Campbell for what he had done this day, that his actions had overstepped a mark that Tommy could not forgive. 

Rosemary prayed that Tommy wasn't about to do anything stupid, she adored him but she feared the path that Tommy was walking to improve their lives. 

The front door to the house opened and Rosemary sat up a little at the sight of Finn, her brow furrowed watching her young brother-in-law as he walked into the sitting room and moved to set a stool before the picture of King George V that attached to the far wall beside the bookcase. 

"Finn? What's going on?" Rosemary asked lifting her feet from the bowl, she sat forward making an awkward move to stand on her sore leg but holding onto the chair so that she didn't fall from putting weight on it. 

Standing upon the stool, Finn removed the picture of the King from the wall just as he had been instructed to do so; he had been several places already to do the exact same thing. 

"Tommy said to get the picture," Finn said innocently, he was only doing as his big brother had told him and he knew that Tommy had to have his reasons; the look on Tommy's face when he told Finn what to do had left no room for questions. 

"What for?" Rosemary asked finding her balance, she took a small tender step forward as Finn climbed down from the stool with the picture tucked under his arm. 

He put the stool back where it was meant to go before fully turning to look at Rosemary, already dressed for bed since Kathleen was spending the night at Polly's to give her time to gather her bearings.

"We're having a fire," Finn said making sure that he had everything before he started towards the door, he didn't want to let Tommy down and he didn't want to miss all the fun that was happening. 

Rosemary stared at him in horror, her stomach twisting at the idea of what Tommy could want with the picture of the King; surely he wouldn't do something that could make them further targets of Campbell. 

"What?" Rosemary gasped, surging forward to grab her coat from by the door as Finn made his way outside into the cold night air; the moon the only source of light illuminating the garden as he went. 

Throwing on her coat, Rosemary slipped on some shoes and followed her brother-in-law out of the house making sure to pull the front door closed behind her as she stepped out into the night. 

"Finn? Where are you going?" Rosemary called after him, she hurried down the garden path as fast as her twisted ankle would allow her; she followed closely behind the boy who carried the picture of the king with him. 

"Bringing it to Watery Lane," Finn called back without turning around, he had to stop by the Garrison as well on his way to pick up their picture; he didn't want to miss out on all the fun that the others seemed to be having when he had left. 

Rosemary took a deep breath, pausing for a moment as she looked at the back of Finn before she moved to follow after him, no doubt she would find her husband at Watery Lane and find out just what he was doing.