It is an easy matter to get a husband locked up; but, until I faced the Tommies at the Castle gates and stated my case, I did not know what a difficult matter it is to get one unlocked. Ammunition sounds so simple. It sounds so simple to say that it belonged to somebody else, and you had no knowledge of it. But the word ammunition changes the expression on every face in Dublin Castle.
There seemed no one to go to. I was sent from guardroom to guardroom. I sat upon hard forms while weary Tommies dawdled off to mysterious inner rooms with a paper which I had filled up and signed. At last there came one Tommy, brighter than the others, who returned and said briskly, “This way,” and I grew hopeful.
This way proved to be across the yard and into another building with other ill-swept corridors, with other stairs which proclaimed that unwiped feet had climbed them for many years. The Tommy left me and disappeared through a door.
I sat beside a small table, and one or two men eyed me. After some time the Tommy emerged.
“Wrong,” he said cheerfully. “Fill this up.” He pulled another slip of paper out of a box, and, while I wrote on it, argued with one of the lounging men as to which was the best place to take me.
“Room 8,” declared one man at last. “He’s shifted lately, but I think he’s Room 8. Anyway, Room 8 will tell you.”
Once more we made our way along dirty passages, and climbed up and down unswept stairs.
“It’s Room 11,” declared Room 8 to our inquiries. “You’ll find what you want there.”
“They’ve been shifting,” the Tommy apologised to me. He stopped a man he knew. “Who’s the best person to go to?” He jerked his head in my direction.
The man rubbed his chin with his forefinger. He thought for a long time.