The Death of an Irish Lass Read online

  McGarr drove his new Cooper, Noreen in the front seat, Farrell and Hughie Ward in the rear.

  It was twilight again and McGarr let the little car course over the twisting stretch of coast road between Kilrush and Lahinch. He couldn’t understand why British Leyland had stopped making the Cooper. It clung to the road like a crab and could accelerate as fast as any motorcycle. The one problem was tires. They were small and wore quickly, and McGarr had found he had to replace his about as often as some people changed the oil in their cars. But he was willing to put up with the expense for the sort of handling the Cooper provided.

  Behind them Dan O’Malley had long since ceased trying to keep up with him.

  McGarr cranked on northwest into a brilliant twilight sky. It was clear and cloudless, the sun like an orange globe on the horizon off toward Iceland. On the hills as they neared the sea, McGarr could pick out bobbing points of light that were fishing boats—some, huge ships; others, private craft that were trawling after mackerel. They would be running now. The water was azure in toward shore where the bottom was sandy, but black out in the deep.

  Noreen, sensing McGarr’s thoughts as he slowed on a cliff to look down into a small boat below them, said, “Broiled mackerel with mustard sauce.”

  McGarr turned his head to her. “With a chilled bottle of Pouilly. A ’59.” It was one of McGarr’s favorite dishes.

  “How’s that?” asked Commissioner Farrell. He had removed his coat and tie and had not said a word when McGarr had stopped at a bar for a dozen bottles of Harp lager and produced a bottle of Jack Daniels from his bag. Farrell had drunk the beers and sipped the sour mash, all the while acting like a truant from hated duties, as though he were involved in a grand adventure—hurtling up the winding road after a work diary that might tip them off to something important about the I.R.A. He had talked incessantly, even sung a bit.

  Noreen explained that there had been a restaurant called Le Conquet in Les Halles, the Paris marketplace that has been moved into an ugly concrete structure on the outskirts of Paris. But when McGarr was working for Criminal Justice, Le Conquet was situated in a crumbling gray building on the corner near the fish and seafood stalls and had been there so long it had two Utrillos in the main dining room and an exquisite Sisley over the bar. The family, who were Bretons, had taken the paintings in trade from the artists and at the time had considered the exchanges bad deals. One of the house specialties was broiled mackerel with mustard sauce.

  “While the mackerel is broiling, the chef makes a paste of butter and flour, adds boiling white sauce, and then a mixture of egg yolks and whipping cream. He beats this over heat until it boils for about five seconds. Then it’s seasoned to taste and fresh lemon juice is added.”

  “Oh, Jasus,” said Farrell. “And that’s put on the fish?”

  “Not yet. He takes some strong Dijon mustard—you know the type, it’s brown, not yellow, and has been made with wine and spices and wine vinegar—”

  “Cripes,” said Farrell. “I’m famished.”

  “—and some unsalted butter. He blends them together.”

  “Good God! You have to wonder how those Frogs ever get to thinking up all of that.”

  McGarr brought the Cooper down to a roll and turned onto a goat track that led from the highway down to the beach.

  “And he beats the mustard sauce into the hot sauce bâtarde. This he then spoons over the freshly broiled mackerel. It’s served with a dry white wine.”

  “Say no more,” said Farrell. “I despised mackerel unawares. I’ve eaten in tens, possibly hundreds of fine restaurants. Why is it that I missed broiled mackerel with mustard sauce?”

  “You won’t tonight.” McGarr got out of the Cooper. They were on the beach now. He leaned back and whistled once. The sound was shrill and the man in the boat turned to look shoreward. McGarr waved to him.

  Noreen honked the horn.

  Farrell got out of the car too. “What are you going to do?”

  “Buy some mackerel.”

  “But what about May Quirk’s work diary? What about Fleming and O’Connor? The I.R.A. is probably searching every nook and cranny for that thing right now. Shouldn’t we—?”

  “They’re not searching the proper nooks and crannies. Specifically, they’re not searching the Quirk mailbox. And we can lift Fleming and O’Connor anytime we want.”

  “Honestly, you amaze me. I thought in hiring you my worries were over and I could do a little office work and then go home and sleep at night.”

  “Are you dissatisfied with my results?”

  “Oh, no. It’s not the results that worry me, it’s your methods. They’re—” Farrell couldn’t find the right word. Finally he said, “Cavalier.”

  The engine of the little open boat had started. The bow swung around and headed toward shore.

  Farrell turned and looked out toward the open ocean, which was calm, with only the occasional roller lazing over the rocks. “It’s as though you think you’re at some sort of party. One that ranges all over the goddamn world!” He took a pull from a lager bottle.

  McGarr turned to him. “Just so. And why not, Fergus?” McGarr had the bourbon bottle in his right hand. He raised it to his lips. “What’s the harm in my thinking I’ve been invited to one long bash at which, from time to time, I’m asked to perform a few small services to justify my presence?”

  Farrell sighed. “What’s New York like?”

  “A good party town.”

  Farrell turned and walked back to the car.

  The man in the small boat had not only mackerel but two large rock lobsters that he had snagged in his net.

  McGarr paid him a fiver and what was left in the bottle for the lobsters and a dozen mackerel.

  When McGarr got back in the car, Farrell said, “What the hell. Maybe for once I’ve been invited to the party too.”

  Up on the road, O’Malley’s Triumph had caught up to them. “Since you’ve been fishing,” said O’Shaughnessy, “we can take your catch over to my aunt’s house in Kinvara.” All O’Shaughnessy’s people were fishermen, and the welcome they always laid out for Liam was extravagant. “After—” O’Shaughnessy added.

  “Of course,” said McGarr and he geared off.

  Reaching for another lager, Farrell said, “I see you’ve got your men well trained, Peter.”

  “Party manners,” said McGarr. “Don’t let them turn your head.”

  Inside the Quirk farmhouse a wake was in progress. Cars were parked on both sides of the road and in every laneway.

  The mauve light of dusk had cast a funereal pall over the house.

  McGarr didn’t look for a parking place. He rushed the Cooper up to the mailbox and applied the brakes.

  Leaning on it was none other than Detective Sergeant Bernie McKeon, McGarr’s detail man and second in command back at Dublin Castle.

  McGarr and Farrell got out.

  “Commissioner, Chief Inspector,” said McKeon, “what took you so long?” He opened the mailbox and pulled out several letters and a small blue loose-leaf notebook. McKeon was a stocky man nearly fifty who had fine blond hair combed over his forehead. His eyes were small and playful. McKeon was seldom without a smile, and tonight it was mischievous.

  “What are you doing here?” McGarr asked. “And what have you got in your hand?”

  Said McKeon, “Day off. I got to thinking just what would a disturbed country man like James Cleary do with such an item with the I.R.A. after it and him not knowing who was in the army and who not, his own sister being one of their gunwomen. Sure, says I, he’d put it in the post if he was able, and since he wasn’t he’d put it in a mailbox. His own or Quirks’, since he was beyond getting to the Garda barracks. That would explain the car and burning furniture.” He wiggled the notebook over his head.

  McGarr could tell McKeon had been drinking.

  John Quirk, standing by McKeon’s side, was not sober.

  In the house McGarr could hear singing, and in through th
e kitchen windows he could see people dancing.

  “I thought I’d follow me hunch.”

  McGarr extended his hand.

  McKeon gave him the notebook.

  Quirk asked, “Have you caught the bastard, McGarr?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Do you know who he is?”

  “Yes.”

  “Anybody I know?”

  “Yes indeed.”

  Quirk sipped from the glass of amber fluid in his left hand. “Say no more. I don’t want to know.” He turned and walked toward the house.

  McGarr raised the book to the faint light from the falling sun. Farrell looked over his shoulder. Fogarty came up to them. They read:

  August 8th: Went over to Dr. John Fleming’s house to confirm my suspicion that I’m pregnant. Took him a long time to answer the door. In his office, which doubles as an emergency room, was a man with a gaping wound in his stomach that had obviously been made by the shrapnel of a bomb. John was all alone and having difficulty treating the man without an additional pair of hands. I scrubbed up and assisted him. Midway in the operation the man began to moan and thrash about. John sent me down to the basement for supplies of anaesthetic. As far as I could remember, this house had no cellar. There I found a complete laboratory equipt in what seemed a most modern way. The storeroom was chock full of all sorts of chemicals, but I noticed in particular several fifty-gallon drums of nitrates. Near the storeroom was a table with a map of Ireland under glass. The map was covered with markings of districts, commanding officers, and numbers of men. Fortunately, I was carrying my Minox in the pocket of my slacks and I snapped that. Then my eye caught something else. It was like a memo but had obviously come in code, and John had been busy trying to translate it when the man upstairs had interrupted him. All he had pieced out so far was, “All bets on horse show.” I took a picture of that too and hustled back upstairs. Later John asked me if I had understood the significance of the setup in the cellar. I told him I’m neither dumb nor blind. Perhaps that was a mistake, but he’s not the sort of person who would have believed a lie from me. He said nothing else, only looked at me. John has never done anything halfway. Once he’s decided, he becomes a zealot. There was a certain cast to his eye. For some time now we haven’t been on the best of terms. This assignment is becoming more snarled by the day. I seem to have become involved with these people—Max Schwerr and Fleming—on a personal basis, which can be fatal for a journalist.

  How well she had written, she could not have known, McGarr thought.

  “The Dublin Horse Show?” Commissioner Farrell asked. “Why, that begins in three days. Mother of Mercy—the queen is planning to attend for the first time in ages. Her daughter is riding for England. It’s not since before independence that the English regent has attended the show.”

  “There’s more,” said McKeon, with that same self-satisfied smile on his face. He flipped a page.

  August 10th: Tragedy has struck. I took the film out of my Minox last night and put it on my bureau so in the morning I could take it to Limerick, where I had arranged to get the use of a photographer’s darkroom. But my Da, who gets up with the sun and can’t be doing enough for me, took the roll of film into the chemist’s in Lahinch. His name is Fitzgerald, and I know for a fact he’s a Fenian. I couldn’t just rush to him and demand it back, because they’re watching me closely now and would know something was up. So I tried all day long to get it back from the photo lab in Dublin, but it seems that’s impossible.

  August 11th: Film back today. Lightning service for Ireland. Perhaps we should consider putting the I.R.A. in charge of the mails. The film, of course, was blank. Fitzgerald was far too solicitous of my photographic techniques. Said, “Those little spy-type cameras are no good at all. Sure only a criminal would use one anyhow.” And so I’ve decided to begin carrying the weapon Paddy gave me in New York. Tomorrow I’m to pay Max $27,000, which the I.R.A. leadership has demanded as payment for their candor. It smacks of extortion, but if the “Horse Show” et al. means the Dublin Horse Show, then the tip could be worth every penny. The queen will be there. I’ve tried to put this notebook in a safe deposit box in the bank, but it was closed when I got there. I’m afraid to leave it at home. I’m causing my parents enough worry as it is with this assignment.

  That was the last entry she had made.

  Farrell asked, “Do you think she wouldn’t have tipped us off, all the while knowing something was going to happen?”

  McGarr turned to him. “Would you if you were a big-time newspaper person and had gotten a tip on a breaking story that would have enormous international significance?” McGarr then turned his head to Fogarty, who had been looking over his shoulder.

  Fogarty scratched the ridge line of bone along his perfectly bald head. “After all, Commissioner, she wasn’t a policewoman, and you fellows will be protecting the queen with tanks, I should think.”

  Farrell’s eyes widened. He glared down on Fogarty. “It always helps to know.”

  “Oh, of course,” Fogarty added quickly. “We’d tell you. The Times.”

  McGarr said, “The day the queen arrived.”

  Farrell said, “And let me tell you something else, my friend from the fourth estate: what you’re seeing here is state information. You’ll have a telegram from the minister of justice about that within the hour. You’ve got to go on working with me and Peter, so don’t go making another dumb-ass mistake or you’ll find yourself in the cooler quicker than you can say Adolf Hitler. Have ya got me right?”

  Fogarty looked away and sighed.

  FOURTEEN

  The Devils We Know

  MCGARR AND Farrell didn’t stop at Kinvara with the others. They dropped Noreen and Hughie Ward off at O’Shaughnessy’s aunt’s house and drove on to Galway City and the hospital in which Phil Dineen was receiving care.

  The hall of the third-floor wing was thick with gardai. It was just midnight and the shifts watching Dineen were changing.

  Dineen’s wife, Bridie, was there as well. She rushed up to McGarr. “Peter—I knew you’d come. Can you tell me how much he’ll get?” She meant jail, of course. She took McGarr’s hand. She was a small woman whose mother had been Spanish-Irish from someplace out here in the West. Bridie’s sallow complexion and dark eyes, ringed and sleepless, made her look haggard. She wore her hair, as always, in jet black ringlets. Women with Latin blood, McGarr had noted in the past, seemed to age more quickly, especially when they’d had children. Bridie Dineen had six children and one on the way.

  McGarr bent and kissed her cheek. “That depends upon what he’s done. And I know of nothing he’s done that we’re interested in, do you, Commissioner Farrell?”

  The two policemen had talked about Dineen on the ride to the hospital: how Dineen could help them with the horse show lead they’d uncovered, how if he did they would refuse to prosecute him on other evidence of criminal activity they had against him. Dineen himself, McGarr imagined, understood his position with the Provos. For some reason, they had decided to get rid of him.

  His wife said, “He caught a bit of the bomb in his left eye. But it was enough. They say he’ll lose it. He went through Korea and Suez and Cyprus and Lebanon without so much as a scratch, and now this. And by the people he was supposed to be fighting for, too. But I guess he was lucky.” And then, when she remembered, she added, “And you too, Peter. I almost forgot.” She squeezed his hand again.

  McGarr assured her everything would work out for the best and went in to Dineen.

  Unlike Jamie Cleary’s hospital room, Dineen’s was dark, except for a small bluish light over the door.

  “Saying your prayers?” McGarr asked.

  “That’s the only dependable guidance, they say.” Dineen’s head was swathed in bandages and both eyes were covered. He held out his hand.

  McGarr shook it and introduced Farrell.

  “All the big guns,” said Dineen. “My nose, which has become quite perceptive of late, tells me there mu
st be a deal in the air. If so, my prayers have been answered. Or are these voices I’m hearing from the lower world?”

  Farrell looked at McGarr and smiled. “We don’t have much time, Mr. Dineen. It’s the horse show plans we’re after.”

  “You mean they’re going through with that foolishness?”

  McGarr said, “So it seems.”

  “Christ. Then I’m glad they’re through with me.”

  Said Farrell, “We can promise you this. Protection and a pardon.”

  Dineen hesitated.

  McGarr said, “C’mon, Phil, we can’t do any better than that.”

  Still Dineen said nothing. He fumbled on the nightstand, found his packet of cigarettes, and took out a smoke.

  Farrell lit it.

  McGarr took a chair by the bedside. “Don’t tell me you want money?”

  Dineen shook his head. “It’s not that. I’ll get by.” He blew out the smoke. “It’s that I’ve never been a fink. I spent seven months in a North Korean prison camp without giving more than my name and rank. It’s hard to—” he drew again upon the cigarette, which glowed brightly in the darkness of the room. “—and then there’s my family. I don’t know if my kids would even begin to understand.” He waved his hand. “You know, how I really had nothing to do with this situation.”

  McGarr said, “Well, when did the Provos ever even use you? Shit—it seems to me they kept you stuck way out here because they’re afraid of your kind of fighting. When did they ever go at things your way? Face up to it—you made a mistake. They’re just a pack of sneaks. Drop the bomb and run. They did it to us. They’re planning to do it at the horse show, am I right?”

  Dineen nodded.

  Farrell pulled up a chair.

  McGarr said, “The other day when we talked, you said you’d joined them because you’d made a decision about how things should be in this country and you were doing something about it. Okay. I accepted that. But your position has changed. The decision to blow up scores of people and maybe a queen has already been made too. It’s just another affair that stinks. Now you know enough about these bastards that maybe the bunch of us working together can stop it from happening. But it’s up to you. You’ve got to decide if it’s right or wrong.