Echobeat

by Joe Joyce

  The lights were on in Mrs Lynch’s café and he glanced in as he went by. An elderly couple were at a table, eating a fry, and a young man sat alone reading a newspaper, his cigarette lying in an ashtray. He reached a slow hand for it without looking as Duggan passed. A waitress was sweeping the floor around tables whose chairs had been upended on their tops. There was no sign of Gerda. Maybe she had left already, he thought, as he crossed the road and continued on to the corner of Henry Street.

  He stopped and opened the paper and glanced at the headlines and then folded it and put it in his overcoat pocket. He lit a cigarette and stomped his feet against the cold, a man without patience waiting for someone. This was probably a bad idea, he told himself again. He shouldn’t be seen anywhere near the café. You’d never know who else could be watching it, who might recognise you. He could put Gerda at risk. He exhaled a cloud of smoke made bigger by the cold air and dismissed the thought. He was just a pretend boyfriend waiting for a pretend girlfriend.

  A young man came out of a jeweller’s across the road, carrying a metal screen which he fixed to one side of the shop window. He went back in and came out with another one. The Angelus bell sounded from a nearby church, the pauses filled in by another one like an echo from a more distant church. An older man came out of the jeweller’s and shot home some bolts and locked them. He grabbed the screen with both hands, shook it to make sure it was secure and cast a suspicious eye across at Duggan before going back inside.

  The elderly couple emerged from Mrs Lynch’s café and were followed a moment later by the young man. Could that be Roddy Glenn? he wondered. The couple came towards him and he watched them, having learned that people weren’t always what they seemed to be, but they appeared to be what they were, a couple going home after an afternoon’s shopping, the woman carrying a large shopping bag. The young man went the other way and the lights in the café dimmed.

  He flicked his cigarette butt into the gutter and its glow died with an instant fizz and when he looked back at the café three women were emerging. Two of them came towards him and he recognised Gerda. She was wearing her gabardine coat and a scarf covered her hair and she carried a handbag. He caught her eye as she approached and she stopped and said hello when she reached him, as if she had expected him to be there.

  ‘See you next week,’ she said to her companion.

  ‘Cheerio,’ the other girl smiled, glancing from Gerda to Duggan and back again.

  ‘Something has happened,’ Gerda said when she had gone, somewhere between a question and a statement.

  ‘No,’ Duggan said, suddenly at a loss for words.

  She gave him a quizzical look. ‘You are on duty?’

  He nodded twice, an expression of regret.

  ‘So we pretend,’ she said to herself and slipped her arm under his and they began to walk up Henry Street. ‘You can come and visit me in the café any time now.’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘Yvonne will tell everyone you’re my boyfriend.’

  He gave a light laugh. ‘Still not a good idea for us to be seen together there. In case someone adds two and two and gets the right answer.’

  ‘And how would they do that?’

  ‘Because I look like a soldier,’ he said, remembering how Gifford’s girlfriend, Sinead, had immediately identified him the first moment she set eyes on him.

  ‘So?’ Gerda shrugged. ‘The whole world is full of soldiers now.’

  ‘I don’t want to put you in any danger.’

  ‘How am I in danger?’

  ‘If it was realised you were helping us. There are people—’

  ‘The Nazis are that powerful here?’ she let go of his arm and stopped and stared at him.

  ‘No,’ he said, taking her hand and starting to walk again past the GPO arcade. ‘But there are people playing their own games. Like the IRA.’

  ‘You really think it’s dangerous?’

  ‘No, not really.’

  ‘So,’ she said, squeezing his hand, ‘you just don’t want to lose your spy. And then have to find another one.’

  ‘That’s true,’ he smiled at her and stopped outside a bar near the Pillar. Snowflakes began to fall, spaced out and hesitant. ‘Would you like a drink?’

  She looked at his left eye, then his right. ‘You’re on duty.’

  ‘I have to go back. But not yet. We’re on standby for tonight.’

  ‘More bombs?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘You know something?’

  ‘No. It’s just in case.’

  ‘Okay,’ she said.

  The bar was jammed and the small lounge was also full, a group of men from the radio station across the road in the GPO spread around three tables covered in pints of Guinness and glasses of whiskey. The air was heavy with the smell of pipe smoke and the sudden heat was oppressive. They found a spot against the panelled wall at the side and Duggan shrugged off his overcoat as he asked her what she would like.

  She untied her scarf and let it fall around her neck and asked what he was having.

  ‘A hot whiskey,’ he said, prompted by the Bunsen burner hissing behind the bar beneath a glass jug of bubbling water. ‘Very medicinal.’

  ‘I’ll try that.’ She shook her hair and ran a hand through it.

  Duggan waited impatiently while the barman topped up a line of pints of porter and a man beside him took three at a time and carried them over to the crowded tables with the care and solemnity of a religious ritual. Duggan gave an apologetic glance back at Gerda. She was leaning against the wall, holding their coats, her dark eyes unseeing, deep in her own thoughts.

  ‘Yes,’ she made a face after the first sip of the hot whiskey. ‘Like medicine.’

  ‘Yeah, you’ll never get drunk on it.’

  ‘Can you hold it for a moment?’ she asked, passing him her glass. She opened her handbag and took out a folded brown envelope and gave it to him as she took back her glass. He unfolded the envelope, the size of a normal sheet of typing paper. It was sealed and had nothing written on it.

  ‘What’s in it?’ he raised the envelope, feeling its weight. Whatever was in it was not very bulky, but substantial enough.

  ‘You don’t know?’

  ‘No. How would I know?’

  ‘I thought it was why you were waiting for me.’

  ‘No,’ he shook his head, perplexed. ‘I just wanted to see you.’

  She gave him a fleeting smile and touched the back of his hand and then was serious again. ‘That English painter gave it to me,’ she dropped her voice. ‘Roddy Glenn. He asked me to give it to a German officer.’

  ‘What is it?’ Duggan dropped his voice too and they moved closer, facing each other, their shoulders against the wooden wall.

  ‘He would only say it was important, very important for peace. He said that a number of times. It’s very important for peace that the Germans get it.’

  ‘Why didn’t he give it to them himself?’

  ‘That’s what I said too. He said they wouldn’t take anything from him. Or talk to him.’ She took a sip of her hot whiskey. ‘I know that’s true. I’ve seen them telling him to go away. To fuck off. They think he’s an English spy.’

  ‘Was that him in the café before it closed?’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘He was there this morning, before I arrived. Yvonne told me he had tried to talk to one of the Nazis but the Nazi spat on his shoe. Mrs Lynch was afraid there was going to be a fight and she told the Englishman to leave and not to come back.’

  She took another sip of her whiskey. ‘He was waiting for me when I arrived,’ she continued, recounting the story in a quiet, matter-of-fact voice. ‘Stopped me on the street before I got to the café and gave me the envelope. He said, “Give it to an officer or just leave it on their table, for an officer.” I said, “I can’t.” And he said, “Please, it’s very important for peace.” And I said, “What is it?” And he said, “I can’t tell you but it’s very important for peace. For ending t
he war.”’

  ‘For ending the war?’ Duggan repeated with a sceptical tone.

  ‘That’s what he said. And then he pushed it into my hand and as soon as I took it he walked away in a hurry. Nearly running.’

  Duggan looked at the envelope. It was farcical to think that something in it could end the war. Anderson was probably right: Glenn was some kind of low-level British agent, trying to feed disinformation to the Germans.

  ‘He seemed nervous,’ Gerda added. ‘Like he had to go away quickly.’

  ‘Like someone was after him?’

  She nodded. ‘That’s what I thought.’

  ‘Did you notice anybody else hanging around?’

  ‘No. I called after him to wait but he kept going.’

  Duggan tried to juggle his overcoat and his drink and get a cigarette and Gerda took his glass to help him. ‘Thanks,’ he said, lighting the cigarette and taking back the glass. ‘Do you think he knows you’re a’– he stopped himself just in time from saying German – ‘who you really are?’

  ‘No,’ she dragged out the word in an unconscious exaggeration of her Cork accent.

  ‘Why would he give it to you?’

  ‘Because I’m the only one there who was friendly,’ she shrugged. ‘No one else gives him the time of day.’

  ‘So he can’t go back there. But I still don’t see why he’s trying so hard to pass information to the German internees. Why not go to the German legation?’

  ‘Maybe he’s afraid it’s watched.’

  ‘Could be,’ Duggan said, knowing that it was. And that any new caller to the German legation would interest the watchers and someone would want to know who he was and what his business there had been. Mrs Lynch’s café and its German clientele was a less conspicuous way of passing information. Unless he used the IRA and its links to the Germans and their spies. But the IRA would be very suspicious of any Englishman offering information.

  ‘They are collecting information there,’ Gerda said, as though she was thinking along the same lines.

  ‘In the café?’

  ‘There are some silly girls who come in and talk and drink coffee and go to the pictures with them. One of them was saying today that her brother is working in England and her mother’s very worried about him even though he didn’t work in a bomb factory. They kept asking her questions, pretending they were worried too. And she told them he works for Electrolux and there is also a factory in the area making tanks and another one making some parts of planes for their air force. So he’s afraid the area will be bombed and she and her mother are praying every night that he’ll be safe. And they kept her talking and said, “We’ll tell our comrades to leave that area alone. Where is it?” And the stupid girl said,’ Gerda paused and shut her eyes to remember the unfamiliar name, ‘“Luton”.’ She paused. ‘Where’s that?’

  ‘Somewhere near London, I think.’

  ‘And then one of them said to their flight captain’ – she leaned in close to whisper – ‘“Das ist eine für Henning nächste Woche.”’ That’s one for Henning next week. She move back and searched his face to see that he understood.

  ‘That’s the name he used? Henning?’ It had to be Henning Thomsen, the counsellor in the legation. He visited the Curragh camp every week.

  She nodded.

  ‘Do you know if this Henning ever turns up in Mrs Lynch’s?’

  ‘I don’t know. I haven’t heard anyone use that name there.’ She sipped her drink. ‘I wanted to slap her in the face and tell her to shut her stupid mouth.’

  ‘People don’t think,’ Duggan said. ‘It all seems so far away. Hard to imagine.’

  ‘What’s hard to imagine?’ she shot back in anger. ‘They bombed some more Jews here last night.’

  A burst of loud laughter came from the group of Radio Eireann men as one finished a joke. Gerda glanced across at them and Duggan swallowed the last of his whiskey, picked a clove from his lips and dropped it in the empty glass.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

  ‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘People can be stupid sometimes. Unthinking. Just concerned with their own problems.’

  ‘Like this country. So concerned with the bad English and their little border.’

  ‘There’s a lot of good reasons for that,’ he said. ‘Centuries of reasons if you—’

  She put her finger on his lips to stop him. ‘I’m sorry,’ she repeated in a whisper. ‘You didn’t want to see me to hear my anger.’ She leaned forward and kissed him on the mouth and drew back. ‘Was that why you wanted to see me?’

  ‘Yes,’ he drew her head to him for another slow kiss.

  She put her hand flat on his chest and pushed him back. ‘Are you trying to ruin my reputation?’ she smiled. ‘Kissing and drinking in a pub.’

  ‘Don’t they do that in Cork?’

  ‘Oh God, no. Pubs are serious places in Cork. For talk about hurling. Do you play hurling?’

  ‘Sometimes.’

  ‘Are you any good?’

  ‘Not bad.’

  ‘A back or a forward?’

  ‘A forward. Sharpshooter.’ He tilted his head to one side in a quizzical look. ‘What are you, an expert?’

  ‘I can talk hurling all night. How are your shins?’

  ‘Would you like to see them?’

  She gave him a coy smile and sipped her drink.

  ‘Would you like another?’ he pointed at the glass.

  ‘Are you trying to get me drunk?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘I think you are.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Maybe I will only get more angry when I get drunk?’

  ‘I’ll take that chance.’

  She looked around the pub. ‘It would be lovely to stay here and forget everything,’ she sighed. ‘You shouldn’t be drunk going back to work.’

  ‘Hot whiskey won’t make me drunk.’

  ‘It’s medicine.’

  ‘For the cold.’

  She kissed him quickly. ‘You should have a clear head for your work.’

  Outside, the snowflakes were coming down faster and thicker and beginning to cover the tyre tracks and pedestrian paths, muffling the fading sounds of the teatime city. They muffled up too: she pulled her scarf over her head and knotted it under her chin and he pulled up the collar of his coat. They held hands and turned up O’Connell Street towards her bus stop.

  ‘I love snow,’ she said. ‘There should always be snow in the winter.’

  ‘Remind you of home?’

  ‘Of being a child,’ she corrected him. ‘I hope it snows for days.’

  ‘I hope not,’ Duggan laughed. ‘Makes everything harder. Harder to walk, to cycle, get around.’

  She gave an exasperated sigh. ‘Everybody here talks like this is real snow and they go into a panic.’

  ‘You should tell them what real snow is like.’

  ‘I can’t,’ she said, as they stepped into the doorway of her office opposite the bus stop and faced each other. ‘I’m Gertie from Cork. What would I know about real snow?’

  He looked into her eyes and put his arms around her and they kissed. She slid her arms inside his overcoat and they held each other. ‘You’re the only one who knows who I am,’ she said into his chest and he held her tighter for a moment and then tipped her head back to kiss her again and saw the moistness in her eyes.

  ‘It’s hard having to pretend all the time,’ she said in answer to his unasked question. ‘To always be careful and not betray myself.’

  ‘You don’t have to pretend with me,’ he said.

  She nodded and tried to smile.

  ‘Or with your family.’

  She shook her head.

  ‘What?’ he asked, pulling back a little.

  ‘My parents want me to stay away from them.’

  ‘What?’ he said. ‘Why?’

  ‘For my own good,’ she added quickly. ‘My own protection. It’s better that I be Gertie Maher than be the daughter of He
rr and Frau Meier. That’s how everyone knows them in Cork. They can’t hide.’

  She saw the shock in his face and tried to lighten it. ‘And not be drinking and kissing in pubs. Like … I don’t know what. Not a good Catholic girl from Cork anyway.’

  ‘But what do your parents tell people? Everyone must’ve known about their children too.’

  ‘They say we’ve gone to England. To work. Like everyone else.’

  He went to say something but she cut it off with another kiss. ‘You Irish,’ she said with a sad smile, ‘you think you’re the only ones with history.’

  They held each other in silence until her bus came up the street, moving slowly, and they crossed to the stop and its indicator flicked out. She gave him a last kiss and stepped onto the platform at the back and the conductor hit the bell twice.

  He cycled slowly through the pristine snow, alert for hidden tram tracks and potholes. The flakes still came down in languorous flurries, some heavy, some light, teasing. The streets were empty except for a few boys pelting each other with snowballs on Arran Quay. They turned their attention to him as he passed and he ducked and sped up and felt a couple of snowballs on his back. He shook a fist above his shoulder and they shouted in delight and another snowball went by his ear. He laughed, still cocooned in the warmth of the pub and Gerda’s embraces.

  He stopped on the steps of the Red House to brush the snow from his shoulders and shrugged off the coat as he went up the stairs to his office. Sullivan was slouched at his desk, his eyes half closed. ‘The commandant was asking where you were,’ he said.

  ‘What’s happening?’

  ‘Nothing,’ Sullivan said, straightening himself. ‘I told him you were skiving off as usual. He said a week’s detention would put a stop to your gallop.’

  Duggan laughed as he sat down and took out the envelope Gerda had given him and smoothed it on the desk.

  ‘And there’s a message for you for from your so-called cousin Peter,’ Sullivan added. ‘I don’t know why that smart-arse Special Branch friend of yours bothers with his bullshit.’