‘Thank you, thank you.’ The Archbishop beamed with pleasure. ‘Are you familiar with the works of John Donne, Lord Powerscourt? He began life in a very distinguished Catholic family and ended up as Protestant Dean of St Paul’s. I have had this quotation from him on my desk these twenty years now.’ The Archbishop opened up a little notebook which Powerscourt saw was filled with neat copperplate handwriting. ‘It comes from the passage about for whom the bell tolls: “And when the Church buries a man, that action concerns me: all mankind is of one author, and is one volume: when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated; God employs several translators; some pieces are translated by age, some by sickness, some by war, some by justice; but God’s hand is in every translation, and his hand shall bind up all our scattered leaves again for that library where every book shall lie open to one another.” Donne talks of many translations, my friend. I like to think there are many mountains, too, not only ones made out of stone and rock and rough scree like our Croagh Patrick. There are mountains of hatred and bigotry in men’s hearts here in our little island which the Church must try to remove. There are mountains or lofty places of the spirit, if we are to believe Donne and the mystics and the poets, where love can take its adherents to the highest peaks of happiness or ecstasy. There are many translations, Lord Powerscourt. There are many mountains too and many different paths to the summit, whether in Mayo or Chelsea.’
Two days later Powerscourt was back in Butler’s Court, reading another letter from the art dealer Michael Hudson. ‘You will be as astonished as I was to hear of the response to our advertisements in the Irish newspapers. So far we have had eighty-seven replies! When Mr Farrell has inspected them I will let you have further details. Unfortunately not one of them is on your lists. It may be that the thieves did not steal them in order to sell them on. It may be that they are biding their time. In my experience thieves are usually anxious to dispose of their booty at the earliest possible opportunity. Yours etc.’
Powerscourt laughed out loud. For all their protestations about their devotion to their ancestors, the Anglo-Irish were queuing up to sell their forebears for American dollars in great numbers. There might, he thought, be more to come when word about the high prices travelled round the thirty-two counties. The answer to his problem did not lie with selling the stolen paintings.
He had met with the land agent in Athlone earlier that day and been given a report very similar to the one he had received in Galway. Some of these Protestant patricians, he had been told, were so happy with the Wyndham bonus that they were even building new houses for themselves, though little thought appeared to have been given to how they were to be maintained. What they ought to have done, the agent from Athlone had informed him, was to invest the proceeds from the sales in sensible stock and maintain their standard of living from the income, but that had little appeal. One single man from Tralee was believed to be working his way through the proceeds of the Wyndham Act at the gambling tables of Monte Carlo. The name Mulcahy produced the same instant frisson of recognition as it had done in Eyre Square but no details of his dealings could be extracted. Powerscourt had also met with Inspector Harkness to co-ordinate the final arrangements of his investigation. ‘If this works,’ he told the Inspector, ‘we’ll be heroes, temporary kings for twenty-four hours. If it fails we’ll be humiliated.’
Powerscourt filled Lady Lucy in with the details in the Butler’s Court gardens late on the Sunday afternoon. ‘At nine o’clock tomorrow morning, my love, Inspector Harkness and a team of eight men, all from areas remote from here in case of leaks, are going to search Mulcahy’s premises. If that fails, they’ll try his house. If that fails they’ll try the priest’s place. I’d love to see Father O’Donovan Brady’s face when they start ripping his house apart.’
‘Is all this legal, Francis? Can you actually raid those places?’
‘Oh, yes, Lucy,’ replied her husband, ‘the Inspector has got search warrants falling out of every pocket in his suit. And, at the same time, exactly the same time so there can be no tip-offs, another party of police, escorted by Johnny Fitzgerald, is going to raid the offices of the solicitor brother Declan Mulcahy in Swinford. His speciality is land and he is believed, Johnny said in his note, to have parcels of land coming out of his ears. Johnny also tells me that there is some mass grave over there from famine times with over five hundred and fifty souls in the ground but our boy Declan isn’t going to starve. Not by any means. There’s property and land and prize cattle in his empire apparently, and it’s growing by the hour.’
‘Are you sure you’re right?’ Lady Lucy looked worried suddenly.
Powerscourt smiled and took her hand. ‘We’ll find out tomorrow. Let’s go and see what’s on the menu this evening, Lucy. But, please, don’t breathe a word of any of this to anybody. If a whisper of a rumour goes down the hill, we’re sunk.’
16
Lord Francis Powerscourt slept badly that night. In his dreams he watched as grave Anglo-Irish gentlemen walked out of the frames on their walls, sat down at their dining tables and demanded food. He saw another empty beach where the sandcastles were being washed away by the tide. He found himself in an enormous throng of persons walking very slowly through the streets of Dublin. He thought they might be mourners at Parnell’s funeral, but he had lost Lady Lucy and the press of people was so great he could not break out to find her. He was locked again in the red velvet of the Ormonde carriage, Johnny Fitzgerald by his side. They seemed to be hurtling down a hill with no coachman on top to halt their progress. He knew without being able to see them that there were rocks and boulders at the bottom. Just when he felt they were certain to crash into them and perish, he woke up and grabbed hold of Lady Lucy who muttered to him sleepily that they were on the first floor of Butler’s Court and the birds were already singing outside. It promised to be a beautiful day.
Shortly after half past eight Powerscourt set out to walk down to the main square. He told Richard Butler that he would like to see him about half past ten, if that was convenient, nothing important, he assured his host, just a couple of pieces of routine administration for his accounts. Lady Lucy followed him about fifteen minutes later. She did not go all the way to the bottom but seated herself on a bench halfway down the hill. She had brought a book of poetry to keep her company if the wait proved long. At precisely nine o’clock Inspector Harkness and a sergeant from Longford called Murphy marched their men into the main square of Butler’s Cross. At three minutes past they were lined up outside the front entrance to the emporium of Mulcahy and Sons, Grocery and Bar. The rest of the square was empty except for a stray dog who limped along the road by Horkan’s the agricultural supply people. MacSwiggin’s Hotel did not begin to serve breakfast to its clients until ten o’clock except in cases of emergency. There was one customer in the shop already, an old lady preparing to pay for a couple of slices of bacon and half a dozen eggs. Sergeant Murphy escorted her gently to the front door and closed it firmly behind her.
‘Pronsias Mulcahy!’ said Inspector Harkness in his best Ulster accent. ‘I have a licence to search these premises. You are to wait outside in the square. One of my men will accompany you. If you attempt to flee you will be transported immediately to Athlone Jail.’
‘You can’t do this to me, you northern bastard,’ Mulcahy spat, ‘this is my shop! You’ve no rights here!’
‘Oh, but we do, Mr Mulcahy,’ Harkness replied, waving the search warrant in his face. ‘Now I suggest you go outside and wait quietly. I should let you know,’ he added cheerfully, ‘that we have a warrant to search your house as well. Any misbehaviour and we’ll be in there too, tearing up the floorboards and poking about in your attics. Now get out!’
A burly constable escorted Mulcahy out of his premises. A chair was provided for him to sit down by his own front door. Harkness’s men began working their way methodically through the main shop, peering behin
d the backs of cupboards, tapping regularly on the walls. Powerscourt headed straight for the back office where Mulcahy did his accounts among the hams hanging from the ceiling and the barrels of stout awaiting final delivery to the bar. He picked up the three books where Mulcahy kept note of his business. He discarded the two concerning the grocery and the bar and took the third, the blue one concerning the loans, out into the open air where he could get a better view.
‘That’s private!’ yelled Mulcahy. ‘That’s mine! You can’t steal that, you fecking traitor!’
‘You just shut up, you!’ said the burly constable, giving the grocer a hefty clip round the ear. ‘Any more disturbances and you’re off to jail.’
It was not yet ten past nine. Powerscourt was to tell Lady Lucy afterwards that he had no idea how it was summoned, but a crowd was already gathering outside Mulcahy’s. It could not have been the old lady’s doing for she lived next door and spoke to nobody on her brief return journey. Two Delaney solicitors were there, muttering to the constable about habeas corpus and due process and whatever else they could think of at that hour in the morning. Father O’Donovan Brady had arrived, the buttons on his soutane not all fastened, escorted by a group of young men with hurling sticks. Two bleary-eyed drovers had tottered out of MacSwiggin’s Hotel and were sitting in the sunshine, watching the proceedings with great interest. Father O’Donovan Brady began a prayer for the afflicted one in his hour of need until told to shut up by the constable, this wasn’t his church and it wasn’t bloody Sunday morning either, so it wasn’t. The stray dog too had heard the summons, calling two more of its kind to patrol the periphery of the crowd. Every few minutes another figure would amble into the square to look at Pronsias Mulcahy, who had so much influence in the little community, sitting on a chair, virtually under house arrest, while the constabulary searched his premises. Then a group of women appeared and began shouting insults at the constable until Inspector Harkness poked his head round the door and told them they would all be charged with a breach of the King’s peace if they did not keep quiet.
Inside the searching party had almost finished with the main body of the shop. Powerscourt had told the Inspector that he thought it very unlikely that anything would be hidden there. But he also said that he doubted if any great attempt at concealment would be made. Mulcahy, he felt, would have thought there was about as much chance of his premises being turned over as there was of his being chosen as Tsar of all the Russias. Powerscourt retired behind the gates of Butler’s Court and checked the dates and the entries on Mulcahy’s loan ledger with the details in Harkness’s letter. A slow smile spread across his face. In one respect, at any rate, he was not wrong.
A couple of hundred yards away, further up the hill, Lady Lucy had left the book of poetry in her lap. The sun was quite warm already. She was daydreaming now, wondering if Francis was going to take her away for a holiday when this investigation was over. He usually did. She checked through various places in her mind, Rome, probably too hot, Nice, probably too crowded, Naples, too dirty. She was wondering if she could persuade him to take her to New England when she fell asleep.
Harkness’s men were in the outhouses now. There was a slight air of frustration among the constables. Various piles of stores, carefully laid in by the grocer in case they should prove to be in short supply in the near future, were kicked over. Outside in the square Mrs Mulcahy had made an appearance, wearing, not the blue suit she wore to church, but a well-worn apron over a cream blouse and a dark skirt. She advanced towards her husband, still sitting defiantly on his chair, a lawyer Delaney on either side of him in case his enemies should assail him from the left or the right. Far from offering comfort, Mrs Fionnula Mulcahy brought wrath. She came not with peace but with the sword. ‘Just look on the disgrace you’ve brought on us all! Stuck there like a common criminal in the stocks! I always told you you’d go too far. Me own father Seamus Dempsey warned me you’d bring shame down on us all and you have! Just don’t expect me to come visiting you in the jail in Athlone with little packets of barm brack and fruit cake, Pronsias Mulcahy! Don’t even expect to find me waiting for you when you come out, if you ever do!’
She shook her fist at him and returned to her home. A small cheer of support from the hurling stick youths followed her back.
At the back of Mulcahy’s they were now halfway through the outbuildings. A faint tremor of anxiety passed across Powerscourt’s face as he contemplated the fact that their prey might not be there. Inspector Harkness was sweating slightly. A party of children had arrived in the square and were playing hopscotch by the Butler’s Court gates. Three Christian Brothers joined Father O’Donovan Brady in silent prayer for their troubled comrade. MacSwiggin’s Hotel and Bar opened its doors early to cater for the demand. A potboy carried a glass of stout to Pronsias Mulcahy who seemed to be in need of refreshment. The policeman scowled but could not think of any laws or regulations that were being infringed. This was Ireland, after all.
It was Inspector Harkness who solved the problem. In the last outhouse but one he thought that the internal dimensions were less than the external ones. The area inside was smaller than it should have been. He stalked round the outside knocking on the walls with a crowbar he had apprehended in an earlier building. He looked suspiciously at what might have been a new internal wall, recently assembled in wood and draped with black tarpaulins. He pointed out his suspicions to Powerscourt.
‘Knock the bloody thing down,’ Powerscourt said, ‘and let’s see what’s on the other side.’
One of the constables had worked as a blacksmith before he joined up. He borrowed the crowbar and struck a number of fearsome blows. Quite soon he had opened up an entry, large enough for one man to pass inside. Inspector Harkness gave a shout of triumph and handed a large parcel out of the opening to Powerscourt. Five more, of different sizes, followed, then more still. Another constable returned with a torch, for the outhouse was rather dark and had no electricity of its own. Powerscourt took out his penknife and worked his way very carefully through the wrapping. After a couple of minutes he found himself looking at an eighteenth-century gentleman, almost certainly a Butler from the set of his cheekbones. He checked all the others to make sure they had not been defaced in the manner of The Master of the Hunt. Then another set of paintings appeared. These were the ones from Moore Castle whose theft had caused such upset to their owner. Inspector Harkness whistled.
‘I’ll get one of my men to saddle up the Mulcahy cart, my lord. We can take these back home.’
The Inspector arranged the transfer so that every painting was carried out right in front of Pronsias Mulcahy, still sitting by the front entrance to his shop. When the parade had finished and the paintings were safely stowed away, a constable on guard on either side of them, Inspector Harkness raised his voice till it carried to the far corners of the square. ‘Pronsias Padraig Mulcahy, I arrest you on the charge of being wilfully in receipt of stolen goods. I have to warn you that anything you say may be taken down and used in evidence against you. Take him away!’ More policemen ushered Mulcahy into a police vehicle and drove him off. One of the Delaneys started to run after it, saying there was an absence of due process, but the constables took no notice. Father O’Donovan Brady turned on his heel and took the Christian Brothers back to his house. The good Lord Himself, Father O’Donovan Brady told them, would not object if they took drink at a time like this.
A small triumphal procession made its way up to Butler’s Court. In the van was Mulcahy’s cart with the paintings and the two constables on guard. Behind that marched Inspector Harkness and his remaining forces. Behind them, a rather grubby Powerscourt, a dirty hand holding on to one of Lady Lucy’s with great pride and affection. They must have been spotted from one of the windows at the front for Richard Butler came out and eyed the cart suspiciously. He remembered the earlier painting that had returned with the faces changed.
‘They’re all right, Richard,’ said Powerscourt, ‘these are the real
things. They’ve come back. After all this time they’ve come back. I think you should rehang them straight away. And you’d better tell Moore to come over as fast as he can. We’ve found his too.’
An hour and a half later Richard Butler carried two bottles of champagne into his dining room. His ancestors and his Old Masters were back on the walls. Next door The Master of the Hunt in the correct version was also back in its place. The entire family was present. Inspector Harkness had borrowed a red smoking jacket for the occasion and was puffing happily on a large cigar. Powerscourt was sitting at one end of the table.
‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ said Butler, raising his glass, ‘I ask you to drink the health of Lord Francis Powerscourt who has secured the miraculous return of these paintings. Lord Powerscourt!’ The toasts rang out into the great hallway. ‘And now, Powerscourt, perhaps you can tell us all what has been going on!’
Powerscourt remained seated. ‘Let me begin,’ he said, ‘by saying how steadfastly everyone has behaved throughout this business. Except for Connolly. I have no brief for Connolly. I expect his pictures were guests of Mulcahy’s as yours were, but were released when he paid up. But without the courage of all of you, even when the Ormonde women were seized, this strange battle would have been lost long ago.’ He paused and looked at the Butlers and the Moores, who had only just arrived to be reunited with their ancestors.
‘Let me begin, if I may,’ said Powerscourt, ‘with the theft of the paintings. One obvious reason would have been to sell them. The market for Anglo-Irish ancestors might be limited, but they do have a certain value. Yet all the inquiries Johnny and I set in motion in Dublin and in London and in New York revealed that not a single one had been put on the market. So, unless we were dealing with an obsessive collector who wanted a basement full of dead gentry, there had to be another reason. And here, I think, we come to a question of psychology. It seemed to me that the only people who would understand what these ancestral portraits meant to families like the Butlers and the Moores would be Protestant. Only they would hear the tribal beat that echoes back down the centuries. Catholics tend to have different kinds of paintings on their walls. So my first theory was that a Protestant dreamt up this particular plot. But for what purpose? And in whose interest? Protestant or Catholic? Then we had the return of two pictures, the Moore one that faded away, and The Master of the Hunt that was returned here with a completely different cast of characters on horseback. Whoever thought of that was clever, extremely clever. I don’t think Mulcahy or anybody like him would have thought of either of those ploys in a hundred years. So there had to be somebody behind the Mulcahy figure, Mulcahy’s brains, as it were. But why should anybody volunteer for such a position?’
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