A Hunt in Winter

by Conor Brady

  ‘There is one other matter that I want to raise with you, my friends. Mr Parnell . . . that great Irishman . . . Charles Stewart Parnell . . . is currently facing an evil inquisition in London. It is part of an abominable campaign by The Times newspaper in collaboration with a corrupt government and supported by those who believe they can continue to hold Ireland as a private estate, a pleasure ground for hunting and fishing, with its people as serfs.’

  He paused momentarily. ‘I would say to you, maintain your support for Mr Parnell. Stand with him in his time of trial, as he stands with the people of Ireland. It is no secret that I have my differences with him, although even in these differences I believe him to be well-intentioned. He is a powerful enemy to your enemies, and as such he is your ally and your prince of men. Do not allow him to be dragged down.’

  Davitt bowed and turned as Kettle emerged from the wings to escort him off the stage. As he disappeared from view, the Round Room broke into a thunder of applause, accompanied by further stamping of feet. From somewhere behind them, Maria and Harriet heard a section of the crowd take up ‘A Nation Once Again’ even as the seats nearest the doors started to empty.

  The November evening was turning to darkness, with the gas lights along Dawson Street flaring into yellow as they left the meeting. A handful of uniformed DMP men stood watchfully under a sergeant, lining the pavement opposite the Mansion House. Somewhere too, Maria knew from what she had learned of Swallow’s work, there would be G-men, measuring the strength of the crowd, noting the presence or otherwise of prominent Leaguers or activists. The Round Room would not have fully emptied before police agents would be delivering an account of who had been on the platform and what had been said by the speakers.

  ‘Wasn’t that stimulating?’ Harriet clutched at Maria’s arm. ‘Mr Davitt is a powerful orator. And it’s important that he stands shoulder to shoulder with Mr Parnell when he needs support.’

  Maria did not answer. The crowd was dispersing up and down Dawson Street with groups making for the public houses or the tram stops. But a knot of people had gathered around the news vendor’s stand at the corner of Duke Street. There were raised voices and impatient shouts. A middle-aged lady whom Maria had seen earlier in the meeting emerged from the group clutching a copy of the Evening Mail. She waved the newspaper at her companions from the meeting, displaying an open page.

  ‘Dear God,’ she called. ‘Murder. Here on the streets of Dublin. I knew it would happen. We’re none of us safe.’

  Maria saw the column headlines.

  ‘Brutal Death of Woman in Rathmines’

  ‘Police Say She Fought for Her Life’

  ‘Inspector Swallow at the Scene’

  She knew she would have no help from Swallow in Grant’s this evening.

  Chapter 4

  It started to rain heavily later in the morning, taking the edge off the November chill but darkening the day. By then, Stephen Doolan’s constables had searched the ditches and hedges that bounded Blackberry Lane. In a patch of clay behind the farm gate, Doolan had spotted the imprint of a shoe or boot. He had succeeded in capturing its details in a plaster cast just before it was washed away by the downpour.

  ‘We’ll need every man you can give us for door-to-door inquiries,’ Swallow told ‘Duck’ Boyle. ‘I want to know the names and movements of everybody living up the lane. All the details to go to Mick Feore for the murder book. Then I need door-to-door, all the way back to the New Vienna restaurant. Everyone who lives or works along the route that she came home has to be interviewed and listed. I want to know about anyone who might have seen her or met her after she left the New Vienna last night. I’m going down to the hospital with Shanahan.’

  ‘Oh Jaysus,’ Boyle groaned. ‘Wasn’t I well off when I had your soft job in the Castle instead of bein’ out here in the drownin’ rain, leadin’ a crowd of bobbies like a football team. But it’ll be done. If I have to, I’ll draw strength in from t’other divisions.’

  ‘I appreciate the assistance, super,’ Swallow muttered through gritted teeth. He did not particularly care if Boyle picked up the undertone of sarcasm. This was his division, and as its superintendent the murder of Alice Flannery was first and foremost his responsibility. Technically, Swallow and the G-men were there to assist.

  Dr Harry Lafeyre was already at the Royal Hospital on Upper Baggot Street as Swallow and Shanahan arrived. Swallow recognised the city medical examiner’s brougham carriage outside the main entrance. Earlier, a constable had been sent to Lafeyre’s house on Harcourt Street asking him to attend.

  The post of Dublin city medical examiner was part-time and proportionately paid, obliging Lafeyre to juggle the workload with his private practice. He had served six years in Africa with the Natal Mounted Police, and he retained the investigator’s instincts developed there. That, together with his qualifications in medical jurisprudence from Edinburgh, made him an invaluable resource in any criminal inquiry.

  The city had, nonetheless, invested money in building and fitting out a state-of-the-art morgue on Marlborough Street, just off Sackville Street, and Lafeyre had been invited to choose his preferred equipment and fixtures for its operation. He had sought specifications from modern morgues in England and Scotland, and these had been faithfully honoured. In addition, he was provided with a small office and storeroom in the Lower Yard of the Castle, close to the Army Pay Office.

  He had finished his examination and was washing up when Swallow and Shanahan reached the hospital’s small morgue. His driver and general assistant, Scollan, was gathering his surgical instruments. A uniformed constable stood by the door.

  ‘I haven’t a lot for you,’ Lafeyre shrugged apologetically. He led the way to the examination table and drew back the covering sheet to show Swallow and Shanahan the small body. He nodded towards the uniformed officer. ‘The child’s mother was here to identify the remains. The constable took her statement.’ The constable stepped forward to hand a foolscap document to Shanahan. The G-man initialled it and placed it in his file.

  ‘She just didn’t have the strength to survive the assault,’ Lafeyre said, glancing through his notes. ‘Well enough nourished, but a slight girl. No signs of sexual activity or venereal disease. She took a terrible beating around the head and face. An extensive fracture on the left side of the skull. Cause of death was massive clotting on the left cerebral hemisphere. The corpus callosum was almost severed at one point. I’d guess there were at least three heavy blows from a club or something such.’

  Lafeyre did not need to translate the Latin term for the fibrous material that links the two sides of the brain. If the corpus callosum was destroyed, the amount of force must have been considerable. Although Swallow had drunk his way through two years of medical school, he sometimes surprised Lafeyre with the amount of knowledge he had picked up. ‘You must have been sober in at least one or two anatomy lectures,’ he had once ribbed Swallow. ‘Yeah, one or two,’ Swallow answered, not untruthfully.

  ‘Could that club be a wooden fence post?’ he asked.

  ‘Very possibly. Certainly a blunt weapon, swung hard, applied with very great force, repeatedly. This was no quick blow struck in anger; the intent was deadly.’

  ‘Any other marks or wounds?’

  ‘Nothing too significant that’s recent. Bad bruising and skin cuts across the fingers of the right hand. Probably defensive injuries after the first blow was struck.’ He gestured to the corpse, ‘But there’s an old injury there on the left leg, running all the way from the hip to the knee and around to the buttock and thigh.’

  Swallow could see an area of discolouration where the skin looked scaly and hard. ‘What do you think happened to her?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Lafeyre shrugged. ‘It could be a burn or a scald mark. It’s not new, but it’s not from early childhood either. Anything from a year to three years old I’d guess. It would have been very painful and uncomfortable I’d have thought. It probably hasn’t been treated as it ought.’


  Shanahan scribbled details in his notebook as Lafeyre continued.

  ‘She’s still in rigor mortis.’ He glanced at the death certificate. ‘The hospital staff are giving me time of death here as 9.15 this morning.’

  ‘What time does that condition set in, doctor?’ Shanahan asked.

  ‘Usually three to four hours after death. But it can vary according to conditions. It can be affected by temperature, for example.’

  A sudden gust of November wind drove the rain hard against the mortuary windows.

  ‘That’s about all I can tell you at this stage,’ Lafeyre said. ‘Have you much to go on?’

  ‘Very little just now, doctor,’ Shanahan told him. ‘Her name is Alice Flannery. She’s eighteen years old, the eldest of a family of six. Worked part-time as a waitress at the New Vienna on South Great George’s Street. The father’s deceased.’

  ‘I know the New Vienna,’ Lafeyre nodded. ‘It’s owned by a fellow called Karl Werner. An Austrian, as you’d expect. I think he claims some aristocratic connection back in Vienna. The place is very popular with the bankers and businessmen around the area. Then they get a late evening trade when the theatres close. They’d be fairly particular about their staff.’

  Swallow nodded.

  ‘She probably did well to get a placement there.’

  ‘I’d say so,’ Lafeyre answered. ‘At least you won’t have to deal with newspaper reporters linking it to these Ripper murders in London. He’s after ladies of the street, not people like this. And I don’t believe anyone would think of Blackberry Lane as a haunt of prostitutes.’

  ‘A little detail like that won’t stop some of the hacks from speculating.’ Swallow’s tone was cynical. ‘If they can find words to frighten people, they’ll do it. It all sells newspapers.’

  Lafeyre gestured to his assistant, Scollan, and started to move to the door.

  ‘If it’s all right with you I’ll release the remains to the family. They want to notify the undertakers. I’ve got a busy afternoon at my rooms. I’ll ask Scollan to take care of the details. Would you like to travel with me to the Castle?’

  There was nothing more Swallow could learn at the hospital. Later in the day, he reckoned, he would visit the dead girl’s home and extend official condolences. By then the door-to-door and other standard inquiries would have been completed. He had arranged a crime conference at Exchange Court for five o’clock. Before that he had to brief his boss, John Mallon, chief superintendent of G-Division.

  It was early days in the investigation, he told himself. He knew very little about the victim’s circumstances. Usually, in his experience, when one got to know even a little about a victim’s life, a motive and a suspect would appear fairly quickly. But he had a feeling that this was not going to be an easy process in this case. Murder was often a relatively easy crime to solve, but so far nothing was clear about the ending of Alice Flannery’s life.

  Chapter 5

  Swallow decided to treat himself to a large Tullamore and a steak and kidney pie in Deegan’s of Parliament Street before presenting himself to John Mallon at his office in the Lower Yard. He and Shanahan had gratefully accepted Lafeyre’s offer of a lift in the comfort of his brougham as an alternative to a drenching ride across the city on the open police car.

  One of the perquisites of office for the chief superintendent of G-Division was the provision of a house in the Lower Castle Yard. It hardly competed with the splendour of the State Apartments in the Upper Yard, occupied by the Lord Lieutenant and his entourage in ‘the season’, when the Castle hosted balls, ‘drawing rooms’ and receptions. There was a world of distinction in rank and status between the Upper and the Lower Yards. Apart from housing the State Apartments, the Upper Yard also accommodated working offices of the powerful civil servants who ran the administration of Ireland for the Crown. Nonetheless, the chief superintendent’s house was well-appointed and spacious, and it had recently been redecorated to Mrs Mallon’s taste.

  After breaking the ‘Invincibles’ conspiracy in the wake of the Phoenix Park murders of Chief Secretary Cavendish and Under-Secretary Burke five years previously, John Mallon could do no wrong in the eyes of the Castle authorities. If Elizabeth Mallon wanted new wallpaper in her parlour, she could have it.

  In providing for their chief of detectives to have his home within the Castle walls, the authorities got excellent value for their money. Whether at his office or in his house, John Mallon received a constant inflow of information on crime and security matters from all over the country, but particularly from across Dublin city. He insisted upon it. Woe betide the duty detective manning the public office at Exchange Court who delayed the transmission of any important intelligence to him in his parlour, or even in his bedroom.

  A sheet of icy rain swept across the Lower Yard as Mallon opened the door in response to Swallow’s tug on the bell-chain. The chief of detectives put a warning finger to his lips, gesturing him to be silent.

  ‘Detective Inspector, come in. I have two gentlemen inside who were just leaving.’

  He led him into the parlour at the front of the house. It was pleasantly warm, in contrast with the outdoor chill, and it smelled of whiskey and tobacco smoke. A good turf fire burned cheerily in the grate. Swallow saw two empty glass tumblers on a low table.

  Two men were standing by the fireplace, evidently preparing to leave. Swallow knew immediately that they were from the office of the assistant under-secretary for security, Howard Smith Berry, in the Castle’s Upper Yard. Smith Berry’s background was in military intelligence in India, and since his appointment to Dublin he had built a separate and supposedly secret security unit, perhaps a score of men, to act under his personal direction. The detectives of G-Division detested them. Most of the secret service men were ex-military, unfamiliar with police work. The G-men regarded them as blunderers and spies. And every G-man believed that they too were being spied upon by Smith Berry’s men.

  Swallow knew the younger of the men now standing in John Mallon’s parlour. Perhaps thirty-five years of age, he was clean-shaven, of average height and athletic build. He was Major Nigel Kelly. At least that was the name by which he had introduced himself. He was an unknown quantity. Swallow had found it impossible to identify his previous posting from the army list when he consulted it. Their paths had crossed unpleasantly, and they had clashed more than once in the past. Kelly had openly voiced his contempt for the way G-Division did its work. Swallow thought him a fraud and a poseur. Military men were usually open about their regimental background, but Kelly never spoke of his. Swallow was good on accents. He could always tell a speaker’s county, and often what part of that county, but Kelly’s eluded him. It was English, but overlaid with something Irish, probably Antrim or Down, he reckoned. And a touch of colonial as well.

  ‘You know Major Kelly,’ Mallon said. ‘You probably haven’t met former County Inspector Waters of the Royal Irish Constabulary. Mr Waters has been assigned as a special investigator to work with Major Kelly on behalf of Mr Smith Berry.’

  Waters had a policeman’s sharp eyes but an easy expression. Swallow knew him by reputation. He had led the RIC’s crime department through the early violent years of the land war.

  ‘The celebrated Inspector Swallow.’ The older man held out his hand in greeting. His smile seemed genuine. ‘I’ve heard a lot about your work.’

  ‘Thank you, sir. I appreciate that.’

  Kelly’s mouth tightened in displeasure, forming an unmistakable sneer. Leading the way out of the room, he made no attempt to acknowledge Swallow.

  Mallon indicated towards an easy chair once they had gone.

  ‘Sit down, Swallow. You haven’t advanced very much in Major Kelly’s affections I’m afraid. A sour bastard, and a dangerous one. He’s got a face like a wolf, and the instincts of one too. Unfortunately, he hasn’t got its intelligence.’

  Mallon had not been so outspoken before about any of Smith Berry’s squad. Swallow knew that he ha
d protested to the under-secretary when the new secret service men had begun to make their presence felt. Mallon felt it was an implied slur on G-Division. The secret service men understood little of the complexities of Irish political crime, and they had subverted Mallon’s own intelligence network on more than one occasion. But the under-secretary had stood firm. Mallon told Swallow his conclusion: that the orders to establish the unit had come from the chief secretary, Arthur Balfour, who had taken over as head of the British administration in Ireland almost two years previously.

  The chief looked stressed; more so than he normally would have, even with the news of an overnight murder, Swallow reckoned. Mallon stood and took a tumbler from the sideboard. Without asking he poured Swallow a heavy Bushmills. Then he poured a shot into his own glass, adding an equal measure of water.

  ‘I’ll talk to you about what those two bloody fellows were after,’ Mallon said tersely. ‘But first tell me about the murder out at Rathmines. Any progress?’

  ‘It’s not looking the best, sir.’

  Swallow sipped at his Bushmills. It was not a taste he particularly appreciated, but he would never offend Mallon over his own favourite tipple.

  ‘No witnesses worth talking about. No motive. Dr Lafeyre tells us she wasn’t sexually active. It probably wasn’t robbery because her week’s wages were left at the scene, although it’s possible someone could have missed her bag in the dark. As of now, I’ve nothing to go on. I’m going out to meet the mother and the rest of the family later. Superintendent Boyle has turned out his fellows in numbers, so the usual searches, door-to-door and all that, are in hand.’