The Death of an Irish Politician

by Bartholomew Gill

  McGarr, who had grasped the check, released it and drew his hand away. “No need—I’m paid to be of assistance to all Irish citizens. Perhaps not well enough, but that’s a bargain between me and the state.” McGarr left.

  CHAPTER 4

  MCGARR’S DUBLIN CASTLE office had not been designed for the baker’s-dozen detectives who comprised his staff. Nor had the builder considered the possibility that persons other than mild British civil servants with low voices and an ease of manner might people these rooms. When the number of detectives not away on assignment rose above six, the main room teemed with activity, the clacking of typewriters, ringing of phones, citizens with complaints or information pushing close to a detective so as not to be overheard.

  After hanging up his hat and coat, McGarr signaled to Hughie Ward. He already knew what Ward would divulge but planned to act surprised, if only to make the young man think his work had not been in vain.

  Into the closing door of the cubicle, McGarr heard McKeon say, “More smoke and shadow! This place will be a bloody fen before our roving Inter-police man gets through.” McGarr’s staff was very proud that their chief had been one of the most prominent international detectives in the world.

  Ward sat on the edge of McGarr’s desk and said in a low voice, “Leona Horrigan is her name.”

  “Not—?”

  Ward nodded. “The minister’s wife.”

  McGarr pretended to ponder the fact. “Where’s Brud Clare now?”

  “Back at the boatyard.”

  “Did you make sure he understood how sensitive our investigation here has now become?”

  Ward nodded again.

  “Send in Slattery, then swear out arrest warrants for Hubbard and her. You can call her address the Shelbourne, for form’s sake, and his Fitzwilliam Square. I don’t know the number. You better check to see if he’s an alien. If he is, notify the British Embassy.”

  “Then what?”

  “Wait for me.”

  Slattery’s inquiries at lawyer Greaney’s had resulted in the name, Cobh Condominia Ltd., a holding company. The law clerk at the office refused to tell Slattery who owned the company or if it held title on other property than the 17 Percy Place address. Slattery had insisted on seeing Greaney himself, who told the detective he’d need a magistrate’s order before he would reveal more.

  “Get it and get the information. I want to know the name of everybody involved with that property and a list of the company’s holdings. Then I want you to take every person concerned and run their finances down. Greaney himself included. Seems to me he’s not the sort of lawyer that people operating aboveboard usually retain.”

  McGarr then called in Harry Greaves, who said the canvassing of Killiney hill was half completed without a witness having been discovered yet.

  McGarr placed a call to Hugh Madigan in London, who corroborated Horrigan’s story. McGarr couldn’t extract any additional information, but got the impression Madigan wouldn’t accept another assignment from Horrigan.

  “Did he pay you?”

  “Yes—promptly and in full.”

  “Then what’s the problem?”

  “I couldn’t tell you without betraying the confidence of my client. You wouldn’t want me to do that, Peter.”

  “Not often. But in this case it would be extremely helpful.”

  Madigan paused for a while.

  Vaguely, beyond the line static, McGarr could hear other telephone conversations, the voices layered over each other so that only a word or two became intelligible now and then.

  “I wouldn’t be a friend unless I told you to watch out for the man. He’s unpredictable and utterly ruthless.”

  McGarr had just put the phone down when it rang. Paul Sinclair, who was staking out the Percy Place apartment, had observed a tall, striking woman in her thirties enter the premises. Being alone, he could only cover one entrance.

  “Hair?”

  “Black.”

  “Built?”

  “Like a pregnant kangaroo.”

  “How’s that?”

  “She had on a fur coat. In such important matters I dare not trust my imagination.”

  From the speed with which McGarr grabbed his hat and coat, the office staff knew this was no time to fool. Ward was holding the door for him and they rushed down the stairs into the courtyard. Ward switched on the lamp and the bell, and they raced down Dame Street.

  Trinity College students, having just returned from summer vacation, were flooding across Parnell Square toward the university gates. Blue-and-grey mufflers were wrapped about their necks. Most of the men were incredibly hairy and many smoked pipes. The gait of the women held a promise, just the slightest lubricity of young hips, that McGarr found disconcertingly attractive.

  This scene, however, had exactly the opposite effect on Hughie Ward. He pumped the brakes, pounded the heel of his fist into the horn button, and shouted, “You blasted lard arses! Can’t you see we’re in a rush? Move it, idjits!”—which just caused the students to slow their pace yet more and assume an even more disdainful expression. Self-consciously anti-institutional as only the sons and daughters of the profoundly middle class can be, these kids seized any opportunity to bait society’s most conspicuous institution, the police. McGarr was old and successful enough to find the stance ludicrous, but Ward was wroth.

  He jammed the Rover into first and nearly burst the engine hurtling up Nassau Street. McGarr said nothing, just grasped the lid of his bowler and let his assistant sublimate his aggressions on the machine. A block and a half from the Percy Place address, McGarr reached over, silenced the bell, and switched off the light.

  “She hasn’t left by the front door. I did see the curtains move on the ground floor, however,” said Sinclair, bending to speak into the front window of the car.

  McGarr said, “You take the rear, Hughie. If you see her making off, don’t wait for us. Suspicion of murder, high treason, grand theft, and violations of the arms-control bill are the charges.”

  McGarr popped out of the auto, and he and Sinclair hustled across the street. Sinclair was a tall, thin man who wore exquisite Savile Row suits, soft hats from Cavanaugh’s, and carried an umbrella. He had been a full superintendent Down Under and was a member of the Australian Bar. He had the manner of a psychiatrist, and McGarr had strained his relations with the minister for finance getting the government to pay Sinclair only a hundred pounds per year less than he received himself, although by the rules of the Civil Service Commission that man’s job classification could only be pegged at detective first class. McGarr was not afraid of competition, since he believed policemen, like athletes, could improve their game only with steady competition of a high order of excellence.

  Sinclair rapped on the porter’s door. A whole minute later, it opened.

  McGarr pulled the arrest warrant from his raincoat pocket and attempted to show it to the old woman who called herself Megan. “Peter McGarr again, ma’am. This is Detective Sinclair.”

  The tall man was trying to see over the top of the old woman’s head. They could hear the Rover winding down the alley out back.

  “I seem to have misplaced my glasses,” she said, but when she began fumbling with the shawl on her upper chest in search of her spectacles, McGarr pushed by her. He wasn’t about to let any doddering old shrew keep him from making this arrest. He wanted to prove to the government that the Dublin Castle Garda had the tact and discretion to handle even the most sensitive assignment. Under other chiefs the Dublin Castle had been a meat-wagon squad that specialized in bullying, intimidation, and even torture. De Valera’s regimes had used them for political purposes. McGarr had taken the job only on the promise he would be allowed to make the department into a first-rate investigative agency. Now he wanted to nip any political complications of this case in the bud. Arresting Leona Horrigan would be the first step.

  “Where are you going? Two A has been declared void, you know,” she shouted after him as he made a quick tour t
hrough her flat and opened the door that led up to the tenants’ apartments. 2A was the Emergency Powers Act that had suspended civil liberties and had given the government the power of internment during the Troubles in the thirties. 2A hadn’t been withdrawn, but the old woman’s acquaintance with the law surprised McGarr.

  The apartment was unoccupied, but the odor of a perfume that smelled like fresh gardenias was still heavy in the air. From the porch, McGarr signaled to Ward in the alley. He hadn’t seen anybody leave. The back gate, however, was slightly ajar, as was a drawer of the dresser in the bedroom. Somebody had rifled through it, perhaps taking fresh clothes. A pair of women’s shoes, the soles still wet from the street, were in the closet. McGarr slipped them into a paper bag he took from the bottom drawer of the fridge. He handed these to Sinclair, saying, “Have the lab check them for blood of Bobby Ovens’ type, please, Paul. And then look up Liam O’Shaughnessy at the Department of Justice. He’ll fill you in on the details of what he’s doing. Tell him I told you to concentrate on Carleton Driver, the minister’s first assistant.” McGarr wanted his best men on that aspect of this investigation now, the two parts of which he was sure would dovetail very soon.

  Sinclair left.

  Back in the car, Ward asked, “Where to?”

  This was no time for a long shot, but McGarr said, “The Killiney Bay Yacht Club. I have a hunch she’s panicked. If so, she’ll run to Hubbard. The old woman probably told her about my earlier visit, pointed Sinclair out to her.”

  As Ward cranked up the Rover, again sounding the alarm and activating the blinker, McGarr called Will Hare at Internal Security and John Gallagher at Customs, asking them to detain anybody named or resembling Leona Horrigan.

  Gallagher asked, “Is that the Leona Horrigan, the minister’s wife?”

  “The same.”

  “And a prime piece of fluff she is,” said Gallagher. “What’s she done? A crime of passion, no doubt.”

  Ward began to laugh. Gallagher was a free spirit. Anybody with a citizen’s band radio could be listening to them, to say nothing of all the police cars and station commanders across the country.

  “We went to university together,” Gallagher went on. “She had a certain way of tossing her hair, you know, that made me want to commit a mortal sin. She was”—they could hear Gallagher sigh—“the Lauren Bacall of UCD, but healthier, if you know what I mean. Nicotine could never violate those lungs!” Gallagher rang off.

  Topping Killiney hill at the Khyber Pass, McGarr noticed the yacht-club van parked near the entrance to the lounge bar. He stifled the bell, turned off the light, and directed Ward to swing around.

  When they got to the bar, McGarr noticed a neat whiskey and one with soda in front of adjoining stools. A cigarette with a lipstick smudge on the filter smoked in the ashtray. McGarr flashed his shield at the barman, who pointed in two directions, toward the men’s room and out the front door.

  McGarr took the former path and burst into the toilet. Along the outer wall, a bank of windows was open, the floor still wet, air heavy with chemical cleanser. McGarr was about to squeeze under a window and reconnoiter the yard beyond when he noticed the tracks of rubber-soled shoes leading to a stall. He could not, however, see feet below the door. He drew his Walther, and with a snap of his knee thrust a heavy-lidded wastepaper basket over the tiles so that it crashed into the stall door, jamming it open. There, squatting with his feet on the bowl rim, was Horace C.K. Hubbard. He looked very much like a frog on a rock.

  “Who am I to question your toilet training, Horace? Climb down off there, please. Then come out here and place your hands on the wall.”

  From outside in the parking lot they heard the soft thump of automobile sheet metal collapsing, then the tinkling spray of shattered glass.

  Hubbard shouted “Lea!” and made as though he would charge out of the toilet.

  McGarr shoved the large man against the wall. Hubbard spun and punched wildly at McGarr’s head, knocking off his hat. The chief inspector followed the arc of Hubbard’s arm, and when the elbow swept past, McGarr thrust his weight into it. Hubbard’s fist smashed full force into the wall tiling of the toilet. Through the elbow McGarr could feel Hubbard’s wrist snap. The big man pulled the hand back from the wall and stared into it curiously as it dangled limp, the knuckles bluing, the swelling immediate and full. He looked at McGarr as though for a diagnosis.

  “You won’t be thumbing your nose at me for a while, Horace,” said McGarr.

  Leona Horrigan was unhurt. She was indeed beautiful. She clung to Ward as though even in her collapse and embarrassment she was attempting to use her glorious body—a tall woman with straight, athletic legs and an erect carriage that emphasized her firm buttocks and large breasts—to win over the handsome young detective. She was sobbing, and like a child who derives emotional support from a teddy bear, wouldn’t release Ward, who said to McGarr in a hushed voice, “And who said this job doesn’t have its moments?”

  McGarr directed the three of them into the rear seat of the Rover and drove to the hospital himself. The radiator of the car was leaking some, but the engine didn’t overheat. He called the Bray barracks for help at the hospital. McGarr enjoyed the heady aroma of gardenias and the spectacle of Hubbard in agony, the woman mortified.

  While the emergency room ministered to Hubbard’s needs, McGarr made a discreet inquiry as to Ovens’ condition, which had improved so significantly that Dr. O’Higgins was contemplating releasing him. The young doctor, McGarr found, was scheduled for ward duty that night. This bit of news pleased him, although the ward report said Ovens had not said a word yet. He had persistently refused to talk to the doctors, nurses, sisters, and priest.

  Hubbard’s fingerprints were on the winch handle along with those of another man. McGarr swiveled in his chair and looked out the window. The dirty brick buildings that bordered the Liffey appeared crimson as an autumn twilight descended. He picked up the telephone and began dialing the pubs he suspected Billy Martin might frequent. At the ninth, he reached a publican who had just seen the man leave. He advised McGarr to wait five minutes and then call Pim’s Lounge Bar on the Stillorgan Road. “You can set your watch by the man. He rides a mo-ped, you know. Takes it right up on the sidewalk when the traffic’s jammed.”

  While he waited, McGarr called Noreen, filled her in on the details, and advised her he wouldn’t be home.

  “Shall I pack up your dinner and bring it down?”

  McGarr knew Noreen would do anything to get in on the interrogative aspects of an investigation. He could see Kevin Slattery at his desk, also on the horn to his missus, making excuses why he wouldn’t be home. Slattery was the stenographer for interrogations. “What are we having?”

  “Curried prawns on wild rice. How many are there of you?”

  “Well, if you come down, I could send Kevin home, so that would make just Hughie, myself, and Mrs. Horrigan and you. We’ll let Hubbard eat prison food.”

  “One hour.” Noreen hung up.

  McGarr pointed to the door. Slattery smiled and left. Thus, the department wouldn’t have to bear the expense of having a matron in the room while Mrs. Horrigan was being questioned.

  Billy Martin told McGarr that yes, before McGarr had arrived at the yacht club, he had touched the winch handle.

  “Whereabouts?”

  “Two places, I believe. The handle itself, you know. And then, because it felt so slimy what with his brains on it and all, I lifted it up by the base to get a better look.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me that at the scene?”

  “You never asked, for one. For another, you seemed so concerned that I not touch it, I figured that as long as we was drinking together, I’d not destroy the moment with such an admission. I should have known better. How’s it coming, sorr? Do you still think it wasn’t an accident?”

  “Did you see a woman around the boat at all Friday afternoon?”

  “Like I said before, Inspector, I never saw a woman around tha
t boat. But then, I’m not of an age that I’m exactly looking for them, don’t you know. Recently, I’ve been poking around the boat, sort of tidying things up for the unfortunate man. Is that all right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And I’ve come across some fancy duds, the like of which a woman would wear, so I believe the man did dally with the creatures at one time.”

  McGarr wondered why Martin hadn’t seen or wasn’t telling him he had seen Leona Horrigan on the dock that afternoon. “How’s your eyesight, Billy?”

  “Not bad at all, at all.”

  “Ovens had your tools, didn’t he, Billy?” McGarr had a report on his desk listing the contents in the garage that the sailor had used as his work shed. Most of the tools had “Mairtin,” the Gaelic spelling of the surname Martin, either burnt into the handles or engraved in the metal. Clare had implied that once the debt on Virelay had been paid off, Ovens did no more work on the furniture he had been making in the shed. That meant Martin had known Ovens well enough to lend him his tools before Ovens took Virelay to Killiney Bay Yacht Club. Also, the Dun Laoghaire barracks of the Garda had sent McGarr a memo stating Martin had tried three times to get into the garage over the weekend.

  “Again, sorr, you never asked. I tried to be as helpful as I could, remember? I’m not a cop. So much more the shame.”

  That was exactly the phrase Megan had used, but it was not unusual among older people.

  “Well, I am. How long had you known Bobby Ovens before he put in at the club?”

  “Certainly, sir, you don’t suspect me? About six months. We’re both boating people, don’t you know. We both like a jar or two from time to time. It was only natural that I ran into him.”

  “Was—is Horace Hubbard in love with Leona Horrigan?”