by Joe Joyce
‘About your height,’ she said to Duggan. ‘Dark brown hair. Brown eyes. You saw his photograph. That’s a good likeness.’
‘You have a photograph?’
‘There was one in Nuala’s flat,’ Duggan told Gifford.
The light in the room changed as something moved outside, from side to side. They all glanced at the window and saw a searchlight sweep from right to left and, in the silence, heard the faint drone of an aircraft. A second searchlight shot into the sky from the right and they crossed each other, sweeping back and forth. Gifford and Duggan moved to the window and looked out. There was no sign of the droning plane. A line of red tracer bullets rose slowly into the sky from the anti-aircraft battery in Ringsend, creating a warning fan, and faded away. The sound of the plane began to fade too and after a few moments the searchlights went out.
Stella stood up as they turned back to her. ‘I’ve got work to do,’ she said, offering a small bunch of keys to Duggan. ‘They’re still in my pocket since the other day. If you want to see Jim’s photograph.’
Duggan took them.
‘He’s not mixed up in anything shady,’ she said. ‘He’s not that kind of person.’
They walked back part of the way they had come, turning into Mount Street Crescent at Huband Bridge where there was only one woman standing now. ‘Where are your fellows hiding out?’ Duggan asked as they went around by the Pepper Canister Church.
‘Nearer the other end of the street,’ Gifford said. ‘The other side of the British outposts. Hopefully they won’t see us.’
The street was empty and they walked fast to the house where Nuala’s flat was. Duggan had the big key out and they went in quickly and climbed the stairs in the dark. On the top floor, he opened the door to the flat and felt inside for the light switch.
‘Wait,’ Gifford said in a quiet voice. ‘Are the curtains pulled?’
Duggan crossed the room to the window and leaned over the table in front of the window to close the curtains. He took out his cigarette lighter and flicked it on to find his way back to the door and the light switch. He pressed the switch and nothing happened. ‘The meter,’ Gifford whispered.
Duggan took another of Timmy’s shillings from his pocket, handed it to Gifford and held the cigarette lighter aloft as he fed it into the meter on the landing. The money dropped into the box and the light came on. The flat still had the feeling of an unused room, the air warm and stale, unmoved. It seemed to Duggan to be as it had been the last time he was there. He pulled open the drawer of the table at the window and stopped. The envelope of photographs was no longer there. Neither were the newspaper cuttings, the old one about the Kilmichael ambush, the newer one of Nuala with a man and another couple at a dance in the Metropole.
‘Fuck,’ he said. ‘It’s gone.’
‘Just the picture of Bradley?’ Gifford looked into the drawer.
‘No. There was a Kodak envelope of snaps. Mostly family. They’re all gone. And a couple of newspaper cuttings, one of a dinner dance last winter and one about the Kilmichael ambush.’
‘The Kilmichael ambush? What’s the connection?’
‘None that I know of,’ Duggan said, trying to remember what else had been in the drawer. Nothing came to mind. He looked around the flat again. Nothing else appeared to have been moved. The cup and plate were still on top of the cupboard by the sink.
‘Who was at the dinner dance?’ Gifford went back to the door, opened it and looked at the jamb. There was no sign of a forced entry.
‘Nuala with some guy called Richie something. And another couple. Stella knows.’
Gifford pulled open the doors of the wardrobe and held them wide while he scanned the contents. ‘Anything missing here?’
‘I didn’t look very closely the last time.’ Nothing seemed to have been disturbed.
‘If anybody searched the place they did it very neatly,’ Gifford said, parting each of the clothes on hangers and looking underneath the jumpers folded on top of each other. He opened a drawer and went through the underwear. ‘And there’s no sign of a break-in. So …’ He stopped as they heard the sound of heavy footsteps coming up the stairs. He crossed to the light switch, waved Duggan back behind him, and turned off the light. They stood with their backs to the wall behind the door as the footsteps came onto the landing, paused, and then moved across to the other door. There was another pause and then the sound of a key in a lock and, a moment later, a door closing. Gifford turned on the light again.
‘Should we talk to the neighbour?’ Duggan asked in a quiet voice.
Gifford shook his head. ‘Keep it as low key as possible. For the moment.’
‘Richie Cummins,’ Duggan said. ‘That was the guy with her at the Metropole dance.’
‘Okay.’ Gifford went back to the wardrobe again. ‘Anything moved about? Different?’
‘I don’t know for sure,’ Duggan admitted. ‘Stella was with me last time. I didn’t want to be pawing through Nuala’s stuff.’
‘Such a delicate creature,’ Gifford gave him a crooked smile. ‘For one who causes such mayhem.’
‘Ah, the hero returns,’ Sullivan said to Duggan as he walked into their office the next morning.
‘What?’
‘Good work last night,’ Captain McClure said as he came in behind Duggan. ‘Take a look at this.’
He took a photograph from the file he was carrying. It was a police headshot of a man with two views, a profile and a full face.
‘Robinson?’ Duggan asked, taking the picture and studying it. The face was long and thin, with a large nose, and deep-set eyes. The full face was even more like a boxer than the side face he had seen.
‘Is it?’
‘I think so.’ Duggan handed him back the picture.
‘Good,’ McClure said, taking the photograph back. ‘We missed him this morning. He’d been staying with the Coffey woman but seems to have moved last night. Or at least before our friends managed to get there. But at least we now know who Brandy is.’
‘He’s Brandy?’ Duggan asked, seeing in his mind’s eye the man walking with the talkative woman along the railway line with the harbour in the background. He didn’t look like a high-level German spy. But what does a spy look like?
McClure nodded. ‘Real name Hermann Goertz. Luftwaffe pilot in the last war. Now working for the Abwehr. Caught spying in England a few years ago, before the war, and jailed. Now on the loose here. Planning, plotting something.’
‘Could I look at the picture again?’ Duggan asked.
McClure gave it back to him and he looked at it closely. The profile was the same, the slightly hooked nose an easily distinguishing feature. Yes, it was definitely him. And if Timmy hadn’t come along he might have been able to follow him to his new hideout. Some hero, he thought. If only they knew.
McClure gave him a questioning look. ‘It’s him all right,’ Duggan said.
‘Okay,’ McClure put the picture away again and looked at his watch. ‘I want to talk to everybody in twenty minutes. In the other room.’
‘What’s that about?’ Duggan asked after McClure had left.
‘Maybe going to pin a medal on you,’ Sullivan sniggered.
‘What happened this morning?’
‘Special Branch broke the door down at half six. Nearly gave the old dear a heart attack. She was all alone but there were signs that your man had been there.’
‘What signs?’
‘I don’t know. That’s all I heard. Signs.’
Duggan sat down at the table, lit a cigarette and inhaled deeply. He pulled the Harbusch file over in front of him and opened it where he had left the marker. But he couldn’t concentrate on it; things were moving too fast on too many fronts. ‘You think that was him?’ he asked Sullivan. ‘In the photograph?’
‘That was the fellow you followed all right. D’you not think so?’
‘I do,’ Duggan said. ‘But how do they know he’s Brandy?’
‘Nobody tells me anything
,’ Sullivan sighed. ‘Presume it was one of the signs they found this morning.’
‘Yeah, you’re probably right.’ Duggan focussed his attention on the Harbusch file again, going back a couple of pages to remind himself of what he had been reading. It was just the brief account of the other people in the building where Harbusch had his flat; nobody suspicious. London, he thought. Was Hans in London the same time as Brandy/Goertz? Were they connected there? And if they had been, were they connected here? The British would know and they would have told us if there was a connection. Wouldn’t they? Or would they? They had obviously supplied the photos and information about Harbusch and Goertz. Surely they would also have pointed out any connections between them.
‘Time to go,’ Sullivan got up. ‘Get your medal.’
The other room had filled up when they got there and they stood at the back. Duggan could see that the photograph of Goertz had joined the one of Harbusch and other suspected German agents on a display board. The murmur of voices died as McClure took his position in front of the display board.
‘These are dangerous days for our country,’ he began without preliminaries. ‘The war which seemed distant and even unreal for many months has become all too real and is now threatening to engulf us as it has already engulfed so many other neutral states. We are inundated with alerts every day, all of which we have to check out. Some may be dry runs, testing our defences and reactions. Most are false alarms. Nothing can be left to chance.
‘In this situation good information is critical. And good information relies on putting our own preferences to one side. As we should be doing in any event as good soldiers. We must not allow our own preferences for the outcome of this war to influence our judgement. On the one hand, that can lead us to inaccurate conclusions. On the other, it may be in conflict with government policy. And our job is to implement the policy of the elected government, no more, no less. That policy, as you all know, is one of neutrality. We will resist with all our might any infringement of our sovereignty. From any source. It is also government policy, as enunciated by the Taoiseach, that our territory will not be allowed to be used as a base from which to attack Great Britain.
‘There are people who, as we all know, would like us to be a base for just that. Which leads them into dangerous alliances. Whether such alliances would or would not be to Ireland’s benefit in the long run is not for us to judge. They are in direct conflict with the government policy we are obliged to operate. There are many armchair generals and armchair politicians abroad at the moment who want to see one outcome or another of the war. Most of it is pub talk. It is not for us to indulge in this kind of speculation, neither at work nor anywhere else. It is for us to provide the most accurate information possible of the actions and intentions of all the parties involved. So that the real generals and our real political masters can base their decisions on the soundest possible information.
‘I don’t need to remind you either of the sensitivity of all the information which passes through here. Or of your obligations under the Official Secrets Act. But people can get carried away sometimes, in discussions with friends, debates with family members. Anything you know from your work here should not be used outside, even indirectly or inadvertently. Our job is clear. Our orders are clear. We must stick rigidly to them. No deviations. No solo runs. No taking sides between the belligerents.’
McClure paused and then dismissed them. Duggan stood to one side as the room emptied and approached McClure.
‘I was wondering if Harbusch and Goertz knew each other in London. Worked together, I mean.’
McClure shook his head. ‘Goertz was in jail when Harbusch arrived there. The British thought first that he was Goertz’s replacement. But he didn’t seem to actually do anything much. Like here.’
‘What was Goertz doing before he was caught?’
‘Collecting information about RAF airfields. Strengths, deployments. So on.’ He went on without a pause. ‘What did you think of my little speech?’
Duggan resisted an impulse to ask why he had made it. ‘Very clear.’
‘Is it possible Goertz saw you following him last night?’
Duggan hesitated. ‘It’s possible. But I was a good distance behind him. And he never looked around.’
‘The woman?’
‘She didn’t either.’ Shit, Duggan thought. I don’t want to go down this road. They probably saw me get into Timmy’s car as they crossed into the avenue. But that wouldn’t have looked like I was following them. Now he’s going to ask me how I knew the man was calling himself Robinson. ‘If I’d been closer I might have seen where he went when they turned into that avenue. By the time I got there they had both disappeared.’
‘Gone into her house. It was just up the road,’ McClure nodded. ‘He was there for a while anyway. Had been staying there.’
‘He’s definitely Brandy?’
‘Yes. He left behind a coded message using the same cipher we found in Held’s. Probably left in a hurry.’ McClure paused. ‘Somebody tipped him off.’
Duggan made no attempt to disguise his shock. Timmy, he thought. Oh, Jesus. He couldn’t have? No. He wouldn’t do that. Why would he do that? Okay, he wanted the Germans to win the war. But to thwart the guards and the army and his own government? No. On the other hand, he had said Brandy wasn’t a spy, wasn’t committing any crime in Ireland, only gathering intelligence on the British.
‘I couldn’t swear that he didn’t see me.’
‘Maybe he was just being cautious. He took a big risk going to the German minister’s house party. He must have suspected that we’d be watching it. And that we’d identify the Coffey woman, if not him. Leaves Herr Hempel and his denials about German spies in an awkward position with the government now. But that’s not our concern.’
‘No, sir.’
‘Breaking my own rules now about armchair strategists,’ he gave a half smile. ‘And,’ he added, going back to Duggan’s initial question, ‘Harbusch and Goertz are connected. They both work for the same master. Keep after Harbusch.’
Duggan turned to go, relieved that the subject had changed from the previous night’s activities.
‘By the way,’ McClure said. ‘I requested more manpower on his surveillance but there’s no chance at the moment. The Special Branch’s stretched to the limit.’
‘Disappointed?’ Sullivan asked Duggan as he returned to their office.
‘Over what?’
‘No medal.’
Duggan gave a short laugh and sat down at the table. ‘What was all that about? That speech?’
‘They say they’re worried about people pursuing their own agendas.’
‘Really?’
Sullivan shrugged. ‘So they say. Not here necessarily. Special Branch is riddled with IRA spies. One of their fellows has been arrested. Being interrogated.’
‘Jesus,’ Duggan said, thinking of Gifford and hoping that he hadn’t set off this chain of events with his own inquiries about Nuala. The phone rang and he picked it up and gave his name.
‘The hard man,’ Timmy said.
‘Speak of the devil,’ Duggan retorted.
‘You were talking about me?’ Timmy sounded pleased.
‘Only joking.’
‘Well, I’m going down the country tomorrow. Mona says your mother’s been asking about you. Hasn’t seen you for ages.’
‘A month,’ Duggan said, surprised at this turn of the conversation.
‘You know what they’re like. Women. I’ll pick you up outside the barracks at eleven. We’ll be back early on Sunday.’
Duggan closed his eyes. He had a weekend pass, the first in the last month. ‘I’ve got a German lesson tomorrow.’
‘Give it a miss. You can drive the V8.’
Frau McMahon, a German woman who had married an Irishman involved in building the Ardnacrusha power station, wouldn’t be impressed, although she had told him the last time that all he needed was more practice. ‘Okay,’ he said.
/> ‘And wear your uniform.’
‘What?’
‘Your mother’ll love to see you in it.’
Timmy hung up before Duggan could argue. It’s not my mother, he thought. Timmy wants to be driven through the constituency by a uniformed man. Like it was a state car. Even though everyone there knew he was Timmy’s nephew. But they mightn’t see beyond the uniform as he drove past. He shook his head at the phone as he put it down on its cradle.
It rang again.
‘Cousin Peter here,’ Gifford said. ‘We’ve an appointment to meet our old friend Richie after work.’
‘Really?’ Duggan said, thinking quickly. Richie Cummins, Nuala’s former boyfriend. Or dancing companion, at least.
‘After his work, that is.’
‘All right. I should be able to make it.’
‘See you at the usual place.’
Duggan put down the phone and opened the Harbusch file at random. He stared at it, unseeing, thinking that things were getting totally out of hand. Should he tell McClure about Nuala? The IRA interest in her and its Special Branch conduit? About Gifford? Timmy? The snippets of information Timmy kept feeding him about government policy? And Timmy’s own preferences and theories? McClure would tell him to drop all of it, it was none of his business. Not army business. But he was already out on a limb. McClure would want to know why he hadn’t reported all of it immediately. Or else he’d see it as a total distraction from Duggan’s real work. And, either way, not trust him anymore.
So what was the worst that would happen? He’d be sent back to the infantry. Fall down to the bottom of the promotion lists. They’d hardly throw him out of the army altogether, given the times that were in it. But he’d have no future in the military. If this army had a future at all. He’d joined out of a sense of duty, something expected of him, although he had had no thoughts of a military career as such. But he realized suddenly that he did like the idea of it now. And not in the infantry. But in what he was doing at the moment. Trying to piece together the shifting hints and puzzles of other people’s aims and intentions. He didn’t want to let it go, now that he had only begun to do it. Not yet anyway.
