‘And if he’s found guilty,’ she said, the brown liquid spreading in a steaming puddle across the cracked floor, ‘what kind of sentence are we talking about?’
‘Well, life is mandatory for murder.’
‘And that’s how long? Nominally ten years, isn’t it? Then out in seven with good behaviour. Not much. Nothing in comparison with my life sentence.’
‘So what’s the alternative?’ he asked. ‘The death penalty? Would you really want that?’
She had looked up at him, her eyelids red and sore, her mouth a narrow slit.
‘Yes. I would. I’m not civilized about this any more. I have no pretensions to compassion or understanding.’
Six months had passed. It had been the end of summer then, when he had knelt at her feet, a tea towel wadded in his hand soaking up the spilt coffee. It was the end of spring now, the evening sun brightening the garden despite the cold wind as he picked his way over the cracked paving stones towards the faded front door. He had phoned ahead to say that he was coming, that he wanted to run through a few points about the trial with her. She had sounded friendly, looking forward to seeing him. She had brought him something, she said, a present from New Zealand. So he stopped at a florist and got her flowers. Lilies, white and stiff, their dark orange stamens nodding in unison as he handed them over.
She walked ahead, down the hall towards the kitchen, and he followed, noticing how her neck rose, stalk-like, from her soft cashmere sweater. There was a cardboard box in the middle of the kitchen table and she gestured to it as she knelt and pulled at cupboard doors, looking, he assumed, for a vase for the lilies, which were lying now in the stained enamel sink.
‘Open it,’ she said, and he tugged back the stiff cardboard tongues, tearing the box in his haste, revealing a model of a late nineteenth-century clipper ship.
‘Hey, that’s beautiful. The Thermopylae, I do believe. Do you know that she was one of the fastest tea-clippers ever built? Capable of fantastic speeds. Once she made a run of three hundred and eighty miles in one day. Incredible for the time.’
He held the model up to the light, turning it this way and that, admiring its lines, commenting on the exactness of the rigging, the accuracy of the scale. He began to talk to her of his desire, his dream. To sail around the world, braving Cape Horn and the Roaring Forties, while she bustled around behind him, producing glasses, a bottle of whiskey, a tray of ice and a jug of water. He poured for both of them, then sat down at the table, the model in one hand, the glass in the other.
‘So tell me,’ she said, ‘the trial. How long will it last’? How many witnesses will be called? Who is representing us, and who the defence?’
He looked from the boat’s white sails to her face, grey with tiredness. He explained. Who and what, how and why. She stood with a large blue vase in her hands, half filled with lilies. Their scent curled into the still air, as the water rose up their hollow stems. And again, her hands opened, as if involuntarily, and flowers and shards of pottery littered the floor, while the sound of the breakage echoed through the silent house. She knelt quickly and began to gather up the pieces, careless, cutting the pad of her thumb so that drops of blood threaded through the water on the tiles. He had tried to help, squatting beside her, offering his handkerchief to staunch the bleeding, but she had pushed him away.
He watched her, as she stood, as always on her own. He was sure there must have been someone who could have come with her. A neighbour, an old friend, like that nice Anne Brady. Someone. But she stood by herself, while around her pushed and shoved the usual Four Courts throng.
He noticed a group of journalists standing near the main entrance. One of them, a thin young man with sandy-coloured hair and glasses, detached himself from the group and headed towards her. McLoughlin stepped forward quickly and got to her just before he did. He took her by the arm, positioning himself neatly between them. He looked at the young man and shook his head vehemently, then led her over to a bench against the wall, just by the entrance to Court Number Two. They sat down together.
‘Sorry about that,’ he said.
‘What?’ She looked puzzled.
‘That guy. Better stay out of his way.’
He had wanted to meet her to make sure that she would get a seat in the court. He explained to her that as the victim’s mother she had no formal role in the business of the trial. Her status was exactly the same as the most casual observer. She would be well advised to get to the court early every morning if she wanted to keep her place. Particularly as the case proceeded and got more and more publicity. But he needed to warn her that the court officials dealt rigorously with outbursts, regardless of who they came from.
She looked at him blankly. ‘Who do you take me for?’ she said, her voice harsh and angry.
He shrugged his shoulders and stood. She didn’t realize what could happen behind those two glass doors. The ancient ritual of trial by jury. Trial it was aptly called. And it didn’t just try the accused or the guilty. He knew that only too well, and soon she would too.
33
He had never got used to being watched all the time. It had begun that first day. When the two guards arrived at his house. He had just come back from the church in Monkstown. That had been fun. It had given him plenty to think about over the following days and months. But he hadn’t expected the guards to show up on his doorstep so soon. He’d tried to fob them off, but they’d started watching him immediately. And he didn’t like it. And he liked it even less when they brought him in for questioning, and put him in that room, with the blank walls. Nothing to look at but the chequered carpet tiles, beige and brown, the red fire extinguisher in the corner, the two strips of fluorescent lighting. No one to talk to but them, all over you, gnawing at you, sucking out everything you know. And watching you all the time. Through the little pane of glass in the door, and later on the peephole in the cell. They all wanted to have a look. He could hear their footsteps coming down the corridor, and then there’d be silence for a moment, before they slid back the metal. Silence, then talk and laughter receding back down the corridor. And silence again. And after they charged him he tried to keep calm but he couldn’t bear the way they checked him every fifteen minutes. He timed them on his watch. He knew it was because they thought he was a suicide risk. And they were almost right. He’d have tried it. Just to give them something to worry about. Not because he wanted to die. Fuck them, he didn’t.
They still watched him here in Mountjoy. Spied on him. Listened to his conversations. Searched his cell. Kept him away from the other inmates. Said it was for his own protection. But he didn’t believe that. And he felt as if he was caught all the time, like the moth in the flame of the candle, or the corpse in the flash from the camera. He had never felt like that before. Before he had always been the watcher. The thing in the dark who can see everything, but can’t be seen. Like the black cat. Only noticed when its yellow eyes are lit up by the headlights of a passing car. And then only for an instant, before the blackness reasserts itself.
But it was never really black in here. Always shades of murky grey or green. Lights on somewhere right through the night. Even if you put your head under the blankets you still couldn’t get away from them.
He had never thought about getting caught. Not really, not seriously. Of course he wasn’t stupid. He’d taken lots of precautions. Like the condoms he’d worn when he was with Mary. When he had to, when there was a chance that his semen might have stayed in her body. Not for when she took him in her mouth, though. It wasn’t necessary then. It was a big sacrifice wearing the condom. He’d told her. The sensation just wasn’t the same. But, he reasoned, he was getting so many other feelings that he shouldn’t complain. He should be prepared to miss out on the odd one.
The one mistake he’d made was her body being found so quickly. He’d really thought that he had that one sussed too. He’d used a wheelbarrow to carry her from the boot of the car along the path. That hadn’t been too difficult. And he�
��d made a second trip with the concrete blocks. He should have been able to see enough by the light of the moon to know exactly where he was putting her. But he’d misjudged it. Fuck that old man and his dog. It had really been a surprise when he turned on the radio and heard the news. He’d thought that it would be just another unsolved mystery, another strange disappearance. After all, there had been so many over the past few years. Girls who went out and didn’t come back. He could kick himself for being so sloppy.
And if he’d been more careful he’d have had time to try it out on someone else. He already had a couple of possibilities lined up. One was a girl who worked in one of the hotels that was on his regular route. A sweet-looking little thing. Skinny, needy. And she’d even written to him since he was in prison. Terrible spelling, dreadful handwriting on pale pink paper. She wanted to come and see him. But he wouldn’t let her. This place was too disgusting for a little girl like her. The only person he’d let visit was his mother. Serve her right. Let her see what she’d done to him, what her tender loving care had driven him to.
But, really, what he wanted most of all in the world was Margaret. Since that first day when Mary had taken the plastic photo album out of her bag and shown him the photographs – Margaret as a baby in a frilly white dress with booties laced around her chubby little legs, Margaret as a little girl, holding her daddy’s hand as they stood outside the house, Margaret as a teenager, wearing a short skirt, her hair hanging in her eyes and a cigarette hanging from her mouth, Margaret with Mary, an exhausted young mother, her face thin and wretched, and the one he liked the most, Margaret on the beach. He’d been silent as he leafed through the pages.
‘Pretty, isn’t she?’ Mary had said, as she lay on the back seat of the car, her feet sticking out through the open window, her hands behind her head.
He didn’t answer. His mouth was dry.
‘But not as pretty as me,’ and she reached over to snatch the little book, but he held on to it, pushing her hands away. He had his own collection of photographs too. Not that he could get at them now, but he had his memories, and the pictures he had torn from the newspapers that made their way into the prison. There’d been a feature article in the Sunday Independent a couple of weeks ago, about women who had died violently, and they had published a photograph that made his heart pound. The caption read ‘Mary Mitchell, murdered last August, with her mother Dr Margaret Mitchell’. He hadn’t see that one before. It was a mid-shot, showing from the waist upwards. It must have been taken in New Zealand, because they were both wearing bathing suits. They were looking at each other and smiling. He was struck by how alike they looked. It wasn’t in the colouring, or the features. It must be in the expression, he concluded. Those indefinable combinations of movements of the muscles under the skin that produce a particular look. He’d never noticed it before.
Certainly not the last time he’d seen her. In the church. He was sorry he hadn’t grabbed her when he had the opportunity. If he’d known what was going to happen, that the guards were waiting for him, that he wouldn’t have time to plan what he was going to do next. If he’d hit her hard, just once, or held the knife to her neck instead of slashing her blouse. He had thought at the time that it was a bit melodramatic, but it had worked. The memory of her had been nearly enough to sustain him all these months. She had been so sure of herself, so confident. And then when the knife slid through the material of her blouse the colour had run out of her face like bleach dripping down a bloody handkerchief. It had been wonderful.
But to be caught because of that fucking English girl. And she was the reason he didn’t get bail. He was sure of it. Although they told him, after they’d charged him with Mary’s murder, that she wasn’t going to co-operate in taking a case against him. She was too traumatized. He mimed the word, turning his face into a tragic pierrot. Silly cow. If he’d known what she was going to do he might have considered going a bit further with her. Just a wee bit further. Or, there again, he might have considered taking it all the way. Then she would have been his first, Mary would have been his second, and the mother his third. And then, and then.
But, instead, he was here. Fucking Mountjoy. And today was the first day of his trial. Oh, joy unconfined. They’d be coming for him soon. And he’d be outside. Breathing real fresh air. He couldn’t wait.
He stood up in the narrow cell, and looked at as much of himself as he could see in his tiny scrap of mirror. His mother had brought him a suit to wear. It was a nice one. Charcoal grey wool. Three-piece. And one of his favourite shirts. Pale lemon. He’d worn it often enough so it was nice and soft around the collar. And his tie was grey and lemon too. Heavy silk. Embossed. An intricate design of spirals and circles. Funny to think that it had been a present from Mary. She’d picked it out all by herself. She always used to say that she didn’t have a clue about men’s things because she didn’t have a father. He imagined her flirting with the assistants in Brown Thomas. All gawky legs and curls. Little Miss Innocent.
He paced backwards and forwards a couple of times. Ten feet from the small window high up in the wall to the metal door. Ten medium paces or seven long strides. Fifteen steps if he carefully put the heel of one foot bang up against the toes of the other. Anything to keep himself amused. There were two bunks in the cell, but he’d been on his own for most of the time. For some reason, the other inmates didn’t like men like him. Accused of sexual crimes. He couldn’t see the logic himself. It seemed pretty hypocritical. After all, how many of the men inside had used their physical strength to get what they wanted? How many men had pushed it just that bit too far, made it happen when it didn’t seem as if it would? Wasn’t that what being a man was all about? Denying nature? Refusing to accept limits? Using your imagination to change situations?
Any minute now they’d be here. He supposed they’d handcuff him. Then he’d walk down the landing, ignoring all the shouts and screams and abuse from the others. Out into the chilly spring morning. Damp and fresh. The buds on the chestnuts and the cherries swelling. And they’d drive in the police van out of the high spiked gate, turning right up the North Circular Road, then left down Phibsborough Road, past the neat red-brick Corporation houses, onto Constitution Hill, with King’s Inns just visible over the high grey wall, across North King Street into Church Street, close to the river now, and then left along Chancery Street and into the back of the Four Courts. There’d be a crowd of reporters and TV people all around the van when he passed. They’d be holding up their cameras to try to get a shot of him. He didn’t mind. He’d nothing to feel ashamed about. And when he got out of the van there’d be a few more waiting, circling, hunting in packs. He wouldn’t put something over his head. It looked really silly, he always thought. Undignified. No, he’d want to stand straight, show off what kind of a guy he was. And the best thing of all would be that when he went into the court room he was absolutely certain that she would be there. Close. Probably less than ten feet away from him. Breathing the same air, in and out, in and out. And the guards would be decent. They’d take off his cuffs. They’d buy him a newspaper. And he’d sit there on the bench, looking just like anyone else. And he’d be able to look at her as much as he wanted. To his heart’s content.
34
The golden harp hung, silent, high on the cream wall. Above the judge’s raised oak bench. Above the rows of seats in the body of the court. Above the empty jury enclosure. Above the polished wooden bench where the accused would sit. Above the people crowded into the aisles, chatting, gossiping, greeting friends, turning around to look, to gawk, to stare.
Margaret stood just inside the door, McLoughlin at her side. Around them in a protective semicircle stood the other guards who had been involved in the investigation. Some of them she knew. Like good-looking young Finney, with his shiny black hair and dimples, Brian Conroy, with his rumpled jeans and leather jacket, and skinny, freckled Bert Lynch. The faces of the others slid into a blur of hair and noses, teeth and chins, none of whom she would ever recogn
ize away from this place.
McLoughlin had introduced her to the prosecution team. The senior counsel had barely glanced at her as she took his hand. His white wig and black gown gave him a certain dignity, which she was sure was missing when he was dressed like any other middle-aged, middle-class man. Like surgeons, Margaret thought, whose green scrubs, testimony to their skill and knowledge, gave them an aura of power unmatched by any number of expensive suits. She remembered girls she had known in medical school who had fallen in love with men old enough to be their fathers, seduced by the eyes that gazed at them over the tops of their masks, beguiled by the hands, delicate inside their rubber gloves, that cut, stitched, probed. She had never succumbed herself. But she remembered, once, coming across a couple in one of the cubicles just off the main theatre. She hadn’t seen the girl’s face. It was buried underneath the man’s gown. His eyes were closed, his body thrown back against a trolley, a mouthful of gold fillings exposed as he grunted his pleasure. One of the top heart surgeons in the country, getting his reward after another triumphant triple bypass.
McLoughlin began to explain the geography of the court room, who sat where and why, but she brushed his explanations away. She looked around her, warily. Wondering. She had been here, before, a long time ago. In another life, it seemed. It was smaller than she remembered, and less formal. The atmosphere was curious. Casual, almost everyday, but with a strong undercurrent of tension. Like the pools of cold water in a warm lake, she thought, that wait for the unsuspecting swimmer.
‘Where is he now?’ she asked.
Mary, Mary Page 20
