Death in Dublin

by Bartholomew Gill

  But McGarr only got halfway across the Oriental carpet.

  “McGarr.”

  He turned to find Sheard holding a handgun.

  “Ah, Jack, isn’t that a cliché?”

  “What have you done with this?”

  “Nothing. Yet.” He studied Sheard’s features, which appeared transformed—eyes widened, brow furrowed. He was perspiring.

  McGarr reached into his jacket and pulled out the sheaf of papers Ward had given him. “But it will soon be on its way. Remember my assistant Hugh Ward? The one you insisted be cashiered? You can thank him for this. Irony is, he put it all together, he did, with the skills he’s learned since you got him sacked. With the same skills at which you’re supposed to be expert—white-collar crime. How does it feel to be hoist on your own petard, Jack?”

  McGarr pulled out his cell phone. “Like to give him a call? Need his number?”

  Sheard only stared down at the papers, his color now high.

  “But none of this need happen. You know who I want—Sweeney.” McGarr turned for the door.

  “McGarr!” Sheard roared, pulling back the slide of the automatic. “It’s not too late for your death. I’ll say you came out here and assaulted me. Your hatred of me, your professional envy is well known. I’ll say you and your team of lawless operatives have been stalking me for weeks now, digging into my affairs, using the power of your office to conduct an illegal investigation. And when you couldn’t find anything, you came here in a rage and pulled a gun. People will understand how that could happen. There’s your wife and father-in-law and the debacle over on Iona that got Kara Kennedy killed. And you an old man falling apart.”

  McGarr stopped in the archway to the hall. “Jack, you’re right on all scores. I am an old man, and my wife and father-in-law are dead. Iona was a debacle twice over, since Kara lost her life and the money appears to be gone, although we both know it isn’t. What was your share, Jack? How much were you to get out of it?

  “And sure, I’ll agree—my staff can be lawless, and you should count on it. You could shoot me. But you won’t, because you’d be handing yourself a death sentence. And we can agree on something.” McGarr waited a moment before turning around.

  Sheard had lowered the gun. “Who else knows, apart from Ward?”

  “Bresnahan and McKeon, who will also keep their counsel, if you give me Sweeney and proof.”

  “But they’ll always have it hanging over me. I’ll always be under their gun.” His eyes fell to the object in his hands.

  “As long as you remain in the Garda.”

  Slowly Sheard’s eyes moved up to McGarr. “As well, there’s himself. And he’s—”

  “Mortal,” said McGarr.

  If anonymity were possible in Ireland, it would reside in Kinsale, a harbor town in South Cork. Several decades earlier, Continental yachtsmen had discovered its deep-water harbor and neat rows of eighteenth-century houses lining the waterfront.

  The ensuing real estate frenzy brought trendy restaurants, boutiques, yacht brokerages, and further foreigners to the quaint maritime community. Before the economic boom of the nineties, it was said few Irish could afford to live there and that the town should be run from New York by the United Nations.

  Pubs had been closed for about an hour, by the time Peter McGarr slowed his Cooper and rolled into the narrow streets by the harbor that were nevertheless still busy with traffic and window-shoppers and others on footpaths. Clubs, restaurants, and the after-hours bistros would still be open. Large yachts in the harbor were ablaze with light.

  Finding a legal parking place, McGarr nevertheless lowered his Garda shield, not knowing how long it would take and not wanting to be clamped or towed.

  Switching off the car, he paused for several moments to steel his resolve. It was not a court of law he would be conducting, neither a tribunal nor an interview. What he was about—he told himself, twisting the rearview mirror to chance a look at himself—was an interrogation of the sort that would get at the truth, one way or another. After a summary judgment would come the penalty phase.

  Glancing at himself in the mirror, he was shocked by what he saw. He was pasty, haggard, and decidedly old, with bloodshot eyes and a grizzled beard. A muscle at the corner of his right eye was twitching. Pulling the Glock from under the seat, he tucked the handgun under his belt, reminding himself of Noreen, Fitz, and Kara Kennedy. He opened the door and stepped out.

  It was chilly, with a brisk wind sweeping in off the harbor and the streets damp from a recent shower. McGarr turned up the collar of his jacket and leaned into the blast, as he passed down a line of shops looking for the address Sheard had given him, a residence, he assumed, over a business, which was Sweeney’s preferred modus vivendi.

  While anything but reticent when honing his personal image, Sweeney was otherwise reclusive in his personal life—sleeping in his office at the Ath Cliath newsroom, before that on a cot in a back room of his run-down building on the Dublin quays where his supposed “merchant bank” was headquartered. Or here, in a building that was just off a main business street—narrow, tucked between two more imposing structures. In spite of his millions.

  McGarr stepped out into the street and looked up at the facade and its windows, which were shuttered and lightless. If Sweeney were there, he did not want anybody to know.

  When McGarr stepped back onto the footpath, there was a figure before him.

  “Hiya, stranger—where you been? Come ’ere and give me a hug, I’m feckin’ freezin’.” It was Orla Bannon who stepped into him, wrapped her arms around his body, and placed her head on his chest.

  McGarr did not resist. On his cheek, her glossy dark hair felt soft and warm, and he breathed in the pleasant odor of whatever shampoo she had used.

  “I’d give you the line, ‘I can tell you’re happy to see me’”—she tightened her hold on him, pressing herself against the Glock—“but I imagine that hard thing I’m feeling is another animal altogether.”

  McGarr moved to break away from her, but she held on. “Ah, now—it’s only a moment or two I’m asking. At the moment.” Her thigh now slipped between his legs. “But he’s up there, I can tell you. He got here looking like death warmed over only shortly after me. Which will tell you how long Sheard interviewed the bugger.

  “Anyhow, Brother Loquacious”—drawing herself back, she looked up at him—“I’ve a plan. To get you in.” She smiled, her jet eyes surveying him. “Here.” She canted her head toward the darkened building.

  “How did you know he’d come here?”

  “Credit me sixth sense that with a man like that, one day, I’d need to know everything I could about him.”

  “He’s alone in there?”

  “Which is—you’ve nailed it—his problem. Socialization. If only Chazz Sweeney could love or trust somebody besides himself, perhaps there might be a remediation of our conditions, yours and mine. Although I have the feeling you’re interested in a more immediate and final solution.”

  The drill was, Bannon explained, that Sweeney would come to the door for her.

  “Why?”

  “Trust me, he just will.”

  “Because of your threat at the news conference?”

  “Did you see it?” Her smile was full now. “How did I look? More’s the point, how did I do?”

  When McGarr said nothing, she continued: “It’s not just that he’ll come to the door—when he does and it opens, his security system won’t detect a certain party breaking in the back. That’s you. Me, he’ll invite me in, and then you’ll be the witness to my little chat with the Chazz man.”

  “How do you know his security system switches off?”

  Yet again she flashed her pixieish smile. “It’s me stock-in-trade—to know.”

  “At the back there’s a door?”

  “Pickable by you.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  “If not by you, then by nobody.”

  A smile nearly formed at the co
rners of McGarr’s mouth. “You’re shameless.”

  “And don’t you forget it. It’ll take you two minutes to get back there, but let’s make it five.” She released him and glanced at her watch. “In five minutes I’ll ring. Say, it takes him another couple to get down and open up. I’ll stand in the doorway and refuse his offers for a peek at his etchings for another five. I think he actually likes me. Too much.

  “That’ll give you a whopping time cushion of ten whole minutes to scope the lock out and let yourself in. The entire house is his, but where he lives—his digs—are on the top floor. Grand view of the harbor. If he bolts, it might be to the boat he’s got tied up to the wall. Wouldn’t you know it’s called the Boru.”

  “You should know what I’m here for, and it’s not a wee chat.”

  “Wouldn’t I love to be a witness to history? Yours and his, his and mine, yours and mine.”

  McGarr turned on his heel, thinking what he had in mind was best done while there were car doors slamming, other ambient urban noise, and the occasional shout. Or curse.

  A ship’s horn now sounded and echoed around the harbor that was here nearly circular.

  The back of the building was hard by the water with a narrow laneway—the width of a horse and cart alone—between the door and the harbor wall.

  Standing there digging a smoke from his jacket, McGarr pretended to survey the rather sizable forest of masts and superstructures that made up the Kinsale pleasure-boat fleet, before turning and cupping his hands to light a cigarette.

  The lock was complex, case-hardened of the sort that was not easily picked, and he would not try. Stepping back into the shadows of the building, he leaned against the door and drew on the cigarette in a leisurely manner, noting the stile in the harbor wall and the raised decks of the Boru, he assumed, on the other side.

  Scanning the laneway before grinding out the butt, McGarr drew the Glock from under his belt, took one long stride away from the door, turned, and fired three quick slugs into the lock. Raising a foot, he kicked out at the door. It held. But not for his shoulder. With a pop, it broke open, and he stumbled into a dark room.

  Pushing the door to, he listened to the sounds of the building, expecting to hear at least muffled voices from the upper stories. Instead, only a few dull thuds came to him.

  But now that he was inside, speed was of the essence. He began moving upstairs, meeting with only one other lock on the door to the first floor, which he opened with a thin supple blade.

  The hallway was darkened, with all other doors closed; a second was the same. Catching sight of a glow at the top of the stairs, he climbed toward it, keeping his feet near the wall and the Glock before him.

  “McGarr!” he heard when he was two steps from the final landing. “Come in, come in. Two uninvited guests in one night—my, my, I’m such a lucky fella.”

  Cautiously, McGarr approached the open door from which light was spilling onto the carpet.

  “Come in, lad. Don’t be bashful. I won’t object to your Garda-issue Glock. Haven’t I got one of me own, although it’s in use at the moment?”

  In a mirror hanging on the wall of the room, he could see a desk on which sat a clear plastic bag containing the head of Gillian Reston, eyes splayed, a blue swollen tongue lolling out.

  Near it was a photograph of Sweeney with Dan Stewart, their arms looped over each other’s shoulders, smiling into the camera.

  Taking another step, he caught sight of Sweeney sitting in a wing chair with somebody lying on the carpet before him.

  It was Orla Bannon, hands duct-taped behind her; more tape was wrapped around her head and an automatic. The barrel was in her mouth. A length of what looked like fishing line ran from the trigger to Sweeney, who, with jacket off and legs crossed, now reached for a drink on a small table by his side.

  “Like my effigy? It was sent me by a caring colleague who will soon enjoy that condition himself, if Jack Sheard has anything to do with it.

  “And actually”—Sweeney tried to smile, but it was more a baring of dim, uneven teeth—“I had intended all of this for you. But it stops her bloody gob well enough, I’d say. Which will allow us a tête-à-tête, if I can just have that object in your hand.” Sweeney pointed at McGarr’s handgun. “Now, if you don’t mind.”

  McGarr did not move. Should he pull the trigger, he asked himself, and risk her life, as he had Noreen’s, Fitz’s, and Kara Kennedy’s? Should he make Orla number four in his litany of collateral damage?

  The cord binding Sweeney to the weapon was taut and was being held both by his hand and a wrap, which had been wound around his wrist. A bullet would make Sweeney spasm and perhaps fall over, and Orla would die.

  Her eyes were wide with fright and imploring.

  “I’ll have that,” Sweeney repeated.

  “Or what?”

  “You see it.”

  McGarr hunched his shoulders. “You plan to kill her anyway. Do it, I’ll kill you.”

  Sweeney began a phlegmy laugh that juddered the taut chain. With his other hand he reached for the goblet, which was filled with an amber liquid. “On one level, which is balls, I must say I love you. Who’da thunk you’da copped—literally—onto my wee device to enrich meself beyond my wildest dreams. And to bring you down in a way that you’d feel daily for the rest of a squalid life.”

  If McGarr could keep him talking and drinking, he might chance a shot when the chain slackened. Sweeney’s meaty features were slick with sweat. There was a large, greasy stain on his red tie.

  “And your device was?”

  “Ach—don’t play dumb, man. I know you’re not stupid. Rash, yes. Predictable and therefore controllable, ditto. But all the truly good lads are, don’t you know. Nothing new there.”

  “Delia Manahan—she one of your devices?” An Opus Dei zealot, she could well have been the woman who had spiked Noreen’s shotgun, causing her and her father’s death two years before.

  “Nah, Jaysus. I’ll take the ‘not stupid’ back, since you’re a dolt altogether. It was I meself who slipped the smaller shell in the barrel. Hadn’t I the access and all the time in the world, with Fitz and Nuala leaving the bloody doors open? The bloody stupid fools.”

  Glancing down at Orla, who had closed her eyes, McGarr removed his finger from the trigger. “Why?” Her breathing was labored, and her brow was damp with sweat.

  “To bring you back to reality, man. To keep you from making further blunders in regard to the holiest and most noble order ever created. God’s order, which you had the audacity and bad sense to think you could thwart.”

  Keeping the chain taut with one hand, Sweeney again reached for the drink with the other. “I don’t forget or forgive. You.”

  He finished the drink, which made his eyes water. A single tear tracked onto the pocked surface of his cheek. “You want the truth? Do you?”

  McGarr only regarded him.

  “The Trinity security guards, Ray-Boy’s hapless father and the other one, something Greene? I had them killed just to get you involved in the case.” A smug smile now exposed Sweeney’s uneven teeth. “For it was you I wanted as much as the money. Oh, yes. I’ve got that too, and all of it.

  “Kara very-much-effin’ Kennedy, my son Dan’s darlin’ wife? I had her seduce you, just to keep you close.”

  “Why would she do that?”

  “Hah, if I had known you were this stupid, I’d have had a bullet put in you years ago and not bothered with the fraggin’. Why the fuck do you think, man? For the fuckin’ money, what else?

  “Dan and me told her we’d split the pot. Equal shares. It would be like alimony, only big-time. No more academia for her, no more piss-poor pay check But, you know, Kara wasn’t blood, and how could we possibly trust a woman like her, who would bed the likes of you for money?”

  He began a low chuckle. “There’s a name for women like her. And her.” With the tip of his shoe, he kicked out at Bannon’s head. “Wake up, you bitch. Wake up!” Raising the chai
n to keep the lead to the trigger tight, Sweeney moved up in the chair. “Nobody threatens me, especially not in public.”

  “But Dan, your Dan Stewart—he was blood.”

  Canting his head, Sweeney looked away, and McGarr’s finger moved back onto the trigger. “After a fashion. I can’t remember, but I think I was actually paying his mother before he was conceived, and the blood tests were inconclusive. He could have been anybody’s bastard, I’d say. She was a right sorry little Scots cunt. We could never have had a future, but Dan, I must say, was pleasant company and useful for a while.

  “But enough of this. That one”—Sweeney pointed at Bannon—“she’s check. And this one”—plunging his hand into the gap between the cushion and the chair, he came up with another handgun—“is mate, matie.” Slowly, haltingly, careful of the tether he had to Orla and the gun he had pointed at McGarr, Sweeney rose to his feet.

  “I’m not much of a shot, you’ll see.” The handgun exploded and the bullet thwacked into the wall only inches from McGarr’s head. “But you’d best go out before us.” Sweeney placed another shot almost exactly at the same point on the other side of McGarr’s head.

  “Out!” Sweeney roared. “Get out! I won’t have you dying in me house. I’m going to me boat, if your wish is to accompany us.” And he began a laugh that ended in a wet hack. Turning his head, Sweeney spat into a mirror on the wall.

  With his Glock now raised and pointed at Sweeney’s heart, McGarr stepped to the door.

  “Go ahead, pull it, you spineless fuck. Pull it, and we’ll all die.”

  McGarr quickly moved down the stairs, trying to gauge where he might position himself for a clean shot at Sweeney. But the doors that he tried were locked, and lights suddenly switched on.

  “McGarr? You still with us?”

  Outside, McGarr thought, he’d conceal himself behind a car or on the other side of the wall where, when Sweeney climbed over, he could grab his arm and fire with the other hand.