A Carra King

by John Brady

  Kelly’s face suddenly gave way to a smile and a wink at a couple. Minogue remembered that it was Kevin Kelly’s size and charm that had allowed Bewleys to stay open late for several years now.

  “Anyway. He overheard some talk. There was something mentioned, something about ‘quits.’ Oh sure, pub-talk. But he’s in tight enough with the Smiths, Bernard says.”

  Minogue glanced at Kelly’s beefy hands adjusting his tie. He must work hard to keep the belly in, he decided.

  “What kind of ‘quits’?”

  “Something serious.”

  “Like using a Garda squad car at Griffith Avenue for target practice?”

  “Might be connected, I don’t know. I’m only passing it on.”

  “Any name?”

  Kelly shook his head.

  “A friend of a friend — and all that. There’s no comeback on it. Just something I heard third-hand.”

  “All right, Kevin. Thanks.”

  “Now I’m not a tout, for Jases’ sake. Okay? But if I hear more, I’ll let you know. If it’s the Smiths, you better be wide awake, that’s all I’m saying. They’re bigger than even the Guards know. I’m telling you. They don’t care, some of them. You know?”

  Minogue took his time on the stairs. He waited by the hallway leading to the museum café for a minute to get his breath. Kilmartin couldn’t have picked a better time to be on a fortnight’s jaunt in the States. Had he known? He thought of Tynan. The Commissioner had spoken to him more in the last few days than in the past six months. Chess, moving pieces to gain advantage. He rubbed hard at his eyes to try to clear the suspicion and anger surging up into his thoughts.

  “You’d qualify as a prominent person, Mrs. Shaughnessy,” he said. “‘It’s better to be safe . . .’ is the approach, I imagine now.”

  Minogue looked at the detective who had been eyeing the doorway, the bored-looking one with the skimpy beard and the polo shirt under his leather jacket.

  “Could I trouble you to set us up with a cup of something here?”

  A pause and a blink before he nodded. Minogue exchanged a look with the older detective.

  “You won’t mind if Mrs. Shaughnessy and I were to chat alone there over in the corner?”

  The coffee was too hot. The detective slid the change onto the table. A fifty-penny coin rolled to the edge and fell to the floor. He took a seat near the door. Minogue picked up the coin. The only other clients, a couple with wire-rimmed glasses and hair so blond Minogue believed it could be dyed, were exchanging maps and sheets of paper at a table by the counter.

  “They’re certainly different from the Guards I knew,” Mrs. Shaughnessy said. “Hard to tell they’re Guards at all really.”

  “That’s the idea, I think.”

  “Are they armed?”

  Minogue nodded. She looked away.

  “On bicycles, I remember,” she murmured. “Armed only with their tongues. Little enough for them to do back then of course. How things change.”

  From what airy suite had Geraldine Shaughnessy been summoned to be told of her son’s death, he wondered. He imagined a city skyline at night, all glass and pastel carpet, a piano —

  “I do appreciate all that you’re doing,” she said. “Especially this now. I dreaded the thought of going to a Garda station to . . . I’m embarrassed, really.”

  Minogue smiled. Fifty, looked thirty-five — if even. Girlish yet: coltish, was that a word? He couldn’t tell if she had make-up. The freckles were scattered sparsely along the back of her hands. Her eyes were bloodshot, the lids pink and tight-looking. He wondered if she’d tell him that Johnny Leyne was in hospital. Maybe she didn’t know herself. Hardly.

  “Can you tell me if you have anything new on, what’s happened?”

  N-oo: nooze. Her native Cork accent clicked handily with American.

  “I can tell you what we know, but it’s far from being anything we can seize on as a solution.”

  She studied the tabletop while she listened. Her eyes didn’t rest on Minogue when she looked up. He noted her hand shaking on the cup. Her eyes were glassy now. She didn’t reach for a handkerchief. She wasn’t going to try drinking the rest of her coffee. The German or Dutch or Swedish couple decamped. That could have been the real colour of their hair, he decided. He watched the bearded detective adjust something under his arm. Surly young fella: like to pin him someday, wise him up to manners.

  A woman with a stream of white hair down her back entered the restaurant. The two detectives exchanged a glance. Mrs. Shaughnessy asked Minogue to repeat words. Place-names and people. Did she want to take notes maybe? She thanked him but no. He began to feel terrible for her. Alone she seemed, composed and dazed and polite and refined. She began to roll a thin silver bracelet up and down over her wrist. He took a delicate line on the cause of death. She stopped tugging on her bracelet.

  “As a result of . . .?”

  Pale enough to start with, he believed she seemed to have shrunk since they sat down. He lowered his voice.

  “There’d have been blood loss. I think the doctor would describe it as shock.”

  “But the beating,” she murmured. She began rolling the bracelet again.

  “Severe. Not many blows but, well, a lot of force applied.”

  She closed her eyes. Minogue saw her chest heave.

  “Your sister,” he said. “Would you prefer . . .? She’s waiting below, isn’t she?”

  She opened her mouth and breathed out through her mouth. “Hah,” Minogue heard.

  “No. I asked her not to come up with me. John, of course, well he couldn’t.”

  She picked up her handbag and took out paper hankies.

  “Are you married? I suppose you are.”

  She blew her nose. She paused, stared at something on the table and dropped the hanky into her bag.

  “I am.”

  “The person you marry is a different person than —”

  She caught herself and looked at Minogue.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s you need to get information from me, and here I am blathering.”

  “It’s all right. Don’t be worrying about that.”

  Her eyes went to the white-haired woman. Surrounded by a pot of tea, cakes and books, she had begun to write in a copybook.

  “John and I got along well. Odd, isn’t it. But we married different people — when we married, I mean. He’s not well, you know.”

  Minogue nodded.

  “He asked me on the plane coming over. I knew he couldn’t sleep, that he’d been thinking about it, that it hurt him so terribly. He asked me if it would have made a difference to Patrick if we’d had more children. Oh it wasn’t sniping or blame or anything.”

  She dabbed at her eyes with a fresh hanky.

  “Without going into detail let me just say it wasn’t medically possible back then. It was me, not John. Things didn’t go well. Patrick was premature. The delivery didn’t go well even. I was left with complications. We would have liked more kids. Patrick had difficulties. That was clear right from the start. This was before they had all the lingo they have nowadays. ADD — do you have that over here?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Hyperactive kids? Attention Deficit Disorder?”

  “I think I’ve heard of it.”

  “Learning disabilities?”

  “Oh to be sure. Now I’m with you. Plenty to go around here.”

  “Good health though, that was Patrick. Nannies came and went. He’d be up all night as an infant. I had no idea kids could be like that. He couldn’t sleep sometimes. And he had a tough time of it dealing with other kids when he went to the nursery — the only child thing now. It was more that he couldn’t really manage everything that was going on around him. . . One specialist thought it was a kind of manic depressive thing, even.”

  “He lashed out at people?”

  She let down the rolled up hanky on her saucer.

  “Yes.”

  “It carried
into adult life, did it?”

  Her voice was low when she replied.

  “I think you know that by now. John and I agreed we could hide nothing.”

  Minogue watched the white-haired woman cleaning her glasses. An albino — of course. Albina?

  “If he brought it on himself we must face up to that,” she said.

  Minogue wondered if Patrick Shaughnessy had struck his mother.

  “The thought occurred to me, Inspector, that my son — ”

  He saw her bite her lip. He wasn’t ready for the glimpse of her contorted face as she lowered her head. He stood and drew his chair around beside her. The detective with the beard was watching him. Her words came out in the squeezed and bitter whispers Minogue had heard so often in interview rooms from innocent and guilty alike.

  “He wasn’t a psychopath, you know. He wasn’t.”

  He nodded at the older detective and mouthed “sister” at him. Her shoulders were bony, he realized. He didn’t know whether to hold her arm instead. Why had he thought her so remote?

  Geraldine Shaughnessy’s sister arrived out of breath. A small enough resemblance, he couldn’t help thinking, between Anne Boland and her. He let go of her shoulder and stood up. Behind the lenses, the white-haired woman’s eyes were enormous. Still she squinted. Minogue stared at her but she seemed not to notice. He headed off the older detective in the doorway.

  “I don’t want her leaving town now,” he said. The detective scratched at the back of his head.

  “There was talk of them going to Cork today. There’s two escort cars set up already, I know that much.”

  “Tell them no can do then, if you please. I didn’t get to recent stuff with the son at all. We have to have her here in Dublin until she can talk.”

  “Fair enough. I’ll pass it on. Who do we call if there’s a scrap over it? All we have is ‘do what the family wants.’”

  “Call Tynan.”

  The detective’s eyelid drooped a little.

  “Tynan, you said?”

  “That’s the one. Have your scrap with him.”

  “You’re probably right,” he said to Malone. “She just realized then that he wasn’t coming back. Ever, like.”

  Minogue leaned around the partition.

  “Anyone call in about Mrs. Shaughnessy, Éilis? Is she sticking to some plan to go to her family below in Cork?”

  Éilis shook her head. Minogue returned to the table. Murtagh tapped his Biro on the duty schedule again.

  “Farrell took that APF fella’s statement. Murphy, Michael — Mick. Murphy levelled with him. So the car could have been there all through those shifts.”

  “Are the others still playing holy?”

  Murtagh shrugged.

  “They don’t want to get kicked, boss.”

  “Tell Farrell to go after them in earnest. Round two.”

  Minogue looked down the list again. Murtagh was eyeing him. Something he’d said?

  “Just pretend I’m Jim Kilmartin for a while, John,” he murmured. He turned to see Murtagh’s reaction.

  “Still nothing solid on phones? People who used the car park?”

  Murtagh shook his head.

  “Tell me about the photos then, how they’re coming. The, er, celebrity mob he was cosying up with.”

  Murtagh stood, tugged at his belt and waved at the photos pinned to the side of the map.

  “This fella’s a stockbroker. He made a killing on the markets there a few years ago. That’s down at the auction place, what do you call — Goff’s. Doesn’t remember Shaughnessy at all. Nobody does. Oh, this one here, the fat fella, Kavanagh, he remembers being introduced to ‘an American.’ That’s all.”

  Malone strolled over. He held out a bag of crisps.

  “Those are the horses there, right?” he said.

  “Good for you, Tommy.”

  “Is that O’Riordan there?”

  “That’s him, yes.”

  Hard to match this beaming face with the reserved, diplomatic companion to Leyne and his ex-wife Minogue remembered from the hotel.

  “Have we set him up for an interview?”

  Murtagh let go the crisps he had drawn from Malone’s bag.

  “He’d be, er . . .”

  “It’s all right, John, I’m not going to bark.”

  “You see him knowing much about Shaughnessy? ‘Friend of the family’?”

  “Try anyway. Get hold of him. Tell him we’ll be wanting a statement. If he fights shy, I’ll talk to him. Eventually. Shaughnessy must have had at least a chat with him. Even if it’s only a how-do. There he is — and again — two places they’re in the same crowd.”

  “He’s a big deal, boss. You see the picture in the papers a lot.”

  “The ponies, the castles for the Hollywood mob, yes, I know.”

  “More to him than that, isn’t there? He put money in films here at the right time. Remember that one that got it all started there about ten years back, Leaves Are Green, was it?”

  “Leaves of Green,” said Minogue.

  “You saw that?” from Malone. “The drug one and the IRA? Shite wasn’t it?”

  “Never got around to seeing it.”

  “Well the Guards look like iijits in it,” said Malone.

  “Shaughnessy was in on the music scene too, when it took off, right?”

  Minogue nodded.

  “The Thicks were the first. I remember them. Then there was Goddamnitohell, remember the ones used to piss on the stage? Then came the Works, managed from day one. But where’s whatshername, this Aoife Hartnett in this?”

  Minogue searched the eight-by-tens.

  “That’s her next to the sculpture. There’s the side of Shaughnessy. Looks like he’s smiling at someone. Nothing in his hands there — look.”

  “Put it on a table,” said Malone.

  “Maybe. Or maybe he went on the wagon,” said Minogue.

  “Huh. She has something. Wine.”

  Minogue stared at the shots of Shaughnessy in a group next to a banner about film.

  “Is she in the Film Museum thing?”

  “Don’t know yet, boss.”

  Minogue searched the half-turned faces, even the ones in shadow behind Shaughnessy. The hairdos were so short now, shaved almost.

  “Will you look at all the black in that,” said Malone. “Artsy-fartsy crowd. What’s the story there, with them always standing around looking pissed-off?”

  Minogue stepped over to the shots of the Carra Fields.

  “There’s the Taoiseach, God be good to him,” said Murtagh. “The back of his head in anyhow. The good side of him. The Minister — there’s Garland. Hard to miss him, with the dickey bow — the size of him.”

  “O’Riordan again,” said Minogue.

  “Shaughnessy’s talking to someone there, that’s all I can tell you.”

  “Damn,” said Minogue. “Your man, the cameraman, can’t remember?”

  Murtagh crunched a few crisps.

  “‘Do you know how many people were there?’ says he. ‘Everyone.’”

  “Ask him who then.”

  “What, a list?”

  “A list, John, yes. We’ve lots of paper.”

  Malone crushed the crisp bag slowly. Minogue turned back to Murtagh.

  “What are our sources on Aoife Hartnett?”

  “Well, she had friends, I mean to say. Pals at work. Had a social life, too. She played squash at a club. She knew a lot of people, it looks like.”

  “Who, like?”

  Murtagh glanced over at Malone.

  “Well, the sister says she knew a lot of people in the art scene. The exhibitions were a thing for her.”

  “Who have we been drawing on here, John?”

  Murtagh began counting.

  “First, the sister, now she’s in a bad way. Her husband, Nolan, well he’s gotten over being a pain. The sister felt sorry for her lately, the past while, says Nolan.”

  “Why so?”

  “Well,
it’s a bit thick really. I mean, who’s to say here. The sister stays at home. Nolan’s a solicitor so they’re okay for the few shillings. She left Telecom after they started having kids. Anyway Nolan says that the wife says that Aoife wasn’t that happy. Especially the last while, like.”

  Minogue leaned against the wall.

  “She couldn’t settle. A let-down with a fella, Whelan. He’s a Eurocrat type. In Brussels now. No hard feelings, it just didn’t work. Nolan thinks — and the wife too — the job might have been losing its appeal too. ‘She’d only complain the odd time though.’”

  Minogue looked around the squad room. Malone was trying to dislodge a piece of potato crisp from somewhere in his lower back teeth. The Inspector couldn’t settle on a question to ask Murtagh.

  “Go on, then,” he said.

  “The money thing was okay. She had her own place and that, paid her way. Got to go to conferences and that. But said there wasn’t much elbow room left. That, well, she’s kind of hit a level. All the jobs are filled like.”

  “A plateau,” said Malone. “The roof like.”

  “Nolan says he thinks the oul biological clock thing was getting to her too. Things passing her by.”

  “Kids?”

  “Yes. Family, he says.”

  “That was all over the phone to you?”

  “Yep. I told him to phone us as soon as the wife was in shape to interview. Ah, I was on the phone to him for half an hour. He’s shook now. The wheels fell off the solicitor bit when he got the idea maybe something bad’s after happening to her.”

  “Who’s doing her apartment?”

  “Driscoll. They started the search just after eleven. Said he’d phone us at four, whether or which. I fed him pointers we were keen on: any sign Shaughnessy was there, like. Travel stuff.”

  “Her car, the Micra?”

  Murtagh nodded at the clock.

  “I phoned at half-nine. It’s somewhere between Castlebar and Dublin.”

  Minogue slid the fax paper out from under the photocopies of statements from the airport. The list of contents, bagged and boxed and also en route to Dublin, was two tightly written pages. Minogue rubbed the paper between thumb and forefinger.

  “At the Museum, John. You’ve put in for interviews with the staff there?”