Whatever Happenened to Molly Bloom?

by Jessica Stirling

  ‘When was the first time Mr Boylan visited Eccles Street?’

  ‘June of last year, just before Mrs Bloom went off on a singing tour with him … with Mr Boylan, I mean.’

  Mr Conway said, ‘Did Mr Bloom accompany his wife on any of these engagements?’

  ‘Mr Bloom stayed at home in Eccles Street, though he might have gone to concerts in Dublin,’ said Lizzie Fleming. ‘I can’t speak about those.’

  ‘Mr Sullivan, do you have anything to say,’ Roland Slater asked, ‘bearing in mind that you have no locus standi in this court.’

  Neville got to his feet and, with a hand on his client’s shoulder, presumably to hold him down, said, ‘I’m mindful of the coroner’s courtesy. With permission, may I put a question to the witness as to the deceased’s state of mind.’

  ‘State of mind, Mr Sullivan?’

  ‘I’m curious as to how the deceased coped with what appears to be a deception of several months standing and to establish, for the jury’s benefit, if Mrs Bloom’s manner was furtive or did she flaunt …’

  ‘Flaunt?’ Slater interrupted. ‘Have a care, Mr Sullivan.’

  ‘I bow to your discretion, sir,’ Neville said, then, changing tack, ‘Would it be permissible to ask the witness where the flowers in the vase in the bedroom came from?’

  Conscious of the jury’s interest, Roland Slater relayed the lawyer’s question to the woman in the witness box.

  Lizzie Fleming said, ‘Mr Boylan brought them.’

  ‘How does the witness know that?’ Neville asked.

  ‘Mrs Bloom boasted about it,’ Lizzie Fleming said. ‘She had Mr Bloom put the flowers in a vase as soon as he came home. She refused to let me do it. She insisted Mr Bloom fetch water in the teapot from the kitchen to fill the vase while she watched.’

  Mr Devereux’s hand moved swiftly over the foolscap. Neville waited until the clerk had finished writing before he put his next question. ‘Would the witness be permitted to tell us how Mr Bloom reacted to being allocated this task?’

  ‘He never complained, not to me at any rate,’ Mrs Fleming said. ‘Mr Bloom was not the complaining sort.’

  ‘In your opinion,’ Neville said, ‘was Mr Bloom aware of his wife’s infidelity?’

  ‘I’m sure he must have been,’ said Mrs Fleming. ‘I don’t see in honesty how he couldn’t have been.’

  ‘Yet, in the months before Christmas,’ Neville said, ‘you observed no fits of temper, no angry words on Mr Bloom’s part.’

  ‘No, sir, I did not.’

  ‘Would it be accurate to say, in your opinion, that Mr Bloom lived in awe of his wife?’ Neville said.

  ‘No, Mr Sullivan,’ Slater intervened. ‘That is a step too far.’

  ‘In that case, I have no further questions to put before the court at this time,’ Neville Sullivan said, and promptly sat down.

  TWENTY FOUR

  The pews reserved for members of the DMP were crowded that Monday morning. Constable Jarvis and Sergeant Gandy rubbed shoulders with Inspectors Kinsella and Machin. A row behind, Superintendents Driscoll and Smout and Assistant Commissioner A.H.M. O’Byrne followed the progress of the inquiry with interest.

  After being sworn in, Constable Jarvis described his role in the events of the morning of March 9th. At the conclusion of the constable’s account several questions on behalf of the jury were put to him by Mr Conway but Neville Sullivan was content to point out for the record that the division’s medical examiner had not been present.

  Spruce, imposing and sober, Sergeant Gandy, no stranger to a witness box, delivered his testimony in a voice of such authority that the jury were almost intimidated.

  If Mr Conway and his crew were happy to accept the bluff sergeant’s word for what had happened that fateful morning in Eccles Street, Neville Sullivan most certainly was not.

  ‘No trace of an intruder was found in the upstairs rooms?’

  ‘No, sir,’ Gandy rumbled.

  ‘You were, I’ve no doubt, thorough in your search.’

  ‘I was.’

  ‘The garden, the lavatory, the wall at the rear of the house?’

  ‘Searched personal, sir.’

  ‘The door of the cellar and the basement steps?’

  ‘Mr Sullivan, we’ve been through all this,’ the coroner put in. ‘The sergeant’s answers are already a matter of record. I trust it isn’t your intention to impugn the officer’s honesty.’

  ‘Oh, absolutely not,’ said Neville, demonstrating surprise that such a thought would even cross the coroner’s mind. ‘On the contrary. The sergeant’s honesty and experience are irreproachable. For that reason, if I may, I’d like to clarify one or two minor details for the enlightenment of the jury.’

  ‘You may not cross-examine, Mr Sullivan,’ Slater said. ‘I will not allow it. This is an inquiry not a criminal trial.’

  ‘I’m well aware of that, sir,’ said Neville humbly. ‘I’m merely curious – as I’m sure the jury are too – as to just how long the sergeant’s “thorough” search of the premises lasted.’

  Sergeant Gandy’s eyeballs rolled leftwards but Tom Machin and Jim Kinsella were looking the other way.

  Bushy brows knitted in perplexity, the old warrior of C Division almost gave the game away by staring at the coroner whose hesitation did not go unremarked by the jury.

  ‘I think we might like to hear an answer to that, sir,’ Mr Conway said.

  The coroner drummed his fingers on the arm of his chair and took what seemed like an age to reach a decision as to the legality, if not the pertinence, of the lawyer’s question.

  At length, he said, ‘You may answer, Sergeant.’

  In Sergeant Gandy’s ethical canon truth was ever flexible. He thought about stretching it one way and then the other, an oath being no deterrent, while the jury and the court waited.

  At length, he said, ‘A half hour.’

  ‘A half hour,’ Neville Sullivan said. ‘A half hour before Inspector Machin sent you to the Orphan School to telephone for assistance.’

  ‘Ay, about half an hour.’

  ‘How long until assistance arrived?’

  Coroner Slater said, ‘If you’re suggesting that the police acted improperly then I must ask you to justify your insinuations, Mr Sullivan, or withdraw them.’

  ‘I’ve nothing but admiration for the Dublin Metropolitan Police, sir. However, the conditions of arrest must be addressed.’

  Jim Kinsella shifted his weight on to his knees and raised an arm in the air. He waited patiently for Slater to acknowledge him, which, after five or ten seconds, the coroner did.

  ‘Do you have something to say, Inspector Kinsella?’

  ‘If Mr Bloom’s counsel is concerned about the time scale I can clarify it for him,’ Jim Kinsella said.

  ‘Then do,’ said Slater.

  ‘Inspector Machin, of Store Street, requested the assistance of a detective by means of a telephone call. I received the telephone call from Sergeant Gandy at twenty minutes to nine o’clock at G Division headquarters in Lower Castle Yard. I travelled by tramcar to Eccles Street and reached the scene at two or three minutes after nine. The times are recorded in my notebook and also in G Division’s log for the day in question.’

  ‘There we have it,’ the coroner said. ‘Now may we move on?’

  ‘One hour and ten minutes, Mr Bloom in custody but not charged. Where was Mr Bloom held in that …’ Neville began.

  ‘No, Mr Sullivan. We’ve wasted enough time on this issue as it is. Sergeant Gandy, you may stand down.’

  The sergeant could not get out of the witness box fast enough. The sound of his boots thumping on the wooden steps echoed through the court room and, bent over like a man with a stomach cramp, he returned to the witness benches and, crouching, hid himself away behind young Jarvis.

  However anxious he might be to save face, Roland Slater was duty bound to see fair play. It was a bold move on his part to summon Tom Machin next to the witness box.

 
Inspector Machin crisply recounted how he had been called to Number 7 Eccles Street and what he had found there. When asked by Mr Conway why he’d felt it necessary to enlist the assistance of a detective from G Division, Tom Machin answered, ‘It was murder. Plainly murder. I felt that the ends of justice would best be served by sending for an expert investigator.’

  Mr Conway said, ‘To assist in questioning Mr Bloom?’

  ‘No, Mr Bloom had not been placed under arrest when Inspector Kinsella arrived,’ Tom Machin replied.

  Mr Conway said, ‘When was Mr Bloom charged?’

  ‘Detained on a warrant of suspicion, you mean.’

  Mr Conway said, ‘Yes, that.’

  ‘Only after the fact of death had been confirmed.’

  Roland Slater sighed and said, ‘In fact, I issued the warrant.’

  Mr Conway said, ‘Will Mr Bloom return to the witness box?’

  Slater said, ‘There’s no obligation upon Mr Bloom to subject himself to further questioning. He cannot be forced to give evidence that might be detrimental to him in a court of Assize. However, a considerable amount of fresh evidence has come to light during the past week and will be laid out for you as the inquiry progresses. If you’ve finished with Inspector Machin, I propose to call Detective Inspector Kinsella to throw some light on the matter. It is the jury’s responsibility to decide only if there is a case to answer, not to prove the case. That will be the lot of judges and jury in a higher court. Are we clear on that, Mr Conway?’

  ‘We are, sir, we are,’ said Mr Conway and, folding his arms, sat back while Inspector James Kinsella took Tom Machin’s place in the witness box.

  Jim Kinsella had served as a witness in many a High Court trial and had come prepared for all and any questions that might be put to him, not by a feral defence counsel or a ruthless Crown prosecutor but by a coroner who had something to hide and fifteen jury men uncontaminated by much knowledge of the law.

  Upon the narrow ledge of the witness box he arranged his notebooks and a single file card upon which he had jotted down the order of events. He took into his right hand the Bible offered by Mr Rice, repeated the familiar oath and touched his lips to the binding of the Book. He stated his name, address and rank as an officer in the Dublin Metropolitan Police and the number of years in which he had served, then glanced at Roland Slater who, with a nod, sanctioned him to begin.

  Briskly the inspector guided the jury through his involvement in the arrest of Leopold Bloom. He took them into the bedroom, described the position of the body and the condition of the room. He precluded any interjection from Bloom’s counsel by stating the precise time the coroner had arrived and how, at that juncture, he had gone down into the half-basement kitchen to speak with the victim’s husband.

  ‘Speak of what, Inspector?’ Slater asked.

  ‘Cat’s meat,’ Kinsella answered. ‘Mr Bloom was concerned about the welfare of the cat who, it seems, had not been fed.’

  ‘The liver?’

  ‘Yes,’ Kinsella said. ‘I did not interrogate Mr Bloom at this stage nor, to my knowledge, did Inspector Machin, beyond confirming Mr Bloom’s story that he had gone out to buy meat and had returned to find his wife dead. I did, however, ask Mr Bloom about the front door to the house, whether it had been locked when he’d gone out. Mr Bloom said it had been left unlocked. I also observed that the fire had not been set. Mr Bloom explained that he had intended to do that when he returned from the butchers.’

  ‘Did you ask Mr Bloom if he had murdered his wife?’ Mr Conway inquired.

  ‘No, the question was not put to him.’

  Mr Conway turned again to his fellow jury members, one of whom, Tarpey, whispered something to him.

  ‘Do you have another question, Mr Conway?’ Slater asked.

  ‘We’re wondering why Mrs Bloom didn’t attempt to get out of bed if there was a stranger in her room.’

  ‘No shred of evidence has been found to corroborate an opportunistic attack by a stranger,’ Roland Slater said. ‘There is no rational motive. True, a motive is not essential if we’re dealing with a mad man but a deranged person would surely have left some trace of his presence when he broke in.’

  ‘I may have an answer to the juryman’s question,’ Kinsella said. ‘After Mr Bloom had been taken off to Store Street station I remained in Number 7 Eccles Street to conduct a more detailed search than Sergeant Gandy had been able to do in the confusion of discovery and arrest. The house at Number 7 is, as you’ve seen for yourselves, no small property and has a number of unoccupied rooms on the upper floors. I came to the conclusion it would be perfectly possible for some person to hide in one of the empty upstairs rooms and remain undetected. The front door, however, has a metal draught board – you’ve seen that too, I believe – which creates a deal of noise when the door is opened or closed, a sound perfectly audible to any person who might be hiding upstairs.’

  ‘Are you saying there was an intruder upstairs?’ Slater put in.

  ‘No, sir. All I’m saying is that the evidence – the physical evidence – does not rule out the possibility that some other person was present in the house.’

  ‘There are no witnesses to support this conclusion, Inspector,’ Slater said. ‘Police enquiries in the neighbourhood have turned up no one who saw a stranger enter or leave Number 7 Eccles Street around the time the murder was committed.’

  ‘Sir,’ Kinsella said, ‘with due respect, we don’t know when the murder was committed. We know from Constable Jarvis’s testimony only when the murder was reported, not when it was discovered. Dr Rule stated that the body had been dead for upwards of thirty hours before he made his examination. In my opinion, it’s not beyond the bounds of possibility that Mrs Bloom did not die between the hours of seven and eight o’clock but several hours earlier.’

  ‘Do you have evidence to support your claim, Inspector?’

  ‘No, Dr Slater, no direct evidence.’

  Neville Sullivan was on his feet at once. ‘If the officer has no evidence for casting doubt on my client’s veracity then I suggest … no, sir, I demand that his ridiculous hypothesis be stricken. If we’re going to allow half-cocked theories to be entered into the record I’ll have no alternative but to call for an immediate adjournment on the grounds of culpable neglect on the coroner’s part.’

  ‘Contain yourself, Mr Sullivan. Contain yourself,’ said Dr Slater. ‘I’m no fonder of wild guesses than you are. Now, before Mr Sullivan does himself an injury, may I ask Inspector Kinsella to explain his reasons for doubting Bloom’s claim that his wife was alive when he left the house for the butcher’s shop?’

  ‘I’ve reason to believe and will, in fact, offer proof that Mr Bloom did not spend the night in bed with his wife. In conversation with Mr Bloom, Mr Bloom declared that the cat—’

  ‘The cat? The cat?’ Neville shrilled. ‘We’ll be calling the damned cat as a witness next?’

  ‘One more word out of turn, Counsellor Sullivan, and I’ll have you removed from my court. Sit down at once and be silent,’ Slater snapped, then, less than affably, turned to the G-man. ‘When did this conversation take place? Before or after Bloom had been cautioned?’

  ‘Before,’ Kinsella replied. ‘Mr Bloom told me that the cat had been fed before Mrs Bloom and he went to bed about half past ten. Mr Bloom repeated the same thing in his sworn statement to Superintendent Driscoll, a statement that’s already part of the evidence.’

  ‘What’s admissible as evidence, Inspector, is for me to decide,’ the coroner said, then to the jury, ‘Bloom’s statement is sworn testimony, however. Any deliberate attempts to distort the truth must be taken seriously when you come to consider a verdict. Inspector Kinsella, have you uncovered any such attempt on Bloom’s part.’

  ‘I have, sir,’ Kinsella said. ‘Mr Bloom’s claim that he went to bed with his wife at half past ten o’clock on Wednesday evening is untrue. Mr Bloom was not in bed with his wife at half past ten. Bloom wasn’t at home at half past ten, nor at h
alf past eleven.’

  The coroner waited until the buzz in the courtroom died down before he said, ‘Do you know where Mr Bloom was at half past ten on the night preceding the killing?’

  ‘In the vicinity of Nancy O’Rourke’s house in Upper Tyrone Street,’ Kinsella said. ‘I cannot place Mr Bloom there at ten thirty but I can place him there an hour later, that is, at eleven thirty.’

  ‘For the benefit of the jury will you explain what goes on at Mrs O’Rourke’s house,’ Slater said.

  ‘It’s a brothel,’ said Kinsella bluntly.

  ‘Are you implying that Mr Bloom was enjoying the company of women within O’Rourke’s establishment?’ Slater said.

  ‘To the best of my knowledge Mr Bloom did not enter O’Rourke’s. However, between eleven and eleven thirty he was seen on the street outside the house.’

  ‘Do you have a statement signed by O’Rourke to that effect?’

  ‘I question if Mrs O’Rourke would be a reliable witness,’ Kinsella said. ‘I do, however, have two witnesses who can place Mr Bloom in Upper Tyrone Street in the hour before midnight.’

  ‘Are the witnesses in court?’

  ‘They are, sir,’ Kinsella said.

  ‘Have you located a witness or witnesses to say where Mr Bloom was in the hours after midnight?’

  Kinsella hesitated. ‘I do have a witness who may shed light on Mr Bloom’s whereabouts after midnight.’ He paused once more. ‘A witness who may, in fact, have been in Number 7 Eccles Street at the time of the murder.’

  ‘Is that person in court today?’

  ‘She is, sir, yes.’

  ‘And the name of this person?’

  ‘Gertrude MacDowell.’

  ‘What is her connection to the case, Inspector?’

  ‘She is Mr Bloom’s friend. In fact I think Bloom intended to run off with her,’ Jim Kinsella said. ‘In a word, elope.’

  The uproar in the court room was deafening.

  Bloom was on his feet. Blazes Boylan was on his feet too, frantically searching the faces on the benches around him.

  In the gallery Milly Bloom thrust herself against the rail with such force that only Dr Paterson’s arm about her waist prevented her plunging into the body of the court, while Maude Boylan, motionless as a statue, stared straight ahead. Then, aided by court officers, the coroner brought the morning session to an abrupt conclusion by announcing a break for lunch.