Death on the Green

by Catie Murphy

  “Not as badly as some of the others. Ireland wasn’t so windy when I was growing up, but the past decade and more I’ve been playing in worse than this whenever I lived here.”

  “You lived in America awhile?”

  “Long enough to go native.” Walsh dropped into an American accent so completely that Megan gave a startled laugh that he looked sadly pleased at before returning to his own accent. “I have to concentrate to do it now, but when I was playing in the States I had to concentrate to keep the Irish. Susan used to make me practice. She said it was part of my branding.”

  “Susan?”

  “My first wife. She died very young.”

  “I’m sorry.” Megan hesitated. “Was it she who embroidered the cap?” Another spatter of rain left fat splotches of water on the side of the car, but a sudden bolt of sun broke through the clouds as Megan turned up the drive toward the golf club. Martin, half-seen in the back seat, took his flat cap off and turned it around to look at the shamrock.

  “It was.” He sounded almost surprised. “I’ve been wearing it so long I almost forget about that. No, if it hadn’t been for Susan, I’d never have made anything of myself. She had all the ideas on what I needed to do, how I needed to present myself. She used to make me watch Irish actors being interviewed on American television. Some of them laid the Irish on so thick I could hardly understand them, but if you listen to them here, back home, they sound nothing like that at all. It’s what she wanted me to do. Lou was better at it, though. People liked him.”

  “Did he live in America, too?”

  “Less than I did.” Martin made no move to get out when Megan parked the car. “He had the charm; I had the drive. And I had Susan, who made something of that drive. When she died I suppose I had to keep going for her. An homage, and a way to move forward. Will you walk the course with me?”

  A twinge of surprise sparked through Megan before she translated the phrase from Irish to American English. To her ears, it sounded like a request, as if Martin needed her support, but living in Ireland had slowly taught her that he really meant do you want to walk the course? “Oh! I—could? I was thinking of going for a hike around the island, though. Although I don’t know, the weather is changeable. Maybe I just want to hide in the car, or the clubhouse, and let everyone else get wet. On the other hand, it’s not like I’ll get many chances to watch professional athletes that up close and personal.”

  “Golfers aren’t the most impressive professional athletes to watch. We just walk around green fields and hit a ball.”

  Megan laughed. “I suppose, but I don’t know, tell that to the millions of people who tune in to golf games around the world. I mean, granted, it’s not like the obvious appeal of swimming or gymnastics, where they don’t wear very many clothes. But people watch chess matches, too, and golfing at least involves dramatic posing, which chess usually doesn’t.”

  Martin chuckled, and by then Megan had pretty well talked herself into going with him. She exited the car to get his umbrella and escort him toward the clubhouse. All the other vehicles in the club parking lot were either hired cars like hers, expensive private ones, or media trucks, and dozens of people swirled around in organized chaos. Megan wielded the brolly like a shield, making a space to get them through. Even so, before they reached the front doors, a swarm descended on them: some media, some event organizers, and a handful of faces she recognized as being part of Walsh’s regular entourage. One, the good-natured caddie who had turned down Megan’s offer of help the day before, nodded to her in greeting. Together, they tried to fend off the media, but a strong-shouldered woman in an RTÉ Sports jacket, her dark hair swept in a tidy twist, turned sideways, and stepped right into Megan and Martin’s personal space. A man lifted his camera over his head behind her, filming the sequence. Megan, recognizing the woman, jolted in dismay as she realized that despite her promises to Orla, she and her Leprechaun Limos uniform were likely to end up on the six o’clock news in proximity to Martin Walsh and Lou MacDonald’s murder investigation.

  “Martin,” the dark-haired woman said with pleasant familiarity.

  Walsh said, “Aibhilín,” with a sigh, and the sportscaster, taking that as permission, dropped the friendly veneer and put a microphone in his face. “Mr. Walsh, the sporting community has been devastated to hear of the death yesterday of Lou MacDonald under suspicious circumstances. RTÉ understands that you, Lou’s best friend, were the one to discover the body. Would you like to comment?”

  “I would not,” Walsh said, more gently than Megan expected, but his voice trembled. “I’ve had a hard night, Aibhilín, and I’ve a game to play now, one that I expected my oldest friend to be playing alongside of me. I’d like to do me best in his honor, and to do that I can only look forward for the next few hours. Please excuse me.”

  A push came from behind, propelling them toward the clubhouse. Megan looked over her shoulder to see the big caddie had moved behind them. He clearly intended to get them through the clubhouse door even if he had to lift them up and carry them in himself. Aibhilín Ní Gallachóir called, “Does that mean you’ll be available for an interview after the game, Martin?” as they were swept past her.

  Megan barely got the umbrella closed before they were rushed through the door, and a supercilious Anglo-Irish accent said, “I’m very sorry about that, Mr. Walsh. Obviously we wish to keep the media from haranguing you, but we also simply can’t ban them from the premises, given . . .”

  The speaker—an angular, balding man with thin features and an obviously expensive suit—made a small, elegant gesture encompassing the entire, high-profile game about to take place at the club. The caddie guiding them into the clubhouse stopped short. Walsh shook his head and waved off the well-suited man’s apology. “Not your fault, Ollie. Aibhilín’s an all-right sort, just doing her job. I’ll talk to her later and make her the darling of the newscast.”

  From what Megan knew about Aibhilín Ní Gallachóir, she didn’t need much help in that department anyway. She was athletic, fit, bold, and had broken her way into the male-dominated sports room years before Megan had arrived in Ireland. She could disarm even the toughest rugby captains with either her encyclopedic knowledge of sports or a flash of an admittedly brilliant smile. To Megan’s mind, she was a fixture of Irish sports, even if it had taken her months to realize the name written Aibhilín Ní Gallachóir in print was the same as the one pronounced Evelyn Nee Gallaher that Megan had heard spoken most evenings when she listened to the news.

  “Mmm-hnn.” The nasally tenor accent appeared to agree with Megan, to whom Oliver’s gaze now turned. “And you are?”

  “This is my driver for the week, Megan Malone. Megan, this is Oliver Collins, the general manager of the club.” A smirk hurried across Walsh’s face. “He’d be the one you’d want to speak to about the club bylaws.”

  Collins’s eyelashes fluttered in a visual stutter as he looked at Megan. The extremity of flutter nearly hid a flash of other almost imperceptible expressions: the flaring of his nostrils, the tension around his lips, a pinch of his shoulders. Megan felt similar reactions flood her own face and posture, and wasn’t at all surprised to hear that he knew who she was from his, “Ah. The lady who objected to club rules older than the founding of this country.”

  Megan stuck her hand out for a shake and offered her toothiest smile. “That’s me. Given that the Constitution, which dates from the founding of this country, has been amended dramatically to improve equality and human rights just in the past few years, Mr. Collins, I think that the club could do with considering a few amendments of its own, yes.”

  “I’ll mention it to the Committee.” Collins managed to pronounce the word with a capital C, and shook Megan’s hand with his fingertips, as if afraid to sully himself with her germs. A bustle of activity took place behind them, and Collins’s entire demeanor changed, distaste replaced with delight. Megan and Walsh both turned to look, the caddie, who still stood behind them, stepping out of the way
. Walsh, in a wealth of understatement, said, “Ah,” while excitement charged through Megan until she had to clench her teeth on a squeal.

  There were always a handful of athletes in any sport who rose into the common consciousness, whether people followed the particular sport or not. This one—taller, darker, and more charismatic even at a remove than Megan had expected—had gone through the entire hero’s cycle, rising from obscurity, conquering the world, falling from grace, and rebuilding a career. Megan, who mostly thought of herself as inured to celebrity, clutched Martin’s forearm and hissed, “I didn’t know he’d be here!” like an overwrought teenager.

  Collins minced off to greet the new arrival as a wicked smile darted across Walsh’s face. “I told you you’d want to walk the course with me.”

  “But—I mean—doesn’t that mean you’re, uh—” Megan broke off, flustered, looked at the caddie, whose eyebrows rose, then shrugged and said to Walsh, “No offense, but doesn’t this mean you’re not going to win?”

  “I don’t have to win. I have to shoot—” Martin took a breath, judged his audience, and obviously cut the gritty details out of his explanation. “There’s a cumulative score kept over a season. I have to shoot beneath a certain par to keep my overall score low enough to be a candidate. The selection is then made by the team captain, who—” He nodded to a swarthy, broad-shouldered man talking to a gaggle of reporters on the other side of the room. “Is Victor Fabron, this year. He thinks I’m a cockerel and would’ve chosen Lou over me, but my numbers are better and—” A grimace passed over his face, and Megan nodded, wondering if sympathy votes were a thing in golf tournament placements.

  Walsh looked down, mouth crumpled in a sneer as he tried to compose himself again. After a moment he raised his head again in an abrupt motion, like sharp actions could recalibrate his emotions, and exhaled hard to say, “And I wouldn’t have expected to see Fabron here today. He’s not playing. I’d say it’s a matter of watching me under pressure, up close and personal, now. Besides, yer man there is American, so he wouldn’t be contending for the European wild cards anyway. So as I said, it’s not about winning.”

  “Did any of these people dislike Lou?”

  “More of them dislike me, but I can’t imagine anyone knocking Lou on the head and pushing him into a pond to keep me from playing. They’d have done it to me instead, and kept Lou with them.”

  Megan inhaled to speak, then closed her mouth on the question, nodding instead. Martin didn’t seem to notice. His caddie did, and cast a curious look her way, but also said, “We have to get going, Mr. Walsh.”

  “Yes, right. Could you make sure Ms. Malone’s name is on my guest list, Anthony? I think Ollie will go out of his way to throw her off the grounds if she’s not.”

  “I will.” The big caddie smiled at Megan, pointed her at a set of doors leading to the green, said, “Wait there,” and disappeared with Martin Walsh.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  A few minutes later the caddie came back with a lanyard for Meg, her name printed on it properly, not just hand-written. She commented, and he rolled his eyes. “It’d never look professional and slick, hand-written, and Collins won’t have that. He’d as soon throw you out on your ar—em, your ear, so you’ve got to look the part.”

  “Thanks.” Megan slung the lanyard around her neck and put her hand out. “Megan Malone.”

  “Anthony Doyle. Friends call me Anto.”

  Megan’s eyebrows went up. “Mr. Walsh calls you Anthony.”

  “Mr. Walsh pays the bills,” Anto said diplomatically. Megan laughed.

  “Right, I get you. Look, uh—” She stood on tiptoe, peering past Anto’s shoulder and through the crowd. Most of the golfers had gone off the same way Walsh had, leaving the clubhouse full of caddies, coaches, and, Megan suspected, people who were simply hangers-on. They spoke to each other in low voices, and Megan didn’t think she imagined that many of their gazes followed Martin Walsh, or that his name was on a lot of lips. So was Lou MacDonald’s, all in a low buzz that she couldn’t quite make out. Megan wavered, wanting to eavesdrop and wanting just as much to talk with Martin’s caddie. “Do you have to go right now? I don’t know how any of this works.”

  “Not just yet. They go out in groups of four, and Mr. Walsh drew a late tee time.”

  “Oh yeah?” Megan settled back down, arms folded across her chest and her chin tilted up at Anto curiously. “Is that good or bad?”

  “For Mr. Walsh, it’s good. He likes to know how everyone else is doing. The weather’s gone softer, too, and he likes that, too.”

  “Yeah, he mentioned he had a lot of practice in the rain.” Megan glanced past the slowly thinning crowd to the enormous windows. The morning was brighter than the day before, but mist collected on the windows and blew in soft, visible gusts over the low green. “Have you known Mr. Walsh a long time?”

  “Long enough.” Anto’s tone made Megan snicker and step closer, dropping her voice conspiratorially.

  “That bad, eh?”

  “He can be a right charmer when he wants to be,” Anto said, diplomatic once more. “Must be. Three women have married him.”

  “But?”

  Anto gave her a side-eyed look. “Ye’s know we’d get in trouble for gossiping about our employer.”

  “Only if we get caught.”

  The big man laughed quietly. “Fair enough. All I can say is, whatever happened out there, somebody must have had it in for Lou, because if the two of them had been together, I’d have expected Mr. Walsh to be the dead man.”

  “So you don’t think somebody went after MacDonald to rattle Walsh?”

  “Mr. Walsh has ice water running in his veins. He placed in the US Open the day after his second wife served him the divorce papers, and played his best year while his first wife was in the hospital with cancer.”

  “Jeez.” Megan looked off where the competitors had gone, as if there might be a sign of Walsh’s coldness following him. “Really, though? He seemed upset yesterday and looked pretty haggard this morning.”

  “All I’m saying is that I’ve walked alongside the man for some fifteen years and I’d say he knows how to put on a performance. He might have been different before his first wife got sick,” Anto allowed. “I didn’t know him then. But by the time she was dying . . .” He shook his head. “Ice water.”

  “But something rattled him, didn’t it? He’s trying to stage a comeback, right? Or go out in a blaze of glory, at least?”

  “Injury. He bollixed his shoulder eight years ago or so, after his divorce. Doesn’t matter how cool you are if your arm cramps and sends your swing short. And the truth is, Mr. Walsh isn’t careful with his money, not that you heard it from me. He’s got nothing to retire on but his name and winning personality. He needs today to go well. Even if he doesn’t make the Cup team, it’s one of the qualifying games for the Open. And it’s part of a new initiative like, as one of the first tournaments men and women are both competing in.”

  “There’s an entire world going on here I don’t know about,” Megan said, mystified. “I read up on professional golfing when the Walshes hired the company to drive them, because I like to be able to ask the clients a couple of questions to get them talking about what they love, but I’m not even swimming on the surface. I’m skating on it. Or maybe flying above it. I kind of knew men and women didn’t compete together, but don’t pro golfers get paid a lot?”

  “Sure, if they’re winning, or even placing. Mr. Walsh was never a headliner like, but he did well enough to be making seven or eight figures a year, and that stands a man well in the PGA’s retirement fund. And maybe he saved up when Susan Walsh was still alive, but he spent it after she died, and his second divorce cost the earth. I know he cashed out what retirement he had then, thinking he’d do well enough to refill the well, but the shoulder injury held him back. He’s old enough now, for a golfer, so this is his last chance to get on the Tour. He’s either got to make it or marry money, and I wouldn’t w
ant to be facing another expensive divorce in hopes of finding a rich wife.”

  Megan’s eyebrows shot up. “Or did he marry money?”

  The caddie gave a knowledgeable tilt of his head. “If Heather Walsh has a fortune hidden away, it’s well hidden. She wins a lot, but I’d say she’s been shouldering a lot of Mr. Walsh’s debts.”

  “Hnh. So Ireland’s favorite is broke, desperate for a win, and just happens to have been in competition with his best buddy. Do you think he did it?”

  “I’m not saying he wouldn’t have, but—” Anto stopped suddenly, like he was hearing himself for the first time. “Ah, I don’t know so. I don’t think Martin Walsh is a nice man, but he and Lou were like brothers. And we were all right there, watching him all morning, so I don’t see how he could have done him a harm.”

  “Yeah, that’s true. Tell me about them, though. Childhood friends or something?”

  “From primary school. Lou stood up for Mr. Walsh’s weddings, every one of them, and vice versa. Mr. Walsh is godfather to Lou’s daughter, and if he’d had any himself, Lou would have been their godfather.”

  “That’s right.” Megan looked around, as if she could magically locate Lou MacDonald’s offspring. “I forgot there was a daughter. How old is she? Is she all right, do you know?”

  “I wouldn’t be, if it was me own da lying dead in the morgue. Are you working with that guard detective? He had a lot of questions yesterday, too.”

  “Hah. No. I’m just really nosy, and I’d only just met Lou, you know? And it’s kind of the second time this year somebody I knew got murdered.”

  “Get away outta that!”

  Megan laughed. “No, it’s true, I’m not joking. You remember that food critic who got killed in June?”

  “That was never you!”