We attracted no attention when we came into the lounge, a nice young couple—maybe on their honeymoon—in jeans and sweatshirts, herself in a white one (tight) with “Galway” in thick green letters and myself in dark blue (loose) with a white outline of the Chicago skyline. If you don’t know what it is, don’t ask. None of the American tourists or European businesspeople in the room could possibly imagine us as the two berserkers who had been on the telly that morning.
The Towers serves a complimentary continental breakfast in its lounge every morning—rolls, scones, fruit juice, and coffee and tea. It was hardly my idea of what a breakfast ought to be, but, as herself argued, it was both quick and free.
She conducted me as though I were an invalid to one of the comfortable couches in the corner and assisted me to sit down.
“Are you all right now, Dermot?”
“Grand!” I sighed contentedly as she dashed away to collect our food.
Actually, every muscle in my body ached, but her tender smile was a remarkable cure.
SHE’S MOTHERING YOU AGAIN, the Adversary murmured.
“Who’s complaining?”
Nuala flounced back with a teapot and cups. She sped away again and returned with grapefruit juice for herself and scones and three glasses of grapefruit juice for me.
“You’re spoiling me rotten, woman,” I protested.
“I don’t spoil you enough, Dermot love.”
I figure that a husband has no right to be mothered (except when he’s sick—maybe), but that when such tender loving care is proffered he should accept it gratefully.
“You don’t have to, Nuala Anne.”
“I WANT to.”
That settled that.
“Ah, woman, if you keep working on it, won’t you become a grand wife!”
For a brief moment her eyes flashed dangerously and I was afraid that I had gone too far. Then she grinned and said, “Och, Dermot, aren’t you having me on?”
“A substitute for having you.”
She flushed dark red. “Hush, Dermot Michael Coyne. Aren’t you embarrassing me something awful with such suggestive talk?”
Nonetheless, she was pleased by it.
The assistant manager on duty managed to smuggle me a plate of ten small raisin rolls, which I devoured with great relish.
“Weren’t the two of you grand on the telly,” she said to us. “Didn’t it serve them gobshites right?”
“Didn’t it ever?” Nuala agreed as she poured my tea.
“And the focking Garda, too,” the young woman added.
‘They don’t dare mess around with me man,” Nuala said as she buttered one of the rolls and popped it into my mouth. “And himself so sweet and nice most of the time.”
“More jelly on the next one please, Nuala Anne, or I might lose my temper again.”
Both women giggled, confident that Nuala Anne had tamed me, though my wife knew I was born tame.
I was halfway through my plate of rolls when a tall, handsome man with wavy gray-tinged hair, twinkling blue eyes, and an easy smile appeared and glanced around the room.
“Cop,” I said.
“And a very important cop,” my wife added.
He saw us and grinned. Even though his gray suit could have used a pressing and the knot in his tie wasn’t quite right, it was clear that this man was in charge.
“Before I risk a swim in the Grand Canal,” he said easily, “perhaps I should claim that I’m a good friend of Mike Casey and I spoke with him last night and again this morning.”
“Well,” said Nuala Anne judiciously, “that might keep you dry for a few more moments.”
Two blarney artists.
“My name’s Gene Keenan and I’m with the Gardai,” he said apologetically.
“Deputy Commissioner, if I read the Irish papers right,” I said as I stood up and shook hands with him. “Sit down and have a cup of tea.”
“If you’re good,” Nuala added, “Dermot might even give you one of his rolls.”
“No thanks, I’ve had me breakfast, but I could stand a small drop of tea—with milk, if you don’t mind.”
Nuala, who had acquired the American habit of drinking tea the way God made it, borrowed a pitcher from the empty table next to us.
“Well, I suppose I should begin my apologizing for the failure of the Garda last night. Patently he should have concentrated on arresting the criminals.”
“He wasn’t armed,” I said, almost by way of excuse.
“We aren’t armed because a great man named Kevin O’Higgins insisted on an unarmed Gardai. However, he could have summoned help easily and we would have tracked them down quickly. As it is, we have only the man you threw into the street, Mr. Coyne. And himself having a case of amnesia this morning.”
“Dermot,” I said.
“Gene … Well,” he went on, rubbing his chin, “that officer will have a considerable time to reflect on proper police tactics at his new assignment in Donegal … We have also arrested the independent television crew as accessories to the attempted kidnapping. I don’t think they’ll go to jail, but they won’t do any TV work for a long time … and neither of you with serious ill effects?”
“My neck hurts,” I said.
For a moment our new friend looked anxious; then he realized I was kidding and smiled.
“Pay me man no heed, Commissioner,” herself explained. “He’s having you on … He’s a solid mass of ache and pain, poor dear man, but we’re not going to sue the Gardai.”
“I had a call from one of the best solicitors in Ireland last night and again this morning, You must have made a lot of phone calls last night, Ms. McGrail.”
“Sure, doesn’t everyone call me Nuala Anne?”
“Actually”—he shifted uneasily on his chair and sipped from his tea—“I think we should have been more concerned about your security. To tell the truth, we thought the worst you had to fear were the Irish media. Now they’re on your side and blaming us for not taking care of you.”
“Gobshites,” said herself fervently.
“Better to have them on your side, however, than on the other side … In any event, we want to correct our previous mistake. With your permission, we will put our most discreet security people on you. More, Commissioner Casey wants to assign the best personnel from Reliable, Dublin.”
“I hope there’s a comma between those last two words.”
“Sometimes there is and sometimes there isn’t,” Keenan laughed. “You didn’t realize that Michael is worldwide?”
No one ever calls him Michael, not even his lovely wife.
“Didn’t we take it for granted?” Nuala replied. “And isn’t he a brilliant man?”
Brilliant is the superlative adjective, for which super is the comparative and grand the base. One can even used dead friggin’ brill if one wants to emphasize excellence.
“He is that … and if you wouldn’t mind, we’d like to take you over to the Point in one of our cars this morning, a detective car of course, and bring you back here after the rehearsal.”
“Super!” Nuala announced. “It’s all super!”
YOU DON’T GET TO VOTE, the Adversary observed.
“Naturally not.”
“Who were the assailants last night?” I asked, changing the subject.
“Amateurs,” the cop said, frowning. “One always thinks of the lads when one encounters a kidnapping in broad daylight. But the lads have been quiet lately as the peace negotiations grind on, and their snatches would be a lot more professional. Moreover, our Special Branch people keep a close tab on them. We would have known that something was going down if any of the various Sinn Fein groups were involved.... Do you have any ideas who it might be?”
I felt my gut tighten. If the local police had to ask us, then they didn’t have a clue.
“Not really,” I replied. “Nuala and I have had some scrapes in the last couple of years, but there’s no one out there who might try to kidnap her. Maybe it was a co
uple of local crooks who wanted to pick up some extra punts.”
A punt is an Irish pound. It is sometimes written IR£.
The Deputy Commissioner nodded thoughtfully. “That’s our line of thought, too. The Canal House bridge is not the best place for a snatch. We will pursue our leads and keep a tight but unobtrusive security ring around you.”
“Fair enough,” I agreed.
“See,” I told the Adversary, “I did get a chance to vote!”
“Och, Dermot Michael, I’ll be late for me rehearsal! I’ll run upstairs and get me slicker.”
“I’m married to one like that,” Gene Keenan observed as Nuala Anne galloped away towards the elevators.
“Lucky man!”
“Sure, don’t I know it! And if I should forget it, I’m promptly reminded.”
We sighed together.
The Irish sigh, you must realize, is a sudden intake of breath, almost a gasp. If you’re not familiar with it, you might think it is the beginning of a serious asthma attack. Sometimes it stands by itself. Sometimes it precedes a statement. On other occasions it ends a statement.
I have no idea what it means to them, but I have learned when to use it.
Nuala returned almost at once, wearing a red transparent rain cape and hood.
“All ready, Commissioner,” she announced.
“We’re going to take you out the back door, Nuala Anne. So the media can’t climb all over you with their sympathy and support. … Dermot, why don’t you go out there and make some sort of statement to them.”
“He’ll love that,” my wife commented.
“I’d like to talk to you afterward, Gene,” I said.
“Certainly.”
Two husky Guards, Rory and Aisling, met us at the door—with an umbrella for herself. She kissed me and dashed for the unmarked car. The soft day was turning hard.
I went to the main entrance of the Towers, where a ring of Guards in rain slickers kept what must have been half the journalists in Ireland at bay. One of the Guards rushed up to protect me with an umbrella. I noted that Gene Keenan was lurking discreetly in the background.
Smart cop. No wonder he and Mike Casey were friends.
I was greeted with loud applause.
“Sure, aren’t youse all so wet that there’d be no point in throwing any of you into the Grand Canal.”
Laughter, somewhat uneasy.
“Are you and herself going home?”
“To America? Certainly. On schedule.”
“You’re not going to cancel the concert?”
“Why, woman, would we ever do that?”
“Because of the security risks!”
I glanced around at the ring of Guards. “Sure, don’t I feel perfectly secure now?”
“You’re talking like an Irishman, Dermot!”
“Doesn’t it get contagious?”
Herself was right. I love sparring with the media.
“Are you going to sue the Gardai?”
“Wasn’t I after telling Commissioner Keenan that I had this terrible pain in the back of me neck?”
Laughter from everyone.
“How’s herself?”
“Hasn’t she gone off in a Gardai car for her rehearsal? She’s fine. Meself, I ache all over, but you’re not interested in how I feel, are you now?”
“Did you see it on the telly this morning, Dermot?”
“We did!
“And what did you think about it?”
“I was convinced that I really am Finn McCool! Or maybe Conan the Barbarian. And me woman is clearly Karela the Red Hawk.”
“You talk like you do such things every day!”
“Usually only on weekends!”
“Were you scared, Dermot?”
“While the fight was going on I was too angry to be afraid. Afterward, wasn’t I scared shiteless!”
“Do you think the battle of Canal House will help sales for herself’s concert?”
“Isn’t it sold out long since? … Now I have to get back to work. See you at the concert.”
Everyone departed the scene in high good humor.
“Fair play to you,” said Gene Keenan.
“They didn’t even ask who the kidnappers might have been.”
“They’ll save that for us.”
I thanked the protective ring of Guards, especially the woman who had held the umbrella.
Back in the lounge I filled up the teapot again and accepted a new plate of raisin rolls.
“Mind if I take one of those?” the Deputy Commissioner asked.
“Only one!”
In Nuala’s absence I had to smear on the butter and the raspberry preserves myself.
Keenan poured the tea, having half-filled his cup with milk.
Filthy habit.
“Well,” I said, exhaling expansively as an Irishman is supposed to do when beginning a serious conversation with another Irishman, “I want to talk about Kevin O’Higgins.”
That blunt announcement was not the approved way for an Irishman to begin a discussion. It was so blunt that Gene Keenan was physically startled.
“What about him?”
“I’ve been reading DeVere White’s book about him.”
“Have you now?”
“It’s a good book.”
“ ’Tis all of that.”
We were circling around again in the approved Irish way.
“Who killed him?” I said, turning blunt.
“Not the men that DeVere White names in his afterword.”
Now we were getting down to business. I figured I could trust him.
“Do you believe in the dark ones, Gene?”
“The dark ones?”
“Those who may have a touch of the fey about them?”
“Aye”—he rubbed his chin again—“not to say believe exactly. But I know there are such people. They frighten me.”
“Isn’t she one of them?” I said, nodding in the general direction of the Point Theater.
He shivered slightly. “One would never suspect it.”
“Part of the package,” I said briskly with a mental nod to George the Priest. “I like the package.”
“Understandably.”
We both sighed, as Irishmen are supposed to do.
“Can I tell you a confidential story or two?”
“Certainly. … Does it have implications for the attempt last night?”
“I don’t know … probably not … but it might.”
I told him first about the Camp Douglas conspiracy affair1 with which we had dealt while we were courting. (I didn’t mention that herself was the only one of us who knew we were courting.)
“And you’re living in the lacemaker woman’s house?” he asked me in astonishment.
“We are.”
“Any, uh, manifestations?”
“I don’t think so, though with Nuala Anne you can never be really sure. Letitia Walsh Murray would be a benign presence in any case.”
“Aye,” he said, not at all convinced.
Then I told him about the incident on the Aer Lingus Airbus coming over (though I left out the burning house), about my reading DeVere White’s book, and about our trip to Booterstown the day before.
“You had quite a day,” he said grimly.
“Now that you mention it.”
“She said that O’Higgins talked to the men who shot him? That isn’t in the book, is it?”
“No.”
“I see. … And she knew that the killers were not the ones DeVere White names.”
“Yes.”
He was silent for a moment. “You understand, Dermot, that it was a long time ago?”
“Seventy years.”
“No good purpose could be served by bringing it up again.”
“I presume so.”
“Irish politics are finally leaving the divisions of that terrible era behind.”
“We have long memories.”
He nodded grimly. “There’s no obvious conne
ction with what happened last night.”
“None that I can imagine,” I replied.
He rubbed his chin again. “Still it is strange, Dermot Strange and scary.”
“And there is the matter of the book about my fellow Chicagoan.”
“Hazel … sad woman.”
First time I’d ever heard that adjective used about Lady Lavery.
He shook his head as if trying to clear away a lot of unrelated facts, indeed facts that could not possibly be related. Could they?
“A long time ago,” he continued, speaking slowly and softly, “Kevin’s daughter, a Carmelite contemplative, began the custom of having a Mass on July 10 for the repose of her father’s soul. She included all those who died during the War of Independence and the Civil War and subsequent terrorism. She invited the killers themselves and their families.”
“Did she really!”
“I know you’re thinking that could happen only in Ireland. You’re right.... At first they didn’t come. Mind you, they could have been arrested, though there wasn’t any proof and their side was in power by then. But the O’Higgins family was not interested in revenge. Only forgiveness. Eventually some of the family members came. Then the next year the man who actually killed him. When they were very old, the other two came. Kevin’s wife, who had remarried, embraced them both. … Forgive us our trespasses, Dermot, as we forgive those who trespass against us.”
I sighed, very loudly.
“The masses continue. The only one still alive from the drama, besides the nun, is the boy who gave the signal and then ran for the priest, as your woman correctly reported. He’s about eighty now. But the children and grandchildren on both sides show up every year. They say they’ll never let the custom die.
“A lot of people know about it, including some journalists. But it’s too sacred an event to violate. My wife and I represented the Gardai last year.”
My throat felt very dry.
“As you can imagine, the Lady Lavery revelations were a great shock to everyone.”
“Nuala Anne says that his wife was the only woman he ever really loved.”
“I believe that, though many thought the letters were damning.… Still and all, we humans are weak, are we not?”
We both were silent. I filled his teacup again.
Irish Mist Page 8
