Unholy Ground imm-2

by John Brady

  Minogue could not get his brain to take up the yoke of work. He really should try to see Kilmartin. He saw half of Combs' face peeping out from under an envelope on the desk. He edged the envelope aside to look again at the tired face. Today the face looked resigned as well as cautious. Eilis was watching him.

  "You want me to know by telepathy that I should be expecting this Mr Moore. Is that it, Eilis?"

  "That is it."

  Minogue stood and ambled toward Eilis' desk.

  "There's a messenger after dropping off stuff from Foreign Affairs and Justice with your name on it. It's plain to see that they are copies of Mr Moore's permissions to go ahead."

  "Urn. Can you tell Detective Murtagh that he may be asked to bring Moore to the house? He'll be good company for Mr Moore, I'm thinking," Minogue said in a conspiratorial whisper.

  Eilis almost smiled, but she caught herself in time. She began clapping her ashtray noisily against the sides of a rubbish bin to make room for an afternoon's butts.

  "And Eilis," Minogue remembered.

  Not heard above the din, he had to raise his voice.

  "Eilis."

  She stopped and placed the ashtray on her desk.

  "Do you remember that Costello fella a few years ago? Shot dead and mutilated a few years back? Up in the North, but there was talk of him being kidnapped from here?"

  "I know the name, but I think it was before my tenure here."

  "I believe that the Special Branch were investigating it, too," Minogue said.

  Eilis nodded slowly. Her face took on a moody cast, Claudette Colbert about to dip her feet in some aggrieved ennui because her celluloid gangster paramour was momentarily inattentive.

  "I remember reading about it in the papers and the kerfuffle about it. A big feud started, fellas getting murdered every week for a while after."

  "Do we have an active file on him? An unsolved, like?" asked Minogue.

  "If it was more than three years ago, it won't be here in its entirety. There'd be a summary here and any updates noted in brief, too."

  "Well, I'm not much interested in reading ten filing cabinets full of this stuff. Could you give yourself fifteen minutes or a half hour over the Costello files and run through them like a roaring lunatic? Not read them, mind you. Look for mention of places in south County Dublin-Stepaside, Kilternan, Glencullen, Barnacullia, Sandyford. I'm hoping that Branch Surveillance Reports on Costello are still in existence."

  Minogue rubbed his eyes and returned to the copy of the telex. Arthur Combs, Customs and Excise career began in 1931, retired 1977. Combs had worked as an insurance clerk in London after leaving school. He had had a secondary school education. He had applied for Customs and Excise twice, failing a test the first time but succeeding in the following year. No other known occupations in the fifty years after that. No criminal record. He had worked in various parts of the Port of London until he retired. There were four promotions in his career, but he had hit a plateau after the last one in 1963.

  Had Combs harboured any of the secret longings which Minogue imagined besetting a man entering old age without a family? Customs man, like Le Douanier, his secret life on canvasses. Not a fabulous life by any means, quietly shuffling into old age in a London suburb. Combs was not recorded as having done Army service during the war. That was odd, Minogue thought, a single man not being called up. Maybe he had been working in a protected job doing his bit for the war effort at home. Combs must have cultivated other sides of himself to hear Mrs Hartigan's account. Languages, reading, travelling perhaps-and his drawings, of course.

  Minogue knew that, customarily, there were no records of British visitors to Ireland. It would be next to impossible to discover whether Combs had been on holiday here before. What would have decided him on living here, though, and why pick Kilternan? If he had known the area from past visits, then some locals must remember him from before. From before… he'd have to go back further with Combs, to make him less of a victim, a cipher. That'd mean Newman, the police in London for a start.

  He retrieved Newman's telephone number from his notebook and dialled. Newman was in a meeting. Could she take a message? She could, Minogue said: Sergeant Minogue from Dublin (should he be saying "a disgruntled Sergeant Minogue?") in connection with Mr Arthur Combs. He needed a more detailed background on Mr Combs. Need Inspector Newman call back? Only if he needs clarification on what I'm requesting.

  At half-past twelve, with his belly light and grumbling about a dinner, Minogue's day became overcomplicated. He wanted and needed a dinner. He was also very keen to get to hell out of the briefing room.

  He had almost apologised to Mr Moore when he had opened the door and led him in. Minogue had been astonished to see a tall, pin-striped figure standing boldly in front of Eilis' desk at five minutes before twelve. Moore had chalky, smooth skin. He must have a very good razor, Minogue believed. Moore's tie was knotted in a manner which Minogue had never seen in real life, but only in ads for shirts and ties and suits. The tie was red and spotty and it was firm over the collar button. It worked very nicely against the white shirt. Even Eilis' face began to give way and her eyes widened at the sight of Moore.

  Jesus, Mary and'Joseph, Minogue said inwardly. It was as well Kathleen didn't have telepathic powers to hear Minogue's gargoyle blaspheming within. In comparison with Moore, he himself could pass for one of those men dug up from the bogs in Sweden after lying there for a thousand years, skin and eyelashes and clothes intact but now residing in glass cases in the museum. Minogue had digested a total of four and a half pages from two government departments, brief requests, all to permit Mr E. Moore every liberty that was practical in respect of looking to the effects and the estate of Mr A. Combs, deed., of Kilternan, County Dublin. It was understood that Mr Moore would in no sense be requesting special privileges in regard to the current Garda investigation into Mr Combs' death. Mr Moore was to submit copies of all documents he might generate (who wrote "generate" Minogue wondered) in the course of his duties as the legal trustee for Mr Combs' estate. No effects were to be removed from the dead.'s residence without the written authorisation of one M. McCartan in the Department of Justice. In the matter of safeguarding Mr Combs' residence and the effects therein, such authorisation could be granted by telephone in response to the relevant written request from Mr Moore…

  At the discretion of the investigating officers (unnamed), Mr Moore could be apprised of certain details of Mr Combs' death, provided that the rights of any suspect or potential suspect were not prejudiced in receiving such information or that the investigation was impaired by disclosing such details. Life insurance, Minogue wondered. And more. The letter from Foreign Affairs noted that Mr Combs' estate might be subject to a determination by the Revenue Commissioners in the Department of Finance as to whether taxes or death duties were or would be owed from the estate of Mr Combs. Public property, now, thought Minogue. The bureaucrats had swooped.

  "And good day to you, Mr Moore. We spoke on the telephone."

  "Sergeant Minogue, hello."

  The voice was even, incurious.

  "You found your way here all right, with the traffic and everything."

  "Dublin is not too big, Sergeant."

  "You must have pressed the right buttons with our civil service, Mr Moore."

  He shepherded Moore back by Eilis' desk and ushered him into the windowless briefing room. It smelled of ashtrays and damp socks. At least someone had wiped the blackboard and arranged the chairs around the two pitted table-tops.

  "You are bona fide, authorized and up-and-running as regards officialdom here, Mr Moore. There are men labouring a lifetime to be so recognised," Minogue began.

  "Fine," Moore said.

  "Maybe you could let me know how you did it. So I can get the same results, you see."

  Moore tried out a smile. It seemed to come from a long way away, setting only on the lower part of his face, pushing his eyebrows up momentarily. Then it was gone.

  "
I think I know what you mean. So it's not just the British civil service which works best in the future conditional?"

  Minogue liked that.

  "Well, we more often dwell in the pluperfect here. The politics and things here. Lost fortune, you understand. I gave up trying to figure it out some time ago."

  There was something about Moore which reminded Minogue of a plate-glass window. It wasn't that you couldn't see through it, but more a quality of mirroring things from the outside. Minogue was passing the letters across to him when Eilis appeared in the doorway.

  "Excuse me for a moment, Mr Moore," Minogue said and closed the door behind him.

  "There are two messages," said Eilis. "Mrs Kilmartin phoned to say that they're not allowing any visitors to see the Inspector until tomorrow at the earliest. But that he wakes up sometimes and appears to have all his faculties," she said.

  "More than I ever had, I can tell you," Minogue murmured.

  "And Pat Corrigan called. I don't need to go through those boxes of files by the sound of things now. He says to phone him. It's about a surveillance report on a certain person in Glencullen several years ago. Said you'd know who he was referring to."

  Minogue clicked his fingers.

  "That definitely tears the arse of out things. We may be on the move, Eilis." As he turned the doorhandle, Minogue caught a light scent of aftershave from the room.

  "Excuse the intrusion, Mr Moore. It's feast or famine, I think, and I don't have an appetite for feasting at the moment."

  Moore nodded. He kept his legs crossed lightly. An academic, Minogue thought.

  "May I ask if you are close to a resolution of this case then, Sergeant?"

  He had asked in such a casual way that Minogue was half-way through an honest answer before a hint of caution slowed him.

  "We may well be making some progress at last."

  Moore's expression did not change.

  "But it may be a complicated box of tricks entirely. You probably know yourself that these murders that don't fit into the 'known-to-the-deceased' variety are the ones that do have us flummoxed for a while at least."

  "There was a robbery in progress, though?"

  "Let me say first, Mr Moore, that the deceased appears to have been the class of person who liked to keep to himself. We are not entirely sure at all as to what valuables he had in the house. A robbery in progress, you ask. Well. It has all the hallmarks of it. Household effects upset. A lot of damage done. Items of value on the person missing. Wallet, you see. About forty pounds that he had in a little bowl in the kitchen, too."

  Moore pursed his lips slightly. He changed legs. Minogue caught a glimpse of a white, hairy shin atop the socks as Moore shifted.

  "May I ask you then, Sergeant, something else? If I'm stubbing my toes here, please tell me."

  Minogue glanced at the flawless sheen on the black oxfords. They hadn't been scuffed yet.

  "Was Mr Combs the victim of, shall I say, anti-British sentiment?"

  Minogue tongued his lower lip.

  "Now, there's an interesting question, Mr Moore. Yes, it is. I don't know. It might be a possibility, but we're not concentrating on it at the moment. Does that sound equivocal enough to you?"

  Moore tried a little with his smile, but it was gone as quickly as his other efforts.

  "Not wishing to be obtuse, now, Mr Moore. But we don't show our cards too soon. Now, have you had your dinner at all…?"

  "Later in the day, thank you. I'd greatly appreciate the chance to get to Mr Combs' house as soon as I can."

  "You'll accept Detective Murtagh's assistance, won't you?"

  "No need, actually-" Minogue searched Moore's face.

  "It's a matter of policy here, I'm afraid, Mr Moore. We may need to return to the house in search of further evidence. An unsupervised visitor might upset things. Inadvertently, of course. Now, would you like copies of the rules in these letters here? About notifying us as to what you might do with Mr Combs' stuff? Then I'll leave you in Detective Murtagh's very capable hands."

  "Kindness indeed," Moore replied. He stood and laid his brief-case on the table.

  Minogue was mildly amused by Murtagh trying to exact a handshake from Moore. It was the only clumsy moment for Moore that Minogue had noticed. He changed hands on the brief-case to take Murtagh's outstretched hand. Eilis watched them go.

  "A natty dresser," she murmured. She reached for another cigarette.

  "A cold fish, too, by the cut of him," she added after blowing out the match.

  "Just the man for this class of work so," Minogue added. "I hope that Pat Corrigan is buying me a dinner."

  "You had better phone him all right. He sounded like his trousers were catching fire." spacebarthing

  There was no trace of smoke from Inspector Corrigan's trousers. Minogue and he sat outdoors, on the footpath in Dawson Street. The staff of the otherwise stand-up-and-eat-it-quick delicatessen had placed tables, chairs and imitation Martini umbrellas out on the sidewalk in an effort to make boulevardiers of their clientele. Cotton-wool clouds moved quickly across the sky, a breeze flapped the umbrellas in the sun.

  "What's that stuff?" Corrigan declared. Meant to be a question, his words came out as an accusation when he pointed to Minogue's scrambled egg.

  "Take it easy, Pat. It's paprika. Your palate is crying out for some training." Minogue spooned more soup.

  "That's cold soup, too. I've heard about that stuff."

  "Gazpacho. It's meant to be cold."

  Corrigan dusted crumbs off his trousers.

  "So there they were. We had a team up in Glencullen for ten days then. It was only sight stuff with a few good snapshots."

  "No tap on the blower, Pat? You must be getting very slack. Don't the District Justices watch the telly and see how every other jurisdiction does it?" Minogue said.

  "You're a howl, Matt. We didn't do much about it except stuff more files. Anyway, Costello stayed there for a week or so. We got word that he had just done a job up in the North. Then he cleared out of the house and we lost track of him. But sure the next thing is he's full of holes and butchered."

  "But sure, indeed," Minogue echoed the Irish national phrase.

  "Tell me now, Matt, how you knew the answer before I knew the question."

  "I don't follow you."

  Minogue was distracted by the groups of students on the sidewalks. Trinity College was down the end of the street. No Iseult among them.

  "You put me up to looking into Costello's files again. Making it up like you didn't know the answer. Come on now and spill the beans."

  "Beans?"

  No Daithi either. A couple was kissing passionately. Minogue was shocked. It was the girl who was pinning the boy against the railings. Busses screeched. People at the next table were laughing. The girl disentangled herself slightly. The better to dive back into the kissing, Minogue thought. It was not Iseult's face, he noted with relief. The woman grasped the man around the neck again.

  "Jases. They'll be peeling off their clothes and having a wear next," Corrigan grumbled.

  "What beans?" Minogue asked.

  "What put you onto this idea? Costello?"

  The boy encircled her with his arms. That was nice. And one hand strayed to her hair. Very nice hair. Would it feel like Iseult's, the way she was always complaining about it being too dry? And stroked her hair. Lovely hair. Lustrous hair.

  "Well?" Corrigan prompted again.

  "Let's call it an association which, like Count Dracula, can't stand the light of day."

  "Combs is English. British. Was, anyway. What was he doing living in bloody Kilternan? There, answer me that one."

  "I'm not sure that I can, Pat. You tell me what he was doing going up to Glencullen for his sup of drink every evening."

  "Is that a fact? Right enough, you mentioned that before. Sure it's only a bit up the road."

  "It most certainly is not up the road a bit. Not if you're seventy something years of age and you have a pub aro
und the corner from your own house."

  "You think that Combs was snooping around or the like?" *

  "I'm exploring the outlandish possibility that Mr Combs might have been in touch with Mister Ball over an item concerning the late Mr Costello and Mr Costello's friends."

  "Mr Costello's friends are mainly members of the INLA. By the leaping Jesus, Matt. Do you know what you're saying?"

  Corrigan sat back in the wire chair and placed his ham hands on the armrests.

  "You don't say," Minogue said.

  Corrigan leaned forward suddenly.

  "So the INLA killed your man?"

  "No, they didn't."

  "Who did, so?"

  "I don't know who killed him, Pat. If I did, I would be buying you the dinner. I need to talk to someone in the embassy, though. Someone in the same line of work as Ball was. To spring something on them and see what they say."

  "You can't. We're not supposed to assume that intelligence operatives work out of embassies, Matt. Rules is rules."

  "A poke at one of them, Pat. One of us has to poke at him. You do it if that's the way it has to be done, but I need some finger on them."

  Corrigan noted the discrepancy between Minogue's tone and his slouch in the chair. He looked like he was daydreaming, but the tone was acid.

  "Come on now, Matt. There's a Second Secretary shot and killed on the streets not twenty-four hours ago. We're not even allowed near the place to interview anyone in the embassy. Damn it man, my own men are playing second fiddle to a team of Brits that landed off the plane this morning, and we're being phoned every hour from Justice. To remind us to let their 'experts,' if you please, do their investigation. 'Experts,' is it? Now how am I going to get anyone to let me do what you want? These are diplomats. This is Ireland, remember. We have this wee issue going on with the British for eight hundred years or so. They make the rules and you and I, we follow the rules. Especially at times like this. That way we don't bollocks up things."