The Truth Commissioner

by David Park

  This is what he’s supposed to say and as Michael Madden stands at the lectern he knows that while he’ll walk away with an amnesty, the self-admitted guilt of his words will be printed on records for ever and he knows, too, that when he releases the words they’ll fly in directions that he’s no power to control. He thinks of the look on Ramona’s face when she saw him strike Eamon in the basketball game; he remembers that first time she squirmed instinctively away from his innocent touch; the way sometimes she whimpered in her sleep. And he knows as much as it’s possible to know anything, that if he says these words he’s finished without a single hope and that whatever piece of absolving paper they give him, he’s destroyed for certain whatever future they might still have. He stands silent at the lectern and the faces are looking at him impatient for him to start. Then into the bitterness of his knowledge surges a sudden spin of anger and he’s angry that they’ve brought him to this place, not just who he is now, but the eighteen-year-old who didn’t know anything about anything and who could have maybe made something better of his life. He’s angry that they used him and he’s angry that they’re still using him now. He looks at Connor’s mother and sister, sees their sad scrutiny of him and feels the intensity of their gaze, and he thinks of how long they’ve waited for the truth. Then he glances round the room at all the other faces staring at him and knows this is finally and inescapably the time and the place.

  ‘My name is Michael Madden. I joined the IRA when I was eighteen. I joined because it was a good thing to do and because I thought it was the best way to defend my area from attack. My home in Bombay Street had been burnt out and there was nobody to defend us and that day had a big impact on me. So I joined the Provisional IRA and I thought it made me into somebody, I suppose it made me feel big. I didn’t do anything big, however – I wasn’t much more than a message boy. I did some driving and collected people and packages a couple of times. That’s all. Small-time stuff. Then one night I was told that Connor had touted to the RUC, that he had been seen with a Special Branch man and was taking money from them. We were told to pick him up. I knew who he was but I’d never spoken to him or anything. We were told he was in the boxing club and when he came out I was told to approach him and ask him if he wanted to make some easy money. I did this and two other volunteers bundled him into the car. He was taken to a safe house in Ardoyne but after an hour or so a senior member of the brigade said he had to be moved because there would be police and army raids in the area. So I drove Connor and two volunteers to Newry where a man I believed to be a senior member of the IRA got into the car and with him directing we drove to a farm in South Armagh.

  ‘There was no one else there except us and after Connor was taken inside I was told to park the car in one of the outhouses. When I came in Connor was crying and the man we picked up in Newry was shouting at him, calling him a tout and other things I don’t need to repeat. When I came in the room I was told to get out and go in the kitchen and make some food. Connor was sitting on a chair and he was crying and shouting. So I went into the kitchen and as this was going on I tried to make a meal and all I could think of rustling up was toast and cheese and while I was getting this ready I could hear the voices shouting and shouting in the other room. There was a lot of screaming and then it went quiet. I was scared and wanted to be anywhere other than there but it was too late. Too late for all of us. The senior man came in and had his food and drank a cup of tea. Just like nothing had happened. And then he smoked a cigarette. Hardly acknowledged that I was even there. I was scared of him – there was something about him made you nervous to be around him. Then I remember that phone calls were made and at one point I was given the job of sitting guard on him and I was given a gun – it was the first time I had even held one. Connor was very quiet, his nose was bleeding and he had bruising on his temple and round his eye. He asked me what was going to happen to him and I told him I didn’t know and I really didn’t. Later one of the volunteers told me that they were going to make a tape of him admitting what he’d done. And he was told that when he’d made the tape he’d be taken back home and all he had to do was appear at a press conference and it would all be over. I was in the room when he was told that and I believed that’s what would happen.’

  Madden pauses and drinks from the glass of water. His hand shakes a little as he lifts it to his mouth and a droplet splashes on his suit. Suddenly he’s aware that his voice and the words he’s using sound intensely strange, as if he has reverted to an older language that has rusted unused and almost forgotten. He thinks of the rust that lined Lynch’s fingers on the day he handed him the letter that brought him here.

  ‘A couple of hours later a senior man from our own district arrived from Belfast. When he saw Connor there was a real bust-up with the guy we’d picked up in Newry. He was angry about the state that Cannor was in and how he couldn’t be put in front of the press looking like that. They went in the front room and there was a lot of raised voices and the one thing I heard was the Newry guy shouting that we were all fucking soft in Belfast and too interested in looking good to get our hands dirty, that we were users and not worth a spit in the wind. If went on like this for a while and there was obviously bad blood between them. The upshot was that Connor was to be kept there for a couple of days or so until he mended up and then he was supposed to go back and make his public appearance. Someone else – a woman – arrived and left in supplies and then left again. I didn’t know much about cooking but somebody thought I did and I got the job of making cups of tea and bacon sandwiches. Endless cups of tea and sandwiches.

  ‘Sometime around midnight and I’m not sure how Connor broke a small window and squeezed out of a space it didn’t look possible to get through. He dropped down into the yard and when we came bursting out of the house he had disappeared in the darkness. There was a big moon and torches were brought from the house. After a while your eyes began to see better. So we split up and tried to find him. I went round the shed but there was no sign of him and then I heard shouting from the back of the house so I headed up there where there was a big orchard. I tripped and fell, cut my hand and then when I got near the back of the house there was one shot rang out. There were torches and I walked towards them and the two senior men were standing there and one held a gun in his hand and the light from one of their torches was shining on Connor and he was lying on the grass under a tree and I could see right away that he was dead. I’d never seen a dead person before but I knew he was dead. He’d been shot.’

  He’s told it and he isn’t sure if he really has, or if he’s only imagined the words coming out of his mouth, but it’s no longer his voice he hears but the sobbing of Connor Walshe’s mother and sister. He looks down to where Mairead is sitting and she’s shaking her head very slowly at him and he looks away again.

  ‘I’m deeply sorry for Connor’s death and deeply sorry for the part I played in it. Soon after this I ran away and tried to make a new life in America but I’ve never forgotten what happened that night. It was a terrible thing and I regret more than you can ever know that I was involved in it.’ He lifts the glass of water but his hand is shaking too much and he puts it down again. For a second the light coming through the stained glass seems to colour the water.

  Francis Gilroy sits in the audience of the small studio theatre and watches the children perform. It’s the showcasing of a cross-community creative-arts project involving three different schools coming together to produce a performance of dance, music and drama. It’s the part of the job he likes best going out and actually meeting people and children, seeing how funding decisions have been translated into creative results. The theme of the performance is ‘Outsiders’ and he sits with some of the teaching staff and the usual crowd of Department of Education inspectors, representatives of the Department of Culture and Learning, and arts practitioners and advisers. There are also parents present and the performance is going well. He watches intently as a group acts out a little drama involving migrant wo
rkers and racial prejudice, then a group of young teenagers performs a dance that involves papier-mache masks and beating drums. He thinks it’s all very clever and imaginative and it makes him feel better, as if there’s value in what he’s been doing, as if all the endless meetings and welter of paper actually have some connection with the real world. The children are full of energy, animated by the experience of public performance, and they come close to the edge of the stage and Gilroy is able to see the painted artwork of the masks while behind the dancers the drums pound out an insistent beat.

  Gilroy shifts in his seat. Perhaps the performance has gone on slightly too long. He’s finding it harder to keep focused and increasingly, although he tries to stop them, his thoughts turn to the hearing that he knows is going on at this very moment. Ricky and the others have come good for him. He knew that when it came right down to it they’d look after their own. It’s what they do, it’s what they’re good at. That’s why they’ve never fractured, never split into civil war even though, God knows, there were times when they came close. Despite this, he still wonders what’s happening in the chamber and if Michael Madden has done his bit yet. On the stage a boy stands alone in a white light while behind him are arrayed frozen scenes from his life, so there’s a family tableau, a bit from school, a group of his friends and each in turn is acted out before freezing again. It’s a play about teenage suicide, about people not ever really knowing what’s going on inside someone else’s head. So they think he’s all right, that he’s a real laugh, and all the time he’s crying inside.

  Connor Walshe cried a lot. He cried so much that it drove Rafferty mad and he’d want to hit him again. He’d already hit him too much and they’d have to wait until his face healed up. Rafferty had had a younger brother killed six months earlier and he was raw as hell, hard to work with, hard to talk to. But he keeps trying. You can’t kill him because he’s too young and it would be a complete own goal, a complete fuck-up, and even you should be able to see that. You have to see the bigger picture, play with the head. But no, no, so it was, That’s all you boys do now – talk complete shite – and you’ve gone soft, Gilroy, too keen to get yourself into a suit and out of the field. And on and on and Rafferty looking down his nose because he thought that the border brigade were the real men, the ones who held their ground and didn’t compromise, didn’t go behind backs and look for deals, because they’d marked out their terrain, claimed the land back so that the only way the Brits could move was in fucking helicopters, and if they’d only get them land-to-air missiles they wouldn’t even be able to do that. And if they let this worthless piece of shit go who’d touted and squealed like a pig then they were finished because every bit of scum would think they could do the same and walk away and his brother, what about his brother? There were people in the struggle giving everything and there were others begging like dogs for crumbs off the table and if Gilroy didn’t want to get his hands dirty then he should get out of the way. Listen, Rafferty, he’d said, you follow orders like we all do but it was fuck the Belfast orders and this is a war not some kind of picnic. On the stage the boy walks into the white spotlight and looks around him and all the groups come slowly to life and wave to him as if they’re calling him to join them but he turns away and it looks as if he’s in a dream or a trance and he stretches out his own hands but it’s as if there’s something separating him from all the others who care about him and then the lights go slowly down. Dark night sky and cold so that when they ran their breath streamed in front of them and Rafferty calling to get torches and splitting up and running in blind circles and pausing to listen and listen and then it’s Rafferty’s voice and he’s in the orchard behind the house and then there’s a gunshot, please God no but it’s a gunshot, and the torchlight shows the gun in his hand. And the boy is sprawled on the ground with a bullet wound in his head and twigs and rotten apples round it and Rafferty is standing looking down at him and whatever was inside him has drained away and he doesn’t say anything and so he gives him the gun without saying anything or resisting and for a second he wants to shoot the bloody fool but as the others arrive he takes control and tells them to get the black plastic out of the barn they use for baling and cord and wrap the boy in it. And then Rafferty walks back to the house and leaves them to get on with it and the torches make the plastic shine like moonlight on thick black water as they parcel him up.

  Gilroy starts as the audience breaks into loud applause. He gulps for air, clenches his jaw tightly with his hand. The cast is bowing and the clapping rises into a crescendo. Some of them are standing and as he lumbers to his feet his seat tips up noisily behind him. It’s his turn now and as arranged he makes his way to the stage where a microphone has been hastily set up and he waits until the applause fades away before he starts to speak.

  ‘I’m sure you’ll agree with me that we’ve been privileged to see something very special today. So much talent, so much creativity, and I think all the young people who participated today and all the teachers and artists who were involved in putting the project together deserve the highest praise, and let’s not forget the parents either who have given so much support to their children and the project. The theme of outsiders was highly relevant and provides us all with a lot to think about. And as we look to the future we want to use the talents of our children to be the foundation of an inclusive society in which there are no outsiders any more but everyone finds an equal and respected place. So once again I’d ask you to show your appreciation for these wonderful young people who give us all hope for the future.’ As he walks off stage there is a new burst of clapping and he stretches out his arm to signify that it’s directed to the children.

  ‘There is an important question that now needs to be asked, Mr Madden,’ Stanfield says and Madden turns his face sideways to him that’s blanched of all colour. ‘Are you able and willing to help locate the body of Connor and see it returned to his family?’

  ‘I am and I’ve already prepared a sworn deposition that gives every detail I can remember as to the location.’

  Stanfield looks at the Walshes’ advocate who nods to indicate she’s finished and so he tells Madden he can resume his seat but as he steps away from the lectern someone calls his name. It’s a woman’s voice and Maria Harper is on her feet and she calls his name again.

  ‘Michael, will you tell us now who killed Connor?’

  Her voice is high and splintering. Madden stops and looks at her. He glances at Mairead who’s also getting to her feet and is about to speak but it’s not Mairead or even Maria Harper that he wants but Ramona with her womb full of his child and to have a chance of getting them back he can’t hold any part of this thing any more. It’s been part of him too long and he has to rip its corrosive heart out of wiiere it’s lain hidden all these years.

  ‘Francis Gilroy. Francis Gilroy killed Connor Walshe.’

  Stanfield blinks his eyes and blows a thin stream of breath. The court has ignited into a flare of noise and already journalists are scampering from their seats, phones in their hands, their momentary pretence of dignity disappearing as they start to shove and push each other aside in their haste to make for the door. He calls for order, remineis everyone of the need for calm. And then he almost smiles. The best-laid schemes. There’s nothing he can do now, it’s out of his control, and Maria Harper is still on her feet and Matteo’s almost bursting out of his seat and the whispers are growing louder so slowly he rises and stands waiting until there’s perfect silence and then with a curiously light and pleasing sense of recklessness, of flying close to the sun, he says in a loud and steady voice, ‘The Commission for Truth and Reconciliation calls Francis Gilroy.’

  Sweeney’s phone rings as they’re crossing the foyer of the building and about to leave but it’s a phone that’s always ringing and Gilroy walks on without him to the exit door. Suddenly he steps into a scrum of people – at first he doesn’t know who they are but there are voices calling him and tape recorders pushed close to his face
and cameras ricocheting with light and the ambushing voices are shouting about Connor Walshe and because they’re all shouting at once he doesn’t understand what it is they’re asking him and then in the confused babble he finally hears the question and in reply he shakes his head and looks for Sweeney. A van is pulling up at the kerb and he sees it’s a television crew and someone is pulling at his sleeve but then at last it’s Sweeney’s voice in his ear shouting at him to get into the car and say nothing, not a single word, and Marty’s opening the door and shoving people aside as he’s bundled into the back seat and then they speed off with squealing tyres.

  ‘Where to?’ Marty asks and at first Sweeney tells him just to drive but then says to take them straight to Gilroy’s home.

  ‘What happened?’ Gilroy asks and when there’s no immediate answer repeats the question.

  ‘Madden said you pulled the trigger,’ Sweeney says as he turns on his seat to see if they’re being followed.

  ‘What the hell happened? You told me everything was OK.’

  ‘I thought it was. I don’t know what’s happened.’

  ‘Why would he do this?’ Gilroy asks, staring at Sweeney as if he thinks the answer will be printed in the lined whiteness of his face.

  ‘I don’t know, Franky, I really don’t know. All I know is it’s a total bollocks.’

  ‘It’s a total fuck-up. I expected better than this,’ Gilroy says then slumps back in the seat and rubs his closed eyes with his finger and thumb. It feels as if the lights from the cameras are inside his eyes and then he opens them and blinks. ‘I need to ring Christine and the boys,’ he says, searching in his pocket for his mobile phone, but remembers he’s left it on the dresser at home. ‘Best they hear it first from me.’ Sweeney offers him his but then realises he doesn’t have the numbers.

  ‘We’ll have you home soon,’ he tells Gilroy. ‘You can phone from there.’