Dead Man's Sins

by Caimh McDonnell

“I see. And yet, when Bernard McGarry rang the doorbell, you met him?”

  “Excuse me?” said Angelina, looking momentarily confused. “Do you mean Bunny?”

  “Yes. I believe Detective McGarry is also known by that name.”

  Angelina gave a brief smile. “Sorry. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him referred to as Bernard. I’m not sure I even knew that was his actual name.”

  “Nobody calls him that at work either,” said Butch, which earned her a look from Marshall before he continued.

  “But you do know him?”

  “Yes. I mean, I hadn’t seen him for years until a couple nights ago, but I knew him when I was a kid. Everybody knew Bunny.”

  Marshall nodded. “So, if you ignored the door as a matter of strict policy, then how did you come to meet him a couple of nights ago? Did he ask to see you?”

  “No. I don’t think he had any idea I was married to Coop until he met me that night.”

  “I’m confused. If you ignored the door as a matter of strict policy, and he did not know you lived there, then how did you come to meet?”

  Angelina leaned forward and Butch noticed that, for the first time in the interview, her body language was showing irritation. “Have you ever met Bunny McGarry, Inspector?”

  Marshall sat more upright in his chair. “Yes.”

  “Then you will know he has a very distinctive voice. I’m sure he’s been accused of many things over the years, but I seriously doubt that not being able to make an entrance is one of them. I heard his voice because he was arguing with Joe.”

  The DI raised an eyebrow. “They were arguing?”

  “No. That’s not what I meant. He didn’t have an appointment but he was talking his way in.”

  “Still, it’s a rather big coincidence, isn’t it?”

  Robinson interjected. “Is there a point to this line of questioning, Inspector?”

  “I’m just trying to establish some facts, counsellor.”

  “I appreciate that. I would also like to note again, for the record, that my client is here voluntarily to assist in any way she can. Given that, I’m not entirely sure why you feel the need for such an adversarial tone.”

  Marshall gave a smile, one that looked as if he had learned it from a book with a couple of the pages missing. “I apologise if that is how you perceived it. I assure you, it was not my intention.”

  Robinson nodded and Marshall returned his attention to Angelina. “Did Detective McGarry explain to you why he was there?”

  “No,” said Angelina.

  “He didn’t mention anything?”

  “We hadn’t seen each other for years. We had a brief catch-up, mentioned a few people we both know. That’s all.” She looked away and then refocused her attention, as if recalling something. “I think he mentioned he was there on somebody else’s behalf.”

  “Whose?”

  “He didn’t say.”

  “Did he appear agitated?”

  Angelina sat back, looked at Butch and then at Marshall. “Why are you asking about this? Bunny had nothing to do with my husband’s death.”

  “How are you so sure of that?”

  Butch turned her head to gawp at Marshall, not even attempting to hide her shock.

  “He’s a detective in the Gardaí,” said Angelina, looking utterly incredulous. “He came around to talk to my husband. Lots of people came around to talk to my husband.”

  “And rest assured, we will be endeavouring to rule them all out, one at a time, if we have to.”

  Robinson picked up his briefcase and got to his feet. “OK, we are done here. My client has been nothing but cooperative, but she is very tired and, frankly, this interview is becoming a little ridiculous. Inspector, if you wish to rule out a serving police officer, I suggest you speak to the officer in question.”

  Marshall referred to his notes. “I would still like to —”

  Robinson cut him off. “It’s been two hours, and my client is a grieving widow who hasn’t slept in over twenty-four hours. Any other questions you have, we can deal with them tomorrow, when she’s had a chance to get some sleep.”

  Marshall kept his eyes on Robinson but spoke to Angelina. “Are you returning home, Mrs Hannity?”

  She nodded.

  “Well, in that case, I should inform you that the bunker in the back garden will be under police guard, and —”

  Angelina’s brow furrowed. “The what where?”

  She continued to look utterly mystified as Marshall briefly explained about the tapes.

  Despite the DI’s instructions beforehand, Butch decided to speak up. “Did you go out to the back garden much, Angelina?”

  Angelina looked at Butch for a second then shook her head. “To be honest with you, I couldn’t stand those bloody pigeons. Can I ask, is there an update on Joe?”

  “If you mean Joseph Stowers,” Marshall said, shooting Butch a look, “Mr Hannity’s bodyguard, I can tell you that, following an interview with my colleague, he has been discharged from hospital of his own volition.”

  “That’s good, then.”

  Robinson placed a hand on his client’s shoulder, and she stood up to leave. She made it as far as the doorway then turned around to the room. “Sorry, I’m very tired, but … Am I right in thinking that all of the money owed to my husband – all those debts – are now owed to me?”

  “Yes,” said Robinson. “That’s my understanding.”

  “In that case,” she said, looking at Butch, “when you see Bunny, tell him I said that whatever debts he was worried about are written off. I owe him that much at least.”

  As the lawyer and his client left, Marshall looked at Butch with an excited glint in his eye. Angelina Hannity might have meant well, but Butch was pretty sure she had done Bunny no favours.

  The Irritated Bowels of Justice

  The offices of O’Leary, Mensah and Goldberg Associates were on the third floor of a converted Victorian house just off the North Circular. The first two floors of the building were taken up with the administrative headquarters of a plumbing supply company. Bunny walked up the creaking stairs and was alarmed to find himself out of breath by the time he had reached the top landing. He was a man in his thirties – the prime of his life – and, not for the first time that day, the thought that some serious lifestyle changes might be called for loomed large in his mind. Of course, he had more pressing immediate concerns, which was why he was here.

  This was the first place he’d come to since renting the car he’d decided he needed. He’d discovered that car hire on the day was a lot like trying to insure your house when it was already on fire – very much a seller’s market. If he’d spent a bit more, he could just have bought a car.

  The important thing to know about O’Leary, Mensah and Goldberg Associates at Law was that, despite the impression the name gave, it was a one-man operation – and always had been. Kofi Mensah had come to Ireland from Ghana as a three-year-old. His mother had cleaned offices at night while his father had cleaned the streets, all while raising five children. At the last count, their family tree had sprung an architect, an accountant, a psychiatrist, a chartered surveyor and a lawyer, not to mention fourteen grandchildren. A classic immigrant story.

  Bunny was here to see the lawyer. The logic behind the name of the firm was that Kofi had decided he needed an O’Leary because people were wary of leaving their fates in the hands of a “foreigner”, albeit one fluent in Gaelige and an expert in Irish history. The reason for the Goldberg was that prior to striking out on his own, Kofi had worked for the legendary Maurice Goldberg. Back in those days, that name meant a lot in Dublin legal circles. Maurice had gifted him the use of it upon his retirement, much like a key to the inner circle, handed down from one outsider to another.

  These days, fifteen years down the line, a lot of Kofi’s clients couldn’t even tell you the name of the firm. Everyone just knew it as “Kofi can” – the slogan he’d had emblazoned on the snow globes he gave out to all
potential clients. Bunny knew for a fact that Kofi could have moved on a long time ago and made a great deal more money, but he liked serving the community in which he’d grown up.

  On top of that, when you offer the best legal defence available to the everyday Joe, nobody cares if you’re a little bit on the eccentric side. Kofi was also well known for being a soft touch when it came to “negotiated payment”, which was why Bunny was unsurprised to see an eight-foot-tall teddy bear in one corner of the waiting room, and what appeared to be thirty-six cans of purple paint sitting in another.

  “Howerya, Louise,” said Bunny.

  The woman sitting behind the reception desk gave him a steely stare.

  “Hello, Bunny. Is he expecting you?”

  “No. I’m just dropping in on the off chance.”

  Louise scurried her blood-red nails on the desk. “I’m afraid he’s booked solid. He’s just finishing up with a client now, and then Mr Gallagher here is his last appointment of the day.”

  Bunny turned to the young man sitting behind him, who smiled at him nervously. Bunny shot him a broad grin in return. “Picky Gallagher, as I live and breathe. I’ve not seen you for a while.”

  Picky Gallagher was rake thin and suffered from a nervous disposition, which meant that at any given time his body was never entirely stationary – some part of it was always moving. That, coupled with the fact that there was something about him reminiscent of a cat recently dragged out of a canal, gave him the air of a man who was never destined to be one of life’s big winners. He wasn’t possessed of a temperament suited to stressful work either – just another of the many reasons he was such an awful thief. It was a mystery that he had managed to reach his late twenties and it still hadn’t dawned on him that a change of career was called for.

  Picky nodded, then shook, and then nodded his head again. “Yeah, no, yeah, Bunny. How have you been? I’m fine. How have you been?”

  “I’m grand, thanks,” said Bunny, taking the furthest of the two empty seats from Picky. “What have you been up to?”

  “Nothing!” he said, sounding alarmed. “Nothing. Whatever you heard, I didn’t do nothing.”

  “Glad to hear it.”

  Louise cleared her throat pointedly. “As I was saying, Mr McGarry, Kofi doesn’t have any space today. Would you like to make an appointment for later in the week?”

  Bunny held up his hands. “I know, I know, I know. He’s a very busy man, but like I said, I’ll just take my chances and hope for the best.”

  He met her glare with a smile. He could see that she was considering saying something else. Instead, she sighed and went back to typing.

  Bunny smiled at Picky.

  Picky smiled back nervously.

  Bunny kept smiling.

  Picky stood up. “Ehm, could I use your toilet, please, Mrs Mensah?”

  Louise didn’t look up. “I’m no longer Mrs Mensah, Picky. Remember? I explained that to you last time.”

  “Yeah, sorry, yeah, sorry, you did, yeah, sorry.” He stood there awkwardly for thirty seconds. “Ehm, sorry, Mrs no-longer-Mensah. I still need the loo.”

  She rolled her eyes and pointed to the door in the far corner. “If it’s a number one, you can go in there. If it’s a two, you’ll have to go down to the ground floor.”

  Picky’s head bobbed up and down. “It’s alright, I’m only looking for a piss.” He hurried through the door and locked it behind him.

  Louise looked over at Bunny again. “You’d think that given that the building is owned by a plumbing supply company, they’d be able to actually fix the plumbing.”

  Bunny went to say something, but Louise had already gone back to her screen.

  He’d been sat there for ten minutes, leafing through a copy of Woman’s Weekly, when the phone rang and Louise picked it up.

  “O’Leary, Mensah and Goldberg … Oh, hi, Cheryl … What?” Louise looked at the bathroom door, then back at Picky’s empty chair, and then back at the bathroom door again. “Oh, for God’s sake. I thought he’d been in there a while.” She moved across the room, opened the window and leaned outside. “Mr Gallagher, exactly what are you doing climbing down the drainpipe?”

  “I, ehm, I, sorry. I was … I just … I … fancied some air.”

  “Did you?” asked Louise, looking over her shoulder at Bunny.

  “Don’t look at me,” Bunny objected. “I just sat down. Hardly said two words to the lad.”

  Louise leaned back out of the window. “Only, I can’t help but notice, Mr Gallagher, that you’re looking a bit stuck.”

  “Yeah, yeah. You’re right,” said Picky. “To be honest with you, I sort of got out here and remembered I was afraid of heights.”

  Before Louise could respond, there was the sound of another window being opened below.

  “What the hell are you doing hanging off my drainpipe?”

  “Hello, Mr Reardon,” shouted Louise.

  “Oh, hello, Louise. Is this fella one of yours?” He didn’t sound happy.

  “He’s a potential client, yes. But he asked to use our toilet and may have found himself embarrassed due to its pathetically unfit-for-purpose flush capabilities.”

  “Here we go. For the last time, I’m going to fix it at the weekend.”

  “Is that right?” shouted Louise. “I’d be delighted to hear that, if you hadn’t told me the same thing every week for the last six.”

  “I think we’re getting off the point. There’s a man dangling off my drainpipe. That’s an AFT 20. It’s a fine bit of piping, but it’s not meant to handle that kind of a load. What are we going to do if he falls?”

  “Well,” said Louise, “I’d imagine Mr Gallagher here will sue the owners of the building, after finding himself in such a precarious situation owing to plumbing failures.”

  “Ah, here now – you can’t go blaming this on me.”

  “I can. And I am.”

  Just then, the door to the main office opened and out walked Kofi Mensah, with a young couple trailing in his wake. The man from the couple was holding a snow globe he almost certainly didn’t want.

  “Rest assured, Mr and Mrs Blake, everything will be taken care of. You have my word. I will just ask Louise to …”

  Kofi noticed Louise hanging out of the window. “Is everything OK?”

  “No,” she snapped. “Our toilet doesn’t flush properly.”

  Kofi laughed awkwardly and looked at the Blakes. “Well, I’m sure we can get that sorted out.”

  “It might be too late,” Louise called over her shoulder. “It may prove fatal.”

  Bunny didn’t need a demonstration of Kofi Mensah’s prodigious negotiating talents, but the next five minutes gave him one anyway. With a warm smile and a calm voice, Kofi managed to usher the Blakes on their way, coax Louise back to her desk, persuade Mr Reardon to close his window and get on with his day, and, with the help of an eight-foot teddy bear thrown down to act as an improvised crash mat, talk Picky Gallaher through a controlled descent that NASA would have been proud of. Having achieved all of that, he ushered Bunny into his office and closed the door.

  “Detective McGarry, to what do I owe this pleasure?”

  “Before we get to that – did I hear Louise say that you and her are no longer married?”

  Kofi took a seat behind his desk and indicated that Bunny should take the one opposite. “That is correct, yes.”

  “I’m very sorry to hear that.”

  “Oh, do not be. Divorce has saved our marriage.”

  “Excuse me?”

  Kofi leaned back in his chair. “We were not able to find a buyer for the house, so we still live together. In fact, because Louise’s mother has had to move in with us – owing to her hip – we are sharing the same bed.”

  “Oh right,” said Bunny. “Hang on, I’ve seen your house. You’ve got more than two bedrooms.”

  “That is correct. But one of the bedrooms is taken up with Louise’s crocheting and sewing equipment, and the box room h
as my train set in it.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I collect model trains.”

  Bunny shrugged. “It takes all sorts.”

  “Indeed. So you see, after some rigorous negotiation, Louise and I have come to suitable arrangements on many things. It has been far easier than if we were still married. And …” added Kofi, favouring Bunny with an exaggerated wiggle of his eyebrows, “… between us men of the world, Louise has taken to jumping me in a sexual manner at the most unusual of times. It is like living with a horny Cato from the Pink Panther movies.”

  “Right,” said Bunny, entirely at a loss as to how to respond to that particular piece of information.

  Kofi sat forward. “But you are not here to discuss my sex life, robust and healthy though it is. So, which of my clients is in trouble now?”

  “Ehm, that would be me.”

  Bunny’s revelation was met with raised eyebrows. “I wasn’t aware you were my client.”

  “I find myself in need of legal representation and, as members of the legal profession go, I’ve always found you to be the least offensive.”

  “Well, obviously I am flattered. But doesn’t the Garda Representative Association normally assist with such matters?”

  “I’m currently on sabbatical,” said Bunny. “This would be a private matter.”

  Kofi ran a hand over his neatly trimmed goatee. “I see. And may I ask, this matter wouldn’t involve any of my existing clients, would it?”

  “No.”

  He opened his desk drawer, took out a snow globe and placed it in front of Bunny. “In which case, I am delighted to have your business. There is just some paperwork we need to fill out.”

  Bunny raised his hand. “Before we get to that, I think it’s only fair that I tell you what you’ll be getting into.”

  Kofi shook his head. “That will not be necessary. It is my job to provide the highest standard of legal representation to anyone who requires it. And may I say that as members of law enforcement go, I’ve always found you to be the least offensive too.” He beamed a wide smile at Bunny, clearly pleased with himself.

  Bunny laughed. “Touché.”

  “Although, you did throw Darren Raker down the stairs.”