Bustle greeted Minogue in Bewley's restaurant. To be indoors was a relief from having to negotiate the crowded footpaths outside. Masses of people flowed from Grafton Street around by College Green, spilling out into the street. The crowds thickened further as they massed in Westmoreland Street, unwilling to test the reactions of drivers speeding down the quays by O'Connell Bridge. Double-decker busses wheeled across five traffic lanes in front of the entrance to Bewley's and screeched to a halt at their stops along the street. Lunatics on bicycles hurtled through the traffic and diesel fumes.
Safe inside the door, Minogue wondered where all the people came from. A huge proportion of the population was between eighteen and thirty-five-a fact unprecedented in Irish history-Minogue remembered from an otherwise dull and farcical debate on the telly.
Bewley's always smelled of burned coffee beans. The cafe had been gutted by fire several years back due to an over-zealous employee roasting beans in a hurry. So used to the smell of burnt coffee beans were the patrons, passers-by and employees, that a delay in alerting the fire-brigade ensued. Much of the restaurant had been destroyed as a result of this habituation.
Minogue eyed the self-serve section before slotting himself into the queue which was waiting for coffee. He spent little time on non-essentials, choosing an almondy-looking bun of irregular shape so that the coffee wouldn't lack for company as it hit his belly. The room was full of cigarette smoke, talk, dishes clashing, young people. Minogue glanced from the table, half-expecting to see an Iseult or a Daithi there. If Kathleen were with him now, she'd probably mutter darkly that it's in pubs he should look for Daithi, not Bewley's Oriental Cafe. Minogue's turn at the coffee came.
"A large white, if you please," he said to the girl.
She was working behind a brace of bulbous boilers which served to heat water and to build up steam for scalding the milk-which in turn became a constituent of white coffee. The whole apparatus reminded Minogue of a submarine, but he didn't know why.
The afternoon sun cast broad beams of coloured light through the stained-glass windows, dividing the room into several realms. Along with the wreaths of smoke, the effect of the light entranced Minogue. Here a blond heat! of hair afire with light from behind, there a group softly adumbrated. The patrons seemed to take their cues from the light which their placements afforded them. Those outside the direct light looked subdued. They smiled ruefully, distracted perhaps by the sight of the blazing angels who laughed and gestured in the full light nearby. Newspapers were up like flags at many tables. There were racehorses to second-guess, letters-to-the-editor to compose, births, deaths and bankruptcies to savour.
The girl doling out the coffees had a compact, determined face. Her expression suggested detachment from the din about her. The steam scalding the milk for Minogue's coffee burbled and hissed in the cup. He stole another glance at her profile. Maybe her ancestors were the Vikings that helped settle this shambles of a city and she had one of their axes ready behind the counter for the likes of a bogman interloper like Minogue. Irish: kings and queens all, lost entitlement. Did Combs, with the dry sense of humour, cotton onto that trait? Queenly? The woman was tired, Minogue's common sense reprimanded. She probably had to wait a half hour for the bus home.
"If you went on at the steam yoke for a bit long, you'd have the makings of a cappuccino" Minogue observed.
"A what?"
"It's a style of coffee that they favour in Italy. Oh, but you'd want to have strong coffee to start with. Espresso. Black stuff. Like tar, for all the world. There's the stuff that'd keep you up all night, I'm telling you."
"Jases, mister, I wouldn't want that," the girl intoned slowly. Minogue recognised a Dublin accent all right, along with the carnal import. Sleep was a very underrated form of birth control, he thought.
"The French are very partial to espresso on its own, I don't mind telling you," Minogue went on. "Yes, indeed. Myself and the wife were over there for a holiday and you'd see fellas standing by a counter knocking back an espresso. Out of a cup a bit bigger than a good-sized inkwell. In an instant, bang, down it goes. Then they leap out the door, back to whatever they were doing. High as kites, I'm thinking."
"Go way," said the girl, turning off the valve.
"It's a fact. You get used to it, I suppose, like anything. Am I right?"
She threw a damp cloth on the counter to wipe up a spray of milk.
"You're right there," she said.
"Thing is," Minogue went on, heartened by her approval, "I'd say there are people that are so used to it that they might wake up in the middle of the night squealing and bawling like a goose caught under the gate looking for a hit of espresso. Caffeine's a very powerful drug. Do you know what I'm saying?"
Minogue had not noticed the queue gathering behind him. He was relieved that yet again he could count on someone from the real world to unwittingly help dispel the gloom which had unexpectedly settled on him as he had walked to Bewley's. Thinking about Combs again. Had Combs ever patronised Bewley's? She left him the trace of a smile as she looked to the next in the queue.
The coffee did indeed perk Minogue up. Still, it took him only a few seconds of thinking to dismiss those three topers, the Mulvaney brothers, as distractions. The drink led them to their choleric behaviour and brought out an innate need to be disputatious. The only people they'd be killing, singularly or collectively, would be one another. The weapons used would be drink and pique and time and bitter memory.
Minogue sipped at his coffee again. He congratulated himself for keeping out of the way of vexatious interviews with the troglodyte Mulvaneys. Mulholland and Murtagh had interviewed two men with lengthy records for burglary. One, Malone, had a record of assaults to match. Neither of the two was a suspect yet. They were unconcerned that their alibis were being checked.
His thoughts let go of the Mulvaneys abruptly and ran to Daithi and Iseult. Then he sat up with a start: he was to bring home a cake this evening and he had nearly forgotten. Iseult's fella was coming for tea. As for Daithi, Minogue was more anxious. If Daithi couldn't get his exams this time… well, that wasn't the end of the world. But to persuade Kathleen of that…? Have a word with him, Matt. Bring him back to the fold. Like the other sheep?
Minogue had felt Kathleen's anxiety and anger keenly this last year. She wondered aloud if every parent saw their children grow into strangers. He wondered if life was the business that ensued when you were busy worrying about your irretrievably adult children going to pot. Kathleen probably remembered these two vaguely familiar adults as infants, those small snoring bodies that had kicked the bedclothes off and lay in battlefield poses in their beds. Have a word. Minogue almost smiled then: Kathleen asking the fox to mind the chickens.
Minogue did not feel despondent as he drained the cup. Daithi floundering, not sure of a future? Maybe the boy needed something tangible to kick against still. Minogue imagined a horse in a stall, the clear thud of a hoof on the planks, patient eyes: can't I get out and gallop in the field, master? So why couldn't Minogue be a parent like any other, a grit for his children to spin a pearl about? What practical use was a father who loved Daithi almost unbearably but who abjured too much of the dogma that their society had prepared a father to enact? Would Daithi and Kathleen be driven to wringing their hands, telling him that he was supposed to be doing something else, that he was supposed to be somebody else? Abstractions. Rubbish. It was Daithi's life. Minogue felt almost happy with his elbows on Bewley's marble table-top. Dublin: decay, scattered, alive.
He bought a cake with icing and a wafery thing on top. He was cautioned, as he took his change, to carry it upright. He took the Garda notice off the dash, returned the glares of two skinheads with a grin and drove down the quays toward Islandbridge.
Hoey was back from the wilds of Stepaside, waiting for him. He drew up a chair and sat by Minogue's desk.
"Keep your eyes off a the cake, Shea. It's spoken for," he murmured as he brought out the file from his drawer. "Now, aside from entertainment value, what of those three clowns, the Mulvaneys?" Minogue began.
"Pat Keating's on his way into town. He had an hour and a half with them. They have two people to vouch for them that night and nearly into Sunday morning, too. Playing cards and drinking. It's well for them that don't have to work for a living."
"Saturday night. They claim that Combs was provoking them with a remarks about the North and stuff like that. 'He called the lads cornerboys and scum,' " Hoey quoted from his notes.
"More luck to him for saying it," said Minogue without rancour. "Any of the three strike you as capable of doing something like a murder?"
Hoey shrugged.
"We interviewed them separately, sir. I suppose that Shag could be belligerent. But if the chips were down, though, they'd be mice, the whole pack of them. Shag was the one who went on about the homo bit. The other two didn't mention it."
"Homo?"
"Said it was common knowledge that Mr Combs was homosexual."
Minogue wondered if this devious Mulvaney was leading policemen down the garden path. Shag
Mulvaney wasn't one to care a whit about a man's reputation if it could be turned to advantage in making ujits out of the Gardai.
"They stayed in the pub after Combs left. All of them. Around nine, Combs left. The Mulvaneys were drinking goodo until closing time."
"Hmm. Say ten minutes for Mr Combs to get the car started and get back to his house. Nine fifteen," Minogue murmured. "Consistent with the pathology estimate…"
Hoey nodded.
"And you checked out their bona fides that night?" Minogue asked.
"Yes, sir. They were in a house the Sandyford end of Barnacullia. House owned and occupied by one Eoin Reilly and family. Reilly goes by the name of Chop. He is well known in the area. He's not a criminal. Reilly gives Shag and The Bronc occasional work as labourers at quarrying or as mason's helpers."
Hoey went on to give Minogue the gist of his own interview with Shag. Minogue half-listened. He hoped that Keating had more than this. Each of the brothers had signed statements accounting for themselves on the Saturday evening.
"What about that mountain of junk around their house? The shed?"
"We had over three hours while they were at the station, sir. Nothing. The boys went through the place good and thorough," Hoey said, not bothering to conceal his weariness.
Curly, Byronic Keating shambled in by Bills' desk. He saw Hoey and Minogue. He looked at his watch as if to stave off the four o'clock meeting. Minogue read the gesture to mean that Keating had nothing better than Hoey. Chasing after straws. As he passed the smoking Eilis, Keating confided what Minogue guessed was a remark with amorous overtones to her. With the expression of a tired croupier who was used to impoverished amateurs, Eilis batted her eyes but once at Keating before smiting him.
"Come back when you're grown up, Pat Keating."
Minogue held up his hand. Hoey stopped reciting.
"Lads. Get yourselves tea or something. There'll be a briefing in ten minutes," Minogue said sharply.
He watched the two detectives leave. Jimmy would have been proud of me, he thought, laying down the law. He had admitted to himself that the first stages of the investigation and the concomitant up-down of the detectives' hopes were played out now. Hoey, more experienced than Keating, had been more circumspect, knowing not to raise false hopes. It was now necessary to make a break with expectations of a quick and ready resolution and get down to slogging over details.
Minogue ruminated again on Shag's declaration that Combs was homosexual. Bad enough that Combs had called the IRA "heroes" in a tone that even the Mulvaneys could detect was sarcastic, but to be a nancy-boy. He looked up to find Eilis by his desk. Behind her were three of the Gardai Minogue had met that morning.
"Well lads, four o'clock is it? Will ye go with Eilis here and I'll be in, in a minute?" spacebarthing
By five o'clock Minogue understood that the murder of Mr Combs would stay an enigma for some time today and tonight and tomorrow. And probably the day after that, too. He wished Murtagh would stop talking. Murtagh had very bad breath indeed. Murphy's Law had Murtagh unconsciously edging closer to Minogue as Minogue drew back from the rancid smell. Minogue had to give up before being trapped against the wall. He was now breathing through his mouth.
"Malone says it has to be new boys," Murtagh was saying. Malone had an alibi. He had been in bed with his brother's wife in Inchicore. His brother was doing time for car theft.
"Malone's all right for Saturday and Sunday. He's of the opinion that only lunatics would do a house on a Saturday night. He says drugs."
"Very helpful of him," said Minogue wearily. "He means city thugs, I suppose."
"That's the gist of it, I think-"
"Local though," Minogue interrupted. "Someone local had to hear about or know about Combs. Knew he lived alone, might have a few shillings around the house. Has to be local."
"There's the Mulvaneys, sir. Their stories might leak yet," Murtagh tried to inject some enthusiasm. "And some fellas in or around Sandyford used to do houses. Stepaside are doing them now. I have the names here…"
Minogue copied four names.
"Wait a minute, sir. Sorry. Driscoll says the last one, that Molloy, he's in England since Christmas. Nix him…"
"And was it yourself that got the statements off the neighbours?"
"Yes, sir. Me and Driscoll. Driscoll and I, yes."
"There's the matter of Mr Combs' sexual orientation we can't be ignoring," said Minogue.
He saw weary curiosity in all the faces save Keating's. Keating was chewing the end of his pencil. The lead didn't seem to be affecting his brain yet. He stretched one arm out in search of additional comfort to prolong his slouch. Minogue addressed Murtagh.
"Sean. We need photos of Mr Combs; get personnel to go to various pubs with them. I mean pubs where gay people go."
Murtagh rubbed at his nose.
"Do you know which ones I'm talking about?"
Keating couldn't contain his smile any longer.
"Like the back of your hand, Seanie, am I right?" he said. One of the district detectives laughed aloud.
"Fuck you and all belonging to you, Pat Keating," said a blushing Murtagh. "I'll put money that it's your name and number I'll find on the wall of the jacks in that class of pub. And the price listed, too."
More laughter.
"We may be looking for a young lad who turned turk on Mr Combs after a pick-up, don't you know," said Minogue. Murtagh nodded solemnly. Minogue saw Hoey look at his watch again. Taking the hint, he delegated to Hoey the task of going to Stepaside station the next morning to co-ordinate the second interviews both in Kilternan and in Glencullen.
"I'll hear from ye during the day," Minogue said.
Minogue nodded toward the district detectives from Stepaside. He visualised them returning home later and enlarging upon their meeting with members of the Murder Squad. Excitement. Drama. Tall tales.
"I'm obliged to ye for coming in, all of ye. It's no small matter to be running around and taking statements like ye did today. Ye've laid great foundations, I'm sure," Minogue said above the screech of scraping chair-legs on the linoleum.
He remained seated, watching the policemen leave the room. He had been more embarrassed by his little morale speech than by the plain fact that they still knew next to nothing about Combs' life. It was almost two full days since the man had been murdered. He looked at the card which Eilis had left on his desk.
Along with a long telephone number, the card also had Inspector Newman's address-down to his room number-with the London Metropolitan Police. The card mutely informed Minogue that Newman was the head of a section called C11 in C Department, the office which travelled under the agreeable name of International Liaison. Would this crowd be working after five o'clock, though?
It took Minogue but a half minute to hear a man's voice announce himself as Inspector Newman. The accent made a funny "r" at the end of his rank, not an accent that Minogue expected. Not like Alec Guinness in The Bridge on the River Kwai, for example.
"Detective Sergeant Minogue calling from Dublin, Inspector. I'm in the Investigation Section of the Gardai here. The Murder Squad, that is. I'm calling on behalf of Inspector Kilmartin. He's indisposed at the moment…" Minogue paused to allow Newman to digest his intro. Should he tell him that Jimmy had his arse in a sling?
"Yes, I know Inspector Kilmartin. And you're…?"
Minogue repeated his name.
"We're looking to a murder here, Inspector. A citizen of the United Kingdom. He last lived in London. A place called Wood Green. Am I making sense?"
Newman said that he was.
"Mr Combs. Mr Arthur Combs. Will I spell it?"
"Honey — C-O-M-B?"
"The very thing. Do you want a date of birth and the like?"
Newman said "righto" each time he recorded details. Recounting those details, Minogue wondered at what meagre things these accoutrements of a life were. A middle name, a height, a weight, a job. All pegs to keep you rooted while life buffeted you, its gusts and lulls alternately testing the pegs. Finally to have a lid closed over you, cold in the earth.
Minogue told him that the Gardai had not assigned a motive for the murder. He did not tell him that the other two of the policeman's morbid trinity-opportunity and resources-were as wide as a barn door with the wind whistling through. Mr Combs had been strangled rather expertly by a person or persons who had been waiting for him as he entered the kitchen door of his house. The Gardai would be glad of Newman's help in furnishing information about Mr Combs before he came to live in Ireland, and after too, if that was to be had. Newman said that he would do what he could. Minogue liked the sound of that. Inland Revenue, army service, would that be a start? Minogue said that would be a great start. Would the Inspector be needing written requests to get it going? He would not. Then he surprised Minogue.
"What kind of weather have you in Dublin?"
Newman pronounced the name of the capital city as if there were a hyphen in the middle, much as a respectful traveller might try to say "Zambesi" without offending the sensibilities of tribesmen leaning on their spears nearby.
"Oh, it's very nice, you'd love it," Minogue said. He had guessed right from the accent. Newman was no sooty Londoner but one of God's chosen, a countryman like himself.
Newman paused.
"Well, that's very nice," he said finally.
"It certainly is. We get buckets of rain here by times, summer or winter. The bit of dry weather does wonders for the morale," Minogue enthused.
"Ay, ay. I'll have an officer start a file on it, and you can call on that when you need it, too," Newman said.
"That'd be great. Yes."
Minogue replaced the receiver and clapped his hands. They weren't bad lads over there at all. Maybe Kilmartin had him over here on a golfing holiday or something, that Newman was so helpful. He glanced at his watch. Holy God: twenty after five. Hoey and Keating could hold the fort and show off all they'd learned off Jimmy Kilmartin. Damn: forgot to phone the same Jimmy…
C had completed the requisite number of patrols, mixed in with the odd full circuit of the room, to whatever end he alone knew, Kenyon guessed. Now he was seated with his legs crossed at the knee. He had taken but a few drags at a second cigarette before leaving it to smoulder. The smell of the burning filter was distasteful to Kenyon. He stole another glance at the balding, basilisk C. Some of the senior staff called him F. Hand-in-hand with his eccentricities, the current Director had the reputation of being a vengeful bully.
"So: find if this Combs committed any gripes to writing," C declared as a question.
"Writing or perhaps tape," replied Kenyon.
"Tape, file, dossier," C murmured. "Would this Combs have secreted material with someone else?"
"There's a possibility, sir," Kenyon answered quickly. "But it just doesn't make sense that Combs' grievances dried up when Ball became his handler. I strongly believe that Combs was at the end of his tether. He may have felt that he had nothing to lose."
"But Combs didn't issue any threats this last while," C stated.
"True, sir. But at the very least, Combs may have made some record. Named names."
"Low-level intelligence work," C murmured. "You don't say. Do we call it that because it was done in Ireland?"
Kenyon mustered a polite smile.
"Bloody burkes," added C. Neither Kenyon nor Robertson needed to wonder if it was the Foreign Office his remark addressed.
"And we have to pick up the bits after these brainwaves… Yes. Tape, file dossier," C murmured again. "It's altogether too like a bloody sordid little treasure hunt or something."
He turned to Kenyon.
"You know now that Hugh and I have had this pot heating before we looked to you for a fresh appraisal?"
Kenyon nodded.
"The most problematic part will be that bloody miserable island of nutters next door to us. Murphy's Law, home of. How do you plan to do business in Dublin with this? You're willing to act on the theory that Combs put something by locally, right?"
"Yes, sir. He may have believed that we had his post screened, too…"
"Was this Combs' thing picked as a complete fiction then? How much cardboard is behind this character? Will it hold up?"
"I think it will," Kenyon took up the question. "As long as there's no leak from our level. We held the death certificate _when Arthur Combs died, so the Irish police will get the goods from the Met here and it'll be bona fide. I have an alert with them if anyone inquires after Combs. Nothing from the Irish police yet. Combs was sixty-seven when he died, six years ago. Not married, no family either. Retired Customs Inspector. One of Six's better fits, I have to admit," Kenyon said.
"No one there in Ireland he'd pour out his heart to?" C persisted. He seemed to Kenyon to be talking to himself.
"Seems not, sir. He had a more general or, shall I say, abstract attachment."
"Meaning?"
"The business about local history there. Old artefacts, ruins, things like that."
"Bit of an old ruin himself, come to think of it," a mirthlessly sarcastic C murmured.
"You're relying on D notices and the Secrets Acts to tame our journalistic friends should they receive anonymous parcels of notes from Ireland?" C challenged.
"Yes, sir. They'd cough up, I'm sure," Kenyon tried to sound confident. Robertson cleared his throat, a cue for Kenyon to get to the main course.
"I believe that we can best get out of the Irish, er, bog, sir, if we insert a man who can legitimately go over Combs' place, his effects. A good sweeper."
Kenyon returned Robertson's glance before dropping the log.
"And with our man there straight away, the need for a joint op with anybody, even Six and the Foreign Office, would obviously be close to nil."
"Obviously," C intoned, again close to sarcasm. "We're not discussing something like the Immaculate Conception here, are we now, chaps? The Micks are hardly going to fall for a long-lost-relative-showing-up routine."
Kenyon sidestepped the leaden mirth.
"Combs' estate is a problem, sir. To be disposed of, the estate needs an agent. Has to be probated."
C snorted faintly.
"Somebody say agent, eh, Hugh?" He looked to Robertson and graced him with a rare grin. Kenyon continued.
"A lawyer. Combs has no will, I believe. Foreign Office worked up a pension for him years ago, and the bank source it as a pension from Customs and Excise.
He also had an annuity. That part of his income comes through a small merchant bank here in the city. They list it as income from stocks. We can surely work up a lawyer to represent either bank involved," Kenyon flourished with a rhetorical lilt.
C was nodding his head lightly.
"Rather elegant solution, James. You'd want to cull some legal type from our own fold here, I take it."
"Ideally, sir. Should have had some field training."
"Find someone, then. Cite my authorisation to hive off this person from what he's doing at the moment. I'll give it priority. Put the fear of a Presbyterian God in the fellow to keep his cards close to his chest. Someone who can get around the police there, maybe listen in on their investigation?"
"That would be quite a coup, sir," Kenyon said.
Kenyon made a mental note of the inquiry which had come through to Newman in the Metropolitan Police. The Garda's name was Minogue, a sergeant. He thought the name looked familiar, but the more he tried to recall where he had seen or head it before, the less he was sure of ever having known it.
Returning to his office after the meeting, Kenyon had felt his elation being swallowed in the maw of anxiety. He had graduated to despondency within the last few minutes. As Kenyon was stepping out of Robertson's car, the door still ajar, Robertson had looked out under the roof at him. Kenyon crouched by the open door. Why did he still feel that Robertson was leaving him out on a limb?
"Keep me posted, James?"
Bowers was propped in front of the terminal.
"Find me somebody, would you? Two people, actually. I need a man in the Service, someone with a legal background and some field training. Let me think, was there somebody a few years back that…"
Kenyon realised that it was six o'clock and that was why he wasn't firing on all cylinders. He'd phone home before going out for supper.
"… Knows something about Ireland, if you can. Get me a list of eligibles. I need this fast. I'm staying on duty for the evening. Can you?"
Bowers detected the tension in Kenyon. He said he could.
"The second chap, sir?"
"Oh, that's a different matter. It's by the way. I seem to remember his name a few years ago, too. An Irish copper, Minogue. Forget it until we've found our own man."
Bowers' face took on a puzzled expression. Kenyon noticed his bewilderment as he was elbowing off the door-frame.
"Some incident a few years back. More than three, let's say, if my memory is sound. We'll be working near him, so I'd like to size him up." spacebarthing
Iseult's wooer, Pat Muldoon, was over six feet tall. His clothes were black again today, save for a dark grey shirt which was not ironed and not meant to be ironed. A long face on him and a bony nose, missing two days' shaving but with lively eyes atop. The eyes were blessed-virgin blue, with a touch of mockery not far behind them. During the tea, Minogue felt he was sitting next to a priest. Pat never laughed outright but smiled enough and gave considered nods of his head. Minogue was a little nervous. Iseult was very animated. She was on guard against lulls in the talk, filling in details which Pat sometimes forgot. What Pat really means, what Pat is getting at…
"He got first in his class last year, so he did. Didn't you, Pat?" Iseult enthused. Kathleen's eyes widened in approval. Pat looked up under his eyebrows as he worked the rind off a rasher, as though to remonstrate with her. Iseult beamed. Kathleen made herself busy with her knife and fork. Was her subconscious leading her to toy with the cutlery, the better to drive away a suitor to her overloved daughter? Minogue wondered.
"Da worships the sun, don't you, Da?" Iseult said guilelessly.
"And the moon and the stars," he said, feeling his cheeks redden. "A bit of everything."
"More luck to you," said Pat. "Nice sermons, I'd say."
Everyone laughed. Pat was studying psychology. When Kathleen had asked before, he allowed that it was very interesting. Was there anything in particular? He liked experimental psychology. Minogue thought about rats with wires attached to their heads.
Kathleen stabbed the Bewley's cake and apportioned slices to the plates stacked by her side. The sun was peeping around the back of the house now. It was Minogue's time of day. He could almost feel his planet turning. Daithi plugged the kettle in and remained leaning on the edge of the sink. No one spoke. The chairs had been pushed back from the table. Birds called out to one another from the garden. Minogue stole a look at the faces around the table. Kathleen was smoothing an imaginary fold in the tablecloth. As his gaze swept by Iseult, she winked at him. Her face seemed bigger. It was entirely possible that his faculties were declining with age, he thought. Damn it, he thought then, her face was glowing. She must have fallen for this lad. The kettle whispered. Minogue looked over to Daithi. He was fidgeting, restless. No doubt he'd want to go out tonight and have a few jars with his cronies. Kathleen had now joined her hands under her chin, elbows on the table.
"Here, Da. Tell us a bit about Paris," Iseult said. She turned to Pat.
"The pair of them are like love-birds so they are, Pat. They up and went to Paris a few years ago."
"To see the sights," Kathleen insisted.
"Some sights you'd see there, too, I'm sure," Iseult taunted. "And they wouldn't take their only daughter to give her a bit of culture. The meanness of it."
"Do you know, Pat," Kathleen countered by turning to the one who might well steal her daughter, "maybe you know something from your studies, but why is it that children turn contrary and get to being punishments for their parents?"
"I don't know, Mrs Minogue," from a diplomatic Pat.
"Here now," Minogue rose from the table, "if ye are really interested in talking about Paris, there's only one proper way to do that."
"And how's that, may I ask?" Kathleen inquired.
"With a bottle of anise and a few tumblers. You bring up the tea if you want, and we'll lay waste the rest of that cake, too," Minogue said, rubbing his hands. "We'll away up to the end of the garden and catch the last of the sun. Now, where's the tape-recorder? We'll bring up your man Offenbach and a bit of Chopin. Who in their right minds wants to be indoors on a summer's evening?"
A Dublin-born Daithi rolled his eyes at the vagaries of a bogman father.
"To hell with poverty, we'll kill a hen!" said Minogue.
The batteries on the tape-recorder died after twenty minutes.
"I thought that Offenbach sounded a bit off-colour," Minogue remarked indolently as he watched Kathleen walking up the garden toward them. She stopped by the rhubarb, toed something delicately in the clay, and continued her slow walk. My wife, I'm her husband, he thought. He had watched her at mass on Sundays for years, her head bowed after communion, eyes closed in prayer. A fine-looking woman.
The sun leaned into the garden now, lighting up the shrubs and branches from the side. Iseult was fidgeting.
Minogue poured more Marie Brizard. He could think of nothing to say. Kathleen was helloing a neighbour across the wall. Then she stood by the garden chair where Minogue was dishing out the anisette. Pat, formerly quiescent with the food and drink, led with a high card.
"You're County Clare, aren't you, Mr Minogue?"
"Absolutely," Minogue affirmed. He raised his glass. Iseult sniggered. Pat raised his glass the length of his arm. Had Iseult primed Pat?
"A hundred and one percent," Minogue added with feeling.
"I heard recently what a Clareman's idea of heaven was, you know," he continued.
"Tell us so," said Minogue.
"Cork beat, the hay saved and a girl in Lisdoonvarna."
Even Daithi laughed. Kathleen and Iseult poked each other, laughing both.
"You should be on the stage," Kathleen said to Pat. She was standing behind Iseult now, absent-mindedly patting the dark hair that fell on Iseult's shoulders. Iseult didn't notice. In Minogue's uncodified religion, Kathleen's gestures had the force of a transfiguration. For several seconds the garden and the orange wash of the sun, the smiles, the smell of clay, the birdsong fell away from him. It will be very hard on Kathleen if this Pat fella does win her, Minogue thought.
"The next stage leaves town at eight," Iseult said.
Minogue was thinking that the unconscious was too strong a force in life entirely when he heard Daithi calling from the kitchen window. He walked down the lawn and entered the kitchen. Daithi was doing the dishes and that gave Minogue pause to wonder. Perhaps the boy was washing his hands in advance of some divilment later on tonight. Neurotic. A girl?
"Phone, Da. It's from work," Daithi murmured.
It was Hoey.
"Sorry to disturb you at home, sir. Stepaside station phoned. Driscoll. They have a fella that maybe we'd be wanting to talk to. A fella that was snooping around Mr Combs' place, like."
"Yes, go on."
Minogue believed his anisette breath would surely stick to the phone like spray paint.
"It was by chance that someone saw him going up the lane. He went into a field and then came back up to the house and started looking in the windows. He tried to get in the door, too."
"Did he try to make off with anything? Use any force trying to get into the house?"
"No, sir."
"Who is he?"
"He's a tinker, sir. He calls himself Michael Joseph Joyce. He's living in a caravan down the back of Loughlinstown somewhere. He has a lot of drink on him and he's not inclined to be very direct with answers."
"Did he resist being brought to the station or that class of thing?"
"No, sir. He was spotted fiddling with a horse in a field belonging to Combs."
"Right, of course. That's it," Minogue said.
"That's what?"
"The horse. I knew there was something I was trying to remember. When I saw the horse, I was wondering who'd be feeding it now that Combs was gone. The horse was tethered up to the gate."
"That's what Joyce said he was about. The arresting Guard wasn't impressed with that one, I'm afraid."
"Hold on there a minute. You said 'arrest.'"
"The Guards here told him that he was under arrest for trespassing. Just to keep him in and question him, sir. They'll keep him overnight so we can see him in the morning. No harm will come of him staying over. You can go straight to Stepaside in the morning, sir. When Joyce is sober, you see."
Minogue noticed the tentative tone in Hoey's voice now.
"Look it, Shea. We can't be locking people up overnight, especially a traveller. It's a fright to God to travelling people to be confined. I don't want us to be giving testimony at an inquest as to why some poor divil woke up in the middle of the night and hung himself. To quote Jimmy Kilmartin, we're not a banana republic. Yet, anyway."
"I know what you're saying," Hoey answered slowly. '‹ "Here. I'll call Stepaside and I'll tell them myself."
"Ah no. It's all right, I'll phone them back myself," Hoey said.
Minogue delayed by the telephone, distracted by the sweet burn of the anisette at the back of his throat. A traveller, tinker. Combs and drinking. A homosexual? Couldn't ignore it. But so squalid an end? Daithi opened the kitchen door.
"I'll be in early," he said.
Daithi seemed relieved. Perhaps it was because he didn't have to face Kathleen who would have pressed questions on him.
"Oh," Minogue shook himself out of his thoughts. Daithi turned quickly as though expecting a rebuke.
"Did I leave a tenner for you under the toothbrushes? Go up and take a look, would you? Maybe I left it under the clock in the kitchen, though. That's old age for you, the first signs. Try upstairs like a good man, would you?"
Daithi's face lifted. He sprang at the first few steps. Too proud to ask for a few bob. As stubborn as an ass. Must have got that from his mother's side. Minogue found a ten-pound note in his pocket and left it under the clock. He stepped down into the garden then, finding that the planet's tilt had raised the sunlight to the tree-tops. The edges of the sky were already primrose. A breeze stirred the poplars next door. Their leaves' soft clacking sounded like the sea. He heard Iseult laugh. He'd have to tell Kathleen about the extra pocket money, he knew, and why he had given it to Daithi if he thought there was a chance he'd be buying pints with it. We're only human, he'd tell her. Would she believe him?
He went outside again. He listened for a while to Pat explaining conditioning in the higher animals. Primates. Weren't cardinals called primates? Even Iseult kept a respectful silence. Then he walked arm-in-arm with Kathleen through the darkening garden. She stopped by the kitchen door. He yanked on her arm.
"If they wanted to smooch and carry on, they can do it anytime," he said. "It's not like we never did it."
"You were all right in that department," Kathleen murmured, not willing yet to release the smile. Minogue, a pagan, kissed his Christian wife.
"And I didn't have to get you all excited talking about monkeys and electrodes, did I?" he said, grasping her tighter.