Death at Christy Burke's (35 page)

“Things are heating up, at least for somebody, now that they’ve found the vandal rotting in his grave. The guards are on the move.”

As well they should be
, thought Brennan,
with a murder on their hands
.

If this caused Finn any anxiety, there was no sign of it in his face or in his eyes, which were, as usual, obscured from view behind his dark glasses.

The town crier went on, “They were spotted in the Bleeding Horse last night. The gardaí. Twice. Place was jammed but all they did was look around and leave. Didn’t question anybody. That says to me” — McCrum stopped and took a sip of his drink — “that they were looking for somebody in particular. Somebody they expected to find at the Horse but didn’t, because the fellow wasn’t there. Making himself scarce, perhaps.”

“Or perhaps just not there,” Tim Shanahan replied mildly.

“Or perhaps,” Eddie Madigan put in, “the guards had a thirst on them, but then they saw Superintendent O’Higgins planted on a bar stool and giving them the eye, so they scarpered.”

“Twice though, Eddie?” Blair McCrum replied.

“Sure you’ve got me stumped there, Blair.”

“Who do you think they were after at the Bleeding Horse?” Jimmy O’Hearn asked.

“I have my theories,” McCrum answered, “but I’ll wait for the evidence.”

“Since when?” O’Hearn muttered into his pint.

But McCrum seemed not to have heard. He resumed his speculations. “In the meantime they’ll be looking for traces of whoever it was — whoever did the murder. They say a killer never gets away without leaving something behind.”

“Yeah, in this case, a pair of bullets left behind in the fellow’s noggin,” Madigan remarked.

“No, you know what I mean, Eddie. Threads or hairs, something like that, transferred onto the body. Remember that murder that was solved because the victim had been tied up in the killer’s truck or his garden shed, or whatever it was, and the guards solved it because they found fertilizer on the victim’s clothes?”

“I might fertilize my pants too if I was tied up in a shed with some yobbo holding a gun to my head.”

“There’s no talking to you, Eddie, and you an ex-guard; you should be telling us all about these things, not me telling you.”

“I’ll leave it to you, Blair. I’m retired.”

“Well, I’m convinced they’ve got a lead. They’ll have someone in the nick before the week’s out. And the news has travelled across the sea.” Whatever he had been holding when he came in he was now waving around. “Finn, I know you have a video player here. I’ve seen it on occasion. You might want to dust it off for us now.”

“What for?”

“I have a tape to play for youse. Finn, you’re famous.” Finn clearly didn’t like the sound of that. “Well, you’re not, but Christy’s is. Go get the yoke and set it up for us, Finn. You’ll see. And I’m warning youse. You’ll not like what you hear!”

Not surprisingly, the patrons expressed their determination to watch whatever the blathering arsehole had with him. Finn, with obvious reluctance, went into the back and returned with the equipment. He set it up, and McCrum handed him the tape.

“This is a comedy routine,” McCrum explained. “The fellow comes on late at night and pokes fun at the day’s news. It’s a British program my nephew always tapes. Normally I don’t bother with it, but he put me on to this episode. Roll the film, Mr. Burke!”

Finn pressed play, and a young man appeared on a stage. He had kind of a foolish rubbery face on him, but that would be an asset in a comic. He was talking about death. He spoke in a Cockney accent until he got to the subject of Ireland, at which point he switched to a stage-Irish brogue.

“And speakin’ of death. Our Irish friends across the water are big on death. And I can say this, ’cause I’m half Oirish meself, so I am, begorrah and begob! Admit it, all you Paddies out there. You love it when somebody croaks their last. Ever been to an Irish wake? Party! Party! Party! But you can’t just die; you have to die right. Worst thing an Irishman can say to another Irishman is ‘May yeh die roarin’ for a priest!’ Worst case scenario for yer Paddy, dyin’ without the priest. Anyway, listen to this. According to a news item out of Dublin today, this bloke died because he disrespected his local pub! Oh, they take their drinking holes seriously over there! Dead serious. The bloke apparently got himself murdered. Why? Because he messed up the walls of the pub, put a little bit of graffiti on there. Can’t you picture it? The man is tanked to the gills in his favourite shebeen and he’s doin’ some thinkin’, and he says to Pat and Mike at the bar, ‘Sure, this place could use a coat of paint, sure it could! What do youse all think of that?’ But the other boozehounds, they don’t want the place painted. They like it just the way it is. Don’t be making changes to an Irishman’s pub; you could get yourself killed. And that’s what happened to this guy. He stumbles out of the pub, decides to do a bit of a paint job himself, puts a message on the place for the rest of them, shag the lot of them, and they kill him for it! Word is, the coppers over there think it’s one of the pub regulars that done him in. I been there, I can believe it! But it’s not as bad as it sounds. If it’s like every other Oirish pub I’ve ever been in, there was probably a priest or two on the premises supplementing their meagre allowance of communion wine, so maybe Father O’Toole was on hand to answer the victim’s roaring before he breathed his last!

“And the Eyetalians. Death is big on their agenda too. Ever see the old crones all in black? You see one of them coming, it’s-a lights out, Tony! Well, the news out of Sicily today is that —”

Finn snapped the tape off. “Fuckin’ maggot!”

Frank Fanning was outraged. “They’ll be voting him in as prime minister next. That little Tan bastard is just saying what they all think: the Irish sit around all day and drink till they’re spiflicated!”

If anyone thought this was an odd remark from one of Dublin’s most renowned pintmen, someone who sat in a pub every afternoon and evening of his life, pouring Guinness down his throat and getting spiflicated himself, nobody let on.

A couple of other men looked ready to punch somebody in the mouth. An Irish pub was no place to be calling the Irish down as drunks. Jimmy O’Hearn looked perturbed. Tim Shanahan, too, looked unhappy. The priest in him, perhaps, taking umbrage at the callous way a man’s death had been turned into fodder for the television audience.

Eddie Madigan, though, seemed to find it all rather droll. “If youse think the man is full of shite about us, stand up for your principles: take the pledge! Go off with the monks and come back cured.” He raised his pint and downed it. “A refill for this Paddy, my good man, or may yeh die roarin’ for a priest! Not a problem in this place, though, Finn. Fathers Shanahan and O’Flaherty are on permanent assignment here, and I believe I saw your nephew, Father Burke, offering the sacraments behind the bar not long ago.”

Finn belted the video machine and grabbed the tape when it came out. He shoved it at Blair McCrum without a word and busied himself behind the bar. McCrum moved off to a table near the window, where he could survey the comings and goings in the street.

Michael

The admittedly daffy notion to expand the investigation beyond the Irish Sea got a boost early Monday afternoon, when Monty called Michael with another bit of information about the shyster, Carey Gilbert.

“I was thinking again about the English lawyer.”

“Oh, yes. You found out he had left the country and had not been heard from again.”

“Right. But I wondered whether he had set up shop somewhere else.”

“Why he’d ever have to work again, I don’t know. He could be living like a lord off his ill-gotten gains. If he’s still among the living!”

“Well, his name didn’t come up as a partner in any law firm. But I looked at the directories listing practising lawyers in the Commonwealth and the United States. There are two lawyers named Carey Gilbert. By a process of elimination, I finally tracked our Carey down. Alive and well and working in Toronto.”

Relief descended upon Michael. The lawyer hadn’t been murdered after all. Of course he hadn’t. Michael scolded himself for letting his imagination get the better of him. “He’s in Canada?”

“Yes. He’s an associate in a large firm on Bay Street.”

“An associate.”

“Right. Not, or not yet, a partner in the firm.”

“Hiding his light under a bushel perhaps.”

“Perhaps. But why don’t you ask him yourself?”

“What? Call him, you mean?”

“Hop on the boat and go see him.”

“Boat to where?”

“Old Blighty. He’s visiting his mum, in a place called Huntingdon, for a bit of a holiday. I called his firm, and his secretary told me that much. Didn’t give me the address or number, of course, but if the mother is Mrs. Gilbert, you may be able to smoke him out. Better not leave it too long, though; he’s due back in Toronto on August eighth. This is what? The third.”

“Can’t leave today though! And it takes the better part of a day to get there. But what do you think, Monty? Are you really saying I should go see him, or are you just winding me up?”

“If you want my honest opinion, I’d strongly advise you to stay out of it, Mike. If this guy is a shyster, a fraud artist, a crook, you’re not going to get anything out of him, so what could you possibly gain by confronting him? It sounds to me as if you’ve gone as far as you can go with this. We know he wasn’t murdered. I commend you on your investigative powers, Sergeant, but it might be time to close the file and move on to your next case.”

Brennan

“Shall I affect a regional dialect?” the MacNeil asked her fellow conspirators in a very creditable posh British accent.

“Perfect,” Brennan replied. “Go ahead.”

They had all gathered in Brennan’s room Monday afternoon for the phone call to the questionably existent Abigail in London.

MacNeil spent a few minutes on the line obtaining the number of the Public Record Office. Then she made her call. “Good afternoon. I’m hoping to reach a person who assisted me some years ago in your office.”

“Good move,” Monty whispered, “checking to see if she was there years ago.”

MacNeil continued, “I believe her name was Abigail, though I’m not absolutely certain of that. Lovely. Thank you.” She gave her co-conspirators a thumbs-up.

Michael said, “She exists!” Then, concerned, “What’s Maura going to say?”

“Have no fear, Michael,” Brennan assured him. “She’s never at a loss for words.”

They fell silent and gave their full attention to the telephone.

“Yes? Abigail? I don’t know whether you’ll remember me or not. My name is Blythe Badgely-Venables.”

Brennan had to make a conscious effort not to snort with laughter.

“Rather a mouthful, I know, and you may not recall the name. But perhaps you’ll have some recollection of the assistance you afforded me. It would have been four or five years ago. I was inquiring about a man my grandfather had in his employ. Did work about the grounds. Simple sort of fellow by the sound of it, not all there. Sad. Collins was his name.”

Brennan smiled across the room at poor Collins.

“There was a scandal. Something to do with the animals, something ghastly, well, the less said the better. And the poor devil had to be dismissed. Those were harsher times, and I’ve always wondered what became of him. He had a cottage full of children. But pardon me for running on. I had asked you back then about the poorhouse records. Does any of this sound familiar? No? Well, of course, why should it? I can only imagine the number of requests you get in the run of a week. What’s that? It was in, uh, Staffordshire. Oh! Blurton, did you say? Splendid! I’ll look into it. Thank you so much, Abigail. Cheerio!”

She hung up and faced the men in triumph. Retaining her British speech patterns, she announced, “Abigail Howard is alive and well and working in the Public Record Office and was doing so five years ago. And Collins,” she added, giving him a pitying look, “you might find records of your family’s unfortunate stay in the Blurton Poorhouse. Lovely word, isn’t it? Blurton. Suits you to a T, I daresay.”

Brennan began the applause, and everyone joined in.

“Well done, Blythe!” he enthused in an accent matching hers. “Smashing performance!”

“Now what?” she said in her normal voice.

“After all that, we can hardly just leave her there,” said Michael. “She’s a resource waiting to be tapped. Now that we know she’s real, we may have to give some credit to Motor Mouth McCrum for having at least part of the story right. I say we go over and meet her,” he urged them.

“We can’t gang up on her,” MacNeil warned. “One or two of you go, and see what you can find out. And you’ll need a cover story.”

“I don’t suppose,” Brennan said, “that she’ll fall for Collins getting released from Blurton at this late date.”

“I’d say not. She sounded very bright, very precise, and well-spoken.”

“Did she sound like a temptress?” Monty asked.

“Not to me, but then, who knows what wiles she’ll use on you lot?”

“All right,” Monty said, “Brennan and Michael —”

“Oh, not me, Monty,” Michael demurred. “If there’s a cover story, I’d never be able to pull it off. I’m not a good liar at all.”

“We believe you, Mike,” Brennan said.

“Okay. Monty and Brennan go as plumber and seducer, or in some other capacity. You guys figure it out.”

“Here’s the story,” Monty declared. “And it only requires Brennan. Two of us would look as if we’re tag-teaming her. Brennan goes in dressed, not as a lounge lizard but as a plainclothes detective.” He turned to Michael. “Are you sure you want to duck this assignment, Sergeant O’Flaherty?”

“It pains me to admit it, but I’m sure. Besides, I think she’d suspect I’m a few years past retirement age for a copper. We’ll unleash Brennan on her. If she gets out of line, as she may have done with Madigan, Brennan has a more intimidating persona than I could ever work up myself!”

“And,” MacNeil put in, “if she tries her feminine wiles on him, Father Burke will be immune to all that, saintly priest of God that he is. That’s why we can’t send Monty. He’d only lie down on the job.”