Silence (16 page)

Walsh claimed that Major Hannon had arrived in South Armagh in the late 1970s. His name became known to Republican sources when two IRA men admitted to working as British Intelligence agents with Hannon as their leader. Walsh suggested that Hannon had then been forced to flee the country as he had done thirty years earlier in Palestine.

Daly found it interesting reading, but Walsh had been unable to uncover any direct evidence linking Hannon to the murder triangle. The research relied too heavily on conjecture and rumour; the nuggets of intelligence information were like stepping stones that he was finding harder and harder to negotiate.

Towards the end of the notes, Walsh appeared to have descended into paranoia, hinting at plots and intrigue involving intelligence services from Israel, South Africa and the US. Several times the priest mentioned dark forces still operating within Northern Ireland, and referred to evidence he was expecting from one of his confidential sources. The writing grew difficult to read and Daly had to move the papers closer to the window and squint. He skimmed through the pages. Walsh’s chronology became garbled, switching between events scattered across the globe, Palestine in the 1940s, Oman in the 1950s and Northern Ireland in the 1970s, rambling on with an irrational fervour that began to depress Daly. He felt that Walsh had dug up too much history, too many facts, to be able to draw up a clear and logical set of connections.

Daly stopped and rubbed his eyes. He began to fear that the priest’s meticulous research had fallen into a final madness, which had ended with his car swerving off a darkened border road. Whatever secrets he had tried to reveal to the world were lost in this bunker-like cell of history. Daly could see that in spite of gathering all this information about the murder triangle, the priest had failed to understand what most needed to be understood: all the intellectual rigour in the world would never fathom the dark arts of terrorism and counter-terrorism.

Daly snapped the ledger shut. He felt overwhelmed by the darkness that loomed over Walsh’s research. The only antidote to all this confusion was to confront his own darkness. Solving the case meant penetrating the central story of his life. He found a clean sheet of paper and a pen. He began to draw up a list of facts that pertained directly to his mother’s death. He scribbled down the blunt forensic details. He leaned so hard on the pen that he almost made holes in the paper. As he sifted through the notes, he found it hard not to plunge into the stories of the other victims, into the web of connections including the descriptions of Hannon’s intelligence gathering methods.

According to Walsh’s research, Ivor McClintock and Kenneth Agnew had been among the police officers manning the checkpoint that stopped his mother’s car. There was no further mention of Agnew; however, McClintock’s name cropped up in legal documents obtained by solicitors working on behalf of some of the victims’ families. He was arrested several times in the early 1980s and released without charge.

In December 1983, McClintock was again arrested because of intelligence received by the RUC. After twenty-four hours in custody, he finally admitted his role in the bombing of a bar in Armagh. Dressed in his police uniform, he had acted as a scout for the driver of the bomb. In his confession, he told police, ‘At no point did I think or intend that anyone would be killed in the bombing.’ He added: ‘I know it’s stupid to say that now.’

McClintock also confessed to a similar scouting role in the murder of the McKenna brothers in March 1981. On the day that he was formally charged, McClintock was made to resign from the RUC. The judge sentencing him praised the professionalism and courage of the police force in the face of extreme provocation. He said the accused was a man who had given service to his community, and it was obvious from the minor role that he had played in the operations that he was not a common terrorist, and had been misguided. The judge gave McClintock a one-year jail sentence.

Daly swallowed and stood up. He paced around the room. The sight of the murder map made him break out in a cold sweat.
I can’t read any more
, he thought.
Already I have read too much
. Part of him wanted his old life back, the life he had before he first entered this room, but it was too late now to return to that more innocent time.

He gazed through the window at the abbey grounds below. The research shed more light on his mother’s murder, but the picture still wasn’t clear. He knew more about the men who had murdered his mother, but he still didn’t know why they had singled her out. He turned to the other murders, looking for points of similarity that Walsh might have overlooked.

His concentration was broken by a sudden rapping that shook the door. He heard a muffled call but ignored it. However, the visitor was determined. The handle turned this way and that, but the door failed to open. Somehow, it had jammed within its frame. The handle rattled as the person frantically worked it. The hinges groaned and at last, the door flew open. To Daly’s surprise, in stepped the journalist Jacqueline Pryce.

‘Celcius.’ She stopped in her tracks, glancing at the opened files. ‘Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?’

‘Don’t worry, I was about to leave. You’ll have the place to yourself then.’

However, she was immune to his brusqueness.

‘Is this your way of stealing a lead on me?’ Her tone sounded light – playful, even.

‘No, not at all.’

She took off her coat and draped it over a seat.

‘Have you been able to make any sense of the murder triangle?’

‘I hardly know where to begin.’

‘No wonder,’ she said, lifting a sheaf of sun-yellowed notes. ‘It’s total chaos. There are files here based on the testimonies of paramilitaries turned alcoholics and born-again Christians. All sorts of demented ramblings. He should have burnt them long ago. It will take days to go through them and sort out the rubbish.’

Daly stared at the files.

‘I’d say weeks.’

A silence fell. He could sense that Pryce wanted him to explain what he had gleaned from his perusal of the files, but he felt more in the dark than ever before.

‘Poor Father Walsh,’ she said. ‘He was so close to nailing the links that would prove his theory, but all he left us was this ugly patchwork of tit-for-tat murders and international conspiracies.’

‘I doubt if anyone will ever work out the links and uncover the truth,’ said Daly. ‘The past is ebbing away. People die and evidence disappears.’

She shrugged.

‘We might never know if he was right or just deluded. In my writer’s imagination, I can see how it might all fit together. It would make such a powerful story.’ She hesitated. ‘With a little poetic licence, of course.’

He glanced in her direction.

‘What do you mean?’

‘I’m thinking about writing a different type of book than the one Father Walsh had in mind. Something along fictional lines.’

‘You mean all this research might work in some sort of a novel, but not as a factual account?’

‘Yes. A novel might be the most fitting way to tell the secrets of the murder triangle. To tie up all the loose ends and clear away inconsistencies.’

‘Is that why you’re here?’ He kept his voice as neutral as possible. ‘Researching a piece of fiction?’

He saw how Walsh’s death might have upset her literary ambitions. A best-selling exposé on the Troubles put on hold indefinitely. Her motivations suddenly seemed mundane and cynical.

She seemed to sense his recoil.

‘Not entirely. I want to help the investigation because Father Walsh’s work is too important to be forgotten. It means a lot to me.’

She saw the look of doubt on his face.

‘Of course, it’s true there are too many unresolved issues to make the book a credible work of fact,’ she continued. ‘That book was Father Walsh’s and it died with him.’

Her expression registered anger or disappointment, Daly wasn’t sure which.

‘But if I incorporated the story of your childhood it might make a different kind of book.’

Daly regarded her uneasily. He didn’t like the idea of her prowling after him, sniffing out the details of his family tragedy.

‘Have you been researching me? Is that how you knew I was an only son?’

She barely flinched.

‘I did ask around for a few background details.’

‘So that’s why you went along with the first meeting when you knew I couldn’t possibly be Father Walsh. That’s why you’re here today. You’re collecting more material for your book.’ He almost chuckled. ‘You’re following me because you’re afraid of losing sight of your story.’

She smiled, a little unsure of herself.

‘I should have admitted to you from the start that I wanted to turn Aloysius’s research into another type of book, but I didn’t have the nerve.’

‘But why do you need to add my story? Haven’t you enough material here?’

She shrugged.

‘Every story needs a lead character. A sympathetic hero.’

He frowned and wondered if she was trying to pay him a compliment.

‘But clearly I’m not a hero.’ He struggled to describe what he was. ‘I’m an outsider who arrived too late in the day to influence anything. When I think about it, there are no heroes in the story of the murder triangle. Except perhaps for Father Walsh, and he’s dead.’

She smiled at him.

‘Can’t you see that you’re perfect? A hero who doesn’t want to be a hero.’

Daly sighed.

‘There must be a better way for you to finish your book. One that isn’t complicated by me.’

‘I suppose I could work longer hours in the library, dig up more relatives and interview them. But that wouldn’t be half as interesting as following you.’

Her eyes glinted. What sort of game was she playing? She reached out and ran her hand along the backs of his fingers. She held her hand there for a moment, as if inviting him to hold it, but Daly did not respond. It was the first time in ages a woman had touched him so tenderly, but he remained motionless.

‘I could write about you sifting through Walsh’s notes like you are now. Doggedly following a trail. Negotiating the obstacles placed in your way. Of course, I’ll change the names; make sure no one can identify you.’

He felt a stab of annoyance, realizing she had already enrolled him in the plot of her book.

‘Except that you’ll never be able to follow the story to the end.’

‘Why is that?’

‘Because I have no intention of letting you find out what happens next. Anyway, why would readers be interested in my search for the truth?’

‘Because you’re a police detective, but also a victim.’

‘Is that the impression I give?’

He could see the truth in her eyes. He was nothing more than a narrative device, a means to carry the interest of her readers. She was searching for a character made out of ink and punctuation toiling away at a knot of evil.

‘I want to see you get closure on your mother’s murder. Is that so bad? I worked with Father Walsh for months. Surely there’s some way I can help you amid all this confusion and uncertainty.’ She gestured at the murder map.

‘For a start you can answer this question: Why was Walsh so interested in a British Army major called George Hannon?’

Her answer gave him a start.

‘You can ask the major yourself.’

He hadn’t considered the possibility that Hannon might still be alive.

‘Where will I find him?’

‘He’s living somewhere in North Down. I’ll see if I can arrange you an interview. He’s retired now, but in the seventies he worked at British Army Intelligence’s headquarters in Lisburn.’

Daly did a rapid calculation. If Hannon was still alive, he must be well over a hundred. It was highly unlikely he had worked for the army in the late 1970s as well as operating in Palestine during the 1940s. Unless he was some sort of ghost.

‘Are you sure it’s the same man Walsh was researching?’

‘Judge for yourself when we meet him. I’ll call you when I’ve arranged a visit. For the two of us.’ She flashed him a winning smile.

‘I’ve already told you, I’ve no intention of involving a journalist in this investigation.’

‘At this point you need all the help you can get. Besides, this case is no longer a matter for the law. We can’t leave it to Special Branch to deliver justice.’

Daly looked at her. He wondered whether she had even been born when the murder gang was doing its despicable work. He considered asking her what age she was but thought better of it.

‘You can’t use my mother’s death as a source of inspiration for your book.’

He looked in her eyes and saw something that sickened him: grinding, writerly ambition. She had spent the entire conversation chipping away at his defences. He shuddered at the idea of her discovering his boyhood secrets, the lists of car number plates, his possible role in the intimidation his parents suffered. He gathered up his notes and stood to leave.

‘I’m going, Ms Pryce. Your story ends here.’

‘What if it’s just the beginning?’

He let her question hang in the air and left. He walked back down the corridor, and passed an open door. He stopped. From inside, he could hear a group of women reciting the rosary. An echo from the past had startled him, the uncanny impression that his mother’s voice was drifting through their murmured prayers. He crept in and took a seat at the back. The voice faded away. Perhaps the contents of Walsh’s cluttered room had strained his mind. The pungent smell of incense filled the air. He listened carefully, and the voice returned. He sank deeper in his seat and tried to pinpoint its location. A man’s voice began to pray at the front of the room, and the congregation fell silent. When the murmuring returned he detected her voice again, those soft syllables so familiar from his childhood. He stared at the backs of the women in disbelief. Her voice seemed to move within their ranks. He followed it like a ripple in water from one corner of the room to another.

To have this solemn echo of her, so close to him, must mean something, he thought. He began whispering the prayers, all the time listening to that reassuring voice floating through the others, as though it might give him some hint about her mysterious death. However, the voice was an auditory hallucination created by his imagination and the voices of living women who spoke in his mother’s old-fashioned Tyrone accent. It had no connection to reality. It was precarious, a single thread guiding him through a maze of strangers’ voices. He got up, a Hail Mary half-finished on his lips, and crept away.