The Death of an Irish Lover (23 page)

Several months later, McGarr, McKeon, Ward, and Bresnahan were returning to Dublin along the N-6 that passes over the Shannon at Athlone, and McGarr suggested they drop downriver to Leixleap for dinner. “My treat. As I remember, the food was quite good.”

“And sights better, we hear,” McKeon put in. Earlier in the week, McGarr had received a phone call—one of several recent updates—from Sergeant Declan Riley concerning the status of what amounted to the Benny Carson-Dermot Finn standoff.

It seemed that every night since Tim Tallon and Sylvie Zeebruge had died and McGarr had spoken to Dermot Finn in private, Finn had appeared in the pub or inn—the control of which Carson had assumed until the estates of the deceased could be settled—and purchased a drink.

Nursing it the night long, Finn only stared at Carson, his eye following the man wherever he went. Car
son complained first to Riley, who said he could do nothing. “It’s a public place, and you’re open for custom.”

Later, Carson had gone to court. But with Finn being a blameless citizen, who had neither said nor done anything injurious to Carson—Riley himself had testified—the suit was dismissed.

And Carson kept languishing under Finn’s “Gorgon gaze,” Riley called it, relishing every passing moment. “The son of a bitch was always gaunt, but now he’s a rail—sunken eyes and his bones mere hanging points for the blue jacket, don’t you know.

“Sure, it’s slow torture, but I only hope he doesn’t die in his sleep.”

McGarr, who was sitting in the back of the car with McKeon, tapped Ward on the shoulder. “Ring up Riley and ask him to join us at the inn.”

It was spring now, and the days were growing longer. At twilight they crossed over the Shannon with Leixleap before them on the other bank, looking like a storybook village.

Perched on a bluff, its riverfront wall and neat rows of shops—dominated by the spire of the church and the eminence of the great stone inn, every window of which was lighted—were cast in a soft mauve light. Below, the Shannon rolled toward the sea, black and slick as obsidian.

But no Carson was in sight either in the pub where the four Dubliners stopped for a jar, or in the inn where McGarr gave his name to the receptionist for the first available table. “There’ll be five of us.”

“And how have you been keeping, Chief Superintendent?”

“Respectably.”

“Which is all that can be asked these days, please God,” said the woman with some feeling.

“And your new boss, how’s he?”

The woman’s eyes told the story.

“I don’t see him. Is he about?”

“Down in the office, I suspect. He doesn’t spend much time up here.” Her head swung toward the small bar, where sat Dermot Finn apart from the group of obvious anglers who were regaling themselves there.

Riley joined McGarr and the others for a drink, saying, “I can’t imagine how it happened, but now the whole county knows. And Carson is a pariah. People see him coming, and they cross the street. The shopkeepers, even—they hang up if he calls. If he stops in, they treat him as though he wasn’t there.

“All this stuff”—Riley raised his glass—“the food in the kitchen, the sheets on the beds Carson has to order in from outside. And if Finn himself doesn’t put him down, sooner or later somebody else will and properly.” Riley’s eyes met McGarr’s for a brief but telling moment.

With that, the aging sergeant finished his drink and excused himself. “The missus would never understand how I could eat here with him in charge. But don’t let that ruin your meal. The chef stayed on, and the fare is the same.”

And excellent, when it arrived.

McGarr began with smoked eel and rambled on to spring trout poached in white wine with apples Charlotte for desert, an espresso, and a snifter of piquant Calvados, since he was not driving.

And it was only when the digestifs arrived that he noticed that Bresnahan was not having one. In fact, he
now realized that he had not seen her take a drink in some time.

Perhaps she was on a diet, he reasoned, since her face seemed fuller, and she had taken to wearing rather loose clothing of late. “Aren’t you having anything, Rut’ie?”

There was a pause in which Bresnahan seemed to have to gather herself. “No, thank you, Chief, and there’s something I have to tell you.”

“Let me,” said Ward. “Ruth is pregnant and will have our baby in August.”

McGarr glanced at Bresnahan, who nodded and attempted a smile of happy guilt.

“But, Hughie,” McKeon blurted out, “didn’t you just have a baby by”—but thought better of it and instead reached for his glass.

“And Hughie and I were wondering if you think it’s a…deal-breaker.”

The deal having been don’t-ask-don’t-tell, during the years in which Bresnahan and Ward had been a couple, “fraternizing” being strictly forbidden by Garda policy.

“We were thinking that, after I had the baby, I’d come back to the Squad, since whose business is it anyhow, as long as Hughie and I are agreed.”

McKeon, who was as conservative in matters domestic as criminal, couldn’t help himself. “What about Leah? I hope you’re not going to abandon your kids by her. What does she have to say about this?”

“She’s all right with it as well,” said Ward.

“You’ve spoken to her?”

Ward nodded. “She’s happy for us.”

“You’re coddin’ me. That’s bigamy.”

“No, Bernie. Hughie and Leah aren’t married,” Bresnahan advised.

“But, then, aren’t you two going to get married?”

Bresnahan and Ward both shook their heads.

“Where will you live?”

“I’ll move into Hughie’s place. It’s big, and my mother will come up from the country to baby-sit, when I come back to work.
If
I come back to work.” Her eyes drifted to McGarr.

“But where will you live?” McKeon asked Ward.

“Both places. The three of us will work it out.”

McKeon had to think about that. Finally, he said, “Well—times certainly have changed. Waiter!”

All eyes then turned to McGarr, who had decided years before that he would hate to lose either of his two able junior staffers and had turned a blind eye to their former liaison.

And then—he thought—wasn’t it said that Brian Boru, Ireland’s legendary chieftain, had twenty-eight children by a number of women including his official wife, and when it came time to name a successor, he chose one of his bastards and not a legitimate son.

Also, Bresnahan and Ward had chosen the proper moment to drop their bombshell, since the excellent meal and brandy had imparted a glow to McGarr. And now the sight of Carson, who had appeared in the door of the dining room, warmed him further. “We’ll see by and by.”

Which cheered Bresnahan and Ward, who clenched hands beneath the table. It was the most they could expect from the man who could not acknowledge or be seen to be complicit in their arrangement.

Said McKeon, rising to go out to the bar, “I’m going to pretend that I didn’t hear any of this.” But he, too, now noticed Carson, and he sat back down. “My God, don’t he look like death warmed over.”

Not having seen them and studiously avoiding looking into the bar, Carson was moving from one table to another, nodding to his guests and inquiring after the state of meals and drinks. And when, finally, he caught sight of McGarr and company, he called over a waiter and said something, before disappearing back downstairs.

Shortly thereafter, a bottle of Calvados and four glasses were delivered to the table. Where they were left.

More than a half year later on a brilliant day in fall with high bright skies and warm winds from the south, McGarr had only arrived in his office in Dublin Castle when he received a phone call from Declan Riley.

“It’s about our man, Benny Carson. Wasn’t he found this morning newly dead, drowned in a pit of slurry.”

McGarr turned and looked out the open window into Dame Street that was crowded with commuters and tourists at the early hour. “At one of Dermot Finn’s fertilizer operations?”

“Aye. But the lucky part is, Finn and Honora have been in Spain a fortnight now, and in their absence Carson had closed the inn and was selling off everything not nailed down to some Dublin furniture broker. But I guess that’s off now.”

“Who found him?”

“Wasn’t it meself who did—out for a bit of a walk with the dog early in the morning.”

“Down by a slurry pit.”

“The vapors are good for the chest, I’m told. And strange how he was situated when I came upon him.

“Those big rakes that they use to spread the excrement around? Carson must have grabbed for it when he
lost his footing and fell. He had it pressed tight to his chest, mouth and eyes open like in shock that he had come to such an end. A few inches under the surface of a pool of shit. Pity he couldn’t swim.”

“Is it anything that might call for my attention?” McGarr asked.

“Ach, no—don’t trouble yourself. He was foolish to be wandering out there in the middle of the night.”

“Then, I take it it’s a death by misadventure.”

“Precisely. I’ll mark that down in my report, and my best to the missus and your gang. I’ll tell you one thing—it’s a grand day down here entirely.”

“Brilliant altogether,” McGarr echoed, ringing off.

“Rut’ie,” he called out from his cubicle, “get Noreen on the phone, I have some news.”

Without any of the difficulty that she had experienced throughout the summer, Bresnahan popped up from her desk and appeared in the doorway of the cubicle.

“I will, of course, Chief. But first, the news.”