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
