“No,” Kilmartin whispered.
“I nearly told him to eff off. They think they’re the bee’s knees, that crowd. Well I happen to know that they have dracul-”
“Draconian?” said Minogue.
“Exactly. Draconian laws to be harassing their citizens, so I do. The French are savages in their own right. Anyway, I says to this upstart, ‘You’re addressing a policeman whose Murder Squad is an example to the civilized world.’ Do you get the hint about civilized? Themselves and their Algeria!”
What civilized world, Minogue wondered. The Commissioner, more fully inflated with that happiest of Irish emotions, the fearless rebuffing of any suggestion that things Irish were not the equal and better of anything on the planet, became even more animated. Minogue did not like this man one bit.
“That’s the way,” said Kilmartin. Minogue winced at his sycophancy. The Commissioner dropped both fists dramatically on the table and his whole demeanour changed in an instant. His face was now a mask of stern determination.
“So that’s the confidence I had under me hat when I was able to say to Chief Justice Fine that all the resources of the Garda Siochana would be brought to bear on this dastardly crime.”
Did he really say ‘dastardly crime’ to Fine, Minogue’s gargoyle asked.
“Most particularly, the proven record of the Murder Squad.” The Commissioner sat back in his chair, satisfied with his oratory. “And do you know, men, that Justice Fine knows you, Matt?”
“A fleeting acquaintance, I’m thinking,” said Minogue, his suspicions returning in full.
“Maybe so, but evidently the man has the same faith in you as I do and as Jimmy Kilmartin does. You’re not an Inspector for nothing, I can tell you.”
Kilmartin must have known this would come out, Minogue realized then.
“He asked me if you’d spearhead the investigation,” said Lally.
Minogue did not trust himself to look at Kilmartin now.
“So naturally I told him I’d speak to Jimmy Kilmartin about that. To see how the land lies, if you follow me.” God Almighty turned to Kilmartin.
“Absolutely sir,” said Kilmartin guilelessly.
“Great stuff, men,” said the Commissioner, rising. “Can I have a call on it every day? The Minister has asked me for a briefing every evening: that’s the kind of priority it has. He’s expecting to be prodded during Question Period as to security. Oh, and lookit… I had the Branch, er, see if they had any file on this Paul Fine. He was by way of being a journalist. The name sort of struck a chord, like. He was a bit of a Leftie when he was in college, that sort of thing. Mild; no record of trouble with the law.”
Lally swept an arm over imaginary protestations and squinted at both policemen. “That’s all water under the bridge, so it is. Trotskyist, Leftie, journalist, Jew-none of that matters a damn to us, isn’t that the way to approach it? Fair play and justice for all.”
Then why mention it, Minogue wondered.
“I’ve greased the wheels with the Branch already, seeing as I had that titbit of information about Fine. There’s a Gallagher in the Branch, Sergeant Gallagher. I believe that he and another few under him monitor these foreign fanatics here.”
Fanatics. Minogue sat down again when the Commissioner left. Anything to do with the Middle East meant fanaticism apparently. There were no Irish fanatics, of course.
“Looks like you’re elected, Matt,” Kilmartin said from the door. Minogue hoped it was a trace of relief he detected in Jimmy’s voice.
“Can I have Shea Hoey and Keating too then?”
“To be sure,” said Kilmartin remotely. He held his hand on the door yet. “Look. A few things. The Commissioner in his haste may get a hold of you to find out how you’ll be doing on this case-instead of getting his brief from me. You heard him say he wants to hear from us every day?”
Minogue nodded.
“All I’m saying is, don’t leave me in the dark on anything. I don’t want him telling me what I’m supposed to know. I know what you’re thinking: ‘Ah, he’d never do that.’ I’m not saying he would, but you can see he’s jumpy about this. And another thing. I don’t want any of the hooligans in the Branch knowing too much about what we’re up to. Take whatever you can off this Gallagher fella, but don’t be giving him so much as the steam off your piss in July. Don’t be surprised if you-know-who is about to give the identical little speech to the Branch, telling them to keep their own investigation under their hats.”
Kilmartin arched an eyebrow and winked. Neither gesture dispelled Minogue’s bafflement. “You’re still a bit of an innocent, Matt. That doesn’t mean you or I should be taken for a gobshite though, does it?”
“I’m not so sure I want to know more at this point,” murmured Minogue.
“Here, so, think on this: God Almighty has no choice but to go along with Fine’s request to have you running this. And don’t be worrying about me and me pride. I’ll be more than happy to take the credit from you when the time comes. But don’t forget that you have the name of being a class of a wild rozzer.”
“I do?”
“Don’t be an iijit, of course you do. You nearly managed to make a diplomatic pig’s mickey out of the Combs business. God Almighty was expecting you to march down to the British Embassy and break down the door looking for any more involved in that Combs case. You don’t think you’d be drawing an Inspector’s pay today if the Commissioner was the sole captain of the ship, do you? It came down from Justice, right from the Minister too, as a signal to the Brits that we done right here and we support our police, no matter what the politicos might say. That sort of political weather spoils our gallant Commissioner’s humours, don’t you see. He just wants to run his shop like any other yo-yo high up on the State payroll.”
Minogue had heard it before. He had no sympathy for the Commissioner’s humours.
“Perhaps I should be grateful to have you keep me from falling under a bus too?”
“Don’t be getting uppity, Matt. Just be looking over your shoulder when you’re working on this.”
Paul Fine’s flat was in Ringsend, close by the new city-centre bypass route. His flat was the upper storey of a house which backed on to Ringsend Park. The house, standing at the end of a terrace, was removed both in architecture and original function from the houses on the terrace itself. Minogue guessed that it had been an official billet or quarters for a functionary who had worked on the docks around this part of the Port of Dublin.
The air was thick with seagulls and pigeons. Sulphurous, fishy smells on the air reminded Minogue that the Liffey Basin and docks were on the far side of the bypass road at the foot of the terrace. He could see the upper decks and cranes of moored cargo-ships when he looked in that direction. A young woman holding an infant stood in a doorway half-way down the terrace watching the two policemen. The snout of a Garda car showed from a lane next to Fine’s place.
Ringsend had had the name of being the toughest assignment for Gardai but that was twenty and more years ago, Minogue reflected, as he stared bleakly down the grimy road. Pitched battles outside and inside the pubs on Saturday nights had been routine then. Innumerable gangs and family racketeers fleshed out the crime figures in Ringsend and Irishtown. As with the newer working-class areas such as Inchicore and Crumlin and, more recently, Tallaght, much damage had been done to Garda work by Gardai themselves. Young Guards, countrymen, fresh from training, had been thrown into areas like Ringsend and had been backed up and directed by Gardai also overwhelmingly from the country. Over the years, those old hands had distilled their native dislike for Dubliners into a cynical and heavy-handed contempt. Time, not training, had settled the matter. Ringsend and Irishtown had become quieter as the first generation born into the flats and terraces had married and moved out. The Garda Press Office still liked to point out, to nuisances who asked why Garda-community relations were so bad, that crime rates in places like Ringsend had plummeted because Garda foot-patrols had solved the problem.
“They used to say that a sign you were a real Dubliner was if you knew where Raytown was,” Minogue observed. Hoey took note of Minogue’s melancholy tone, of Minogue examining the grey sky over the docks. “Yep,” Minogue added. “Raytown’s over there by Ringsend village.”
“Seems like a rough spot still to me,” Hoey said.
“Ah, it is and it isn’t. Is this the house?”
A cramped glass porch had been built around the front door. Two Guards were sitting in the kitchen drinking tea. The middle-aged woman who had admitted Minogue and Hoey fussed with the teapot for the new arrivals.
