down to one twenty-minute span-trouble was, the time was around nine o’clock. The note from Eilis was cryptic but complete. GTI-Br. in A.-yes. Brothers in Arms was the title of the tape. Hickey was closer to being in the clear. Now, how the hell was he supposed to get back on board if Hickey turned out to be going nowhere?
Murtagh was reading the evening paper. The Inspector saw no sandwich but he could smell onion somewhere.
“Well, John.”
Murtagh looked up. Minogue became suddenly baffled. What had he wanted to tell Murtagh, that it looked like he was going to be a grandfather? Iseult had rebuffed his pleas to come to Kilmacud for the night at least. No amount of talk about croissants, hot baths, sitting in the garden, doing nothing or catching up on her reading persuaded her. He had left her at her studio. She had not asked him in. He had nearly clipped the end of a van coming down through Kilmainham, a place he shouldn’t have been in but which he couldn’t remember turning into. Was this the same as being drunk?
“Well, boss?”
Murtagh was still looking at him.
“Sorry, John.”
“Are you all right there?”
And what did that mean? Giddy. Everything so vivid and changed as he’d driven through the streets.
“I think so. Yes. You’re er…?”
“I was going over the timetable again, looking for cracks.”
Minogue looked up to the notice-board. Kilmartin had updated the line for Mullen. The gap began with “20:45?” and the thick green line resumed with “21:20 (log).” He walked closer, looking down the names. Lenehan filled in completely, three names to account for him. One, a J. Mahon, did not have an X for criminal record. His eyes slid down by the Egans to the orange line leading out from Leo Hickey’s name.
“Still no word on Hickey?”
“Nope,” said Murtagh. “He did a natty disappearing act after the call, and that’s a fact.”
“Talk to anyone about him recently?”
“All the patrol units have the description. The Killer got Central to leave two cars set aside. They’re out there until midnight.”
He let down the paper, stretched and scratched at the back of his head.
“What’s the world coming to?” he sighed. “No United in the cup. The first time in five years.”
Minogue flopped down at his desk and stared at the notepad he had left. Ryan-photo files; Alan Kenny-he looked back up at the notice-board. The gaps for Kenny remained but the alibis had names now. He recognized the names of the two pubs in brackets. Upmarket, he believed, all the rage in the lotsamoney eighties. Weren’t they too bloody busy in those pubs to reliably keep track of the likes of Kenny? Murtagh was looking at him.
“Yes, John?”
“You’re, er, well, you’re sure?”
“Sure of what?”
“That you’re okay, like?”
Minogue blinked.
“You’re gone kind of red… Is it sunburn, maybe?”
Minogue began moving the folders and papers about. Murtagh took up the paper again. Would Iseult’s baby be a few lines in the Births, Marriages and Death columns early in the new year? His eyes stayed on the headline over the photo of a sweaty headed player holding his head in his hands. ‘The Good Life Over.’
“What’s that good life they’re talking about being over, John?”
Murtagh smiled.
“Ah, United had their name on the F.A. Cup this last few years. Injuries done them in this year but. They’re out of the running now.”
“Since?”
“Last night really. Ah, sure it was time for them. They were in trouble from last month when what’s-his-face got a broken ankle. Brown. Downtown Brown? He was the heart of the team. Should have seen the tackle that brought him down. Oh, yes. That’ll go down in history books, so it will.”
“When was that?”
“Last Thursday three weeks. It was about seven minutes to go and… What? Did I say something?”
“How do you know it was seven minutes?”
Murtagh smiled.
“Taped it, didn’t I.”
“I didn’t know that this soccer mania had taken over in the Guards too.”
“Are you, er, finally going to break down and take an interest in the oul soccer, boss?”
Minogue remembered Murtagh’s good-natured jibes at the height of last year’s hysteria when Ireland looked like making it to the semifinals in the World Cup. Dublin had closed down on the days the Irish team played its matches. Novels were written around the World Cup fever which gripped Dublin. Housekeeping money disappeared into pubs. Newspapers reassigned staff-even their luminary pundits normally only content in their great task of reprobating everyone and everything-to issue pensees on the skills, accomplishments, history, status and future of Irish soccer. Pubs became choked with guff about whether one player’s ankle was up to par, another’s knee. Had Eddy Gagan, our glorious full forward, looked a bit peeky on his last outing? What about that Danish striker, the one who had destroyed England’s defence? Well, the Irish would show that fella a thing or two about defence: offence too, for that matter!
Minogue had watched and wondered while Ireland suffered and enjoyed another of its galvanic spasms of underdoghood: weren’t we great, our gallant little country taking on the world? Soccer had floated the entire nation on a rising tide of hope and pride. He had heard Kathleen detailing scores, moves, prospects and hopes at great length on transatlantic calls to Daithi. Unwise enough to query what all the fuss was about, Minogue had staggered into a blitzkrieg of taunts from Kathleen and Iseult alike: Stuffy! Snob! Culchie! Begrudger! Cynic! Get wir’ it- soccer’s bleedin’ brilliant!
“Have you got a copy of the press release we fired out the day after the murder?”
Murtagh yanked open a drawer and began flipping through files. Minogue phoned Kathleen.
“You’re serious, I take it,” was her reply to his request.
“As ever.”
“You sound a bit odd, that’s why.”
“Odd?”
“Something in your voice-ah, don’t mind. Look, try and get to bed early. You want newspapers for the night this girl was…?”
“Exactly.”
“They’d be gone, Matt. Sure bin day was yesterday.”
“Would you forage around there with the Costigans or somewhere?”
“Tell me again.”
Murtagh laid the copy of the press release on Minogue’s desk. Stapled to it was a clipping from one of the evening newspapers.
“I want to know about a soccer match on Monday night.”
“What match?”
Minogue tossed the file papers to find the copy of Tierney’s statement.
“Hold on a minute. Here. Everton were playing Spurs. Did I say that right?”
“Yes.”
“When it was on, when it was over, etcetera.”
“All right, love. Listen, were you sitting in a draught or something? Your voice, well-are you a hundred percent?”
Minogue was trying to find the times in Tierney’s statement.
“Draught,” he said.
“Oh, don’t mind me! Listen, did you get ahold of you-know-who?”
“Who’s you-know-who?”
