'Mickey Rooney stayed here, you know,' Maisie said, looking about herself appraisingly. 'And Grace Kelly.'
Quirke lifted an eyebrow. 'Together?'
She gave him a shove with her elbow.
'No, you clown,' she said, laughing. 'But I saw the Aga Khan and Rita Hayworth here one time, when they were married.'
'Aly,' Quirke said. She glowered at him. 'It was Aly Khan that was married to Rita Hayworth,' he said, 'not Aga.'
She bridled. 'Aly, Aga, what does it matter? If you know so much, Mr. Smarty-Pants, tell me this-what other film star was Rita Hayworth a cousin of?'
'I've no idea.'
She grinned triumphantly, showing most of her large, slightly yellowed teeth. 'Ginger Rogers!'
'Maisie, you're a walking encyclopedia.'
At that she scowled. Maisie was touchy, and never more so than when she thought she was being mocked. He ordered another drink for her, and for himself a glass of plain water.
'Are you still off the gargle?' she demanded. 'Would you not have something, to keep a girl company?'
He shook his head. 'If I have one I'll have another, and then another, and another after that, and then where will I be?'
'Christ, Quirke, you're no fun anymore, do you know that?'
When, Quirke wondered idly, had he and Maisie had fun together?
'That one you were asking me about,' Maisie said. 'The one that topped herself.'
'Yes?'
He had paused before responding. Maisie liked everyone to keep a leisurely pace. She was gazing into the ruby depths of her second and already half-drunk drink.
'I inquired around,' she said. 'No one knew anything, or not anything that would be likely to interest you, anyway. Then I spoke by chance to a former client of mine, that lives out in Clontarf. A former nun, she is, living with a former priest-would you believe it? Came over from England, the two of them, on the run from the bishops, I suppose, or the peelers, I don't know which. She bought a ring, or got one out of a Halloween cake, and they set up house together, as respectable as you like.'
'How did you come to know her?'
She gave him a look. 'How do you think? A ring is one thing, but a bouncing babby is another. Anyway, here's the thing, here's the coincidence. When I asked her about this one, Deirdre Hunt, had she known her or heard of her, she gave a laugh and said, 'Deirdre Hunt, is it? Sure, doesn't she live across the road from me.' '
'In Clontarf,' Quirke said.
'St. Martin's something-Avenue, Gardens, Drive, I can't remember. Isn't that a queer thing, though, me ringing her up and asking her about someone who turns out to be her neighbor opposite?'
Quirke waited again, and took a lingering sip of water. 'Did she know her?' he asked. 'I mean, to talk to.'
'They kept themselves to themselves.'
'Which, the nun and her priest or the Hunts?'
She turned and studied him for a long moment, shaking her head slowly from side to side. 'I sometimes wonder, Quirke, if you're as slow as you seem, or are you only pretending?'
'Oh, I'm very slow, Maisie, very slow.'
'Sure you are,' she said with a scathing chuckle. 'Sure you are.'
Her glass was empty, and now she waggled it meaningly. He said: 'But your nun-what's her name, by the way?'
'Philomena.'
'-She must have had some contact with the Hunts?'
'Only to say good morning and hello to, that kind of thing. 'A nice quiet couple,' Philomena said they seemed. She couldn't believe it when she heard that the wife had drowned herself. 'Must have been an accident,' she said, 'must have.' ' Maisie turned again and this time gave Quirke a searching look. 'Was it?'
He returned a blank gaze of his own. 'Was it what?'
Maisie nodded knowingly. 'You wouldn't be interested in it if it was an accident,' she said. 'I know you, Quirke. And by the way'-she tapped a finger on his wrist-'you may have given up the sauce, but some of us around here are dying of the thirst.'
So he ordered her another brandy and port and waited while the barman poured it, both of them watching him as he worked. He was young, with a short-back-and-sides haircut and a pustular neck. He wore a white shirt and a black waistcoat. Quirke noted a frayed cuff, a greasy shine at the pockets of the trousers. This country. Someone had recently offered Quirke a job in Los Angeles. Los Angeles! But would he go? A man could lose himself in Los Angeles as easily as a cuff link.
Maisie took up her drink and resettled herself contentedly, hen-like, on the stool's high perch.
'The night Deirdre Hunt died,' Quirke said, 'did Philomena notice anything out of the ordinary?'
Maisie Haddon fairly tittered. 'You talk like a detective in the pictures. Humphrey Bogart. Alan Ladd. 'Notice anything suspicious, lady?' ' Laughing, she took up her drink, a little finger cocked, and delicately sipped. 'Do you know where Philomena insisted on meeting me?' she asked. 'In the church in Westland Row. What do you think of that? You'd imagine she'd be too ashamed to show her face in God's house. 'Why not Bewley's?' I said. 'Or the Kylemore.' But no, St. Andrew's it had to be. There was a Mass ending, we had to sit in the far back, whispering. Philomena kept blessing herself and looking pious. The rip! She goes in for stylish outfits, you know-the sky pilot she's living with must have money-nylons, makeup, perfume, the lot. But do you know what it is?' She paused for effect. 'She still smells like a nun. That musty whiff, there's no getting rid of that.'
Quirke was bored, and his damaged knee ached, and, as always in Maisie's company, he was beginning to want a drink badly. Maisie had nothing to tell him. Why had she asked him to come here? Perhaps she had been bored, too. He thought of slipping away, as he usually did, and had even begun to ease himself off the stool in preparation for flight when Maisie, looking into her glass, a little bleary now, told him, with blithe offhandedness, what it was she had summoned him to hear.
9
THEN ONE DAY, WITHOUT WARNING, HER WORLD JUST FELL ASUNDER. that was the way she thought of it, that was the phrase she kept saying over and over in her mind:
