Cathedral

the pace for an overly eager bride, or a reluctant one. He smiled as he joined with the smaller organ below and looked at Megan, who had just come from the south tower. “Give us the pleasure of your sweet voice, Megan. Come here and turn on this microphone.”

Megan looked at him but made no move toward the microphone. Leary’s eyes darted between Flynn and Megan.

Flynn said, “Ah, Megan, you’ve no idea how important song is to revolution.” He turned on the microphone. Hickey was going through the song again, and Flynn joined in with a soft tenor. “As she wheeled her wheelbarrowThrough streets wide and narrowCrying cockles, and mussels,Alive, alive-o …”

John Hickey smiled, and his eyes misted as the music carried him back across the spans of time and distance to the country he had not seen in over forty years. “She was a fishmonger,And sure ’twas no wonder,For her father and mother wereFishmongers, too,And they each wheel’d their barrow …”

Hickey saw his father’s face again on the night before the soldiers took him out to be shot. He remembered being dragged out of their cell to what he thought was his own place of execution, but they had beaten him and dumped him on the road outside Kilmainham Jail. He remembered clearly the green sod laid carefully over his father’s grave the next day, his mother’s face at the graveside…. “And she died of a feverAnd no one could save her,And that was the end of sweetMolly Malone,But her ghost wheels her barrow …”

He had wanted to die then, and had tried to die a soldier’s death every day since, but it wasn’t in his stars. And when at last he thought death had come in that mean little tenement across the river, he found he was required to go on … to complete one last mission. But it would be over soon … and he would be home again.

CHAPTER 35

Bert Schroeder looked at the memo given him by the Hostage Unit’s psychologist, Dr. Korman, who had been monitoring each conversation from the adjoining office. Korman had written: Flynn is a megalomaniac and probably a paranoid schizophrenic. Hickey is paranoid also and has an unfulfilled death wish. Schroeder almost laughed. What the hell other kind of death wish could you have if you were still alive?

How, wondered Schroeder, could a New York psychologist diagnose a man like Flynn, from a culture so different from his own? Or Hickey, from a different era? How could he diagnose anybody based on telephone conversations? Yet he did it at least fifty times a year for Schroeder. Sometimes his diagnoses turned out to be fairly accurate; other times they did not. He always wondered if Korman was diagnosing him as well.

He looked up at Langley, who had taken off his jacket in the stuffy room. His exposed revolver lent, thought Schroeder, a nice menacing touch for the civilians. Schroeder said to him, “Do you have much faith in these things?”

Langley looked up from his copy of the report. “I’m reminded of my horoscope— the language is such that it fits anybody … nobody’s playing with a full deck. You know?”

Schroeder nodded and turned a page of the report and stared at it without reading. He hadn’t given Korman the psy-profiles on either man yet and might never give them to the psychologist. The more varying opinions he had, the more he would be able to cover himself if things went bad. He said to Langley, “Regarding Korman’s theory of Hickey’s unfulfilled death wish, how are we making out on that court order for exhumation?”

Langley said, “A judge in Jersey City was located. We’ll be able to dig up Hickey … the grave, by midnight.”

Schroeder nodded. Midnight—grave digging. He gave a small shudder and looked down at the psychologist’s report again. It went on for three typewritten pages, and as he read Schroeder had the feeling that Dr. Korman wasn’t all there either. As to the real state of mind of these two men, Schroeder believed only God knew that—not Korman or anyone in the room, and probably not the two men themselves.

Schroeder looked at the three other people remaining in the room—Langley, Spiegel, and Bellini. He was aware that they were waiting for him to say something. He cleared his throat. “Well … I’ve dealt with crazier people…. In fact, all the people I’ve dealt with have been crazy. The funny thing is that the proximity to death seems to snap them out of it, temporarily. They act very rational when they realize what they’re up against—when they see the forces massed against them.”

Langley said, “Only the two people in the towers have that visual stimulation, Bert. The rest are in a sort of cocoon. You know?”

Schroeder shot Langley an annoyed look.

Joe Bellini said suddenly, “Fuck this psycho-crap. Where is Stillway?” He looked at Langley.

Langley shrugged.

Bellini said, “If Flynn has him in there, we’ve got a real problem.”

Langley blew a smoke ring. “We’re looking into it.”

Schroeder said, “Hickey is a liar. He knows where Stillway is.”

Spiegel shook her head. “I don’t think he does.”

Langley added, “Hickey was very indiscreet to mention Major Martin over the phone like that. Flynn wouldn’t have wanted Martin’s name involved publicly. He doesn’t want to make trouble between Washington and London at this stage.”

Schroeder nodded absently. He was certain the governments wouldn’t reach an accord anyway—or, if they did, it wouldn’t include releasing prisoners in Northern Ireland. He had nothing to offer the Fenians but their lives and a fair trial, and they didn’t seem much interested in either.

Captain Bellini paced in front of the fireplace. “I won’t expose my men to a fight unless I know every column, pew, balcony, and altar in that place.”

Langley looked down at the six large picture books on the coffee table. “Those should give you a fair idea of the layout. Some good interior shots. Passable floor plans. Have your men start studying them. Now.”

Bellini looked at him. “Is that the best intelligence you can come up with?” He picked up the books in one of his big hands and walked toward the door. “Damn it, if there’s a secret way into that place, I’ve got to know.” He began pacing in tight circles. “They’ve had it all their way up to now … but I’ll get them.” He looked at the silent people in the room. “Just keep them talking, Schroeder. When they call on me to move, I’ll be ready. I’ll get those potato-eating Mick sons of bitches—I’ll bring Flynn’s balls to you in a teacup.” He walked out and slammed the door behind him.

Roberta Spiegel looked at Schroeder. “Is he nuts?”

Schroeder shrugged. “He goes through this act every time a situation goes down. He’s getting himself psyched. He gets crazier as the thing drags on.”

Roberta Spiegel stood and reached into Langley’s shirt pocket and took a cigarette.

Langley watched her as she lit the cigarette. There was something masculine and at the same time sensuously feminine about all her movements. A woman who had an obvious power over the Mayor—although exactly what type of power no one knew for sure. And, thought Langley, she was much sharper than His Honor. When it came down to the final decision on which so many lives hung, she would be the one to make it. Roberta Spiegel, whose name was known to nobody outside of New York. Roberta Spiegel, who had no ambitions of elected office, no civil service career to worry about, no one to answer to.

Spiegel sat on the edge of Schroeder’s desk and leaned toward him, then glanced back at Langley. She said, “Let me be frank while we three are alone—” She bit her lip thoughtfully, then continued. “The British are not going to give in, as you know. Bellini doesn’t have much of a chance of saving those people or this Cathedral. Washington is playing games, and the Governor is—well, between us, an asshole. His Honor is—how shall I put it?—not up to the task. And the Church is going to become a problem if we give them enough time.” She leaned very close to Schroeder. “So … it’s up to you, Captain. More than any time in your distinguished career it’s all up to you—and, if you don’t mind my saying so, Captain, you don’t seem to be handling this with your usual aplomb.”

Schroeder’s face reddened. He cleared his throat. “If you … if the Mayor would like me to step aside—”

She came down from the desk. “There comes a time when every man knows he’s met his match. I think we’ve all met our match here at this Cathedral. We can’t even seem to win a point.