Death at Christy Burke's (28 page)

The others sat in uneasy silence till Monty spoke up. “It could be anything. But do you suppose it’s the preacher?”

“I’d lay odds on it,” Brennan replied. “The question is . . .”

“Is he alive?” Monty filled in. “I have a feeling the answer is no. The only thing Leo asked was ‘where.’ Nothing about his condition.”

“I wonder how far poor Leo has to go tonight,” Kitty said.

“Far enough so it’s across the border, I’m hoping,” Brennan muttered in reply.

Brennan

Brennan had no luck reaching Leo the following day, and there was no news, good or bad, on the radio or television about the Reverend Merle Odom. Or, Brennan reflected later, about young Clancy.

Michael O’Flaherty was scheduled to say the noontime Mass in Irish at the Aughrim Street church, so Brennan offered to serve on the altar. When Mass was done, Brennan commended Michael on a job well done, and they decided to have lunch at Michael’s place and then head over to Christy’s.

The priests’ housekeeper, Mrs. O’Grady, made them roast lamb sandwiches on crusty bread, and she had a chocolate cake on hand for dessert, so they thanked her profusely. When she was out of earshot, Michael brought up Leo’s hasty departure of the previous night, and said he had not seen Leo since. What did Brennan make of that?

“That phone call and that hasty departure don’t bode well for the situation on this island, I’m thinking.”

“So you think it’s the Belfast crisis.”

“I do. I just hope I’m wrong, but somehow I doubt it.”

“You think the minister’s been killed.”

“Yes, I do.”

“Brennan, I can hardly bear to imagine what might happen as a result.”

“That makes two of us.”

And Michael didn’t even know about the Clancy disappearance. If the bishop’s nephew had been snatched as well, what hope would there be now for his safe return to Dublin? Of course he may already have suffered the same fate as Odom. If so, were they in for a spate of Catholic-Protestant kidnappings and killings, each one avenging the other? Would the events involve people in religious life, or their families? But this was nothing but grim speculation.

“Something occurs to me, Brennan, as bad as things might be.” Michael leaned forward and spoke in earnest. “This could be a wake-up call. At last. If poor Odom has been killed, God rest his soul, surely there will be an international outcry. This man is an American, and you know how they are about their own. Foreigners dying, that’s one thing. Too bad, pass the butter please. But an American? Well, that’s another matter entirely. The U.S. might bring so much pressure to bear on the authorities in the North, and perhaps the authorities here in the South, to get this sorted . . . I mean if Northern Ireland comes under the scrutiny of the international community in light of this, perhaps something good could come out of it in the end. Not that I’m downplaying what has probably happened to that poor man. But something will break the cycle, something will lead to peace, now or in the not-too-distant future. I’m sure of it.”

God love and protect Michael O’Flaherty, Brennan thought. O’Flaherty was a highly intelligent man, with decades of experience as a priest and confessor; in the confessional one hears people own up to the most despicable behaviour. Michael was a man who believed in the existence of evil; he had even assisted at an exorcism! But he had a blind spot, and that was Ireland, his ancestral home.

“Michael,” Brennan cautioned him, “nothing good is going to come out of this. It could be even worse than you imagine.”
Particularly if it’s not just the Reverend Merle Odom, but Bishop Clancy’s nephew as well.
“I would like to share your optimism, but I cannot. International attention hasn’t deterred the factions in the North from violence in the past, and it’s not going to now. It may have the opposite effect; increased publicity may make it harder for people to back down. They’ll feel they have to make a point. Only evil will come of this.”

Michael looked more and more dejected as Brennan went on. “I suppose you’re right, Brennan, but I don’t like to give up all hope. It goes against my nature.”

“I understand that, Michael, but I don’t want to see you setting yourself up for disillusionment. Do you remember the story Finn told us that night at his house, about the young bridegroom Davey? We were all wondering what happened when his bride got home and saw the trouble he’d run into trying to fix the house up for her. What happened was, he disappeared from the story. Took a bullet in the back. A revenge killing, for something he hadn’t personally done. Do you remember what Leo said? ‘Someone fundamental to your world was gone in an instant.’ That’s the way it was, and that’s the way it is now, in certain parts of this island.”

They were silent as they cleared the table, and headed out for the afternoon.

Order had been restored in Christy Burke’s by the time Brennan and Michael arrived; all four regulars were in place. That man McCrum was seated at a table near the bar, but his mouth was not in gear, a relief to all present, no doubt.

Frank Fanning looked scrawny, and there was a yellowish cast to his skin. Seeing him now, Brennan could not conceive of him as the would-be bomber of the Apprentice Boys Memorial Hall. The whole plot was inconceivable, not to mention what would have happened in the wake of it. But whatever Fanning had done, or tried to do, Brennan’s heart had to go out to him today. He looked like hell.

Michael O’Flaherty obviously thought so too. Michael had been rocked by the news of what Fanning had been plotting in Derry, but Brennan knew he had become fond of the regular crowd here in the bar, in each case seeing the man behind the flaws and weaknesses. Michael was looking at Fanning with sympathy.

“Frank!” Michael said. “We haven’t seen you in a while, or at least I haven’t. You’ve had us all concerned.”

“Ah, well, I was in the hospital, Michael.”

“Oh, is that so, Frank? And you didn’t tell anyone? Are you all right now?”

“I’m fine. But the doctors don’t agree with me. They’re saying there’s something wrong with my liver. They’re saying I drink too much. Not the sort of thing I was going to call in and announce here at Christy’s! Doctors these days, they’re all about fourteen years old and they don’t know a thing about the world or the people in it. Feck ’em!” He took a long sip of his pint, put down his glass, and sighed with pleasure.

“That will put the roses back in your cheeks, Frank!” Jimmy O’Hearn assured him. “It kept many a working man going in this city for years, so it did.”

Brennan saw Tim Shanahan exchange a look with O’Flaherty. Whatever his own personal habits, Shanahan wouldn’t be a man to buy into the legend that the jaundiced yellow of a liver-damaged drinker would be cured by more drink.

Michael and Brennan sat at a table and were joined by Shanahan, who said, “Good to have our foursome back again.” His tone suggested that he was quite aware of how that foursome might appear to the rest of the population.

“Indeed,” affirmed Michael, and Brennan agreed.

Turning to Brennan, Shanahan said, “I was wondering whether you were aware of the Russian choir that’s performing this evening. I know you’re a musician yourself.”

“No, I hadn’t heard. What’s the word?”

“It’s the St. Gennady Russian Orthodox Choir.”

“I know them; they’re brilliant! Didn’t even know they were in town.”

“They are. You can hear them at the Jesuits’ church at seven o’clock.” He stopped and seemed to give it some consideration before he spoke again. “I’m going. We could go together if, well . . .”

“Perfect, Tim. Leave from here at, what, half-six?”

“Good. You, Michael?”

“No, you fellows go ahead. The music, and the language, would be wasted on me!”

Shanahan nodded and smiled, then returned to his place in the universe of Christy’s pub.

Michael opened his mouth to say something, but everyone’s attention was caught by an exclamation from Mr. O’Hearn. “Well, here’s a sight we rarely see! Father Killeen!” O’Hearn stood and raised his glass to Leo Killeen as the priest entered the pub and closed the door behind him.

“Jim,” Killeen said and nodded.

“What happened, Father? Is everything all right over at the Glimmer Man?”

Michael looked at Brennan and asked, “Glimmer Man? I think I’ve seen that place.”

“Most likely. It’s a pub in Stoneybatter. Leo’s local. He’s not a big man for the drink, but when he has a drop, he has it there.”

A little joke at Leo’s expense. But O’Hearn’s expression was one of concern, not jocularity.

“Have no fear, Jim,” the priest assured him. “The Glimmer Man hasn’t come to grief.”

O’Hearn looked relieved.

Leo caught sight of Michael and Brennan and greeted them. Brennan started to pull out a chair for him, but Finn appeared at the bar and looked at Killeen.

“Good afternoon, Leo.”

“Finn.” Whatever passed between them did so without another spoken word, and they both disappeared behind the bar.

Frank Fanning said, “It’s not often you see Leo Killeen in this place. I tell Finn it’s just as well not to have two old soldiers in the same trench in case the enemy comes storming in! Grand fellow, Leo, very dedicated to his vocation. As he was to his previous vocation! He’s not a big drinker but he’s good company and a fine storyteller if he knows you’re on the right side of God and politics. But he can be intense, can Leo. He’s been known to leave more than one man trembling in his wake. In church, I mean, in the pulpit or in the confessional. He doesn’t even raise his voice. Just has a sixth sense about what you’ve been up to. Well, he’s seen it all, in both his incarnations.”

If Leo came rarely, what brought him in today? What were Leo and Finn talking about behind the bar? Brennan didn’t get a chance to ask. Leo emerged and walked out of the pub with nothing but a distracted little salute to those assembled.

A party of young women came in then, celebrating the return of one of them from Liverpool, and their high spirits and witty conversation kept everyone entertained. Motor Mouth McCrum’s eyes glittered at the girls as he passed by on his way out of the pub. Later on, after the young ones straggled out, Michael finished his drink and prepared to leave. Brennan curbed the temptation to question Finn about the visit from Leo; if either of them wanted Brennan to know what was going on, he’d find out soon enough.

Seconds after Michael departed, the door opened again, and two men entered the pub. One was heavy-set with fair hair buzzed short on his round skull. The other was thinner and darker, with the same close-shaved head. In spite of the mild, sunny day, they both wore dark blue windbreakers and had their hands in their pockets. They peered around at the patrons, then looked at Finn. He didn’t invite them to have a seat. He directed his dark glasses towards the two men, and they stared back. After a few seconds of this, they turned and left. It wasn’t long before Brennan heard a car start up and drive away.

This time, he got up and approached the bar. “Who were those fellows, Finn?”

“Don’t know.”

“You don’t know them, and yet you —”

“I didn’t like the look of them.”

“They got the message.”

“They’d have been expecting it.”

“Whoever they were.”

It was the mirror image of the scene Michael O’Flaherty had described, when O’Flaherty had walked into a pub somewhere on the other side of the border. The locals took one look at him and froze him out. How were people able to recognize each other this way? Natural enemies circling around each other in the wild.

Brennan shook his head and returned to his seat.

It wasn’t long before Brennan and Tim Shanahan were on their way to the Jesuits’ church in Upper Gardiner Street. As they walked along, Tim chatted knowledgeably about the sacred music of the Roman and the Orthodox churches, the use of Church Slavonic in the Orthodox liturgy, the timeless beauty of Gregorian chant, and other subjects dear to Brennan’s heart.

Tim looked over at Brennan. “Michael may have told you I’m a priest, though currently out of service.”

“He did, Tim, but he didn’t have to. I’d have known you anywhere as my brother priest.”