No Enemy but Time (37 page)

They'd dropped down from the rear as the train slowed to a near halt. People's heads were poking out of carriage windows way up front, staring ahead looking for whatever had caused the driver to put on his brakes. No one saw them leave the guard's van. Quinlan would come back and relock the door. The incident would be put down to teenagers fooling with the emergency cord, and there'd be no connection with the Dublin bank robbers.

Except that there was a witness up there on the bridge who'd seen them leave the train.

‘Declan!'

It was a command. Declan thrust one hand into his coat and bounded up the few steps leading to the bridge. Donny stared at him. He was still grinning and mumbling to himself. He didn't see the knife. In a frenzy of rage and fear, the man called Declan stabbed him over and over again, holding him by the front of his ragged jersey as he plunged the weapon into his heart and lungs. Donny didn't even cry out. He died with the memory of the lovely train imprinted on his mind. The first vicious stabbing pierced his heart before he had time to be afraid.

He crumpled into a heap, blood spreading like a rain puddle all round him. The three men were gone, leaving him there. Across from the bridge, down a side road, they saw the Escort parked and the woman sitting in the driver's seat. She opened the passenger door, expecting them to put the suitcase in and go.

‘Drive us to the next town,' she was told, and before she could protest they'd piled into the car, slamming the doors.

‘We were feckin' seen,' was the snapped explanation. ‘Get on, will ye, for Christ's sake!'

She started the car, began to drive too fast, and was ordered savagely to slow down.

‘Drive normal. Into Naas. We'll get the bus.'

Marie turned to the man beside her. She had begun to tremble. A witness. Oh, God, it had gone wrong.

‘Who saw you?'

‘Some auld fella on the bridge. He won't be tellin' anyone. This'll do, here.'

They got out when she pulled in to the kerb. She tried not to see the others. She kept looking ahead of her. The suitcase was on the back seat. One hundred thousand pounds in notes. She'd heard the news flash on the car radio. The manager had been murdered. Now there was another man dead. She couldn't think properly till she got back to the house, and that case was hidden and the car shut away in the garage. Only then, with whiskey sluiced into a cup of coffee and the shakes subsiding, did Marie realize that the witness on the bridge must have been the Sallins idiot, Donny.

The neighbours were sitting round with Donny's mother. Someone had brought a few bottles of Guinness. His married sisters were there and the two brothers. They were dazed and aimless, making tea, clearing cups off the kitchen table, staring anxiously at the mother who was the mainstay of them all. The father had died years ago of drink and misery, leaving her to bring up five weanlings, as she said. And one of them missing a sixpence … Donny, poor harmless creature that he was, stabbed to death in the middle of the day on Sallins bridge.

For a long time his mother sat with her apron pulled over her face like a shroud, weeping as Irish mothers had done for their sons since time began. Now she had calmed herself and taken a glass of Guinness. The Gardai had been and gone. One of them had left two pounds on the mantelpiece. She'd known them all her life. Donny's body had been taken away. There were words she hardly understood like ‘autopsy' and ‘inquest'. But it was murder, she understood that. When one of her daughters bent and whispered to her that Mr Arbuthnot of Riverstown was outside asking if he might come in, Donny's mother just sat and stared. She broke into a storm of tears as soon as he came into the room. The neighbours huddled in the background. Mr Arbuthnot himself coming to a place like this! Donny's eldest sister wiped her hands on her skirt and asked if he'd have a cup of tea. He looked terribly upset, she told everyone afterwards.

Frank knew Ireland. He said thank you, if there was tea ready, he'd be glad to have a cup. He said gently, ‘Mrs Brennan, I heard about Donny on the news. It's a dreadful thing for you.'

He looked into the lined and weary face; the hands wringing in her lap were worn with rough work and twisted with arthritis. Every day as long as Donny stood on the bridge, she'd come out and led him home, scolding him all the way. But she'd cared for him and borne the burden for all those years.

Frank leaned down and said, ‘Whoever did it will be caught, don't worry. They'll pay for it. Donny never hurt anyone in his life.'

‘He was a good lad,' she said, and let her tears flow, mopping them with the crumpled apron. ‘He never harmed so much as a fly on the wall. Who'd do it, Mr Arbuthnot, sir? Who'd kill a poor child o' God like him?'

Frank didn't answer.

News on the car radio was linking a bank robbery with an incident on the Dublin-Cork train when someone pulled the emergency cord at Sallins, where the poor simpleton had been found stabbed to death. Frank knew, even as he looked into Donny's mother's face, that he would get a call to say the money for the arms shipment was ready for collection.

‘Don't worry about anything,' he said. He spoke to Donny's brother. He worked in the local slaughterhouse, and kept not only his own family of four children, but helped his mother as well.

‘I'll be in touch,' Frank said. ‘Your mother'll need money for the funeral. I'll see to that. She's not to go borrowing. You tell her that.'

‘I will,' Donny's brother mumbled. ‘I will so. She's some put by for herself, but that's all.' He stared after Frank as he said goodbye and left the house.

Sallins would talk about that visit for years to come.

Frank drove back to Meath. Mrs Brogan came out to meet him. He saw the husband in the shadow of the kitchen door.

‘Isn't it terrible news, sir?' she said. ‘That poor man murdered in Dublin?'

‘Yes,' he said. ‘Terrible.'

He went into the study and shut the door. He sat down and switched on the television for the latest news. Mrs Brogan went back to her husband.

‘Did ye see the face on him?' she demanded. ‘White to the gills. Maybe it's robbin' the bank he doesn't like – too close to home.'

Brogan said, ‘It looks like our lads, Mary.'

‘I'd say so,' she said. ‘Good luck to 'em. I'll say a little prayer they won't be caught.'

‘You don't understand.' Marie's voice rose. ‘He stopped the car to give that dirty old creature money. He'll go mad over this!'

Sean said, ‘Lower your voice. You don't need to shout. He won't like it – so, what does he do? He's agreed to take the money and pay it through to the supplier in Monaco. He's in up to his neck. Calm down, woman, for Christ's sake. You're losing your nerve.' He turned away from her.

Marie moved after him. ‘He'll shop us,' she said. ‘He'll give the lot of us away. That'll buy him immunity.'

‘From Dublin maybe,' he answered, ‘but not from us. He knows what happens to informers. He'll shout the odds, but he daren't do more.'

She said bitterly, ‘He's not afraid of us. He's never seen that side. He's never in his life had to keep his mouth shut for fear of anyone. Arbuthnot's no poor yob from Cork who can be scared witless by the threat of a kneecapping. I know him,' she went on. ‘I know him better than you or anyone else. I told you why we broke up and I lost the job. I stood up for what we were doing, and he raved at me. Murderers, cowards … that's what he called our people in the North. But you don't want to know, Sean. You'd rather risk everything than listen to me!'

He swung round on her. He never lost his temper, but he did then.

‘I know what you told me,' he shouted. ‘I know I backed you with Quinlan and the others. But I didn't believe you, Marie, and I still don't. You're jealous because he doesn't love you, and now that he's sick of you, you'd see him dead if you could! But I won't kill him to please you. Not till I know he's a real danger. Now I'm shouting,' he said in exasperation.

‘Prove it,' she taunted him. ‘Ask him to accept the money. See what he says!'

‘I'm going to,' he answered. ‘I'm going to Meath tomorrow. Now shut up. I've had enough.'

He went out, banging the door. She heard the car start up and screech as it turned out on to the road. She knew Sean. He was afraid, but he wouldn't admit it. The plan to rob the bank had misfired. Two men were dead, one because he was brave and foolish, the other because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The public was roused. The IRA was being accused in the media; the circumstantial evidence was growing, linking the murder of the idiot at Sallins to escaping robbers who feared he could identify them. Nothing could be proved, unless one of the killers was caught. Or Quinlan came under suspicion. She wasn't worried about that. He was too experienced to slip up, and there'd never been a blot on his record with the railway in thirty years. The money was hidden in the house. There'd been no arrests, no new developments after two days. The local pubs and lounges were taking collections for Donny's widowed mother. They were safe, except for Frank Arbuthnot.

He went into Dublin to his office as usual. The staff thought he seemed withdrawn and tight-lipped, as if he had something complicated on his mind. He did business as usual, accepted an invitation to lunch at the Hibernian with two brokers. He told his secretary to cancel the appointment with Doctor Filey at his home that evening. He had to stay in town on business. He read the newspaper reports and listened to the news bulletins. They weren't going to be caught. There were no clues. The guard on the train said he'd seen a youth pull the cord and then run down the corridor. He couldn't catch him. The car stolen on the morning of the robbery had been recovered in a side street off the Quays. Forensic tests detected traces of a recently fired shotgun on the rear floor. A porter at the station remembered seeing a similar car draw up and some men getting out, but he couldn't remember the number and couldn't give a description of anyone. They weren't going to be caught.

Kevin Ryan telephoned. Frank didn't take the call. He didn't want to talk to his uncle. He knew the moment of decision was upon him.

There were violent, ruthless men within the framework of the Provisional IRA. And they were part of a horrible scenario of vengeance and terror in the North. Now that terror had struck two streets distant, and knifed a helpless old man because he happened to be in the way. He wouldn't touch the money, until the men responsible for killing Donny had been punished by their own people, and he'd been given proof of it. If they refused – he had made up his mind what to do.

He left Dublin and drove to Riverstown. Claudia was in the study. They hadn't seen each other since his father's funeral. She had aged. But nothing else had changed. She flushed angrily when he was shown in.

‘What the hell are you doing here?'

‘I came to see you about Donny.'

She said, ‘Donny? What about him? Why do you burst in here without even ringing up?'

Frank said, ‘Because I knew you wouldn't see me. Claudia, I want to do something for the family.'

He saw the bitterness in her face. ‘Why don't your friends in the IRA provide for them?' she countered. ‘After all, they killed the poor devil.'

‘It's not proved,' he said, and it sounded feeble.

She shrugged. ‘Balls,' she snapped at him. ‘Everyone in Sallins knows it was them. That's why nobody's come forward. The porter at the railway wouldn't even give a rough description after he realized it wasn't just a robbery. You make me sick, Frank, talking about helping the family. You and your speeches in New York and your public support for the bloody murderers – what do you want to do, salve your conscience with money?'

‘I want to offer a reward for information,' he said. ‘And set up a proper fund for Mrs Brennan. I want you to join me, Claudia, and get your friends to contribute. If we offer enough, someone will inform on whoever did this. They always have.'

‘So it's said,' she said contemptuously. ‘Offer them enough and they'll betray their nearest and dearest. Why don't you get your charming uncle to do something about it? Ask him to put his hand in his pocket for this? I bet you'll get a short bloody answer! I wish you'd go,' she added and turned away from him.

‘Then you won't help?'

‘No.' The answer was final. ‘I'm sorry about Donny. But I'm not going to get a bomb thrown through my window just to make you feel better.' She turned round to him. ‘If your chickens are coming home to roost, then it's about time. You're one of them. You do something about it.'

‘I'm going to, Claudia,' he said. ‘The bank manager had a wife and three young children. It's not just Donny.'

He went out, and left the house. She stood by the window and watched him get into his car and drive away. Suddenly she remembered the flash of premonition that had come over her so many years ago, when he and Claire stood side by side, smiling at each other. The same sense of tragedy swept over her again. It was so strong that she tried to open the window and call him back. But the catch was on too tight, and the next moment the car had disappeared.

By the next morning the story was being whispered throughout Sallins. Not only had Frank Arbuthnot gone to see Donny's mother and paid for the funeral, but he was up at the house telling the missus he was going to pay big money for information about who'd done the killing. The missus wouldn't have any part of it. Wise woman, they agreed. It didn't do to meddle with things like that. All you'd get was trouble.

The report came direct to Sean Filey via Joe Burns, who'd heard it in the Gardai station. He didn't dare contact Jim Quinlan. Quinlan thought he was being watched. Filey had to deal with this alone. He couldn't trust Kevin Ryan either, if he felt his nephew might be at risk. He'd intervened once and it hadn't gone deep enough to survive the shock of the idiot's death. He suffered two days of suspense after Frank cancelled their meeting. The excuse could have been genuine. He had tried to believe it was, if only to allay his own fears. He decided to be calm and rely upon rationality instead of instinct. He decided not to rush Arbuthnot, not to betray any suspicion. Then he got the call from young Burns, and he knew then he had to act. He phoned Mrs Brogan.