The Death of Love (22 page)

“You are a hawd man, Shane Fwost.”

“No—anybody will tell you, I am an easy man who merely wants to be dealt with
fairly
, Anaki. Eire Bank will give you what you need, an unfettered toehold in post-’92 Europe. It will also get you continued government support.”

“Gua’anteed?”

“I have it from the taosieach himself. Look—from the cash flow on government deposits alone, you’ll have your money back in a decade. Meanwhile you have the trading and finance base. Face it, given your needs, it’s a bargain price and you know it.”

“How much are Eire Bank’s deposits?” McGarr asked Noreen.

“Because of government accounts, billions. Since
O’Duffy has been in office, tax receipts have been lodged in Eire Bank.”

O’Duffy again, McGarr thought.

“Then I suppose we can’t do business.”

McGarr heard what he believed were hands slapping thighs. “Such is life,” said Frost.

Or death, thought McGarr. Perhaps Paddy Power’s for the possibility of the sale of Eire Bank. And now no sale.

Again McGarr jotted down some figures. Twenty percent of the first figure mentioned was a king’s—or, rather, a chief executive officer’s—ransom of some 84.6 million. Just over 80 million to Nell Power and her children. And nearly 16 million to whoever inherited Paddy Power’s share. Frost had just said it was Gretta Osbourne, and, as Power’s solicitor, he would know. Motive enough for murder? McGarr rather believed it was.

And Frost was willing to let the deal walk out the door? What did Frost know? How much was Eire Bank really worth? Had he another, better offer waiting in the wings?

“Let me say that I have nothing but the greatest respect for you, your associates, and compatriots.”

“Good aftahnoon, Shane.”

“Well, I suppose in one way it is. Paddy would have wanted Eire Bank to remain Irish, now he has his wish.”

“Ah, yes. Me. Pow-ah,” the man, Anaki, said. “A tragedy. He was so cha’ming.”

“Good afternoon, good afternoon, Pleasure,” Frost was saying to the others.

Noreen reached out and gripped McGarr’s bare arm. “They don’t know Irishmen.”

All of whom had a bit of horse trader or cattle dealer in the blood, thought McGarr. Frost wouldn’t be able to live with himself, did he not let the Japanese walk at least as far as the door.

“Anaki?” Frost said.

Noreen shook McGarr’s arm.

“Fifty-one, and I swear to God they’ll give you a medal when you get back to Kyoto.”

A Japanese phrase that was evidently “Fifty-one” was repeated among the other men. Some discussion followed.

“And you will become chai’man and remain on the board for five years?”

“At a level of remuneration to be negotiated only upward, plus an allowance for any inflation.”

“And Ms. Osbourne will agree to everything?”

There was a pause and then: “I wouldn’t have brought you this far, Anaki, were I not certain.”

“Well, then—” McGarr heard the door close. “Now we
will
dwink with you. May I use your phone, Shane?”

“Only if it’s a local call.”

There was yet another pause, in which, McGarr supposed, the man called Anaki translated what Frost had said. Suddenly the room burst into laughter, through which they heard Frost say, “I just happened to have some champagne on ice, gents. But, remember, this has to be between us, at least until Paddy is decently in the ground and has his will read and made public. If anybody asks, we’re celebrating Anaki’s birthday and not his great triumph in purchasing Eire Bank for what in a few years will be seen as peanuts.”

“Satisfied that it’s Frost?” Noreen asked.

McGarr canted his head, wishing her to continue.

“Being Power’s lawyer, he knew that Power was planning to leave Gretta Osbourne his share of Eire Bank. When Power vetoed Frost’s plan of selling Eire Bank, he murdered Power and stole the note cards.”

“Why steal the note cards?”

“To deflect attention from himself. To make it look like it was Gladden or Nell Power or even Gretta Osbourne, considering the way he edited the contents of the cards. As I’ve heard you say time and again, murderers always try too hard.”

Which was the problem with saying something too often. “But that only called attention to the possibility that it was murder. Without the theft of the cards, I would have reported it as a death by misadventure.”

Noreen offered a palm and smiled, as though the facts were plain for any fool to see. “But Frost needed something to mask what we’ve just heard him accomplish—the sale of Eire Bank. By sending a copy of the sections that, he knew, would be incendiary to Mossie Gladden as well
as an edited version to the…fiery Nell Power, he hoped to create a furor in which the sale of Eire Bank would seem like no big thing. If you’re going to muddy the waters, make them black.”

Or mix metaphors, McGarr thought. “What about Nell Power and her…tryst or whatever with Shane Frost?”

Noreen hunched her shoulders and looked away. “Maybe the three of them were—are—in on it together.”

“Then why steal the cards to shift any blame?”

“Onto Mossie Gladden with his readily identifiable country gorsoon costume? It strikes me that he was the perfect party to blame.”

It was McGarr’s turn to think. He remembered the letter that Nell Power had been writing to her daughter in America that mentioned Gretta Osbourne as “That blessed perfectionist woman.” Could Nell Power enter into a conspiracy with her? Not if O’Shaughnessy’s theory of premeditated murder was at all accurate and could with-stand the exigency of a quick £423 million.

He also thought of one of the objects that he had found in the pocket of Mossie Gladden’s greatcoat. The blond wig. What use would Gladden have had for that? Did it fit in, and where?

“I suppose it all boils down to who delivered the photocopies of the note cards to the Waterville Lake Hotel. You know—who was the rough-looking country gorsoon?”

Noreen blinked. A furrow appeared in her brow, then cleared, as her green eyes brightened with insight. “You should run a lineup, is what you should do. You know, with Gladden’s hat and greatcoat, all the prime suspects, and the desk clerk from the Waterville Lake Hotel.”

“Just like in the movies.”

“Tomorrow, right before the funeral mass for Paddy Power. If Gladden won’t cooperate with the coat and hat, I’m sure I could find similar objects in a shop in the village and a blond wig.”

McGarr considered the suggestion for a moment, then nodded. What would it cost? Fifty or sixty pounds. It would also obviate the need to “disturb” the truculent Gladden, who would be nursing his damaged image after
his disastrous press conference on the bridge. “What about Maddie? Perhaps she’s ready to return—”

“Oh, Jesus—I completely forgot about her!” Turning on heel, Noreen rushed into the bedroom.

McGarr turned an ear to the celebration, which was continuing loudly in Shane Frost’s room. In Japanese exclusively. He checked the tape recorder to see if the reels were still spinning. It might be interesting to have it translated and transcribed, when they got back to Dublin.

AT 11:07, WELL PAST the hour at which he should have been back in his dormitory digs, barman-trainee Hughie Ward ambled into the lobby area of Parknasilla and nicked a silver ashtray from the receptionist’s desk. In the public toilet he washed and dried it until the surface gleamed. From the coat of his service tuxedo, he then drew a buff-colored envelope, which he had lifted earlier from one of the several writing desks that were scattered throughout the hotel. He placed the envelope on the tray, and he fitted on his white gloves.

As though delivering a message, Ward made a pass through the public rooms of Parknasilla: the sun room with its sweeping gray-stone walls and views of the dark bay and starlit sky beyond. In one corner of the large, L-shaped room a pianist was rendering classical and old Irish favorites for the bankers, some of whom were playing cards or chess; others were engaged in cigar-smoky, animated conversations, mainly in English. A fresh heap of coal was burning in the fireplace, an oily yellow flame licking at the flue. There, a group of French women had gathered, two of whom tried to order another pot of tea from Ward, who said he’d refer their request to the kitchen.

The Shaw Lounge came next, which had become a kind of reading room. Every seat, divan, chair, banquette, and sofa was taken by somebody with something legible in his
hands, and the feeling was rather collegial and pleasant, Ward judged. Again he had to fend off brandy and cigar orders. There too the hearth was giving off the deep heat of a mellow coal fire, and Ward decided that someday,
if
and when all this was over, he would return as a guest.
With
Bresnahan.

But no Bresnahan was to be found there. Nor among the guests lingering over coffee in the Pygmalion Restaurant, nor in the Snooker Room, nor the Derryquin Suite, where some sort of banking meeting was still taking place, nor the swimming pool, into which he glanced on the off-chance that Bresnahan might be taking the only other sort of vigorous exercise that she practiced regularly. Bresnahan swam like a great red dolphin, taking powerful strokes even in heavy surf, the waves just washing right over her. Ward sank like a stone.

Another difference, he thought bleakly, climbing the stairs to the second floor and the Shaw Library. There, an exotic-looking Italian woman asked him if, in fact, George Bernard Shaw had actually stayed in the hotel. Ward had noticed her on the day before with an aged husband, who was now nowhere to be seen. She pointed to photographs of the dramatist, which had been hung on every wall.

“Yes. He wrote his best play here.
Saint Joan
.”

“Why
best?
” the woman asked with an intensity that neither the play nor Ward, as barman-waiter, merited. He begged off the gambit, claiming it was only his personal opinion. Smiling, he then glanced down at the silver tray with its envelope and back up into her hazel eyes that a gold choker around her neck made seem gamboge.

The woman spun around and stepped quickly back to the red chintz love seat on which she had been reclining in wait. Another country as yet unconquered, thought Ward as he withdrew strategically up the stairs toward Bresnahan’s room. He wished he had fifty pee for every opportunity he had ignored in the past two years; he’d have enough money for a holiday in Trieste, which was where the woman’s husband owned his bank.

Ward was about to step into the hall on which, he had earlier learned, Bresnahan’s room was located, when he saw her, or at least he thought he did: her wide shoulders,
thin waist, that certain athletic swing to her stride that he so much admired, even the unmistakably particular aroma of her costly perfume, which had been recently applied and now pervaded the hall.

Ward opened his mouth to call out, but restrained himself. What if her “sugar daddy,” as it were—the one who had “sprung” for all the designer “threads” and the Merc—was in residence at the hotel and that was the reason she had been avoiding him. His heart pounding in his temples and with all his senses jacked up to ring-readiness, Ward followed in her spice-musky train, employing the even deeper shadows along the sides of the walls to conceal his pursuit.

In the stairwell he waited until she had passed beyond the rail where she might look down and see who was behind her. But she neither stopped nor turned her head left or right. Instead she made straight for Frost’s door. There she raised her hand to knock, but the door opened, and Frost—reaching out—pulled her to him and kissed her.

Ward was on the final stair, and his entire body went taut. The pattern of the carpet spun before his eyes, and he felt lightheaded and weak in the way that was disastrous in the ring. Control. He did not know if he could keep hold of himself, job
and
profession be damned. How could he work with her, how could he go back to Dublin, after this…mockery of their relationship. He’d make hash of Frost, so he would. And resign.

Ward’s right calf tensed, and he was about to propel himself forward when she pushed herself away from Frost, saying, “Get away from me, Shane. You’ve been drinking. If I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a dozen times, I will not confer with you while you’re drunk.”

“Who’s drunk? I’m just celebrating. We’ve done it—fifty-one bloody pounds per share, outright purchase! Even Paddy could not have refused that.” In the brilliant light spilling from the doorway, Frost raised both arms, his mane of silver hair lapping back over his bare shoulders. He was wearing only shorts, and his tall, square body looked lean, well exercised, and deeply tanned. One hand held a bottle of champagne. “Well…?” he demanded.

“I’ve changed my mind. I’ve decided not to sell.”

Ward’s eyes cleared. It was
not
Bresnahan after all, but rather the other tall woman—Gretta Osbourne, Paddy Power’s former…assistant.

“
Why
for Jesus’sake?” Looking up the hall in one direction and then—Ward flattened himself against the wall of the staircase—the other, Frost closed the door.

Ward’s body was tingling, and sweat—something that usually took as many as two rounds to gather—now beaded his forehead and upper lip. His arms were shaking, and, when he looked down, he saw that his hands were still knotted in tight white fists. He told himself to relax, and he did.

Until he turned to descend the staircase and, looking out the casement window, saw the Merc that Bresnahan had been driving. It wheeled around and came to a stop with its lights focused on the back bumper of a red Audi.

Bresnahan, who was sitting in the passenger seat, now got out and approached the Audi, walking through the beam of the Merc’s headlamps. She glanced down at the bumper sticker that Ward knew from its shape said:

EIRE BANK
EUR BANK     OUR BANK

Then she copied something into her notebook. Probably the plate number.

The driver’s door of the Merc popped open, and out stepped a man who looked enough like Bresnahan in height and build to be related. But for his black, wavy mane, they were a pair.

Bresnahan raced around to the other side of the Audi to copy the information on the tax stamp and to check the doors there. She then said something to the man, pointing to the empty slot beside the Audi. He parked the Merc, got out, and, taking Bresnahan’s arm, led her toward the hotel.

Some cousin? Some friend? Ward was so relieved that Bresnahan was not the woman who had entered Frost’s room that he was nearly dispassionate in considering who the tall young man might be. The owner of the car? No, he was around Ward’s own age and too young to be able to afford such an extravagant machine.

“What are
you
doing
here?
” A deep voice asked from the stairs below. It was Sonnie, carrying a tray with a wine bucket and the towel-wrapped neck of a champagne bottle protruding from ice.

Ward showed him the silver tray and envelope. “Mr. Feeney asked me to deliver a message.”

“Mr. Feeney went home hours ago,” said Sonnie skeptically. “But as long as you’re still here, go down to the kitchen and fetch the cart that’s been ordered for Mr. Frost’s room.”

“But I’m—”

“Nonsense, man. You’re in service now, and you should resign yourself to the idea that your time is no longer your own. And a piece of advice—when you’re to go home? Go Home. Don’t linger around.”

Sonnie swept by him, and knocked on Frost’s door.

Frost appeared, still nearly naked. He handed Sonnie a tip, took the tray, and closed the door.

Sonnie snapped a five-pound note before Ward’s face. “This from him is like a gold scapular from the pope. He’s drunk, I’d say, and there’s probably one of these in it for you, if you hurry.”

Enough said; Ward turned on heel.

O’Suilleabhain directed Bresnahan beyond the trapezoid of yellow light that was spilling from the main entrance of the hotel and the eyes of the doorman, whom they both knew.

In the shadows he pulled her to him. “Give us a kiss.”

“Are you singular tonight, or is there more than one of you, as usual?”

O’Suilleabhain smiled understandingly. “Fair play, but, you know, people can change.”

“And for the worse, as well.” Bresnahan had both hands on his chest, and she pushed herself back to look up at him. “Let me ask
you
something. How old are you?”

Working back and forth as though attempting to cast a spell, his green eyes fixed in hers. “You know as well as I. Two years older than yourself.”

“Thirty.”

O’Suilleabhain nodded.

“Don’t you think it’s time to stop playing games?”

O’Suilleabhain pondered that for a moment, then said, “But isn’t life one big game? Isn’t that what makes it fun?”

“Like hide-and-go-fetch?”

“Well, tonight I had in mind something more like tag.”

Bresnahan fixed his gaze and wondered how long, if he were to pursue her, she could avoid the lure that Rory O’Suilleabhain represented. In every way he was—or at least had been—so right for her, and after all the years she had pined for him, she could not keep herself from wondering what it would be like to realize those not-entirely-forgotten dreams. Perhaps Wilde was right and she could cure herself of the temptation only by yielding to it.

But it occurred to her as well that any such concession, no matter how slight, would be the death of her love for Hughie Ward. Or at least would begin the process. Things between them would become immediately different and…diminished. And yet she wished to live and experience and possess life in all its forms, especially that which had been most appealing to her for so long.

Perhaps she couldn’t have it both ways. She knew this: You had to pick and choose, and then live with your choices. But at what cost?

She reached up and seized O’Suilleabhain by his long, chiseled nose, which she squeezed. “Suffer, sinner.” And she broke away from him, stepping back into the light where she could be seen by the doorman.

O’Suilleabhain followed her. “Didn’t Martin Luther say something like that?”

“No, he said, ‘Sin bravely.’”

“And look what it got him. Another religion.”

And centuries of religious strife that had not yet ceased, at least in Ireland. Life was too complex to be reduced to riposte or a dalliance for all the
right
reasons.

“Well—how do I get home?”

She was tempted to tell him on his two feet, but she had no reason to be angry with him. He was who he was, and there was no changing that. “You have the key to my car. I’ll need it again tomorrow, before the Power funeral.”

“Are your folks going?”

“Of course. Wasn’t his eldest sister maid of honor at my mother’s wedding?”

“I’ll give them all a lift, then.” Together with his mother, he meant.

So, he
was
serious; their parents’ presence would make tongues wag and seriously curtail any protracted “sparking” he might be engaged in at least locally.

“Michael,” she said in greeting to the doorman, sweeping by him.

“I see Rory’s found you, Ruthie.”

“Did you think he wouldn’t?” she asked.

“They say he’s got radar.” He canted his head to add confidentially, “A word to the wise.”

Bresnahan raised an eyebrow, thanking him, and walked into the lobby, which was empty. But she had no sooner climbed the deeply carpeted stairs to the second floor, when she saw Hughie Ward, pulling a laden cart down the hall. “Can I give you a hand with that, waiter?” Like a matador(a), she opened the fire door and tilted her smiling face to him as he wheeled the cart through.

Ward caught a glimpse of her gray eyes, which the red illuminated Exit sign flecked with bite of ruby light. Jesus, how had he gotten himself into such a mess? He punched the Up button on the elevator that would take him to the second story and Frost’s suite. He glanced up at the lights of the floor monitor; he couldn’t look at her while deciding, but he had to face this thing straight on and then act according to his determination.

This was—he took a deep breath and then abandoned himself to his fate—love, for Christ sake, and love was trust, sharing, and mutual respect. Love was help, encouragement, and support. Love didn’t go around suspicious, distrustful, and bitter. Having only his hard self to guide him and the sorry history of his past, failed affairs—all of them 100 percent ruined by design—Ward didn’t rightly know how to proceed, but he suspected it was a matter that couldn’t and shouldn’t be planned.

Instead he’d wing it. He’d speak and act, not think, and see what came out. The point was to be light, not heavy. Any time a woman had become serious with him, he had
split, especially when he had had a choice. He thought of the tall, dark, handsome man who had brought her home.

The elevator slid open. Ward put a foot in the door and turned to her. He smiled and let his eyes roam her powerful body, every inch of which he knew perhaps better than his own; Ward was nothing if not an attentive lover. “So—how went your day? Make Gladden’s press conference on the bridge?”

She nodded and told him how Gladden had painted Power as martyr and himself as scapegoat in a government cover-up led by McGarr. “He also didn’t seem to know much about Paddy Power’s note cards. It was as if he never really read them thoroughly. When the Power proposal for the debt was brought up, he stormed off. You know, swapping debt for equity.”