Women of Courage (77 page)

Nevertheless, it was not something she wanted her servants to think about. They were all much older than her, and could hardly be expected to approve of a thing like that. She climbed the great staircase under its ornate plaster ceilings to the first floor, and continued up a slightly less grand one to her own rooms. She shut herself in her sitting room to think.

It was a large, comfortable, untidy room. When she had moved back into the house she had chosen it as a retreat, and that was what it still was. The servants were allowed in only to light the fires, and when she specifically asked them. There were two desks on either side of the window, one cluttered with the accounts and papers for running the house, the other with her essays and lecture notes. In between the two was a long green window seat, which was what she had chosen the room for. She could sit here in the sunshine, and read, or gaze out over the little park in the square and remember what it had been like before the war. For this was the room in which she had slept - or stayed awake, entranced - in those magical times of her childhood.

For the rest, there were several glass-fronted bookcases, some lemon-coloured armchairs, an ottoman, and a number of pictures of lakes, beaches, horses and mountains in Galway, to remind her of Killrath, her other home.

But now, she hurried to the window seat, to see if the detective was still in the square.

He had gone, but the confusion he had left behind him remained.

Sean’s act - the bullets through the car window, the blood, the headlong flight through Phoenix Park - had been heroic, romantic, exhilarating. She had felt no fear at all then. But the policeman in her own breakfast room this morning, his big hand holding Sean’s photo on his knee, made her feel sick inside. This was no game now, it was real. If her republicanism was anything more than fine words, she had to help Sean now - protect him from those big hands that had held his photo so casually.

She had to see Sean, that was clear. As soon as possible. But how? She did not even know his address; and anyway, if the detective had taken the photograph from his flat, Sean could not be staying there any more. If he went there and was caught, he would be in prison.

Perhaps he was already in prison! The thought made her gasp, like a blow. The Inspector hadn’t actually said they were still looking for him, had he? Perhaps they had already caught him and he was refusing to talk. The thought of Sean, alone in some stone cell, made her shudder. She wrapped a shawl round her shoulders, and strode up and down thinking back frantically over the interview. No, surely he had said the police were anxious to talk to him, something like that? Sean must still be free then.

Who would know him, to give him a message? Professor O’Connor perhaps, the people from the Gaelic League in Parnell Square. But the classes were closed for Christmas. And anyway, what would she say? The police are after you, they’ve got your photo, please be careful. That was silly, he must know all that already. Perhaps not about the photo, but all the rest. And then - she remembered her blush - that Inspector was no fool. He might be waiting for her to go to Sean, have her followed, so that she would lead the police to him.

In that case, she must not see him at all.

But the thought of it was so painful, she dug her fingers into the velvet cushions of the window seat in frustration. She wanted to see him, more than anything else. Not because of the police visit, that just made it more urgent. She wanted to see him for herself.

5. Radford

K
EE SAT together with Radford and Detective Sergeant Davis in DMP headquarters in Brunswick Street.

They were in Radford’s office. It was a drab, functional room with a desk, several filing cabinets, and a solid table that was cluttered with papers, dirty teacups, and ashtrays. It was eight o’clock in the evening. The single window, which was slightly open to let out the smoke, looked down on the street two storeys below. The occasional sound of cars, and the clip of hurrying feet or hooves, formed a background to their discussion.

‘So that’s it, then, Tom, is it?’ Radford asked. ‘The grocer gave the lad a room and a job, let him take time off whenever he chose, and never asked any questions?’

‘That’s what he says.’

‘And his other tenant was a model university student, only pausing from his studies to help old ladies cross the road.’

‘That’s the boy.’

Radford sighed. ‘Well, I suppose we could intern him on well-founded suspicion of lying through his teeth, and earn ourselves another half-dozen newspaper articles about police insensitivity. But there’s another lead, you say.’

‘Yes. The girl. Catherine O’Connell-Gort.’ Kee pronounced the surname with exaggerated precision, as though it offended him in some way. He got out his notebook, and went carefully through the details of his interview with her. ‘She’s one possible lead to the boy, Brennan. If she is involved with him in some way, she may lead us to him. I think we should put a watch on her.’

Radford paced up and down, considering the idea. ‘It’s promising, but there are difficulties. First, the boy, Brennan. We can’t prove he was at Ashtown, or even that he’s a Shinner. All we know is that he shared lodgings with Martin Savage, who definitely was there, and that he had a clip of German cartridges in his sock drawer. Well, that might not convince a jury, but it should be enough to intern him for a while, if that’s what we want to do. Then there’s the girl. If anyone ever had the perfect alibi, for God’s sake, she has. She was sitting there, squashed up between her father and Johnny French, when the bullets started flying through the window! You’re not saying she planned it?’

‘No, sir, of course not. I just think she’s fond of Brennan.’

‘And you base this theory upon a blush?’

‘Well, not entirely, sir. Her whole demeanour, more like.’

Radford stopped pacing and sat on his desk. ‘I don’t know about your experience of the female mind, Tom, but I would have thought the young lady’s ardour - if it ever existed - might have received a rather rapid douche of cold water if she really saw her young Lochinvar chucking a Mills bomb at her head, as you say.’

Davis laughed. Kee said: ‘She may not have seen him. She may just have believed it was possible he was involved. In which case she might run off in desperation to ask him if it was true.’

Radford considered this. ‘Possibly. In which case Sod’s Law tells us she’s with him now, while we’re discussing it. But then there’s another thing. Her daddy, as you know, is a fairly important man in Dublin Castle, and in the country generally. Have you thought what I’m going to say to him about this, if she complains she’s being followed everywhere by big men in raincoats?’

Kee sighed. ‘We stick to the grocer, then.’

‘That’s about it, unless you’ve got any more ideas.’ Neither of them had. ‘Right, then, I’m going to get a bite to eat. Dick, can you type this up, as usual?’

‘Sir.’ Davis gathered his notes together, and took them into his office. Kee took his coat off the stand by the door. As he was leaving, Radford touched his arm. He pushed the door softly to.

‘Sorry about that, Tom,’ he said quietly. ‘It wasn’t such a daft idea as I said. But there are other things we can do. Come on back to the hotel. I’ll buy you a drink.’

In his office down the corridor, Davis had also closed his door. He sat down at his desk, in front of the big Imperial typewriter. He was a good typist for a policeman, and a meticulous keeper of records. He arranged his notes carefully on the left of the machine, and took paper, carbons and flimsies from the drawers on the right. He arranged these neatly. A top copy for the Assistant Commissioner, Radford; then a carbon; a second copy for the main files kept in this room; then a second carbon; a third copy for Military Intelligence in Dublin Castle.

Then he added a third sheet of carbon paper, as he always did; and a fourth sheet of flimsy paper.

He looked at his notes, and began to type. If he wasn’t interrupted, he would be finished in about half an hour.

Tom Kee was a man of few loyalties, deeply held. His wife, Margaret, was the one he held most dear. Since their marriage he had seldom been away from home for more than a few days, and his transfer to Dublin had caused him much inner distress, because of the separation from her. But they had three sons and a daughter, all at good Protestant schools in Belfast. He wasn’t going to risk their education for anything.

He had hoped to travel home at weekends, but had only managed it once so far. Some of the greatest miseries of this time were the constant train strikes, encouraged by Sinn Fein as a protest against British rule. The one time he had got home, he had had to wait fifteen hours on Sunday night for the chance to return.

So he was forced to rely on the telephone. He had had one installed in the house before he left; it was only the second private phone in the street, the engineer had told him, and they had put up a special pole to carry the wires. But it was not very satisfactory. Kee was an undemonstrative man, but he loved his wife deeply, in the way the Bible prescribed. He realized now that he loved the warmth of her, the rich full curves of her body in his arms in bed; and he loved her cheerful efficiency, the way she bossed him and the kids around, so that they dared not be lazy or untidy. And he loved the smell of hot stew or fresh bread when he opened the door of the little terrace house in the evening, despite the irregular, unpredictable hours that he worked. None of that came out of the tinny, crackling voice on the telephone; and Kee could not express his feelings towards her, with the thought of the ever-present ear of the operator on the line.

So their phone conversations were inhibited, awkward and increasingly irregular.

His other great loyalty, apart from those to parents, church and Empire, was to William Radford. Indeed, it was only for Radford’s sake that he had agreed to come to Dublin at all.

If it had not been for Radford, Kee would probably still have been a uniformed sergeant, patrolling the Shankill Road on Saturday nights. A docker’s son, he had no connections or influence to help him climb to the top. But ten years ago Radford, then a detective inspector, had recognized some traces of ability in the young sergeant, and encouraged him to take the exams for the CID. He had passed, and had worked with Radford during the war on anti-espionage work. They had foiled two attempts by spies to penetrate Belfast’s naval dockyards, and their mutual respect had grown and lasted. So when Radford had been made Assistant Commissioner of the DMP, with orders to do something about the demoralized G Division, he had asked for Kee to go with him.

Now they lodged together in the Standard Hotel in Harcourt Street, a few hundred yards from the entrance to Dublin Castle.

Most of the rest of the clientele were army officers. As the two detectives crossed the dining room to a table in the corner, Kee noted with amusement how several had ostentatiously laid a loaded revolver on the table before them, beside the fish knife.

Radford waved greetings to one such officer, a much-decorated major with fine handlebar moustaches.

‘What’s that for, Tony? Waiters late with the soup again?’

The Major shook his head. ‘This is a country in rebellion, Bill - don’t you forget it. I remember a chap like you in Simla once. Intelligence officer. Fine fellow, great on the polo field, but refused to believe the natives meant what they said. I had to fish his body out of the river in the end. Nasty business.’

Radford nodded. ‘I know. I’ll be careful, don’t worry.’

Kee admired Radford’s assurance. He might be an inspector now, but he wasn’t able to relate to men like these. He lacked their sense of ease, of banter, of worldwide social control.

Their table was quite secluded, out of casual earshot for the other customers, away from any door or window. To Kee’s surprise it was laid for three. ‘Expecting someone, Bill?’ he asked.

Radford smiled, and ordered beer. While they waited for it he said: ‘That’s my surprise. The man we’re meeting here tonight is from Military Intelligence. To be precise, that girl’s father.’

‘What?’ Kee spilt some beer on the table, and mopped it with a handkerchief.

‘I know, he doesn’t sound the type. But he must have more between the ears than he lets on, to be where he is.’

‘Perhaps; I haven’t met him. But if he’s in MI, how can he be so daft as to let his daughter run around with the murder gang?’

‘You wait till your kids are her age, Tom. They don’t always turn out exactly as you’d hope.’

Kee frowned. ‘Not my kids. Not a thing like that.’

Radford took another draught of beer, and smiled. It was the thing he liked most about Tom Kee - his utter reliability. For all his intelligence, he never seemed to have any doubts about what was right and what was wrong. Ambiguity, in Kee’s view, was a disease that afflicted criminals, not the rest of the world.

‘I hope not, for your sake, anyway. But here he is.’ Radford pushed back his chair as a tall, grey-haired colonel made his way towards them across the dining room. As he approached, Kee had the impression of an archetypal soldier: tall, high forehead, long nose, a proud, disdainful chin under the bushy Kitchener moustache. Well-cut khaki uniform with a line of medal ribbons, highly polished Sam Browne belt and cavalry boots, cap crushed under his arm. A man who would be at home leading the King’s birthday parade in Phoenix Park, Kee thought; but hopelessly at sea fighting Collins in the back streets of Dublin.

But when Sir Jonathan shook his hand, Kee noticed the eyes. Hard, cold, grey - paler than those of his daughter, Kee thought: the eyes of a man who was no one’s fool, and would get what he wanted whatever the cost.

They ordered, and while they were waiting Sir Jonathan asked, crisply, for a report on how far the police had got with the Ashtown incident. Radford told him, giving details of the findings in North Strand. With a warning glance at Kee, he mentioned the interview with Catherine, but omitted his suspicion about her blush. He passed Sean Brennan’s photograph across the table.

‘Good,’ said Sir Jonathan. ‘Pity it’s not the negative. But we’ll try and get some kind of copy made for the troops. There’s a young major in the Castle who’s hot on that sort of thing.’