The other thing you asked me was what happened the day James died. Well, it was a long time ago so I’m not sure how many of the details I remember. But Dominic had a bunch of his friends staying. One of them, a kid called Ben, had brought his motorboat with him. It was fantastic. They launched it on the lake. The weather was amazing that summer. They all went water-skiing, sunbathing. There was a lot of drinking going on. Anyway, that day, the first I knew there was trouble was when I heard the boat revving. I wasn’t with the other kids. Dominic didn’t want me around. They’d all gone off into the woods. My mother had taken Vanessa, the baby, down to the lake shore to paddle. Marina was messing around in the dinghy and I was up a tree in the woods, watching the deer through my binoculars. Then I heard the boat. It startled the deer and they took off in a group. I climbed down from the tree and I started following them. When I got to the top it was incredible. I could see the house and the woods. I could see the lake and the rock face rising up from it. I could see my mother lying in a deckchair and the baby in her pram. And I could see a little plume of smoke coming from the pine trees by the lake shore where Dominic and his snooty friends hung out. And then I saw a motorboat down the far end of the lake. It was doing circles. It was swirling around, these big white circles on the surface of the water. And I could see the dinghy, and this tiny figure, Marina, standing up and she was leaning over the side. I went on tracking the deer, but when I looked down at the lake and the shore I could see there was something going on. Dominic and all of them were running towards the house. My mother was standing on the beach. She looked so tiny, just like a little doll. And every now and then, when the wind was in the right direction, I could hear someone shouting. Eventually I went back down the hill. I came in behind the house but there was no one there. I walked down to the lake and everyone was standing around. looking at James. He was lying on the jetty. My mother was screaming, completely hysterical. And so was Marina. She was crying and shouting. She kept on saying that it was her fault, that she should have made James wear a life-jacket. That he wouldn’t have drowned if he’d worn a life-jacket. And for a long time afterwards, even after the funeral, even when we went back to school, she kept on about it. How it was all her fault, the whole thing.
Finally, you asked me if there was anyone who would want to harm Marina. I don’t know. She was expelled from the Lodge. She pretty much dropped out after that. She wouldn’t go back to school. She moved out of the house. We didn’t see much of her. Then she went to the States. We didn’t hear from her for months at a time. And by the time she came home I had left. My mother used to pass on bits of news. I was glad she seemed to be getting on well. Although, to be honest, I wasn’t convinced. So when my mother called me and said she was dead it wasn’t that much of a surprise. And I can see it suddenly clearly. The view from the top of the hill that day. The lake, the dinghy and Marina. ‘My fault,’ she kept on saying. ‘My fault.’
Have to go now. It’s very busy here. Too many hungry mouths. Not enough food. All donations gratefully received.
All the best,
Tom Spencer
‘I can see it now,’ Tom Spencer had written. And McLoughlin could see it too. He could see Spencer’s vantage-point from the top of the hill. And all that Spencer could see from it. He began to doodle with a pen. The oval shape of the lake. The long rectangle of the house. The square of the big field that went down to the water’s edge. He filled in with cross-hatching the area of woodland by the house and along the lake shore. He defined the narrow, sandy beach. And he drew the snake of the drive from the gate, putting in the small square shape of the lodge. And at the far end he marked, with a series of small circles, the rapids where Helena had found Marina’s body and the little stream that flowed over the stones and down into the next valley. He picked up a red pen and uncapped it. He scanned his map and marked with an X where everyone had been. Marina and James in the boat. Sally and Vanessa on the beach. Dominic de Paor and his friends on the little promontory. Tom Spencer at the top of the hill. And who else might have been there? he wondered. Where was Helena on that hot summer day in 1985? Was she in the clinic in the city? Or was she somewhere else? In the cottage, perhaps? Or in the woods too? Watching, waiting, hating.
He got up and walked into the kitchen. He opened the fridge. He was hungry but he couldn’t decide what he wanted to eat. He slid back the glass doors and stepped outside. His phone rang. He sat on the bench and scanned the screen. The number wasn’t familiar, but he recognized the voice immediately.
‘Michael McLoughlin?’ Poppy Atkinson’s tone was more measured than it had been the last time they had spoken. ‘I’ve just heard about Mark Porter. I’d like to meet you. Are you free at lunchtime today?’
She suggested they meet in the bar of the Shelbourne Hotel. She worked, it turned out, at the Anglo-Irish Investment Bank, just around the corner in Kildare Street. She was a partner and fund manager. He hadn’t realized she had such a prestigious job. But, as she had said, she’d got the brains and Rosie the looks.
She was waiting for him at a table in the corner. The bar was dark and empty. Her wine glass was empty too. He asked the barman for a refill, and a mineral water for himself.
‘Very sensible.’ Poppy lifted her glass and saluted him.
‘Now,’ he leaned back into the deep leather chair, ‘what did you want to talk about?’
It was mid-afternoon by the time they left the bar. He walked with her to the bank’s revolving door. She wasn’t completely steady on her feet. He suggested a taxi home, but she brushed aside his suggestion.
‘I’m fine.’ She gave him a little push with both hands. ‘If the guys can have their long lunches, so can I.’ Then the door swallowed her. He moved away and crossed the road. He walked past the uniformed guards on duty outside the dáil and in through the wrought-iron gate to the National Library. He went quickly up the marble stairs and into the Reading Room. It was quiet and calm. He sat down at one of the desks and switched on the green glass lamp. He took out his notebook. He began to write.
Ben Roxby and Rosie Webb had been having an affair. It had ended when he had fallen off the roof. Rosie blamed herself for his death. Annabel had found out about them and she had challenged Ben that evening when he came home. His guilt had made him go up on to the roof. His guilt had killed him.
‘Did Rosie’s husband know?’
‘Everyone knew.’
‘Everyone?’
She explained. The group from school had continued to be close. But Ben’s father was ambitious for him and sent him to America to study at MIT. By the time he had come back to Ireland, Rosie had met and married Nick Webb. Ben then married Annabel Palmer, whom he’d known all his life, but it wasn’t long before he and Rosie became lovers again. Their old friends colluded. Provided alibis, places to meet. Dominic gave them the use of the Lake House. Mark Porter would keep one of his flats in Fitzwilliam Square specifically for them.
‘And what happened after Ben died?’
The group supported Rosie through it. They gave her succour and comfort. And Dominic gave her more.
‘Such as?’
He supplied her with cocaine. He had his sources. Her addiction grew. She would do anything for the drug. And then . . .
‘He wanted something from her, did he?’
‘Yes.’ Poppy nodded. ‘No such thing as a free lunch. Or a free line of coke.’
‘And her husband, he must have known something was going on?’ He drummed his fingers on the table.
‘You know,’ she drained her glass and beckoned the waiter over, ‘I could never figure Nick out. He’s a smart guy, sophisticated, all that. But either he knew and he didn’t care, or he genuinely didn’t know. And I actually think it’s the latter. I was always waiting for the shit to hit the fan, but it never did.’
‘And what about Mark? What did he have to do with it all?’ He fished the piece of lemon from the bottom of his glass and sucked it.
‘Mark was their go
fer. Their delivery-boy. Their messenger. He was party to all their sordid secrets, all their messy relationships. Rosie wasn’t Dominic’s only conquest.’ She sniggered. She picked up her fresh glass. ‘I’ve known a few in my time. And they always told me how Mark would show up with flowers and presents. It was almost as if they became Mark’s lovers by association.’ She took a gulp of wine. ‘I used to think that the group were like the Famous Five. You know, the Enid Blyton stories?’
McLoughlin nodded. ‘I was a Secret Seven kid, actually.’
‘Yeah, well, no accounting for taste. But you’ll remember that the Famous Five included a dog. Well, Mark was the dog.’ She crossed her legs, bumping one knee against the table. Their glasses shuddered. ‘He got the leftovers. When Dominic was done with someone, Mark would show up.’
McLoughlin lifted his eyes from his notebook. The Reading Room was almost empty. A few grey heads bent over books. A girl who might have been a student reading a newspaper. A couple, Americans probably, scanning a dusty ledger that the librarian had brought out from the stacks. He wrote the word ‘party’ in his notebook. Now, what had Poppy said about it?
‘The party? Well, I wasn’t invited, of course. I’d volunteered to babysit for Rosie’s kids.’
‘So Nick was there?’ McLoughlin didn’t remember seeing him in the group by the fire.
‘No, he was away on business. So I said I’d look after the kids. I love them, love spending time with them.’
‘You don’t have any of your own?’ McLoughlin shifted in the leather chair. It creaked loudly.
‘No. As I said, Rosie got the looks. She also got the perfect Fallopian tubes. I got the brains and the ectopic pregnancies. I can’t have children so I make do with my sister’s.’ She drank some more wine. ‘It must have been one hell of a night. Rosie was in a bad state when she came home. I put her straight to bed with a Valium.’
‘Well, I presume she was upset about Marina’s death.’
Poppy shook her head. ‘No, it wasn’t that. It was something else. I assumed it was to do with Dominic. After all, his wife, the ever so cute Gilly, was there too. And Sophie Fitzgerald. All Dominic’s lovely ladies. And, of course, his mother was in residence. Anything could happen if she was around.’
‘Do you know her?’
Poppy made a face. ‘Not really. I doubt if anyone knows her now, except Dominic. And Rosie used to say that the only person who understood Dominic was his mother. So what does that say about him? If the only person who has a clue what’s going on in his head is a nutcase. A certified paranoid schizophrenic. Not very healthy, is it? Actually, I think Rosie was quite jealous. Apparently, whenever they went to the Lake House, Dominic would disappear for hours up to the little cottage where his mother stayed when he had guests. And I remember her telling me that when he came back he always smelt of her. Ugh, what a thought.’ She gave an exaggerated shiver.
‘Smelt of her in what way?’ McLoughlin remembered her perfume. Saliva filled his mouth and his stomach heaved.
‘What way do you think? Scent, body odour, whatever. Rosie was very put off.’ Poppy’s long nose twitched. ‘But as far as the party was concerned, Rosie didn’t mention Helena. Anyway, who knows what happened that night? One thing I do know, however. There was a lot of cocaine involved.’
‘What about LSD? Acid?’
‘Doubt it somehow. It’s not a cool drug, these days. It’s for teenagers, the ecstasy generation. Not for Dublin’s sophisticates.’ She smiled.
McLoughlin wrote ‘cocaine’ and underlined it. Hard to believe that five years ago cocaine was a rarity. Only the very rich and the very famous had had access to it. Now every suburban party, every family get-together, every wedding, every night on the town got lift-off from those little plastic sachets of white powder.
‘So, tell me, what do you think about Mark now? About his suicide? What caused it, do you think?’
‘I don’t know. I was hoping you might be able to tell me. You were there last night, after all.’ She touched the back of his hand briefly.
‘How do you know that?’ McLoughlin slid his hand to his lap.
‘Your photo’s in one of the tabloids. You’re leaving Mark’s house with a woman.’ She finished her drink. ‘Did you see him?’
‘Yeah. I did. It wasn’t nice.’
‘No.’ She played with the heavy gold bracelet on her right wrist. ‘It never is. So, what I wondered . . . it said in the paper there was a note. What was in it?’
‘Why do you want to know?’
‘Well,’ she wriggled in her chair, ‘it occurred to me that, with all that’s happened recently, Mark might have said something about people we know. And to be honest, we could do without the publicity.’ She leaned towards him. He could smell the alcohol on her breath. ‘You’re a good guy, Michael McLoughlin, aren’t you? One of us. If there was anything you thought I should know, you’d tell me, wouldn’t you?’
He was glad now he’d resisted the temptation to drink. ‘I think it’s time we were going.’ He stood up and held out his hand.
‘Oh, come on, you’re not cross with me, are you?’ She pushed back the table. It scraped noisily across the tiled floor. She got to her feet. She was slightly unsteady.
‘Not cross with you, Poppy. And, anyway, I didn’t see the note. I haven’t a clue what was in it. And I wouldn’t worry. The guards will keep it quiet.’ Like hell, he thought. These days, any guard worth his salt was a favourite of the fourth estate. ‘Come on,’ he took her arm, ‘it’s time we were going.’
They walked through the lobby. McLoughlin was conscious of Poppy’s unsteadiness. He held her arm tightly as they went through the swing doors and on to the crowded pavement.
‘You know,’ he said, as he steered her towards Kildare Street, ‘you were pretty hard on Marina when we spoke about her before. But she doesn’t sound that different from the others now. As far as Mark goes, anyway.’
‘No? You don’t think so?’ Poppy’s voice got louder. ‘Well, I think she was the corrupter. I think she started it all. If it hadn’t been for Marina, none of this would have happened.’ She swayed out of his grip and faced him. ‘She taught them what to do. She showed them how to hurt. My sister would still be alive if it wasn’t for her. And so would Mark.’ She stepped backwards and almost toppled off the pavement, the spike heels of her boots giving way beneath her weight. He grabbed her and held her upright.
‘I’m fine,’ she protested. ‘I don’t need an escort.’
‘Yeah, right. Come on, it’s this way to your office.’ They walked together at a brisk pace. ‘Anyway, it’s a pleasure, it’s not often I get to ramble around the city centre on such a nice day. I like this part of town. The seat of government and all that.’
‘Yes, it’s cosy, isn’t it?’ She stopped and leaned against the hotel railings. ‘My husband and I work within five minutes of each other. Rosie’s husband’s office is two minutes from here. And do you know who else is just down the road?’ Her face broke into an exaggerated smile. She didn’t wait for him to answer. ‘Why it’s Dominic de Paor, senior counsel. In a fine old Georgian building that just happens to belong to the Porter family. Now, is that cosy, or is that cosy?’
McLoughlin peered at his notebook. She was right. It was all very cosy. All those years since they’d left the Lodge and they were still gnawing away at each other. It made him feel claustrophobic and sick. He closed it and put it back into his pocket. Then he switched off the lamp and left the Reading Room, went down the wide stairs and out into the sunshine. He had asked Poppy why she was at work. After all, it was only days since her sister had died. She hadn’t been buried yet. Didn’t she need time to grieve?
‘Grieve? We don’t grieve. Not publicly. We observe the formalities and in Rosie’s case that will be a private cremation. Family only. And until then we will carry on.’ Her face was fixed in a rigour of pain. He could feel sorry for Poppy Atkinson, he thought, as he crossed the road. Not that she wanted his pity. S
he had made that very clear.
He walked slowly along Kildare Street, scanning the discreet brass name plates beside the Georgian doors. And found the one he was looking for. He pressed the buzzer on the intercom and noticed a tiny camera pointing at his face.
‘Hello?’ a woman’s voice answered. ‘Can I help you?’
‘I’m looking for Dominic de Paor. I was wondering if I could see him.’ He smiled up at the camera.
‘Do you have an appointment?’ The tone was efficient and bored.
‘No, but my name is Michael McLoughlin. I’m a friend of Mrs Sally Spencer. I’m sure Mr de Paor will see me.’ He smiled again, encouragingly.
He waited. Time passed. Then the voice again: ‘I’m sorry. Mr de Paor isn’t available.’ There was a loud click.
‘Hey.’ McLoughlin jammed his finger on the buzzer. ‘Hey, can I make an appointment to see him?’
But there was no reply. He crossed the road again. Dominic de Paor’s office was opposite the National Museum. McLoughlin lounged against the tall black railings by the entrance. The footpath was crowded, as always in summer, with busloads of tourists. He moved back and out of their way as his phone rang. It was Paul Brady.
‘Hey, Paul, how’s it going?’ His voice was resigned.
‘Michael, are you set for the off on the tide tomorrow evening?’ Brady sounded excited.
‘What? You’re kidding? I thought it was going to be weeks.’ McLoughlin felt suddenly disappointed.
‘Don’t ask me to explain the vagaries of some people’s lives.’ Brady laughed. ‘I got a call yesterday from the owner. They’ve changed their holiday plans. The wife’s ankle’s on the mend. Now they’re going to drive through France and Switzerland, ending up in Venice. And they want us to bring the boat to the marina and meet them there. We’ve ten days to do it, so we have to leave as soon as possible. I’m in the middle of provisioning. I just wanted to know if you’ve any what they call special dietary requirements.’
I Saw You Page 22