Ian St James Compendium - Volume 1

by Ian St. James

  Sean had no such worries. To his mind financial independence could only strengthen a political career. If his father disagreed there was nothing Sean could do - except prove him wrong.

  By nine-thirty they were at the bank, being ushered into the manager's office with a flourish. Everything was prepared. Pat Connors had to sign because his son was a minor and under age - but it was Sean who took the bank draft. He stared at the piece of paper, feeling slightly disappointed. Only the figures were impressive - thirty-two thousand, five hundred pounds, payable to Lord Averdale.

  The banker stressed that he would certainly seize the small house in Ballsbridge if anything went wrong - even though its value was only a fraction of the loan. "But we would have to start somewhere," he said sternly. "Frankly this is a most unusual business. I don't mind telling you that.if it wasn't for Senator O'Keefe's confidence ..."

  They left as soon as they could ... and made for the Shelbourne, where Senator O'Keefe had reserved a small meeting room. "Less formal than my chambers and I believe Lord Averdale has already declined to visit the Gazette."

  Sean fairly tingled with excitement.

  Mr Daly was waiting at the Shelbourne, with Michael O'Hara and Dinny Macaffety. Dinny grinned ruefully at his plastered leg and raised a crutch in greeting. He was visibly nervous, still unsure about what was happening.

  Senator O'Keefe took over. The document extracted from his case looked much more impressive than the bank draft in Sean's pocket. "This is a service contract," O'Keefe announced, looking at Dinny. "Ten years as editor of the Gazette. How would that suit you?"

  Dinny thought he was hearing things. He had lived with the threat of dismissal, now he was being offered the Gazette for the rest of his working life. Words formed and re-formed on his lips before tumbling our - "I don't understand. Has Lord Averdale reconsidered? I mean I thought-"

  Senator O'Keefe smiled. "This contract is with the new proprietor. You see, we expect change of ownership to be finalised this morning and the paper must be sure of its editor."

  Dinny stared helplessly. "New proprietor? Well who's that? Sure now, he'll be wanting to see me first -"

  "He knows your work well," said the silver-haired Senator. "A meeting is unnecessary, besides clause three of this contract gives you total editorial freedom. You won't have any problems with the new proprietor, I feel confident of that."

  Dinny's expression was too much for Sean who inspected the patterned carpet with sudden interest. It reaffirmed his belief - that a man with assets can perform more good than a politician any day of the week. He wondered what his father was thinking.

  Senator O'Keefe continued, "May I suggest that you study the contract over coffee in the lounge. Mr Daly, I wonder, since you are here, perhaps you would give Mr Macaffety the benefit of your expert opinion?"

  It was done with such courtesy that neither Daly nor Dinny took it as a dismissal. Pat Connors opened the door and Daly led the way out, with Dinny following on his crutches, the look of bewilderment still on his face.

  Sean breathed a small sigh of relief. So far so good, but his fingers remained tightly crossed. They waited in silence, not daring to tempt fate with another rehearsal. Sean pretended a nonchalance that he did not feel by looking out of the window. He felt sick with apprehension.

  Then, at last, Lord Averdale arrived. Michael announced him at the door and ushered him in with the gravity of a butler - he even helped him off with his coat and offered to take his bags out to the hall. Lord Averdale seemed happy to release one case but he preferred to keep the other, which was large and flat, like cases artists use for transporting their sketches.

  Sean made the introductions as completely as he knew how, careful to give each man his proper title ... Lord Averdale, Senator O'Keefe, and my father Teachta Daile Connors.

  Senator O'Keefe rose to the occasion perfectly. He was no stranger to the British aristocracy. "Castle Irish" they used to call them in Dublin, Irishmen who mixed so freely with the Imperial administration that they became more British than the British. Those days were long gone and it had taken the wily Senator years to recover his political standing - but he still remembered how to behave. He handled everything, from offering Lord Averdale biscuits with his glass of Madeira, to a brief explanation of the contract - "This is such a simple business that it's barely a couple of clauses. One sheet of paper. Merely that you convey the Gazette in its entirety for the value of the net assets shown on the balance sheet... er, thirty-two thousand, five hundred pounds."

  Lord Averdale's eyes flicked down the page. With surprise he looked sharply at Sean - "Am I to understand that you are the purchaser?"

  Sean blushed to the roots of his hair. Senator O'Keefe rescued him quickly. "Mr Daly told me your Lordship's instructions," he said, "that the Gazette should be offered to Mr Macaffety and his associates. Well, the sum was rather more than Mr Macaffety could afford, but his associate Mr Connors has been with the paper some considerable time."

  "You have the money?" Lord Averdale interrupted, still looking at Sean.

  "Yes, sir." Sean produced the bank draft and handed it over. "My father arranged it this morning ... in preference to a cheque, sir."

  Lord Averdale's surprise was obvious. He looked from the draft to Pat Connors and then back to the draft. Then he returned to the contract. "This man ... er, Macaffety. What happens to him?"

  "Oh, he stays, sir," Sean blurted out. "That's taken care of."

  "Oh, is it?"

  Sean blushed again, aware of the frown on the Senator's face. Nobody spoke after that. Sean wanted to say something - anything to break the silence - but a warning look from the silver-haired lawyer froze him into obedience.

  Then Michael knocked on the door and came in. He looked at the Senator - "You asked me to check the times of the Belfast trains, sir, in case Lord Averdale wanted to know. Well, there's one in forty minutes and another at three this afternoon."

  "Thank you, O'Hara," said O'Keefe grandly. He turned back to the table and addressed Mark. "I hope you will honour us by staying to lunch?"

  Sean watched in admiration. It was the ultimate bluff. He remembered the Senator's earlier assessment - "Everything must be ready but we mustn't rush him ... we'll invite him to lunch ... he won't accept, don't fret yourself about that ... he'll not want to socialise with the likes of us ... but it will take the pressure off, you'll see."

  Sean stood up, his heart pounding as he played his part. "Hadn't I better book a table now?"

  Lord Averdale pored over the contract.

  Senator O'Keefe said, "Aye do that, Sean, will you - and bring a wine list back with you. Perhaps Lord Averdale would choose?"

  But Lord Averdale was reaching for the inkstand on the table -

  "Thank you but no, I must get back to Belfast. Let's get this over and done with."

  Sean struggled to hide his relief. It had worked. Just as the Senator had said it would. But hell would break out if it hadn't - Jim Tully was due in half an hour. The extent of the gamble took Sean's breath away, not from fear but sheer excitement.

  Everyone signed both copies of the contract - Mark Averdale and Sean as principals, Senator O'Keefe as witness and Pat Connors as guarantor to the act of a minor. Sean's hand shook. His signature was different from usual, but legal for all that.

  "I'm sure Lord Bowley would have approved of our arrangement," Lord Averdale said. He folded the bank draft into his pocket book and rose to his feet.

  "Good luck, sir," Sean said in a burst, excitement getting the better of him, "I'm sure we'll meet again."

  "Oh, I doubt that," Lord Averdale said coldly, on his way to the door, the large flat case in his hand, "I doubt that very much."

  Then they were alone... Sean Connors and his father... with the door closing behind Senator O'Keefe as he led Lord Averdale out to the lobby.

  Sean looked at the contract with dazed eyes - "We did it, Da," he whispered, "Da - we did it! We just bought the Gazette!"

 
; The atmosphere in that little room was still charged with excitement half an hour later. Senator O'Keefe had ordered drinks to be set up on the sideboard and was filling their glasses with the gusto of a man in Mulligan's Bar. "To you, Sean," he said, raising his glass, "to the new owner of the Dublin Gazette."

  But there remained one hurdle, as Pat Connors pointed out - "We'll be without a roof over our heads unless we pay the bank back." Then - for the very first time - Pat suddenly understood the whole deal. It dawned on him. He gaped for a second, then burst out laughing. "Would you believe it but I've just worked it all out!" He laughed so hard that the Senator joined in, and Sean gave a whoop of joy which tinkled the bottles on the sideboard ... and he was still laughing and pacing the room like a demented tiger when Tully walked in, with his solicitor Keaton on his heels.

  "Be God it's a wake," Tully said cheerfully, shaking hands all round. "If you'd told me before I'd have brought a bottle."

  "Just so long as you've brought your cheque book," Sean beamed happily.

  They settled into their chairs, each with a glass. Senator O'Keefe brought the meeting to order - "Not that this will take long," he said with a quick look at Tully, "I think Mr Keaton and I agreed everything yesterday."

  "That we did," Keaton agreed. "Including the leases. If you've got the title deeds, we've got the money. All we need now is Lord Averdale himself to sign the contracts."

  Pat Connors burst out laughing, unable to restrain himself. It was not what was planned. Senator O'Keefe had wanted to lead up to it. Sean had wanted that too. But Tully's face was almost as good. He stared incredulously at the tears on Pat's cheeks. It took minutes to restore order, and even longer to convince Tully that Lord Averdale's signature was no longer necessary.

  "You own it?" Jim Tully gasped at Sean. "You bought the Gazette? Everything... the paper, the printing plant... you own the building ..."

  They had to inspect the contract which conveyed title to Sean. The Senator stuck a piece of paper over the price paid and stood over Keaton while the man read it, prepared to swoop if the man tried to cheat.

  Jim Tully could not work it out. He knew Pat Connors lacked the finance... so how ... how had Sean raised the cash? Not that it mattered - Tully wanted the building, and the Gazette as a tenant. Then he realised something. "You could have charged more," he said in astonishment to Sean. "I offered thirty-five thousand and you let me drop two and a half. You cheated yourself."

  "Did I cheat you? That's the important thing, Jim Tully. Didn't you get what you wanted, and didn't I do you a favour?"

  It was beyond Tully's experience. He signed his cheque for thirty-two thousand, five hundred pounds. Then the contracts - the Senator and Keaton were busy for five minutes, passing papers back and forth ...

  And so it was concluded.

  Sean passed the cheque to his father. "Thanks, Da, thanks for the loan, and thanks for trusting me."

  Pat could not answer for the lump in his throat.

  But the excitement was far from over, even then. Michael was summoned to receive the magic five hundred pounds from Jim Tully - and then Dinny came in. His eyes widened. "By God, I might have known it was you, Jim Tully. Well, it's a very fair contract you've written me, Mr Daly's approved every word of it. Hard man you may be but you've been very generous to me and I'll not forget it. God bless you for it. The Gazette's in good hands now right enough, with you as owner and me as editor, we'll drive the Times off the streets, indeed we will."

  The room erupted - Dinny was led to a chair and a glass pushed into his hand. "You're talking to the wrong man, Dinny," Tully said, delighted to reveal the secret. "Young Sean's your new boss, not me."

  It took Sean half an hour to extricate himself. The noise was deafening. Jim Tully sent for the Widow O'Flynn and ordered a champagne luncheon for everyone. The celebration looked set for the rest of the day. Sean was as excited as everyone else - but just for a moment he wanted to be alone. He retreated to the only place he could think of - the toilets downstairs, where he shut himself in a cubicle. He buried his face in his hands and let the events of that wonderful morning flow through his mind. At one point he had owed the bank the dizzying sum of thirty-two and a half thousand. Him, Sean Connors, who had never seen money like that in his life. The debt was paid off now, with Jim Tully's cheque. He owed the bank not a penny, and what was left was his, that was the staggering thing to contemplate. He withdrew the balance sheets from an inside pocket and pencilled in the alterations. Even after deleting the book value of the building, he was left with a fortune. Net assets worth twenty-seven thousand pounds. His net assets. He turned to the profit and loss account. Paying rent to Jim Tully would add to the running costs, but even after adding that to the overheads it left a profit of seven thousand pounds. Seven thousand a year ... for the rest of his life! But Sean knew it was just the start.

  Mark Averdale was also reflecting on the morning's events. He sat in the first-class dining car on the Belfast train, still recovering from his surprise. He had not known what to expect... the truth was he had been so busy with his plans to send O'Brien to Africa that the Gazette had barely entered his mind. The reception at the Shelbourne had completely wrong-footed him. He had half expected them to haggle, or ask for time to pay ... but nothing of the sort. The contract was perfectly adequate and who could argue with a bank draft?

  He shrugged. It was for the best. The Gazette had been dealt with, he had been paid. Damn funny people though, especially the new proprietor, he couldn't have been more than about twenty, blushing like a girl all the time. And that business at the end - "Good luck to you, sir, I'm sure we'll meet again". Bloody cheek. Typical Croppy - treat them civilly and next thing you know they're up to the big house for dinner.

  Mark snorted and put the matter out of his mind. He had better things to think about. First thing to do was go to the office and see O'Brien. Tell him about Africa, but get him used to the idea. Once that was dealt with ... away home to Brackenburn. He sighed with pleasurable anticipation. He always did when he thought of the great house. But tonight would be special. Tonight he would hang the photographs next to Rouen's painting, tonight would be devoted to Kate. Kate and Brackenburn, the two most important things in his life. He sighed again ... yes, it would be good to get home.

  But Brackenburn, even at that moment, was a crumbling inferno. The west wing was ablaze. The chapel roof had already collapsed. Tongues of flame licked upwards through the charred rafters. Blistering heat compelled the fire-fighters to abandon that end of the building. Now all efforts were concentrated on preserving the central core and the east wing, including the famous great hall. And while firemen fought to save the fabric of the house, other men - Brackenburn's servants, RUC men, farm labourers, Averdale employees - stripped the great mansion of its contents. Furniture was dragged from the ground floor onto the paved terraces by a score of men who shielded their faces from the scorching heat and shouted above the crackling roar. The two local fire tenders were completely overwhelmed by the blaze, even now men worked feverishly with extra pumps to bring gallons of water up from Lough Neagh.

  Smoke-blackened and hoarse-voiced, Eoin O'Brien stood on a cart near the entrance to the stable block, directing a line of men staggering under the weight of chairs and tables and cabinets. A rough shelter of tarpaulins lashed to an outside wall gave the area the appearance of a bazaar, especially at one end where rolled carpets and rugs were dumped unceremoniously across tea chests of silver. Alongside the rose garden twenty men laboured to erect a marquee which would provide a more secure shelter. Meanwhile O'Brien utilised whatever came to hand. Tireless himself, he bellowed at others, constantly exhorting men to work faster. Like refugees fleeing in the face of an enemy, the would be saviours of Brackenburn's treasures trudged wearily into the stable yard, caught their breath and turned back to the house.

  Closer to the raging flames in the west wing stood the Fire Chief, directing men as they fell back in an organised retreat to the great ha
ll. Hoses snaked up the steps and through the stone balustrades, carrying gallon after gallon of water into the house. The main staircase was completely engulfed by fire. The upper floors had been abandoned. Below that the Long Room itself was threatened.

  Across the lawn fifty yards away, the pink and white summer house had been converted into a first-aid post. A tub of butter from the kitchens stood on a table, much of it already used for the treatment of burns. Housemaids were busy tearing linen sheets into strips for use as bandages, while in a corner Lady Dorothy Averdale tried to calm the hysterical niece of the head gardener ...

  All told - counting servants and staff, RUC, firemen, farm labourers and neighbours - more than a hundred people toiled furiously to save Brackenburn. Above them the bruised sky, swollen with clouds, turned black with smoke as the huge pall rose ever upwards.

  The warning had been telephoned to the Averdale offices at eleven o'clock. "You've half an hour to clear the big house before it goes up in flames. And remember, next time you kill a man like Mick Nealson the IRA will kill you."

  The name Nealson had meant nothing to O'Brien. He thought first of his own house, but that was absurd ... big house meant only one thing in Ireland, the big house ... the house of the master. Brackenburn!

  It took O'Brien five precious minutes to convince the RUC. Even then the small police station at Bellpicken, three miles from Brackenburn, was not alerted until eleven twenty-five.

  Not until he was halfway to Brackenburn in a police car did O'Brien question the telephone call. The caller had asked for Lord Averdale, but had settled for O'Brien quickly enough. O'Brien's mind had been on other things - a scheme to reduce costs in the shipyard - anticipating his wife's return from London that evening. He would not have spoken to the caller, had the man not stressed it was a matter of life and death. Then O'Brien remembered the name - Nealson - the man killed at the factory gates? That was Mick Nealson. O'Brien urged the driver to go faster, fearing the worst. His fears were confirmed as they rounded the hilltop above the great house. A thick plume of smoke was already high in the sky, fed by flames as tall as the house itself.