The City in Darkness

by Michael Russell

  ‘It’s quite possible, Inspector. I don’t know. Why do you ask?’

  ‘What about the girl’s family, the Moores? Do you know them?’

  ‘I don’t at all. I think they left the area quite some time ago.’

  ‘You do know what happened, though?’

  ‘The girl isn’t buried here. She disappeared, I’m not sure when. I think after the war. She was never found. I think her people left in the twenties. A lot do now. You’re not from here. Does your wife’s family—’

  A change of subject felt like a good idea, but not to Stefan.

  ‘Have you seen lilies like this here before?’

  The Reverend Campion was now showing signs of irritation.

  ‘Is there a reason for these questions, Mr Gillespie? I really can’t answer. Possibly. It isn’t something, even if I noticed, that I’d remember.’

  ‘Does anyone else come to Marian’s grave or the girl’s stone?’

  ‘I don’t know. Probably not as far as the Moores go. But everyone knew Miss Gort. I’m sure there are often flowers on her grave. Why are—’

  ‘Did you ever see the postman here, William Byrne?’

  ‘He would have had no reason to come in here.’ The vicar spoke coldly now. ‘He would have passed the churchyard, on his way to the vicarage, but I can’t see why he would come in. You can ask Father Malone, but I think you’ll find he was a stranger even in his own church.’

  When Stefan Gillespie returned to the Garda Barracks it was dark. The last search party was dragging in along Laragh’s main street; most of the volunteers turned at the Green to Whelan’s Bar. Dessie MacMahon was walking up to the barracks when Stefan saw him. He did not look happy.

  ‘Nothing?’ said Stefan.

  ‘My arse! You could walk past a dozen bodies up there.’

  Stefan caught the breath of beer. ‘You found time for a pint.’

  ‘I was visiting the scene of Billy Byrne’s last performance.’

  They walked into the police station.

  ‘And what did that tell you?’

  ‘Missing postmen are good business. You can’t get in the place.’

  ‘Anything new on what happened?’

  ‘You’d think that would be all the talk in a pub.’

  ‘Isn’t it?’

  ‘It is from fellers who came up from Rathdrum or Arklow. But if you start a conversation with any of the local lads you’ll find yourself standing on your own. Maybe I’m just not used to country ways like you, Stevie.’

  As they came into the station there was a crowd of detectives and uniformed Guards, most of them covered in the filth of the mountains.

  ‘But there is something on,’ Dessie spoke quietly, ‘here.’

  The noise suddenly stopped. Detective Chief Inspector Halloran had entered behind them, the gaunt Inspector Grace at his shoulder. Pat Halloran’s teeth showed more than ever in his smile, a smile of satisfaction.

  ‘Get Chisholm and the other two, Fintan.’

  The inspector disappeared into the mess-room corridor.

  ‘All the Bray men in Sergeant Chisholm’s office. The rest of youse get off home, because you’ll be back out on those fecking hills tomorrow.’

  Fintan Grace reappeared with Sergeant Chisholm and two Guards.

  ‘You can do something for me, George,’ said Halloran.

  ‘And what would that be, sir?’

  ‘Bugger off.’

  ‘And where will I bugger off to, sir?’

  ‘Go home, and your two Guards as well. If you’re in the barracks keep to your quarters. You’re all suspended. There’ll be letters tomorrow.’

  Sergeant Chisholm smiled.

  ‘A bit harsh, sir, for a drink on Christmas Eve?’

  ‘Sorry lads, harsh is the last thing I’d ever want to be to you,’ said Halloran, ‘but even with Christmas over, I’m still making my list, I’m checking it twice, I am going to find out . . . who’s naughty . . . or nice.’

  He walked away. Chisholm looked less cocky than he had been.

  Stefan was watching Halloran, uncertain whether to follow him.

  The chief inspector turned as he reached the sergeant’s office.

  ‘You’d best shift, Inspector, or do you prefer listening at the door?’

  ‘The search goes on till we find a body. There’s a limit to how far away it can be. There are places round the town to check again. And some of the mineshafts up there go very deep as well. I’ve spoken to the commissioner about special equipment. There’s the lakes too. There’ll be divers tomorrow.’

  There were murmurs of frustration, but the general silence from Halloran’s officers reflected the scale of the search and the slim chances of success. Looking where they had looked was an admission of how slim.

  ‘But we have a lot of statements now. Some contradictions to dig at too, but not many. Not as many as I’d expect if I asked a couple of dozen people to tell me what happened when half of them were too pissed to remember. But out of that we do have what we might call, for now, the authorized version of Billy Byrne’s movements on Christmas Eve.’

  Halloran picked up a piece of paper.

  ‘He left the post office at Glendalough around eight in the morning. He’d been sorting letters with Mrs Casson since six. He cycled into Laragh and started deliveries. He finished in the town at twelve-thirty, two hours later than usual, then set off on outlying deliveries at the Laragh end. He’d have gone back to Glendalough after that and finished with the farms along St Kevin’s Road. He didn’t even finish in Laragh. I don’t know how many deliveries involved a Christmas tipple, since no one wants to say, but when he left the town he was as pissed as you like. He got to Trooperstown where he gave up and cycled back to Whelan’s. The pub was closed but they were still drinking. I don’t have all the names. Some I know were there still say they weren’t. And despite their indignant denials, partaking of this session behind locked doors were our colleagues, Sergeant Chisholm and Garda McCoy.’

  There was some laughter; Chisholm’s involvement was no secret.

  ‘But as the story goes, Byrne was in Whelan’s no more than fifteen minutes. He had one whiskey, then Mary Whelan, concerned she says about the drink he’d taken, ushered him out. Her word, “ushered”. A helpful woman. Billy wasn’t keen to go. He got a bit argumentative, but two friendly Guards were, at that moment, walking across the bridge and Mrs Whelan asked for assistance. I don’t want you lads thinking this is a fairy story. In Laragh there’s always a policeman there when you want one.’

  The laughter was louder.

  ‘Garda McCoy put a comradely arm round Mr Byrne and carried his post bag. Sergeant Chisholm wheeled his bicycle. When they got to the Green, in all of three minutes, your man had sobered up. He was grand. So they put him on the bike, wished him safe home and a Nollaig Shona, and waved him off. The bicycle was found on the other side of Glendalough, on St Kevin’s Road, late that night, by Mr and Mrs Lee, on their way back from Mass. And Billy Byrne, as we know, became the Missing Postman!’

  Chief Inspector Halloran now picked up a heavy ledger.

  ‘This is the station diary, which helpfully records George Chisholm’s encounter with Billy. No reason why it shouldn’t if George was the kind of sergeant inspectors dream of. But a quick flick through this shows nothing but roll calls and officers arriving for duty and finishing shifts. In the last two weeks we have two traffic accidents, a drunk who spent a night in the cells, and a burglar at Knockfin who turned out be a man locked out by his wife for reasons Sergeant Chisholm is too delicate to go into. The sergeant doesn’t usually write down every time he helps old ladies across the street. But he does alter the record to falsify when he and his men are on duty. He doesn’t do it very well. One entry for Christmas Eve has been erased and rewritten. Times have been changed. The details of Byrne’s departure from Whelan’s were written in later, over something else. And by later I mean after he went missing. Or maybe that just jogged the sergeant’s memor
y.’

  Pat Halloran turned to Inspector Grace.

  ‘Have you got Dearing’s statement?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’

  ‘We have one statement that doesn’t fit the rest. Paul Dearing, the blacksmith. He was at the session in Whelan’s. He says Byrne was in the pub much longer than anyone else does. There was poteen one of the Whelan girls had from Glenmalure. That was why there were so many there. Byrne was drinking it. I’d be confident Dearing’s is the real version.’

  He nodded at Grace, who cleared his throat self-consciously.

  ‘This is from Dearing’s statement: I got into Whelan’s through the yard as Mary had closed up. The front was locked but Mary said her girl had some good poteen and to come in anyway. I went down the back hall. Daisy Whelan was in the kitchen playing the piano and Sergeant Chisholm was singing. The sergeant’s soft on Daisy, so you’d know not to go in.’

  There was some sniggering; Fintan Grace glared and continued.

  ‘Garda McCoy was with a crowd at the bar. Billy Byrne was well gone. He was arguing about paying. Mary said he could pay or fuck off. Nobody took any notice. Then he starts laughing to himself. He looks at me and asks was I getting a Christmas box. He says, I’ll be getting mine. I’ll be on the pig’s back, and the Devil fuck all here! I sat down. All of a sudden it went quiet. People were looking at Billy and Shamie Tyrrell. Shamie has a half-crown. You want this, Billy? Billy says, it’ll do, bring more next time. Why? says Shamie. You know, says Billy, only your missus doesn’t. Shamie drops the half-crown. Pick it up, Billy. I will, says Billy, I’m not proud. No, you’re not, says Shamie, and as Billy bends, Shamie knees him in the face. Billy flies back at the fireplace and hits his head. Then Mary Whelan walks out and says, Jesus, you have killed a man in my house! Garda McCoy comes over to Billy. The others is crowding round, saying he’s breathing and he’s not breathing. I didn’t want trouble, so I left.’

  As Fintan Grace concluded, there was a buzz of conversation. The bleak prospect of the search for a body was pushed aside. That would continue, but the wall of silence in the Vale of Glendalough was broken. Now there were real facts. The rest would follow. One statement would lead to another; every new one would chip away at what was being hidden.

  Stefan Gillespie caught Pat Halloran’s eye, surrounded by his own men, reinvigorated by all this. The job wasn’t done yet, but he was confident it soon would be.

  It was late when Stefan got back to Kilranelagh. Tom was waiting, still on the coat-tails of Christmas. But the farmhouse wasn’t the place it had been for Stefan when he left that morning. Nothing had changed for anyone else. His father sat in the armchair in front of the range, the radio on, half-asleep. His mother was knitting. Tom was at the table with his Meccano set.

  ‘There’s some dinner in the oven,’ said Helena, getting up.

  ‘Don’t worry, Ma.’

  David Gillespie sat up, yawning. ‘Any sign of this postman?’

  ‘No, nothing, Pa.’

  Stefan sat down, tousling Tom’s hair. Tom looked up, smiling. For a moment Stefan let his hand stay on his son’s head. He didn’t like what he had brought into the house with him. It was a new grief when grief had long gone. Tom was a part of Maeve; Stefan always saw her in him. That should have been reassuring, but he felt the weight on him now. He couldn’t share it with anyone.

  Helena put down a plate of dinner.

  ‘Kate was on the telephone, she’s back in Dún Laoghaire.’

  ‘Oh, good.’

  ‘They have a telephone there.’

  ‘I know they do, Ma.’

  He hadn’t thought of Kate all day. He wanted to hear her voice, yet he didn’t know how to talk to her. He wanted to put the content of William Byrne’s head back in his desk. If it was true the thought of how Maeve died was not just new pain, it was guilt. If it was true he had failed her even after her death, failed her all these years. If she had been murdered the how was hard enough, but there was no why. There was a kind of vertigo inside him, as if he was falling in empty space. How could he not have known? A postman in Glendalough knew. And Stefan believed it. He couldn’t make believing it go away. Somewhere in that valley, where he had been all day, somewhere there was Maeve’s killer. The man who had drowned her.

  Next morning Stefan left the farm before dawn. His father was in the barn, milking. It was a time of day David Gillespie liked, as much in the darkness of winter as in the light of summer. He emerged to watch his son drive out of the farmyard, the lights of the car filling the lane below for a few seconds and then disappearing. Perhaps it wasn’t surprising that Stefan was in an odd mood. Investigating a death where his wife had died would unsettle him. But he knew his son’s varieties of quietness. This one was strange. There had been something in Stefan’s mood that he had not seen for many years. It wasn’t unusual that he had nothing to say. The two men had worked together on the farm since Stefan’s childhood, too closely not to appreciate each other’s silence. But it wasn’t only that his son was preoccupied. It wasn’t only that he seemed to want to get away so quickly that morning. It was what David sensed but could not comprehend. It was a kind of rage.

  12

  The Spinc

  Stefan stood high above the Upper Lake. The search parties were already out. He had followed them towards the Seven Churches, but as they started up the slopes on the northern side of the lake again, he took the climb to the south, past the Poulanass Waterfall, beyond the ruins of Temple na Skellig, and the cave that was called St Kevin’s Bed, high on to the steep cliff that looked down at the long water. All this had been searched already, on Christmas Day. He could hear voices across the lake, but he was alone.

  He stood at the top of the ridge known as the Spinc. The sun was visible in the sky today, a cold, white sun, but enough to bathe the Upper Lake in light. He held two of Byrne’s photographs. This was where he took them; one looking down the track Stefan had climbed, the other looking from the edge of the Spinc to the water below. This was where Marian Gort died; where she slipped and fell, climbing on her own. That was what Maeve had told him. It was what everyone knew. But was it? William Byrne had found an announcement in the Irish Times; the engagement of Marian Gort of Laragh, County Wicklow, to Oliver Stanford Crosbie of Boroughbridge, Yorkshire. The cutting was dated 21 April 1930. Below it he had written: ‘Engagement broke off July’. Marian died on 8 August. Byrne had got another version of the story; she killed herself. But what had Maeve really believed? She was very close to Marian. She must have known there was gossip. Yet the Missing Postman didn’t believe either story. He thought someone was with Marian that day, someone who killed her.

  Stefan had climbed the Spinc as much to clear his head as anything else. He knew what the photos showed. What he needed to do was take hold of it, to step out of the darkness and deal with it as a policeman. He had evidence; it wasn’t much but surely it was real. He had what his instincts told him; whatever Billy Byrne was, he was no fantasist. Everything showed him piecing together tiny, vicious puzzles. Why was this different? He looked at the shoreline at the eastern end of the lake where Maeve’s body was found. The two women died in almost the same place. It was an odd coincidence. It was a favourite saying of Terry Gregory’s that when you had to call something a coincidence it meant you didn’t have all the facts.

  He returned to the postman’s rooms and set about gathering everything together. He noted the items and put them in a box file he had brought from the Garda Barracks. This was what he had told Chief Inspector Halloran he was doing. It was evidence, even if Halloran had no real faith in any connection to Billy Byrne’s death. But Stefan was less interested in Byrne as a victim than as witness; even dead he was the only way to the truth. Some things were clearer today. They were not things that would make Halloran listen, but Stefan had to tell him. He wouldn’t like it.

  He reached up to the mantelpiece to take a photo down, the one of Byrne in the uniform of O’Duffy’s Bandera. It marked a before and aft
er in the postman’s life. Stefan had pieced together some facts in conversation with Mrs Casson. It had been hard work but he knew that before 1937 Byrne lived in Rathdrum, working as a painter and decorator and occasionally doing jobs in Laragh and Glendalough. He had never married; he had a reputation as a bad worker and a drunk. When Stefan asked the postmistress why she gave him a job she seemed to forget about that reputation. Then she clammed up. Given his habitual ferreting it was likely Byrne had something on Miss Casson. It was obvious she despised him; yet despite that, on his return from Spain, she employed him as her postman.

  There were two Christmas cards on the mantelpiece, one signed ‘Joey’, the other ‘Eileen’, with the words ‘All well with us over here’. They were probably from the brother and sister; Halloran would know about that. Stefan felt it was unlikely to matter to him. As he put the cards back an envelope fell to the floor. It had a Spanish stamp. He took out the letter. It had been sent a month earlier from the Irish College in Salamanca. Spain seemed important to Byrne. Almost the only personal things in the room, bar family photographs, were the picture of the soldiers and now this letter.

  Dear Billy,

  I am sorry to return your letter to Jim Collins. The Rector passed it on since we were pals while you were convalescing. Jim threw in his job here six months ago and moved closer to his wife’s family, now the Republicans are gone. He left no address. The war has made the country a mess, as you would expect. We thank God it is done. The college is still closed, but the German Army still have offices here, the way you will recall. I help the Rector keep the old place ticking. But I may have to bite the bullet and come home to train for the priesthood. In Salamanca we are weary even talking of war. We want to forget it. But it doesn’t look bright anywhere else now. I hope old Ireland keeps out of it all. We pray Franco does the same for Spain.

  All the best in Holy Ireland, Mikey Hagan

  It struck him how isolated William Byrne had been, amid all his drawers of information. Even this letter had an element of disconnection about it; a letter about another letter, a letter that hadn’t been delivered. But somewhere it had to connect to the Bandera photograph. He looked at the envelope again. There was something else. It was the thinnest, lightweight paper, an air letter, still sealed. It was addressed to the Irish College, to Jim Collins. The writing was Byrne’s and his address was on the back. Stefan opened it with a paper knife.