The Death of an Irish Sea Wolf

by Bartholomew Gill

  As Mirna remembered, Clem and Breege had even offered to loan her money from “Clem’s pension scheme” Breege had put it, to help her through. They had been strange and wonderful people. No, were wonderful people. Mirna would not give up hope.

  The second loose page was a hand-drawn map that showed how to enter a cave at the steepest face of the Croaghmore cliffs. Mirna was sure there was none. She had been by the place perhaps a half-dozen times during slack spring tide, which was the only time the area was even approachable, as far as she knew.

  Now the possible reality of the cave, which would more than prove Clem’s statements of the night before, terrified her. In every way, from the bottom of her soul, she wished the packet gone and the night before had never happened. But yet she copied the map onto the back of the other sheet of paper. It was spring, and the tides were low. Maybe in a day or two she would take herself out there, if the police weren’t still about.

  The police. They had been at the harbor, and one of her employees, phoning Mirna, had said that they had gone out to the Fords’.

  Raising the binoculars again, she found that the man was much closer now, no more than a quarter mile away. Short but square and fit, he was moving with a quick, rolling gait, ready and alert. He was dressed casually in khaki, like a golfer or a sportsman. She had seen the face before with its nose that was bent slightly to one side, those pale gray eyes, and red, curly hair. And more than once. But where? Certainly he looked too much of a piece for a country man.

  Lowering the binoculars, Mirna looked around the studio. On the television, of course, and in the newspaper. He was the police, the detective, the one from Dublin who was sent out on major investigations. She panicked and looked down at the muddied packet and the still-unopened paperboard pouch with the red sealing wax. Why did she feel like she had done something wrong, when, in fact, she should welcome the security that his presence represented? He would protect her, perhaps even set everything right.

  But she also remembered Clem’s entreaty about the Trust, and how it had given Breege’s and his life point and purpose. And certainly it had done great good. Finally, it could be that the Fords were not dead and would come back and take the entire thing off her hands.

  Mirna looked down at the sealed pouch that Clem had asked her not to open yet, not until she had gone to the cave and to the solicitors in Dublin. But she just had to understand more completely what she was getting into, before pressing forward as he had asked.

  Slipping a fingernail under the flap she slit the wax seal. It contained a sheaf of handwritten pages that were yellowed and timeworn. The top page was dated 1948. It began:

  11 November 1947

  Clare Island, Mayo

  Eire

  I write this while the details are still fresh in mind and so you who succeed us will know the source of the cargo that I brought to this island. I write also for posterity and my God, who shall judge me; it was war, but it was also a struggle between forces. I knew that back in the mid-1930s. The pity is, not well enough.

  First, a word about who I am, since beginning in 1945 I had to abandon my true identity, again because of the cargo. I arrived here under circumstances that were, at the very least, covert and perhaps even criminal, when viewed in the light of history.

  I was born in…

  Mirna glanced up. If the memoir or whatever it was now told her that Clem Ford was some sort of thief or worse, she could not read on. It was all too much for her. And what was she seeing out of the corner of her eye, movement close to the house on the far side of the yard. The man had arrived.

  Snatching up the sheaf, she folded the pages hurriedly and slipped them into the pouch and the pouch into the packet. Then the map. But where was the top sheet, the piece of stationery with the names and addresses on it? Glancing wildly round the table and then under it, Mirna could not locate the thing, so she emptied the packet again and shuffled through the documents. Perhaps it had got caught between some of the pages. No, it was not there, and she had only just fitted the documents back inside, closed the flap, and stuffed the packet under the cushion of her reading chair when a knock came on the door.

  Flushing with shame or guilt or…she didn’t know what—mortification, maybe—Mirna Gottschalk rushed to the door and pulled it open. “Yes?” she demanded in a strange, choked voice that was not her own. Suddenly she felt faint.

  The clear gray eyes regarded her calmly. It was as though he could read her thoughts, and the pause seemed to continue for an eternity. Finally without taking his gaze from her, he pointed to the ground by the door. “Clement Ford was here early last evening, wasn’t he? He slipped and fell right here.”

  Even through her tears, which without warning had filled her eyes, Mirna could see a long scrape. It could only have been Clem. There were other impressions from his large boots where he had picked himself up and staggered. Even his muddied tracks were still on the stairs, the print of his large hand on the rail.

  “What did he bring you?”

  It was the moment of decision. But too soon. Mirna had wanted to think about it some more, to wait for some word about Clem and Breege. She had also wanted to lay the entire matter before Karl, her son. Again, as Clem had requested.

  She could lie. She could say that Clem had visited her earlier yesterday, sometime late in the afternoon. Why? Why to view the portrait she was painting of his wife. There it was in the center of the room, a bright blur of color through her tears.

  But when she tried to speak, her throat wouldn’t let the lie out, and she only sobbed. And the sound of her voice cracking brought on further sobs for Breege and Clem and Kevin O’Grady and Packy, but also for herself and her predicament.

  She believed she felt worse—both low and worthless—than she had ever in her life. How could she have lived beside Breege and Clem all these years and ignored the great problem that had created this debacle. Why had she not done something last night? And here she was embracing the problem as her own.

  “I’m sorry,” she managed, turning away from the door toward a small kitchen. “But the Fords were—are—my best friends. Could you come back later, when I’m—” She reached for some tissues and began blotting her eyes. But it did little good, and Mirna just stood at the sink with her hands on the edge, her body racked by sobs.

  McGarr studied her for a moment. She was a shapely woman in her early fifties whose braided white hair appeared whiter still because of her complexion. It was dark, like her eyes, and maybe because of the braids or her prominent cheekbones or the way she was dressed—blue cotton work shirt, jeans, and even beaded moccasins on her feet—the woman looked rather Amer-indian.

  McGarr let his eyes sweep the studio, fixing on the oil portrait in the middle of the room. The portrait was of the very same woman in the very same pose as the blood-spattered framed photograph in the hallway of the Ford cottage. The wife as a young woman. In fact, a print of the photograph was clipped to the easel.

  But the larger portrait was a colorful oil painting, artfully rendered, such that the woman’s obvious beauty was enhanced not diminished. And just as in the photograph, the diamond-and-sapphire ring was on her finger, the one that was by now in the possession of the Technical Squad.

  “What is your opinion of that ring?” he asked.

  Mirna turned her head and tried to focus on the canvas. “What? I don’t understand.”

  “Is it real?”

  Mirna began to shake her head, but then thought better of it—realizing suddenly that, all along, she had admired the ring that had seemed so real because it was real. And, my God! What must it be worth?

  “Did the Fords have money?”

  “I wouldn’t know.”

  “I thought you said they were your best friends.”

  “Are my best friends. You’re speaking of them in the past tense. Do you know something I don’t?”

  “Only that whoever came to their cottage was looking for something important enough to commit murde
r. And we still don’t know how many.”

  When McGarr stepped back to get a different perspective on the painting, he noticed something in the shadows beneath the easel—a sheet of writing paper. Even from where he was standing, he could read the “Clem and Breege Ford” printed at the top of the page. It was the same sort of sheet that he had seen in Ford’s sitting room.

  Walking over, McGarr squatted down and picked it up. “Is this what Ford brought you last night?”

  Mirna decided she would say nothing. If he now ransacked the studio and discovered the packet, well then, it would be all over, and she would be relieved of the burden Clem had placed upon her. If he didn’t, she would proceed as she had intended, and either Clem would return and there would be no need for her to act, or she would tell Karl and he would know what to do.

  McGarr looked down on the sheet, which was undated. In his peculiar script, Ford had written the names “Monck & Neary, 2 Merrion Square, Dublin” and “Sigal & Sons, the Coombe,” which was the name of a street also in Dublin.

  The first was a firm of solicitors renowned in Dublin legal circles for handling the legal affairs of the country’s “quiet money”—the very few remaining Ascendancy families who had managed to retain their wealth, as well as a select group of newly rich who had the sense not to flaunt theirs. Monck & Neary had the reputation of being most discreet.

  The second was the name of a family of jewelers and gold merchants who had been plying a similarly select trade in their own specialty, which was antique jewelry, old gold and silver. McGarr’s wife, who was a picture dealer, had dealt with the Sigals often and well, and she recommended them to her own clientele.

  Farther down the page was a single name, Angus Rehm, but no address.

  Turning the sheet of paper over, McGarr found what looked like a map but drawn with a soft lead pencil of the sort that artists used. He could make sense of nothing but the label, “cave,” which—it appeared—was near some wiggly lines that looked like water.

  “Is this what he brought you?” he asked again, thinking: over a treacherous mile of boreen and bog, in the teeth of a storm, with a more deadly threat looming? All to deliver a note, the contents of which would as easily be said over the telephone in a minute or two? Also, where was the mud? If Ford had touched it after his fall, there would be mud on the sheet, but there was none.

  But neither did she deny it. Only the wind replied, soughing past the eaves of the studio that was perched on the very edge of the cliff.

  “You know, I could make one phone call and get permission to search this place. But I’d prefer your help.”

  As in, “helping” the police. It was the euphemism employed to describe suspects. “Don’t tell me you think that I’m involved in this?” Mirna asked in a small, incredulous voice.

  McGarr cocked his head. “I hope not. For your sake. Now”—he raised the sheet of paper—“I’ll ask you once more. Is this what Clement Ford brought you last night? Just nod.” And then I can toss the place legally, he did not add. Looking for something that had to be mud-covered.

  But she only continued to regard him.

  Walking over to the wastepaper bin, McGarr peered inside. But there was nothing muddy visible. Straightening up, he again surveyed the room. “Of course by now you know what happened last night to your best friends, the Fords. And to Kevin O’Grady and probably to Padraic O’Malley?” McGarr moved slowly about the large room, making sure his eyes surveyed every surface. “But do you know the sequence of events? You should.

  “Paul O’Malley, the quadriplegic with the binos and sideband—he saw a large white schooner anchor in the harbor. He rang up your friend. Sometime after that, Ford phoned O’Grady and asked him to come out here and sit with his wife. Armed, he was so worried.

  “Why? Because he knew what the people aboard the boat had come for, and he had to get it out of the house. So he came here and gave it to you. Now O’Grady’s dead, and the Fords and Padraic O’Malley are missing, along with O’Malley’s boat. Is this what he gave you? Or is this only part what he gave you?”

  Yet again McGarr waited for a reply before continuing.

  “I can understand loyalty to friends. It’s important, and probably all the more so on an island, like this, where you are so few. But if Clem Ford gave you what those killers came for, you’re now taking a hell of a risk. All they need is a map. Where else could Ford have come on short notice and during a storm in the dead of night? And him an old man. This place is the only possibility. And has it occurred to you that your friends might not be dead, that your helping me now might allow us to find them?”

  Yet again McGarr waited, but she did not move from the sink. She was looking out the window there, at the brilliant ocean to the northwest.

  “What do these names mean? Who are these people? Why did Ford bring them to you? It was last night, wasn’t it?”

  McGarr waited at least a whole minute, listening to the wind wail past the eaves of the studio. “I can appreciate that you’re distraught. And that you have not actually lied to me.”

  That brought the woman round. Her face was streaming with tears, her fists clenched by her sides. “Get out.” She moved to the door and opened it. “Get out now.”

  “I’ll leave you my card.” Slowly, deliberately, McGarr removed one from his pocket secretary and placed it on the sheet from Ford on the drawing table. “I have a feeling you’ll need it. For the moment, I’ll be at the hotel. Or you can ring any barracks. They’ll put you through. Please understand that you’re in danger, and I can help.”

  Tom Rice was waiting at the bottom of the stairs. “The old van we drove to the Fords in? Wouldn’t start. I thought I’d hoof it over here to save you time.”

  “Do you know where Paul O’Malley lives?”

  The large older man shrugged. “The place is called Capnagower, but we’ll have to ask at the harbor.” Rice gazed resignedly at the collection of white buildings that had to be about four miles away. “Maybe we can get the loan of another car when we get there.”

  McGarr turned to Mirna Gottschalk, who was closing the door. “Is it possible to walk to Capnagower?”

  With her palms she pushed the tears from her eyes. “If you know the way. But I wouldn’t recommend it. You can take my van and leave it at the hotel when you’re through. The key’s in the switch.”

  It was a generous gesture to be sure, and McGarr wondered how much it was by way of apology. A Land Rover with only 492 miles on the odometer, it still bore the rich fragrance of new leather. The powerful engine ticked over on first crank.

  As soon as the van disappeared over the crest of the drive, Mirna went straight to the reading chair and pulled the muddied manila packet from under the cushion. She had never felt so compromised in her life, so sullied. Like some criminal in a docket evading a charge, she had kept silent when she should have spoken; she had failed to acknowledge the truth. She had even challenged the man.

  Well, she had enough of that and it. Stuffing the note from Clem in among the other papers, she carried the thing to the house where she would hide it beneath the hearth where it belonged. And it would remain there, at least until she heard more about Clem and Breege or Karl arrived to tell her what the thing meant.

  She would ring him up right now, so he would come out for Kevin’s funeral. And they would decide then what to do. Together.

  CHAPTER 10

  AS THE ROVER wheeled slowly along the rutted boreen, McGarr regretted not having taken a more definite tack with Mirna Gottschalk.

  He could have simply begun a search of the premises, later saying that he had been “in hot pursuit,” since Ford’s footsteps led to the studio. If she filed a complaint. But would she? Probably not, given the fact—and he was convinced of it—that Ford had brought her whatever the raiding party had come for.

  But it now occurred to McGarr—as they topped a ridge that presented a panoramic view of the verdant island—that her keeping it might be helpful in another
way, so long as she was willing to take the risk. And she obviously was.

  Said Tom Rice, looking out the windows that were photosensitive and had darkened in the strong sunlight, “’Tis a wonder how tidy the greenskeepers maintain this place. They could use them yokes at Ballybunion,” which was one of Ireland’s premier golf courses. He meant the sheep that could now be seen in every direction.

  “It’s rumored there’s not an inch of grass on even the most remote ledge of Croaghmore. Time was the south slope of that mountain was three feet thick in heath. Now I don’t think you could find a patch. It’s the EC or EU—they now call themselves—playing Puck. Anyhow, the bloody Common Market t’ugs from Brussels telling us how to live.”

  McGarr nodded, knowing about the policy. Having designated much of the West of Ireland “severely disadvantaged,” Brussels had decided that it could keep people on the land by encouraging “traditional farming practices,” one of which was raising sheep. But the subsidy did not reward farmers for animals brought to market, which would depress sheep prices. Instead it paid them according to the number of sheep on the land—aged, infirm, or ill; it did not matter—which had led to overgrazing and the destruction of native plant habitats.

  On the other hand, an environmentally-conscious farmer was not required to accept Brussels’s largess, however hard it might be to pass up. Being “severely disadvantaged.”

  McGarr stopped the Rover so Rice could get out and open a gate that prevented animals from straying down the road.

  “Are those the remains of lazy beds?” he asked when Rice climbed back in. He pointed to the tightly spaced pattern of ridges in the fields that followed the contour of the land right down to the edge of Clew Bay in one direction, and all the way up the flanks of Croaghmore in the other.

  “Famine furrows, some call them. Sure, people hereabouts never do nothin’ halfway. Now it’s the sheep, then it was potatoes. Before the blight in the last century, you had sixteen hundred people on this island with every last patch of ground they could find in potatoes. Compared to other places, like Inishturk”—Rice jerked a thumb at the looming shape of another large island to the southwest—“the land here is good, which was their undoing. When the potatoes thrived, the population grew. When they rotted, people died. I’m a bit of a history buff, don’t yeh know.