Who Took Eden Mulligan?

by Sharon Dempsey

  ‘So, Danny. What’s going on with you and the divorce?’

  He shrugged. ‘Same old shite. Paying solicitors for f-all. Trying to keep Amy from blaming me for everything from a broken fingernail to the state of the world.’

  ‘That bad?’

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘You know you can talk to me, don’t you?’

  ‘Aye, but talking shite and crying on your shoulder over a glass of whiskey isn’t a classy look.’

  ‘Danny, come on. We’ve been friends for a long time.’ She reached out and took his hand.

  ‘Don’t be giving me sympathy, woman, or I’ll start gurning. No one wants to see that when they’re tucking into their greasy burger.’

  ‘All right, no sympathy,’ she said taking her hand away. ‘But if you need me to listen, even if you are talking shite, I’m always available.’

  She hesitated and wondered if she should clarify. ‘Available’ sounded like a come on, but then she figured she was being over sensitive. They were firmly in the good friend and work colleague zone. She’d made sure of it.

  CHAPTER 58

  The retirement home for priests was nothing like Rose imagined. At the back of her mind she’d pictured a Father Ted set-up, full of cantankerous old men and subservient women pouring endless cups of tea. The reality was more clinical and business-like. It was a cross between a small hospital and a hotel. The Saint Columbanus Retirement Home sat off a busy main road into Bray, sheltered by trees and shrubs. The automatic doors led into a reception lobby, where Rose asked a small Eastern European woman if she could speak to Edmund Ryan.

  ‘Father Ryan is in the chapel for evening prayers. You are welcome to wait until he is finished, but you’ll need to sign the visitors’ book. Please wait here until he returns,’ she said, looking up from the computer screen.

  Rose and Danny sat on a pale blue fabric sofa in the lobby to wait. A statue of a saint – probably Saint Columbanus, Rose assumed – stood looking down on them with a book carved into his stone hands. There was a hushed reverence about the place and the steady tick of a grandfather clock was the only sound. Danny looked at her, eyebrows raised. They waited for a bit until the receptionist cleared her throat and said, ‘Evening prayers have ended, so if you want to make your way through to the great room, it is down the corridor, the third door on the left.’

  Ryan was waiting for them, as if he’d had some forewarning that he had visitors. The great room was a large living room dominated by a huge bay window that looked out across a pebbly coastline. Ryan was seated with a book on his lap and a serene expression on his lined face that made Rose think of the statue. He looked frail and wizened, as if life had been sucked out of him, leaving him desiccated. His sparsely covered scalp looked raw and exposed in the fading light. Rose noted he wasn’t wearing a collar, but then, she didn’t know if priests were obliged to always wear them.

  ‘I hear you have come to see me,’ he said with a feeble voice, muffled by mucus. He coughed to dislodge something and spat into a cotton handkerchief that he then secreted behind his back.

  ‘We’re from the PSNI. We need to ask you some questions about your time at St Malachy’s parish in the eighties,’ Rose said.

  He laughed, a dismissive wheeze of a chuckle that sounded like an asthmatic donkey braying. ‘I’m afraid you’re too late if you’ve come to chase me about my involvement with the republican movement. We won the war and then our comrades sold us out for power and a pay cheque, signed by the Queen of England herself.’

  Rose wasn’t going to waste time. ‘We are interested in Eden Mulligan. How did you know her?’

  He startled, as if he hadn’t expected to hear Eden’s name.

  ‘Oh, so soon? I thought we’d have a warm-up first. Eden was a parishioner. I administered to her spiritual needs.’

  ‘Is that all you administered to her?’ Danny asked with a sneer in his voice.

  ‘I don’t know what you mean by that.’

  ‘We have reason to believe you were in a relationship with Eden Mulligan. Within weeks of her being taken from her home in July 1986, you fled Belfast. Can you account for your sudden departure?’ Rose asked.

  ‘I was moved to America by my bishop. It was a great opportunity.’

  ‘A great opportunity to raise funds for the IRA and oversee gun-running from a safe distance.’ Danny didn’t hide his disdain.

  ‘So what? You can hardly prosecute me now for my involvement with the republican movement. We’ve moved on, or haven’t you police noticed? You really think it’s in anyone’s interest to harass a retired priest on the basis of murky hearsay?’

  ‘No, but if you were involved with Eden Mulligan’s disappearance, I will make damn sure you’re charged and held to account,’ Rose said.

  ‘Now, now, haven’t you heard of the arrangement? Any information leading to the unearthing of remains is exempt from being used in court proceedings. We were at the table putting these provisos in place while you two were probably still in nappies.’

  Danny leaned forward. ‘Who were you working for?’

  ‘I don’t work for anyone but the Lord our Father. I’d advise you to drop your line of enquiry.’

  ‘Is that a threat?’

  ‘Don’t go hearing imaginary conversations.’ He coughed again and wheezed. ‘I don’t have long to live. Lung cancer. Convenient, you might think, but I’ve had my life. My work here is done, as they say, but as a parting gift, I did inform the Commission for the Disappeared as to where they might find Eden. You have no case against me. To tell you more would be a goodwill gesture. Perhaps it could even be cleansing.’

  Rose balked at his nerve. To suggest that he was doing something good by revealing his secrets was sickening. Dusk fell over the room, casting shadows. A rumble of voices from the hallway died away and then the grandfather clock from the reception area began to chime.

  ‘So, you admit that you were responsible?’

  ‘No, dear,’ he said patronisingly. ‘That is not what I am saying. I was a priest. I was privy to certain sensitive information. That does not make me her executioner.’

  ‘You’re sick. You were involved in denying five children a normal childhood and you sit there talking about goodwill,’ Rose said.

  ‘If it’s justice you’re after then you need to go back to partition.’

  ‘Why did you give Father Dominic permission to share your confession? The testimony was incomplete.’

  ‘Well, settle yourself down and I shall finish what I started.’

  Rose looked at Danny. He was entranced, waiting to hear what they had come for.

  CHAPTER 59

  Ryan leaned back in his chair. ‘I was the messenger, nothing more. We went into the priesthood together, much to the delight of our mothers. Edmund and I were thick as thieves back then.’

  ‘Wait, you’re not Edmund Ryan?’ Rose asked, incredulous.

  ‘No, I needed to get out of the country and Edmund unwittingly assisted me. My name then was Peter. It’s not difficult to swap identities. Neither of us had family to worry about us, or question where we were. Our mothers were both dead. No one thinks to look at a man of God too closely. Even when Edmund disappeared, covering it up wasn’t too hard. We said he had been removed from the parish. Moved on to better things.

  ‘I went to Boston. They treat their priests with great respect and love over there. I settled into the parish under his name and managed to keep any minor indiscretions under wraps. Before the peace process there were priests like me who had to step up, do what was necessary to keep the republican movement in line. I may have overstepped the mark a few times. You really shouldn’t underestimate the respect afforded to priests. It paves our way.’ He smirked.

  ‘Edmund, well, he liked the ladies. Eden wasn’t his first and he did care for her. Cared for her so much that he was willing to risk everything for her. We couldn’t allow that.

  ‘He was a charming bastard. He had the whole place eating out of his ha
nd. They thought he was one of them. A man of the people. You’ve got to understand that priests in those days were removed, set apart like glorified martyrs in waiting – living saints among the people. But Edmund, he was different. He acted like he was one of the people. I suppose when it came down to it, he was. Just another selfish man, out to take what he could. In this case, Eden.

  ‘She was his woman. Not that it was common knowledge. God knows it was all clandestine, Thorn Birds style. I’m sure Eden didn’t know what had hit her when he turned on the charm. A lonely woman that looked like her needed a man. Someone to tell her she was beautiful, to hold her and make her feel desired. He wooed her. Cried on her shoulder about his conflicted conscience, no doubt. Hard to resist that which is forbidden.

  ‘Anyway, the two of them managed to keep their love affair secret for long enough. Well over a year, I believe. Until it all changed. She was like a brood mare. Got pregnant at the drop of a hat. When she told Edmund she was carrying his child, he panicked. Came to me looking for a solution.’

  ‘What was your part in it?’ Rose asked, her voice steady and calm but Danny could sense she was seething.

  ‘Edmund talked of running away. Leaving the priesthood and bringing up Eden’s five children as his own. He even talked of setting up a community of priests who had found themselves in a similar predicament. Men of the cloth who couldn’t or wouldn’t keep their vow of celibacy. It was clear to me that he would be better off if I dealt with the problem for him. I thought in time he would have grown tired of her anyway. That he would set his sights on another, more promising woman. Men like him rarely stay faithful. So why risk everything he had built on one woman?’ He paused, staring out at the darkening view.

  ‘Edmund had set her up a bank account. Promised her that they would find a way to make it all work out, but I didn’t know that until much later. Not that it would have made any difference. I wasn’t about to let him destroy what we had built. We had worked together all our lives. Played as boys, pretending to carry the host, practising saying the creed. We were made for service. Service of both church and country.

  ‘Edmund was instructed to tell Eden to meet him at the parish house. The plan was to get him on side and to take Eden away for a period of time. Long enough for the pregnancy to be hidden and the baby to be handed over to the convent sisters to pass on for adoption to a rightfully needing couple. Except Edmund wouldn’t go along with it. He was still full of ridiculous plans to bring the child up and to take care of the Mulligan brats. In the end, he left us no choice.’

  ‘Eden was killed?’

  ‘She was told that Edmund wanted to discuss their future. A car was sent for her in the middle of the night. These things don’t intentionally happen. Not always. She fought like a banshee when we took her to the safe house across the border. Tempers were flared.

  ‘When Edmund realised what had happened, he begged to be executed and buried with her. If we refused, he said he would go to the police.’

  CHAPTER 60

  Rose woke at dawn and found herself lying on Danny’s bed with his arm draped around her. They had talked until after 2 a.m. and then decided to sleep. It seemed silly to go to her own room and they had been relaxed enough to put their heads down where they were. At one point in the night she felt herself easing into the crux of his body and he’d responded, wrapping himself around her. She didn’t want to think beyond the here and now. There was no point second guessing how they felt about each other.

  Danny groaned and rolled over. ‘Christ the night. My mouth feels like something’s died in it.’

  ‘Well, don’t breathe near me then. First point of business is to buy a couple of toothbrushes.’

  ‘Aye, boss. I’ll put them on expenses.’

  ‘Danny, there’s something I need to tell you.’

  He exhaled. ‘Go on.’

  ‘I came back to Belfast for my mum’s funeral.’

  ‘Christ, Rosie, why didn’t you say?’

  She put up her hand. ‘No, listen. We weren’t close. In fact, I hadn’t spoken to her in years with good reason. I’ve never told you this because, well, I was ashamed.’

  ‘Of what?’

  ‘Of my family, of where I come from, all of it.’

  ‘Why? What are you on about?’

  ‘My mother was a republican and I’ve reason to believe she was an active member of the IRA.’

  ‘Shit, Rose.’

  ‘Exactly. I knew you’d feel like that. If you want me off the case, then fine. I understand.’

  ‘Would you let me process this before jumping the gun? There’s no reason for you to come off the case … unless you’ve uncovered a connection. Have you?’

  ‘No, nothing, but I have run her name through the system and it’s coming up as classified. That’s as far as I got.’

  ‘Right. There must be a good reason for that. I’ll do some digging of my own, if you like. So, that’s why you kept me at arm’s length all these years? Never saying too much about home.’

  She shrugged. How could she explain the shame she felt?

  They were on the road to Belfast by eight thirty, sustained by coffee and croissants. Rose was driving and was determined to get back before they lost any more time.

  ‘So, Rose, our wee road trip was worthwhile. What did you make of the priest’s story?’ Danny said.

  ‘I think it’s the confirmation we needed that Eden was murdered, and a cloak of paramilitary provided the perfect cover. We can also be fairly certain now that the second body uncovered is Ryan’s.’

  ‘But where does that leave us with the Dunlore murders?’

  ‘What if they were carried out to draw attention to Eden’s disappearance? To make us re-open the case?’

  ‘You’re thinking that someone close to Eden, someone invested in finding out the truth about her, did it?’

  Rose thought how strange it was that death in Northern Ireland appeared to be sanctioned if it was for political gain. There was an almost unwritten and unspoken rule that people who had been involved in the paramilitaries got what they deserved. She thought of Eden and her children, trying to get by in life. She had found herself caught up in something she had no power and control over and had paid the ultimate price.

  Danny turned to Rose. ‘We need to talk to her children again.’

  CHAPTER 61

  Back up north, the rain had finally come. The sky was a shifting mass of low cloud. For a second, the cloud cleared, and it seemed as if the sun was returning with a vengeance, but then there was a muffled rumble of thunder in the distance.

  Danny was silent. Rose could tell he was thinking. She watched him, saw the quiet intensity and wondered about the thought processes going on in his head. The case was at a critical juncture. They couldn’t afford to get this wrong.

  ‘We need to question each of the Mulligans. Starting with Cormac,’ Danny had said.

  Following a few phone calls, they had discovered that Cormac Mulligan was working on a building site near the foot of Cave Hill. A new development of houses had sprung up and Cormac was getting labouring work by the day. They parked the car and approached the site. The sky had turned a deep violet, like a livid bruise. The air crackled with electricity, the long-promised thunderstorm imminent.

  Danny spotted him first. ‘He’s over there, look.’

  Cormac Mulligan was dressed for the building site, wearing a reflective vest and a hard hat. He was talking to someone and had a pickaxe in his hand.

  ‘Let’s go have a word.’

  Cormac was none too impressed to have his working day disrupted.

  ‘For Christ’s sake, it’s hard enough for me to get work without me bringing coppers onto the site.’

  ‘We need to talk to you, Cormac. There’s a few issues we need to tie up. We’d appreciate it if you came down to the station.’

  He put the pickaxe down and turned. ‘You have got to be effing joking. I said all along you lot would never help us. You put us thr
ough hell. Again. There’s only so much of this that any one family can take.’

  ‘Cormac, we are asking nicely, but if you force us, my colleague here will bring you in the hard way,’ Rose said.

  He looked defeated and shouted over to his foreman that he had to go sort something out.

  ‘If he docks my pay, I expect to be reimbursed.’

  ‘What’s this about?’ Cormac asked, taking a seat in the interview room.

  ‘We need to know where you were on the night of twenty-eighth June.’

  ‘How the hell am I expected to know what I was doing weeks ago? I was probably working or watching television back in my flat. Take your pick. What day of the week was that?’

  ‘It was a Saturday.’

  ‘Well that’s easy then – I was at Rosario football club. I coach the under sixteens.’

  ‘It shouldn’t be too hard to confirm your alibi then,’ Danny said.

  Rose leaned forward. ‘Cormac, your family must feel desperate to have the mystery surrounding your mother’s disappearance solved. How far would you all go to see the case resolved?’

  ‘What kind of question is that? We’ve done everything in our power to find out what happened. You promised all sorts that you can’t deliver. Told us that you were on our side and then you come to my worksite and bring me in for questioning? The problem lies with the RUC and then the PSNI in not doing more. Don’t try to lay it at our feet.’

  Rose resented his tone but couldn’t work up enough anger to fire back at him. She wasn’t the RUC; she hadn’t messed up the first investigation and she was doing everything to solve the case now. She had no right to feel stung by his accusation of police indifference to his mother. Every time she looked at the case file she, herself, was struck by the lack of due care and attention. She couldn’t help feeling that it was because Eden was a mother from a Catholic community.

  ‘I’m just doing my job,’ she said. More than anything, she wanted to be done with Cormac and his family. And to be done with the nagging worries she had about her own mother.