Irish Lace

by Andrew M. Greeley

  “Not at all.”

  Outside it was hotter, and curtains of humidity were growing thicker—and it was still mid-June. It looked like a long, hot summer.

  Nuala had called me early in the morning and said that she was fine and that she was going to work so “they won’t give me job to someone else. I’ll ask them for the days off.”

  “I have set up a breakfast tomorrow with the head of Reliable.”

  “Mike Casey? He’s a famous artist, too, you know. Relative of the bishop.”

  “Of course.”

  Naturally, I didn’t know. I knew about Casey the painter, but I didn’t know that he had a security firm on the side. Ah, Chicago!

  “Can we meet for lunch?” Nuala continued. “We can compare notes. I’m going to talk to one of me friends at work who knows something about the art galleries.”

  “Chicago Yacht Club at noon?”

  “Grand! … Where is it?”

  “The foot of Monroe Street. You walk out of your office, turn left, and walk till your hat starts floating.”

  “I won’t be wearing a hat, but I take your point.”

  “See if you can get an extra half-hour off. They might give you that because you came in today.”

  “I’ll ask, Derm, but I don’t know for sure—not after I ask them for the next two days off.”

  In my mind there was no doubt that the young accountant from T.C.D. could get anything she wanted at that company.

  I ambled over the Illinois Central tracks, as we still called them, though the I.C. no longer used them. I adjured myself to remember that until she had gone to Trinity three years ago, Nuala Anne had never been out of County Galway, and not even to Galway City very often. She had grown up an area where Irish was still the first language, part of a backwater that history had left behind. Indeed, she could watch the world on a telly, but that was not quite the real world, was it, now?

  Foreign travelers had come to their farmhouse, often on big buses, to drink their tea—and probably be told that this was a typical Irish-speaking family in one of the most picturesque districts of Connemara. She had owned a bicycle but not a car. Her parents had used a donkey cart. She herself had admitted that she would have attended U.C.G. (University College Galway), and “Sure, there’s nothing wrong with that at all, at all. Isn’t it older than U.C.D. (University College Dublin)?”

  Hadn’t she, like a true eejit applied for the Trinity scholarship, but only because her ma and da had urged her to? When she won it, wasn’t she horrified? She did not want to live in a terrible big city like Dublin at all, at all. She had planned to return home and work in Galway City. But then she learned about the Morrison visa program and the possibility of a job at Arthur Andersen. So she entered her name in the lottery, and hadn’t she won it?

  Again she didn’t want to go to America. Hadn’t all her brothers and sisters already left home? Wouldn’t her parents be left alone way out in Connemara? Yet didn’t her ma and her da urge her to take the job? And didn’t she think that they’d be needing money as they grew older, and herself wanting to contribute to their needs?

  And, Dermot Michael, you didn’t have anything to do with it at all, at all and don’t you go thinking you did!

  Not even a little bit?

  Well, maybe just a little bit.

  So she was utterly unprepared for Chicago and its big buildings and the professional-class family that had absorbed her as one of their own on arrival, to say nothing of being hauled off the Area Six lockup.

  And she’d been here for only two months!

  No wonder she drifted from one persona to another with practiced ease.

  No wonder she was homesick.

  No wonder she felt like a greenhorn!

  She was a greenhorn, albeit a gorgeous and self-possessed one.

  I slouched into the yacht club some five minutes before noon, demanded a diet Coke from the bartender, and took a whole dish of their great popcorn.

  Knowing herself, I looked out the door about a minute before twelve. Sure enough, there she was, standing patiently in the sunlight, waiting for the light to change. She was wearing a light green summer dress with a white belt, nylons, pumps, and, as best as I could tell, a touch of makeup.

  What a beautiful young woman!

  WELL, the Adversary, said, trying to join me, ISN’T SHE YOURS NOW FOR THE ASKING?

  “Go away. I’m working on a mystery.”

  He slunk away.

  Nuala crossed the Drive when the stoplights changed. On a hot summer day with a nice dress, she was not about to hurry. Greenhorn that she was, she didn’t know that you had to rush to get across the street before the lights changed again.

  So a line of northbound cars could not jump the instant the light changed.

  Some boor in a Buick New Yorker beeped at her. She turned in surprise and smiled at him. He beeped more insistently.

  I wanted to break his neck.

  She turned and looked back at the skyline. She stood there for at least a minute, gazing in awe and admiration at the city.

  Then she strolled gracefully into the club.

  I met her at the door.

  “Glory be, Dermot Michael, isn’t this a brilliant place? Look at that skyline and look at all them glorious boats? Can I go out and look at them?”

  Every eye in the club followed us out on the deck. A big motor cruiser, at least fifty feet long, drifted by, followed by the powerful blue-and-white boat of the Chicago Police, and then by a sail boat, of the sort which, in a few weeks, would race up to Mackinaw.

  “Dermot!” she whispered, “What lovely boats!”

  “Aren’t they ever?”

  “You don’t have a boat here, do you Derm?”

  “The family has one up in New Buffalo, Michigan, a few miles down the road from Grand Beach. That’s why they let me belong. Actually, I joined because of the pastry.”

  “Go ’long with you,” she said, tapping my arm in a gentle reprimand. “You do sail, though, don’t you, Dermot?”

  I remembered the Galway Hooker T-shirt.

  “Sometimes. I’m about the only in the family that still likes it. They’re all into windsurfing.”

  “Sure, I’ve never done that.”

  “I’d be glad to teach you and also to let you crew for me on the Grania.”

  “Named after the pirate princess, I suppose?”

  “Who else?”

  We went back into the club. I ordered another diet Coke for her, sat down a chair, and pushed the popcorn bowl in her direction. She dipped into it with her long, slim fingers and pulled out a huge handful of popcorn.

  “Am I not perishing with the hunger, and on a hot day like this, too?”

  “Eat all the popcorn you want. We’ll go to the table in couple of minutes.”

  “Could I be taking some of this along for the afternoon, or is that a dumb greenhorn question to ask?”

  “Not at all. I’ll ask them to put together a package for you.”

  Actually I had never seen anyone do it before, but why not?

  I stopped at the desk and bought her a Chicago Yacht Club sweatshirt (dark blue and gold), a T-shirt (red with the club’s semaphore seal on it), and a cap (white).

  “You shouldn’t be doing this for me, Dermot Michael Coyne.”

  “And what would your ma say if she heard those words coming from your mouth?”

  “She wouldn’t say a thing, Dermot, because she’d know I didn’t mean it. However she would insist that I thank you very much and, maybe, kiss you.”

  Which she did.

  We sat for a few moments while I finished my Coke and Nuala “destroyed altogether” the bowl (large) of popcorn.

  “You’re looking much better today than you did yesterday.”

  “’Tis only the makeup,” she said with one of the all-purpose West of Ireland sighs. “I’m still a little frazzled. I didn’t sleep much … . Now, isn’t that a glorious buffet? I see what you mean by the pastries. And such l
ovely views! Ah, isn’t this an exciting place to eat!”

  “How did they react when you came into the office today?”

  She blushed.

  “Ah, sure, didn’t they act like pack of eejits, and themselves cheering and clapping their hands and me boss saying I should have used the extra day off and insisting that I should take two hours off for lunch.”

  “And they all wanted to know who the romantic interest is?”

  “How would you be knowing that?”

  “Human nature to be curious about that subject.”

  “Well, it’s none of their friggin’ business.”

  “You didn’t tell them that.”

  “I did not,” she replied, sticking her nose up into the sky. “I said that all the speculation was terrible premature … . They all know who you are, by the way, and they all say you’re a fine man. Didn’t my boss say that you really are a grand fella and very bright, too?”

  “Yeah.”

  “He even said that you’re very perceptive with women.”

  “Calumny! Now let’s go and collect our buffet and get down to work. If we don’t eat wholesome food now, I’m afraid I’ll have to get another bowl of popcorn.”

  Mr. Foster, the maître d’, led us over to a table next to the window which looks out on the harbor and was not near any of the other luncheon patrons.

  Nuala sat at the table for a moment, asked if I would ever buy her a glass of red wine, and dashed for the buffet. After I ordered two glasses of cabernet sauvignon, I joined her at the buffet. She was filling her plate as if she expected a food shortage in Chicago that afternoon.

  “’Tis grand, Derm, super, brilliant.”

  Which are the three favorite words in the vocabulary of the Irish. Even the Irish speakers when they are talking in their own language, will often say “did fockin’ brill.”

  That’s the super superlative.

  “I don’t want them to take any of this away before I have a chance to eat it.”

  I took her salad dish, assured her that the meat and pasta would not get cold, and herded her back to the table.

  “Well, your appetite has come back, Nuala Anne.”

  “This is the first real meal I’ve had since dinner at Grand Beach on Sunday. I’m perishing with the hunger.”

  We sat at the table. The wine was served. Nuala took time away from wolfing down the salads she had collected, and toasted me silently. I returned the toast. Then she dug into the salad plate with renewed gusto.

  “Well, Ms. Holmes, what did you find out?”

  “You first, Dr. Watson.”

  I reported on my conversation with Edgar.

  “Aren’t all the conspiracies even more complicated than I expected—and kind of like all that were going on in Chicago a hundred and thirty-one years ago?”

  She finished off the very large piece of smoked salmon and then continued working on her salad plate.

  “Do you know what the slang word ‘Monet’ means?”

  “Sure. Everyone knows that. It’s someone who looks great from a distance, and then is all jumbled and confused and messed up if you get close to him … or her. Even we greenhorns know that. Now what do you have to tell me?”

  I felt very old, close to retirement.

  “You were right about your key prediction. There is indeed something funny about those canvases.”

  “Didn’t I tell you there would be?”

  Several members of the club and their wives came to our table; purportedly to say hello to me, but actually to meet herself. Some of them didn’t even know about the drama at Area Six yesterday. She responded to them graciously and told everyone how “wonderful altogether” the food at the yacht club was.

  I reflected that even though I was receiving something of a reputation—in very limited circles—for my stories, Nuala would always be the first to get attention when we appeared in public. Nor did she need a few sound bites on TV to attract interest.

  So be it.

  We returned to the meat and vegetable table. Didn’t Nuala sweep through that table like a Viking—roast beef, ham, mashed potatoes, two kinds of pasta, and just “a small bit of chicken.”

  “Am I disgracing you altogether, Dermot Michael?”

  “You’re entitled to as much as you want, Nuala Anne, and yourself hardly eating a thing all day yesterday.”

  Back at our table, and with another glass of cabernet, Ms. Holmes turned to her report.

  “Well, didn’t your man tell me everything I wanted to know without asking why I was interested and himself suspecting all along why?”

  “And he said?”

  “He said that the art business in Chicago was in frigging terrible shape. People don’t like modern art anymore and most of the galleries have contracts with artists who do only modern. He said that the last recession dried up demand and that the recovery is also slower in the luxury markets then other markets. The galleries in River North, says he, have high rents to pay and not many customers anymore. He also says that a place like the Armacost or Richard Gray’s Gallery in your building are still doing well enough, but the others are living on the edge, even though their books look pretty good. It’s the big inventories that are doing the trick on them.”

  “So, did he think they might turn to theft of their own work to collect insurance?”

  “He said that there were easier ways to collect. Like arson. There are a lot of very accomplished arsonists in Chicago who would leave no clues at all, at all.”

  You learn something new about your city every day.

  “He did say that he’s fairly certain the insurance companies will pay eventually, but not without a fight that will take a long time. He says he could hardly believe that Wayne Armacost would do anything like that.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “He said that the big office-building boom in Chicago ended about five years ago. Architects and developers had bought many modern paintings to decorate walls and lobbies and such like—there’s one in the lobby of your building. Now they aren’t building any new buildings and won’t for a long time. The rents in River North are going up, and restaurants and highprice specialty stores are replacing the galleries. It’s hard times over there.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  “It fits my theory perfectly, doesn’t it?”

  “It sure does.”

  “Don’t you see, Derm, me love, that the gobshites could have waited inside till they saw a car coming and then dashed out into the street to make it look like a theft?”

  “Pretty wild possibility, it seems to me.”

  “That’s what happens when several conspiracies come together and men and women are desperate. That’s what we learned from ’Titia.”

  “Well, I know what my task is for tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow evening, I have another idea on which we can cooperate … . Now let’s try some of those pastries.”

  “The Linzer torte is wonderful.”

  So she took a slice of Linzer torte, a dish of dark chocolate mousse, and a large piece of apple pie with whipped cream.

  I was content with the Linzer.

  “And our buried treasure, Ms. Holmes?”

  “One thing at a time, Dr. Watson. It will turn up. I know it will.”

  All right. I know my role.

  We finished eating at 12:50.

  “Don’t we have tons of time, Derm? Let’s go over to Mr. Daley’s Ferris wheel.”

  I aged several more years. I didn’t like heights, and I didn’t like rides. While I had not eaten as much as Nuala Anne, I could easily vomit at the top of Rich’s Ferris wheel. Humiliate myself half to death. I was too young to be such an old man.

  There was no way out, however.

  I hailed a cab and we rode up to Navy Pier.

  “What a brill place, Dermot. Can we come back here again and look at the grand shops and museums and the lovely walks?”

  “Certainly,” I said, already feeling queasy.

&nb
sp; The line waiting for the wheel was, alas, short. We slipped into our car, which we had all to ourselves, before one o’clock.

  The wheel doesn’t move very fast. You can easily climb on it while it’s running. In fact, it never stops moving till the end of the day, so you have to get on a car while it’s easing along the platform. Herself flew in without a second’s pause.

  I had a more difficult time and stumbled in on my second try. Nuala didn’t notice because she was too busy screaming.

  She screamed, shouted, laughed, hugged me, and clung to me as we spun around slowly. Normally, I wouldn’t ignore such gestures, but I was so frightened by the height and so queasy from the motion that I hardly noticed.

  Unlike the windows in my apartment, the doors in the Ferris-wheel cars could open. Therefore, my acrophobia concluded, they WILL open.

  I concealed my woes from Nuala, who was so busy with her cries of glee that she wasn’t paying much attention to me, save as a guarantee of stability.

  When our car reached the very top of the wheel, I thought I would lose everything—my lunch and my nerve.

  However, the revolution of the wheel continued; the ground rose to meet us, however slowly.

  Nuala shrieked joyously all the way to the ground, loving every second of terror.

  I really am too old for her. Maybe I was born too old.

  When we eased up to the platform, I stood up on very shaky pins. The attendant opened the door from the outside, I tried to step out of it but the ground was tilting and swaying and shaking.

  Nuala simply shoved me out.

  “Och, Derm, wasn’t it brilliant!”

  “Dead friggin’ brill.”

  “Thank you so much. And won’t your man be unhappy with you if you don’t ride on his carousel?”

  “What man?”

  “The Lord Mayor, who else?”

  “We don’t have Lord Mayors in this country, Nuala Anne, only mayors—and how would he know that I didn’t ride his merry-go-round?”

  “Well, sure the next time I see him,” she hesitated and then continued, “somewhere or the other, won’t I tell him?”

  So Grand Beach was still under interdict.

  “You never would!”

  She had cleverly guided me to the ticket office for the merry-go-round. I still wasn’t quite sure where the ground was, so I had followed her trustingly.