by Anne Emery
Chapter XXXV
Monty
Maura’s anguished reports of Brennan’s arrest and imprisonment had thrown Monty into turmoil. He and Maura had made regular calls to Ronan and Gráinne over the course of the summer. Brennan’s cousins tried to sound reassuring; everyone was hopeful that when the case went to trial Brennan would be found innocent of all charges. What Monty had seen in the Belfast courts gave him no reason to be optimistic. But surely in this case there would be no evidence, no evidence at all, that Brennan had committed the offences with which he was charged. Monty had also called Reddy O’Reilly a couple of times, but the conversations were awkward; Brennan was the client, not Monty, and there was only so much O’Reilly could say. He, too, tried to be reassuring. But Monty could read between the lines; O’Reilly would have no trouble raising the reasonable doubt that should stave off a conviction, but the judges in the Crumlin Road Courthouse knew a bloody Fenian terrorist when they saw one. When the word came that he had been found guilty and had been sentenced to six years in prison, Monty was dumbfounded. He was, quite literally, sick to his stomach.
He could barely concentrate on his day-to-day work at Stratton Sommers in Halifax. He came to a decision: he would fly over to Belfast again and make as many prison visits as he could in the few short days he would have available. Before making his flight reservations, he would call Ronan and find out about Brennan’s condition and the visiting policy for sentenced prisoners at Long Kesh. Gráinne took his call and sounded hesitant to bring her husband to the phone. But Monty was patient and Ronan eventually came on the line. He sounded strange, not like his usual self. He was courteous as always, but Monty sensed an undercurrent there. Well, who wouldn’t be distressed if his cousin, his guest, had been arrested, convicted, and thrown into prison? Ronan told Monty he would speak to Brennan and call Monty back.
The call came two days later. And if Monty was troubled before the call, he was distraught afterwards. The message was blunt: “Don’t come.” And Ronan sounded even worse on the phone this time. His speech was a bit slurred, almost as if he had been drinking. Maybe just exhausted. Surely the man Brennan had extolled as a “heroic non-drinker” had not fallen into his old family-destroying habits. Ronan had been tactful while putting Monty off. “Ah, Brennan’s going through a bad patch these days, as you can imagine, Monty, so it’s best that you don’t come to see him now.” But Monty didn’t buy it. Brennan’s life had gone almost as far down the toilet as one’s life could go. Monty would have expected Ronan to make this point, certainly, but then say something like, “Don’t expect much from him, Monty, but he needs all the support and encouragement and friendship he can get. So hop on the first plane out, and come see him.” Instead, it was plain that neither Brennan nor Ronan wanted him in Belfast.
Any talk about the situation upset Maura so much that Monty now avoided the subject at home. And after his experience on the phone with Ronan, he was not about to call on any of the Burkes for enlightenment. He had often picked up foreign newspapers at Atlantic News on Morris Street, so he called to see if they had any of the Belfast papers in. They did; they had the Telegraph. Monty got up and left his office and said to the receptionist, “Darlene, I’ll be back in a bit. I’m going over to Atlantic News for some Irish newspapers.”
Kyle, the law firm’s computer guy, had just come in with a large box under his arm. He always came in these days with a large box under his arm. “Did you say you’re going to buy a bunch of foreign papers, Monty? Pretty soon you’ll be able to get all the information you want on your desktop computer. Information from the world wide web.”
“World wide web, right. I won’t cancel any subscriptions yet, Kyle.”
Darlene said, “You’ll be back for the lunch, eh, Monty? The Canadian Earth Equipment people are coming in.”
Lunch with the big client, right. The company had issued its third-party claim against the metals supplier, and all indications were that Canadian Earth would be successful in avoiding losses in the hundreds of millions of dollars. The client was delighted with the work Monty had accomplished in Belfast, and he was scheduled to give a talk to personnel from the company’s various offices across the country. But he had other things on his mind.
He hoofed it down Barrington Street to Morris and turned right, walked to the corner of Queen, and went inside for his papers. When he got back to his office he closed the door and spread the papers out on his desk.
All hell had broken loose in Belfast.
He looked at page one of the Telegraph and what to his wondering eyes should appear but Old Saint Nick. Gideon Sproule, the Ulster firebrand, was in the paper holding forth on the latest turn of events in his native land. Monty read his words and heard in his mind the harsh, razor-wire Norn Iron accent of the famed preacher.
“What kind of peace talks can they be, if the main negotiator the Republicans put forward, the best man they can offer up in the cause of peace, is nothing but a supposedly retired IRA man with a whole band of still-active IRA terrorists hiding behind his back? Including at least one member of his own family. We call upon the Republicans’ man of peace to come clean about the cover-up surrounding the murder of one of his fellow terrorists.”
What was this? Ronan and a cover-up? And was his son implicated too? Lorcan? Monty flipped the paper, and directly below the fold were side-by-side photos of Ronan Burke and not Lorcan, but Tom. Monty stared at the page with growing apprehension. There was more from Gideon Sproule.
“No loss to the world, you might say? Live by the sword, die by the sword, Fritzy O’Dwyer the gunman and multiple murderer is no loss to the world? Aye, maybe not. Maybe he’s no loss to decent society. But that’s not the end of it. Now we know there was more to it than the elimination of one rotten apple. Because when the IRA decided back in 1992 that Fritzy O’Dwyer had to die, it wasn’t just a case of the IRA terrorists executing one of their own.”
Oh, God. The O’Dwyer murder on the Ammon Road. Ronan’s son Tom connected with it. Was this why Reddy O’Reilly, Republican solicitor, wouldn’t take the Flanagans’ case?
This was what the warning had been about. Monty had spoken to Maura and reassured himself that nothing about the Kentucky tourist impersonation was going to come back to haunt her or Brennan. Monty hadn’t known about any other misadventure. But he had called Brennan himself. He hadn’t come clean with Brennan about the warning, and he had to admit to himself it was because he had brushed it off. But he had asked if Brennan had any concerns. Maybe Brennan himself didn’t know the whole story. If Monty had known there was something else going on, he would have tried harder to pin it down. But he hadn’t known. And the papers had to be served to get the Flanagan lawsuit safely underway before Monty left Belfast.
His mind flew back to Katie Flanagan telling him about mysterious payments to her mother after her father’s death. Was it money from some kind of IRA slush fund? Were the payments engineered by the Burkes or others involved in the calamity that night to try and do clandestinely what they could not do openly, support the widow and her children? Why did the money stop? Did somebody notice the finances taking a hit?
And where did Colman Davison fit in? Monty focused again on the paper with a feeling of dread.
“What did they do, the young bloods of the Andersonstown IRA? They hatched a conspiracy to make the murder look like a killing by a Loyalist group, the Ulster Defence Association. Fit up an innocent Loyalist for a murder he didn’t commit!”
As previously reported in this newspaper, a UDA man testified that he was not “fitted up” for the murder but was actually “forced” to pull the trigger.
There. That’s where Davison fit in. Forced, somehow, to do the killing. And maybe he panicked afterwards, perhaps afraid he was next. So he took off, and his car was fired on as he drove away. There was more in the paper from Old Saint Nick.
“The whole vile business was arranged so it would look as if there was ‘
collusion’ — aye, you’ve heard that word before from our Republican friends — collusion by the Royal Ulster Constabulary, the British Army, the intelligence agencies, and who knows who else? The FBI and the CIA, perhaps, too! Maybe aliens from outer space! Well, I am here to tell you, men and women of Ulster, that the forces of law and order and security who are doing such a magnificent job, under very difficult circumstances, to maintain law and order and security in this province had nothing whatsoever to do with this sordid crime! They are innocent, and no amount of IRA conniving and conspiring can change that!”
And if the news suggesting Ronan’s son’s involvement in the Ammon Road shooting was not bad enough, Monty found more bad news in the next day’s edition of the Telegraph. The story was about the bombings of Monaghan and Dublin in 1974. A man was interviewed, a man named Patsy Healey.
Mr. Healey is the son of Paddy Healey, who was killed in one of the bomb attacks in Dublin. He was asked for his reaction to the Royal Ulster Constabulary’s statement that they will not be investigating any leads in the bombing case.
Will not be investigating! Will be stonewalling Dublin. Monty sank back in his chair, deflated.
Patsy Healey told this reporter that the facts of those bombings were known to the authorities. “No matter what is going on in the North, no matter what other cases the police are dealing with, we know they have always had the identities of the terrorists who committed these atrocities. And we also know that the police have new and solid evidence against one of the bombers in particular. We demand that they act on this evidence and arrest this man.”
An RUC spokesman, Detective Inspector Glenn Hobson, said, “I do not know what Mr. Healey is referring to or why he is talking about new information.”
The cop was lying. Monty knew perfectly well that the Northern Ireland police force had received new information. They had very specific evidence about Brody MacAllan, the man Maura and Brennan had tag-teamed in the bar.
“There have been no new developments in the Monaghan and Dublin bombings,” the spokesman stated. “The RUC takes every criminal act seriously and investigates every lead. Every lead is examined, if it comes from credible sources. Occasionally we get so-called tips from people with another agenda, with an axe to grind. Sometimes these people try to manoeuvre the police into laying charges against someone who didn’t do it, someone these people don’t like, so they try to fit the person up. Well, I am here to remind everyone that we are a professional police force, and we are not here to be manipulated or tricked by people out there trying to settle scores.”
There was no need for the cop to spell it out any more clearly. Even though collusion had been a reality of life in the North for years, the police had now turned the tables on their accusers. All they had to do was point to the Fritzy O’Dwyer fiasco and say, “See? They’re trying the same thing again. Making it up.” Monty knew how important it was to Brennan to have uncovered the truth about MacAllan, to give new hope to his old friend’s family all these years after Paddy’s death. He would be devastated by this announcement. The Ammon Road revelations had torpedoed the chance to find justice for the Monaghan and Dublin families and maybe also the chances of Ronan Burke to be elected to the new institutions that were expected to be set up in a new, peaceful Ireland.
This, and Brennan Burke tried in a Diplock court and sent to prison for six long, agonizing years. Father Burke, his brilliant friend, in a prison cell! And it had all come about because of Monty’s lawsuit, Monty’s unquestionably righteous lawsuit, against the man who was forced to pull the trigger. It had taken down Brennan Burke as one of its victims, and Monty might have prevented this simply by holding off a bit, if only he had heeded that sinister warning.
There was a racket outside Monty’s office, and he looked up. A posse of lawyers and staff members were calling to him, mimicking the raising of a fork and the hoisting of a glass. Lunch with the big corporate client. Then the group lapsed into silence.
A few moments passed before the senior partner, Rowan Stratton, said, “My dear fellow, are you all right?”
“Monty, what’s wrong?” asked one of the secretaries. “Are you sick?”
He was looking in their direction but he didn’t see them. All he saw was the concrete cell of a prison and a man inside, lying motionless on the floor. There was another man, in shadow, at the door of the cell. He had a gun in his hand. He replaced it in his pocket and turned away. Colman Davison? Tomás Burke? No. The face he saw on the gunman was that of Monty Collins himself.
Chapter XXXVI
Brennan
Falling in a drunken heap on the floor with the Holy Eucharist in his hands was the most shameful failure in Father Brennan Burke’s long and not always exemplary life. The kindness he had seen in the face of Turlough at the moment of his disgrace was something that would stay with Brennan until the day he died. Turlough was a bomb maker. He would be labelled a terrorist by many, a soldier by others, a man fighting a war against uniformed soldiers who, like Turlough himself, had killed in the course of the conflict. Brennan was a consecrated priest, and yet he was the lowest person in the chapel on that day. He had disgraced himself, disgraced his church, in the presence of all those who had gathered for the consolation and blessing of the Mass.
That night, he smoked a cigarette before going to bed but denied himself a flask of prison-issue poitín. As the shakes began, he drove his mind back to the time before everything fell apart, before the universally feared knock on the door at midnight had set him hurtling towards the abyss. And into his mind came the exultant music of the Gloria by Vivaldi, which he had been enjoying when the knock came on the door. This music had always elevated Brennan to a state of pure and shining bliss. The piece had been performed by the girls at the orphanage where Vivaldi worked as a musician in eighteenth-century Venice. And here was Brennan — no Vivaldi, but a musician of some ability — here was Brennan who had lost his choir of girls at Holy Cross, and who had banjaxed his opportunity to direct the choir at Regina Coeli in Rome. And what about his choir school in Halifax? He pictured their angelic (at times) little faces, Normie Collins foremost among them. He heard their sweet voices. He heard them in his memory singing the Gloria as it was meant to be sung. And he longed to be with them, to hear them again. How old would they be by the time he got out of here? Long gone from the choir school. Unbearable to think of.
But if his appeal was successful . . . Reddy O’Reilly had told him the Court of Appeal overturned Diplock convictions more often than it did jury convictions. Brennan tried to focus on that slim hope instead of on the brutish police and the unrighteous judge who had reduced him to an embittered wretch. He directed his mind to the possibility, however remote, that his sentence might be reduced, or some of his convictions overturned.
He kept coming back to music. He recalled a quotation attributed to Giuseppe Mazzini, the nineteenth-century Italian patriot: “Music is the harmonious voice of creation, an echo of the invisible world.” At times in Brennan’s life, music had given him unmediated communion with that invisible world. Following an earlier crisis in his life, Brennan had returned to his church in Halifax and, in the hour before a concert at the church, he had sat in his room and found his pen flying across the empty pages of his music dictation book. He later had no conscious memory of writing the piece, a setting of the Agnus Dei. He handed copies to his choir sight unseen, and they performed it to near perfection. They asked him afterwards when he had composed it. But he hadn’t composed it; he felt as if he had been taking dictation. From an unseen power.
With all that God had given him, this was how Father Burke repaid him? Sinking into despair. Failing to appreciate his gifts, failing to use them for the benefit of others. A piece of music came to him then, inevitably, but not a sacred piece. An old Neapolitan song, “Core ’Ngrato.” Ungrateful heart. He was the ingrate here. He vowed that he would mend that ungrateful heart, starting now. If he could wean himself off the d
rink, he would. If not, he would not let it keep him down. He would be priest and musician. He would use his gifts to endure his imprisonment and to help lift his fellow prisoners from their misery.
He saw Turlough the following day and said to him, “Do something for me, Turlough. If you ever again see me in a self-involved or drink-fuelled funk, take me to your OC and have me disciplined.”
“Ah now, Father, there will be no need of that. You can think of me as, well, your provisional altar boy. From here on in, I’ve got your back.”
It was going to be difficult, it was going to be painful. But never again would Father Brennan Burke be the one who had to be picked up off the chapel floor.
Epilogue