The Death of an Irish Politician Read Online Free Page B

Dublin possessed. McGarr’s yachting shoes scuffed on the deep plush of the beige rug. Walls to match held portraits in oil of sundry Irish historical figures. A tastefulchandelier of cut glass illuminated the landing on the third floor. “How much is the rent of five A?” Noreen asked, as they ascended.
    “Twenty-nine per.”
    “Month?” McGarr asked.
    The old lady turned to him with a thin smile on her lips. “No, lad—per week .”
    The apartment was no less agreeable than the hall. Immediately the porch attracted them. Sliding glass doors opened onto its rows of potted plants. McGarr peered over the railing and looked down upon the garden below, which, having thrived through an abnormally sunny summer, now fructified with such abandon that even he detected the aromas of apples, pears, and many flowers just past prime. The mélange was heady to his senses.
    The rooms contained simple but expensive furnishings in a style that McGarr called Continental, this is to say, that which Irish and British intellectuals might choose for their flats: bean-bag chairs, Plexiglas tables, circular fluorescent lights that craned from weighted bases and lit half the room. No one motif was dominant, each piece seeming to have been chosen for itself, but all was tasteful. The place was spotless and comfortable, yet strangely its ambience seemed sterile. Certainly, it had not been lived in recently.
    While Noreen admired the curious decor, McGarr examined the kitchen cabinets, finding only some tins of foodstuffs and a well-stocked liquor cabinet that contained a half case of Mt. Gay rum. The fridge was empty and switched off, the door slightly ajar.
    Meanwhile, the old lady kept up a monologue. “The place gets done out thoroughly once a week no matter how long they’re away. The heat goes on come-day-go-day.”
    That was when McGarr noticed the self-contained central heating system with which the apartment was equipped. It was composed of baseboard electrical units that operated at enormous expense in Ireland.
    “I sometimes bring my knitting up here when I water the plants what have a better life than half the poor of this city. I sit here”—she indicated a low couch of at least ten feet—“if only to allay such terrible waste. Every once in a while, when the house is empty, I hear the phone go off. It rang so long three weeks ago I finally climbed all the way up here only to have the operator tell me the call was from Rome. I speak English alone and a smattering of the mother tongue. So much more the shame.”
    Presently, McGarr was opening bureau drawers in the bedroom and carefully turning back the clothes. He had not found one written item, picture, or memento. He lingered for some time in the drawer that contained the woman’s underthings.
    Finally, the old woman said, “I should thinksuch fluff would grow on a man in your profession, Inspector.”
    Noreen added, “He’s beginning to act like one of those, so to speak.”
    “Ah, there’s many a man with a worse failing. The whole country would be better off if the men kept their hands to themselves.”
    McGarr smiled wanly and walked out of the apartment. That made twice today his sexuality had been questioned. In spite of these insinuations, however, he had noticed that the female occupant of the apartment had a doubtless pleasing bust size of 38C and purchased her clothes at B. Altman and the other shops that figured as the origin of the clothes on the boat. As well, the wardrobe was large, the woman obviously shapely and chic. What troubled McGarr was how a man of Ovens’ rough-and-tumble demeanor might fit into this scene. The only men’s shoes in the closet were a pair of Topsiders, the American boating moccasin.
     
    The Dolphin was a working-class pub near the Dun Laoghaire docks. Today, the frosted glass door had been jammed open, and the crowd within had spilled onto the street. In spite of the sun and mild weather, all the men wore heavy raincoats and,