The Parting Glass (44 page)

Liam wondered if a priest had a life. He doubted it, but perhaps the old man had friends, even people he had come to love. Surely he hadn’t stayed because he found the climate pleasing.

“Perhaps I’ll ask him, although it’s of little importance,” he told her.

“You’d be interested for a reason,” she said, her eyes narrowing in question.

“Oh, it’s only that young Glen Donaghue resembles a man I once knew.” Liam lifted Irene onto his shoulders, said his goodbyes and started back home. But the old woman’s suggestion intrigued him. Why had he not thought of the priest? Priests meddled in the lives of everyone they met. Christened and married, absolved and buried. He resolved to visit Father McSweeney to find out what the old man knew about Glen Donaghue.

He found the opportunity later that week. McNulty and his bodyguards had gone to New York for a meeting, and Clare, who had become Liam’s personal charge, was visiting her mother’s sister in Buffalo. McNulty himself was depositing her there on his way to the big city, and Liam’s watchful eye was not needed. His list of responsibilities while they were gone was short and uncomplicated.

He called the rectory and spoke to the housekeeper, who relayed his message. Surprisingly, Father McSweeney agreed to see him that very afternoon at four.

Liam was waiting, hat in hand, when the priest made his way into the rectory parlor. Each step was measured and shuffling, but when Liam offered an arm to help the old man seat himself, the priest waved him away. More than age afflicted McSweeney. Some form of palsy held him in his grip, and disease withered his body. But the man’s blue eyes were still clear, and once he began to speak, it was obvious that the mind behind them remained sharp.

“You’re welcome here, but you’ve come for more than a chance to see the rectory, I suppose?”

“Yes, Father.” Liam perched on the edge of an overstuffed horsehair chair. Both arms of the chair were covered with crocheted doilies, and he was afraid he would knock them to the ground. He wasn’t yet over his discomfort with priests and the punishment they could mete out.

“You have questions for me?” Father McSweeney seemed to be trying to ease Liam into revealing himself. There was no hint of impatience in his voice.

“The conversation will go no further than this parlor?”

“Well, it’s not the confessional, but it’s nearly as good.” Father McSweeney searched Liam’s face. “But you haven’t been in a confessional for some time now, have you?”

“How would you know that?”

Father McSweeney smiled. “I can’t read your mind, son, nor the stains on your soul. It’s only that I’ve never seen you there.”

“Oh.” Liam realized he was twisting his hat in his hands. “I met a man. Glen Donaghue is his name. And I’m trying to find out something about his family. Someone told me that you would be the one to ask.”

“I know something about
you.
”

Liam was surprised. He had not expected this. “Do you, now?”

“I made inquiries some weeks back. In Ireland.”

Liam was more surprised, and growing alarmed, as well. “Now why would you do such a thing?”

“Perhaps for the very reason you’re here to ask about the Donaghues.”

As the priest struggled to make himself more comfortable, Liam pondered that possibility.

Finally Father McSweeney sighed in resignation and stopped fidgeting. Clearly comfort was not to be had. “I saw you at Mass on Easter Day, and you reminded me of someone. I asked your name of another priest. You’re from a village called Shanmullin?”

“That’s right, Father.” Liam placed the hat at his feet and leaned forward. “
Who
did I remind you of?”

“Someone long dead. Also named Tierney.”

Liam waited, breath held.

“A man named Terence Tierney,” the priest said. “Your uncle, if my information serves us both correctly.”

“Long…dead.” Liam had known as much, but the news was still something of a blow, although why, he couldn’t say.

Father McSweeney continued. “Terence had a son, however, who is alive today. And that son has two children.”

Liam thought he knew the name of one of them. “Glen Donaghue?”

“Yes.”

“The wife married again?” It was the only explanation Liam could see.

“Yes. Lena Tierney gave birth to Terence’s child after his death. She called the son Terence, as well, but she married a man named Rowan Donaghue soon after, and he adopted little Terry. Terry was always called Donaghue.”

“When I arrived, I asked about for Tierneys, but there were none to be found. So that’s the reason. Why did you ask about
me?
Before you even knew my name?”

“I saw something of Terence in you. A flash, a gesture. For a moment you took me straight back to another time. I thought it was only an old man’s whim, but I asked, just in case. When I discovered your name, I asked with more interest.”

“And
I
saw something of my father in Glen Donaghue. Glen is very much like Da must have been at his age, but I see no resemblance between the two of
us.
”

“Perhaps not, but each of you resembles, in some small way, the other’s ancestor.”

Liam thought how odd it all was. He had saved Glen’s life, never knowing they were cousins. Now Liam worked for Tim McNulty, and Glen struggled to find ways to put Tim out of business.

“I wasn’t certain what to do with what I had learned,” Father McSweeney said. “I’m glad you came to me. Will you tell Glen?”

“What else do you know about me?” Liam asked.

“Enough, I’m afraid.”

“Then you’ll understand why I
can’t
tell him. Will he want to know that his long lost Irish cousin is a bootlegger?”

“His parents keep a saloon, you know. His grandmother began it.”

“His parents don’t work for Tim McNulty.”

“You don’t have to, either.”

Liam considered that. If he quit, he could tell Glen who he was and how they were related. Ironically, Liam’s job was to keep Glen and Clare McNulty apart, a mission he had found distasteful even without knowing that he and Glen were cousins. Now it seemed worse, and he could end it by leaving Tim McNulty’s employment.

Yet could he quit? Even if he wanted to? Would McNulty allow him to simply walk away, knowing all he did? And there were other considerations. Brenna, Irene and the lovely house they could now afford. And men at home in Ireland who expected him to show proper gratitude for helping him bypass America’s traditional immigration procedures.

Then, of course, there was the IRA cause. Something bigger than himself, the
only
thing bigger that he really believed in.

“Perhaps breaking with Tim McNulty isn’t as easy as it sounds?” Father McSweeney said. “Would you like to pray about it with me?”

“Thank you, but no. I’m not a believer, Father, and if there’s a God, He stopped listening to me long ago.”

“Impossible.”

Liam picked up his hat and rose. “I’m grateful to you for speaking with me. You won’t tell Glen or the other Donaghues?”

“They would help you make a new start, you know. It’s a good family. And Lena, Terence’s wife, would be happy to know that some of the Tierney family survived. We’re old friends, and I see her often. She grew up in your village. I suspect she knew your father when he was a lad.”

“Perhaps, but she never knew the man he became. That’s a story she’s better off not knowing.”

Father McSweeney struggled to his feet. “If you won’t pray with me, I’ll pray
for
you.” He held up a trembling hand when Liam began to protest. “It can’t hurt, can it? And it will fill an old man’s final days with something more than letters and endless contemplation.”

“Then pray for Glen, and for Tim McNulty’s daughter, too, will you, Father? She and Glen believe they’ve fallen in love. And if they really have, they’ll need more than prayers. They’ll need all the heavenly hosts to avoid McNulty’s retribution.”

“And you would allow such a thing? For your very own cousin?”

Liam set his hat on his head. “I do what I’m told.”

“And it got you in trouble once before, didn’t it, son? In Ireland, just before you came to America.
That’s
why you believe God has turned away from you.”

Liam could think of nothing to say about that. He turned and left before he could.

Tim McNulty was a rich man who wanted to be richer. It was not an uncommon ailment. Liam had seen the disease frequently in his homeland. Ireland had come to a sorry state because of greed, as pervasive and destructive as the blight that had attacked the potato crops.

McNulty’s greed was matched by a fierce need for power. It wasn’t enough that his own little bootlegging empire thrived, and that he was the undisputed crime king of Cleveland’s West Side. He wanted more, needed it the way most men needed whiskey and a willing woman. And the only way to guarantee more of everything was to take chances.

McNulty, born to be a gambler, was about to take a big one.

“I won’t pretend this is any ordinary haul, lads,” McNulty told the men assembled inside one of his warehouses. “If I do, then you won’t know that you
have
to give this one your all. So I’m telling you now, this is the real thing tonight, the thing you lay your life on the line for if you have to. Because if all goes well,” his eyes narrowed, “and it had better, then every man here’s going to leave for home a lot richer. There will be large bonuses for every one of you if we come through this with no problems.”

Liam was more interested in McNulty’s appearance and tone than his words. McNulty was sweating like a washerwoman bent over a laundry press. And the smile that characterized all his dealings, even the most grisly ones, had disappeared, melting away in his personal deluge.

McNulty fished a handkerchief from his pocket and mopped his forehead. “So if anybody has any questions, now’s the time to ask them. Otherwise, you lads are on your own.”

Nobody said a word.

“Okay, then.” McNulty waved them away. “Come back with all the goods, or I’ll find you, and you’ll be returning in a pine box.” This time he did smile, a sickening imitation of his usual. Then he turned his back on them, and stepped out of the warehouse and into his Cadillac.

The men waited until the car had been driven away before anybody moved.

“Exactly what’s going on?” Liam asked Jerry. “What’s he so flustered about?”

“You criticizing the boss?”

“No, but if I’m about to risk my life, I’d like to know the stakes.”

Jerry motioned him farther away from the others, three of McNulty’s favored “assistants,” who were talking among themselves. “I can tell you what all I heard.”

“Good enough.”

“This panther sweat they’re bringing over from Canada tonight? Well, it’s better stuff than usual, see? A lot better, and there’s a lot more of it. The boss has everything tied up in this haul.” He looked around before he spoke to be sure no one else was listening. “He borrowed money to make this deal. That’s why he went to New York, but his regular source in the Bronx turned him down flat. So he took big simoleans from Bugs Moran and his gang, and they don’t give nothing unless they get a whole lot more something back, you know what I mean?”

Liam knew. Obviously McNulty had gone into heavy debt to get the money for this shipment. If all went well, he would make it back and a whole lot more, plus gain some muscle with the North Side Chicago gang. But if things didn’t go well…

Jerry pulled out his watch. “We gotta get going. One at a time.” He signaled to one of the other men, who nodded. Jerry turned back to Liam and winked. “You’re the end of the line. Put the cat out, and lock up nice and tight for the night. I’ll see you there.”

Liam forced a smile. “That you will.”

The others left, one by one in four separate vehicles with five-minute intervals between. Liam waited another ten before he slipped out the door of the darkened warehouse. He had been told to walk down to Whiskey Island, where the shipment was supposed to arrive. The walk took him twenty minutes more, along rugged paths lit only by a cloud-dusted moon and the occasional flickering glow from some resident’s shanty.

The clouds congealed and gathered forces as he walked, and he hoped that the storm that was brewing held off until the night’s business was complete. He skirted what industry there was, and the railyards, too, kicking twice at packs of stray dogs who were searching for rats or garbage. The bars that had once dotted the landscape were gone now, casualties of Prohibition. He was just as glad, since that meant fewer people to mark his presence.

The others had hidden themselves well on the peninsula’s most deserted shore, assisted by skies that were growing steadily more menacing. Lightning flashed on the distant horizon, but it was the only light he saw now.

This spot was a favored destination for rumrunners, and it wasn’t Liam’s first visit. Had he been in command of the booze agents, he would have assigned a man to live right here and reap the frequent harvests of Canadian hooch. But he wasn’t in charge, and he supposed the Lake Erie coast had plenty of other places as ripe for business as this one. He stood behind a line of scrub and waited for the others to show themselves.

They did, one by one, materializing like stories he’d heard of the half-fairy
grogoch,
which only appeared when it had grown comfortable with its surroundings.

“Anybody see anybody he shouldn’t have?” Jerry asked when they had gathered into a tight little bundle of nerves and flesh.

No one had. Men shuffled uncomfortably, afraid to smoke and draw unwanted attention. When they spoke, they did so in low voices, chopping off words as if final syllables might get them arrested.

Liam couldn’t see his watch, a gift from Brenna on his last birthday, but he figured another half hour passed before Jerry shook his arm. “Look.”

Liam followed Jerry’s pointing finger. Something was moving in the water just off the shore. Two somethings, if he was right. “Two boats?”

“Three. Look farther that way.”

Liam turned his gaze to the left and saw the outline of another cruiser in the wake of the second. Liam whistled softly. McNulty had been right. This was going to be some haul.