Whatever Happenened to Molly Bloom? (30 page)

She had full lips, very white teeth and merry eyes. If Bloom had elected to run off with Miss Caffrey he would have better understood it. The crippled girl, MacDowell, was too timid, too shut in on herself to make the most of her looks. Granted she was pretty and nicely dressed but, compared to her friend, she seemed vapid. She was scared to death, of course, of what the coroner would make her say that afternoon for, being a Catholic, she wouldn’t dare lie.

He said, ‘Are the fishcakes not to your liking, Miss MacDowell?’

‘I’m not hungry.’

‘Go on,’ said Cissy. ‘Dig in, Gert. You’ll need all your strength for afterwards. Here, we’re not paying for this, are we?’

‘It’s on the house,’ Archie Jarvis assured her.

‘The house wouldn’t run to a glass of stout, would it?’ said Cissy optimistically. ‘Quite partial to a glass at din— lunch.’

‘No stout,’ Archie said. ‘Tea, coffee or milk only. Sorry.’

‘How about puddin’?’

‘Rice and prunes, or apple duff and custard.’

‘Lovely!’ said Cissy while Gerty lifted a sliver of fish on her fork and placed it on the tip of her tongue.

‘Chew, for goodness sake,’ Cissy said. ‘Nobody’s watching.’

Gerty closed her mouth tightly and let the tiny piece of fish slide down her throat.

‘There.’ Cissy patted her friend’s arm. ‘That wasn’t so bad, was it?’ To Constable Jarvis she said, ‘She always eats like a bird. Surprised she ha’n’t wasted away by now. She’s a lovely baker, too. Her ginger biscuits are a treat. Your wife, Archie, does she bake you ginger biscuits?’

‘Oh, Cissy!’ Gerty scraped the breadcrumbs off a second fragment of fish. ‘Leave the poor man alone. He’s not interested in you.’

‘I wouldn’t say that,’ said Archie Jarvis. ‘Do
you
cook, Cissy?’

‘Cook, clean, do the wash and look after the kiddies.’

‘Kiddies?’ said Constable Jarvis.

‘Brothers,’ said Cissy. ‘Twins. Horrors they can be, too. Where are you from, Archie?’

Attention diverted, Gerty swallowed three tiny pieces of fish, sipped from the cup of tea that the constable had poured for her and watched Cissy weave her spell on the young policeman which, for a moment or two, took her mind off the ordeal ahead.

‘Wexford,’ Archie Jarvis said. ‘I’m from Wexford.’

She wished she could be more like Cissy, though a lot of things Cissy did bordered on the vulgar. What she admired most in Cissy was her happy-go-lucky attitude, that and her insolence. Cissy made it clear she had a mind of her own and, while she would quite like to be a wife, she’d no intention of becoming a slave to the first smooth-talker to come along.

‘We’re from Sandymount,’ Cissy went on. ‘Tritonville Road. You ever down that way, Archie?’

‘Now and then. I like the Strand when the weather’s hot.’

‘It’s not just the weather that’s hot in Sandymount.’

‘Cissy! Stop it!’

‘You’re a fine one to talk, Gert. Didn’t you first see the love of your life on the sands? You wouldn’t be here now if you hadn’t.’

Hastily, Archie put in, ‘My father’s a policeman, Royal Irish. Do you have anything against coppers, Cissy?’

‘Coppers?’ Cissy considered. ‘Nah, not coppers like you, any roads. You should come down to Sandymount now the weather’s picking up. It’s only a penny tram ride from town and you never know who you’ll bump into by the seashore.’

‘I might just take you up on that,’ Archie Jarvis promised.

‘I’ll be in need of a chum by then,’ Cissy said. ‘When Mr Bloom steps out o’ that court a free man Gerty’ll be off to London. Or Paris. Ooo-la-la! Paris! You can do anything you wish in Paris, be as naughty as you like.’ She grinned. ‘Me, I’d settle for a day out at the races. Get to wear me pretty hat, drink fizz and blow a bob or two. You ever been to the races, Archie?’

‘Do you know, I never have.’

‘First time for everything,’ Cissy said and winked.

Gerty put down her teacup. Tea or not, a fishbone was stuck half way down her gullet. She could feel the muscles in her throat tighten, threatening a bout of the heaves.

She lifted her handkerchief to her mouth and gulped.

‘What is it, dear?’ said Cissy solicitously. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘I feel sick.’

‘Nerves, just nerves,’ Cissy said. ‘Take a great big breath, darlin’,’ then, to Constable Jarvis, ‘We’d better get her out of here.’

Gerty crushed the handkerchief into her face and rose from the table, clattering the chair. Cheeks burning, she swung round in search of an exit. Cissy rose too and, snaring her friend by the waist, steered her towards the doorway that led to the barracks’ yard.

‘Hoy?’ the catering sergeant shouted while the other officers in the room stared at the distressed young women and, not unsympathetically, shook their heads.

Constable Jarvis slapped two half crowns down on the table and, grabbing up his cap, headed after the women with as much decorum as he could muster. He would be ribbed about this later, ribbed mercilessly, but right now his prime concern was for the woman he’d been charged to protect.

Gerty clung to her friend, her boot scraping the linoleum, as she stumbled towards daylight; a small defenceless creature who, Archie thought, knew little of courts and coppers or middle-aged men with scolding wives. He wouldn’t take on Gerty MacDowell if she was the last free woman in Dublin, but then he wasn’t Leopold Bloom, thank God. He caught the door before it closed and stepped into the yard.

Knees spread, Cissy Caffrey had Gerty draped over her forearm like a blanket while Gerty retched and retched and brought up nothing but three or four undigested bits of cod.

Cissy dabbed Gerty’s mouth with a handkerchief, then, looking at Archie Jarvis, said, ‘She’s not well. I really should be gettin’ her home.’

Archie nodded. ‘If she’s ill, then the coroner won’t …’

Straightening, Gerty said, ‘No, I’m going through with it.’ She snatched the handkerchief from Cissy and wiped her lips. ‘I don’t care what they think. I’m going through with it.’

‘That’s the ticket, Miss,’ said Archie, much relieved, while Cissy, with a sigh, retrieved the handkerchief, spat on it and, gripping her friend by the scruff of the neck, scrubbed off the last of the sick with a vigour that made Archie flinch.

Chopped egg and onion was Bloom’s least favourite sandwich filling. And the tea was stewed. He applied a drop of milk from the half pint bottle that the court officer had delivered and three spoonfuls of sugar from the canister with the label, ‘Property of Dublin City Council’ peeling off its side.

It was all very shabby and indicative of his status in the circus that the inquiry had become. He’d been duped by the wily detective into believing that if he played along he’d not only walk out of court a free man but would still have Gerty. As for that fool, that foppish boy they’d found to defend him, he’d lost faith in him long ago. He stirred his tea with the bent spoon they’d given him and sipped, his mouth pinching with the taste of it.

He’d been left alone to stew, like the tea, in a bleak little office at the back of the courtroom, close to the stairs that led down to the mortuary where Molly’s body had lain; Molly and the foetus that Molly had assured him would tumble into the world wearing a straw boater and a striped blazer and with not one drop of the blood of the tribe of Reuben in his veins.

She shouldn’t have said that, shouldn’t have taunted him. She thought that Boylan would take her on, of course, make her a queen of song and her child, his child, a prince among men. And if Boylan didn’t take the bait then he, reliable old Poldy, would forgive her.

The DMP officer who’d been stationed outside in case he decided to top himself threw open the door to admit his lawyer. Following Neville into the room was a foxy, not-quite-elderly, little man in a morning coat, silk-buttoned waistcoat and a collar the like of which Bloom hadn’t seen since his school days. He wore spectacles, too, nose-pinchers, that caught the light from the room’s only window and, for an instant, make his eyes sparkle.

‘May I introduce my senior,’ Neville Sullivan said. ‘Mr Alfred Tolland. He’s taken an interest in your case since the beginning and has one or two questions he’d like to put to you.’

The habit of courtesy urged Bloom to rise and offer his hand but, stubbornly, he stayed in his chair, glowering over the sandwich plate while Mr Tolland drew out a chair and arranged it at the table, facing Bloom.

Once seated, Mr Tolland peeled off his gloves, dropped them into his lap, then, glancing up, said, ‘Tell me, Mr Bloom, strictly between thee, me and Neville here, why
did
you murder your wife?’

TWENTY SIX

S
o great was the crowd in the bar of the Belleville that you could barely find a table upon which to rest your glass, let alone a chair upon which to rest your bottom.

Smoke from pipes, cigars and cigarettes filled the air like ectoplasm and, hyperbole being the order of the day, the clamour of the men of the fourth estate rose like the wail of the damned teetering on the verge of the pit. If you wished to order a drink, express an opinion or simply greet a friend, the only way to do it was to roar at the pitch of your voice and with reporters in from Cork, Belfast and as far afield as Liverpool all doing likewise, the racket was, as Mr Flanagan put it, positively Pentecostal.

Even sharp-eyed locals were too busy ferrying booze from the bar to their corner refuge to notice that a breathless Blazes Boylan had found his way to the waterhole and, having grabbed the barmaid’s attention, was hoarsely demanding service in the form of three large gins.

‘Here, isn’t that Gandy?’ Robbie Randall said. Gesturing with a half full glass, he shouted, ‘Gandy. Over there. What’s he doing here? I thought he was on duty.’

‘When did that ever stop Gandy,’ said Charlie Palfry who, following the line of spillage from Randall’s glass, had spotted the sergeant’s cap bobbing above the heads of the multitude.

‘Perhaps he has a titbit or two to sell,’ Robbie Randall suggested. ‘Who’s going to stand him a jar?’

Jack Delaney had secured a bread roll filled with sausage meat. He crammed the roll into his mouth and sluiced it down with porter. ‘He’s here with Boylan.’

‘Blazes? Where?’ said Mr Flanagan.

Juggling three glasses of London Dry, Blazes elbowed through the crowd. ‘Here he is, the man o’ the hour,’ Mr Palfry declared.

‘One for me?’ said Flanagan, reaching out. ‘How kind.’

‘Get off,’ said Blazes savagely. He looked around for a ledge upon which to place the glasses but, finding none, reluctantly passed one glass to Delaney with the warning, ‘Touch a drop and you’re a dead man.’

He drained the glass in his right hand, as if gin had no more bite than tap water, retrieved the second glass from Delaney, drained it too and, stooping, put the empties on the floor behind a potted plant. ‘God Jesus, but I needed that.’

‘I’m not surprised,’ said Jack Delaney. ‘If I were you, though, I’d go easy on the grog, Hughie. You’re in the box this afternoon and you’ll need all your wits about you.’

‘Particularly if Slater has a female witness who saw the whole thing,’ said Charlie Palfry. ‘Does anyone know who she is?’

‘One of Bloom’s tarts,’ said Blazes.

Breathing had returned to normal but he was still sweating. He blinked, flicked away a greasy droplet from his brow and tipped back half the contents of the third glass.

‘How many tarts does Bloom have?’ said Randall.

‘Two at least,’ said Boylan.

‘Who’s the other one?’ Mr Palfry asked.

‘Martha Clifford. Christ knows who
she
is,’ Blazes answered. ‘I have letters from her to Bloom, so I know she exists. She’s a dirty devil, too, I tell you, a spanker. Just Bloom’s type. I didn’t know anything about the cripple, though. He kept her dark all right.’

Sergeant Gandy loomed behind Boylan. His eyes roved hopefully from gin to stout. He licked his moustache with a thick red tongue and cleared his throat.

Blazes swung round. ‘Why are you trailing me, Gandy?’

‘Told you already,’ the sergeant said, ‘it’s me job.’

‘Who sent you?’ said Blazes. ‘Kinsella, was it?’

‘Machin,’ Gandy said. ‘Is that Guinness you have there?’

‘For God’s sake, Blazes, buy him a pint,’ Mr Palfry said. ‘He’s your man after all.’

‘He is not my man,’ said Blazes. ‘He’s Machin’s man.’

‘Tell you what, Sergeant, I’ll spring for a pint,’ said Robbie Randall, ‘if you tip us a wink what Slater’s got up his sleeve?’

‘Kinsella thinks he’s turned up a witness puts Mr Boylan with Bloom outside Nancy O’Rouke’s on the night in question,’ Gandy said. ‘Now, what about that pint, eh?’

Flanagan said, ‘What’s your part in it, Jack, since you’re sitting with the witnesses?’

‘Buy me a drink, for God’s sake,’ said Gandy.

‘Yes, Jack,’ said Palfry, ‘what is your contribution?’

‘Wait and see,’ Jack Delaney said.

‘One drink,’ said Gandy.

‘Jesus!’ Digging into his pocket Blazes brought out a ten shilling note and held it up between finger and thumb. ‘Get yourself a pint, Gandy, fetch me another double London while you’re at it, and don’t pocket the change.’

He polished off the gin in the remaining glass and, stooping again, deposited the empty by the potted plant. Then he rose and confronted the
Star’
s
reporter. ‘It
was
you, wasn’t it? You squealed. You toadied to Kinsella.’

‘Did you, Jack?’ said Mr Palfry.

‘Ask him what he’s doing on the witness benches if it isn’t to see me fixed,’ Blazes shouted. ‘Where’s Gandy? Where’s my bloody gin?’ He swivelled on his heel, lost balance, righted himself and cried, ‘You’re all the same, every bloody one of you. Licking the coppers’ arses. Bugger you, Delaney! Bugger you for a squealer!’

The punch had no weight behind it.

Delaney intercepted the fist before it travelled far from Boylan’s shoulder and deftly turned the blow aside.

Blazes lost balance and would have toppled to the floor if Gandy’s reflexes had not been so sharp. He fended Blazes against his chest, spilling not one drop of London Dry in the process. The same could not be said for the pint of stout, the contents of which slopped over Blazes like a baptism.