Michael Russell - The City of Shadows

When Stefan Gillespie turned away from the ticket window at Kingsbridge Station, he saw the tall, fair-haired man again, sitting on a bench, reading the Irish Independent ; the man who had stopped so abruptly for a cigarette in Clanbrassil Street; the man he was now convinced was following him. And as the man turned a page and leant back — just as he had turned a page and leant back into a leather armchair, in the entrance to the Shelbourne Hotel the night before, Stefan remembered that was where he had first seen him. There were still fifteen minutes to go before the train left for Baltinglass. He walked across the station concourse, back towards the street. He stood close to the entrance, looking at a rack of newspapers and magazines. Outside, a taxi drew up. A man and a woman got out. As the man paid the driver, Stefan walked briskly out of the station. He opened the taxi door and got in.

‘Straight across the river, over the bridge. As quick as you can.’

The driver pulled away with a sour glance in the mirror.

‘And where am I going then?’

Stefan looked through the back window. The fair-haired man had just emerged from the station, looking up and down, his eyes fixed on the departing taxi. There could be no doubt at all; the man was following him.

‘If you’re in a hurry, you’ll want to tell me where you’re going, sir.’

‘Just turn round at the other end and drop me back at the station.’

‘What the fuck is this? There’s a bloody minimum fare — ’

Inside Kingsbridge, the fair-haired man was at the ticket office window, talking to the clerk who had sold Stefan his ticket. He was unaware that the man he had been watching was now watching him. He walked to a platform where a train was disgorging passengers. He looked for a moment, then moved to a hoarding and ran his finger down the printed timetable. Stefan was right behind him now. The man turned. As he did, Stefan grabbed his shoulders and slammed him up against the hoarding, very hard.

‘Baltinglass, that’s where I’m going. Why do you want to know?’

The response wasn’t what he expected. The fair-haired man grinned.

‘You’re back.’

‘And you’re not very good at this.’

‘I didn’t think I was doing badly. It’s a shame about your nose.’

‘It’s Jimmy and Sean I owe that to, but any friend of theirs — ’

‘Friend would be overstating it. You’re going to miss your train.’

Stefan took his hands from the man’s shoulders. He looked over to the platform, where a few passengers were now boarding. Smiling amiably, the man brushed the shoulders and lapels of his coat. He held out his hand.

‘John Cavendish.’

‘You’re not Special Branch.’ Stefan ignored the proffered hand.

‘Oh, I’d say you’re a better detective than that, Sergeant.’

The Tullow train pulled out of Kingsbridge. It wasn’t a corridor carriage and they had the compartment to themselves. No one would hear; that mattered to Cavendish. He had made Stefan wait on the platform till the last minute.

‘I’m a bit like you, Sergeant.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘I’m not supposed to be doing this.’

‘What is it I’m not supposed to be doing?’

‘I don’t know what Sergeant Lynch would make of you meeting Miss Rosen today. I assume you’ve been warned off Keller.’ He tapped his nose. ‘Well, you didn’t have that when you left the Shelbourne last night.’

‘Are you going to tell me who you are?’

‘I’m actually Lieutenant John Cavendish.’ He reached into his pocket and took out a leather card case. He pulled out a neatly printed card.

Stefan looked down at it. He shook his head, stifling his laughter.

‘I’m sorry, am I missing a joke?’ frowned the lieutenant.

‘You’re with G2?’

‘More or less.’

‘And you give out cards saying Military Intelligence?’

‘Well, someone had them printed up,’ he grinned amiably.

‘And more or less means — ’

‘Not leaving undone those things that ought to be done simply because our political masters have instructed us to leave them undone.’

‘This could go on for some time, couldn’t it? And I’d say I’ll still have no idea what you’re talking about. So why are you following me?’

‘I did think you were working with Lynch.’

‘Does it look like I am?’

‘No. I don’t know what you’re doing. I don’t know why you arrested Hugo Keller, only to have Special Branch pull him out of a cell in Pearse Street and take him home. I don’t know who Hannah Rosen is or what she’s got to do with Keller. I don’t know why you met her today when you’ve been told, in a variety of ways I imagine, to lay off Herr Keller now. But I’d hazard a guess that Lynch is looking for something he thought you had.’

‘And is that what you’re after too, Lieutenant?’

Cavendish looked at him, saying nothing. He had been thrown into this conversation abruptly and unexpectedly. Whatever about the nonchalant smiles, he had blown what was meant to be a simple surveillance.

‘It’s not my business, Lieutenant. I don’t want to get between you and Special Branch. You’ll have important work to do, following one another round Dublin. I just arrested an abortionist when nobody wanted me to.’

‘What happened to the evidence you took out of Merrion Square?’

‘Lynch has got it.’ Stefan smiled. ‘Except for what’s missing.’

‘And what is missing?’

‘Give me a clue. I might have seen it, who knows?’

‘What the hell does that mean?’

‘It means it would take a lot more than a punch in the face from Jimmy Lynch’s bulldog to make me give up something worth having. So what’s your offer? You don’t look like the shite-kicking sort, Cavendish.’

The soldier didn’t reply. He was trying to get the measure of Stefan. He wasn’t sure about him. Was he joking? Was he really hiding something?

‘Look, I haven’t got it, Lieutenant. I don’t even know what it is.’

‘So what are you doing then?’ persisted Cavendish.

‘My job.’

‘And where does Keller come into your job now?’

There seemed no reason not to tell the truth. It wasn’t a secret.

‘I’m looking for a woman who disappeared earlier this year. The last thing she did was go to Merrion Square for an abortion. That makes Hugo Keller the last person who saw her, the last I know about anyway. That’s what I’m doing. So what about you? Why don’t you tell me what you and Special Branch are looking for? Did Keller keep a list of his customers?’

‘That would be some of it,’ replied the lieutenant.

‘I guess there’d have to be more to interest Special Branch?’

Cavendish’s silence gave him his answer. Then the officer smiled.

‘So what do you know about Hugo Keller, Sergeant?’

‘As a posh backstreet abortionist, he’s got some unusual friends. And he seems to generate a surprising amount of activity in unexpected places. What with Special Branch dancing round him, not to mention the director of the National Museum, who happens to be the leader of the Nazi party the Germans have set up here, and now Military Intelligence, I can’t decide whether he’s a national treasure or a threat to national security. Which is it?’

The lieutenant didn’t answer. ‘So, who is this missing woman?’

‘I doubt she’s going to be of any interest to G2 or to Special Branch. She’s just a woman no one’s seen for a long time. I’d be surprised if she’s alive. I don’t know how, or why, but that’s what I think. That’s what I was talking to Hannah Rosen about. It’s what I intend to talk to Herr Doktor Keller about, whether it goes down well with Military Intelligence, or Special Branch, or the German embassy, or my inspector or anybody else.’