John Brady - A Carra ring

“You’ve been in these situations a lot, I suppose,” from Garland finally.

The inspector nodded.

“You cope?” said Garland. “You have to, I suppose. ”

Minogue had to let go of his wanderings down the lane to Gleninagh Pier.

“It’s always bad,” he said. He met Garland’s blurry eyes. “Tell me what she said. When ye had your disagreement, I mean. ”

Garland sighed and wiped his eyes again.

“Oh, I hadn’t the vision. The vision — me. Aoife could put her case very well. Did I not see the implication for the future of the new media, et cetera. Ecotourism came into it somewhere. Distributed learning, walls coming down…”

“Is there a book of less than twenty pages where I could figure out what any of that means?”

Garland smiled briefly and blew his nose.

“Maybe she was right,” he resumed “That’s the hard thing to take right now. That we — that I — thwarted her, God forgive me.”

Garland had more hankies in his pocket. Minogue jotted down “medication?” in his notebook She must have confided in someone.

“A catalyst it was,” Garland said, “ when you think about it now. The artifacts being stolen, I mean. We very quickly saw the need to bring in some of the vulnerable pieces. There was no doubt about that. There was good agreement there in committee, I mean. But the computer stuff available all over the world, well it seemed to be an answer for some time in the future, maybe. ”

“But not from your point of view.”

“I’d still have to stand by that. It’s not just that these things should be kept in their area, the indigenous area, for tourists to spend money getting there in their rented cars and eating their dinners in the local hotel and that. It’s that these things belong there. The vernacular. I don’t know if that makes sense now to the man in the street…”

He stopped wiping his eye and eyed the inspector.

“Do the Guards speak MBA now? ‘Reengineering?’ ‘Vision statements?…?”

“I don’t know,” Minogue said. “We get odd memos at times, to be sure.”

Garland took a breath. Minogue heard it escape slowly.

“Well, it was my idea she take a leave. I only hope now I didn’t do wrong. Putting time on her hands then.”

“April,” Minogue said.

“Yes ”

“And how was she since?”

“Oh, good. Everything running smoothly. The project ready…”

“Did you know her socially, like, would she be in your milieu?”

A flicker on Garland’s face gave Minogue a pleasant twinge. Garland didn’t know whether this Guard meant it sarcastically, and he wouldn’t ask.

“No. She liked the arts. Well, obviously. Her ex was an opera fan, I believe. ”

“She didn’t discuss her personal life with you?”

“No. We’d chat, go to dos together, but nothing of a personal nature, no. ”

“Who did she mix with, relate most to, here at the office?”

Garland eased back. Minogue listened to the chair back taking the weight.

“Well, she was friendly with everyone really. Eileen, her secretary, would be in there now. Dermot Higgins, she had a lot of time for him.”

“Was she involved with him?”

“No. I mean, I don’t know. I don’t think so. I never heard anything to…”

“She had a job to come back to here when she left on leave?”

“Of course she did.” Said like a retort, Minogue registered.

“And she knew this?”

“Absolutely. I told her. We’d stand by her, without a doubt.”

“She didn’t mention resigning, did she?”

“No.”

“Or moving? Departments, jobs?”

“God, no. There’d be no place really, well that I can think of. Her expertise and all, you know?”

Minogue fell to staring out the window. Garland blowing his nose brought him back.

“Thanks,” he said. “You’ll be here for the afternoon? In the office, I mean.”

Garland said that he would. Minogue watched him leave. He waited for several minutes. He couldn’t very well go out and drag in Eileen Brogan if she was so upset still. Maybe he should leave her until the afternoon. No, he couldn’t.

He looked around the walls of Aoife Hartnett’s office again. There were pictures of kids, the niece and nephew, he guessed, on the cork-board by postcards. The Algarve — she’d been, the writer thanked her for steering them to the best hotel — Moscow, Paris. Milan. Thirty-eight, that wasn’t old. Smart, hardworking. She worked late, she did her homework. She took on loads of work, more than she should have, probably. Had she reached the top in the job and then found there was nowhere to go? Where did she want to go anyway, and who with? Shaughnessy? Christ, he thought, and the weariness fell on him. She’d had a nervous breakdown, big or small — that’s what pushed everything off the rails.

Minogue heard shoes on the carpet outside. It was Eileen Brogan who tapped on the open door. Already, he thought: things might go his way at last.

“Mrs. Brogan? Thanks now.”

She stood in the doorway.

“You’re great now,” he said. “I’m wondering if you could give me some of your time first to go over her messages. Voice mail and that too, if you can?”

She glanced back toward the main office.

“We won’t be long now,” he said. “Tell me, are you long here?”

“Three years,” she said. “I was at home but then I did a job training thing. Word processing and that.”

“You’re well ahead of me then,” he tried. “I’m an iijit still in that line.”

She tried to smile but a tear dropped from her eyelash.

“I saw you on the telly the other night,” she whispered. “Asking about the man at the airport.”

Minogue looked around her freckled face.

“It was your good self who alerted Mr. Garland to phone us, Mrs. Brogan. I’m obliged to you. Thank you.”

She stared at him, the surprise winning out over the frown or wariness.

“Oh… well,” she paused to clear her throat, “it’d be hard to miss him. The Am — you knew that he called himself something else here?”

“Leyne, I was told. Did that name mean anything to you?”

She shook her head.

“How’d he strike you?”

In the moment their eyes met, Minogue understood that she had picked up on his clumsy phrasing

“Well, I only saw him the once. He arrived in asking for Aoife.”

“‘Aoife?’ ‘Ms. Hartnett?’ ‘Dr Hartnett’?”

“I think he said Doctor.”

“Was that all then?”

“Well, yes. I went off to tell Aoife. She was in with Dermot, I think. He stood there, but by my desk there, waiting.”

“Smoking? Say anything?”

She frowned and scrutinized the hanky she had been twining slowly.

“But I, well, maybe I’m just putting ideas on it now.”

“You lost me there,” he said

“Ah, maybe after hearing about Aoife, that he was with her.”

Her lip trembled

“An impression you had maybe?” he tried.

“Maybe I’m not being fair.”

“Go on, you’re all right. It’s not a statement now. We’re chatting.”

She looked at the window as though it had some irresistible appeal for her.

“Well, he, ah — eyes on him — ah, it’s not fair.”

Minogue waited.

“Eyeing people,” she said. “Women His eyes would be on you, you’d feel them. Like, sizing you up. Maybe all the Americans are that way.”

Minogue looked down at the lists she’d made, the hanky crushed tight in her fist now.

“Cup of tea?”

She let out a sigh, sat back, and opened her hand. She seemed surprised to find the hanky there.

“No thanks,” she murmured “I was told to go home after you’re finished. I’ll pick up Ronan from the minder’s and — ”