The Convictions of John Delahunt (16 page)

I changed into dry clothes while she busied herself beneath the mantel. We sat before the fireplace upon an old blanket that acted as hearth-rug, and I opened the wine. She shifted on to her knees to unpin her hair. ‘Where did he bring you?’

I told her about Devereaux being held in Store Street. They had never met, but I had spoken about him several times.

‘Why had he been arrested?’

I said he beat up a girl.

‘A girl?’

‘She worked in one of those houses in Montgomery Street.’

‘Oh.’

I recounted some of her long list of injuries.

Helen’s eyes searched my face. ‘Did you see her?’

I shook my head. She was in hospital.

I refilled the glasses and placed the bottle behind us, away from the heat. I told her how Devereaux was brought back to the Castle, how Sibthorpe tricked him, how two men from the girl’s family were waiting to kill him.

Helen was staring into the firelight. I was going to explain that the Castle wanted rid of Devereaux because he knew too many agents, but there was no need. She looked back at me. ‘If he hurt the girl that much then he deserved it.’

I leaned across to pick a piece of wood from a bundle of sticks, used it to stir the fire, then threw it on top. The edges began to char and smoke. I thought she might have expressed more concern for my safety. ‘Working for the Castle will be dangerous, Helen. Though I’m not sure I have a choice.’

I kept looking at the fire, and she sat still beside me for a moment. A gust blew down the chimney, sending a thick wisp of smoke into the room.

She reached across to touch my cheek, then took my hand and held it in her lap. ‘But you’re good at it. And you’re clever enough to keep out of trouble.’

I laced my fingers through hers.

She moved closer and leaned her head beneath my chin. ‘If we can keep making this kind of money, John, we could be comfortable. Even happy.’

We sat like that for several minutes. Raised voices drifted from below, signalling the start of another quarrel between Lynch and his wife.

Sibthorpe had described to me the type of information gathered by the Department. It was all-encompassing. Nothing was too trivial; no person was too lowly to warrant the Castle’s attention. Also, reports didn’t have to be of something criminal. They collected tittle-tattle and rumours like reporters in the scandal sheets. A man’s predilections, proclivities and sympathies, anything that could be held against him, was collated, indexed and filed.

But not on Castle grounds. Having to traipse in and out of Little Ship Street was considered a threat to an informant’s anonymity. I was told to go to an address in Fownes Street whenever I had anything to report. The building was entirely nondescript, unadorned by signs or nameplates, bordered on one side by a bookseller, and on the other by a commissioner for oaths. The door was always unlocked – no need for secret knocks or whispered entreaties to enter.

Inside the dim hallway, a bored sentry sat at a desk beneath the stairwell. It was a different guard every time, never wearing any kind of official garb. He would turn away any who wandered in by mistake. Those on official business, such as myself, were allowed to approach.

I was told by Sibthorpe to state my name and say I wished to speak with a man called Farrell. The sentry scanned a list of names on his desk, only ten or so. Mine must have been among them. He reached across and tugged on a bell cord that disappeared through a small hole in the ceiling. It rang in the floors above, just at the edge of hearing. After a few moments, another cord in the corner quivered, jerked up and sounded a small brass chime. The guard looked up from his seat.

‘You can go up to the second floor.’

I ascended the crooked stairs and Farrell met me on the landing. He was a young man, wearing a waistcoat with white shirtsleeves rolled up. His fingers were ink-stained, and he had spectacles that sat perched atop short tawny hair. There were two entrances in the hallway. One was quite ordinary; the other, an imposing metal doorway with exposed bolts, like those in a bank vault.

I told Farrell that I was John Delahunt.

He nodded. ‘I thought as much, since I didn’t recognize you.’ He invited me into his office, a small room with a desk cluttered by files, and boxes stacked on the windowsill obstructing the light. Once seated he asked, ‘Any trouble finding us?’

‘Sibthorpe’s directions were quite clear.’

He smiled at me. ‘Tom never leaves anything to chance.’ He cleared a space on his desk. ‘So, what have you got for us?’

It seemed to me a rather feeble story. Helen convinced me it was worth reporting. ‘My neighbour beats his wife.’

Farrell held my eye for a second, and I feared I had wasted his time.

‘Lovely.’ He opened a drawer and pulled out a blank form and an index card. ‘Let’s get the particulars.’

I described Nicholas Lynch of No. 6 Grenville Street, his age and occupation, his wife and children. I told how he and his wife would argue almost nightly, their spats ended by the sound of blows and broken crockery. I said Mrs Lynch showed bruises on her face and neck. I’d never seen any, but Helen assured me they were there, artfully concealed.

Farrell finished taking down the details. There were spaces on the printed form to note the date and time and my initials. I asked if Lynch would be arrested.

He had set the sheet aside in order to fill in an index card.

‘That’s not quite how it works,’ he said. The police couldn’t follow up every tip-off. However, there was now a file on Nicholas Lynch in the Castle archive. If ever he came to the attention of the authorities again, say if he joined a criminal gang, or the radicals, the file could be retrieved, and the contents held against him.

‘Everyone has their weak points, John. It’s up to us to find out what they are.’

Lynch might live an otherwise blameless life and, if so, the file would simply gather dust. ‘On the other hand, if he ever decided to do the wife in’ – he frowned at a mistake he made, crossed out a letter and continued on – ‘we could use your statement as additional evidence.’

He finished printing the details on the card in a neat hand and blew on the ink. ‘Since this is your first visit, I’ll show you the stacks.’

He led me back into the hall and unlocked the metal door, revealing a large chamber spanning the entire width of the house. Mahogany shelves lined each wall, stretching up towards the ceiling. Three double bays stood in the centre of the room. Each shelf bent under the weight of manuscript boxes and loose folders. An alphabetical order was evident as each box was labelled with surnames. It started high on the nearest shelf with the box ‘Abbot – Adair’, then ‘Adam – Ahern’, and continued in that fashion. There was no other furniture, except shuttered cabinets in one corner, which contained the card catalogue.

The room was cold, and the high bays cast deep shadows, so Farrell lit an oil-lamp. Dust swirled in the light above the bevelled glass chimney. He gestured towards the shelves and said, ‘The most extensive archive of Dublin’s citizens.’

He went over to the catalogue, pulled up the shutter and opened a small drawer marked ‘L’. Reams of index cards were stacked upright. His two fingers ran along the top, a single card pulled back with each stride. When he found the proper spot among the Lynches he slipped the new card into place.

Then he went to find the box among the shelves. He told me that other archives held collections of estate papers from the wealthiest families, or the documents produced in governance. ‘But these are records of the most ordinary people. There’s no other repository like it.’

I scanned the front of the boxes in their haphazard stacks, noting some of the names written. ‘But they only record their misdeeds.’

‘Precisely.’

He found the box marked ‘Lydon – Lysaght’. I took the lamp as he dragged it down and removed the lid. He clamped the box between his chest and the shelves, freeing his hands to delve within and ensure the new file was put in the proper order.

We were standing in the narrow space between two bays. The opening at the end showed a section of shelving against the far wall which contained the Ds. One label said ‘Delaney – Delmare’. I looked at the box above, but it was cast in shadow. Farrell ceased his rummaging and followed my gaze.

‘Now, John,’ he said. ‘You don’t think files on the likes of you are kept in here?’

‘Where are they kept?’

He pushed the box back into its gap. ‘Under Sibthorpe’s bed.’

Back in his office, Farrell took a cloth-bound tombstone ledger from beneath his desk. It was a register of the information provided by each agent. Initials were written at the top of each page, and three columns on the right-hand side were headed: ‘Information’, ‘Prosecution’ and ‘Other’, with amounts of money recorded in each.

The book was arranged by alphabetical order, so many of the pages were left blank – to allow for the inclusion of new names. Still, I was surprised at the number of men employed. Some of the pages contained only two or three entries. Others were filled with text and figures, denoting a particularly prolific agent. One such page had the initials ‘NH’, which I guessed was Ned Holt. Though perhaps he would have been ‘E’ for Edward.

Farrell leafed through the ledger. ‘Here you are.’ The letters ‘JD’ were written at the top. Some items were already inscribed. Farrell lowered his spectacles and traced a finger over the page.

‘Let’s see. The case of James O’Neill. No payment – there must be a story there. The case of Captain Craddock.’ The figure of £20 was written in the ‘Prosecution’ column. He looked at me over his glasses. ‘That was you?’

I confirmed it was. He pursed his lips and nodded in approval.

He continued, ‘I wrote in the latest entry just a few days ago. “Engaged to assist Sibthorpe for five pounds.”’ He looked around his desk for a pen. ‘Don’t worry, John. None of us mourned Devereaux’s demise. An agent like that undermines the whole Department.’

Below that he wrote the date, then: ‘Information on Nicholas Lynch’, and ‘2 shillings’ in the appropriate column. He said if the information was ever used in a prosecution, the payment would be increased to a pound, though he thought that unlikely. ‘You won’t get far on a few shillings, but you know yourself. Keep an ear out for any talk that might help convict a murderer, rapist or, worst of all, Repealer.’

A tally would be kept of all reports I provided, and work I carried out. ‘You have to come here to collect your pay, on the last Friday of each month. It’ll be with the guard down at the desk below.’

The spine of the ledger creaked as he closed it over. ‘I think you’ll be able to make a decent living at it. Do you have any family?’

I said I was recently married.

He screwed the lid on to his fountain pen, then looked at me closely. ‘And your wife, is she very beautiful?’

I considered. ‘Very beautiful’ would overstate it. There were moments – when her head bent beside a candle and a lock of hair fell; or when she laughed over her shoulder…

Farrell was looking at me with an amused expression, and I realized I had mulled too long. ‘She’s handsome.’

He fixed his glasses back on top of his head. ‘That’s what I like,’ he said. ‘An honest informant.’

Helen swept the floorboards before the hearth. She took some of her manuscript pages and laid them on the ground, then sat with her back to the fire. One leg was folded beneath her dress; the other splayed out, bare below the knee, a blackened sole shown to the room. I poured two whiskeys and went to join her, sitting in a warm spot where the early afternoon sunshine fell upon the floor. Helen dipped her nib in ink, too far as usual, for a couple of black dots splashed upon the pale yellow sheet as the pen hovered.

‘Let’s start with mine,’ she said as I placed the drink beside her.

She began to write out the names of Stokes family members residing in Dublin, the page headed by the name of her paternal grandmother, who was still living bent and incontinent in Ballsbridge. Helen tapped the pen on her chin as she recalled the names of cousins, their spouses, and even some of their children, to fill in the branches of her family tree. In short order, a full Stokes lineage was produced and left aside for the ink to dry.

My pedigree was more sparse. Since Alex was abroad, only Cecilia lived in the city, married to Captain Dickenson. To supplement my sheet I gave the names of fellows from college, classmates, as well as those I used to drink with in the Eagle. As such, Arthur made it on to both our lists.

We then set about noting the names of mere acquaintances: old lecturers and college staff; the ladies who attended the Stokes salon every Tuesday afternoon; Mr Stokes’s wide circle of friends. I mentioned her coming-out ball, and she jokingly gasped. She said, ‘Of course,’ and began to list those who’d attended, who so far had escaped our recollection. After writing one name she prodded it with her pen. ‘I’ve something good on him.’

‘What is it?’

‘I’ll tell you when we’re done.’

After an hour we could think of no others. I refilled the glasses, and we regarded the littered pages of smudged namerolls and crooked bloodlines. Helen appeared wistful as she arranged the sheets more neatly.

‘This could have been our wedding list.’

Farrell had taken me aside after my third or fourth visit to Fownes Street. He said it was all very well keeping an eye on our new neighbours in the tenements, and an ear on the loose talk in the pubs on Gardiner Street – which Helen and I had begun to frequent – but we should not forget the social circle to which we once belonged.

I told him the people we knew when growing up were loyal for the most part. He said that may be, but Sibthorpe liked to be able to call on influential people for favours. High-ranking surgeons, bankers and lawyers could provide any number of services to the Department. ‘We’ve found that the more a man has to lose, the more he’s willing to help.’

When I told Helen of the notion, she put down her pen and gazed out of the window. I thought she was considering the ethical dilemma of betraying the trust of former friends and relatives, but she turned back to me and said, ‘A few names spring to mind immediately.’