"Well, one thing's for sure, he'll remember your return," Billy said.
"What happened?" Ferguson asked.
"I got angry and, you might say, I let rip, at least that's what Billy would tell you, because he heard. But it was all on purpose. I figured a little acting job was called for. So if you'll all take your seats and Roper turns on his recorder, we'll begin."
It took no more than twenty minutes, and when they were finished Roper switched off and Ferguson said, "Extraordinary. I find particularly interesting the remark Murphy made to you when he gave you the card. That it would be a comfort for all victims of a great cause. It certainly indicates where his political sympathies lay then, and no doubt still do."
Miller put in, "But it's hardly illegal. So it influenced an impressionable youth, which was what Dillon was then, and now he's angry about it. Most people would say so what?" He turned to his sister.
"Come on, Monica, as an archaeologist, you constantly have to analyze the past based on very little. What have you got to say?"
"It's seems simple to me. So far, four people are dead and various others have been put in harm's way, and the one constant has been that prayer card."
"Which first turned up in Frank Barry's wallet at the Plaza Hotel," Miller said.
"No, Harry," she said. "As far as I'm concerned, it first turned up on that evening in 1979 when Father James Murphy gave it to Sean. He's the one we have to look at next."
"I absolutely agree." Ferguson turned to Roper.
"I'll get right on to it."
Monica said to Miller, "I'd like to go to Dover Street now, Harry, and settle in. Is that all right with you? We could see Kurbsky, Svetlana, and Katya off later."
"A good idea."
She brushed Dillon's cheek with a kiss and went out, followed by her brother. Billy decided to pay a visit to the Dark Man, and Ferguson retired to his office. It was suddenly quiet, only a low hum from the equipment.
Roper said, "You're too wound up, Sean. Relax, go and have a sauna."
"It wasn't good," Dillon said. "I was surprised how violent I felt towards him and that bloody woman. I don't know a thing about her except what the old lady next door to Pool's house in Green Street said about her. A hard bitch, I know that having met her, but the old woman described her as a kind of Mother Teresa."
"Well, we'll see who's right, so off you go, and leave it to Uncle Roper."
Dillon returned to the computer room, hair damp but looking refreshed, wearing an open-necked black shirt, black bomber jacket, and black velvet jeans.
"Not bad," Roper told him. "But it's time you saw the barber."
"Never mind that." Dillon poured two whiskeys and handed one over. "What have you got for me?"
"You're going to love it. I've found a good deal about Murphy and the lady, who's fifty, by the way."
"Good God." Dillon was genuinely astonished. "I'd never have believed it. She's a handsome woman."
"I agree with you, her picture's coming up now from an identity card. There she is. At least she doesn't look like a prison warden. To summarize, her mother, Mary Ryan, was born in Derry in 1934, she trained as a nurse, married a Patrick Daly when she was twenty-five. Caitlin, her only child, was born in 1959. In 1969, with the civil rights business, there was serious marching in Northern Ireland. The Dalys were in a mixed housing area, and armed men in hoods broke in one night and shot Patrick Daly dead in front of the mother and Caitlin, who was ten at the time. The family had friends in London, so they fled to Kilburn."
Dillon looked grim. "Not good, not good at all."
"Her mother-a trained nurse, remember-got a job at the Cromwell Road Hospital, and they lodged in Kilburn with a cousin, who was a widow. As Caitlin is a year older than you, I wonder if you ever knew each other?"
"I came to Kilburn later than that, when I was twelve, but I can't recall a Daly. What did she do then?"
"Went to St. Mary's College, London, to train as a teacher. Member of the students' union, president of Fairness for Ireland Committee, left-wing activist, vice president of the Civil Rights Committee, third-class honors degree in English, teaching certificate."
"Spent too much time marching," Dillon observed.
"Teacher in various Catholic schools. Then, in 1984, her mother packed it in as a nursing sister and took the job of housekeeper at the church, and they moved in together, and so continued until the old lady died last year."
"And Caitlin is still there, still teaching it would seem, and still without a man."
"Not true. She's got one, in a way. Listen to Murphy's story and her position is explained, but not in the way you might think. I'll roll his file round and read it, particularly 1979."
"The year my father was killed."
"Can you remember the date?"
"Of course I can. November thirteen. How could I forget that?"
"Well, Murphy went on secondment to Londonderry in January for six months to be a priest with them at the Little Sisters of Pity's St. Mary's Priory. Read it."
Which Dillon did. He shook his head. "I never realized that. I'd stopped going to church, and I was finished at RADA by then. Kilburn was pretty working class, so I was used to keeping my head down about being an actor."
"So you lost touch with him. But I've got a report he sent to his bishop, telling him how bad it was in the war zone and how impressed he'd been with the priory as a nursing home and the efforts of the nuns to help the sick and needy against the odds. His intention was to have a hospice called Hope of Mary, and he intended to recruit nuns from the Little Sisters of Pity. This would cost money, but the bishop responded to his enthusiasm. Murphy registered a charitable trust, called Requiem, and the church agreed to buy a suitable house on mortgage for him on the condition he was responsible for raising the operating costs."
"And he has, presumably?"
"In spades. See the photo of him here in full regalia, another when he was made Monsignor. He proved irresistible to many businessmen and a sensation in the city. The hospice is paid off, including all improvements, and they've started ones in West Belfast, Dublin, and now one in the Bronx in New York."
"That's a hell of a lot of money, when you look at it. A hell of an achievement. I wonder where it came from?"
"He certainly seems to have the golden touch."
"And where does Caitlin figure in all this?"
"Her mother worked at the housekeeping post at the presbytery till she was seventy. At that time, Caitlin just carried on, obviously by arrangement with Murphy, helping out but still teaching. When her mother got cancer, she packed in her job to nurse her, becoming more and more involved with Hope of Mary. The old lady died over a year ago, and Caitlin is still doing her job, but twins it with being executive director at the hospice."
"Fascinating stuff. What else have you got?"
"Costello-cum-Docherty, who tried to torch the Dark Man. Inspector Parkinson recognized him as a petty thief and drunk named Fergus Costello who'd apparently gotten religion over twenty years ago at a refuge for drunks and down-and-outs in Wapping High Street. It was interfaith, but Parkinson spoke of a charismatic priest who turned up there on occasion. So guess who it was?"
"Oh, I'm at the stage where I'm prepared to believe anything you say. But why the fake Irish passport?"
"I don't know. He had a prison record as Costello, maybe he wanted to start fresh."
"He must have known the right people. The passport was an absolute ringer. But our Irish connection falls down when we consider Henry Pool, doesn't it? I know his wife was from Cork, but his father was a cockney soldier, as I recall, so badly wounded in April 1945 in Germany he was immediately discharged and went to live in Kilburn with his wife, who produced Henry in 1946."