The ceremony passes quickly. It is dreamlike – the same words as yesterday, the same sentiments, the same skewed sense that none of this can possibly be for real. The hardest part – again, like yesterday – is when the members of the congregation file past the front pew to express their condolences. Although a form of torture, this also happens to be when Gina realises for the first time just how far Noel travelled in his life. She always knew that he was successful, but she is surprised to see certain people file past here, people he must have known, people whose circles he must have moved in – politicians, businessmen, sports stars, TV personalities. She realises how little she really knew him, and this adds to her heartache.
Afterwards, outside the church, the mood is sombre, but there is still an air of conviviality, as people greet each other, shake hands, slap shoulders and talk.
Jenny is very dignified, but she is frozen in her grief, moving slowly and saying almost nothing. Yvonne and Michelle, who are as tired as Gina, also find it hard to speak.
Gina, though, forces herself. She doesn’t know where to begin, or who to talk to, but she moves around, introducing herself to people, determined to get some kind of a fix on Monday night. It seems obvious to her that the sequence of events, at the very least, needs to be established. What she finds hard to take, however, is that no one else is asking any questions. An official version of Noel’s accident very quickly fell into place, and was accepted, but hasn’t it occurred to anyone that what happened was, well… strange? There is the supposed coincidence of the two deaths, Noel’s unaccounted-for trip into Wicklow and the downright unacceptable notion that he was drunk behind the wheel.
But it’s not that easy. Actually, it’s very awkward. How do you quiz people without coming across as abrupt, or rude, or possibly even – given how exhausted she is and must look – unhinged? Perhaps now is not the most suitable time for this. But when is? When else does she find practically everyone Noel knew herded together in the one location?
She talks, then, to people who knew Noel through work but didn’t really know him. She talks to people who knew him well but hadn’t seen him for ages. She talks to someone who regales her with anecdotes about Noel’s capacity for work, his dedication, his legendary perfectionism. She introduces herself to a TV presenter who apparently played a lot of poker with Noel.
As things break up and people begin leaving, Gina feels frustrated, as if she’s blown her one chance at this. But trying to get someone’s life into focus, trying to square up different people’s perspectives on the same person, is difficult. More than difficult. It’s like trying to pick mercury up with a fork. How do private investigators do it? How do biographers do it? Although she’s only starting, she already has a nagging sense of how futile this might prove to be.
There is a general invitation to come back to the house – Noel and Jenny’s new spread on Clyde Road. Despite how tired she is, Gina decides to go, and accepts a lift from Jenny’s brother, Harry. Yvonne and Michelle have to get back to Catherine’s and they leave. Goodbyes are said and very quickly the crowd disperses – cars inching towards the gates and feeding out into the evening traffic.
In the house people are received, coats are taken, drinks are served. Jenny sits in the main reception room, in an armchair, sipping a cup of tea. The room gradually fills up, as does the hallway outside, as well as a large kitchen area at the back. Gina hasn’t been here before and is amazed at how grand the place is. Noel and Jenny only moved into it from their place in Kilmacud a few weeks back and had been meaning to have family over. Gina stands with a glass of wine at the bay window in the main reception room – which is more like a ballroom – and looks out onto the floodlit front lawn.
She is alone, and her will has flagged, but when someone approaches her she musters energy from somewhere and introduces herself. She quickly finds that she is talking to a Detective Superintendent Jackie Merrigan. He is the first person she has met today who it turns out actually spoke to Noel on Monday night, and this fact animates her further. He tells her that he was a friend of Noel’s from years back and that it was he who informed Noel about their nephew’s murder.
‘You phoned him?’
‘Yes.’
Gina latches on to this and tries to find out as much as she can about the conversation. Merrigan is tall and slightly stooped. He’s in his fifties and has a shock of silvery white hair. He seems to understand Gina’s desperate need for information, that it’s part of the grieving process, and she, in turn, seems to understand that he is indulging her in this, and is grateful.
One fact that comes out of their exchange is that when Merrigan made the call, Noel was having a drink somewhere with Paddy Norton, the developer.
Gina nods along at this. ‘I see.’
Merrigan then turns to his left and looks around the room. ‘In fact,’ he says, pointing, ‘that’s him over there, in that group. The one in the dark red tie.’
Gina scans the room and zeroes in on the red tie.
She takes a sip from her wine. ‘Thanks,’ she says, almost in a whisper.
The room is full. Most people are in clusters of two or three, but standing in front of the fireplace (a huge marble affair, the fire roaring), and in a rough circle, are five men in suits. They are holding glasses of wine or whiskey, and two of them are smoking cigars. One of them is young, twenty-four or twenty-five, but the rest of them look older, mid-fifties maybe, or late fifties. The man wearing the dark red tie is holding forth about something. The others are listening.
As she makes her way across the room towards the group, Gina recognises one of them, and then another. The young guy, tall and thickset, is the captain of the Ireland rugby team. The man on Norton’s right, standing with his back to the fire, is a cabinet minister, Larry Bolger. The other two she doesn’t recognise, but they look generic – they could be barristers, solicitors, accountants, anything, bank executives, equity-fund managers.
She reaches the edge of the circle and stops, uncertain how to proceed. She can’t just break in here – though she could.
Jenny’s brother passes with a bottle of wine and offers her a refill.
She holds up her glass. ‘Thanks. How’s Jen?’
‘She’s OK. Well. I don’t think it’s really hit her yet.’
‘No, me neither.’
‘It’s sad, you know,’ Harry goes on. ‘She keeps looking around this place in disbelief. There are still a few boxes upstairs they haven’t unpacked yet.’
This hits Gina hard, and she groans, ‘Oh God.’ It’s another unexpected little window into her brother’s life.
Then, as Harry turns one way to refill someone else’s glass, Gina turns the other, and finds herself looking directly at Paddy Norton. He’s not speaking now, but is listening to one of the barristers or equity-fund managers and staring down at the carpet. After a moment, he lifts his head and looks in Gina’s direction. Their eyes meet. Gina instinctively raises her eyebrows and gestures to him, pointing to the side. Surprised, Norton immediately moves, mumbling a word of excuse to no one in particular, and exits the circle. Gina moves around it and they meet head on.