Minogue breezed by Eilis and glanced at the policemen’s faces which turned to him. Hoey followed him into Kilmartin’s office.
“I’m after coming from the Fines,” Minogue muttered.
“How is it with them?” inquired Kilmartin.
“They’d be a lot less upset if they had their son’s body,” Minogue snapped. “Jews try to bury their dead as soon as they can. It’s damned important to them and I wish there was something I could do. As for me, don’t ask. I’m fit to be tied. What the hell happened last night?”
“One thing at a time, bucko,” Kilmartin snapped back. “PM stipulates a minimum of three days, and well you know it. How would it be if we handed over the remains and then wanted them back for a test we forgot later on?”
“A word in someone’s ear,” Minogue said acidly, glaring at memos on Kilmartin’s desk.
“I’ll look into the matter,” Kilmartin said slowly.
“To hell and damnation with looking into it, Jamesy,” said Minogue. “The point is this: what can we tell Mr. and Mrs. Fine now?”
Minogue turned to Hoey before Kilmartin could frame an answer. “Shea: what about this child, this Boy Scout fella? Is there anything to hope for?”
“Keating’s talking to him. Hasn’t phoned in yet.”
“Give me what you have on this fire-bombing then. Or do I have to go out and buy a bloody newspaper to find out what’s going on, at all? I feel I’ve been away for a week and I don’t know a damn thing that’s happening.”
“One witness heard the thing go off. Another witness heard a car tearing away down around the corner toward the city centre. She thinks she heard footsteps running fast before that.”
“And one in the car, no doubt,” Kilmartin slipped in.
“What’s Gallagher say?” Minogue asked impatiently. “Is this a planned thing, a campaign? What are we looking at here? Come on, Shea, feed me.”
Hoey blinked several times. “I phoned Gallagher: he has detailed a team to pick up a lot of the mob off the lists he drew up for us with the murder. Even ones he has already interviewed. Says the bombing and the murder were hardly the same people. No call to claim responsibility, he kept saying.”
“He has all the manpower he needs,” said Kilmartin. “We’d do well to leave Gallagher to his own devices on this. His crowd can do the fretting about what might happen next, if this is some campaign about I-don’t-know-what.”
“Anti-Semitic terror?” Minogue glared up from the desk-top at Kilmartin.
Kilmartin didn’t rise to the bait. “Lookit, God Almighty was on the phone not ten minutes ago, reminding us to do what we know best and to leave the other matter with the Branch. They have armed detectives outside people’s homes and all, already.”
“You mean to tell me he’s saying or hoping there’s no connection between last night and Paul Fine’s murder?” Minogue barracked.
“Don’t jump the gun, damn you,” Kilmartin snarled. “You’re in here with a mouth on you, bejases, and you’ll know no government. It’s all team-work, can’t you see? Gallagher’s helping us out and we’re helping him. He’s taking a lot of the weight, too. Of course he’s not an iijit about whether there’s links or not. Don’t you start getting foxy with me about it, man. Like it or not, we fall in line with an overall strategy. He said and did nothing to impede us.”
“Are we losing staff on the head of this, then?” Minogue shot back. “The staff we were given for the murder?”
Kilmartin looked at Hoey, then swivelled his gaze full on to Minogue. “You’re losing your marbles, by the sounds of things.” Still staring at Minogue, he said to Hoey: “You didn’t hear that, Detective Garda Hoey, did you?”
Hoey shuffled.
“Share and share alike,” Kilmartin drawled in a slow, ominous monotone which Minogue registered as one of his early-warning systems. “We work with them; they’re our mates; they have the goods; we need them. If they ask us for breakfast in bed, we’ll give it to them and we won’t throw it at them. They’re doing nearly all the interviewing. Don’t be rearing up on me because of it. Are you sure you’re not a bit too close to the boy’s family to stay cool on the matter?”
Minogue cast around for patient words. After several moments he felt the loosening of the anger in his throat. “I suppose you could say I’m not cool on the matter, Jimmy. Yes, you could say that, all right.”
Kilmartin’s brow lifted. He kicked off from the desk and rolled back to the wall before standing up and killing his cigarette. Glad to see me in a flap, Minogue wondered.
“I’ll see about the funeral arrangements,” said Kilmartin. “Now: about any people that Fine put away in jail.”
“We’ve been through the list of cases he’s heard,” said Hoey. “Twice, as a matter of fact. There’s nothing worth getting excited over.”
“What about Brian Kelly and Opus Dei?” Minogue led.
“I’ll give you what I have so far. We can’t say for certain that this Brian Kelly was actually a member of the outfit but…” said Hoey.
Kilmartin nodded. “Go on anyway, man, can’t you?”
“Right so. Opus Dei is the Latin for ‘God’s Work’. It was founded in 1928 by a Spanish priest, a Father J. E. De Balaguer. Hope I’m saying the name right. It was one of his books that Fine looked at on Saturday, if ye remember the dockets. It’s an apostolic movement. Here’s a quote on what they do: ‘… strive to sanctify their daily work and family life, to Christianize society’.”
“You mean that it was set up to counter the pagan materialistic twentieth century, especially after the Bolsheviks and what have you?” Minogue asked.
Hoey shrugged. “I’d have to know more to agree there. But it’s for lay people from any walk of life. Clergy can join up too. The basic idea is so as the church doesn’t get to be out of touch with modern society, that’s the way I read the aims. Now these Opus Dei people, they want to use whatever social positions they have to renew the faith. Make it more relevant, you see, on the factory floor… outside the chapel, like. Very sincere, holy people. There are ranks in Opus Dei. It’s organized like you’d see in any business or institution. The top dogs are called Numeraries. They’re about one-tenth of the whole outfit.”
“How big is this Opus Dei thing?” Kilmartin asked.
“They don’t give out lists of names or tell you the membership in any country. Estimates average about 70, 000 world-wide.”
“They’re not Masons or what have you, running around with funny clothes and doing unnatural things, are they?” Kilmartin pressed.
“I don’t know about that, sir. I believe that the church forbids Catholics to become Masons… Anyway, the top group are Numeraries. They stay celibate and they have to be highly educated and trained in things like philosophy and theology as well. They usually live in centres, one big house, like. There are at least three centres in Dublin but I’m having a divil of a time getting any facts on this. The next rank is Associate. They can be priests as well. They’re supposed to be celibates but they needn’t be university grads or professional types. Then there are Supernumeraries. They can marry and so on. The last rank are Co-operators and they’re basically sympathizers. I’ve been talking about the men’s branch of Opus Dei. The women’s branch has either Numerary Assistants-they’re basically skivvies who keep house for the higher-ups-or Numeraries like the men’s.”
“You mean ‘don’t like the men’ by the sound of things,” said Kilmartin.
“Oh, I get it,” said Hoey. “That’s a good one. You’re probably right there. The women Numeraries are celibates too. Matter of fact the women are encouraged to sleep on a plank until they’re forty years of age.”
“On a plank?” asked Kilmartin. “Are you in earnest? What the hell for?”
“On a plank. Wait’ll you hear this: the men and the women often wear bands with pins stuck on them, stuck into their thighs. So as to mortify themselves. That’s not the end of it either.”