Page 37 of Safe Enough

“The 1960s.”

“In this house?”

“Upstairs in the bedroom. No time to get to the hospital.”

“A baby?”

“The future Edmund Wall.”

“I never heard about it. Mrs. McKenna has a sister. She never talks about it.”

Which felt like the runner getting checked back. I said, “You know Mrs. McKenna’s sister?”

“We have a wee chat from time to time. Sometimes I see her in the hairdressers.”

“It was fifty years ago. How’s her memory?”

“I should think a person would remember that kind of thing.”

Carter said, “Maybe it was hushed up. It’s possible Edmund’s mother wasn’t married.”

Mrs. Healy went pale. Impropriety. Scandal. In her house. Worse than cancer. “Why are you telling me this?”

I said, “The Edmund Wall Appreciation Society wants to buy your house.”

“Buy it?”

“For a museum. Well, like a living museum, really. Certainly people could visit, to see the birthplace, but we could keep his papers here too. It could be a research center.”

“Do people do that?”

“Do what? Research?”

“No, visit houses where writers were born.”

“All the time. Lots of writers’ houses are museums. Or tourist attractions. We could make a very generous offer. Edmund Wall has many passionate supporters in America.”

“How generous?”

“Best plan would be to pick out where you’d like to live next, and we’ll make sure you can. Within reason, of course. Maybe a new house. They’re building them all over.” Then I shut up, and let temptation work its magic. Mrs. Healy went quiet. Then she started to look around her kitchen. Chipped cabinets, sagging hinges, damp air.

The kettle started to whistle.

She said, “I’ll have to talk to my husband.”

Which felt like the runner sliding into third ahead of the throw. Safe. Ninety feet away. Nothing guaranteed, but so far so good. In fact bloody good, as they say on those damp little islands. We were in high spirits on the way back in the Mercedes.

The problem was waiting for us in the Europa’s lobby. An Ulsterman, maybe fifty years old, in a cheap suit, with old nicks and scars on his hands and thickening around his eyes. A former field operative, no doubt, many years in the saddle, now moved to a desk because of his age. I was familiar with the type. It was like looking in a mirror.

He said, “Can I have a word?”

We went to the bar, which was dismal and empty ahead of the lunchtime rush. The guy introduced himself as a copper, from right there in Belfast, from a unit he didn’t specify, but which I guessed was Special Branch, which was the brass-knuckle wing of the old Royal Ulster Constabulary, now the Police Service of Northern Ireland. Like the FBI, with the gloves off. He said, “Would you mind telling me who you are and why you’re here?”

So Carter gave him the guff about Edmund Wall, and the appreciation society, and the birthplace, but what was good enough earlier in the morning didn’t sound so great in the cold light of midday. The guy checked things on his phone in real time as Carter talked, and then he said, “There are four things wrong with that story. There is no Edmund Wall, there is no appreciation society, the bank account you opened is at the branch nearest to Langley, which is CIA headquarters, and most of all, that house you’re talking about was once home to Gerald McCann, who was a notorious paramilitary in his day.”

Carter said nothing, and neither did I.

The guy continued, “Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom, you know. They won’t allow unannounced activities on their own turf. So again, would you mind telling me who you are and why you’re here?”

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