In Dublin's Fair City (Molly Murphy Mysteries, #6)

At this he threw back his head and laughed. “Offer you the lead instead of Oona here? Now there's a thought.” And I realized that I had seen pictures of the woman in white gracing posters and newsstands. Oona Sheehan, one of the darlings of the Broadway stage.

“We know you are notoriously ickle, Tommy dear,” Oona said in a deep, melodious voice. “If you found someone suficiently younger and prettier, you’d drop me in a second. I know my days are numbered.” She turned to look at me and winked.

“Never,” Tommy exclaimed. “You’ll still be the darling of the public when you’re sixty, just like the divine Madame Sarah.”

“And one hopes I’ll keep my looks longer than she has,” Oona said. “We live in the same building, you know. We each keep a suite of rooms in Hoffman House, and I nod to her from time to time. I fear she has become quite plain and ordinary looking.”

“But she can still act,” Tommy said. “By God, she can still act.”

“Are you a fellow Thespian, Molly?” Oona asked. “I don’t recall seeing you—”

“Indeed no, Miss Sheehan. I’ve no aspirations to go on the stage.” “You might do well for yourself,” Tommy said. “I’ll wager a good pair of legs extends up from those trim little ankles.”

“Tommy, you are incorrigible. Now you’ve made her blush,” Oona said.

“Surely not. Don’t lady detectives have to be as tough as nails?” “She's a lady detective?” Oona asked.

“So Ryan tells me. Although I never expected a lady detective to look so young and winsome. So are you really and truly a lady detective, my dear?”

“I am.”

“And Irish too, by the sound of it?” Tommy asked. “I am that too.”

“A perfect combination for my needs. I think you might do very well.”

“Do what?”

Tommy Burke leaned closer to me. “I’ve a little job for you, my dear,” he muttered into my ear. “We won’t speak of it in public.come to the Casino Theater tomorrow, where I’m rehearsing a new play. It's on the corner of Broadway and West Thirty-ninth.” Tell them to bring you straight to me, and we’ll have a little talk. Any time you like. I’ll be in the theater all day.”

“Hiring a detective, how exciting,” Oona said. “He can’t want you to shadow his wife to start divorce proceedings because he isn’t married any longer. I’m bursting with curiosity, Tommy darling.”

“Then you’ll just have to burst, Oona, because I’m not saying another thing,” Tommy Burke said, with a grin in my direction. “You just enjoy yourself tonight, Miss Molly Murphy, and we’ll continue our conversation in private tomorrow.”





Three


I’m a self-made man, Miss Murphy,” Tommy Burke said, turning to me. We were sitting side by side in the darkness of an empty theater. On the dimly lit stage actors were reading through lines, but here at the back of the stalls, we were in a private world, and I was conscious of the intimacy of his big shoulder touching mine, of his warm, slightly beery breath on my cheek.

“I’ve done very well for a boy who came to America with nothing, and who was close to starving several times in his childhood.”

He looked at me and I nodded approval. “We came over during the famine, you know,” he went on. “Driven out of our homes like so many families. The landowner's thugs actually knocked down the cottage as my parents struggled to save our few possessions. I was only about four years old at the time, but I can still remember it clearly. They broke my mother's one good pudding basin, and she would have killed them if my father hadn’t held her back. Then we had the chance to come to America on a famine ship. You’ve heard about the famine ships, have you? Back and forth across the Atlantic, crammed full of poor wretched souls like ourselves.”

He was still looking at me as if he wanted me to say something, but I couldn’t think of anything to say. “It was a terrible time,” I said at last. “My own family almost died out in the famine.”

“What part of Ireland are you from, my dear?”

“County Mayo.”

“Ah, the wild, wild west. Never been there myself, but I understand it's very beautiful, all mountains and lakes and rugged seacoast.”

“That it is,” I said. “Beautiful and remote. You feel like you’re at the end of the earth. I couldn’t wait to escape from it myself.”

“We came from the south ourselves. Near Cork. I don’t remember anything of it, but I do remember that ship. No steam in those days, you know. Twelve days under sail, and most of us sicker than dogs. Packed in like sardines, we were. People were already weak from the famine, you know, and they were dying like flies all around us.”

“Why are you telling me this, Mr. Burke?” I asked.

“I’m coming to that.” He put a beefy hand over mine, making me wonder for a moment whether he had invited me here with baser motives. I’d certainly heard about old men like him preying on young women. But he cleared his throat. “Like I said, I started with nothing, and I’ve done pretty well for myself, wouldn’t you say? Only problem is that I’m not getting any younger, and I’ve nobody to leave it to.”