Christine Falls: A Novele by Benjamin Black Page B

available to him, even though, knowing it, he felt the faintest twinge of shame.
    The salmon was tasteless and faintly slimy in texture, and the grouse when it came was dry. A youngish, plump woman at the table nearest to them was looking at Mal and saying something about him to her companion; a patient, no doubt, another matron the great Mr. Griffin would have had a hand in. Quirke grinned covertly, and then before he could stop himself he heard himself say:
    “Sarah asked me to do this, you know.”
    Mal, who had got on to the subject of budgets for the coming fiscal year, fell silent and sat quite still, gazing at the last forkful of omelette on his plate, his head inclined sideways a little as if he were hard of hearing or had water trapped in an ear.
    “What?” he said, tonelessly.
    Quirke was lighting a cigarette and had to speak out of the side of his mouth. “She asked me if I would talk to you,” he said, blowing an accidental but perfect smoke ring. “Frankly, it’s the only reason I’m here.”
    Mal laid aside his knife and fork with slow deliberation and again put his hands palm down on the table on either side of his plate in that way that made it seem he might be about to push himself violently to his feet. “You’ve refused Sarah before now,” he said.
    Quirke sighed. It had always been like this between them, this childish tussling, Mal dourly dogged and Quirke wanting to be offhand and gay but annoyed instead and blurting things.
    “She thinks you’re in trouble,” Quirke said shortly. He twiddled the cigarette irritably in his fingers.
    “Did she say that?” Mal asked. He sounded genuinely curious to hear if it was so.
    Quirke shrugged. “Not in so many words.” He sighed again angrily, then leaned forward, lowering his voice for effect. “Listen, Mal, there’s something I have to tell you. It’s about that girl, Christine Falls. I got her back from the morgue and did a P.M. on her.”
    Mal exhaled a long, silent breath, as if he were a large balloon that had been pricked by a tiny pin. The woman at the other table looked his way again and, seeing his expression, stopped chewing. “Why did you do that?” he inquired mildly.
    “Because you lied to me,” Quirke said. “She wasn’t down the country. She was lodging in a house in Stoney Batter—Dolly Moran’s house. And she didn’t die of a pulmonary embolism.” He shook his head and almost laughed. “Honestly, Mal—a pulmonary embolism! Could you not have thought of something more plausible?”
    Mal nodded slowly and turned his head aside again and, catching the eye of the woman at the next table, mechanically assumed for a second his blandest smile, the smile, it struck Quirke, more of an undertaker than that of a man whose profession it was to guide new life into the world.
    “You’ve kept this to yourself,” Mal murmured, barely moving his lips, still looking not at Quirke but at the room.
    “I told you,” Quirke said, “I bear you no ill will. I don’t forget that you did me a favor, once, and kept it to yourself.”
    The funereal waiter—all was death today—came and removed the remains of their lunch. When he offered coffee neither man responded and he glided away. Mal sat sideways on the little chair with one leg crossed on the other, drumming his fingers again absently on the tablecloth.
    “Tell me about the girl,” Quirke said.
    Mal shrugged. “There’s precious little to tell,” he said. “She was going out with some fellow and”—he lifted a hand and let it fall again—“the usual. We had to let her go, of course.” We. Quirke said nothing, and Mal went on. “I arranged for the Moran woman to look after her. I got a call in the middle of the night. I sent an ambulance. It was too late.”
    There was the sense between them on the table of something slowly falling, as Mal’s hand had fallen, listlessly, ineffectually.
    “And the baby?” Mal’s only reply was a faint shake of the head. There was a