In the 1970s, many new houses and apartments were

built in Dublin. In some parts of the city, the old houses were
very bad. Dublin City Council knocked down these bad
homes. The council built new houses and apartments for the
people who lived in the old houses.
The worst houses were in Mayo Road. These houses
were more than a hundred years old. Rain came in through
the roofs. The walls were damp. People did not want to live
in these old buildings any more.
In 1978, Dublin City Council built some new
apartments near Mayo Road. The City Council bought the
old houses in the road from their owners. The people moved
out of their old houses and into the new apartments. Council
workmen started to knock down the old buildings. The
council was going to build a new shopping centre with a
large car park in Mayo Road.
The council knocked down all the houses in Mayo
Road - except one. One old man did not want to move out of
his home. The council sent him many letters, but he refused
to leave. At last, the council asked the police to help them.
They asked the police to get the old man out of his house.
It was nine o'clock on a wet November morning. The
sky was grey and the rain was falling heavily. The rain fell
on the building site where the houses of Mayo Road had
stood. The rain fell on the tarmac of the road and it fell on
the only house which remained - Number 38.

A police car came along Mayo Road. There were two

men in the car - the young police driver and Chief
Superintendent Hanley. Bill Hanley was in charge of all the
policemen in this part of Dublin.
The car stopped outside 38 Mayo Road and the chief
superintendent looked around him. A year ago, there had
been houses on both sides of the street. But now only one
house remained. Number 38 stood alone in the middle of the
large muddy building site. The old man was still inside the
house.
A big crowd of people was standing a few metres from
the house. When they saw the police car, the people moved
forward. There were council officials, council social
workers, and council workmen in the crowd. The officials
were from the Housing Department. They had asked the
police to get the old man out of Number 38. The social
workers were going to help the old man to move into his
new home. Then the workmen were going to knock down
the house.
Chief Superintendent Hanley got out of the police car
and spoke to the officials from the City Council.
'Have you talked to the old man in the house?' the
Chief Superintendent asked.
'Mr Larkin won't speak to us,' one of the officials
replied. 'We've tried to speak to him. We've told him that he
must leave before nine o'clock this morning.'

Hanley looked at the crowd. He saw two newspaper

reporters. One of them had a camera.
Hanley thought about the front page of tomorrow's
newspaper. 'There will be a picture of the old man coming
out of the house with two policemen,' he thought. 'And there
will be a headline above the picture - 'POLICE TAKE OLD
MAN FROM HIS HOME.'
Bill Hanley spoke to one of the officials.
'I don't like this part of my job,' he said, 'but I have to
do it.'
'The City Council has sent many letters to Mr Larkin,'
the official said. 'We have told him that he must move out.
We have told him that the council has bought his house and
built a new apartment for him. But he hasn't replied to any of
the letters.'
Chief Superintendent Hanley looked at his watch. The
time was two minutes past nine. 'Speak to the old man
again,' he said to the council officials.
The Chief Housing Officer from the council knocked
on the door of 38 Mayo Road.
'Mr Larkin!' he shouted. There was no answer.
'Mr Larkin!' the Chief Housing Officer shouted again,
'we have an order from the court. If you don't come out,
we'll knock down the door.'

But there was still no reply.

Hanley spoke to two workmen who were holding large
hammers.
'Knock down the door,' he said.
The workmen went to the front door. They broke the
door with their hammers. Mr Larkin had put a table and
some chairs against the inside of the door but the workmen
quickly pushed the furniture away. They walked into the
house.
Hanley spoke to the social workers. 'Go in now,
please,' he said.
The social workers followed the workmen into the
house. A few minutes later, they were leading Mr Larkin out
through the broken front door.
Mr Larkin was a pale, thin old man. He was ill and
hungry and his hands were shaking. Bill Hanley felt sorry
for him. A social worker put a woollen blanket round the old
man's shoulders. The social workers were going to take Mr
Larkin to his new council apartment. But Hanley had an
idea.
'Put Mr Larkin in the police car,' he said. 'We'll give
him a good meal before he goes to his new home. There's a
cafe near here.'

'OK, Chief Superintendent,' said one of the social

workers. 'We'll wait in our car while Mr Larkin is eating. It's
a cold morning.'
As the police took Mr Larkin to the cafe, the workmen
were carrying the old man's furniture out of the house. Soon,
all the furniture was gone.
The workmen opened the back door of the house.
Behind Number 38 Mayo Road, there was a small garden.
The work-men found two chickens in a shed in the garden.
'The old man can't have chickens in his new
apartment,' said one of the men. 'I'll take these home with
me. I have a little garden. I keep chickens too.'
At half-past ten, the council workmen began to knock
down the walls of the old house.
In the cafe, Bill Hanley bought Mr Larkin a meal of
eggs and toast and tea. And he bought a cup of tea for
himself and for his driver. The old man ate the food. He did
not speak. Hanley and the police driver were drinking their
tea when another police car stopped outside the cafe.
A policeman came into the cafe and spoke to the chief
superintendent.
'Will you come back to Mayo Road, sir?' he said. 'The
workmen have found something.'
The old man stopped eating and looked at Hanley.

The chief superintendent stood up. 'You stay here with

Mr Larkin,' he said to his driver.
He left the cafe and returned with the other policeman
to Mayo Road.
The crowd was still standing outside Number 38. A
man in the crowd called out, 'Is there some treasure in there?
Is that why the old man wouldn't leave? Have you found
some money?'
Hanley went into the house. The workmen had started
to knock down the fireplace and the chimney. Bricks from
the wall were lying on the floor. The workmen had made a
large hole in a wall by the fireplace and they had found
something behind the wall. They had seen something
through the hole. They had seen something between the wall
and the chimney.
'Look in there, sir!' one of the workmen said, as Hanley
came into the room.
Hanley looked through the hole. Between the wall and
the chimney, he saw a human body. It was old and black, but
he saw that it was the body of a woman.
Hanley went outside to the police car. He made a call
on the car's radio. He called Police Headquarters and he
spoke to an inspector.
'I've found the body of a woman in Mayo Road,'
Hanley said. 'She was behind a wall. She has been there for

some years. I think that the woman was murdered. Please

send someone to take the body to the mortuary. There will
be a murder investigation.'
'Do you have a suspect?' asked the other man.
'Yes,' Hanley answered. 'Mr Larkin, the owner of 38
Mayo Road. I'm taking him to the police station now.'
The police car took Hanley back to the cafe. He went
inside and he spoke quietly to Mr Larkin.
'We've found her,' he said. 'You must come with me to
the police station.'
The old man followed Hanley to the police car. He did
not speak.
When they were in the car, Hanley asked Mr Larkin a
question.
'Who is the dead woman in your house?' he asked.
The old man refused to say anything.
'Is it Mrs Larkin?' Hanley asked. 'We will find out
soon. Aren't you worried? You'll feel better if you tell us
about it.'
But the old man would not speak.
When they arrived at the police station, Hanley put
Larkin into an interview room. He gave the old man some

tea and some cigarettes. Mr Larkin drank the tea and took
the cigarettes but still he did not speak.
'I'll talk to you later, Mr Larkin,' said Hanley.
Hanley went to his office and he phoned the police
pathologist. The pathologist looked at dead bodies and found
out information about them. Now he would help Hanley by
looking at this body - he would do a post-mortem
examination.
'I'm going to send the body of a woman to the
mortuary,' Hanley said. 'I want to know how the woman died
and I want to know when she died. I need the information as
soon as possible, please. This is a murder investigation.'
Next, Bill Hanley spoke to a police sergeant.
'Go to the council offices,' Hanley told the sergeant.
'Find out how many years Mr Larkin lived in Mayo Road.
Also, try to find out who lived in the house before Mr
Larkin.'
Then Hanley sent another sergeant to Mayo Road.
'Find out if the old man left any papers or documents in
his house,' Hanley told the sergeant. 'Also, find out the
names of his neighbours - the other people who lived in
Mayo Road before the houses were knocked down. Talk to
them. Ask them if Larkin was married.'
Early in the afternoon, the pathologist phoned Hanley.

'The body from Mayo Road is a mummy,' the

pathologist said.
'What do you mean - a mummy?' asked Hanley.
'The dead body was between a wall and the chimney,'
the pathologist replied. 'For years, the heat and smoke from
the fireplace has dried the body. The body is like an
Egyptian mummy.'
'That's interesting,' said Hanley. 'But can you tell me
how the woman died? And can you tell me when she died?'
'No. I can't tell you that today,' answered the
pathologist. 'I have to do a post-mortem examination on the
body. I think that the woman was strangled. I think that
something was tied tightly round her neck. I think that the
woman died many years ago, but I am not sure about that. I
will have more information for you after the post-mortem.'
'When will you be able to give me the information?'
Hanley asked. 'I need some help with this investigation.'
'The body is hard and dry,' said the pathologist. 'I'll
have to make the body soft. I'll have to soak it. I'll leave the
body in some liquid until the morning. I'll do the postmortem tomorrow, when the body is soft.'
Hanley thanked the pathologist and he put down the
phone. A few minutes later, one of the police sergeants
brought him some more news.

'Sir, we've found some documents at 38 Mayo Road,'

he said. 'We've found some papers. There is some
information about the house in them. And we've found a
British Army pay book and a photograph. Here they are.' He
put a large envelope on Hanley's desk.
These things gave Hanley a lot of information and he
made notes as he looked at them.
First, he looked at the army pay book. Every soldier in
the British Army had a pay book. It showed how much
money the soldier had been paid while he was in the army.
And it showed the soldier's date of birth and his army
number. Every soldier in the British Army had a number.
The pay book which Hanley was holding had belonged to
Herbert James Larkin. Larkin was an Irishman. He had been
born in Dublin, in 1911. But he had been in the British Army
from 1940 to 1946.
Hanley phoned the British Embassy in Dublin. He
spoke to the military attache at the embassy. Hanley told the
attache Larkin's army number and he asked the attache to get
some more information about Larkin.
'I'll check the Army's files,' said the military attache.
'I'll phone Army Headquarters in London. I'll call you
tomorrow, when I have some news.'
Next, Hanley looked at the papers. They were the
deeds of 38 Mayo Road. These papers told Hanley that

Larkin had bought the house in 1954. Now, Hanley wanted

to know where Larkin had lived between 1946 and 1954.
The chief superintendent phoned an official at the City
Council.
'I want to find out about Herbert James Larkin who
lived at 38 Mayo Road,' said Hanley. 'Please give me any
information that you have.'
The official asked Hanley to wait while he got some
files. After a minute he spoke again.
'From 1946 to 1954, Mr Larkin lived in North London,'
said the council official. 'He returned to Ireland in 1954. He
was a security guard in Dublin from 1954 to 1976. Mr
Larkin retired in 1976.'
Hanley thanked the official and he put down the phone.
Then he looked at the photograph. It was many years old. It
showed a soldier and a young woman. The man was Larkin.
He was dressed in army uniform. Who was the woman? Was
it Larkin's wife?
Later that day, the sergeant who had been to speak to
Mr Larkin's neighbours came to see Hanley.
'I've spoken to some of the people who used to live in
Mayo Road,' the sergeant said. 'I spoke to a woman called
Mrs Moran. She lived next to the Larkins and she
remembers the time when they moved into Number 38.'

'So, Larkin was married,' said Hanley.

'Yes, sir,' said the sergeant. 'And Mrs Moran
remembers the man who lived at Number 38 before the
Larkins. That man's wife was dead when Mrs Moran moved
to Mayo Road. The man himself died in 1954. Five weeks
after the man died, the Larkins moved into the house. Mrs
Moran said that Mr Larkin was about forty-five years old at
that time. But his wife was nearly twenty years younger than
him. Mrs Moran said that Mrs Larkin was English - she
came from London.'
'And what happened to Mrs Larkin?' Hanley asked.
'Mrs Moran says that Mrs Larkin disappeared late in
1963.'
'Disappeared? Is Mrs Moran certain about the date?'
'Yes,' replied the sergeant. 'She said that Mrs Larkin
dis-appeared in the autumn of 1963. She had disappeared
before President John F. Kennedy was killed in November
1963.'
'Was Mrs
disappeared?'

Moran

worried

when

Mrs

Larkin

'I don't think that she was worried,' the sergeant said.
'Mrs Larkin had an argument with her husband and she
disappeared. The neighbours thought that she had gone back
to London.'

'Sergeant, I think that Larkin killed his wife,' said

Hanley. 'I think that he hid her body. That's why Larkin
didn't want to move out of 38 Mayo Road. He knew that
someone would find the body when the house was knocked
down. That's why he didn't want the council workmen to
knock down the house.'
'I think that you're right, sir,' said the sergeant.
Hanley went to the interview room and sat down
opposite Mr Larkin. The old man looked very worried.
'Mr Larkin, we know that your wife disappeared in
1963 - fifteen years ago,' said Hanley. 'Tell me what
happened. You knew that someone would find your wife's
body one day. Now we have found it. You must speak to me.
This is a murder investigation, Mr Larkin. Now, tell me
about your wife. You'll feel much better!'
Larkin said nothing.
'Was the woman behind the wall in the house your
wife, Mr Larkin?' asked Hanley.
Larkin looked at the chief superintendent for a
moment. Then he smiled. Suddenly his eyes were bright and
calm. But still he said nothing.
'Herbert James Larkin,' said Hanley. 'I charge you with
the murder of your wife. You do not have to say anything.
But anything that you do say will be written down. It will be
used in evidence in a court of law.'

The next morning, Hanley waited for a phone call from

the pathologist. But the first call that he received was from
an official at the City Council.
'Chief Superintendent Hanley, your men are stopping
our work at Mayo Road,' said the council official. 'We want
to cover the ground with concrete and tarmac. The building
site is going to be a shopping centre and a car park. There is
a lot of work to do. Can we start work today?'
'Yes, OK,' said Hanley. 'We've looked at the house. You
can knock down all the walls now. You can build your
shopping centre. You can make your car park.'
Twenty minutes later, Hanley received the phone call
from the pathologist.
'I'm going to start the post-mortem examination now,'
said the pathologist. 'I'll call you again in a few hours.'
While Hanley was waiting, the military attache at the
British Embassy phoned. He gave Hanley some information
about Larkin's life in the British Army.
'Herbert James Larkin joined the army in 1940,' said
the attache, Major Dawkins. 'Mr Larkin fought in the Second
World War. He fought in Egypt in 1941. The German Army
captured Larkin at the end of 1941 and he was taken to a
prison camp in Poland. He was at that camp until 1945.'
'Thank you, Major Dawkins,' said Hanley. 'Do you
have any information about Larkin's marriage ?'

'Yes, I do,' said Major Dawkins. 'Mr Larkin was still in

the army when he got married. He got married in London, in
November 1945. His wife's name was Violet Mary Smith.
She was seventeen years old and she worked in a hotel in
London.'
Hanley thanked Major Dawkins again and said
goodbye to him. Then he waited for the pathologist to phone
again.
'So, Violet Smith married a man who was more than
twice her age,' Bill Hanley said to himself. 'When Violet
disappeared in 1963, she was thirty-five years old and
Herbert Larkin was fifty-two.'
The phone rang. 'Hanley, I've found out how the
woman died,' said the pathologist. 'She was murdered.
Someone hit on her the head and then strangled her.'
Hanley wrote down the information. 'Thank you,' he
said. 'Can you tell me when she died now?'
'The body had been in the house for more than thirty
years,' said the pathologist. 'The woman died between 1940
and 1945.'
'But the Larkins did not move to 38 Mayo Road until
1954,' said Hanley.
'I'm telling you what I have found out, Hanley,' replied
the pathologist.

'And how old was the woman when she died?' asked
Hanley.
'She was more than fifty years old,' said the
pathologist.
Chief Superintendent Hanley put down the phone.
Then he spoke to the sergeant who had talked to Mrs Moran.
'Sergeant, who was the man who lived at 38 Mayo
Road before the Larkins?' Hanley asked.
'I couldn't find out his name, sir,' answered the
sergeant. 'But I know that the man lived alone. His wife was
dead.'
'Yes,' said Hanley. 'It was his wife's body in the house!
Let Mr Larkin go, sergeant. Let him go to his new
apartment. Tell the social workers at the City Council that
the old man is free. Tell them that Mr Larkin isn't a
murderer. The City Council must take care of him now!'
That afternoon, Mr Larkin moved into his new
apartment. But a few days later, he wanted to visit Mayo
Road.
The old man walked to Mayo Road. His house was no
longer there. The council workmen had knocked down all
the walls and they had covered the ground with concrete.
When Mr Larkin arrived, the foreman was walking round
the building site. He was looking at the new concrete. He
was finding out if the concrete had become hard.

'What's this?' he called to one of his men. He pointed to

a piece of concrete which was a different colour. 'This piece
of concrete is old.'
Mr Larkin watched the two men carefully.
'There was a chicken shed in the back garden of
Number 38,' said the workman. 'This concrete was the floor
of the chicken shed. The old concrete is very hard and
strong, so we put new concrete around it.'
'OK,' said the foreman. He called to the driver of a
bull-dozer. 'Cover all this concrete with tarmac!' he shouted.
The bulldozer pushed soft, hot tarmac over the
concrete. Mr Larkin watched the black tarmac covering the
floor of his chicken shed. Then the old man smiled and he
started to walk back to his new home.
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