For a few dollars more... some answers, Bertie boy?

IF THE curious saga of Bertie Ahern’s purchase of his Drumcondra home were a children’s story it would be called The Buying, The Stash and The Wardrobe.

The extraordinary explanation of how Mr Ahern clambered the long and winding road to Beresford Avenue was fleshed out in scintillating detail by his former landlord Michael Wall.

With slicked back white hair and a matching beard, the Mayoman-turned-Manchester millionaire looked like the lost triplet brother of Colonel Sanders and Kenny Rogers — and had a tale to tell the Mahon corruption probe as compelling as any deep fried southern country and western classic.

It is Saturday, December 3, 1994, and Mr Wall wants to buy a Dublin house that Mr Ahern can live in. The little Drumcondra Palace is selected and an offer made.

So far, so plausible. Then, without warning, Mr Wall turns up at St Luke’s with a black briefcase full of stg£26,000 in £20 notes and “maybe” another IR£3,000 and plonks it open in Mr Ahern’s constituency office, the bundles spilling onto the desk in front of the Taoiseach, whose then partner Celia Larkin hovers close by.

The money, we are told, was for a conservatory and refurbishments on the house, though no contracts had yet been exchanged and, apparently, Mr Ahern was not aware the cash was coming.

And how did Mr Ahern and Ms Larkin respond to such unexpected generosity, the tribunal’s counsel inquired.

“Were they surprised? Appreciative? Agog? What was their reaction?”

“Normal,” replied Mr Wall. Bertie just picked up the case, left the room and put it in the safe. Obviously he inhabits a different normality to the rest of us.

Despite his instincts as a trained accountant and the trifling matter that he was finance minister at the time and (wrongly) expected to be elected Taoiseach the following Tuesday, Mr Ahern didn’t bother counting it, or even offer a receipt, we were told.

Indeed, the black briefcase was lucky to find its way into Mr Ahern’s hands at all, as Mr Wall insists the cash spent the previous night dumped in his wardrobe at the Ashling Hotel. Safes are clearly for wimps in Mr Wall’s mind.

Had Mrs Wall been aware of the stash left in their bedroom, the tribunal again wondered?

“Not necessarily,” Mr Wall deadpanned before confirming she was kept in the dark. But it was such a large sum of money, the counsel pressed.

“To some people,” came the terse reply.

And so we have the cast-iron explanation for why Ms Larkin deposited IR£28,772.90 into her account two days later.

It was the punts equivalent of the (vague) amount given to the couple by Mr Wall. But, hang on, queried the tribunal; the original sum Mr Ahern claimed he received from Mr Wall, stg£30,000, could not translate into that amount of punts, but IR£28,772.90 does match $45,000 on that day’s exchange rates. Exactly and to the penny.

However, Mr Ahern is adamant he has never dealt in dollars, and Mr Wall would only admit to handling “the odd one”.

But then why would someone turning up at his office with a briefcase full of grubby £20 notes phase Mr Ahern as he stood on the brink of becoming Taoiseach in the winter of 1994? This was the period in his life when men would, literally, pin money to him as if he were a shy bride at a Greek wedding. If friends weren’t pushing unsolicited “dig-outs” into his hands, then Manchester businessmen were having spontaneous whip-rounds of stg£8,000 to thank the serving cabinet minister for enthralling them with news of growth rates across the Irish Sea. He didn’t want to take the cash, of course, but it would have been rude not to. That’s why all those lodgements started stacking up for a man who didn’t have a bank account for six years, yet managed to save £50,000.

Of course, Mr Ahern forgot to tell us Mr Wall was at the infamous Manchester gathering at the Four Seasons Hotel in 1994 — not that he was being evasive; it was just Mr Wall stayed in the bar and “didn’t eat the dinner”. A curious affair indeed.

It is Mr Ahern’s birthday today. No doubt, Ms Larkin will be too busy testifying to the Mahon probe to organise a cake and Mr Ahern probably has the curtains drawn at the house he bought from Mr Wall, lest the millionaire businessman pops round with any more of those troublesome surprise briefcases.