There were few people left in the public gallery yesterday, but those who remained could not be faulted for lack of enthusiasm. After a day of routine legal submissions, they responded to the adjournment by putting their hands together for the chairman.
It was a bit like hearing applause in a church, and the older members of the congregation - mostly lawyers - were a little embarrassed at the display of spontaneity. But on the final day of public hearings, the public was insisting on being heard.
Maybe it was the theatrical effect of the occasion, as the cast of senior counsel took their curtain calls with a series of closing statements. Even counsel for the public interest, who has maintained a dignified silence throughout most of the proceedings, joined in.
One of the longer contributions, in keeping with the performance of his client, came from counsel for Michael Lowry. Indeed, Donal
O'Donnell SC was careful to point out that time spent in the witness-box should not be a reflection on the witness concerned.
This was an important distinction; otherwise Mr Lowry's verbosity would have provided the rope to hang him, and there'd still have been enough left over for a ship's rigging.
Mr O'Donnell also reminded us that the Constitution protected the good name not just of "saints" but of "scoundrels" too. At first this seemed a high risk strategy, but presumably counsel was including Mr
Lowry in the "the great mass of people in between". In another memorable phrase, he claimed his client had come to the tribunal under "a virtual Niagara of innuendo". But at least Mr Lowry was carrying an umbrella, unlike Mr Haughey. The former Taoiseach's counsel had nothing to submit yesterday, or maybe he decided there was only so much of Mr Haughey's submission we could take.
He could only sit and listen as counsel for the tribunal reviewed his client's performance and found it badly wanting. Denis
McCullough's cross-examination of Mr Haughey had been a polite affair, but yesterday he came out of his corner swinging.
It was damning when he said Mr Haughey had "lied" and been
"disingenuous, at the very the least" in his evidence. Only a man with a lavish lifestyle could have considered a £280,000
annual expenditure anything other than lavish, he said.
The lavishness of Ben Dunne was dwelt upon by Fine Gael's counsel,
Kevin Feeney SC, who portrayed him as a latterday Gatsby. "He is a remarkable man with a unique attitude to money," said Mr Feeney, without a trace of a smile.
Meanwhile, the cessation of hostilities between Mr Dunne and his family threatened to unravel during other submissions. The former
Dunnes boss had "unequivocally" withdrawn his allegations about the family trust, we were told by the trust's counsel. But some observers wondered whether the cessation was permanent as well as unequivocal, after counsel for Mr Dunne took umbrage at the thrust of comments from the Dunnes Stores' corner.
The final day would not have been complete without a reprise of the rotten potatoes affair. Mr O'Donnell poked fun at it by quoting
Patrick Kavanagh's line from Homer's ghost - "I made The Iliad from such a local row". Even Homer might have struggled to make poetry from the Ballyvolane potatoes or the "Merchants of Mullingar", counsel suggested.
Maybe so, but Homer would have been well qualified for the rest of the tribunal plot. After all, nobody understood better than he the consequences that can follow when visitors make you a present of a wooden horse, and tell you: "there's a little something for yourself".
