Orna Mulcahy on people we all know
Just as nature abhors a vacuum, Liam has no time for peace and consensus. It bores him rigid, but luckily there isn't a lot of it about. Mostly, people are up to their necks in difficulties and dramas and are badly in need of Liam's almost mystic read on The Situation.
To describe Liam as a fixer doesn't quite cover the huge networking operation he runs from the mobile phone clutched in his slightly sweaty hand. But in fact, most of his day is spent trying to fix things and stroke things and spin things into happening. Liam's elderly mother in Laois still couldn't tell you exactly what he does for a living, though she worries that it's in the same line as Frank Dunlop, and that he could end up in a Tribunal one day.
A leather document bag holds the only piece of equipment he needs - a falling-to-bits address book that's stuffed with priceless contacts. God knows what he did before mobiles were invented. But that was in the dark ages, when he was an auctioneer with a side-line in selling coffins, until he hooked up with a builder who was going places and needed someone to interpret the planning decisions in plain English. Billionaire now, of course, great pal. Liam firmly believes that every problem, no matter how awful, can be solved if you have the right meeting with the right guy at the right time, and he's here to introduce you to the right guy. He's trying him now ... amazing how clear the line is between here and South Africa. "Sean, is that you? Listen ..."
Most days will find Liam rooted beside a potted plant in some hotel lobby or other, hand shooting up in greeting to every suit coming through the revolving doors. People constantly sidle up to him, expecting to hear the latest, but they usually end up telling him what they know in return for some furious conspiratorial nodding. Like a prize truffle-hunting dog, Liam can nose out the news from the most innocent of chats and run with it so that hours later, it has become another Situation.
There are grown men who won't make a move without Liam's say-so, and yet while he does have flashes of brilliant insight, a lot of the time he's telling them exactly what they want to hear. When it comes to flattery, his motto is to lay it on with a trowel. He never, ever, admits to not knowing something.
A county player in his day, Liam can banter with the best of them, but when he drops his voice a few octaves to a soft monotone, you know that he is giving you some incredibly valuable piece of information that has come red hot from Very High Up. Sometimes he's so accurate, you wonder does he hack into the bank computer files in his spare time, while his contacts in Dáil Éireann are such that he can park there any time he likes. Liam's real knack is that if he asks you for something, you feel bad if you can't do it for him. It's not all self-serving stuff. He has great admiration for Christina Noble and is just about to touch you for a donation to her very worthy Foundation.