by Ken Bruen
A small tear rolled down his cheek, the cheeks flushed from the booze. It landed softly on the sand, like an abandoned prayer. He said,
“She’s dead. And I swore to her that I would not only find the bastard but ensure he never bothered her again.”
Then he near shrieked,
“I didn’t find him. He actually increased his campaign of terror as if he knew I was trying to find him or maybe her, who the fuck knows these days.”
I had nothing so said nothing.
With supreme effort he said,
“On her own birthday, she hung herself in her bedroom.”
Pause.
“With the navy tie.”
He rolled up his sleeve, said,
“I was so insane with grief that I got a tattoo. You think I got my daughter’s name?”
I thought so.
He said,
“You’d be wrong.”
Showed me his arm.
In bold Gothic script was
D.
B.
S.
A miracle
Is defined as a
Wonder,
A marvel,
A marvelous event due to supernatural agency.
One of the mysteries of Galway is a curious thing on the clock over Galway Camera and what it says.
It says Dublin Time.
The fact that now the clock shows ordinary winter time only adds to the mystery.
Not so long ago Galwegians, delighting in the longer days of sunlight than in Dublin and displaying an oddity that makes living in Galway a pleasure, set their clocks a full eleven and a half minutes behind Dublin.
Of course, this plays into the Dublin belief that Galway is/was behind and not just in minutes.
I was standing under said clock when Jimmy Higgins came along; a radio broadcaster, terrific musician, and possessed of a sharp wit.
He handed me a double CD and said,
“It’s old style.”
Just what I love. I said,
“Jimmy, nowadays they say old school.”
He looked baffled, asked,
“Why?”
Indeed.
I attempted,
“They want to change the name of everything now and, get this, get rid of the Angelus.”
Jimmy had written a beautiful book about the show-band era, titled,
“Are Ye the Band?”
He asked how I was after my accident.
I said,
“They called it a miracle.”
He pondered that, giving me that Tuam look of utter frankness, then,
“You appear in fine fettle. I suppose all the hurling you did stood to you.”
Jimmy was that rare to rarest individual—he saw the good in you, little as it was. He added.
“Well, mind yourself Jack, there are few of us left.”
And getting fewer by the day.
I took a measured stroll down the town, passed the bronze seated statues of two writers, on a bench, a distance of two feet between them; one was Edward Carson and the other, well, he was what the locals call a total.
Shorthand for “total stranger.”
I looked in the window of the Treasure Chest; all the goods displayed cost a small fortune to even contemplate.
As a child of poverty, I remember when it was Glynn’s, what my mother called a “dear” place, meaning it wasn’t dear in the sense of sentimental but fierce expensive.
It was fierce.
For weeks there was a beautiful replica of the Titanic, in each and every correct detail, down to the doomed lifeboats: It filled me with wonder.
It cost ninety-five pounds, in what is now known as “old” money before the curse of the euro. The china factory that employed a quarter of the town had a weekly wage of two pounds, ten shillings, and that was with overtime.
A union?
Yeah, dream on.
My father, who worked like an African American on the railway, earned one pound, twenty shillings.
But, oh my God, money felt like money. A half crown was not only a fine sum but the coin, it felt like wealth; eight of them and you had a mighty pound.
A woman I knew vaguely stopped, asked,
“What are thinking of, Jack?”
I gave her what passed for a not unfriendly smile, said,
“I was wondering what I’d buy with ninety pounds?”
She discreetly backed away, her look screaming.
“’Tis early to be drunk.”
My former lady friend/significant other, whatever the hell the fluid term is now, had previously introduced me to
“Danny Doherty.”
From Derry—no, not London Derry—and for odd reasons we became friends, despite Marion, my ex, telling him I was toxic.
Thing is, I agreed with her on that.
Most of my friends were in the graveyard and, yes, because of me, directly or not.
I may not have put them there but I sure paved the road.
Danny was a whiz in an IT company, made serious cash but seemed like he hadn’t a shilling. The best kind of wealth, the nonshowy type.
I saw him making his way past a busker who was mauling “The Fields of Athenry.” Danny gave him some money, smiled when he saw me, said,
“Jeez, he must really hate that song.”
He was five-foot-ten, weighed 160 pounds, was gym fit and looked like a benevolent bouncer. Sounds crazy but then this is Galway. His only concession to being rich was his clothes, discreet but oh so freaking classy.
A cap that made him seem handsome.
He wasn’t.
Chinos with a permanent crease, no mean achievement, one of those tweed coats called Tru Dry, truly expensive. (I checked one time in Anthony Ryan’s; they were as dear as the ship in Glynn’s from my youth.)
And shoes, ah, the shoes.
Keen boots.
Small fortune, they say.
My Doc Martens went blacker with envy. We shook hands and he asked,
“Fancy a pint?”
I did and mostly do.
We were at a table in the Imperial Hotel, at the top of Eyre Square, once a late night pit stop for the Guards, as it was quiet.
We had boilermakers as ’tis not often we get to chat.
I managed to pay first, an Irish gig where friends near fight to buy the first round. You have to be quick or not, depending on whether you’re a mean fuck.
Danny said,
“I was sick to my stomach about Christchurch.”
The day before, a gunman, Australian, twenty-eight years old, entered two mosques, murdered forty-eight people, one a boy of five. He wore a live cam on his head, feeding his sick supporters live commentary as he killed and mowed down the innocent. He then got in his car, blasted out the side window with a shotgun, continued to shoot at passersby. He had, as these psychos do, written a long manifesto, which, along with the video footage, was available for twenty-four hours after the carnage.
There are no words.
I had no words.
Danny sighed, said,
“I don’t know this world anymore.”
Me neither.
To ease the darkness, I said,
“They arrested McGregor again in Florida for criminal battery.”
Danny said,
“Next time he gets in the cage for a fight, may they lock it with intent.”
Amen.
I said,
“Danny, I need some help.”
He nodded, said,
“Tell me.”
I did, outlined the death of Meredith Morgan, her father’s grief, even the tattoo on his arm, how the Guards were already swamped with cyber theft, bullying, the whole new dizzying arr
ay of crimes the Internet was spewing out.
He listened attentively, even took out a slim black leather notebook, a Cross pen, jotted down the details. Then he looked up, said,
“The dark web is a scary place and difficult to track. You break through one firewall, six more are behind it, and they have nigh perfected the art of redirecting, or rather misdirecting.”
Not reassuring but I asked,
“Can it be done?”
He smiled, almost weary, said,
“Oh, yeah, if they are there, they can be found, but it takes time.”
I dreaded asking, but
“How much time?”
He considered, then,
“A month, if we get lucky and especially if the sick fuck gets arrogant.”
I caught the barman’s eye, did the finger thing they understand, said to Danny,
“It’s expensive.”
He waited until the round came, then,
“For friends, money is not a factor.”
I asked,
“Will you do it?”
He nodded, said,
“One thing you need to understand. I said it could take at least a month but I was talking in general terms.”
I waited.
“But me, say twenty-four hours.”
The whole day had just shaped up, I asked,
“You want to get some dinner? They do fine bacon and cabbage here, like in the old days.”
He said,
“And ruin a fine building buzz with food, no way.”
I agreed.
Later, as we unsteadily wound our merry way toward taxicabs, Danny put his arm on my shoulder, asked,
“I don’t want to put a damper on a fine evening but . . .”
He was going to put the damper on.
He asked,
“When I find this troll, and I will find them, what then?”
I had thought about that, thought about it a lot, then said, nearly truthfully,
“I was thinking a tattoo.”
He gave me a look that showed the steel behind his good nature, said,
“I’m not sure what that entails but I don’t think I want to speculate.”
I shook his hand, firmly, not bone crushing but close, said,
“That’s for the best.”
“If
You’re
Lucky
Enough
to
Be
Irish
Then
You’re
Lucky
Enough”
St. Patrick’s Day.
A grand excuse for the world to drink like the Irish.
And, at least in Ireland, they kept the mad notion well oiled, excuse the drunken pun.
But.
But is always bad and here it is very dark and woesome.
In Tyrone, in Northern Ireland, a small hotel in a small village held its annual disco for mainly teens. A hundred turned up but then buses began arriving, spilling out nearly four hundred unexpected teenagers.
A ferocious crush/ push/ stampede ensued, and the hotel staff locked the doors. Teenagers, forced against the glass, begged to be allowed in; the staff refused.
Three kids were crushed to death.
Aged
Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen.
Horror engulfed the country.
In the days following, the hotel manager and one of the staff were arrested, charged with manslaughter. In a bizarre twist, the manager was arrested on drug charges when a white powder was found. Then, when tests revealed it to be not drugs, he was
De-arrested.
A term new to the population.
The three funerals took place on the Friday, in three separate churches, but the sight of a pink coffin for the lone girl did me in entirely.
The prime minister of New Zealand earned the respect of the world when she pledged in an address to the captured terrorist,
“We reject you; your name will never be uttered as long as I live.”
No notoriety/infamy for the psycho.
On Saturday, Keefer and I met for a drink. He handed me a book.
Life
By Keith Richards.
Said,
“You want to know about the Stones, read this.”
I actually didn’t want to know a whole lot about them but said,
“Can’t wait to read it.”
He shrugged, asked,
“Dude, when are you coming back to the farm?”
I told him of the cyber bully and the sheer grief of the father.
Keefer thought on that, then,
“So, we have two miracle children to find, an arsonist we need to literally put out, and an asshole husband who killed his wife. Now you have this new case?”
We were drinking tequila, for no good reason, which might be the best excuse.
On the other side of my third, I was feeling crusade-ish, said,
“Once I find this cyber fuck, we’ll deal with the other three cases.”
Keefer had deep frown lines on his face, said,
“I have a real sense of impending doom.”
I shrugged it off, said,
“Blame it on the tequila.”
Maybe a little more flippant then I meant but it did sound like a blow off.
He stood up, said,
“No, Jack, it’s not the booze, it’s you.”
Then, in a gesture that haunts me, he threw a rake of money on the table, said,
“Buy the next few on me.”
And was gone.
Guns and Rosaries
I watched a documentary with the above title.
Narrated by Martin Sheen.
An incredible story.
Patrick Peyton, from a large, poor family in Mayo, wanted to be a priest.
The Irish crowd said,
“You are not educated enough.”
So he went to the U.S.
Became a priest and then near died of tuberculosis, which was killing thousands of people in America. Near death, Patrick pledged if he recovered, he would devote his life to the Madonna and spreading the rosary.
He turned out to be a public relations genius.
He got the slogan,
“The family that prays together,
Stays together.”
And hounded celebrities like Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly, Frank Sinatra, Maureen O’Hara to join his crusade of the family rosary. He said,
“Aim to get ten million families to say the rosary.”
He did, trebled it, and was a rock star in his appearances.
His big task was South America, so enter the CIA, who funded his campaign.
Gave him a million dollars.
But.
The Church in the sixties, fearful of this money coming out, began to curb his appeal.
You might say,
“The Church that conspired together.
Prayed together.”
Then I saw the documentary The Family, a massive network of politicians and businessmen whose tentacles reached all over the world. Their influence and power was staggering. Utilizing the National Prayer Breakfast, they had every U.S. president since Eisenhower in attendance and all this web spun by the most influential man you never heard of.
Douglas Coe.
His genius was to stay invisible, manipulating the name of Jesus, to cover a whole host of activities that remain mired in darkness and the shadows.
I had been to the cinema for the first time in years—Galway’s new movie theater.
Theater was $8 million in debt, not that we needed a new one. We already had two Omniplex and the city was outraged at this white elephant.
The cinema itself was a maze of steep granite chairs and screens all over a confused site. Chaotic didn’t even come near to the whole shambles.
But I wanted to see Us, the new one from the director of the brilliant Get Out.
Phew-oh.
Terrifying, topical, and oh, so relevant.
Put the heart sideways in me many times.
Lupita Nyong’o in a dual role was a sight to wonder at.
I came out shaken, nearly walked into a woman, friend of my late mother. My mother, the very hound from hell.
So any of her friends were never going to be chuffed (as they say in Hampstead) to meet me.
But she excelled herself, near spat,
“Is there anything sadder than a grown man having to go to the pictures on his own? Sure, who’d go anywhere with the likes of you?”
Normally, if “normal” has any meaning in the realm of the truly evil, I’d just pass on by.
But!
I got right in her face, snarled,
“My mother was a bad bitch but you? You might be just a little bit worse.”
She took a step back, frightened, but the nastiness won out, she railed,
“I wish that truck had killed you.”
Now that is true horror.
Who needs the cinema?
After an encounter like that, you need some balance. I went to Charlie Byrne’s bookshop. It had just won
“Best Independent Bookshop in Ireland!”
I congratulated them; it was a pleasure to see them win. I bought
Emily Dean’s
Everybody Died, So I Got a Dog.
Purely on the title. Noirin asked,
“You had a dog?”
Indeed.
Two.
Both died.
I didn’t of course say that, in the midst of them delighted with their win.
Even I have some decency.
Danny Doherty called me, said he had news.
I felt part exhilaration, part dread.
If he had the name of the troll, what then?
Tell Stephen Morgan I knew who had terrorized his daughter into her grave?
I didn’t know.
Danny was dressed to impress as usual: fine suit, expensive raincoat, he looked composed. We were in the Meyrick hotel; seemed apt for serious business. We ordered coffee, didn’t speak until we’d settled. He had a file before him, said,
“Phew, this was a tough one, behind every firewall was another blind, then bounced back to three different locations.”
I wasn’t entirely sure what that entailed save it sounded difficult.