by Ken Bruen
She took out a flask and a board game. I asked,
“Is that your tea?”
Thinking, with Kiki, it would of course be herbal green muck.
She said,
“It’s a smoothie.”
Right.
She looked at my overflowing untidy bookshelves, asked,
“Can I tidy that?”
OCD?
I nearly said,
“Hon, you touch my books, you lose the arm from the elbow.”
But went,
“Thank you, that would be lovely.”
She asked,
“Alphabetically or by genre?”
WTF?
Had to pinch my own self, mentally ask,
She’s only nine?
Her little face was so elfin, so heart wrenching in its earnestness, I thought of the lines of Merton,
“You will be loved
and it will
murder your heart and drive
you into the desert.”
Who knew?
We had an amazing day, chock-full of
Laughter
Food
Sodas
Chocolate
And
Hugs.
... Hugs?
Who could have foreseen that?
I went into the bathroom and down on my knees, whispered,
“Oh, thank you, Jesus!”
Meant it with every fiber of my wasted soul.
If you’ve seen series one of The Wire you might remember a young black drug dealer from the corner, teaching young bloods how to play chess.
In a truly fantastic, memorable scene, he demonstrates the chess pieces by calling them all the names the boys use for
Cops
Dealers
Soldiers
And explains the various moves in the way a young gun plots his way to the top.
I did that using nuns as pawns, and priests and cardinals, too, and, of course, we almost had a bishop.
The king was the pope
And
The queen, well, she was her very own mum.
She loved it and we played for hours with me promising to get a custom-made set for her own self.
A beautiful perfect day.
End of watch.
I took her hand and we stood outside my apartment, looking out across Galway Bay, my joy near boundless.
A motorbike roared behind me and I turned
Too slow.
The first bullet took Gretchen in the throat.
The second blasted through her tiny heart.
She
emitted
the
tiniest
soft
sigh.
And was gone.
34
They have a new barman
in Garavan’s, but I don’t talk to him at all.
In fact, most days, I stay home,
pretend to read,
the bottle at my hand
and the smashed, crushed chess pieces
at my feet. If you were to look in the window you’d
probably be struck by the utter stillness.
The absolute quiet.
You might even comment,
Jesus, a room of the dead,
but, then, you might say nothing.
Nothing at all.
35
Marvin Minkler was the old-school type of detective. He’d been in the army, served overseas, and then joined the Guards, progressing rapidly up the ranks by sheer smarts and that ancient concept of being good at his job.
Maybe best of all, he evaded office politics and was beholden to no one person. He’d been sent down from Dublin to investigate the highly suspicious deaths of
Tevis
Harley
Mrs. Renaud’s apparent suicide
Plus the horrific shooting of a nine-year-old girl on the Salthill Promenade—the death of my beloved Gretchen. He arranged to meet me in Crowes pub, not the police station. Like I said,
Old school.
I was seated at the back of the pub where Ollie Crowe ignored my smoking as did the customers. No one approached me. Word was out about the killing of my daughter and I was best described as armed and maniacal.
True that.
Ollie had set up a fresh shot of Jameson before me, then withdrew quietly. The front door of the pub opened and a bitter November wind made a fast attempt to freeze the lounge. The man who walked toward me could only be a cop—the walk, half strut, mostly caution.
Head of snow-white hair and not because white was the new option. Tall, in his vaguely maintained late forties. His face was of the sort you hear called craggy.
Basically, no one wants to come right out and say you’re an ugly cunt.
Wearing a gray suit that was so nondescript it meant money or poverty in that you noticed it without actually knowing why. He held out a large worn hand, offered,
“I’m Detective Minkler. Most call me Marv. I am sorry for your shocking loss.”
I was too weary to be insulting, said,
“Jack Taylor.”
He gave the hint of a smile, said,
“That much I do know.”
He didn’t ask,
“Is this a bad time?”
Every time now was a very bad time.
I kind of appreciated that.
He ordered a black coffee and asked Ollie to bring me another of what was in my glass. I said,
“I can buy my own booze.”
He nodded, fair enough, said,
“Saves me a few quid.”
Quid.
His coffee came and he sipped delicately, said,
“Jeez, I could kill for a cig.”
Realized his remark... kill, tried to rein it in, went,
“Fuck, that was tactless.”
I stared at him, asked with a hint of snarl,
“That supposed to show you’re a decent sort and like down with the broken sad fucker?”
He gave what could only be seen as a nasty grin and for a second, behind the outward affable manner, lurked a street cop with lots of hard edge.
I liked him a little more, said,
“You have some moves.”
He relaxed, reached over for my pack of soft box Reed’s, asked,
“May I?”
I said,
“Sure, need a light?”
He did.
He sat back, assessing me, then,
“Here’s the thing...”
Pause.
“Jack.
Two young men are murdered,
Then their father hangs himself.
You save a guy from drowning,
You steal a Garda-issue coat.
A pedophile grabs your girlfriend’s boy.
You rescue him.
Then the said kiddie bollix is found in pieces in a bog in Connemara.”
I must have looked startled, so he said,
“Ah, you didn’t know that, but to continue.
A filmmaker documenting your life and the very sad sack you saved are killed under very suspicious circumstances, and the widow of the dead father meets you, then she kills herself.”
He took a deep breath, leaned over, asked,
“May I?”
And took a healthy dose of my Jay.
Continued.
“Then, for fucksakes, your ex-wife asks you to mind your young daughter and she is gunned down right in front of you—the daughter, that is—and you have to wonder: what the fuck is going down here?”
I said nothing for a solid minute. I timed it, then said,
“You have one error in your account.”
“Only one?”
“I didn’t steal item 1834, the Garda coat.”
He nearly choked, spluttered the last remnants of his coffee, gasped out,
“That’s what you’re focusing on, seriously? How so fucked is that?”
I signaled to Ollie who was getting more than a little pissed about all the table ser
vice, not to even mention the smoking.
I said,
“You want to know what I’m focusing on, where my ruined mind is as we speak, as the death of
Gretchen
Occupies every nightmare moment of my being, do you really want to hear what is in my mind this very moment?”
Ollie brought the drinks, did not speak.
I lifted my glass, said,
“This is what I use as a mantra to blind my mind.”
Took a large swallow, lit up, then intoned in a dead fashion:
“The window in the wall is the Sacred Host, the window between two worlds, as a window belongs at once to both the room inside and the open air, so the Eucharist belongs to both time and eternity...”
Pause as I struggled for breath, then on:
“So just as natural light comes through a window so does supernatural light come through.”
There, I was done, madness articulated.
He looked ashen, this streetwise cop who thought he was calling some shots, and now wondered if he sat opposite a deranged individual, a man who was not only crushed and broken but had, as they say in crime novels,
Lost his marbles.
Long, tense, loaded silence, then he said,
“We arrested David Lee for shooting your girl. Seems he believed you had him near beaten to death over a dog. A dog for chrissakes?”
The Jay was weaving its lethal dark alchemy and I asked,
“Not a dog lover then?”
He reached in his jacket, took out one of those police-issue notebooks, and for a mad moment I regretted the loss of the career I might have had with the Guards. But it was but a fleeting dead angel, never meant to fly.
I asked,
“Ever listen to Iris DeMent, ‘No Time to Cry’?”
He looked up from his notes, snarled,
“I look like a bollix who has time to listen to tunes?”
He read from the notes:
“Michael Allen, psycho extraordinary. Seems he is the root of all your, how should I say...”
Pause.
“Woes?”
I said,
“If you know him, about him, why is he still free and killing like he has a franchise?”
He grimaced.
“Time and time again, we thought we had enough to do him but witnesses always vanish.”
I said,
“And yet he seems to do exactly as he likes.”
He nodded, went,
“Even putting it to one of your old ladies.”
Waited for my reaction but I was too mutilated to rise to easy bait. I said,
“Delicate turn of phrase.”
He asked,
“That’s it? You’ve gone fucking philosophical about him?”
I stood up, drained my glass, slowly buttoned the controversial coat, said,
“Leave a tip for the barmen.”
He stood, contempt on his face, sneered,
“Just walking away. Hear from sources that is what you do best.”
I put a rake of notes on the counter for Ollie, who nodded in sympathy. He’d heard the last comment. I turned very slightly, moved my face close to supercop, whispered,
“I’m going to shoot him on Friday, at about three in the afternoon, so you can be there to make the big arrest.”
He moved back a step.
“Are you serious?”
I pondered, then,
“Maybe it’s the drink talking.”
Debated.
Added,
“Could be Thursday. I’m lousy with dates.”
36
The Sagrada Família,
Gaudí’s
temple of madness
triumph
ruin of Catholicism
monument to the greatest victory
brutal failure
breathtaking
glorious
without any semblance of order or even sanity,
but
at a certain time in the late evening,
before the revelers of Barcelona
begin to stir,
there is a profound silence
like the silence
before the bolt
on a Remington rifle is racked.
37
They killed the black swan.
By they, I mean, of course, Michael Allen.
He left the poor creature’s head at my door, with a note:
“Prepare for your swan song, Taylor.”
Oh, I was preparing.
Had the Jeep and on a Wednesday drove out to Anthony’s mansion / stately pile, broke in easily, and stole the Remington rifle plus six long shiny bullets.
Studied Michael Allen’s routine in the house he shared with my ex-wife.
How utterly fucked up is that sentence.
Every Tuesday, he strolled to the local pub, careless in his arrogance and so convinced of my cowardly acceptance of every new outrage he visited on me.
Never even gave the Land Rover a second glance.
I had the back window open and, lying prone along the backseat with a pillow as sniper’s block, I watched him saunter from the house.
I think he may even have been whistling
“The River Kwai March.”
I shot him first in the right knee.
Let him fall and the actual revelation of what was happening dawn on him.
I muttered,
“Suck on that.”
But didn’t feel a whole lot. Mainly my mind was consumed by, of all things,
Gaudí.
Yeah, as I pulled the bolt on the rifle, it gave a satisfying thud, like my favorite clunk of a Zippo.
Second shot to the gut.
They say it is the most agonizing.
He certainly roared enough. I watched,
Whispered, like a blasted prayer, a crazed mantra,
Gaudí.
“I’d go to Barcelona,” I said.
Then a third shot right between the eyes.
Lit a cig with, of course, the Zip.
The door of the house pulled open and I saw Kiki run shrieking down to the piece of garbage, got in the driver’s seat, and pulled away, no hurry.
I even turned on the battered radio and Jimmy Norman was reporting from, get this,
Catalonia!
If you believe in omens,
Or such drivel,
You might think it was auspicious.
I thought of Barca and Messi and the most glorious football club in the world.
Left the Jeep back where I found it, dumped the rifle in the Corrib.
Thought of the black swan, her beautiful plumage black as my heart.
I went home, made a hot toddy, it being November and the Feast of the Holy Souls.
Waited for the supercop to come get me.
He didn’t.
Nobody did.
Go figure.
Mainly, I couldn’t give a toss.
*
Next morning, I went to Annette Hynes in Corrib Travel, booked an all-expenses trip to Barcelona.
On my way home, ticket secured, I went to Dubray’s bookshop, looked at an art book featuring Gaudí.
I heard a female voice say,
“Dude, you down with Gaudí?”
Turned to face a young goth woman with all that kohl eyeliner.
Jet white face, serpent sleeve tattoo, and for a mad moment I thought Em / Emily / Emerald had come back from the dead.
Shook my head, went,
“And you are?”
She said in a very Brit, upper-class accent,
“Jericho.”
I nearly laughed, said,
“But of course you are.”
The Jericho saga would have to hold until I had my vacation.
Don’t you think?
We hope you enjoyed this book.
About Ken Bruen
The Jack Taylor Series
An Invitation from the Publisher
About Ken Bruen
KEN BRUEN is one of the most prominent Irish crime writers of the last two decades. He received a doctorate in metaphysics, taught English in South Africa, and then became a crime novelist. He is the recipient of two Barry Awards, two Shamus Awards and has twice been a finalist for the Edgar Award. He lives in Galway, Ireland.
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First published in the United Kingdom in 2018 by Head of Zeus Ltd
Copyright © Ken Bruen, 2018
The moral right of Ken Bruen to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.