by Jane Ryan
I looked for the return address of Sister Finbarr in Quebec, finding a neat pile from her. They were stacked in date order, so typical of my mother, and I pulled the first one out, golden-washed with age. I settled down on a chaise lounge to enjoy it.
‘My dearest cousin, Elizabeth . . .’
Sister Finbarr’s writing was dainty and as restful to look at as her prose was to read. I lay there reading the first packet of letters and saw my mother and her Laois childhood through her cousin’s words. A breath crossed my cheek like butterfly wings and my eyelids came down of their own accord. I dreamt of bogs at turf-cutting time, the slice of a sleán as it cut through the rich brown peat, taking a single sod with it, and girls skipping towards the workers with a pail full of sandwiches and flasks of tea.
Chapter 15
‘You listen to me, Bridget Harney! Christ, I should have known something was up when you asked for this meeting!’
Joe was standing in his new office in CAB, more of a repurposed toilet cubicle. The chill autumn crept in and a pigeon flapped by, looking for a perch on the lipless window. The sound of belling trams floated up. A pleasant backdrop, were it not for Joe rammed up against the wall on his side of the desk, fists bunched and glaring for Ireland.
‘You might think I’m off on –’
‘But isn’t that you all over, Bridge? Hard lessons given but still the same stubborn girl.’
There are few people who will call me ‘girl’ to my face, but Joe Clarke has the right, given I owe him my place in the Garda.
‘I’m not, Joe, but I’m going to investigate this drug seizure. Any leads I get I’ll share, my movements will be accounted for and I’ll update the systems. I have changed.’
‘No, you have not.’ He rubbed a hand across eyes whose pouches had pouches. ‘You’re still running a tout no one knows anything about.’
‘Who told you?’
‘Your face.’ He held up a hand. ‘You’re secretive, it’s your nature, and I won’t fault you, but you have to put that informer on the Covert Human Intelligence Sources system, at least have some written record of this fellah. You’re dependent on this tout. I’d hate to think –’
‘Someone was leading me astray?’
‘Or that you’re making promises you can’t keep.’
A well-aimed blow. Lorraine Quigley dead in a deep freeze was a punctured pattern in my mind, as if a cobbler had hammered it in with silver nails. I was silenced.
‘That was a step too far, but I need to know who the informer is, Bridge.’
Silence wasn’t serving me, and Joe deserved better.
‘Put up the window,’ I said.
I sat in the small chair and Joe closed the single pane. He had an air of expectation about him.
‘Well?’ he said.
‘Sheila Devereaux.’
A muscle in Joe’s jaw, tucked into a jowl of empty skin, trembled.
‘Jesus, Granny Dev herself? The crooked witch? Are you sure?’ He waved a hand in the air. ‘Stupid. Sorry. I mean, why is she doing this? The oul’ bag has been lying to us for decades, covering up for her own sticky-fingered mother. You know her father disappeared after botching a robbery for that gangster Henchico in the sixties?’
‘They have form, for sure.’
‘Don’t joke, Bridge! Sheila Devereux’s kids are no better – her daughter ran off at fifteen after she’d had Gavin and her son’s serving life in Portlaoise. Why’d she turn Turk?’
It wasn’t a politically correct comment, but that was Joe.
‘Sheila Devereaux has joined the dots. She’s worried for her grandson and Seán. Dealing with the cartels is a death sentence. They’re in over their heads.’
‘Ah, she’s petted Gavin for years and she’s not wrong about the cartels. How did she get to you, outside the normal channels?’
‘The Judge.’
‘What!’
‘Dad sentenced Gavin. He had just turned eighteen. The Judge believes he should have gone easier on Gavin, kept him out of Mountjoy. It’s the only sentence in all his time on the bench he’s ever spoken of with regret. To me at least.’
Joe dipped his head. ‘How well she knew to throw that at you.’
‘She used the same solicitor who worked Gavin’s case to make the approach. He was on the Bails years ago when Gavin was arrested, came with her to the house.’
‘Sheila Devereux came to your house? The oul’ bitch.’
A smile tugged at the corner of my mouth. ‘You never swear.’
‘I know, I let myself down and you, but I’ll make an exception for Sheila Devereaux.’
‘She wants her great-grandchildren to have a chance. Gavin lives in the Gardens. It’s Flannery’s compound, but Gavin’s children are there too. He’s in on every deal Flannery’s ever pulled.’
‘Criminal mastermind,’ said Joe.
That got a laugh from me.
‘Gavin’s as dumb as a box of rocks,’ I said, ‘but his granny isn’t and she wants him out, wants both of them out. Calls them “deboys”, like they’re a pair of scamps. Said this thing with the cartels would end one way, with her family in coffins.’
‘She thinks of Flannery as her family?’
‘I believe so, from what she said – he came to her soon as he left State care.’
Joe looked thoughtful. ‘Do they want relocation? You’ll have to go through C3.’
‘Garda Crime and Security Branch? Why does everyone still call them C3?’
‘Habit – and same people running the show. Anyway, I’ve a friend there, worked with her years ago in Roscrea.’
‘They don’t want relocation – the Devereuxs are enshrined in the East Wall.’
Cogs clicked behind Joe’s eyes, his mouth snapped into a wet circle.
‘She wants Flannery and Gavin in prison?’
‘Yes. In a protected wing of Portlaoise, serving some minor possession charge.’
‘Jesus Christ, she wants State protection for them!’
‘She believes it’s the only place the cartel can’t get them. When Fuentes are destroyed and someone else starts up, the boys can come out and be safe. And I quote.’
‘She told you about the shipment and the Farm?’ said Joe.
‘Yes. I’m guessing she wanted to bring Fuentes to Dublin, in the hope we’d disable whatever retribution they try to deliver and in parallel charge Seán Flannery and Gavin Devereux, keeping them safe in prison. When the “de boys” are released from prison there’ll be no more drug-dealing. Sheila Devereux’s word on that.’
Our mouths twisted in a semblance of smiles, but no mirth.
‘She said that?’
‘And expected to be believed.’
Joe’s chin found his hand, the rough palm scratching off his bristled skin. ‘Sheila Devereux’s had no schooling to speak of, but she’s as cunning as they come. Those crime families in the East Wall are bandits, ignorant and violent. And in this day and age it’s by choice. They glory in it.’
I was taken aback – the soap box was my usual haunt. ‘I’m speechless.’
He smiled. ‘Go on, that’d happen! Any chance you’d tell Flannery his beloved Granny Dev is a tout? He’d burn her place to the ground if he knew.’
‘Ah here, Joe, talk about taking a joke too far!’
‘I was kidding.’
The pinching sensation sliding down my back disagreed.
‘The Fuentes shipment was good intel and it bought us kudos with the brass.’ I jabbed a finger up to the sixth floor, which accommodated two assistant commissioners and a confederacy of chief superintendents. ‘But the whole landscape is about to change as a result of our seizure.’
It was an understatement – we were standing in the vortex of a tornado and at some point we’d have to pass through it.
‘Fuentes will send someone, or several someones,’ said Joe. ‘I’d love to tell you we’ll be all over it, but we won’t. If we’re lucky, some fellah or girl with a record will show up throug
h the National Central Bureau – or Interpol might catch a passport, but it’s unlikely.”
Depressing and accurate.
‘Know what I’d do, Bridge?’ Joe gave me a level stare. ‘I’d let them have at Flannery and Co. The cartel might have them already.’
‘No!’ It was out of me before I could rationalise. ‘You don’t mean that. We know Sheila Devereux’s manipulating us but forewarned is forearmed.’
‘I say we stand by from the safety of the side-lines.’
‘It wouldn’t be safe. You know how many innocent lives would be lost. And the likes of the Devereuxs and Flannery would escape unharmed – they’d be told of our plans well in advance.’
‘Bridge!’
‘You know it’s true –’
‘What have I told you?’ Joe lowered his voice. ‘Do you want O’Connor to end you? And I don’t mean in the Force.’ His face stayed the same, affable to anyone looking in, but the words themselves trembled from rubbery lips.
‘Circumstances point in that direction. The only time Flannery hasn’t been a step ahead of us was this seizure.’
‘You’ve no proof Flannery’s getting information from him.’ Joe scowled.
I pushed a damp strand of hair off my forehead. ‘Lorraine Quigley told me last year Flannery had an informant in the Garda. Do you remember the meeting we had about Flannery’s involvement in Emer Davidson’s murder? Who was in that meeting?’
I answered my own question, knowing by the set of Joe’s mouth he wouldn’t.
‘O’Connor, you and me. He was in all the high-level meetings about the seizure in Kilkenny. Tell me, who was in the briefing when MAOC first contacted us?’
Joe sighed. ‘Muldoon, me and O’Connor, but that doesn’t mean anything, Bridge. The Supers all brief one another.’
I continued, unwilling to be side-tracked.
‘Last year, when we thought we had Flannery, O’Connor denied me the Armed Response Unit when I tried to raid St Martin’s Garden. We had probable cause. The second time he gave me armed support, Flannery was ready and waiting. He’d been tipped off. And another thing I know. Neither of us have two ex-wives and four children in private schools.’ I couldn’t stop myself. ‘Kay was lured into meeting Seán Flannery. I’ll bet he used his informer as bait.’
Joe was pale to begin with but now he was rinsed of colour. ‘Bridget, no more. Not in here.’ He looked out his closed window. ‘You’re going down a dangerous path and for all we know Flannery is manipulating the information you’re getting.’
‘Flannery’s on the hook to the cartel for over two tonnes of coke and prescription drugs. He’s risking his life and the people he thinks of as family, to get me? I don’t think so.’
‘Please, Bridge, take a step back.’
‘No, I can’t.’
‘Bridget, don’t chase O’Connor or the cartels, it’s too dangerous, it’ll change everything, there’s no way back from this.’ He spoke in a slurred panic, a man who believed in the weight of words and that putting enough of them in the right order could change minds. He took a breath. ‘The odds of succeeding are negligible.’
‘I have to try, Joe. I’ll keep Flannery under surveillance until the Fuentes strike, take as many as I can get into custody with Flannery and wring the informer’s name out of him. Then charge Flannery with Kay’s murder as well as trafficking drugs.’
‘Because it’s that simple?’
‘No, Joe, it’s walking a burning tightrope with no net, but what choice do I have?’
He made a reedy sound, somewhere between a sigh and the prelude to a choking.
‘Think about this, Bridge. You can walk away or you can start a war. Because make no mistake, these people are personal. They’ll target you and everyone you love.’
I said nothing. Joe would spot a lie.
‘Your mind’s made up. Go to Muldoon. You’ll need massive resources for this and an ironclad case. Apart from the Commissioner and the ACs, who would have a heart attack if they were asked to go on active duty, he has the kind of heft you need.’
‘The seizure has everyone looking at us and applauding. We’ll get extra resources now. We have a chance, Joe.’
He looked doubtful.
‘Will you help me?’
‘Of course I will, alanna, what else would I do? While we’re at it, put a listening device in Flannery’s car.’
‘Flannery doesn’t drive. Gavin Devereux does all the driving – they use an old Avensis. What are we going to do? Ask Toyota out in Bluebell if they’d give us a copy of Flannery’s key and we’ll black-ops the bugging device in at night? Or better yet, we’ll pose as mechanics and fit up the car when Flannery brings it in for a service. I’m sure Liam can change oil and tyres.’
‘Quite the comedian,’ said Joe. ‘I find the easiest way is often the simplest. Get your tout to plant it.’
I had to hand it to him.
‘If Sheila Devereux won’t do it, she’s not genuine,’ I said.
‘We can’t use any of it in evidence, but it’s a way of her establishing good faith. If she won’t do it, any deal on immunity for Gavin is gone. And while we’re at it, I want to know what Flannery’s up to. Get the solicitor – Richie Corrigan – in here, let’s see if we can’t squeeze him.’
‘He’s downstairs.’
‘Aren’t you the early bird?’ said Joe. The merest hint of a smile.
‘I’m not sure he knows much about what Flannery’s up to. Richie’s getting on a bit. I’d say Flannery uses him because he’s not as sharp as he was.’
‘You could be right, but he might have more information than he realises,’ said Joe.
I gave a tight smile.
‘Don’t stand there grinning. Go and get Corrigan.’
I headed for the lift bank, the idea of Sheila Devereux putting a bug in Gavin’s car a light inside me.
DCS Muldoon’s secretary was in the lift when the doors opened. A formidable woman in her fifties, she was coiffed and manicured, an old-style personal assistant who got Muldoon his tea in a china cup.
‘You look pleased with yourself, Bridget Harney,’ she said.
You had to be above the rank of superintendent before she’d use your title.
‘Just in good form, Josie.’
‘Ms Goddard to you, Bridget Harney.’
She harrumphed and we stayed silent as the lift car descended to reception. I could sing for my next meeting with DCS Muldoon if Ms Goddard took against me. The doors opened onto the too-bright reception. Some architect had shoved a glass box in the old entrance during a renovation, giving the impression the building’s mouth was forced open in a ceaseless howl.
Richie Corrigan stood to greet me and I badged him through the Perspex security gates. His glance snagged on Ms Goddard, flushing when I caught him staring.
‘There’s life in the old dog yet, Richie.’
PART 2
If you look at the drug war from a purely economic point of view, the role of the government is to protect the drug cartel. That’s literally true.
Milton Friedman
(Nobel Memorial Prize Winner in Economic Sciences)
Chapter 16
At the start of every run my joints protested, despite my warm-up. There was a taste in my mouth of old pennies and my breath was coming in piston-pumps, but the pace evened out and my body began to remember the routine. The emptiness of running contracted my problems – they never went away but were easier to deal with. Tonight it was my mother – it was my mother most nights. The loss of her presence in the house, milky clouds in her eyes stripping away her memories one by one. She didn’t recognise me anymore. I ran harder, my lungs iron-hot and bursting in my chest.
At no point did I have a plan but when I found myself in Waterloo Lane, metres away from Paul’s house, I couldn’t deny the thought of him brought me comfort. It was late, past eleven, and he could be out having a late dinner or upstairs with someone after an early bird. Caution was not high on my
agenda as I rang the bell on his front door, my breath frosting on the night air and sweaty ovals of fingerprints left on his glass sidelights. I gave the bell a second tap and winced as digital chimes jangled again. He came down the stairs two at a time, sleep-tousled and yawning.
‘Bridge.’
He wasn’t surprised to see me in the middle of the night, dressed in my running gear. He took my chin in the crook of his index finger, pulling my face close to his and kissed me. I fumbled in the door and he closed it with a push, taking my hand and pulling me upstairs to his bed. There was heat and melting skin until we shared the same space. My moan came from his throat and the catch in his breath from my lungs. He trailed figures of eight around my breasts. Our sweat moulded us together. I peeled away only to join him again, hoarding the sensation of being recoupled. My body was dissolving, made of soft paper turning to pulp, a single splinter of old wood showing.
‘Do you want me?’
‘What?’ His voice was amused in the dark. ‘This isn’t like you, looking for reassurance.’
I didn’t have an answer and leaned into him, travelling down his body.
‘I want you.’ His voice was hoarse.
Chapter 17
The air in CAB’s offices had the texture of cottage cheese when I pushed open the doors, the pong of fried food and overcooked vegetables greeting me. It signalled late hours and delivered food. Joe had asked to meet in one of their poky meeting rooms – to be fair, everything in Harcourt Square was poky or overfilled with gardaí. I was delicate after my night-time tryst with Paul, afraid it would be graffitied on my face and was glad Joe had his own news.
‘Morning, Bridge!’ he said. He was standing at the halfway mark in the doorframe with an excited meercat look to him. ‘In here.’
‘Easy, Joe. You’ll give yourself a hernia with excitement. What’s up?’