by Pat Mullan
CREATURES
OF
HABIT
Pat Mullan
CREATURES OF HABIT
By Pat Mullan
An ATHRY HOUSE book
Copyright © 2014 Pat Mullan
ISBN-13: 978-0983865209
ISBN-10: 0983865205
This book is a work of fiction. Any reference to historical events, real people, or real locales is used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from the author/copyright owner.
Cover design by BEAUTeBOOK
Original photography by Stefano Corso at Wikimedia
Praise for Pat Mullan's CREATURES OF HABIT
“Creatures of Habit, the shimmer of evil…”
“There are shades of Chesterton, Dorothy L. Sayers, and even Tom Clancy in Creatures of Habit, Pat Mullan’s powerful new novel. Set mainly in “Celtic Tiger” Ireland, the punning title displays the shimmer of evil that the novel’s hero, the all-too-human Ed Burke, senses throughout. Pederasty, madness, and murder abide in this complex and fascinating story; a story stolen by humanity’s seemingly bottomless capacity for corruption. Ed Burke is just the man to smoke it out. This is certainly one of the most exciting, and powerful, thrillers I’ve ever read—the complex art of the thinker’s mystery. Great stuff!” E. M. Schorb E.M.Schorb, award winning author and poet: winner of The Frankfurt Grand Prize in fiction for his novel, Paradise Square; 1973 International Keats Poetry Prize; Verna Emery Poetry Prize for Murderer's Day, his fourth collection of poetry (Purdue University Press). E. M. Schorb’s new novel, Fortune Island, was published in 2009.
More praise for PAT MULLAN
"Pat Mullan is a natural born storyteller with a gripping, engaging style. He may just be the next big thing in Irish crime fiction." Jason Starr, author of LIGHTS OUT
"Pat Mullan's latest, LAST DAYS OF THE TIGER, is a razor blade down the spine. So fast-paced, expect whiplash. This is Irish noir with a hero whom you'll want at your back in any gunfight. Grab a copy and clear your schedule!" James Rollins, New York Times bestselling author of BLACK ORDER.
“LAST DAYS OF THE TIGER bristles with ingenuity and a plot to kill for …this is a thriller of such high caliber that it transcends all genres…has all the Irish gifts: dizzy narrative, sly humour, and marvelous readability. It rocks!” Ken Bruen, Edgar and Macavity Award winning author of THE GUARDS.
"A high-powered legal thriller chocked full of betrayal, deceit, corruption, and murder. Mullan is Ireland's answer to John Grisham, with a smattering of Ross MacDonald thrown in. LAST DAYS OF THE TIGER will make your head spin." JA Konrath, author of RUSTY NAIL.
“LAST DAYS OF THE TIGER is a tight, intelligent thriller. Author Pat Mullan blends political intrigue and murder with a unique Irish flavor that goes down smooth. His hero, Ed Burke, is striking––almost an anti-hero in some respects. To unravel the deception and save himself, Burke must test old friendships, and determine who to trust in an Ireland changed by the Celtic Tiger. Mullan writes suspense with an edge reminiscent of Bob Ludlum. An author to watch.” Cerri Ellis - MOSTLY MYSTERY REVIEWS
But who so shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea. Matthew 18:6
1
Ireland
The two boys, breathless, reached the west corner of the big study hall and flattened themselves against the granite wall. Night had fallen and the wind had reached gale force. Sleety rain sliced the air like sheets of broken glass. The trees bent and groaned. Wearing short trousers, their legs were scorched red from knees to ankles,
They could see the flashlight coming towards them and they knew they’d have to run again. So they left the shelter of the wall and dashed past the handball court as the lightning illuminated everything. Exposed, they cut across the front lawn and ran towards the outer wall. They could hear the loud squelch of running feet behind them.
A line of ancient oak trees stood like sentries inside the outer wall. They hid between the trees, hoping their pursuers would bypass them. But that was a false hope. The flashlight reached the trees, weaving in and out, getting closer and closer. Panicked, Patrick, the older boy, started to climb the nearest tree. Terry, the younger boy, tried to follow but couldn’t. So he ran, blindly, out of the shelter of the trees. Patrick sat on a branch as the flashlight passed beneath him. He had stopped breathing and his heart thumped so loudly he imagined they must hear it. But they moved on, following Terry as he fled.
Now alone and terrified, Terry ran into the blinding rain, his lungs seared from the effort. Lightning flashed again, silhouetting the old ruined tower that stood inside the north-east boundary of the school. He stumbled over the uneven lumpy ground and, as the lightning flashed again, he saw the scaffolding clinging to the side of the tower. Erected recently by workmen hired to halt the deterioration, it seemed to offer him hope. Reaching the bottom of the scaffolding, he saw a wooden ladder the workmen used to get up to the first level. He started to climb as the lightning ended and the tower once again became pitch-black like the night above. On the first level he crawled over the rough wooden planks that bridged the gap between the metal scaffolding rods until he could feel the tower wall. Standing up he grabbed the next horizontal rod and, bracing himself between it and the wall, leveraged himself to the top level. Now he could hear voices nearby and streaks of light from a flashlight threw ribbons of white across the scaffolding. Trapped now, he realized he had nowhere to go. If he went back down he knew they’d get him. Backing up he found himself on a ledge near the door. He squeezed into the door frame, hoping to somehow disappear.
“We’ve got him! He’s in the tower!” The first priest with the flashlight looked back at his companion, triumph in his voice.
“There he is!” he cried, shining his flashlight upwards until the boy stood transfixed in the glare, like a rabbit caught in a car’s headlights.
“Don’t! Take the light off his eyes!” The second priest, cautious, held the first priest’s arm, “Let me talk to him.”
The first priest hesitated and then moved the light away from the boy’s face, “All right, we’ll try it your way.”
“Terry, can you hear me?
No answer.
The boy stood, fixed like a gargoyle, urine dripping down his bare legs and running into his socks.
“Terry, we are not going to hurt you. We only want you to give us your camera phone. The one you took the photos with.”
No answer.
“Terry, you know we can’t let you keep the photos, don’t you?”
No answer.
“Terry, give us the phone and we’ll say no more about it. Don’t you want to go back to your room? You could catch your death out here on a night like this. You don’t want to die over a few photos, do you Terry?”
No answer.
The first priest, ‘I told you so’ in his tone of voice, cut in, “OK, we tried it your way. It didn’t work, did it? Now we’ll do it my way.”
With the flashlight carving a path ahead of him, he moved to the foot of the ladder and started to climb. The boy saw him coming but he was cornered, nowhere to go. The priest, agile and sure footed, soon reached the top level of scaffolding, within easy reach of the boy.
“Give it to me! Now!”
The boy squeezed even further into the door opening. Sobs gurgled somewhere deep i
n his throat.
The priest, patience exhausted, reached for the boy. But the boy, terrified, tried to squeeze further into the door, lost his balance and fell. Seconds later, they heard the thump of his body on the rocks below.
“Oh, dear God, he’s dead!” The words, almost a wail, escaped from the second priest as they stood over the boy’s body.
The first priest took the boy’s pulse and said, “Yes, he’s dead.” He knelt down beside the boy and searched the pockets of his school blazer. Then he searched the pockets of his trousers.
“Nothing!”
“Maybe he lost it somewhere tonight. Or maybe it’s lying around here. Could have fallen out of his pocket.”
They started to search, lighting arcs around the body, guessing how far a phone could have landed away from the tower. After fifteen minutes they abandoned the search.
“What will we do about him?” asked the second priest.
“Nothing! Leave him here! When he’s missing tomorrow, the prefects will search for him. Someone will find him.”
“There’ll be an investigation.”
“No, there will be no investigation. It’s an accident. Another dare gone wrong. Climbing the tower on a stormy night.”
The second priest couldn’t disagree. He knew that some of the boys got up to daredevil antics, climbing the walls after lights out, things like that. But Terry was never one of them.
“What will we do about the phone? What if it’s lost and somebody finds it?”
“I don’t think he lost the phone. He hid it. Or he gave it to someone.”
They had almost reached the priests’ residence hall and the storm had abated. The first priest stopped, turned to the second and said, with conviction: “That’s it! He gave the phone to someone. We followed two of them tonight. And we lost one of them. Who was he?”
“We don’t know.”
“Well, who was young Terry friendly with? Who was he close to? “
“That’s it, he wasn’t close to anyone. He was quiet. A loner. Kept to himself. I tried to get him to participate. But he always held back, stayed on the fringes.”
“Well, he must have a friend somewhere. He wasn’t alone out there tonight. We’ve got to find that other boy. Soon!”
2
Patrick stayed in the tree for almost an hour. It was nearing midnight, the rain had stopped and the wind had eased. He climbed down and walked, then ran, back towards the junior dormitory. He shared a room on the top floor with Terry and Dermot, a farmer’s son from the country.
Wide marble stairs swept upwards from the entrance hallway. He took off his shoes and soggy wet socks and climbed the stairs in his bare feet. The dormitory was silent. Lights out at ten pm was usually followed by a prefect inspection a half hour later. On some nights the Dean would sneak around about eleven, even as late as midnight, hoping to catch someone in the toilet. He’d relish meting out six on each hand with a leather strap the next morning. Luckily, he encountered no-one and, once on the top floor, he made his way to his room, the fourth door down the hallway.
He turned the door handle gently and entered. As his eyes adjusted to the dark, he could see Dermot bundled up in his blankets, asleep. But the other two beds, his own and Terry’s, were as neat and well made as they’d left them. Terry had not returned. They’d found him! He feared the worst. What would they do to him? As these thoughts overwhelmed him, he shrugged his arms out of his wet blazer, emptying the pockets as he usually did, and saw the phone. Oh, Jesus! I forgot! He gave it to me, to keep it safe for him. He felt afraid, very afraid. Did they catch him? What did they do to him? Maybe they killed him! And he immediately chastised himself for having such outrageous fears. He’s probably still hiding somewhere. He’ll be back in the morning. I’ll hide the phone and give it back to him tomorrow. Although not convinced of his own reasoning, he accepted it. To do otherwise seemed unthinkable to him.
3
Terry was reported missing when he didn’t show up for Mass next morning. A search of the grounds soon found him. John Heaney, the tall geeky senior prefect, was the first to see Terry’s body lying on the ground near the old round tower. The two boys accompanying him ran towards Terry.
“No! Don’t touch him!”
“He’s not moving.”
John Heaney knelt down beside Terry. From the pallor of his skin it was obvious that Terry had been dead for some time.
“Both of you – stay here. Don’t let anyone near him. I’ll tell the Dean.”
The Dean called the Gardai and they notified the State Pathologist, Dr. Mona Kennedy. Luckily she was available and she reached the school by noon. Her preliminary examination showed that death had resulted from internal injuries, most likely caused by an uncontrolled fall from the nearby tower. However, final cause could only be confirmed by autopsy.
In the meantime, the Dean and the President had insisted that the school day continue as normal. But nothing was normal. Classes were subdued, priests taught from textbooks, students sat quietly and sombre. Patrick had Latin and Maths that morning. Latin with Father McGinty, known by his nickname ‘the goat’; English with one of the few lay teachers in the school, Mr. Galligan, a small five foot tall sadist who liked to walk on the top of the students’ desks and pull them up by their ears. Patrick’s darker thoughts often revolved around the most painful way to torture and kill Mr. Galligan. This morning Mr. Galligan was subdued in class, just like everyone else.
Patrick sat in fear all morning. He knew that Terry was dead. Everybody knew. There’d been no announcement. There didn’t need to be. Everybody just knew. And Patrick was afraid. He knew that Terry had been murdered. He just knew. But he couldn’t tell anyone. He didn’t know who to trust. He’d hidden Terry’s camera inside a pair of dirty socks that he’d stuffed in the bottom of his sports bag. What if they searched his room? What if they found it? He couldn’t wait until lunch so that he could go back to his room and move the phone to a safer place.
4
Emmet Joyce got the tearful call from his wife, Claire, in his office at his car dealership, Joyce Motors, at ten a.m.
“Emmet, you need to come home. Now!”
“My God, Claire. What’s the matter? Are you alright?”
“Oh, Emmet …” and she started sobbing uncontrollably.
Emmet, his heart thumping, bracing himself for bad news of some kind, said, “It’s OK, Claire. Take it easy.”
After a minute, her sobbing subsided and she tried again, “It’s Terry. Something happened…”
“What? Is he sick, is he hurt? What happened?”
“Oh, dear God, he’s dead! Our son is dead!” and she started bawling again, this time her piercing cries shattering his ear.
“How? What happened?
“They said it was an accident.”
“Who said …”
“The school. They called me. Said that Terry had been climbing that old tower. Fell out of it.”
“When?”
“Last night, they said.”
“Last night? In that wind and rain! Naw! Terry wouldn’t do that! I don’t believe it!”
“That’s what they said, Emmet”, and she burst out crying, unable to continue.
Emmet Joyce had been bracing himself for bad news of some kind. But not this! His own Terry. His son. Dead! He couldn’t believe it. He could feel the anguish deep inside and the howl that erupted from his throat, a howl of madness. He put his head between his hands and the tears ran freely down his cheeks and through his fingers.
He drove home in a daze, eyes bleary with tears. Claire lay curled on the living room couch, almost catatonic. The blinds were closed. Shutting out the world. He knelt down beside here, laid his head in her lap, and hugged her. After a long time, their crying exhausted, he helped her to her feet and gently walked her into the kitchen. He sat her at the table and made a large pot of tea, her comfort drink. But there would be no comfort today, he knew. They sat there, wordless, for the longest time.
“There’ll be an inquest.”
“I know, I know. But we have to see him. I’ll call the school.”
“We have to tell our family. But I can’t, not this morning. I just can’t.”
“Claire, we’ll see him first. Then we’ll call them.”
5
The dorms were off-limits at lunch time but Patrick took a chance. He had to get that phone. The junior dormitory was empty, not a soul in sight, especially not a prefect. So Patrick took the stairs two at a time and rushed, breathless, into his room. A quick look told him that nothing had been disturbed. But they’d make it look like that, wouldn’t they? He dug out the dirty socks from the bottom of his sports bag and took a deep breath when he felt the phone still inside.
He had to see why Terry died. So he turned on the phone and selected ‘pictures’. There were twelve pictures and, starting with the first one, he selected ‘view’. The first was a goofy self-portrait, the second a snap of the College, and the next three quick shots of fellow students. But it was picture number six that stunned Patrick – and seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, and twelve. The details showed that all had been taken last night, an hour before he and Terry had made a run for it. He went back to number six and looked at each of them again. Each picture showed the same two people, a priest and a student. The priest in the photos was Father Roland Cormack. And he recognized the student too. John Carty! Patrick was shocked. He had never seen anything like this before. And he was frightened. He knew that these photos were very dangerous.