Bad Catholics

by James Green

  Jimmy shrugged. ‘I’m alive so I suppose not. Bridie isn’t easy to hide so she must be clever.’

  ‘OK, Jimmy, but if it’s you on your own, count me out.’

  He got up. ‘Flowers or donations?’

  Jimmy smiled.

  ‘Just what comes to hand, Tommy,’ and as Flavin got to the door he added, ‘If you’re out, does that mean you’re going to be a good copper?’

  Flavin paused. ‘I suppose so, Jimmy. If anything happens, well, I’ll have to cover myself.’

  ‘That’s OK, A10 aren’t what’s worrying me just now. I just wanted to know.’

  Flavin opened the door and left to resume the fight against crime. Jimmy sat for a few minutes then the door opened and Denny Morris walked in.

  ‘Hello, Jimmy. I waited for Tommy to go. I thought we should have a chat.’

  ‘Sure, Denny, just don’t make it a long one.’

  ‘Don’t hurry me, Jimmy. You might not have anywhere to go.’

  He sat down. ‘I’m going to do you a favour, then you’re going to do one for me. I’m going to forget all about a young lad who became copper and is now a DS, who once helped knock over a jeweller’s in Highbury, and I’m going to try and persuade Harry not to use that job to deal with the charge he’s up for. I don’t promise anything though. How much Harry says depends on a lot of different things. If it looks like Harry and the others have to go down, then he’ll use it. Helping with the clear-up rate always counts as a favour and, as we both know, in the jewellery store job Harry really did it, so all the details will hold up, including who he had with him.’

  ‘All of them, Denny?’

  ‘I don’t get your drift.’

  ‘Will he be including you? Because I won’t forget to mention it, even if Harry does.’

  ‘Me? I’m pretty sure that I was in Marbella when Harry pulled that job. Yes I’m sure I was in Marbella, with about thirty other people who will swear to it if called on.’

  Jimmy shrugged. It hadn’t been much of a threat, and now he also felt sure Denny had been in Marbella at the time.

  ‘What do you want, Denny?’

  ‘A name, just a name.’

  ‘Whose name?’

  ‘The name of the copper who organised the outing that Lenny wanted. The one where I was supposed to get picked up.’

  Jimmy thought for a moment. Was Denny trying to get a cheap confirmation out of him, or did he really not know? Then he decided he didn’t give a toss one way or the other. Being clever just wasn’t worth it.

  ‘It’s too high up for me. Ask Tommy Flavin.’

  Denny smiled and shook his head.

  ‘No, if I ask Tommy he’ll run straight upstairs and then Lenny gets told and we have to do it the hard way.’

  ‘Ask Tommy and then break his legs after he’s told you. He’ll travel slower in a wheelchair.’

  Denny laughed.

  ‘I knew I was right to come to you, Jimmy. But no, that’s no good either. Tommy dead or mangled points Lenny straight to me and there we are again. No, you see, I don’t want to hurt anybody, not this time. I just want to give someone a piece of information. I want the top men to know that it’s no good working with Lenny any more. Soon, very soon, they’ll have to work with me, so why not ease Lenny out and ease me in? It makes good business for everyone.’

  ‘Especially you, Denny. What if Lenny doesn’t agree to be eased out?’

  Suddenly Denny’s voice was full of compassion, a caring voice. ‘Lenny’s a sick man, Jimmy, a very sick man.’ Then he grinned and his voice was normal. ‘He’s only got a year at most.’

  ‘Why give him a year, Denny, if he’s already making mistakes?’

  ‘Well done. Yes, he’s making mistakes but not many people know they’re mistakes and definitely not the coppers. How do you know, Jimmy? I’ve made very sure it’s been kept quiet.’

  ‘Free information, Denny? Now there’s a new idea.’

  Denny relaxed.

  ‘OK, everyone will know soon, when I want them to. Lenny’s got cancer.’

  ‘Terminal?’

  ‘It will be.’

  ‘Is he getting treatment?’

  ‘Lenny doesn’t know. I made sure that when Lenny saw a doctor, I saw the doctor first. He thinks he’s got a persistent infection, nothing to worry about and not too painful, yet. By the time the doctor asks for a second opinion it will be too late. Lenny’s out of the frame.’

  ‘But he still had a go at you?’

  ‘He can see what I want and he still thinks he can stop me. But look what happened. A total balls up. Just get the word placed where it needs to go. It’s not a big favour but I will be upset if you say no.’

  Denny stood up but he didn’t leave. ‘You’re sharp, Jimmy, very sharp.’

  ‘And Harry?’

  ‘Harry? He’ll say nothing. You’re going to be worth a lot more to me on the outside than you would be on the inside. And Jimmy, if we’re going to work together again, get some fucking promotion. A DS is OK but inspector or even chief inspector is better. You’ve got the talent, no reason why you couldn’t go right on up.’

  Jimmy shook his head.

  ‘No thanks. I’m OK as a DS.’

  ‘If it’s the exams …’

  ‘No, it’s not the exams.’

  Denny went to the door.

  ‘Well, we’ll see. Regards to Bernie,’ and he left.

  Jimmy sat and thought. Whatever it was, it wasn’t the exams. He waited a while and then left the pub and decided to walk to the nick. He wanted to think.

  The Merc pulled up like before with two men in front but this time there was no gun visible. Jimmy got in the back beside Bridie. She looked more or less the same but the coat was different. It was worse.

  ‘OK, Jimmy, I’m here, tell me what I want to hear.’

  ‘That was quick, Bridie. Did you come down on your broomstick or were you already here?’

  ‘Fuck you. The day I can’t be ahead of a cripple like you I’ll give up and join the Sally Ann or become a fucking nun. Now tell me what I want to hear.’

  ‘Soon, Bridie, but I want you to come with me somewhere.’

  She gave him a look and her eyes still scared the shit out him. ‘Careful, Jimmy. I like you, but I don’t like you that well.’

  ‘I want to go to church, Bridie. You can say a prayer for Jamie, and maybe light a candle.’

  Jimmy wasn’t being funny, he meant it, Bridie could tell. ‘You found him?’

  He nodded.

  ‘Then that’s all I need. Fuck your candles, give me my boy.’

  ‘Listen, Bridie, I told you you’d get the price when I knew what it was. Now I know. The price is five grand and this has to be done just how I say.’

  ‘Or?’

  ‘Or it doesn’t get done at all.’

  Bridie sat silent for a moment, then she said to the driver, ‘Go somewhere quiet, Colin.’

  Colin nodded and the car pulled away and joined the traffic.

  ‘OK, Bridie,’ Jimmy was trying hard to make his voice sound calm, ‘but it won’t do you any good.’

  ‘No, but it’ll make me fucking feel better.’ And they drove on in silence.

  The Merc stopped at a derelict riverside site. Colin and the other man got out. The other man had the gun again.

  ‘Get out,’ said Bridie.

  Jimmy got out, Bridie followed.

  ‘Turn round, Jimmy, and kneel down. I don’t want you to hurt yourself when you fall.’

  Colin laughed. Jimmy turned round and knelt down. He felt the gun muzzle being placed on the back of his head.

  ‘Tell me where Jamie is or Bobby blows your fucking head off. There’s no third way.’

  ‘My way or not at all, Bridie.’

  So Bobby blew Jimmy’s head off.

  When Jimmy came to and opened his eyes Bobby was standing over him still holding his gun and Colin, the driver, was putting a gun away. Bridie was getting into the car.

  ‘OK,
Jimmy, we’ll go to church and I’ll listen.’

  Jimmy got up and got into the car and pulled the door shut, he didn’t feel well.

  ‘Fucking hell, Bridie, every time I get into this car I need new trousers.’

  Bridie laughed.

  ‘Don’t worry, that seat’s been wet and worse plenty of times. But Jimmy, if I don’t like what you say at church you won’t be needing trousers of any sort any more. Tell Colin where to go.’

  Half an hour later Jimmy and Bridie sat at the back of St Patrick’s, Kilburn. They were the only ones there.

  ‘So, Jimmy, tell me what your way is.’

  ‘Jamie was killed about two days after he came down here. His body was doused with petrol, burned, and put in a shallow grave on a farm just outside London.’

  ‘The farm belongs to Lenny Monk?’

  ‘I suppose so. Anyway it belongs to someone who wouldn’t disturb that bit of ground for a long time.’

  ‘You know who did it then?’

  ‘No. I know what was done and where to find the body. Just getting that was expensive. No one wants you around here, Bridie, because you’re trouble and people who poke into Lenny Monk’s affairs have very nasty accidents. He may be slipping but he still pulls more weight than anyone else. Finding Jamie and staying alive while I found him cost me a lot.’

  ‘You’ll get paid. Did you say you’ve got him?’

  ‘Yes, Bridie, but I had to move bloody quick. If Lenny got wind of what I wanted or who I wanted it for, Jamie would have disappeared for good. So would I. And there was a good chance Lenny would find out. If I could get the information, so could others. You know how it is, why get paid once when you can get paid twice? If the information was important to me that made it important to others.’

  ‘So, your neck is still out and when Lenny finds you’ve moved Jamie he’ll chop your head off. But if I was you, I’d worry about me before you worry about Lenny Monk.’

  ‘I’ll take my chances. You need me, and Lenny’s got other problems at the moment.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Cancer, stomach cancer. He’ll be dead inside the year.’

  Bridie was surprised. ‘Cancer. Dead in a year?’ She thought about it. ‘Too fucking true he’ll be dead in a year, Jimmy, but it won’t be cancer, it won’t be that easy for him.’ She looked away, then turned back. ‘Thanks for that. I wasn’t in any hurry before. Now perhaps I am. But Jamie first. If you’ve got him, I’m taking him home.’

  ‘If you want to, Bridie, but if you do then that’s all you’ll do.’ He knew he was on very thin ice. He was praying the ‘thank you’ bought him something. ‘Look, you can take Jamie home but what then? It’s not going to be easy to square the paperwork on this one and even if you manage it how will you square the law?’

  Bridie gave him a look that said squaring the law wasn’t something she worried about.

  ‘OK, let’s say you’ve even got enough muscle to manage that, do you have a bent priest on your payroll?’ he continued.

  She began to understand.

  ‘It’s up to you. You can get some of it by money and threats but how much do you want, do you want all of it? How much is a proper Requiem Mass for Jamie part of it? If it doesn’t matter, say so, and you can have Jamie tomorrow.’

  She sat quietly. ‘Fuck off for a minute. I want to think.’

  Jimmy got up, blessed himself mechanically with the holy water by the door, and went out. Colin was leaning against the car. He stood up when Jimmy came out alone. Jimmy went across to him.

  ‘Relax, Colin, she’s thinking.’

  Colin walked past him and went into the church. He came out again quickly. ‘That’s dreadful fucking language to use in a fucking church.’

  They waited.

  Bridie came out after about a quarter of an hour and got into the car. Colin, Bobby and Jimmy got in and the car pulled away. The smell from Jimmy’s trousers was making him feel sick but no one else seemed to notice it. The car drove on for a few minutes.

  ‘Can you get a proper Mass for Jamie?’

  Jimmy nodded.

  ‘Yes, in that church. Money will square the undertaker and the priest will be told that Jamie McDonald was a young man from Glasgow who died in a building-site accident while he was working down here.’

  ‘What about the paperwork?’

  ‘It won’t cost much, there’s nothing to it, just a young Jock’s sudden death, sad but of no interest. I can make the story work around here. I can use the right people so the priest won’t know any different and there’s nothing for Lenny to know unless you make a fuss.’

  ‘I want it done right, no hole-in-the-corner pissing about, a proper big Mass.’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘And I don’t like cremation.’

  ‘If you can swing moving him up to Glasgow for actual burial, that’s up to you. With this story it should be easy enough. But I’ll need to know. The funeral’s got to be soon, no more than a week.’

  Bridie was silent.

  ‘Don’t be greedy, Bridie, don’t lose him again.’

  ‘OK, Jimmy. Now take me to see him.’

  ‘I can take you but you can only see the coffin. It’s sealed.’

  ‘Then I’ll fucking open it.’

  Jimmy spoke quietly. ‘You can, Bridie, but what do you want your memories of him to be? I know you’ve seen it all, but this is your son, this is Jamie. You know how long he’s been dead and what was done to him. Is that what you want to remember?’

  For a second Jimmy thought Bridie would cry.

  Then she said, ‘So I pay you five grand for a heavy box and just take your fucking word it’s Jamie? What d’you take me for, pal?’

  Jimmy felt in his pocket.

  ‘Here you are. I thought you’d want something.’

  He handed her a small plastic bag. Bridie unwrapped it and took out two dirty items. One had once been an open razor with an ivory handle and elaborate decoration engraved on the blade and the other had been a cheap rosary.

  ‘I took them off Jamie. There was nothing else to speak of, nothing I thought you’d recognise. Apart from the body that’s all there is.’

  She nodded. They were both presents from her to her youngest son, the rosary at his First Communion and the razor on his sixteenth birthday. He had always said they brought him luck. She had known that Jamie was dead, now she would soon know where he was.

  ‘OK, take me to him.’

  Jimmy gave Colin the instructions and they went to an undertakers where Bridie was reunited with her son.

  The funeral took place on a Wednesday morning. The priest had been given all the information he needed to speak of a young man who had died far away from home, of a young life cut short by a tragic accident, of the family’s sorrow. Everything was well done, the church was full, Jimmy had seen to that, there was even a choir. Bridie and her two remaining sons were alone on the front bench. Jimmy was surprised that they all knew when to stand, sit, and cross themselves. They weren’t the strangers to the Mass he had expected. Colin and Bobby stayed outside across the street in the Merc.

  Later, before the funeral cars pulled away from the church, Bridie came up to Jimmy and gave him an envelope.

  ‘It wasn’t what I wanted but he got sent off right. Now I’ll take him home.’ She stood quietly for a moment. ‘Thank you, Jimmy, this was a family matter. My business with Lenny Monk will come later.’

  She said it like a woman who didn’t say thank you often if she ever said it at all, and she had said it twice to this man.

  ‘OK, Bridie.’

  Jimmy pocketed the envelope without opening it. She turned and left him.

  The white Merc pulled out after the hearse and the black limo carrying Bridie and her two sons. No other cars followed. That was it, thought Jimmy. It had been risky, it still was, but it was worth it and the real payment he had received was nothing to do with the heavy packet in his coat pocket.

  NINE

  Paddi
ngton, February 1995

  Next morning when Philomena came into the dining room she found Jimmy asleep at the table, his head on his arms. She made some tea and put a cup on the table beside him before gently waking him.

  ‘Have you been here all night? There was no need for that.’

  ‘I needed to think something out, I’m all right.’

  Jimmy picked up his tea and took a drink. He needed it.

  ‘God, Jimmy, you look dreadful. You know, when I was a young Sister, girls the same age as me used to be sorry for me, that I wouldn’t have a husband, a man in my bed. They thought, what a pity, does she know what she’s missing? But lots of the married women, especially the older ones, used to look at me in a way I couldn’t understand back then: as if I had a secret, a lucky way that they had missed somehow. Many’s the time I’ve envied women their husbands and children. But seeing the likes of you in the morning, Jimmy, I thank God I don’t know what sex is like. Children can be a great blessing, but what a price, Jimmy, what a price. The likes of you in the same bed in the morning.’

  And Philomena laughed, hid her face in her hands and laughed.

  Jimmy smiled and spoke with mock seriousness. ‘Well, well, if Mother Superior could hear talk like this, what on earth would she say?’

  Philomena removed her hands.

  ‘She’d say we have the best of it. If you’re built for sex, then get on with it. If you have the choice, if you can do without it, then leave it alone. It’s no different from drink – ten per cent thirst and ninety per cent wishful thinking.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Jimmy, finishing his tea, ‘except after a very short while it’s ten per cent wishful thinking and ninety per cent habit.’

  ‘God help us, you’re a cynic. Even I wouldn’t say it’s as bad as that.’

  ‘Drink?’

  ‘Sex.’

  ‘Sorry, we’re at cross purposes now. You seem to know all about sex and I know a bit about drinking. But you’re the lucky one, at least you are if you got your information second-hand.’

  ‘Which is the best way in both cases.’ Philomena paused and then asked, ‘Did you decide anything in your thinking, Jimmy?’

  ‘Yes, I decided something.’

  ‘Was it to do with us here?’