“Please tell me what is the meaning of this, Mr. Cleary, if you’d be so kind?”
Niall turned and saw the regal fearful bearing of Very Senior Postperson Raichoudhury, whose dark tunic was buttoned all the way up past his Adam’s apple in a way that made everyone think of an overzealous parking attendant rather than the officer he secretly wished he could have been. The tall ascetic figure cut across the small room and pointed a neatly manicured finger at the floor, where several sheets of paper still lay spread about. He acted as if he had legions under his thumb rather than two people, and Mrs. Cody was out sick.
“I am really quite concerned about your attitude, Mr. Cleary, I don’t mind telling you. What on earth are you doing here so late anyway, may I ask?”
“Just drawing, sir.”
“Again?”
“’Fraid so, sir.”
He now stood so close Niall could see the belt buckle the older man had inherited from his great-great-grandfather, who had “taken Ayub Khan’s guns” during a glorious battle against a warlord sometime during the Second Afghan War in the mid-1800s. The gangly supervisor had once taken a sun-stained photograph out of his wallet and showed it around the office. On it, a man very like Mr. Raichoudhury himself sat astride a magnificent horse, wearing a striped turban and carrying a serious-looking lance while daring the photographer to do anything but tremble at the sight. “He was an officer with the Twenty-third Bengal Cavalry,” he had once explained to the largely unenthusiastic Mrs. Cody. He always shined the buckle, Niall remembered, on which a complex coat of arms signaled death before dishonor or something.
At present, however, the Bengal Lancer’s descendant didn’t have death in mind so much as office discipline. He looked at the sorry desk as if he now regretted having given it to this young man, who clearly couldn’t be trusted not to mess about after closing time. Then his eye fell on the bin’s open latch, and he looked as if he missed his ancestor’s weaponry after all.
“What the devil is . . .” He walked over and gently swung the gate shut. Then he turned and fixed Niall with a withering glare every bit as deadly as Ayub Khan’s guns. “Go home, please. And come see me tomorrow, first thing. I think there are several things about your . . . deportment which we have to talk about at length.”
“Yes, sir,” answered Niall. He slipped Fiona Walsh’s fat envelope into his bag by using a back issue of Jeff Alexander’s most recent comic book, The Road to Boot Hill, as a shield. On the cover, three nearly naked female gunfighters aimed their pistols at the reader, which in this case was an increasingly exasperated Mr. Raichoudhury.
“Now, please,” said the imagined officer, as if ordering about a dimwitted redcoat recruit on the bloody battlefield near Kandahar. He followed Niall all the way through the shoe repair shop (behind which the entire post office was ignobly sandwiched) and pushed him out the front door, which he locked from the inside. He could be heard to mutter something about “no respect” as the sound of his leather heels faded into the bowels of the smallest post office in creation.
ONCE OUTSIDE, NIALL lit up a smoke and through the shuttered keymaker’s station could see his boss once more stepping into the dead-letter bin as if to ascertain whether young Niall had somehow besmirched his holy office. Niall took a deep drag and remembered what he was carrying. He walked over to the main intersection in front of a lit-up newsagent’s window, fished the envelope from his bag, and opened it.
A black book lay inside, like a headstone from the graveyard nearby.
Its cover, made from coarse cotton, was rough to the touch. A deep gouge ran across the bottom half, almost as if it had been used for defense. He held it up to the light. No, more like it had been wedged somewhere for safekeeping, maybe jammed down behind a radiator, which had singed its dark fibers. Niall already imagined how Fiona had managed to hide it from her aunt. But what was inside it? Lurid tales? Hidden accounts? A treasure map, perhaps?
“Shut up, you eejit,” he said to himself, dampening expectations. “This isn’t Space Colonies.”
He was about to turn the first page when he noticed someone staring at him from inside the shop.
“You all right out there?” asked the cashier, a fat man in a white apron whose cheeks had turned the color of ripe plums. Something about his tone made Niall hide the book.
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Fine, then,” said the man, and took a bite out of what from a distance looked like an extremely ambitious-sized tea cake while following a rugby game on TV.
Niall nodded and continued over to his bicycle, which still waited patiently by the tobacconist’s, even if he’d forgot to lock it again. He strapped the bag across his chest and swung his long leg across the iron bar, where the paint was peeling like autumn leaves. As he pedaled up Dublin Road, he could see the faint white glimmer of a jetliner’s anti-collision lights as it navigated a landing approach to town right above the professionally cute storefronts. It was nearly midnight.
Niall didn’t feel any impatient spirits gliding past on the road next to him as he biked the long trip home, nor did he even sense the faintest whisper of anger from two girls who refused to be forgotten.
But if Stash Brown himself had been the accidental carrier of Fiona Walsh’s black book, he would have brought along his very biggest laser gun and never taken his eyes off the handlebars. Because two impatient ghosts were sitting backward right in front of Niall’s face on the chromed steel, itching for him to open the damn thing and begin to read.
OSCAR HAD EATEN through everything when Niall stepped into the tiny one-room flat they shared in Ballymun.
When Niall had come to town from way out in the arse end of nowhere, nobody who lived there ever called it anything but “the Mun,” which, to him, sounded a bit like war-weary Vietnam veterans describing “the ’Nam.” He quickly came to realize that the cluster of concrete towers intended for social regeneration had worked inversely, turning the Mun into something like an urban ghetto straight out of the charming old East German Republic.
Seven buildings—each named after a martyr of the Easter Rising in 1916, when a small band of Irish fighters trying to birth a nation had held out against the British Army—had blighted North Dublin for decades with Stalin chic. A local initiative was finally under way to restore civic pride in the place by leveling the eyesores, one after another, but Niall’s own solitary black Lego piece, called Plunkett Tower, still yawned at him each night when he neared home. The Mun always beat a happy mood, hands down, even with new and airy plans for parks and the like. Who were they kidding? he thought. This wasn’t cappuccino-land and never would be. It was a place populated by knackers, real ghetto tinkers like the ones they still had out in Tallaght, with sharpened coins and worthless lotto tickets in their pockets. To them and everyone else around, these places would forever be the Knackeraguas and Tallagh-fornias of their past, and fuck their regeneration.
But Oscar didn’t care either way, as long as there was enough food. The orange tabby blinked disinterestedly when he heard the door and climbed up on a chair to allow Niall an unobstructed view of the damage he’d been proud to cause: one mangled telephone cord, two eviscerated Mars bars, and at least ten tea bags swiped from the kitchen and scattered to hell and gone like the mummified mice he dreamed of when he looked the most peaceful.
“Love you too, you orange fucker,” Niall said, and began cleaning up. But he quickly settled at his work desk, which Oscar never came near because he hated the smell of ink and of the lacquer coating the pens. The cat purred and turned his head toward the first light, still not visible out across the cement ocean, even from the forever grimy windows on the twelfth floor.
Niall dug the black book out of his bag and placed it underneath his brightest architect lamp. Now he could see that someone had carved the initials F. W. into the felt by running a ballpoint pen over the same spot over and over. Fiona Walsh? This could be the genuine article. But he’d have to wait and see. He waited for Oscar to
give him a sign to continue, but the sugar-sated cat merely glanced at him with that classic heartlessness peculiar to its kind that seemed to say, Whether it kills you or not, I won’t go hungry to bed. So go ahead, stupid fucker, and see if I care.
Should he ring the gardaí? he wondered for a moment, hefting the book in his hands. It could be evidence. It might be important and help solve the murder case. His ears burned. NIALL CLEARY IS TOWN HERO! screamed the headline inside his head. His hand was on the telephone. Then it snaked left, as if by itself, and touched the rough black canvas again.
He finally turned the first page and forgot all about the cops.
Though he couldn’t know it then, his life—or at least the repetitive existence he’d so far known—would never again be the same.
Niall’s heart quickened as he read the first few words of the tightly lettered scrawl that filled page after page. There were spots of dried blood and tears on the thin onionskin paper. Or was it sweat? He compared the penmanship to the words on the envelope, and they matched. Same ragged downstroke, similar tight loops on the vowels. Written in a hurry. Not cozy like, with tea or a bowl of crisps nearby. Nails had dug into the paper everywhere, desperate half-moons leaving their dirty imprint.
Just then, daylight came up in the shape of a pale streak of sunlight attempting to carry the entire horizon of gray clouds on its lonesome shoulders, but it was quickly overwhelmed, as if concrete made it wither and die on contact. Darkness fell on the tiny flat that was as solid as the blackest night. Niall turned on all the lamps he had and drew his puffa jacket tighter against the cold, because the heating had conked out again. He ran his fingers across the first sentences of Fiona Walsh’s story and began to read. Niall was firmly in her grasp already, and knew he wouldn’t move until he’d reached the last page.
At the top of the page, she had written:
Dear unknown good friend. Please listen to me. I’m right here, and my time is short. To you I bequeath my story and all my tomorrows, for we will be dead soon. We’ll die in this house because we loved a man named Jim without knowing his true nature. Listen carefully as I tell you what happened.
Part One
FIONA’S
DIARY
• 3 •
She’s finally being quiet downstairs.
I haven’t heard my darling aunt ranting and raving for at least an hour. That means I have a little while to write myself warm. So before she starts back up again with her banging on the door and her accusations of murder, I thought I’d better introduce myself to you.
I’m Fiona, Fiona Nora Ann Walsh, and I’ve been inside this bloody house for nearly three months. I’m manky. Smell like a monkey’s arse. The dress I have on is Thai silk, or at least it used to be. People at home told me I was pretty, but usually only after they’d told my sisters first and meant it. Forget your guilty conscience, okay? If you have found this diary, you can’t save me. But even so, at least remember me. Promise me you won’t forget who I was and how I came to be here. Because being carted out in one of those rubber bags without a soul knowing the true full story is more than I can bear to imagine.
Just so we don’t get off on the wrong foot, let’s get something straight: Don’t start feeling sorry for me. I can take care of myself, even now. A month ago, just before evening room inspection, I found some hairpins and a screwdriver in a drawer she had forgotten to padlock, and I hid them inside my mattress. For the last couple of nights, after I’ve checked on Róisín, I sharpen the screwdriver on the raspy edge of the brick wall near the window. It’s already pointed enough to puncture three demon aunties. And I only need to jam it into one. But I have to wait, to listen. Because when the time comes, I will have just one chance. I sometimes hear scraping from her room downstairs, as if she’s dragging something across the floorboards. I bet she’s found something heavy to beat my skull in with: a pickax, perhaps, or a shovel. But can she even lift it? I’m not so sure. Last I saw of her about two days ago, through my upstairs window, she looked as shriveled as poor Rosie.
I’m dizzy all the time now, day and night. And that’s not just from eating potatoes and bread. It’s a feeling somewhere bubbling up inside me that’s like my guts being shoved sideways. Or drying up by themselves, leaving a big hole of nothing. I’m not sure I can describe it right, but I know she had a hand in it, whatever it is. I’ve been bleeding when I pee. Róisín, too. At night, my Rosie whimpers like a barn animal and cries for our mother.
We’ve heard nothing from the basement for a while, just a clattering sound that could have come from anyplace, really. I’m afraid it’s just the two of us up here now on the second floor. I wouldn’t put it past that bitch to have flooded the downstairs hole with her garden hose, just to make sure nobody who might be able to help us made it out alive. But we would have heard that, I suppose. So would the neighbors. And from the sound of it, Aunt Moira’s strength is ebbing, too. It’s become a question of will now, I think, not faith. Endurance. I ran more half marathons than that whore. She may worship her plastic Jesus, but I have my hatred for Moira and my love for little Rosie. And that’s stronger than a hundred self-serving rosaries from that wretched woman, now, isn’t it?
Help has often been so close I could smell it. But it’s never come to visit.
Recently, I’ve seen a few people right outside on the footpath stopping and staring at my upstairs window, including that funny little postman with the lopsided smile. He always looks like he’s thinking about something, making up his mind. His grin always just hangs on his face, even after Auntie Moira stopped inviting him inside.
Because he knows.
I know he does. He just doesn’t want to admit it to himself. But what would I have been willing to believe myself before this entire thing began? That one murder can lead to imprisonment and preparing to kill your own family? I doubt that I would. And the postman is putting it out of his mind, too, I’m sure. Because you never believe what your eyes tell you. You trust what you feel in your gut and compare with your own experience. That’s the reason old ladies who lived next to serial killers for years always tell the papers what a “wonderful normal boy” he was. You refuse to believe in the presence of evil and go searching for the good “at the bottom of the soul.” Me and Rosie, we know better now. If there’s black tar in that well, you won’t find fresh flowers when you drain it.
Two weeks ago, when I was sure Auntie Moira was listening for the postman downstairs by the front door, I pulled the curtains aside and waved as he started up the front steps. He blinked and stopped for a second. I could see him through the curtains, praying he’d turn around, run down the street, and ring the fucking guards. But he trusted only his eyes, I’m sure. And his eyes had seen a fluttering piece of lace that the wind had moved, not me. The mail was delivered, and we weren’t. Lately, when I see him coming, it’s as if he averts his glance from my window as he hurries for the mail slot. He wants to make sure he can live with his guilty conscience. And fair play to him, I suppose. You have to be able to tolerate yourself, right?
That means it’s up to me to save us. Me and my prison-shank screwdriver. Unless I can find something better before it’s time. Something to beat her brains in with.
Wait.
Hold your breath with me. Don’t make a sound.
Because I can hear her downstairs. She’s rummaging through those drawers of hers, and there’s the rattling sound of metal on metal. Scissors, maybe. Or knives. Can you hear it? Clanking together like a dragon gnashing its teeth. She shouldn’t be up this late, it’s past half two in the morning. Something isn’t right. Usually, the yelling and the screaming only begin after what we’ve got used to calling breakfast around here.
There—now it’s quiet again. But she’s preparing for something, I know she is. Perhaps she’ll make her final assault tonight or tomorrow. So I don’t know how long our time together may be. When I stole this book from underneath her Bible last month, I thought we might make it another three weeks
. To be honest with you, now it feels more like three days.
But I promise you this: I will write until I can’t move my hands any longer. She’ll have to pry this pen right out of my fingers, and get past my screwdriver doing it, won’t she? So take notes, if you like, because I might remember things out of order, even if I want to tell you everything just the way it happened. We’ll never meet, you and I, but it’s important for me to know that you can trust me. Just have a little bit of patience. I’ll get to all of it.
You need to know something right away, just so you don’t go thinking we’re innocent lambs, for only children who haven’t told their first lie are innocent.
Auntie Moira is right about one thing.
We are murderers, as sure as my hand is shaking on this damn paper. And while it’s a sin, and I don’t look forward one bit to accounting for it on the other side, I’ll never regret it. There are good and bad deaths, just as there are innocents and people who need to be killed. We had a choice in the matter, I’ll tell you that. Only cowards and wankers who whinge when they’re caught make up stories about how God or destiny “forced their hand.” We used good solid steel to do it and wiped our hands in the grass afterward. And we didn’t lose one night’s sleep. I’m getting ahead of myself again, sorry. Read on, and perhaps you’ll understand how such contradictions can exist inside someone whose biggest concern until recently was trying to remember our lives the way they used to be. Before Jim.
As we’ve now been introduced, I suppose it’s only fair for me to admit something else to you, something that’s much harder than labeling us as killers:
It’s my fault. All of it.
Darling Jim Page 3