by Chris Petit
‘Shut up and co-operate and we’ll make life easy for you,’ Hargreaves told Willcox as he hauled him back into his seat. ‘Forget this is happening and you’ll be looked after. You’ll get hot meals and four-star service. Fuck us and we fuck you. Stick a truncheon right up your fat arse. One word from me is all it takes, so do we understand each other?’
With the psychological boundaries of the room redrawn, Willcox seemed to understand his place and the atmosphere changed. Cross was secretly thrilled by this turn of events. After the briefest of flurries, the change required was brought about swiftly and without mess. Part of him was appalled by his condoning of violence, but this pin-prick of conscience was overridden by a more excited voice that said: we can get away with this. Deep down, it told him: isn’t that what it’s always about? What you can get away with.
Cross repeated to Willcox that their talk was not official. Even so Willcox took a long time deciding. Cross hoped it was face-saving rather than continued resistance. When Willcox took out a cigarette and showed it to Hargreaves, asking permission to smoke, Cross knew he was theirs.
‘OK, shoot,’ Willcox said after lighting the cigarette and expelling a lungful of smoke.
‘Tommy Herron,’ said Cross.
‘Tommy? Dead for years.’
‘Tell me about the man that shot him.’
Willcox asked Cross what that had to do with anything. Cross waved the question aside and repeated that nothing Willcox said would be used against him. He wanted to know about this man.
‘Yeah, I remember. I saw him on the day he did it.’
He went on to explain that – as far as he knew – Herron’s killer was one of a number of British mercenaries who ran the loyalists.
‘What do you mean, “ran the loyalists”?’
‘There were a few reservists and some fellows in the UDR with army experience, but it wasn’t until these Brits turned up that there was any real organization.’
Cross had heard rumours but it was the first time anyone had told him to his face that the British had secretly trained the loyalists to fight the IRA. Hargreaves looked unfazed.
‘So who killed Tommy?’ asked Cross.
‘Who didn’t?’ answered Willcox, looking crafty. ‘They were lining up to shoot him by the end, from what I heard.’
‘What about the man who pulled the trigger? Was he doing it for the Brits?’
Willcox shrugged and lit another cigarette. ‘That’s one story. I also heard he and Tommy fell out over something and the Brits had nothing to do with it.’
His description of Herron’s killer tallied with the one given by McGinley, Mary Elam’s boyfriend: fair hair cut short, blue eyes, slight but wiry build, not tall.
‘You’d not think to look at him that he was dangerous, but I saw him flatten one of Charlie Eddoes’ boys – a big strapping fellow – with the one blow.’
‘Eddoes?’ asked Cross, looking up.
Willcox was vague about what Eddoes did in those days, something on the organization side.
‘Why would the Brits have been involved in Tommy’s murder?’ Cross asked.
‘Let’s say the Brits didn’t miss Tommy when he went. Tommy knew where the bodies were buried.’ Willcox laughed. ‘Another story I heard was an RUC man was behind it because Tommy was giving the man’s missus a pop, so there you go.’
Cross was suddenly having trouble breathing. It was panic, panic at the realization that Tommy Herron’s killer had been acting to secret orders. And might be still with these latest killings.
His mind raced uselessly like a revving engine. The room felt too small and he grew giddy. Finally he managed to ask if Willcox had talked to Moffat about Tommy Herron.
‘Not as such, but we talked a lot about the early days. He wanted to know about the Brits that were around.’
Cross was now even more afraid of Moffat’s game. He was sure now that Moffat was conducting an investigation parallel to his own, but cutting him out by keeping it secret, perhaps even using Cross’s findings to feed his own. However he looked at it, he had the feeling he was facing a cover-up. Willcox was the patsy – a curiously willing one – while Moffat got on with the more serious business of sweeping Cross’s investigation under the carpet.
Willcox was staring at him. Cross realized that he must be looking distraught. He pushed his chair back. His breath felt sour.
‘This man who shot Tommy, did he have a name?’
‘Sinatra—’
‘Sinatra?’ interrupted Hargreaves in disbelief.
Willcox looked at Hargreaves and sneered at him with some of his old defiance.
‘Yeah, Sinatra. Popular singer.’
‘Why was he called that?’ asked Cross quickly.
‘Because his name was Francis Albert. Or so he said.’
‘And Albert was his last name?’
‘As far as I know.’
Cross took a deep breath. He was still shaky. He needed fresh air. ‘What happened to him afterwards?’
‘I heard he left Belfast.’
Willcox ground out another cigarette. ‘There’s another story.’ He looked amused. Cross waited patiently for him to get on with it.
‘There’s a story that he came back working as a gunman for the Taigs.’
‘You mean he changed sides,’ asked Cross in disbelief. ‘Come on.’
Willcox shrugged. ‘I’ve not heard of anyone else doing it, I have to say. Maybe it was just Rah propaganda trying to spook us into thinking one of our own men was running around shooting loyalists. But there were stories that the Taigs had a man with fair hair and blue eyes, like our friend who shot Tommy, and he called himself Dr Death.’
45
CROSS put out a trace on Albert, Francis and drew a blank as he’d expected. He had more calls to make and was cutting it fine. It was past noon and he was due at the O’Neills by one. Each year on the Twelfth of July weekend his parents-in-law held a barbecue for friends with young families. Deidre and the children were already there.
He was about to leave when his phone rang. It was Westerby. She sounded disturbed and apologized for not being able to get hold of him before.
‘Have you seen the papers?’ she asked.
He hadn’t.
‘There was another Psalm yesterday. And one today.’
‘Two in a row?’ Cross was sceptical. He asked her to read them out.
‘This is the one that appeared yesterday,’ she said. ‘Like sheep they are laid in the grave; death shall feed on them. And the one from this morning goes, Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me. What do you think, sir?’
Cross couldn’t get his head round the implications of advertisements on successive days. Nor could he accept what Westerby said next.
‘If he’s sticking to the pattern that means—’
‘I realize what it means. But I can’t believe—’
‘Catherine Edge was fourteen, sir. Before she was killed we couldn’t believe that—’
‘Let’s concentrate on finding our man rather than speculating what he might do next.’
‘I thought you found it useful to speculate, sir.’ Westerby sounded hurt.
‘Up to a point.’
He excused himself by saying that he was late.
Again he was on the point of leaving and was delayed, this time by a hunch. He contacted Molly Connors, telephoning to ask if she had ever met a fair-haired English-man in the company of Breen.
When the answer was yes Cross’s heart gave a leap.
‘What do you remember?’
‘He was English, for a start, so he stuck out being married into a republican family. Short sandy hair, like you say, and a level accent. I remember remarking on the accent and he said bluntly: “It’s as flat as where I’m from.”’
Maybe the marriage accounted for the switch, Cross thought, if there were any truth to Willcox’s story.
Molly had met him only once.
‘Francis to
ld me he’d promised to give the man a ride to Belfast, and sniggered because, like everyone else, he called a fuck a ride.’
She remembered the farm they’d collected him from being off the Newtownhamilton to Keady road in South Armagh, near the village of Derrynoose. The name had stuck in her mind. She met the wife, she added, because they stayed for a cup of tea.
‘It struck me as odd, this taciturn Englishman who did not bother to introduce his wife.’
‘What was an Englishman doing in a republican family?’
‘That was my first thought too. I was curious enough to ask Francis and I can’t remember what he said. Nothing that answered the question, at any rate. I think he said something like: “He has his uses.”’
She said the wife’s family name was Malone and her father an Official of some standing.
Cross wondered if the wife was still on the farm. They might even have their man before the end of the day, he thought with a surge of excitement.
‘What do you remember about the Englishman?’
‘I didn’t really see him. At the farm he disappeared with Francis, leaving me with the wife, and on the drive I sat in the front. I could feel his eyes on the back of my head, and it made me – I don’t know the word.’
Molly at a rare loss for words, thought Cross.
‘He seemed to resent my presence. Francis did all the talking as usual.’
‘Tell me about this feeling.’
‘I don’t know how to describe it,’ said Molly. ‘Well, I do, actually. He made me feel dirty.’
Breen had dropped her in Belfast, saying that the boys were going off to play.
The police at Keady phoned back to say that the farm was empty and had been for some years. However, Becky Malone was easily enough traced through the local library.
Cross checked his watch. He thought the library would be open on Saturday mornings. He had nothing to lose by calling.
‘Who shall I say it is?’ asked the woman who answered.
‘It’s a personal matter,’ said Cross and waited. Becky Malone sounded suspicious when she came to the phone.
‘I need to get in touch with your husband,’ said Cross.
‘Who is this?’ she asked with an odd, nervous giggle.
‘I need to talk to your husband about a man he knew.’
‘You’ll find it hard.’
There was a bitterness to the voice. She sounded strange, not altogether there, a bit simple, even. Yet Molly had said she had gone to Queen’s.
‘Why?’
‘Because there’s not much of him left.’
The line went dead. She had hung up. He rang back. The phone was picked up straight away. It felt like some weird game. He knew it was her behind the silence.
‘Please, listen. You don’t have to say anything,’ he said. ‘I spoke to a woman called Molly who met you a long time ago. She was with the man I need to talk to your husband about. It’s important,’ he added lamely.
He wondered what was going through her head.
‘Please,’ he repeated.
‘They blew him up,’ she said finally.
He heard her quite clearly. It was his turn to be reduced to silence. Christ! Was the man dead after all? Another false trail.
‘When?’ he asked.
‘Three years ago. In his car.’
The voice was devoid of feeling.
‘I realize this is painful for you, but would you know if this was before or after Francis Breen’s wife was killed?’
It was the wrong question.
‘Who’s Francis Breen’s wife when she’s at home?’
The voice was sharp and suspicious.
‘She was killed by a bomb in her car as well.’
‘If you say so.’ Her voice sounded empty.
‘There’s one last thing. Can you tell me what your husband looked like?’
Shivers down the backbone, I got the shakes in the knee bone. The line was from an old song he’d heard on the jukebox in the bar where he’d met Stevens. It came back to him in the silence after Becky Malone’s description.
He joined Westerby in the same bar; ‘La Cucaracha’ was on the jukebox now, full blast. He’d phoned her at home on his way back from the barbecue, which had been unspeakable, full of smug parents and squabbling children. He’d left before the others, as early as he decently could. As he drove home news came through on the radio of rioting in Portadown.
It was a talk they could have on the phone, he thought, until he realized he’d had enough of the telephone for one day, after the blind feel of his conversation with Becky. He was bursting to discuss his news but was reluctant to go to her place – he was aware of not avoiding her exactly since Nesbitt’s warning but of keeping his distance – so he suggested the bar. It turned out to be impossibly crowded and noisy. They were lucky to get a seat when a couple in the corner suddenly stood up and left.
‘It wasn’t him that got blown up,’ she said, as quick as a flash. Cross admired her certainty. He had been in a state of gloom since Becky’s news.
He shook his head. ‘She was there.’
‘She was upstairs, you said. She didn’t actually see. I bet there wasn’t much left of him afterwards.’
Cross remembered Becky saying the same. Maybe Westerby was right.
‘Otherwise what have we got?’ continued Westerby. ‘There’s a fair-haired Englishman who killed Tommy Herron and talked to me and leaned on Mary Elam’s man. But he’s not the same one that married Becky Malone and once met Molly Connors because that one’s dead.’
La cucaracha, la cucaracha.
Don’t be a smartarse, thought Cross about Westerby. The truth was that she was much cleverer than him. It was noisy in the bar and the music too loud. Something seemed to amuse her and he asked what.
‘Nothing, sir,’ she said, smiling into her glass.
‘What? ’
‘It’s just that you look so bad tempered,’ she announced cheerfully.
‘I am bad tempered,’ he answered, equally cheerful all of a sudden. ‘And that record’s not helping.’
There was a brief lull as ‘La Cucaracha’ came to an end. Cross and Westerby looked at each other, wondering what was coming next.
Cross glanced round at the busy bar and the queues of people lining up to get served.
‘Looks like the recession’s over,’ he said, then groaned. ‘Oh God! “Sylvia’s Mother!”’
And the operator said forty cents more for the next three minutes, and pleee-ase Mrs Avery . . .
‘Why can’t it play ordinary records and serve ordinary beer?’ He was drinking something fancy out of a bottle.
‘I don’t know,’ said Westerby.
With the record and the general noise there wasn’t much point in trying to have a proper conversation.
‘I’ve always rather liked Shel Silverstein myself,’ Westerby announced.
Cross was confused by their banter, and more confused by his going along with it. It seemed uncharacteristic of them both.
‘I beg your pardon?’
Westerby grinned. ‘Never mind.’
Now she’s getting fresh, Cross thought.
‘I’m going down to see Becky Malone tomorrow,’ he said, without adding, did she want to come? Instead he asked who Shel Silverstein was.
‘He wrote most of Dr Hook’s songs.’ Westerby was having to shout now. There were so many people in the bar that there was hardly any floor space. ‘And some of Bonnie Tyler. We’re living in a powder keg and giving off sparks. Do you know that one?’
Very Belfast, he thought, wondering if he was tipsy.
‘You’d know it if you heard it. Once upon a time I was falling in love and now I’m only falling apart. What’s the title? It’s on the tip of my tongue.’
Cross shook his head. In spite of the overbearing atmosphere he was reluctant to leave.
‘So you think he’s alive?’ he asked.
‘Becky’s husband?’
Cross
nodded and Westerby nodded back. ‘What I don’t understand,’ she went on, ‘is how the man described by Willcox – a Brit that ran with the UDA – ends up in South Armagh in the bosom of Republicanism.’
Cross shook his head. Talk really was impossible. Westerby was suddenly tugging his sleeve.
‘It’s that record I was just talking about!’
A new record had come on the jukebox.
‘“Total Eclipse of the Heart”!’ shouted Westerby when she remembered the title. ‘What’s the matter?’
Cross was laughing and pulling a face at the same time.
‘It’s awful.’
‘A big hit the summer before last. It’s awful but it’s great.’
They arrived in Keady at lunchtime. The place was unnervingly empty, even for a Sunday. The library was closed but Becky had told him she would be there all day for the annual stock-taking. Cross had a hangover. He and Westerby had been drunk by the end of the evening.
He recognized Becky straight away, sitting behind the checking desk. She had a put-away look about her, like her life was closed off already. Her hair was up in a bun, which gave her an old-fashioned, spinsterish air. Cross wondered why she had agreed to talk.
The dry squeeze of her handshake made little impression. The brief flicker of her eyes as she looked into his did. There was a force to them not apparent from her normal averted gaze.
‘You can go in there,’ she said, pointing them towards a door. ‘I’ll be with you in a minute.’
They waited in a large room. There was sun on warm glass and the dry smell of unread books. The few he glanced at hadn’t been taken out in years.
‘It’ll be all over town by now that I’m talking to the police,’ she said, shutting the door behind her.
Her remark pointed up their vulnerability. They were a target for any young Turk wanting to notch up a score. For a second, as he looked at the self-possessed woman in front of him, he wondered if she were a siren luring them to destruction.
Bitter Becky, he thought, as she told her story, prefacing it by saying that she had already crossed some forbidden line by marrying an Englishman and was looked on as a witch as a result.