by Sam Millar
Without warning, the creature stretched out its paw-like hand. The thing’s mouth was leaking sounds, dreadful soulless whimpering sounds. “Help … me. They’re mad …”
Only now had Andy noticed the small box tucked neatly against the wooden wall inside the basement, its blinking blue eye winking accusingly. He wanted to laugh at his own stupidity and arrogance, snipping the wires of a decoy that any amateur would have spotted a mile off.
Cops! They would be on their way. How long had the silent alarm been screaming at the nearest station? Fuck! Five years in jail at your age, Andy Fleming, will be a life sentence. Told you to get out while you could. There’s still time. Run!
“I’m sorry …” said Andy, backing quickly away from the slithering monstrosity. “I … I can’t help you. I’ll alert the … cops and ambulance, once I get away …”
“Please … don’t leave me … please … they’re all mad. You can’t leave me alone with them. Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease …”
Turning speedily on his heels, Andy bolted towards the back door and its lure of freedom. I have to get away from here, away from the madness and that monstrosity.
Stumbling twice, he barely managed to open the back door, only to be confronted by his worst nightmare.
“Put the gun down!” screamed an armed police officer, weapon at the ready, aimed directly at Andy’s sweating, petrified face. “Now!”
“You don’t understand. There’s a thing covered in blood –”
“Now!”
Slowly, obediently, Andy eased the shotgun to the ground. “Okay, okay. Look, I’m complying,” pronounced Andy, a dry swallow scraping against the back of his throat. “But if you think I’m the problem, wait until you see behind that basement door.”
“Lay down on the ground – nice and easy.” The edgy cop edged closer. “Good. Stay that way. Do not move a muscle. Do not speak.”
Andy didn’t want to speak. He wanted to cry.
CHAPTER SIX
Wednesday, 24 January
‘And how am I to face the odds
Of man’s bedevilment and God’s.’
A. E. Housman, Last Poems
“The city looks so peaceful from up here, doesn’t it, Chris?” enthused Karl. “If I had the money, I’d have a house built, right on this spot. What about you?”
Directly to Karl’s right, Chris Brown sat scanning the green landscape surrounding the magnificent Belfast Castle. Being ensconced in a wheelchair for the rest of his life gave him little option other than to sit. Varicose veins of rust webbed the spokes of the wheels. Held lazily in his hand was a half-bottle of cheap wine. Half empty, half full, depending on Chris’s moods. Sitting obediently beside Chris was Paisley, his pedigree Basenji.
“You working for the fucking tourist board, now?” quipped Chris. “From where I sit, it looks like a big green turd. Know that advert for corn? Ho ho ho, Green Turd?”
“Your master is his usual jovial self. Eh, Paisley?” The dog’s ears did a tiny movement, but the rest of its body ignored Karl. “That creature must drink from the same tap as you. Has the same temperament.”
Opening a packet of cigarettes, Karl crinkled the cellophane annoyingly, and shook two cigs free before offering one to Chris. Both men lit up, and everything went quiet. Only the sounds of restless birds in the forest could be heard along with the weird semi-hush of outlying traffic.
“Well, what do you have for me on Wesley Milligan?” asked Karl, finally breaking the silence. “Heard anything on why someone would want to pump three bullets into the back of his head?”
Chris released smoke through badly chipped teeth, before replying. “Very little. It’s not as if I can do a fucking tour of all my old places, anymore. Is it? No one wants to know a snitch, surprise surprise.”
“Look, I know how –”
“Don’t. Okay? Do not give me the old I-know-what-you’re-going-through routine. Understand? Unless you’ve had a wheelchair rammed up your arse, lately, of course?”
“Not lately,” admitted Karl, shaking his head.
“In another couple of years, I’ll be as bad as that freak Hawkins, who walked on the moon. All he can do is speak like a fucking Dalek.”
“Hawkins? You mean Stephen Hawkins? He didn’t walk on the moon. He discovered black holes.”
“Black holes, hairy holes. Who gives a fuck?” Chris angrily flicked the half-devoured cig onto the grass, ignoring the Do Not Litter sign. Sparks bounced in every direction. “You know what all the bastards are calling me?”
“No,” lied Karl. “What?”
“Squeals On Fucking Wheels.”
Karl shook his head, seemingly disgusted. “I thought it was just Squeals On Wheels. I didn’t know they had added fucking to it.”
Chris turned, pinning Karl in his gaze. For a second, the glare of an animal returned to Chris’s eyes; the same glare that had once terrified his victims before he shot them at point blank above the nose, when he operated as a hit man for local gangsters. But as quickly as it had appeared, the glare quickly faded, as if he knew how ridiculously impotent it now looked.
“You’re a funny man, Karl. Not Frank-Carson-funny; more like Tommy-Cooper-funny.”
“The last I heard, Tommy Cooper was dead.”
A snake grin appeared on Chris’s lips. “Precisely …”
Not liking the direction of the conversation, Karl steered it quickly away. “Do you fancy going in for something to eat in the Cellar?” He nodded towards the castle, then quickly added, “Though I hear the food is crap in there, to be honest.”
“You’re still as tight as a bodhran,” said Chris, making a face. “I should take you up on the offer, just to see the tears in your eyes.”
“That’s unfair. Financially, I can hardly breathe. Crooked lawyers and a ball-busting ex-wife are fleecing me. Besides, there’s a few quid in this for you. I wouldn’t call that being tight.” Karl sounded quite offended.
“Yeah, few being the operative word. I’ve just had to use my entire insurance claim on a security system. I doubt if what you’re giving me would pay for a mousetrap.” Chris nervously rubbed his massive forearm, like a genie being called up.
Karl knew the sign. He waited.
Covering most of Chris’s muscular torso was a gallery of tattoos, the most striking of which was a Heavy Metal skeleton painted on his forearm playing a guitar. Upon closer inspection, the guitar was shaped from a large erection protruding from between the skeleton’s legs: a boner with a boner. The more Chris stroked his forearm, the more the skeleton seemed to move in masturbatory slow mo. It’s the only way I can get an erection these days, laughed Chris, when first showing it to Karl, a couple of years back, shortly after the attempted murder bid. The laugh, Karl noted at the time, was void of emotion.
“Okay, here is what I have,” said Chris. “Not much, but more than your scumbag brother-in-law is probably telling you.”
“Let’s not get personal.”
“Personal? You don’t know the half of it. Wilson’s one of the Seven Great Wankers of the Western World.”
“Agreed. Now, can we move on? Please.”
Chris spat a fragment of tobacco from his mouth. “Wesley Milligan used to be a bailiff before progressing naturally to the lower rung, becoming a screw. He worked mainly in Woodbank, the prison for women and men, many years ago. I’ve spoken to a couple of my lady friends who spent some time in that hellhole. They told me he was the devil’s bastard.”
Silence.
From a tree, a nosey squirrel, its tail curving into a hairy question mark, watched the two men.
“And? That’s it? A screw bastard? That’s headline news?” said Karl. “C’mon, Chris. You can do better than that.”
Sighing, Chris continued. “He and a few of his mates pimped some of the women prisoners, those on drugs, leasing them out to high-placed establishment figures at private functions.”
“What kind of establishment figures?”
“The
usual shit-bag collection of politicians, judiciary, clergy – and cops.”
“I take it that there is little love lost between you and the aforementioned gentlemen and pillars of society?”
“Most of those leeches would benefit from an early death. Ever see one of the bastards drive a second-hand car?”
“Point taken.”
Karl scratched his arse, digging his finger in, wondering if he should surrender his reluctance, have a doctor check his engine?
“I’m not trying to annoy or offend you, Chris, but all that sounds a bit far-fetched. The only one you left out was Mother Teresa. Sure you’re not just trying to spice it up, make the information sound important?”
“Take it or leave it.”
“And into the bargain, you’re trying to convince me that the women prisoners were simply released each day, and then returned of their own free will? Why didn’t they simply abscond, once outside the prison walls?”
“You’re such a suspicious bastard, it makes you naive.” Chris swivelled the wheelchair expertly, cutting across the toes of Karl, forcing a grimace on the private investigator’s face. “They got paid in small amounts of H, you fuck. That would have made them as loyal as homing pigeons just to get their fix. They weren’t going anywhere, but back to the coop for their next feed. Besides, most of them were so-called illegal aliens – though what the fuck possessed them to come to this pimple on god’s arse, is beyond me.”
“H? You mean heroin?”
“No, I mean H for Happy fucking Meals at McDonald’s.”
Karl’s fingers moved from his arse to his face, and began to scratch a two-day growth.
“I suppose there is some warped logic to what you’re saying, Chris.”
Chris slugged back a mouthful of wine, rinsed his teeth, swallowed, and then extended his arm for Karl to see. It was moon surfaced, badly scarred with needle marks and sores. “Logic doesn’t come into it; cold facts of life do. Once an addict; always an addict. Addiction is the shadow that always follows. You look behind you and it’s gone. Except, of course, it’s never really gone …”
“What is that place like now? Woodbank?”
“Because of all the shit going on in there, they got rid of most – if not all – of the old guard. A new governor has been recently installed, by the name of George Hanna, but in reality, the place is actually run by a Principal Officer by the name of Lange. Y.M.P.’s is Lange’s choice of drugs, I’ve been told.”
“Y.M.P.’s? What kind of drugs are they?”
“Young Male Prisoners. He likes them beefy but smooth. Kind of like a sausage dipped in ice-cream.”
“Very appetising. Must remember never to have that combo for lunch.”
The nosey squirrel watched Karl watching it. Disgustingly, Karl noted, it was vigorously scratching its nuts.
From his pocket, Karl removed three twenties, studying them for a second before stealthily slipping one back into the warmth of his coat.
“Here.” He handed the two remaining twenties to Chris.
Chris took them without counting. “You’re too generous. That’ll help me get out of Belfast, set up home in Portugal.”
“You know what they say about Belfast? An easy place to leave, but not to stay away from,” replied Karl, checking his watch. “Time to depart. Sure you don’t want to go for a bite to eat?”
“No. My diary is full. Must rush. So many people to meet and greet.” Chris’s smile could cut the skin off a turd. He took another brave slug of wine. “Your good deed is done for the day, so you can fuck off now.”
Chris’s misery was beginning to tunnel right into Karl’s marrow, and because Karl has always deemed himself a man who never became preoccupied for long periods on what he considered debilitating emotions, he finally readied himself to leave.
“We’ll, I’ve got a few clients waiting back at the office, Chris. It was an interesting wee chat …”
“Sure it fucking was,” said Chris, tilting his head back, filling his throat with wine, before closing his eyes as if drowning.
“Should you be drinking and driving?” enquired Karl, buttoning his coat to the neck.
“Trying to be smart?”
“I’m smart enough to know not to be smart.”
“You don’t need a licence for a wheelchair, last I heard.”
“What happened to your car, the one you got from the disability people?”
“They took it from me.”
“Why?”
“Stopped me every mile at roadblocks. Said I was drunk all the time, and dangerous behind a wheel. Bollocks. Just another form of harassment from the fuckers.”
“I can give you a lift home.”
Chris ignored the offer. Patted Paisley’s head, instead.
Karl thought about what Chris just said.
“When you said ‘they’, you meant the police?”
“You have a knack for asking questions to which you already know the fucking answers,” replied Chris. “It was a warning from them. They’re terrified I will say something about them, their methods, in my book.”
“Book?” Suddenly Karl no longer felt the urge to go. “I didn’t know you were writing a book?”
“It’s a memoir.” Chris nodded wearily. “I’ve completed a few chapters.”
“Do you have a publisher?”
“Yes.”
“That’s brilliant …” Envy was sticking in Karl’s throat. He wanted to spit it out, but it refused to budge. “Who?”
“Burrger and Goldman.”
Bastards! “They’re big …”
“Yeah. Look at me, Ma, top of the world. Let me do a jig for you – or a wheelie.”
Karl ignored Chris’s biting sarcasm. All he could envision were copies of Chris’s books stacked on shelves at all the bookstores. Inside, Karl was crying.
“Seriously, Chris, that’s brilliant.”
“Brilliant …”
“Do you have an agent?”
“An agent? Is that another joke? You shouldn’t use that word near me.”
“I mean a literary agent.”
“No, the publishers got in contact with me directly, asked me to consider writing my memoirs. I’ve sent them about three chapters. Still working on the rest. I’ve a lot of it strewn about the place. Haven’t been able to focus, lately.”
Shaking his head in disbelief, Karl wondered why was it that he never got the breaks every other fucker seemed to be getting?
“I could be your agent,” volunteered Karl. “Those publishers can be tricky bastards. I know quite a bit about the publishing world.” The last sentence sounded bitter.
“You know about publishing?” Chris made a don’t-make-me-laugh face.
“A lot more than you can imagine. I can draw on my wealth of … experience, to further your career. Here’s my card.” Karl produced a business card.
“What’s this for? I already have one.”
“Send it to Burrger and Goldman. They’ll be impressed. They’ll understand that you’ll take no shit from them, once they know you have acquired my services as your agent. I’ll get you all the media contacts you need.”
Chris looked at the card, then directly into Karl’s eyes. “Why do I sense that you want this more than me?”
“Forgive the pun, but it’s a long story.”
“I’ll think about it.” Chris took the card, slipping it into a little pocket attached to the side of the wheelchair.
“That’s all I ask, that you think about it. Nothing more, nothing less.” Karl smiled. “Do you have a title for your memoir, yet?”
“Haven’t really given it too much thought.”
“Killing for a Living.”
“What?”
“Killing for a Living. That’s a cracker of a title – and I won’t even charge you for it.”
“What a guy.” Chris shook his head. “I only hope you understand that once this gets out, about me writing a book, all those associated with me are not going t
o get any invites to the Policemen’s Ball?”
“I hate dancing with cops, all those wooden truncheons swaying to the music. Anyway, you just wait until I get started,” promised Karl. “Killing is a serious business in the publishing world. Trust me.”
A wry smile suddenly appeared on Chris’s face. “The last time I heard those famous two words, someone shot me six times in the fucking back …”
CHAPTER SEVEN
Monday, 29 January (Afternoon)
‘Cowardly dogs bark loudest.’
John Webster, The White Devil
KARL PRESSED THE doorbell but could not hear any sound coming from either it or the inside of the house. He rapped on the door twice. No answer. He waited a few seconds before trying again.
“What the fuck’s with all the noise!” screamed an angry-looking young man, suddenly pulling the front door wide open. “We aren’t buying anything. Now blow, before I get pissed off and have to slap you about, pops.”
Mister Young Angry, noted Karl, was built like the proverbial brick wall. He was wearing a greasy T-shirt two sizes too small to accentuate his Sylvester Stallonesque torso. Leprous tattoos covered his unreal, Popeye-the-fucking-Sailor-Man arms.
“Is your mother in?” asked Karl, his voice calmly professional.
“What?” Young Angry’s face screwed slightly.
“Your mother? Would she be –?”
Without warning, Young Angry took a swing at Karl’s head. Thankfully, steroids had impeded Young Angry’s speed, and Karl ducked easily, grabbing the swinging arm in midair, turning slightly before jerking the arm up along Young Angry’s back.
“Easy, sonny,” hissed Karl into Young Angry’s ear-ringed ear.
“Let go! You’re in for it, once I get free – arghhhhh!”
“I need you to calm down, sonny. Otherwise, the arm goes further north. Understand?” Karl gave the arm a slight push.
“Arghhhhhh! Bastard!”
“Understand?”
“Yesssssssssssss!”
Suddenly, a woman came rushing down the hallway, wearing an off-white bathrobe, exposing cleavage. Hair was hidden in a turban-like towel, and her skin was glowing from hot water and anger.