‘Don’t do it as a penance, Frankie.’
He realized, once again, how well she knew him. ‘I won’t.’
Frankie’s final day was a Tuesday. Bitterly cold morning winds carried the smell of snow, and Frankie worried about his successor, Father Boyle, slipping on the ice, which was thick as armour in places. He’d had breakfast with the elderly priest, then went to pick up the single suitcase he’d packed the night before. Returning to the warm kitchen, he said goodbye to Father Boyle but got no response. The old man was asleep.
Frankie went through the sacristy door for the last time and into the freezing church. His breath drifted like a cloud of incense. He walked to the altar and knelt. He bowed his head and tried to think of an appropriate prayer. It was too late to say sorry and he was certain that God didn’t want an apology anyway. He whispered, ‘Thy will be done,’ then got up and walked down the centre aisle to leave by the main door, which he pulled shut behind him without turning round. The echo boomed in the cold, thin, empty air.
Frankie had sold his car when he first faced the prospect of unemployment, so Kathy had offered to pick him up, but he’d said he’d rather walk to her door from the station. In the last hundred yards along a secluded tree-lined drive, Frankie marvelled at how grand her house was. He arrived at the door rosy-cheeked and rang the bell.
It was almost a minute before he heard a sound and he was beginning to worry. Then the door opened and she stood there in tight black ski pants and a yellow T-shirt. This was the first time he had seen her casually dressed. He liked the fact that she’d chosen this day. He noticed that she had a tea towel in her right hand. She smiled. ‘Sorry, I was doing the dishes. Come in.’ She stepped back. He went in and stood in the big bright hall, looking up at the ceiling, which seemed very high. A triple-shaded light hung on a brass chain.
He realized she’d closed the door and he turned slowly, taking in the newness, the dried flowers in large pots on the black and white tiled floor, the polished table with Queen Anne legs, the almost see- through cream drapes. She watched him, his fine-featured face seeming childlike as he surveyed his surroundings. He wore a heavy overcoat bought from a charity shop. It made him look older; it was a middle-aged man’s coat. She had seen the brown corduroy trousers before too, and the soft tan shoes. The suitcase, ancient as it was, was new to her. ‘You can put your suitcase down here, if you want,’ she said.
He nodded and bent at the knees, straight-backed to lower it to the floor so slowly it made no sound. ‘Got nitro-glycerine in there?’ Kathy asked.
Frankie shrugged. ‘I didn’t want to scratch your floor. The house is amazing.’ He was looking through the door into a big room where a log fire burned in an inglenook fireplace.
‘Come in and have a proper look. I’ll take your coat. Do you want some tea or a drink? Beer or whiskey or something soft?’
He followed her into the room. ‘A whiskey would be nice. Warm me up. It’s cold out there. Nice but cold.’ He smiled nervously at her.
‘Sit by the fire. Get warm. I’ll fix you a drink.’ She went into the kitchen. He couldn’t see her as she called, ‘Want anything in your whiskey?’
‘Some ice, if you have it.’
He heard the clink and she came back, a glass in each hand. They stood on the thick Indian rug in front of the fire. She raised her glass. ‘Welcome.’
He raised his. ‘It’s nice to be here. I like your house. I never pictured you living alone in such a big place.’
‘Probably psychological compensation for having nothing but a bed and a locker when I was a kid.’
‘In the orphanage?’
She nodded. They sipped their drinks. ‘You’ve done well for yourself,’ he said.
‘It doesn’t really mean much to me, not anymore.’
He shifted awkwardly and drank again. She said, ‘My priorities changed around fifteen months ago. Every minute that I’ve spent with you has meant more to me than any of this, anything money can buy.’ He reddened and looked down at the rug. ‘Don’t look away from me now, Frankie Houlihan. We’ve spent almost a year and a quarter in small talk and I promised myself every night before I went to sleep that I wouldn’t waste a single minute more…’ She eased the drink from his fingers and put it alongside her own on the high dark stone mantelpiece. She took his hands in hers, held them softly and said, ‘I love you.’
Letting her hands go, he opened his arms slowly, a gesture he had performed before only at the consecration of the Blessed Sacrament. She stepped forward and he gathered her in until her head rested on his left shoulder and her arms were around him. They stayed that way for a long time before Kathy spoke softly. ‘If you knew how much I’ve longed for this.’
‘Me too,’ he said. ‘I love you, Kathy.’
She held him tighter and her tears flowed silently in celebration. After a minute she wiped them and made space between her and Frankie so she could kiss him.
‘God, this is the part I’ve been dreading!’ he said, looking genuinely worried.
‘Well, thanks a million!’ she smiled, cheeks still wet.
‘You know what I mean. I haven’t done this since I was at school.’
‘It’s not rocket science, Frankie, just pucker up those lips.’ She laughed.
Shutting his eyes, he tried to do what she said, making her laugh more. ‘I was only kidding! You don’t need to pucker up! Just relax.’
‘Can I keep me eyes closed?’
‘If you like.’
He did. She kissed him gently and primly for a few seconds, then pulled away. ‘Here endeth lesson one. You can open your eyes, sonny.’
He opened them and they laughed together.
9
It was past noon when Brendan Gleeson woke in his bedroom in the Chequers Hotel in Newbury. He’d had to drive Corell to the airport before returning to the hotel last night, and he’d been determined to make up for lost drinking time. Checking his watch, he saw he was already ten minutes late for his meeting with the slaughter man. ‘Shit!’ he said and reached for his jacket, which lay on the floor. If he messed this up Corell would go crazy. From his jacket pocket, he pulled the fax with Hewitt’s directions on it. He’d written the slaughter man’s mobile number at the bottom. He dialled it, hands shaking from the effects of the alcohol. Monroe answered on the first ring and told Gleeson he was waiting for him downstairs. ‘Gimme five minutes,’ Gleeson said, and went to the bathroom to throw water on his face.
The slaughter man was sitting in the corner with two untouched half-pints of orange juice on the table. That was the sign they’d agreed on the phone so Gleeson would recognize him. It had been the slaughter man’s idea; Gleeson was impressed but couldn’t wait for a drink. Raising a thumb to the man and smiling, he motioned to the bar and went to get himself a drink. He carried a pint of Guinness and a large whiskey and lemonade to the table. ‘Mister Monroe?’ he said.
‘Mister Gleeson.’
‘That’s right.’ He put the drinks down and they shook hands. Gleeson sat across from him and drank half of the Guinness then nodded to the orange juice. ‘Want a proper drink?’
‘No thanks.’
Gleeson drank again, watching Monroe. ‘You look worried, Mister Monroe.’
‘Should I be?’
‘Not so far as I’m concerned. I just wanted to put a little business proposal your way so you can make yersel a few quid.’
‘Doing what?’
‘Before we talk about that, you need to understand the importance of keeping this quiet. Whether you decide to do it or not, you can’t talk about it. Not now, next week, next year, whenever. It’s important for your own, eh, what do they say these days, quality of life?’
‘You already said all this on the phone. I told you, I don’t have a problem with keeping my mouth shut.’
Gleeson smiled and drank some more. He liked the fact that this guy was so easily wound up. He much preferred dealing with people he could boss around. Guys like Hewitt that
had some sort of special brief from Corell and acted almost like his boss, he found hard to cope with. But the Monroes of this world let him act superior. He said, ‘The people who gave me this project are very serious about confidentialism.’
Monroe frowned in puzzlement at the word. Gleeson continued, ‘They are men that secrecy and loyalty mean a lot to.’ Gleeson loved to hint about IRA connections; his accent was a bonus for this sort of stuff.
‘Is that a threat?’ Monroe asked.
‘Not at all. I just want to make sure you know what the, eh, whole package is.’
‘Well, I told you, I don’t have a problem with it! ‘ His voiced was raised.
Gleeson looked around. They were alone in the bar. ‘Keep the head, son, and I’ll buy you a hat.’
Monroe’s ice-blue eyes glinted with anger and he lifted a glass and drank some orange juice, put it back down and folded his arms.
Gleeson lit a cigarette and drank some whiskey. ‘Now,’ he said, ‘this is the deal. You know the racehorses you get to take for the slaughter?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well I want you to take a little detour on the way to the slaughterhouse and let a friend of mine borrow them for a day.’
‘Borrow?’
‘Before you shoot them.’
‘You’re kidding!’
‘Now why would I be flyin’ from Dublin, payin’ all that money in air fares to sit here kiddin’ with you?’
Arms still folded, Monroe shook his head slowly. ‘Where does your friend live?’ he asked.
‘Near Lambourn.’
‘Whereabouts?’
‘Are you interested?’
‘What’s the money like?’
‘Two hundred and fifty pounds a horse, minimum.’
Monroe sat forward. ‘How many horses?’
‘As many as you can get - but they need to be racehorses and if you can get a good one the money goes up.’
‘What does he want to do with them?’
Gleeson slugged from the whiskey glass then smiled. ‘He’s going to tie his washing between two of them and make them run round the garden until it’s dry.’
Monroe didn’t smile.
Gleeson said, ‘It doesn’t matter to you what he does with them, does it? You drop them off, then pick them up a few hours later, collect your money then go and do your job.’
Monroe stared at him for a while then said, ‘OK. I’ll do a couple and see how it goes. Who pays me?’
‘My friend does.’
‘Where do I take them to?’
‘We’ll drive up there and I’ll show you. It’s a hard place to find.’
‘When do I start?’
‘Yesterday.’
‘We’d better move then.’ He got up. Gleeson finished both drinks. Monroe jangled his car keys as he watched Gleeson drain the glasses. ‘I think I’ll drive, eh?’
Gleeson smiled at his sarcasm. ‘Sure. So long as you can bring me back.’
They got outside and he said to Gleeson, ‘If something happens and your scam goes tits up, I’ll deny I had anything to do with it.’
‘Listen, son, if anythin’ happens you will keep your mouth completely shut. I don’t exist. Neither does the guy we’re going to meet. Understand?’ Monroe scowled and turned away toward the car. Passing through Lambourn village Monroe said, ‘Where did you get my name and number?’
‘A friend of mine in Ireland. Said he thought you might be up for it.’
‘What’s his name?’
‘It doesn’t matter. You’re here now so he was right, wasn’t he?’
As they turned along the track leading to the house on the hill, Monroe said, ‘I know this place. A guy called Kennedy used to train here. Went bust and did a moonlight about three years ago.’
‘Is that so?’ Gleeson asked in an uninterested voice as he looked out of the window at the thick woods bordering the narrow track on both sides.
Monroe said, ‘How long’s your man been here?’
‘The less you know, the better for you, son. I just want you to meet Hewitt so you know where you’re going and who’s paying you.’
They trundled toward the big gates in silence, Monroe’s jaw set hard and his eyes glinting with anger. He didn’t like the way Gleeson spoke to him. As he braked to a halt, he noticed the closed- circuit camera mounted high on the black gatepost turn toward the car. ‘Is that attached to a recorder?’ he asked.
Gleeson didn’t know but wouldn’t admit to that. ‘I told you, the less you know the better. If you want to ask questions, take your nice looks and go get a job on a quiz show.’
Monroe pulled the handbrake and turned to Gleeson. ‘Listen, mate, two hundred and fifty pounds isn’t a lot of money and you want me to risk my job for it. I’m not bringing a horsebox up here every couple of days for it to be caught on tape when I don’t know what’s happening at this place or where the tape’s going.’
Gleeson smiled at him patronizingly. ‘Stop worrying, son. If you don’t want the job, just tell me now before I ring the bell. You can head back to the slaughterhouse and keep shooting cows for two hundred and fifty pounds a week if you want. Four horses a week for here makes a grand.’
Monroe looked away and revved the engine hard. Gleeson said, ‘Is that a yes or a no?’
‘I told you in the hotel, I’ll try a couple. If I don’t like it after that I won’t do any more.’
‘Stop whinging, then. Let’s go in and see Mister Hewitt.’
As he drove Gleeson back to his hotel, Monroe wondered what Hewitt was doing up there, why he wanted the horses. He wasn’t a horseman; Monroe noticed it when he shook hands. Hewitt had a pen and a little notebook in his top shirt pocket, and there had been a white garment on the arm of the chair in the room they’d been in. He’d thought it was a dressing gown at first but it had been more like a hospital gown or a lab coat. Still, Hewitt seemed much more civilized than Gleeson, had better manners. Monroe glanced at him as he pulled up outside the Chequers and decided that a chimp had better manners than the Irishman, so he probably wasn’t paying Hewitt any compliments.
Gleeson got out then stooped and looked into the car at Monroe. ‘Thanks. I’ll say farewell. There’ll not be any need for us to meet again unless you decide you’re going to be a naughty boy.’
‘Yeah, if I do you’ll be the first to know, Mister Gleeson.’
‘You’re right. I will be,’ he said, trying to look stern and dangerous. Monroe smiled dismissively, shook his head and drove away.
Gerry Monroe had a natural affinity with horses, especially thoroughbreds. Horses did things willingly for Monroe that they’d do for others only under duress. Horses would even run their hearts out for him and that quality alone would have made him a great jockey, which was what he’d wanted to be.
But his personal tragedy was that he was too heavy to ride on the flat, and he’d found out very quickly in his brief career as a jump jockey that he didn’t have the nerve for it. As much as he trusted his own ability, however much his mount would give in effort, Monroe was terrified at the prospect of attacking those big black fences on half a ton of galloping muscle and bone surrounded by others, all travelling at thirty miles an hour, being squeezed up, jostled, forced into errors that might see him crashing to the ground.
During the twenty-seven races he rode in before retiring, Monroe could picture nothing but severed spinal cords, caved-in skulls, hospital beds, wheelchairs and coffins.
He quit at the age of twenty-three, staging a very soft-looking fall in muddy ground at Hereford on a gloomy November afternoon. He claimed the fall had damaged his back so badly that he’d never be able to ride again. For more than two years he’d taken his regular payment from the Injured Jockey’s Fund, knowing it wasn’t merited, knowing he was stealing it. Then they’d stopped paying him after a specialist could find nothing wrong. Embittered, Monroe had found a job.
He still worked with horses. Used his special affinity now in other ways to calm them
, make them trust him, even as he placed the muzzle on their heads and squeezed the trigger.
He parked the red Volkswagen outside his council house on the western edge of the village and went inside. He was thinking about Hewitt and Gleeson. There was a lot of money involved in what these guys were doing. Had to be to take that big place on the hill, install cameras, bring dickheads like Gleeson from Ireland and pay him two hundred and fifty pounds a time to get their hands on a racehorse for a few hours.
In the small kitchen, Monroe filled the kettle then went to the bookcase by his chair and pulled out a thick softback with a picture of the Kray twins on the front. He liked to read about crime and criminals. He fancied he had the brain for it, and he’d dabbled in a few dodgy deals. He’d set fire to a stable once to help the trainer collect a big insurance pay-out, so he supposed he was a criminal really, but anything he’d done had been like what he was doing this time, working for somebody. As the kettle boiled, he stared through the steamed-up window; the thought that idiots like Gleeson could be high up in a criminal organization bolstered his confidence that he could, one day, make some very serious money.
10
While his father had been in England for a few days, Sean Gleeson had tried to clean the flat. He’d bribed his mates to help him, but had to throw them out after an hour because of their carry-on and messing around with the washing-up liquid and the mop and bucket. Now the floor was soaked. They’d been slagging him off too when they’d found his dad’s dirty underpants and the bits of mouldy food and empty bottles and cans. And Barry McDonald had held his nose and said ‘Dis place feckin’ stinks!’ and the others had laughed at what he’d said and the way he sounded and they’d all started saying it and holding their noses.
Sean looked around him. The place did stink. It had stunk even when his mother was there to clean it. The whole block stank, he thought. The living room light was the only bulb that still worked. His father wouldn’t spend money on anything for the flat. Sean knew he hadn’t exactly been brilliant himself at keeping the place clean. He’d made the best of the fact that his ma hadn’t been here to nag him about tidying his room and clearing up after him.
For Your Sins: previously published as Joseph's Mansions Page 3