by John Brady
“Martin runs things day-to-day,” said Hand. “Eddsy sits in the shop. Martin’s on the go. Carphones, faxes, the whole bit. Martin’s the brain, the planner. Eddsy had set up the rackets but he had to bow out. Last is Bobby. Bobby’s a madman. He’s into drugs but we don’t know if he’s into them on a regular basis. Probably. He has a very short fuse. Bobby scares everyone, his brothers included. He’s the one who looks after the enforcement end of things. Mention of him is enough to get the job done.”
“So he’s the one who looks after the whores?” asked Malone.
“There’s a loose confederation of pimps and gougers in the trade. The Egans decide about some areas. They don’t exactly control the pimps or the trade, but pimps give them some of their take or a quid pro quo, at least.”
“What quid pro quo?” demanded Kilmartin.
“Girls. Information on clients that the Egans could use. We think the Egans pass drugs along a network of girls. For their clients, like, or for the girls themselves.”
“What’s the extent of that now?” asked Minogue. Hand shrugged.
“We don’t know. But we’re working on the belief that the Egans are trying to develop new markets for drugs away from the street. It’s getting a bit hairy for them there on the streets. So Bobby has two or three fellas on the payroll as enforcers. They move between the operations- drugs, fencing stolen goods, moving property and money around. We’ve put some away but there are always fellas available. Fellas get out of jail and, bang, they show up on surveillance. Next thing is they’re caught again. It’s like a merry-go-round with them.”
Kilmartin exchanged a glance with Minogue. Tommy Malone was examining the backs of his hands. Minogue wondered if Hand knew of Terry Malone.
“This Bobby Egan character,” said Kilmartin. “Drag him in and work at him. Squeeze him a while?”
Hand scratched at the back of his neck. Kilmartin’s eyes had taken on a glint.
“Well, now, I don’t know,” said Hand. He didn’t return Kilmartin’s gaze.
“Well, we shagging well do, Mick. Bring ’em in tied onto the back bumper of a squad car for all we care.”
Hand cleared his throat and glanced at Kilmartin.
“Well, as I said to you earlier on, Jim…”
Kilmartin wasn’t budging, Minogue saw. He’d make Hand say it in front of the Squad.
“Yes?” said Kilmartin. Hand’s tongue worked around his upper teeth. Minogue sat back and joined his hands behind his neck.
“What are we hearing here, Mick?” asked Kilmartin. “A hands-off, is it?”
Hand shifted in his seat.
“God, no,” he said. “But there’s a very big operation ongoing. Very big thing now.”
“Very big,” said Kilmartin. “How big? Sure, we’re very big here ourselves.”
Hand smiled wanly.
“Well, it’s really a matter of co-ordinating your involvement now,” he said. Minogue felt a little sorry for Hand. Mere messenger or not, he still deserved to leave with one arrow in his back.
Hand looked hopefully to the faces in the room. “Your investigation could turn out to be a really valuable tool, another bit of leverage-”
“We don’t queue here, Mick,” said Kilmartin. “Murder’s top of the list. Garda Handbook, sweet pea. Page 777. Criminal code. We’re in first. All the time, every time.”
Hand shrugged and looked down at his notes. Kilmartin looked from face to face and then back to Hand.
“Before you go now, Mick. Bring us back to the house you had under surveillance. Eddsy Egan’s place, where Mary Mullen was spotted.”
Relieved, Hand sat up.
“Okay. Sure. She arrived the night before in the taxi-actually the morning. Half-two, with Eddsy. No sign of her until eleven then. A taxi rolled up and she came out.”
The whole afternoon ahead of her, thought Minogue. “Now, if you look back to the summary, you’ll see that she seems to have come and gone from the house fairly regularly…”
Hand stopped by Eilis on his way out. Minogue studied Kilmartin’s expression as he, the Chief Inspector, watched Hand give a tentative wave before heading out to the car-park.
“To hell and damnation with that,” said Kilmartin. “He’s bloody lucky not to be leaving here with skid marks all over his arse, I can tell you.”
He blew smoke out the side of his mouth.
“Did you ever hear the like? Yahoos. Is this what all the guff about joint operations is about? Let me tell you something. Joe Keane is still top dog over in Serious Crimes. I’ll be on the blower to him in a few minutes. Lift him out of it I will bejases. Sending Hand over with bits of paper to keep us quiet. What does he take us for at all, at all?”
None of the policemen spoke.
“I can live with Joe,” Kilmartin went on. “Joe’s all right. But the rest of them can be desperate messers. Christ, the crap you hear some days! ‘European police methods…’ ‘In Germany they do this…’ ‘On the continent…’ Iijits. Conferences and duty-free hangovers!”
Malone began tapping his biro on his forehead. Kilmartin broke his stare on the doorway where Hand had disappeared and looked over.
“Stop that, Molly,” said Kilmartin. “Or you’ll be giving me ideas. Now. See those names? I have me own mind on this. Let’s be thinking about the runners and hangers-on that the Egans use. The enforcers.”
Minogue looked back at the board. Lenehan. Balfe. Malone cleared his throat.
“I, er, well, I sort of know one of them,” he said. Kilmartin’s brows shot up.
“You do, do you, now?”
Was this why Malone had looked so distracted during the briefing, Minogue wondered. He took in Kilmartin’s sardonic grin.
“Yeah,” said Malone. “That Balfe fella.” He leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. “It was years ago. He was in a boxing club.”
“Anything you can tell us about him then?”
“I kind of lost track of him. He went the other way.”
Kilmartin looked at his cigarette.
“Like that brother of yours?”
Minogue stared at Kilmartin but the Chief Inspector was looking about the squadroom.
“Let’s see if we can pin those thugs,” Kilmartin said then. “Those enforcers.”
He turned back to Malone and eyed him.
“Pick ’em up, even. Spin ’em around, see what falls out, like.”
He took a last pull of his cigarette and leaned over the desk to reach an ashtray.
“Who do you think might fall out if we did that, Molly? Our Mary?”
Malone glanced at Minogue.
“Maybe,” he said. “Maybe Hickey.”
Kilmartin turned and leered.
“Attaboy there, by God, Molly,” he whispered. “That’s one for the Dublin team.”
EIGHT
Here, get up. It’s nearly ten o’clock.” His eyelashes had stuck together. He panicked for a moment and began rubbing hard at them. He had been crying last night, he remembered. Was it a dream, or had he heard someone moving around in the night? He looked up into the lamp shade overhead. He remembered yesterday and stale fear broke through his bewilderment. Jammy Tierney was still standing in the doorway.
“Thanks, Jammy. Great. I’m okay now, man. Yeah.”
Tierney stared at him. What the hell was up with him?
“I’m going out,” said Tierney. “You can’t stay. You might rob the light bulbs or something.”
Very smart, Jammy. He rolled to the side of the sofa and sat up.
“You look a right knacker and you sleeping in your clothes.”
“Jammy?” He cleared his throat. “Could you loan me a bit of something? You know…?”
“What? What bit of something?”
“A tenner, maybe?”
Tierney folded his arms.
“Fiver? I’ll pay you back. All I need is…” He stopped then. Jammy had that weird grin.
“A fiver,” said Tierney. “Only a fi
ver? You fall in the door here at eleven o’clock last night, looking like you been through a lawn mower. No explanation, don’t want to tell me what has you wrecked. I hear you poking around here last night when you’re supposed to be sleeping. In the fridge. Opening drawers. Snooping. Now you want to sponge money off me?”
“Wait, Jammy, that’s not the way it is, man-”
“You must be joking. Go home and tidy yourself up. Get a job.”
“Hold on there a minute, Jam-”
“And then go to a clinic and start telling the truth! For once in your life, Leonardo.”
The urge to scream in Jammy Tierney’s face welled up in him. Mr. Fit, with his motorbike and his nixers and his pool sharking. They’d been friends all these years but all he’d done this last while was preach to him about drugs.
“Jammy, I swear to God, man! I don’t do drugs. I don’t! Not the way you think. I mean, man, I wish I could be like you, you know. Really! But a joint never hurt anyone. Takes the sting off things, you know? Christ, you know what it’s like out there! But I’m tired of that scene. Really I am.”
Tierney gave him a bleak look.
“Jases, Leonardo. Always that hurt kid look. I don’t believe I’m doing this.”
“I’ve only got you, man. I’m sorry. I’m going to turn things around, I swear.”
“What happened to you last night then? You weren’t pissed.”
“I ran into a spot of bother at home, like. You know? The ma’s giving me stick and all. I just couldn’t handle it last night. I had to get out.”
“You had to get out, did you.”
This bastard, he thought. Leaning against the doorjamb, putting him through this. So bloody smug, so much better than he was. He thought he was doing him a favour lecturing him. He met Tierney’s eyes for a moment. He imagined giving him a kung-fu leaping kick right in the snot: boom!
“Promise me what I give isn’t going into some dealer’s pocket.”
“Honest to God, Jammy. I’ve had it, man. I know I need to change.”
“How much?”
“Get a job, the whole thing-”
“How much money?”
“Oh.” He tried to laugh but couldn’t.
“A hundred?”
He followed Tierney through the doorway into the kitchenette. Christ, even this place was spotless. Maybe Jammy did it to to impress his mot. Her stuff there in the bathroom.
“Fifty, Jammy. Fifty?”
“What for?”
“Bus fares. Some to the ma. A shirt maybe. To do interviews?”
Tierney picked up his helmet.
“I don’t have it.”
“Twenty then-”
“Shut up. I have to go into town anyway. Come on.”
He’d been leading him on. He looked around the room. Bloody snob, that’s what he was. Always talking of making something of yourself, moving up. It was a bit like Mary, but with her, you knew that she could do it. Jammy Tierney wouldn’t. He’d just have the attitude, looking down his nose at the people he’d grown up with. But he’d never be any better than them.
He rubbed sleep from his eyes.
“I’ll get you something,” Tierney murmured.
“Jesus, Jammy!”
He clapped Tierney’s shoulder.
“Great, man! I knew you wouldn’t sell me out!”
Tierney glared at him. He was about to say something but he let it go. Weirder and weirder, he thought. Too much health did that to you. Too wound-up, too perfect.
“The back of Charley’s, the poolhall, do you know it? Around twelve.”
“That’s great, Jammy. Brilliant, man!”
Minogue put down the phone. He studied the doodles he had drawn while he’d been talking with Toni Heffernan. Triangles; was that anger? He crossed out the i and put in a y. Was it short for Antoinette? Short was right: she had been curt, blunt and short with him. Sister Joe was out on a call. When would she be back? Toni Heffernan didn’t know. Minogue had said he would try again-unless she were to phone him first. He made his way to the kitchen, half-filled the kettle and plugged it in. He was searching for a clean cup when Kilmartin arrived. The Chief Inspector began working on his ear with his baby finger. Minogue opened the bag of coffee beans and inhaled the aroma.
“Any luck,” said Kilmartin.
“I’m trying to get ahold of a Sister Joe. She runs a drop-in centre for kids on the street. She might know Mary.”
“Uhhh.”
Minogue poured beans into the grinder and resealed the bag. He let the grinder run longer than he needed. Kilmartin was still there when he turned back.
“Yourself?”
“Ah, Christ, don’t be talking. Politicking. Phoned Serious Crimes, talked to Keane. ‘We’d appreciate your input’ and all that, says I. Nice to him and all, I was. Still he hems and haws. Huh. Felt like giving him the, well, the you-know-what.”
“In the you-know-where?”
“Exactly. I might have to beat some sense into that mob of his soon.”
Kilmartin rubbed more vigorously at his nose. He stared at the kettle.
“Jack Mullen,” he said, and looked up at Minogue. “He’s hopping the ball, isn’t he?”
Minogue frowned.
“He’s a nutter, Matt, isn’t he?”
“He has a temper, James. That interests me a lot, so it does.”
Kilmartin nodded.
“What’s the name of his outfit again?”
“The self-help group, you mean? The Victory Club.”
Minogue watched Kilmartin lighting a cigarette.
“Victory over the drink, like. Well, I’m sure that’s not a bad thing in itself. Like Al Anon. But as for this sitting around and crying on the next man’s shoulder…”
“It’s not uncommon these days, James.”
Kilmartin coughed out smoke.
“Don’t be talking to me. Sure everybody’s at it. (The psychology racket.”
Minogue poured a third of a cup of milk and placed it in the microwave. The Chief Inspector rubbed at his eyes with his free hand.
“Arra sweet and holy Jesus,” he groaned. “Even me own wife is talking about stuff like that. Everybody’s-a-victim style of thing. ‘Couldn’t help it, Your Honour. Me ma looked sideways at me in the maternity ward. Never got over it.’ ‘Case dismissed. Hire ten shrinks to look after the poor lad.’ ”
“Maura?”
“Yes. Maura Kilmartin. Got a letter from the young lad. He’s in Philadelphia now. Maura got herself in a state about it. I must have put me foot in it somehow. She starts in on this stuff, as if there was something wrong with me-me, the man she married thirty-one happy years ago, bejases! Oh, we’ve had our spats and everything. But sure, who doesn’t?”
Minogue nodded. He recalled Kilmartin’s jibe about the stone he had given Hoey and Aine.
“You probably know the routine. ‘Let’s talk’ kind of shite. Babbling on. All this feelings stuff-they make a religion out of ’em. Everyone’s their own tin pot God now. We’re all victims of one thing or another. Hand out badges, I say. We’d all be millionaires and Shakespeares if only the da or someone hadn’t given them a right well-deserved kick up in the arse. Are you with me?”
Minogue looked in at the revolving tray in the microwave. Kilmartin warmed to his subject.
“Oh, yes,” he resumed. “It was the sixties done us in if you really want to know. We were all softened up: the ads, the self-esteem crowd, taking away the leather from the schoolmaster. Everything is supposed to be perfect now, isn’t it? Everybody deserves everything they want. Want? Demand is more like it! Jesus, we’re taken for iijits. Anyway. I thought that at least that kind of eyewash hasn’t gotten into my house when Maura gives me one of those looks.”
Minogue glanced over.
“Come on now, Matt-you know the ones I mean. Out at a dinner. I’m not stupid, you know. I knew that maybe I was a bit, er, strict and all, but, sure, life isn’t all holidays in Greece and wine and ‘feeling
good about yourself’ now, is it?”
Minogue recalled his ten blissful days in Santorini last year. He registered the jibe with a nod.
“That look on her face. Anyway. Right in the middle of eating this very nice bit of dinner, says she: ‘Were you very close to your father, Jim?’ What do you think of that?”
“A tough enough question. Even when your mouth isn’t full.”
“You’re telling me. Ch-a-rist! ‘Not if I could help it,’ says I.”
Minogue unplugged the kettle and poured water into the jug. The two men stared at the coffee maker.
“Even if Mullen has fares all evening, he has the few minutes it took to go by the canal and spot the daughter,” Kilmartin said.
“His taxi is nearly done, is it,” said Minogue. Kilmartin nodded. He pushed away from the counter and pointed his cigarette at Minogue.
“This bloody Victory Club I’m reading up on. Gentle Jesus and all that stuff tagged on to it. ‘Charismatics,’ yippy-eye-ay kind of stuff. Crying and shouting and floating off the ground? Waving their hands around and singing? These bloody group talks often ended up with his pals telling him he needed to find his daughter. I’ll tell you what ‘find’ meant to Jack Mullen, will I?”
Minogue thought of Iseult.
“I don’t know, Jim. The social worker fella that sits in on their meetings says it’s all part of the recovery deal.”
“Huh. Social workers-oh yeah, I forgot. They’re in charge of everything now. What does that mean anyway, according to him?”
“‘Find,’ meaning build a proper relationship with Mary.”
“Me arse and parsley, man. I know English better than these frigging social worker experts seem to: ‘find’ means go out and get her. Get her. That’s plain English as she is spoken.”
Minogue prepared the plunger at the top of the jug of coffee. Kilmartin mightn’t be far off the mark, he reflected.
“What did Mullen say again about God lifting her or something like that?”
Minogue thought for several moments.
“‘God called my daughter and lifted her out of her dejection.’”
“My God, how you remember stuff like that. Holy Joes.”