I gazed daggers. He continued: “Ok, no sign, forget the sign, ok, so anyway I went out into the arrivals hall and I thought I’d lost you, but, you see, I knew you were Irish, so I thought to myself, why don’t I check the pub and anyway I—”
“Yeah, if I’d been black you would have checked the watermelon stand? Enough of your nonsense, what’s the goddamn message?” I asked.
He rummaged in the bicycle messenger bag and brought out a fax sheet. He unfolded it and began reading: “It’s from Mr. Moran, do you know Mr. Moran?” he asked.
“No, I don’t know Mr. Moran, read me the bloody message before I really lose my patience.”
“Ms. Callaghan apologizes for her heavy-handed behavior of this morning. She says that she urgently needs your help and she would like to speak to you again,” he said, producing a cell phone from his bike bag and placing it on the table.
“What’s the deal here? Is it going to blow up as soon as you walk off?” I inquired.
“Uh, no, it’s just a phone. She wants to talk to you,” he said.
“Bridget wants to talk to me? Ok, fine, I got some time. But I’ll call her on my phone. You ever hear of ricin nerve-toxin poison? One touch of it and you’re toast. For all I know you’re wearing some sort of protective lubrication on your hands, that phone is coated in poison, and I’m about to be topped like they did with that Bulgarian.”
The kid looked at me to see if I was taking the piss out of him, which, if truth be told, I half was.
“Why don’t you just give me her number, if you’re legit I’ll call her on the phone,” I said.
He gave me the number without any fuss at all. A Belfast listing. I dialed it.
“Hello, Europa Hotel,” a voice answered.
“Yeah, I need Bridget Callaghan, she says she’s staying there.”
“One moment, please.”
“Hello?” Bridget said.
“Nice try, sister,” I said. “I didn’t bite last time, I won’t bite this time, took care of your delightful emissaries,” I said.
“Yes, Michael, I heard about your exploits. In fact, I saw the results of your shenanigans on BBC World. For God’s sake, they weren’t there to kill you. Don’t you believe me? I need your help.”
“Aye, they weren’t there to kill me, that’s why they pulled out their guns and told me to make my peace with the Lord.”
I looked at the lawyer and put my hand over the receiver.
“Are you getting an earful of all of this? Make yourself scarce for a minute.”
“I’ll sit over there until you need me,” he said, moving to an adjacent table.
“They weren’t supposed to hurt you, Michael,” Bridget insisted.
I laughed out loud.
“Oh, Bridget, the times we had, you make me smile, and I suppose the men in Los Angeles last year wanted to take me to a surprise party in Malibu.”
“No, they were there to kill you. They were there to kill you and cut your fucking head off and bring it to me. But the two men today were there to make sure you flew to Ireland. My daughter has gone missing and I need your help. For God’s sake, I’m a mother and my only child has vanished. I need your help, Michael,” she said, her voice trembling.
I looked at the phone. I found her very affecting. She was good. She nearly had me convinced. All she had to do was squirt a few and I’d be on my way to the Emerald Isle and certain death.
“Honey, look, it’s been great talking to you and it was very clever of you to find me twice in one day. But this time I’m out of your life forever. I’m going to India, wearing a turban, opening a pawnshop in Bombay, so adios, Bridget, my love. And I’ll give you this wee warning, honey: my patience has its limits. This game can go two ways. Try this one more time and if I find you’re still after me, I’m coming for you, understand? Be a lot harder for you to conceal your movements than it will be for me to conceal mine. I’ve had twelve years of practice.”
“Are you threatening me?”
“Aye. I am.”
“Michael, first off, you are no position to fucking threaten me. Second off, I’m not trying to con you or scam you. Everything I said was completely true,” she said.
“I am sure it was. Right back to ‘I love you’ and ‘Let’s run away together.’ Bridget, it’s been terrific having this chat. Do keep in touch. Do think about what I’ve said. Hate to have to kill ya some night like I did with your boyfriend back in the day. But I will if you keep on my case. And now I have to go, love, got a couple of federales coming to meet me and give me a lift downtown. So I wouldn’t try anything.”
“Don’t go, Michael, don’t go, listen to me, just listen. Everything I said was true. My daughter, Siobhan, has gone missing in Belfast. We were over here on a trip, we come here every summer. We were in Belfast. On Saturday she went for a walk, she didn’t come back to the hotel. She said she was going to get a milk shake but no one at the milk shake place saw her. Michael, she has completely disappeared. The police are looking for her, you can call up their tip line if you don’t believe me. 01232-PSNI-TIP. Please, Michael, I want you on board. I am losing my mind, I’ve got every single person I know helping me here. The police, everyone. Please, I’m willing to let bygones be bygones. Wipe the slate clean, if you would just come and help. I know you’re good at being you and you’re better than anyone I know. I’m not trying to flatter you, Michael, but you’re the best I’ve ever met. This is your town, you can find her, I know you can. Please come. Please.”
And now she did start to cry. She cried and cried.
I could feel the tide shifting under my feet. I blinked. And I fought against it, but it didn’t help and now I did believe her.
Shit.
What an eejit I was.
“Don’t cry, Bridget, please don’t cry,” I said.
The sobbing continued for another minute.
“Ok, enough, I’ll come,” I said.
Bridget blew her nose. Sniffled.
“I love her. She’s my whole universe, Michael.”
“I understand. I’m sure she’s fine. Kids run away sometimes. Especially at that age. It’s a mother-daughter thing more than likely. Don’t worry about her. We’ll get her.”
“Thank you, Michael. That man who contacted you will give you fifteen thousand dollars for expenses and a ticket to Dublin. The plane goes in an hour, you better hurry if you’re going to catch it,” Bridget said.
“I’ll be calling that tip line, I need to confirm this. What did you say her legal name was?” I asked.
“Siobhan Callaghan. Eleven, nearly twelve years old. The spit of her ma.”
“Heartbreaker, in other words.”
“She’s my whole life, Michael, I want you to help me.”
“Ok, if it’s kosher, I’ll be on the plane. Bridget, I got to warn you, I don’t respond well to heavy stuff; if you have goons waiting to meet me in Ireland, I’ll kill them and you’ll never hear from me again. And if it’s a trick, I’ll make sure you go down. I’m getting mighty tired of this.”
“Thank you, Michael. It’s not a trick. I hate you. I hate your guts. But I need you. I’m pulling out all the stops.”
“Ok.”
She hung up. I motioned the kid to come over.
“Ok, dickwad, you got some money for me,” I said.
“Mr. Forsythe, I have been instructed to give you this envelope containing fifteen thousand dollars and a confirmation for your Aer Lingus ticket to Dublin on the five-fifteen flight this evening.”
“Take out the money and put a few bills in your mouth.”
“Why my mouth?”
“Didn’t I tell you about the nerve toxin? If they’ve poisoned the money, I want it to kill you first.”
The kid hesitated, as if considering the possibility that someone had indeed spiked the dough. He put the first two bills in his mouth with no ill effect.
“Ok, now, the thirteenth bill and the last five.”
He did those as well, again
without keeling over or spitting blood.
“This may seem crazy to you but you never know with Bridget. She’s smart. Now do the same with the airline ticket and then piss off out of my life and go back to your vida loca.”
“Can I get a receipt for the money?” he asked.
“A receipt? Oh, I see. Of course. You’re worried I’ll take the money and just fuck away off with it. Well, I’ll let you in on a little secret, that’s precisely what I’m going to do,” I said.
“Ms. Callaghan believes you will not do that. However, Mr. Moran has instructed me—”
“He’s instructed you, has he?”
“Yes, he has. I am to ask politely but I am not to coerce you in any way,” he said.
“You think you could coerce me if you really needed to?”
“Um, well, it isn’t really my department,” he said.
“No, I didn’t think so.”
He nodded, stood.
“Good luck, Mr. Forsythe,” he said.
I watched him walk out of the airport and hail a cab. I counted the money. Fifteen large, sure enough. And I could have it for free. But there was that other thing she said. She would “wipe the slate clean” if I helped her.
Wipe the slate clean.
Now that was an attractive proposition. My body ached from the exhaustion of it all. Dodging her and her minions. Twelve years I’d been on the run from the New York Irish mob. Since Christmas Eve 1992. Now Bridget claimed she was willing to forgive it all. Forgive me killing Darkey, forgive me selling Darkey’s boys down the river. Why?
There were really only two possibilities.
One, that this was all a trap, an elaborate hoax to get me to come to Ireland.
Two, she really did have a daughter who had gone missing and like any concerned parent she was at the end of her tether. If I were a betting man, I’d have gone for one.
But you never knew. I sipped the dregs of my beer.
“How do you think the Red Sox rotation will match up against the opposition this year,” a voice said.
I looked up.
A tall, blond storm trooper of a man, in a wide blue business suit. A clone behind him with dark hair.
“Can’t you cocksuckers get anything right?” I said. “Yankees’ rotation and I’m supposed to mention the— Oh, forget it, take a seat, there’s been a slight change of plans. . . .”
When his lads phoned Dan and told him that I was heading for Dublin, Dan said he wouldn’t allow me to go until he spoke to me in the flesh. I told him I’d miss my plane, so Dan told the DHS that he needed a background check of every passenger on the Aer Lingus flight to Dublin.
“That’ll hold the bastards up for an hour or so,” Dan said while he drove in from an “important conference,” which in fact was almost certainly a golf course in Westchester.
He arrived about thirty minutes later in navy slacks, white shirt, and red Kangol beret. I hadn’t seen him in person for a long time. He was a nice guy, going places with the bureau. An administrator, not a field man. He wouldn’t be in witness protection forever. Although twelve years could seem like it. Tall, bald, but good-looking and very affable. I liked him. He sat down at my table and ordered a lime juice for himself and another beer for me. The agents got up and slipped into the background.
Dan had known me since ’93, when the FBI had offered me that first deal to rat out Darkey’s organization. He’d helped me in ’97 when the bureau and MI6 had had me infiltrate an IRA splinter group in Massachusetts and he’d cleaned up that ugly situation last year when Bridget had sent her men to Los Angeles. We’d been through a lot together and we shook hands with genuine affection.
“Michael, first thing I have to say is I’m sorry I didn’t meet you off the plane, I thought we’d have a couple of days and I was right in the middle of, well, to be honest, I was right in the middle of a foursome at the country club.”
“Aye. That’s ok. Makes me happy to see that you’re golfing in the middle of a workday. That’s what our taxpayers’ money goes on.”
“Since when did you ever pay taxes?” he asked.
“Sales tax.”
“Ok, so what’s this I hear about you wanting to fly to Dublin?”
“I talked to Bridget. Her daughter’s gone missing and she wants my help to find her. She’s willing to wipe the slate clean.”
Dan smiled.
“It’s a trap, don’t you see that?” he said without inflection.
“Does she have a daughter?” I asked.
“She does.”
“Is it Darkey’s kid?”
“It is,” he said flatly.
“How come I never knew about this?”
Dan looked embarrassed.
“Why would you need to know? Bridget never took the stand, even as a witness, so it never came out in court. Furthermore, it was information we did not wish to share with you because we didn’t think it was important,” Dan said. It was an answer filled with weasel words.
“You didn’t want me to know she was pregnant when I killed her fiancé and rolled up her fiancé’s gang; you thought it might throw me a bit, didn’t you?”
“It wasn’t relevant, Michael, it still isn’t,” Dan insisted.
“It’s relevant. While I was waiting for you, I called up the police in Belfast. Bridget did indeed file a missing persons report three days ago.”
“That doesn’t mean anything. It could still be a setup. The kid could be in the room with her right now,” Dan said.
“I know.”
“Michael, come on, we’ll go to Midtown, get you in a nice hotel, maybe the Plaza. Take it easy for a few days and then we’ll send you somewhere new.”
“Dan, that’s precisely it. I’m tired of this. Tired of running. Tired of moving to new cities. I want to check this out, if there’s any possibility that this could be real I want to investigate.”
“Big mistake,” Dan said, shaking his head.
“I don’t think so.”
Dan sighed. “Let me remind you who we’re talking about here,” he said. “After you helped put the rest of Darkey’s crew behind bars, Bridget was off the scene for a while. She wasn’t a natural successor to Darkey White. There were at least two other candidates Duffy could have put in charge of Upper Manhattan and Riverdale. He wasn’t a sentimentalist. He didn’t owe her a goddamn thing. Bridget made her own way to the top. Murdered her way up. She started with next to nothing. Not even Darkey’s name, remember. She got a few loyal men, she took out the opposition without a second—”
I didn’t want to hear this right now.
“I read the papers,” I interrupted.
“James Hanratty, shot on the way back from his sister’s wedding. Pat Kavanagh, shot in front of his wife and two kids. Miles Nagobaleen, pushed in front of a subway train. This isn’t the girl you used to know, Michael. She’s ruthless. When Duffy died someone ordered the murder of Duffy’s brother the very same night, so he was out of the picture too. We suspect she’s ordered at least three hits in the last year, not counting the ones on you. I mean, come on, Michael. Why do you think the Boston mob stays out of New York? They’re scared of her. And they’re right to be.”
“She’s a killer,” I said, trying to sound blasé.
“No, Michael, more than that. She’s the general behind the killers.”
“She’s also a mother,” I said.
Dan took a sip of my beer, put the bottle back on the table, shook his head. His eyes were sad, he knew he wasn’t going to convince me.
“We can’t look after you outside United States jurisdiction,” he said.
“Dan, I’m not that bad at looking after myself, as you well know.”
“Michael, if you go to Ireland, there’s nothing I can do to protect you.”
“I realize that.”
“If we lose you, it’ll be a black eye for the whole program, a huge setback. It’ll discourage other potential informants. It won’t be good for anyone.”
“Least of all me.”
“Least of all you, exactly.”
Dan looked at me for a long time. He leaned back with a big exaggerated sigh.
“But you’re set on going, aren’t you?” he said finally.
I tapped the passport on the table.
“Don’t worry, Dan, they won’t harm me now I’m an American citizen,” I said.
Dan shook his head, for him this was not an occasion for levity.
“There’s nothing I can say?” he said sadly.
“No.”
Dan motioned for one of the agents to come over. He told him something I couldn’t catch and the agent sloped off.
“What was that all about?” I asked.
“I’m going to get some paperwork faxed over. I’ll want you to sign a release ending your relationship with the WPP. If you’re killed by Bridget Callaghan or one of her employees, or meet with any kind of accident while you’re there, I want us off the hook. I’ll want us to be able to say that you did this strictly against my advice and that you were no longer a member of the WPP.”
I nodded. He was right. There was no point kicking up a stink about it. He ordered two more Sam Adams, getting one for himself this time. We clinked the bottles together.
“Ok, so tell me everything you know about the daughter,” I asked.
“Her name is Siobhan, it’s spelled with a b, pronounced Shavawn, but there’s a b in there somewhere.”
“Christ, I’m Irish, I know how to spell Siobhan.”
“Ok, we believe it’s Darkey’s kid. I think she must be about eleven or twelve. She went to private school in Manhattan. A good student. Pretty girl, takes after her mother, not Darkey, thank God. Only child, but she has a lot of cousins. . . . And, uhh, well, I’m afraid that’s about all I know.”
“You think Bridget is the type of person to use her daughter in a ploy to get me?”
“I don’t, frankly, but nothing would surprise me.”
“How often does Bridget go to Belfast?”
“I have no idea. I do have other cases, you know. I heard something about a home in Donegal, wherever that is.”
The Bloomsday Dead Page 4