The Bloomsday Dead

by Adrian McKinty

  He was sweating, shaking, scared, but even so he was more frightened of them than he was of me, even with the promise of Bridget’s wrath and a .38 sitting right here on the table.

  I scoped the joint.

  The place was stuffed to the brim with school boys and girls. The two cops. I really couldn’t shoot the fucker. I couldn’t actually put the gun to his head and order him to speak. The only thing to do would be to wait until he closed up shop and get the son of a bitch on the way home.

  “What time you finish up here?”

  “We’re open to midnight.”

  “You stay till midnight?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” he replied sensibly.

  “Listen, is there any way we could talk in a back room or in private somewhere?” I attempted. Get him back there, show him the meaning of fear.

  “Uh, no, I can’t do that, sorry,” he said.

  “I’ll give you one more chance: the name of the boy or the name of the person you pay off to.”

  “I’ve told you, I don’t know.”

  One of the cops walked past on his way to the bathroom. I put the gun in my jacket pocket.

  “Are we done?” the manager asked.

  If I’d more time I could work on him. But I didn’t. I stood.

  “You haven’t heard the last of me,” I told him.

  I turned on my heel and walked out of the Malt Shop onto Bradbury Place.

  “Shit,” I said. Christ on a bike. I’d thought that I could succeed where the cops and Bridget had failed. Instead I’d bollocksed it up. Run into a brick wall.

  I leaned against the window.

  And I hadn’t exactly told Bridget the truth either.

  I wasn’t connected. I wasn’t tuned in. I didn’t know people. Sure, I’d run with the teen rackets back in the early nineties, but that was a long time ago. I hadn’t kept track of any of those useless fucks.

  I bummed a cigarette off a passing student and sat down in the Ford Thunderbird. What the hell was I going to do now? I took a couple of drags on the ciggy and threw it away. Nodded to myself. Aye, there was nothing else for it. I wasn’t connected, but I knew a man who was. I had only one card up my sleeve, but that card was a wild one-eyed jack.

  Chopper Clonfert owed me a favor.

  Back when we were both teenagers, Chopper and I had collaborated on a massive smuggling operation across the border between Northern and Southern Ireland. Petrol, butter, cows, booze moved north; condoms, birth control pills, banned videos, and sometimes the same cows moved south. It was a more innocent time, when the paramilitaries weren’t keen on drugs and the cops didn’t exactly rate cattle rustling as high on their list of priorities. But even so, it was still a risky operation. You had to move product through a number of territories, and for the sake of good business you needed a truce among all the separate gangs and factions.

  One wet Saturday night, Chopper and I got lifted driving a lorry load of whisky. I was just a kid, so the Garda Síochána didn’t even cuff me, but they worked Chopper over and threw him in the back of a van. He could have done five years for smuggling, but lucky for him, I wandered to the back of the lorry, broke a bottle of hundred proof, threw in a lit cigarette, and ran like hell.

  Classed as a fuckup by the Guards and with virtually no evidence, Chopper pled guilty to importing without a licence, got six months and was out in four. Of course, by that time I was in the army and then I went to America and I hadn’t seen him since. But I read things about him on the BBC. I had followed his career. Nowadays he no longer called himself Chopper.

  Now he was a Northern Ireland assemblyman, a Belfast City councillor, and one of the rising stars of the Independent Republican Party. Indeed, he was tipped as a potential leader and was almost certain to become an MP at next year’s election.

  Garrett Clonfert. Né Chopper.

  The one villain in Belfast I knew was still in the game.

  He had to be, because you don’t get to become an IRP councillor without having murdered your way through your rivals. Hard for an outsider to keep track of the fissiparous alphabet soup of Irish politics, and even I had trouble sometimes, but I did know that IRP was an offshoot of Republican Sinn Fein, who were themselves a radical offshoot of Provisional Sinn Fein, itself a breakaway of official Sinn Fein. IRP was by far the nastiest of the lot. It had renounced the IRA ceasefire of 1997 as a perfidious betrayal. Its military wing had planted a dozen bombs since 1998, pre-9/11 they had praised Osama bin Laden as an anticolonialist freedom fighter, and they were linked with ETA, the PLO, and the Italian Red Brigades. It didn’t fill me with glee to have to go begging for help from my old pal Chopper, but realistically he was my only hope.

  A quick scan of the phone book. A ten-minute walk from the Malt Shop.

  Councillor Clonfert’s offices were in a new glass-and-steel building off the Ormeau Road, near the BBC.

  The entire ground floor was an IRP “advice center” for his constituents. There were a couple of hard men looking for work as well as some genuine local people there to complain about the drains, the trash collection, and the noisy neighbors. The place was painted a blushed shade of rehab-facility pink. There were posters of smiling children, of all races, holding hands. Embroidered along an entire wall was a Bayeux-style tapestry, also either done by children or mentally challenged adults, depicting scenes of daily life in Ireland. Scenes that were frozen in time about 1927. Sheep farmers, dairy farmers, fishermen. And above these scenes of mythical rural idyll was emblazoned the baffling IRP motto: “Peace, Power, Prosperity.”

  I found a receptionist whose name tag said she was called Doreen. Older broad with a poisonous expression and a blond Partonesque wig.

  “Doreen, I’d like to speak to Garrett, please. I’m an old friend of his. Name’s Michael Forsythe.”

  “Councillor Clonfert is on a conference call with Brussels at the moment,” Doreen said with a hateful smile. “If you wouldn’t mind taking a seat, I’ll see—”

  I interrupted.

  “Doreen, I don’t mean to be rude but this is extremely urgent. Could you please tell him that Michael Forsythe wants to see him.”

  Doreen looked across at the two heavies who were sitting on a sofa reading the Keira Knightley issue of Vanity Fair.

  “Listen, Doreen, there’s no need to get your goons involved. I’m not a troublemaker. Please, just call up Garrett and I’ll guarantee you he’ll want to see me,” I said quietly.

  Doreen picked up her telephone and turned away from me. She spoke very quietly.

  “I’m so sorry, Councillor Clonfert, but there’s a gentleman here to see you, he’s says it’s very urgent. He says his name is Michael Forsythe, I can get Richard to see him off the . . . Oh, ok. Ok. I’ll send him right in.”

  Doreen looked at me with a bit more respect.

  “Mr. Forsythe, you take the door behind me and then it’s the first door on your left. I’ll buzz you in,” she said.

  She pressed a button on her desk and the massive armored door behind her swung open. Garrett would have needed this level of additional security because you never knew who might try and kill him. Because I seemed to be an old friend, she’d hadn’t got the two ganches to pat me down.

  That might be handy.

  Outside Garrett’s office there was a poster of pastyfaced Irish weans standing on Blackpool Pier with the words “Vote Clonfert: A Bridge to the Future” underneath. Might have been nice if the photographer had used an actual bridge.

  To catch him off guard, I tried to open Garrett’s door without knocking but the handle didn’t turn.

  “Who is it?” he yelled from inside.

  “Michael Forsythe,” I said.

  “It is you. Wait a second, Michael, and I’ll buzz you in.”

  The door buzzed. The handle turned.

  He was sitting at a large oak desk in a massive office. Behind him, through an enormous window, I could see the BBC building and cloudy Belfast.

  Leather chairs, a
leather sofa. Computers and a stereo playing Radio 3. Art prints on the wall: a Gauguin full of naked Polynesian girls and the detail from Klimt’s Three Ages of Woman that cuts out the old broad. On one side of his desk a photograph of Councillor Clonfert getting lost in a three-way hug with Senator Ted Kennedy and Congressman Peter King at the unveiling of the Irish famine memorial in New York City. On the other side a photo of Garrett with an attractive younger woman and a little girl.

  Garrett stood and offered me his hand. He had put on weight since last I’d seen him, but he looked good. Late thirties, sandy hair, smooth cheeks, and warm open eyes and smile. He was wearing an Italian tailored silk suit in a fetching shade of burgundy. It was flashy for Belfast, and a canary yellow silk tie didn’t help tone him down.

  “Michael Forsythe, as I live and breathe,” he said.

  “Chopper Clonfert,” I said.

  We shook hands.

  “Sit down, sit down. Cigar? They’re very good,” he said.

  “No, thanks.”

  “Michael Forsythe, Michael Forsythe. You’re a bit of a legend, aren’t you?”

  “Nah, not really. You’re the star, Garrett. Councillor, assembly-man— I’m very impressed.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m just doing my bit for the people. A life of service turned out to be my calling.”

  “Very good of you, I’m sure.”

  His eyes went glassy as he remembered the old days.

  “Jesus, Michael Forsythe. I haven’t seen you since way back. Boy, oh boy, I couldn’t believe it when I heard you’d joined the British army. I’m glad you got out and I didn’t have to kill you,” he said with a big laugh.

  “Maybe I would have killed you.”

  Garrett laughed again.

  “Oh, don’t worry, you don’t have to brag, I know all about you, Michael. I heard about your exploits in America.”

  “What ya hear?”

  “You killed Darkey White over money. That’s the story on the street.”

  “It’s close enough,” I said.

  “What are you doing with yourself these days? Maybe I got the wrong end of the stick, but I’d been led to believe that you were living a secret identity, in the witness protection program,” Garrett said.

  “Aye.”

  “I heard you were in Australia.”

  “No, I wasn’t. . . . Listen, Garrett, I’d love to talk about old times and your rise to fame and fortune, but I came here because I need your help.”

  Garrett’s smile disappeared from his face.

  “You need my help?” he said suspiciously.

  “Yeah.”

  “Michael, um, these days I have to keep within the letter of the law, I’m running for parliament and—”

  “Garrett, it’s nothing illegal. I’m working for Bridget Callaghan, her wee girl—”

  “I know. Her wee girl ran away with some fella and she’s been doing her nut, sending her boys everywhere looking for her. I know all about it.”

  “Aye. Well, her boys have drawn a blank and the cops have been fucking useless and now they’ve received a ransom demand.”

  Garrett nodded slowly.

  “Have they now? So she’s been kidnapped.”

  “That’s what it looks like.”

  “I heard she ran off. Maybe she staged it to get her ma’s money.”

  I was getting a little impatient with this.

  “Garrett, regardless of how it happened, I’m trying to find her and I’d like you to help me.”

  Garrett pushed his chair back on the rollers, creating a psychological and physical distance between us. You didn’t need to be a head shrinker to read those signs.

  “You owe me a favor, Chopper,” I said.

  He laughed.

  “A favor? What the fuck are you talking about?”

  “For the van full of nicked whisky. If I hadn’t torched it, blown it the fuck up, you would have done five years for that.”

  Garrett shook his head.

  “No way, Michael. I would have bought my way out of that one. I would have done what I done, no matter if you’d torched that van or not. Stop kidding yourself, mate. I don’t owe you a fucking thing.”

  I closed my eyes. Seethed. This was the wrong thing to say to me on the day I’d had.

  “Take that cigar now,” I said.

  Garrett opened a box on the table, took out two cigars, cut the end off, lit them both, and passed one to me.

  “Michael, let’s go get some lunch. I’m happy to see you, let’s talk about what you’re about and what you’ve been up to. It’s fascinating that you’re actually working for the woman who, I heard, had a million-fucking-dollar contract on ya. I mean, for Jesus’ sake.”

  I puffed on the cigar. An expensive Cuban. Way above a councilman’s salary.

  “Garrett, I don’t want to threaten you—” I began again.

  Garrett laughed.

  “You. Threaten me? Whose town do you think this is? Aye, I know who she is and I seen her goons about, but let me tell you, this isn’t the fucking Big Apple. Don’t even try to go down that road. Don’t embarrass yourself. Would you walk into Palermo and start mouthing off about Bridget Callaghan? Well, don’t walk in here and try the same thing.”

  “Garrett, it wouldn’t just be her. You wouldn’t want the IRA after you, would ya?”

  “The IRA, Michael, is on cease-fire. Come on, enough of this talk, you’re spoiling what could be a nice reunion between old pals.”

  “Hear me out, Garrett, all I want to know is the name of the gangster who owns the Malt Shop on Bradbury Place. That’s all, just a fucking name. Fucking manager was too afeared to tell me, but I know you know. You’d have to know.”

  Garrett nodded. He did know. He knew all the underbosses in his territory.

  “Why is that name so important to you?” he asked.

  “The Malt Shop is where Siobhan Callaghan met the boy she disappeared with. The boy was reeking of pot. A drug dealer. He has to be connected. He’d have to get permission to deal there and whoever gave him that permission will know who he is and where he lives.”

  Garrett rubbed his chin, slowly shook his head.

  “I’m sorry, Michael, I can’t help you, I don’t want to rock the boat. If they ever found that I had told someone who—”

  “I’ve got a .38 in my pocket,” I interrupted.

  “I’ll pretend you didn’t say that, Michael. The intercom has been on the whole time you’ve been in here. I know you’re joking, but I wouldn’t want my boys rushing in and fucking shooting you by mistake. That would be an ugly thing to happen to the prospective MP for West Belfast. Even with the whole IRP behind me, it would hurt my campaign,” he said jovially.

  I was angry now.

  “‘Peace, Power, Prosperity,’ my arse.”

  “Michael, all those things are important. We’re bringing people together. We are taking power from the old archetypes committed to a past full of hate. We’re building a new society here.”

  “Chopper, don’t come the politician with me, don’t get ideas above your station. You are what you’ve always been, a small-time fucking hood. Ignorant hood, too,” I said.

  He forced his laugh harder.

  “Ignorant. How so? Oh, do enlighten me, rat exile from abroad,” he said, not at all nonplussed.

  “I know where you come from, mate, even if your constituents have forgotten. I know you are in an ugly fucking business and if your boys rush in, well and good, let them do their worst, you’ll be dead before the door handle turns,” I said, pulling out the revolver and pointing it at his head.

  “Put that away, you’re making a fool of yourself.”

  “Aye, well, better a breathing fool than a dead fucker.”

  “You’d never get out of here alive.”

  “Shoot my way out.”

  “You wouldn’t dare kill me. Your life wouldn’t be worth tuppence.”

  “Who owns the Malt Shop on Bradbury Place?”

  “Mic
hael, forget it, what do you care about some missing wee tart.”

  A knock at the door.

  “Is there a problem, Councillor Clonfert?” a voice asked.

  Chopper looked at me quizzically. He was right. If I laid a finger on him, his boys would top me. There was no angle in killing him and Chopper was certainly brave enough to see me blink first.

  We regarded each other for a half minute, and then for the second time in an hour I put the gun away, my bluff called, my threat useless.

  “There’s no problem, Peter. Mr. Forsythe here was just leaving,” Chopper said.

  Aye, the son of a bitch knew I wouldn’t kill him. He knew I couldn’t kill him. But everyone has a weakness. I got to my feet.

  “Well, Garrett, you can keep your cigars, I suppose I’ll he heading on.”

  Garrett stood too.

  “Michael, it’s always interesting being with you. So over the top. So old school. You should have gone into the theater,” he said, and offered me his hand again. I shook it and winked at him.

  “You’re a brave man, Chopper, should have know better than to threaten you.”

  “Aye,” Garrett said, pleased with himself.

  I hesitated, thought for a moment, nodded at the photograph of him with his wife and child.

  “Although if I were you, I’d put a couple of bodyguards on that wee girl of yours and keep them there for at least ten years, that’s how long Bridget waited till she hit me. She’s patient.”

  “What did you say?”

  “You heard me, Garrett,” I said, and began walking for the door.

  “Bridget Callaghan wouldn’t dare come after my family,” he said, his face completely at odds with his words.

  “Nah, not your family. Just your wee girl, she’s old school too, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, dead daughter for dead daughter.”

  Garrett let me walk two more paces. He hit the intercom button on his desk, turning it off to give him privacy.

  “Sit down,” he said in a whisper.

  “I think I’ll stand.”

  “What would you tell Bridget?”

  “When her daughter turns up dead, I’ll tell her that you’re the one that stopped me from saving Siobhan and that you have a lovely wee girl yourself.”