I remembered a move from this afternoon.
I pretended to slip on the bathroom floor.
I half went down.
“Gotcha,” Jackie said gleefully. He bent down and swung the blade in a big arc, trying to cut me on the left arm, which I’d raised in a defensive posture. I dropped my hand so that the edge of my palm caught him on the forearm. I tugged him towards me, kicked at his feet, and hooked my thumb into the nerve bundle on his wrist. He let go of the knife and lost his balance. I wrenched him to the floor, pushed his head down, got up, snatched the chalkboard from above the urinal, and smacked it down on the top of his skull. Jackie yelled as the board broke in half and I smacked him again with one of the pieces, knocking him spreadeagled to the floor.
Blood drooled out of his mouth and he groaned incoherently.
I picked up the knife and began walking it across the room to the nearest trash bin.
That was my only mistake.
I’d thought he was out for the count and I’d forgotten about the firearm.
Jackie was now so enraged that any notion of proportionality had long since departed his dazed consciousness.
He sprawled on the floor, rolled to one side, and tried to pull the revolver out of the shoulder holster under his jacket. He got the gun into his hand. I turned round, saw what he was about, ran at him, and jumped. My big Stanley boots landed on his back, knocking the wind clean out of him.
I placed one knee on his throat, pushed the other hard down on his wrist, bent over, removed the gun from a hand already turning purple.
I squeezed his throat with my knee until his face reddened and he began to pass out.
“Will I kill ya, Jackie?” I asked.
The fight was out of his eyes. He was frightened.
“Nah, I won’t. At least not today,” I said.
I stood, emptied the shells from the revolver, and dropped knife, gun, and shells into the nearest toilet bowl.
Jackie was only semiconscious now.
“Fugga, have you, keep fugga mits off her.”
But the adrenaline was pumping through me, so maybe that was my excuse for piling on. I pissed onto the gun, knife, and bullets, zipped up, washed my hands, kicked Jackie in the stomach for good measure, and exited the men’s room.
I fixed my T-shirt, wiped his blood off my steel toe caps, and walked back across the bar.
Back at the booth, they’d been talking about me.
“What took you so long?” Kit asked as I sidled in next to her.
“In one of the toilet cubicles there’s a portal to the land of Narnia. I went through, got married, met Aslan, became a prince, and had fifteen kids; of course, only minutes passed for you, that’s because of the time-dilation effects off General—”
Kit grabbed my leg to shut me up.
“Dad wants to say something to you,” she announced significantly and looked at her father.
Gerry cleared his throat.
“Yes. Kit tells me that you’re a very hard worker and she mentioned that you’re looking for a new job,” Gerry said.
I faked an aw-shucks and stared at Kit.
“Well, I suppose so,” I said, as diffidently as I could.
“Have you done any construction before?” Gerry asked.
“Oh aye, sure enough, hod carrying, mixing cement, brickie stuff,” I said.
“In this country the dwellings are made of wood, so that won’t be much good to you here,” Gerry said sternly.
“Ach, Gerry, stop teasing him, offer him the fucking job,”
Touched said, winking at me.
“Would you like gainful employment?” Gerry asked with a grin.
“I certainly would,” I said.
“Then it’s yours, my young friend,” Gerry said, stretching his big paw across the table. I shook it and said politely:
“Thank you very much, Mr. McCaghan.”
“Gerry, call me Gerry, the only one that calls me Mr.
McCaghan is the bloody magistrate.”
“Thank you, Gerry.”
“Come by tomorrow, I’ll fix you up and give you a place to stay, rent-free if you want it,” Gerry said.
“That’s very generous,” I said.
“No, it’s not really, you’ll stay in one of the premises we’re renovating; it means I can rise you earlier and work you longer,” Gerry said and started to laugh, his big body shaking with unaccountable mirth.
We talked a little about construction and Gerry launched into a story about a Portuguese man who fell into a cement mixer, Touched hinting that he had pushed him in as a practical joke. At the end of the story Sonia yawned behind her hand. Gerry took the sign and got slowly to his feet. When Gerry stood, everybody stood, and such was his presence I found myself getting up as well.
“Look, we better head on to pastures new. Come by the company tomorrow. It’s on Plum Island. You know how to get there?” Gerry asked.
“Aye,” I said.
“Where’s Jackie?” Kit asked.
“Last I saw he’d collapsed in the toilet, think he was the worse for drink,” I explained.
Touched looked at me, at first with suspicion but then a glimmer of understanding came into his eyes.
He’d been watching Jackie and he was astute. He reckoned he knew what had transpired in the bog. He pushed hard on my shoulder as Gerry and Sonia started putting on their jackets. Touched leaned in to whisper to me, all the while keeping his eyes on the bar.
“Jackie’s my boy, he won’t bother you again, I’ll see to that. But, just so as you know, if you lay a finger on him one more time without my say-so, I’ll fucking kill ya. Savvy?” Touched said.
He squeezed a little on my shoulder to emphasize the point.
“If he doesn’t bother me, I won’t bother him,” I said.
Touched nodded. “Good,” he said. “We understand each other.”
“We do. Make sure Jackie understands too,” I muttered, glad that I’d gotten the last word.
Touched turned to Gerry and led him towards the toilets to gather up their fallen comrade.
“Bye,” Kit said happily to me, catching her dad and looping her arms between him and Sonia.
“Bye,” I said.
Touched went in to get Jackie, leaving Gerry with the two women in the wide blue yonder, without a bodyguard, for nearly five full minutes. Not the sort of thing I would have done even if my boss hadn’t been the victim of an assassination attempt a few weeks before. Touched clearly had a soft spot for his young apprentice. This made him vulnerable and in my eyes weak. It was good. Gerry was careless, Jackie was unpredictable, Touched had mellowed. The Sons of Cuchu-lainn were on the skids. That suited me just fine. The more cracks, the more fault lines, the better. Easier for me to slip between them.
Even so, I was a little nervous for Kit until Touched came out again. Without a piece I couldn’t have done anything to stop a hit, but by God I would have tried.
When Touched did finally materialize, the protégé was cleaned up and appeared half-respectable. Still, a look of disgust passed across Gerry’s face. Hmmm, maybe the time was ripe to move someone else into the role of junior bodyguard.
“Bye,” Kit yelled across the room.
“Bye,” I said.
Jackie didn’t look at me but Kit did and with a final wave from her they left the bar. I finished the rest of my pint, well pleased with a very successful night’s work on every conceivable front.
* * *
Drizzle. Cold for summer. The amusements deserted. The sound of generators guttering off, stalls being closed, people leaving.
Someone pulled the master switch and the colored lights swayed on the cables for a moment and went out.
Her eyes were dark. Her skin alabaster.
She’d been waiting for me.
“Spare a couple of hundred?” a homeless man asked and I gave him a buck.
We crossed to the ocean side of the road. The town like a deserted film set. Oppressive reds an
d a frail green light bobbling on the concrete.
“This is how every episode of Scooby-Doo starts,” I said to lighten the mood. “An abandoned fairground, a dark and stormy night.”
She smiled and looked confused.
“A TV show,” I explained.
The rain ceased.
A few insects, a few seabirds. Quiet.
Her tousled hair falling beneath her hood. She was wet, younger now. Her legs a wee bit unsteady in heels and tight black jeans. I’d heard her murmur something to herself. She was a little tipsy and it was almost as if I were the older one.
Novice and initiate.
The field agent and his control.
“You made a successful contact?” she asked finally.
“Yes.”
“We’ll talk in my car.”
“Are you sure you should be driving?”
“Don’t make me cross, darling. I had to have a couple of G&Ts to keep up the act of the desperate woman on the prowl. But I’m fine.”
The big plum-colored Mark 2.
“You met them,” she said when we were inside.
“Yeah.”
“Did you make a good impression?”
“What do you think?”
“I think you did,” she said, grinning.
“Gerry offered me a job, I said I’d take it.”
She nodded, drove south. She opened the sunroof and wound the windows down. Not for mood, but to clear her head and help her drive. She was slightly more intoxicated than she was letting on.
I knew enough not to ask why we weren’t going to my apartment in Salisbury. She drove over the Merrimack bridge and into Newburyport.
She parked the car in the lot behind the All Things Brit store.
“What about Touched?” she asked as she turned off the ignition.
“What about him?”
“Did he frighten you?”
“No.”
“That’s what I was afraid of, dear. Well, we’ll talk about that.”
“I have to say, I’m not impressed. The Provos have put the fear of God into them. I met most of the whole crew. Can’t be more than five or six of them.”
“I saw that, too.”
“Six people. Come on. All this for six people?”
“That’s the definition of a cell, darling. Now save your breath just for the moment while I look for the keys to the . . .
I suppose I should have put them on the same ring as the car key, I hope I haven’t left them back in . . . no, there they are. Thank goodness. My ability to retain keys is not my best virtue.”
She walked me to her flat above the All Things Brit store.
She’d painted it Mediterranean blue and filled it with numbered Picasso prints and Andalusian pottery. There was a Moroccan throw rug and of course that skylight that let in half the galaxy.
The air-conditioning had cooled the apartment to fifty degrees.
She removed her coat. She’d been watching me all night. Watching me with Kit. I may not be an expert at intelligence but I can read a situation.
Of course she was beautiful. Seductive. Almost the polar opposite of the way Kit was beautiful. This was a woman, not a girl. A poppy bloom, not a daisy.
Her hair wild and wet. Soaked dark strands plastered inside her blouse between her breasts.
She unbuttoned the blouse, removed her watch and a pearl necklace. She sighed as she kicked off her shoes.
“What else do you want to know?” I asked.
She leaned over the bed.
“Help yourself to a drink, darling,” she said, her breath carrying the scent of juniper.
“Uh, where is the booze again, over in the—”
“In the little study. The drinks are in the bloody globe, if you can believe it. I know it’s terribly bourgeois but it came with the place. Have a drink, I need to freshen up.”
She went to the bathroom. I opened the globe. A twenty-five-year-old Glenfiddich, a thirty-year-old-Bowmore, and a venerable bottle of brandy that looked as if it had been laid down to celebrate one of Napoleon’s more famous victories. I helped myself to a full glass of the brandy but before I could sip it she came out of the bathroom in only the high heels. She marched across the room, took the glass out of my hand, knocked it back, and lay down on the bed.
“Fuck me,” she said in an imperative tense that was impossible to refuse.
I took off my T-shirt and jeans, dimmed the light.
Her body was ruddy and pale and her breasts were huge and perfect. I climbed on top of her. Her lips like a dollop of strawberry jam on a cream scone. I kissed her. She was hot, aching with desire, her body bending up to meet mine.
“Don’t think I’m always this unprofessional,” she said.
“Of course not,” I assured her.
“I don’t screw all my agents. Not even all the good-looking ones.”
“No.”
“Clouds the judgment.”
“Yes.”
And I laid her down, and eased my body on top of hers.
I was an amputee but it meant nothing. Not to her, not to me, and I could do wet work just as well with a prosthesis as your average bloke.
Her hands stroked my back and pulled me close. I kissed her breasts and her neck but she was impatient for sex. She pushed me off her and kissed my belly and stroked my penis and sucked it till it was hard.
She smelled good.
And we kissed and I thrust my way inside her and we made love, our bodies moving together like singers in a duet, a new song, but one, somehow, that we knew by heart.
And I forgot Kit.
And I thought only about her.
Her snowy English arms and thighs, hungry lips, and assassin’s eyes that were warmer now, burning and alive. The only sound, the harbor boats; the only light, the rotating galaxies and nebulae and stars. We made love until Orion set and the big bear rose. The heavens peaceful, silent, and fair; and, for once, here on Earth, we were in perfect symmetry with the world above.
6: A HEIST IN NEW HAMPSHIRE
Four days of this. Seagulls. Heat. Midges. Greenhead flies. Blackhead flies. Mosquitoes. The stink of marsh gas and a broken sewage pipe. Sand fleas, no fresh water, hundred percent humidity, a dozen men grumbling in Portuguese.
It was noon. Ninety-two degrees and the flies liked the taste of a Belfast boy.
The cool blue waters of the Atlantic a few feet away.
Instead this.
“So it’s bloody mutiny, is it?” I asked the leader of the Portuguese insurrection, who wagged his finger in my face and accused me of being the offspring of Satan and either a kind of donkey or, more likely, a prostitute. At least that’s what I gathered from my shaky command of the Romance languages.
“You listen to me, you fool, I am at my wits’ end, you either start digging or it’s back to the Azores,” I told him in broken Spanish. The Portuguese looked at me with disgust.
Seamus lay snoozing in the hammock. Seamus was supposed to be the foreman but when he had shown up for work, all he’d done was sleep off his hangover and tell me to get the “dagos” back to work.
It all began so promisingly. The day after I met the crew, Seamus and Touched came to see me in Salisbury. They formally offered me a job in Gerry’s construction firm. I packed my bags and drove with them down to Plum Island. They introduced me to a bunch of Portuguese guys and said I’d be living with them in a house Gerry was renovating. The house was the first bad sign. A timber-frame sweatbox with mattresses on the floor, no ventilation, poor plumbing, and also apparently the major breeding ground for every type of bloodsucking insect in New England. The job itself was a piece of piss. Twelve bucks an hour and uncomplicated and anyway I figured it wouldn’t be long until Touched checked out my rap sheet with the Boston PD.
But then nothing after that.
No contact, no pledge of loyalty to old Hibernia, no secret torchlight induction ceremony à la Riefenstahl. No news of any kind. Just getting up and working all day in
the hot sun, liquid lunch with Seamus, more work, a quick dye job on my hair, and going to bed in the fly-ridden hell house full of drunk Portuguese men all of whom, it transpired, hated me.
I’d been to see Samantha once at her lair in the All Things Brit store, ostensibly going in to buy English candy; but she had been aloof and very unhelpful. “Just keep at the job and sooner or later they’ll swing by and recruit you. They’re desperate for manpower, bound to be what with the defections they’ve had.”
“What if, Samantha,” I said bitterly, “the Ra has scared the shit out of them and they have decided to pack in the life and disband their organization? How long am I going to have to do this sweaty, annoying job before you tell me that I’ve finished my bloody assignment and can go home?”
“Oh, we’re not close to that time yet,” she said. “Now if you don’t mind I have to get back to the shop. I’m quite enjoying working here. I might take early retirement and open a place like this for myself,” she said, arranging a box of tea towels.
No erotic fumbling, no swooning looks. All bloody business.
No joy from Samantha, and I hadn’t even seen Kit at all in the last four days. Four days, seemed like forty.
August had ended and it was now September. Princess Diana had died in Paris, not that the Portuguese or Seamus gave a shit, but Samantha had put black drapes in the windows of All Things Brit and, in a canny business move, doubled the price of the Princess of Wales mugs and commemorative wedding plates.
I’ve described Seamus once before, but I’ll recap. He was the one that did the shooting in the Rebel Heart back in Revere. His pal, Mike, as Touched had explained, had the be-jesus scared out of him and left Gerry’s employ, but Seamus was seeing it all through at least until his trial, when he’d be convicted of assault or attempted murder, probably the former, and get a couple of years inside. Serve him right.
Seamus was a disillusioned beat cop, about fifty-five. An old-school racist, with gray skin, salt-and-pepper hair, and a body wrecked by his sixty-a-day habit, which he’d been maintaining through thick and thin since he was fifteen years old. In a series of depressing lunchtime conversations, I quickly ascertained that the highlights of Seamus’s life had been the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., the abandonment of court-ordered busing in the 1980s, the blowing up of Mrs. Thatcher at the Conservative Party Conference, and the glorious run of the Celtics under Larry Bird. The low light: game six of the 1986 World Series. I suppose his loyalty to Gerry was less ideological and more an attempt to give his pathetic and useless existence some meaning.
The Dead Yard Page 12