Shadow Box

by Peter Cocks

  “Have you called the police?”

  She looked blankly at me and shook her head.

  “My dad wouldn’t like it.”

  I guessed my lot wouldn’t be too keen either. I was completely thrown. I had “burgled” the flat only a few hours earlier. What were the chances of another, random burglary the same afternoon? Virtually none, I guessed. Someone else was on Hannah’s case.

  “Are you sure it was a burglar?” I asked. I put my arm around Hannah’s shaking shoulders and felt her lean into me a little. “Anything missing?”

  “I don’t think so,” she said. “There’s nothing much to nick.”

  “Let me just have a look around,” I said. “Have a cup of tea, you’ll feel better.” I put the kettle on and put a teabag into a mug for her.

  I did a quick inspection of the bathroom and Hannah’s room. I checked the open drawer where I had found the pills. The tin wasn’t there.

  I went back to finish off making the tea then sat back down beside Hannah.

  “Any clues?” I asked. “Why won’t your dad call the police? Is he, like, involved in anything?” I asked, innocently. “Does he owe anyone money?”

  Hannah shook her head. “He doesn’t trust them. He had bad experiences in Ireland. The Troubles, you know…”

  “Sure,” I said. “Could there be any connection? Could anyone be after him – or you – over that?”

  I had heard of Irish families, both Catholic and Protestant, whose feuds from the 1970s were still running today. Tony had made me aware of that stuff.

  Hannah shrugged and looked at me with panda eyes. Her tears had smudged her heavy make-up into big black patches that made her wet eyes very blue. Her cheeks were red and her lower lip trembled. It was the first time I had seen her look vulnerable.

  “Can you stay?” she asked. “I don’t want to be here on my own.”

  I agreed I would. I bodged up a bolt across the door of the flat and wedged a chair under the handle. I wanted to feel secure as well. The break-in, hot on the heels of my own, unnerved me. As did the missing pills. And the massive stash above our heads.

  I looked out of the window, nervously checking the street outside. It was as quiet as usual.

  Hannah cracked open the cans I’d bought earlier. They were welcome now. She opened a small tin and rolled a spliff.

  “I don’t much,” she said. “But I’m all on edge.”

  “Sure,” I nodded, then declined when she offered it. “Doesn’t agree with me.”

  Hannah put some music on and we sat in near silence, sipping Guinness while Hannah mellowed out. An hour later, her eyelids began to droop.

  “I’m done in,” she said. “You OK out here?”

  “I’m fine, I’ll crash on the sofa.”

  Hannah found me a hippy blanket and I threw it over the sofa. I was better off in the living room, I thought. I took my jeans and shirt off and made myself as comfortable as I could, wrapping the blanket around me. My brain was still racing with questions and possibilities, but I must have got some kip because I had disturbing dreams about fighting, Ireland, black eyes, Sophie Kelly, boxes of pills, Spain and the recurring image of an exploding car that woke me up with a start.

  That, and the click of a door.

  I didn’t move. I could sense a person in the room, but they were behind me and concealed by the back of the sofa. I got ready to spring, then heard a voice.

  “I can’t sleep.”

  Hannah.

  She padded round to where I could see her. From the streetlight outside the window, I could see her bare legs and the baggy T-shirt she was sleeping in.

  “Kieran.” She touched my shoulder.

  I grunted as if I was just stirring, not fully awake, pretending I hadn’t heard her. I rolled over to face the back of the sofa and felt the pressure as Hannah sat on the edge of the cushion, then swung her legs up to lie beside me.

  I knew this wasn’t a good idea.

  Donnie felt the pill kick in.

  As the rush came up on him, he realized he’d been stupid taking a whole one. Of course, he was used to narcotics in their various forms, but he’d never seen these green pills before. He should have been cautious and started with a quarter to assess their strength. Donnie knew where he was with the nose candy. Cocaine was cocaine, give or take a cut of baby laxative, but these new pills were getting stronger, and you never knew how strong till you took one. He downed a couple of lagers and a vodka chaser at the bar of a pub, trying to level off the effects of the E. He stepped out into the night air and lit a fag, feeling marginally less woozy, and his phone rang. He looked at the caller ID, not wanting to talk, but couldn’t drop the call.

  “Don? Dave.”

  “Dave,” Donnie answered, his tongue feeling a bit fat. “How you doing, Dave? S’Don.”

  “What’s new, Don?”

  Donnie gathered his thoughts; at least he had something new to offer.

  “She’s up to something, Dave. I went up there and had a look around and…” Donnie tried to stop gabbling.

  “Who? What?”

  “The girl. I went in the drum like you asked. It’s just a student sock, a right hole. But there was quite a few Jack and Jills in the chest of drawers.”

  “What sort?”

  “Es I think. I’ve took…”

  Donnie felt the bags of pills rattle in his jacket pockets.

  “You took what?”

  “I’ve secured some of the pills for testing,” Donnie said, pleased with his turn of phrase.

  “How many? One, two…?”

  “All of ’em. About a thousand.”

  “You great plum, Don, you weren’t meant to take nothing, you daft slab of shit! You were supposed to have a butcher’s and naff off, not disturb nothing.”

  “Thing is, Dave, I got discombobulated during my fact-finding mission. Didn’t know what to do for the best.”

  “Don? Have you taken one of them pills yourself?”

  “No.”

  “Don? Troof?”

  “Like I said, I’m just a bit discombobulated.”

  “Don, Don, Don … what the eff is going on? I ask you to keep an eye on the Savage boy and you put your size twelves into God knows what. This is confusing, Don, very confusing. I don’t like the flavour of it. Get them pills to me asap. I’ll have to speak to the guvnor. He won’t be happy.”

  Donnie wasn’t happy either. He hated the thought of being dobbed in to Tommy Kelly.

  “Don’t tell him I done a ricket, Dave, I was just following instructions. Reacting to the situation.”

  Dave sighed.

  “I’ll tell him what I need to tell him, Don. Now don’t call until you’ve got some good news for me. In the meantime, I’ve got an idea where you might deposit them pills.”

  Donnie rang off, deflated, his head suddenly cleared by the thought of upsetting Tommy Kelly. He’d nip up west and drop the Es. Seconds later his phone buzzed with an incoming text. He read it, felt a little better and headed back into town.

  Hannah tugged at the blanket and arranged it around herself so that we were cocooned together on the sofa. She put her arms around me, and I could smell the slight musk of her hair as she tucked her face into my neck and wrapped a leg around my own.

  If I’d thought Hannah getting into bed with me was a bad idea before, I knew it was when I felt the knife at my throat.

  “What’s your game, Kieran?”

  I tried to struggle free, but she was surprisingly strong. Her leg was tightly wound around mine and my face was wedged into the back of the sofa, giving me no leverage. As I struggled, I felt the sharp, steel point nick the soft underside of my chin. I was powerless.

  “Hannah,” I wheezed. “What you doing?”

  “Where are the drugs?” she hissed in my ear.

  “Eh? What drugs?”

  “You don’t know what you’ve got yourself into, Kieran, you feckin’ idiot, hanging around me like a bad smell. Who are you? You’re never
right, snooping around and using my laptop – and now you’re in the shit.”

  She was right in a way. She’d rumbled me, but I knew nothing about the drugs. Something else was going on here.

  “I didn’t break in, Hannah, honest…”

  I heard a key in the lock and the door to the flat open. Heavy footsteps.

  “Try telling that to my da. He wants to talk to you.”

  I felt Hannah’s grip relax as she rolled away from me, then a rough hand on the back of my neck. As I turned to look, I saw a fist coming towards my face and, too late to avoid it, I shut my eyes and felt the sickening crunch of it connecting with my cheek. Hands hauled me to my feet, then shoved me across the room; another blow to the back of my head knocked me into the door frame. I tasted blood. I was grabbed from behind and shoved out the door. A kick in the small of my back sent me tumbling down the stairs, then there were footsteps and another kick between the shoulder blades to stop me getting up. I was hauled down two more flights and, wearing no more than a T-shirt and a pair of boxers, felt the night chill and saw the glare of the street lights as I was manhandled on to the pavement. I felt something prick my arm as I was thrown into the boot of a waiting car. My head felt thick and my vision blurred as the lid slammed down on me.

  Then darkness.

  At last, Donnie had what felt like some good news.

  His trip to Camberwell had borne some fruit. Gallagher had texted and agreed to meet him again on the understanding that Donnie wouldn’t lay a finger on him, though when they met in the betting shop late in the evening, it was all Donnie could do to restrain himself from picking up the ratty little bloke by the scruff of the neck and slapping him about a bit. Gallagher had insisted they stay in the betting shop watching a race, while he leaked snippets of information from the corner of his mouth.

  “Paul Dolan’s been seen in London,” Gallagher hissed.

  “Where?”

  “Kensal Rise.”

  “Who by?”

  “A friend at The Harp swore he saw him in McGarrigal’s, day before yesterday.” Gallagher had shuffled about before adding, “It cost me, Don.”

  Donnie dug into his inside pocket.

  “Good work, James.” Gallagher’s eyes widened as Donnie peeled twenties off a roll and didn’t stop. Dave had given him expenses. “Now, there’s another job I want you to do. There’s this kid… I’ll give you an address.”

  Donnie stuffed five hundred into Gallagher’s top pocket, wrote something on a crumpled betting slip and palmed him a bag of pills.

  Donnie vaguely knew McGarrigal’s, a big Victorian beer hall in Kensal Green frequented by the north London Irish. He had been there once or twice, on a minding job or to pick up money for the firm. It had been modernized by the Irish mafia into a branch of a chain of fake Irish boozers; it was generally rough, and had hot and cold running Guinness day and night and a soundtrack by the Pogues.

  It made Donnie shudder. Too near Wormwood Scrubs for his liking. He hated north London.

  “Good news, Dave,” Donnie said into his phone, attempting cheeriness.

  “Give, Don.”

  “Dolan. McGarrigal’s. Kensal Rise. Been seen up there.”

  “And where are you now, Don?”

  Donnie looked around him. He was sitting in his car, sipping scotch from a hip flask and smoking a fag, in the car park on Peckham Rye. He’d had a late night, and the morning – and some of the afternoon – had drifted by before he felt ready to share his new information. He knew that once he did, it would be all systems go. Again.

  “Peckham, Dave.”

  “So why aren’t you outside McGarrigal’s, ready to have a reconnoitre and a verbal?”

  “Loud and clear, Dave.”

  Donnie started up the Beemer and headed off towards the Rotherhithe Tunnel: through the pipe and on up to north London. Again.

  I awoke feeling almost happy, as if I’d had the longest dreamless sleep. And then memories and images began to fast forward in my brain as I opened my eyes and focused on a single bare bulb coming out of a woodchip ceiling. I didn’t know where I was, nor did I know how I got here. I was on a sofa in a strange, suburban-looking room, and I was restrained.

  “He’s awake, Daddy,” I heard Hannah’s voice say.

  A man walked round the head-end of the sofa and looked at me. He had thick dark hair and a full beard. From where I was lying, his head could have been either way up.

  “Kieran Kelly?” He looked at me blankly.

  “Yes,” I said. My mouth was dry as sand and my voice came out as a small croak.

  “I’m Martin Connolly, Hannah’s dad,” he said, as if introducing himself to Hannah’s friends while they were upside down and tied up was quite normal. “Any relation?” he asked.

  “To who?” I asked.

  “Tommy Kelly, of course.”

  The name obviously meant something to Martin Connolly. I found myself relieved that I was connected with such a powerful name. Like Tony had said, the name was my protection. I nodded.

  “He your da?” he asked.

  “No,” I said. “He’s my uncle.”

  “So who is your da?”

  “Patsy,” I said. “Patsy Kelly. His younger brother.”

  “Tommy Kelly doesn’t have a brother.”

  “Not any more,” I said. “He died last year.”

  “When did you last see him?” Martin Connolly was testing me. I stuck to the story.

  “In Spain, Benalmádena at his fiftieth. I went out for a couple of weeks last summer.”

  “Why did you start sniffing around Hannah? I find it a wee bit suspicious that someone from the Kelly family is interested in my daughter.”

  “I dunno,” I said. “I just met Hannah at college and we kind of became mates.”

  “He stalked me,” Hannah put in. “Then nosed around the flat.” I tried to crane my neck to look at her.

  Martin Connolly took something from his pocket and held it in front of my eyes. It was the memory card from my camera. I’d been slack. I began to sweat.

  “So what are these pictures?”

  I strained to remember what was on my memory card. I should have been more careful to delete things. I was hoping he hadn’t had time to trawl through the hundreds of images on the card that might incriminate me.

  “Just photos for my project,” I said. “I do documentary stuff, like Hannah.”

  “Snooping,” Hannah said.

  Connolly prodded the tattoo on my arm with a hard finger.

  “What’s this all about? You think you’re Irish?”

  “All the men in my family have them,” I said. “It’s a kind of tradition.”

  Connolly sniggered dryly. “Third generation pikeys, first to live in static homes in Essex, then pine for an ‘old country’ they don’t even remember, like the Yanks. You’re about as Irish as Barack Obama.”

  I wasn’t arguing.

  “What do you know about the IRA?” Connolly asked, serious again.

  “Nothing,” I admitted. “I’ve lived in England most of my life. I know a bit about the politics, but it’s never really affected me. I know my uncle had some connections…”

  “Like what?”

  “He backed a place called The Harp, a club in south London. I don’t know what they did exactly, but I think some guys there were sympathetic to the IRA cause.”

  Martin Connolly’s interest was piqued. He prodded at the harp tattoo on my arm again.

  “Anyone can get a tat. Ever go to the club?”

  “I was too young,” I said. “But I knew some of the people who used it, through my uncle.”

  “Like?”

  “Um.” I hesitated, genuinely trying to remember the faces. “Donnie Mulvaney, Dave Slaughter, Billy Gorman.” I hoped these names would be my get-out. Connolly shook his head as if they didn’t register.

  I felt I was building a credible picture. I was sticking close to the truth about Kelly connections without revealing anythi
ng about myself. I hoped I was getting somewhere until Martin Connolly pulled a plastic bag of greenish pills from his pocket.

  “What are these?”

  “Es, I guess?”

  “How do you explain them? Five grand’s worth. They were found in your flat.”

  “My flat?” I croaked. My mouth went bone dry, my stomach lurched. I’d never taken Hannah there; no one knew where my flat was. Martin Connolly waved a crumpled slip of paper in front of my face. My address was written on it in biro.

  “Your flat,” Connolly said.

  “He stole them,” Hannah helped.

  “These change the game, Mr Kelly,” Connolly said.

  “I didn’t take them. I don’t know where they came from. Honest! I’m telling the truth.”

  Martin Connolly considered the bag of pills.

  “Well, I guess this puts you out of my jurisdiction, young man,” he said. “There are other people who’ll want to talk to you about what you’re doing with these.”

  He took his mobile from his pocket and dialled.

  Donnie parked up on a double yellow and put his fake disabled badge in the windscreen.

  It was just after six and he galvanized himself with a smoke outside the heavy doors of McGarrigal’s. He peered through the bay window and stamped out his Benson before entering; it was early, but the pub was fairly full, as it was most afternoons. He walked up to the long bar, pushing past the drinkers in his way. He found a space and, catching the barman’s eye, ordered a Jameson’s. As the barman handed him his drink and some change, Donnie leant forward and asked, “Paul Dolan in?”

  The barman pretended to cock his ear against the music and shook his head. He had heard Donnie quite clearly. Donnie discreetly took the barman’s hand from where he was leaning it on the bar, and squeezed. Knuckles crunched. “Paul Dolan,” he repeated. He hardened his eyes into what he knew was his most persuasive stare and, as the barman’s hand writhed inside his paw and his eyes began to water, the man said, “I don’t know who he is. It’s my first day.”

  Donnie followed the barman’s glance to the far depths of the pub, illuminated by the glow above a pool table, and let go of his hand.