Dead Man's Sins

by Caimh McDonnell

  Now that Bunny had a better look, he realised that the word “castle” might be a more appropriate descriptor. The thing looked somewhere between Disney and Dracula Gothic, complete with actual towers at both ends of the property. It had a mock-stone facade but Bunny was disappointed to note the lack of a drawbridge.

  Hannity operated in that grey area of legality that coppers hated. He could at best be described as a loan shark, although that was a bit like describing da Vinci as a decorator, or Bill Gates as an IT guy. Being a loan shark wasn’t illegal, although Bunny had read in the paper that there was talk of finally doing something about that. Hannity had made his name by lending to people nobody else would, and then charging them through the nose for the privilege. Most of his clients – usually ordinary people who’d fallen on hard times – ended up paying back the loan several times over, or just drowning in the compound interest.

  Hannity and his sort were leeches, who clamped on to the skin of communities and sucked the life out of them a little at a time. The loans might not be illegal, but the collection methods often were, extending far beyond strongly worded letters. Muscle, such as the type Bunny had clashed with earlier, were on the payroll, making threats and, when required, carrying them out. It was nearly impossible to get any of the victims to testify in court, and even if they did, people like Hannity were insulated. “Sorry, Your Honour, I’m as horrified as you are. I had no idea my employees engaged in such activities off their own bat.” And the activities often involved the brutal application of said bat. Hannity’s various operations produced the only two things that mattered in the modern world: money and plausible deniability.

  To give the man his questionable due, there was nobody quite like him. Most money lenders reach a certain position within their own community and stop, but Hannity had managed the rare feat of growing his empire far beyond his geographical roots. A combination of factors had gone into it; first and foremost, he had a brilliant understanding of risk. Maybe if he’d been born in Blackrock or somewhere like that, he’d be running a bank or an insurance company now. Instead, he’d been born in Ballymun, the youngest of six, and he’d clawed his way up from the streets. He was blessed with the kind of shrewd business sense you couldn’t teach, a prerequisite comfort with brutality, and a preparedness to be truly hated if necessary. It had been a long time since anyone had dared to express such feelings to Hannity’s face, not unless it was as their last words.

  Of course, he didn’t wield any bats or dig any holes himself these days. For a man in his position, delegation was key. Back in the day, though, rumour had it that he had personally broken his own brother’s legs when he’d been unable to make his loan repayment. Bunny wasn’t sure if this was true or not, but it didn’t matter – only the legend had any significance. Anyone thinking of pleading their case would remember how Paul Hannity walked with a cane now, and would then go back to trying by any means necessary to find the money they owed.

  For all his “talents”, the secret to Hannity’s longevity was that he never expanded into other areas of crime. Most criminals like him did. Drugs were easy money, and God knows they gave him enough business indirectly, but he didn’t want anything to do with the supply line. It also meant he didn’t clash with other figures from the criminal underworld. They stayed off his patch, and he off theirs. That’s not to say he didn’t have involvements, but always at a remove. Say someone couldn’t make their payments and was desperate to find a way – he could pass their details on. Somebody somewhere always had a use for the truly desperate, and were willing to pay for it. If, later on, that person was stopped at Dublin Port with a car full of something illegal, or was involved in administering a beating, or even in a gangland shooting, nothing splashed back on Coop Hannity.

  No, instead, he focused his attention on his area of expertise: credit. He even had a more legit arm of the business now, providing no-questions-asked credit on that new sofa you could probably almost certainly afford. Much of suburbia would have been scandalised to learn that behind the various innocuous company names on those bits of paperwork from the car dealership or the furniture showroom lay Coop Hannity. Keep up with your payments and you need never find out. Don’t keep up and, well, there are lawyers and then there are other people who don’t cost as much or dress as nicely.

  And so Coop Hannity existed in the in-between and got rich by adding up the numbers in the margin.

  Bunny took a step towards the house and stopped. Some instincts you can’t explain. He’d felt that prickle on the back of his neck, as if something wasn’t right. He looked back up the cul-de-sac, examining each of the parked cars in turn. Nothing was obvious, but still … He stepped back and, as soon as he did so, the engine of the blue BMW, a few cars up on the far side of the road, roared into life. Before Bunny could move another muscle, it drove off. Only as it reached the end of the road did its lights come on, which prevented him from getting the number plate.

  Maybe it was nothing. Somebody making a phone call before setting off, or something equally innocuous. Maybe.

  Concrete lions sat at the end of Hannity’s driveway, which led to a garden that had been landscaped to within an inch of its life. The hedges on the far side had been pruned into the form of cherubs, with roses growing where the arrows would be. The lawn looked like the kind of greens they play the Masters on and the flowerbeds were explosions of colour. In the middle sat a pond, where a solitary garden gnome fished for eternity, a rather perplexed look on his face.

  Bunny walked up the gravel drive and rang the doorbell. It sounded a chime of sequential tolls, more suited to the ordaining of a new pope than something you’d hear every time you got a pizza delivered. Warm light spilled through the stained glass on either side of the large oak door, before it was all but eclipsed. The door opened and Bunny realised what had obstructed the light. An immense amount of humanity stood before him in the doorway, beaming a friendly smile down at him. The voice that came with it was incongruously cheerful.

  “Alright, buddy, how can I help you?”

  “Jesus,” said Bunny, “who in the name of holy giant haystacks are you?”

  The man smiled. “The name is Samoan Joe.”

  “The size of you. You should play rugby or something.”

  “Oh, I did that exact thing, mate, but I blew out the old knee.” He tapped his right leg and gave a rueful smile. “Got brought over by one of the clubs. Would you believe I did it in my first training session? Straight off the plane.”

  “Christ, that’s fierce unlucky.”

  “Ah, worse things happen at sea, though, eh? Club paid for the surgery, which was decent of them, and there’s always work for a big fella.”

  “Don’t you miss Samoa?”

  “I’ve never been. I’m from New Zealand, but my mum is from Fiji.”

  “So how come …”

  Joe laughed. “Guys preferred ‘Samoan Joe’ to ‘Kiwi Joe’, I guess. No skin off my nose.” He favoured Bunny with another warm smile. “Anyway, what can I do for you, sir?”

  “I was hoping to have a word with the master of the house.”

  Joe shook his immense head, despite seemingly lacking a neck. “No can do, fella. I’m under strict instructions that he’s not to be disturbed.”

  “I’m sure he’ll want to see me.”

  “Everybody is. Nobody is right. Mr Hannity likes to keep his evenings separate from work. He is most emphatic on that particular point. Let me take your number and I promise I’ll pass it on.”

  “My name is Bunny McGarry. Just ask him.”

  Samoan Joe sighed. “Look, fella, you gotta take no for an answer here. The boss’ll rip me a new one if I disturb him, and I’m just not gonna do it. Alright?”

  Bunny had got around many noes he’d received in his life, but this one was being delivered so politely it was making things tricky. Joe seemed like a cordial fella. When you’re big enough that life has to go around you, as opposed to the other way round, Bunny reckoned yo
u could afford to be.

  “Look, Joe, I promise I’m not trying to be a pain in your arse, but I came here to speak to the man and I’m not leaving unless I do.”

  Samoan Joe managed to pull off the combo of cracking his knuckles while giving Bunny a sympathetic look. “I’m afraid that’s not an option. Now, I’m sure you got good reasons, but believe me when I say that whatever you need to talk to him about, he’ll be a lot more receptive in the morning.”

  Bunny rolled his head around his neck. “I really didn’t want this to go down this way, Joe. You seem like a nice fella.”

  “Likewise. Mind if I take my jacket off?”

  “Not at all. Be my guest.”

  “Appreciate it.” Joe slipped off his suit jacket. “Got to have them made special and they keep ripping.”

  Bunny nodded. “Price of the job, I guess.”

  “That and the blood stains.”

  “Bleed a lot, do you?”

  “Me? No.”

  Generally, Bunny preferred his opponents to be so riled up that they’d make a mistake, or so over-confident that they’d do the same. Joe seemed unrilable and possessed of an utterly justifiable confidence. Bunny hadn’t come here looking for trouble, but if he was going to resolve the situation before it got any worse, he couldn’t afford to be fobbed off.

  Joe gave a rueful smile as he bunched his fists. “Last chance. There’s really no need for this to get unpleasant, Mr McGarry.”

  “McGarry?” asked a female voice from behind Joe.

  Joe turned his head. “This is nothing to concern yourself with, Mrs Hannity.”

  “Get out of the way, ye big lug.”

  Joe sheepishly took a step to one side to reveal a brunette woman in a blue flowing dress. She held a martini glass in one hand and wore a black glove on the other. Her eyes widened. “Bunny?”

  Bunny stood there for the longest time, flat-footed. In his defence, he’d been preparing himself for a kicking but now found himself in a game of Guess Who.

  “Shitting Nora. Angelina Quirke, is that you?”

  “That it is,” the woman said with a smile, striking a jaunty pose. “Come on in.”

  “Ehm,” said Samoan Joe, shifting awkwardly, “the boss said …”

  “He’s not here to see him,” snapped Angelina. “Now he’s here to see me.”

  Joe nodded and ushered Bunny inside. “No hard feelings, I hope?”

  Bunny shook his head as he stepped past. “Not at all. I’m just glad I didn’t have to hurt you.”

  Should Old Acquaintance Be Forgot?

  Bunny felt awkward sitting in the drawing room of the Hannity house. He only knew the room went by that name as that’s what Samoan Joe had called it as he’d directed him through the doorway. Everything around Bunny appeared to be made from leather, mahogany or velvet. He was wearing the same coat he’d been rolling around in on Diana Spain’s lawn earlier in the day, and suddenly worried that he’d picked up one of her neighbour’s cat’s shits and might now be depositing it on the indecently expensive soft furnishings. While Bunny was no fan of Hannity or his ilk, he was here to try to resolve a tricky situation, and although smearing cat shit all over the man’s sofa was a strong opening move in any negotiation, he felt as if it might set the wrong tone.

  One wall was filled entirely from floor to ceiling with books, and even they looked expensive. In the hearth that dominated the room, a log fire was burning. Bunny sat watching the sparks dance around each other and then disappear up the chimney. Once you looked past the opulence, however, the place was missing something. There were no pictures of family or friends anywhere. No sense of a life lived. It lent a peculiarly oppressive feel to the space. As if it were a museum exhibit.

  The door swung open and in strode Angelina Quirke with Samoan Joe trailing awkwardly in her wake. Bunny was still trying to get his head around her. In his mind, she was still the little girl he remembered from back in the day when he’d helped out with the North Paw Boxing Club and it had been used as a venue for ballet classes for the local kids a couple of evenings each week.

  Angelina had been a shy little thing, and the teacher, Mrs Glynn, had made the other girls watch her as an example. Bunny imagined quite a few had done so and then given up on dancing entirely. Seeing true talent can have that effect on the less gifted.

  He could still recall the day he’d been sent to collect Angelina from class. Her mother had been found dead and her father had not taken the news well. As Bunny was known in the community, he’d accompanied the social worker to pick up the young girl. When faced with the tiny ballerina’s big blue eyes the woman had bottled it, and it had been Bunny who broke the news to Angelina that her mother had died. John Quirke ended up being sectioned for his own safety and from that day on, Bunny had kept an eye on Angelina until she went off to see the world. On some level he knew he had no reason to feel guilty – after all, all he’d done was pass on the news – but then he’d long ago realised that guilt didn’t need a reason. It was just something you collected more and more of as you went through life.

  “Sorry about that,” said Angelina, “just sorting something. Bunny McGarry, as I live and breathe. Now, here is a sight for sore eyes. C’mere and give me a hug.”

  Bunny got to his feet and awkwardly did as she asked. Angelina was still slight of build and smelled of jasmine with just a hint of gin. As they embraced, Bunny caught Joe’s eye from where the bodyguard was standing beside the door. He looked decidedly ill at ease.

  Angelina drew back, placed her hands on Bunny’s arms and looked up at him. “My God, it’s been what? Nine, ten years, and you’ve not changed a bit.”

  “Neither have you.”

  She gave a hearty laugh. “Thank you for lying.”

  “Last I heard, you’d deferred your university place and gone off to do modelling in London, or LA, or Milan – something like that?”

  “Yes,” she said ruefully. “All of the above. I took my turn on that particular wheel. Not as much fun as they tell you. Don’t do it if you get the chance.”

  Bunny rolled his eyes theatrically. “Ara shite, now you tell me? I’ve only gone and signed a contract with Calvin Klein.”

  Angelina laughed again, harder than the line warranted. “Well, international fashion’s gain will be law enforcement’s loss. You’re still with the guards, aren’t you?”

  “More or less.”

  “Glad to hear it. Sit, sit, sit.”

  Bunny nervously took his seat again.

  Angelina turned to Samoan Joe. “This here is Bunny McGarry, the last honest man in Dublin. Hero to the working man, and especially the women.”

  “Ah, here now,” said Bunny, “you’re laying it on a bit thick.”

  “No, I’m not. If something went wrong back in those days, you didn’t ring 999. You sent one of the kids down to the cop shop and asked for the big fella from Cork. Back when we were barely teenagers, a monumental arsehole from the estate was trying to push my old friend Mags to do, well, things she didn’t want to. Bunny stepped in, sorted it right out.” She gave him a sideways smile. “An honest-to-God hero in a world that doesn’t allow them to exist. In olden times, they’d have written songs about you.”

  “Come on now, Angelina. You’re embarrassing me in front of the man mountain over there.”

  She waved dismissively at Joe. “Don’t mind him. He’s harmless. It’s me you have to worry about.”

  “How is Mags these days? Are you still in touch?”

  “Oh yes. She’s got a nice apartment over in Rathfarnham. Her and her boyfriend, Bobby. I visit her when I go see my dad – he’s in a care facility out there.”

  “Great. The two of you were always thick as thieves. The ‘terrible twins’ we called you.”

  “I remember.” She laughed. “And us with the terrible matching outfits.”

  “Tell her I was asking for her.”

  Angelina slapped her forehead playfully. “Sorry. I’m so thrown by seeing a ghost f
rom my past, I’ve totally lost my manners. Joe, a drink for our guest. Still a whiskey man?”

  Bunny nodded.

  “See? As unchanging as the North Star.” She turned to Joe. “Go get him a double, please. From the really good stuff my husband keeps locked in his little cupboard in his study.”

  Joe opened his mouth to speak but Angelina silenced him with a wave. “Don’t embarrass me in front of our guest.”

  “Honestly,” said Bunny, “there’s no need to—”

  “It’s no trouble,” Angelina said, the brightness returning to her voice. “And I’ll have my usual.”

  Bunny felt for Joe as he shifted on his feet, trying to decide between the best of two bad choices before bowing his head and slipping through the doorway.

  Angelina glided across the room and perched on the oversized couch. She’d always been a sweet kid but had blossomed into a real beauty and ended up coming second in Miss Ireland, or some similar competition. Despite everything going on around her at home, and there had been plenty, Angelina had been a top student too. On the estate, her success had inspired that peculiar mix of jealousy and pride. She’d got out. Gone off to live the life less ordinary.

  She might only have been in her late twenties now, but there was something very different about the woman who sat opposite Bunny. Still beautiful but possessed of a bruised quality. As if she’d seen the Promised Land and found out it was all papier mâché and plasterboard scenery.

  “How’s your dad?” Bunny asked.

  “Not great. I go and see him when I can. Sometimes he’s talking up a storm, sometimes …” She left the sentence unfinished.

  “Sorry to hear that. He was always a lovely fella.”