Whatever Happened to Betsy Blake?

by David B Lyons

  ‘This’ll be fun,’ Keating says, holding the gate open for Lenny to walk through.

  ‘Thanks, Alan,’ Lenny says. He was unsure what tone to talk to Keating in; wondered was thanking him for holding the gate open even applicable conversation to have with a gangster. Keating hadn’t explained anything on the drive over and Lenny was still wondering why they had both made the journey; whether Keating was genuinely trying to help him with his investigation or whether he was just taking the piss and trying to intimidate him. He took his mobile phone from his pocket, just to check the time as they waited on Barry to open his door after Keating repeatedly rapped his knuckles against the window panes on it. 11:37. He’s wasting time here; is certain Keating and Barry have fuck all to do with Betsy Blake’s disappearance. Poor Gordon’s time is ticking away; no impact is going to be made on his final wish; not today.

  ‘Whatsup, boss!’ Barry says holding his hand for Keating to grab. They greet like gangsters do, a grasp of hands that helps them lean in for a half-a-hug.

  ‘Who this?’

  ‘Barry, meet Lenny Moon. Lenny Moon’s a PI.’

  Barry looks Lenny up and down, then stares at Keating, his eyes squinting, his mouth almost forming a smile.

  ‘A PI? Ye don’t look like a PI. Ye look like the fuckin’ shit member of a shit boy band.’

  Keating laughs as he enters Barry’s hallway. ‘You rolling?’

  ‘I’m awake amn’t I?’ says Barry.

  Barry swings his hand, welcoming Lenny inside his home, the whiff of cannabis in the hallway alone enough to get anybody stoned. They all enter the square living-room, Barry making his way straight to a glass decanter in the far corner. He picks it up, shows it to his guests.

  ‘Jesus no, too early for me,’ says Keating.

  Barry stares at Lenny, awaits his response.

  ‘Eh… too early for me, too,’ he says.

  Barry and Keating take a seat on the dated furniture, leaving Lenny standing. He stares around the room, takes in the impressive artwork on the walls. They look so out of place in the tiny gaff; probably just as valuable as the gaff itself.

  ‘Sit down, PI,’ says Barry. Lenny does as he’s told, plonks himself on the couch next to Keating. He becomes aware of his left knee bouncing up and down, so places his hand over it, holds it in place.

  ‘Wait till ye hear this,’ Keating says, turning to Lenny. ‘Go on… tell Barry why you’re here.’

  Lenny takes in a breath, then blinks rapidly.

  ‘I’m investigating the Betsy Blake disappearance on behalf of her father Gordon Blake. He—’

  Lenny is interrupted by Barry’s laughter. Then it stops abruptly, almost as if he was half-way through his laugh when a sniper aimed a dart into his neck.

  ‘Well, you’ve come to the right place, PI. She’s under the stairs.’

  Lenny swivels his head to peak out the sitting-room at the door leading under the bannisters and is then met with an even bigger laugh. This time Keating joins in; bringing Lenny back to school, back to the days he used to be picked on for being the oddest boy in the classroom. But back then it was only harmless insecure teenagers picking on him – not Ireland’s most notorious gangster and his psycho sidekick.

  ‘Ye know what?’ Lenny says, standing up. ‘I have decided to stand down from this job. I will be notifying Gordon Blake of my resignation and – gentlemen – I am so sorry to have disturbed your mornings.’

  ‘Sit down, Lenny Moon,’ Keating orders. Lenny does as he’s told, his eyes blinking. ‘Barry – are you just gonna let that J sit in the ashtray or are you gonna offer your guest a welcome puff?’

  Barry bends down to his glass ashtray, picks up the joint he had started to smoke when the knocks came at the door. He holds it in front of him, ignites the flame on a lighter with his other hand, then holds the flame to the joint until it catches. Lenny squints. He had smoked weed before, back when he was studying for a pointless certificate in media at college, but had never seen this technique for lighting a joint before, didn’t think it was possible to light one without inhaling.

  ‘No thank you,’ he says when Barry holds the joint towards him. ‘Too early for me.’

  Barry laughs again.

  ‘I understand it being too early for whiskey, but no such clock exists for this shit.’

  Lenny turns to look at Keating beside him, hoping ol’ uncle Arthur would appear; pat him on the back, tell him to get home if he wants to. But Keating holds Lenny’s gaze, again staying mute, allowing Lenny to do the talking. Lenny reaches out, takes the joint, assumes being on friendly terms with these two is probably his quickest route to getting the fuck out of here.

  He inhales slowly, making sure the smoke isn’t too harsh on his throat. The last thing he needs right now is these two laughing at him for coughing up a storm.

  ‘Gordy Blake’s dying,’ Keating speaks up as Lenny exhales. ‘Lenny Moon here has told me he may only have a few hours left to live. Has to have a massive heart operation later today that he might not wake from. He’s hired Lenny as his one last shot at finding little Betsy. And… guess who he came to investigate first?’

  Barry arches his right eyebrow, breaks out a tiny smile and then shakes his head.

  ‘Poor Gordy. I’ll miss him. Y’know,’ he says, turning to Lenny, ‘he’s hung out a few times on this street, stalking me. Haven’t seen him in a long, long time… but Jesus yeah, I’ll miss the poor fucker. We’ve always felt sorry for him, haven’t we, boss?’

  Keating nods his head then pinches the joint out of Lenny’s hand as Barry continues.

  ‘I did my best to look for that little girl. Even held a lot of fuckers heads under water trying to get answers. Nobody knows anything. She wasn’t taken, wasn’t kidnapped. She died, didn’t she? Hit by a car.’

  Lenny clears his throat, his attempt at ridding his mouth of the stale taste of tobacco. It’s been so long since he’s inhaled smoke, inhaled weed. Can already feel his head spin a little.

  ‘I believe so yeah… Gardaí closed the case in absentia.’

  ‘Are you talking fuckin Latin now, PI?’

  ‘Without a body,’ Keating says while exhaling a huge cloud of smoke. ‘They closed the case and announced her dead without finding a body.’

  ‘Well they’re hardly gonna find her body if she’s living under my stairs, are they?’ Barry says.

  Keating coughs out a laugh.

  ‘I’m just… I’m just trying to carry out Gordon’s last wish; trying to give the investigation one last roll of the dice,’ Lenny says. ‘That’s all. I’m just doing what I was hired to do.’

  Keating leans forward in his chair, passes the joint to Barry.

  ‘Here, show Barry the note.’

  Lenny rolls his eyes sideways – almost in slow motion – to stare at Keating. Then he reaches inside his pocket, flattens out the crumpled paper and holds it between his fingers, stretching it towards Barry. Barry takes it, squints at it. Laughs. Takes a drag of the joint. Laughs again.

  ‘Freak he calls me?’ he says, ‘That’s rich coming from that nut job. Listen, PI… it’s no surprise Gordy thinks me and Keating are top of this list; he’s hung onto that theory for… I don’t know how many years it’s been.’

  ‘Seventeen,’ says Keating.

  ‘Is it that long? Fuck! Listen, PI; Gordy Blake’s a nut job. He goes around believing his daughter’s still alive, when it’s been proven she died. His daughter disappearing didn’t just break his heart, it broke his head too. The man’s sick. We had nothing to do with his daughter’s death. Pigs initially thought it was Gordy himself, then when they cleared him, they came straight to us. Gordy told them he’d been working with us. But the cops knew we didn’t have anything to do with it. What the fuck would we want with a bleedin’ four-year-old girl? That’s twelve years below the age I like.’ Barry laughs, then takes another quick drag of his joint before passing it to Lenny.

  ‘If you wanna get honest answers for Gordy Blake
before he dies; go to the cops, get them to give you the proof that Betsy is dead… Tell him and make him believe it. Because if he wants closure, he has to believe the truth.’

  Lenny smiles a thank you, hands the joint towards Keating without taking another drag and then stands back up.

  ‘Gentlemen, thank you very much for your time.’

  ‘Where d’ye think you’re going?’

  ‘To eh… the cops, as you said. I wanna get confirmation of what really happened, to stop messing around following up the false leads on that note.’ Lenny takes his hat out of his pocket, then holds a hand out towards Barry. Barry remains sitting, hands still flat on the arms of the chair.

  ‘Who the fuck is the Jake Dewey fella on the note?’

  ‘I eh… I know only what’s on that note,’ Lenny says, blinking. ‘Gordon was keen for me to get out and interview all three men named on there and kinda just rushed me out of the hospital, telling me to get on with it, that time was ticking.’

  ‘It’s Michelle Blake’s new husband isn’t it?’ Keating says.

  Lenny nods his head. ‘I assume so, judging by what’s written there.’

  ‘You’re not a very good private investigator, are ye, kid?... Here.’ Keating says, handing Lenny the joint back. ‘Take a couple of drags, calm yourself down.’

  Lenny pinches the joint, looks at both men and then sits back down.

  ‘How did you become a PI?’ Barry asks.

  ‘Had to leave the force.’

  ‘Ah… so you were a pig. Knew I could smell it on ye.’

  Lenny looks at Keating, then back at Barry. He feels like he isn’t in his own head; can’t quite fathom the reality he’s finding himself in: about to open up to The Boss and his main henchman about his ambitions for a career in serving out justice.

  ‘I didn’t last long as a cop. Was looking to go down the detective route… made good progress in my first eighteen months but eh… then… then… We have twins, me and my wife. She suffered with post-natal depression from the day they were born. It’s been…’ Lenny stops, swallows back the emotion that threatened to run to the back of his eyes. ‘It’s been a testing five years for us. She tried to commit suicide a couple of times. So I quit as a cop; decided to start my own PI business so that I could be close by at all times, case she needs me. I rent a little work space five minutes from where we live. It’s tiny. Quarter the size of this room.’

  Barry moves his eyes to look at Keating.

  ‘So you’ve been a PI how long?’

  ‘Almost six years.’

  ‘How come I’ve never seen you sniffing round us before today then?’

  Lenny sucks in a tiny inhale of the joint, passes it to Barry. He’s starting to feel slightly relaxed; feels as if sharing his truth about Sally has endeared him to the gangsters. He doesn’t feel as intimidated.

  ‘I only really work for bloody insurance companies. I’m not an investigator really… I’m eh… I don’t know what you’d call it. I find out if people claiming from insurance companies are telling lies or not. Today’s the first day I’ve ever been asked to investigate a criminal case.’

  Lenny’s phone buzzes. He slides it out of his jacket pocket, stares at the screen.

  ‘That’s him ringing now. Gordon Blake.’

  Keating takes the phone from Lenny’s hand, stabs his finger at the answer button.

  ‘Heya, Gordy,’ he says.

  There’s a silence on the other end of the line. Barry, Lenny and Keating all inch their ears closer to the phone.

  ‘Alan Keating!’ Gordon says.

  ‘Long time no speak, Gordy. Y’know… I still wish you were running my books. I’ve never quite replaced you; isn’t that right, Barry. Don’t I say that often?’

  ‘He does, Gordy,’ Barry says.

  ‘Jesus Christ. Lenny must be a good investigator after all. He found both of you in the same room, huh?’ Gordon says.

  ‘Don’t get carried away with compliments for Lenny. He didn’t orchestrate this – I did,’ Keating replies.

  A gulp can be heard coming down the line, followed by a distant beeping sound.

  ‘So, it’s true is it, Gordy. You’re in hospital, fifty-fifty chance of ending the day alive?’

  ‘Let Lenny go,’ Gordon says.’ He’s an innocent man. Is only carrying out what I paid him to do.’

  ‘You just worry about yourself, Gordy, yeah? We’ll look after Lenny for ya.’

  Lenny double takes; stares at Keating, then at Barry, then back to Keating, his eyes blinking as he does so. He can’t read what’s going on.

  There’s a long silence, Keating stretches the phone outward a bit; insisting he’s not going to talk next. Lenny cops it; Keating had been playing this game with him since he met him; staying silent. He waits on information, he doesn’t offer information.

  ‘Look, lads… I just asked Lenny to put my mind at rest before I die,’ Gordon says. ‘The only people I’d fallen out with around the time of Betsy’s disappearance was you guys. It’s all I’ve had to go on all these years… Just you two and that fuckin smug asshole my wife shacked up with. I just want to cross you off my list once and for all.’

  ‘What do you think we did, Gordy; kept Betsy chained up in Barry’s gaff all these years?’

  The line falls silent again.

  ‘Tell ye what,’ Lenny pipes up. ‘We’re in Barry’s house now. I know you’ve hung outside here over the years. Would it eh… would you be willing for me to cross this theory off your list for good? What if I was to just call out Betsy’s name while I’m here – so you will know with absolute certainty before you go for your surgeries that these guys had nothing to do with this? That she’s certainly not shacked up in Barry’s home.’

  Barry snarls up at Lenny, his confusion made obvious by the deep vertical line that has just formed above the bridge of his nose. Then he looks at Keating wondering how the fuck he should react to this. Keating doesn’t move, doesn’t say a word. Lenny realises what he’s just said is quite risky. He hadn’t thought it was as he was saying it. He was genuinely thinking of the best way he could move on, get the fuck out of the situation he was finding himself in. Perhaps it was the weed talking for him.

  ‘I don’t really know whether or not Alan and Barry had anything to do with this, but yeah… yeah… anything to get something off my mind. If you can confirm for me that Betsy isn’t in that house, I guess that’s something.’

  Lenny’s heart begins to rise again. Not out of fear – out of excitement. Gordon told him earlier that if he got an answer for him that Gordon hadn’t got before, he’d leave him his house in his will. Or maybe he’s just getting carried away, getting high. He looks at Barry, then at Keating. Keating shrugs his shoulders.

  ‘Just because we feel a real sympathy for you,’ Keating says. ‘So you can put this theory to bed.’ Keating licks his lips, looks agonisingly at Barry. Barry’s been unusually silent; probably caught off guard.

  ‘Ye might as well start here,’ Keating says, brushing past Lenny and into the hallway. He twists at the knob on the door under the stairs, pulls it open. Lenny walks towards it, stares into the darkness, then at Keating.

  Fourteen Years Ago

  Betsy

  Dod drops four new books on my bed. I crawl out from under my sheets and give him a hug. I wrap my arms around the top of his legs. Squeeze him tight. Then I pick up the books and smell them. It’s the first thing I do every time he gets me a new book. My favourite smell in the whole world is books.

  The first of my new books that I look at is called The Letter for the King. It says on the back that it is ‘suitable for eight-year-olds’. I’m only seven but I know I can read it. I’m so good at reading. That makes me lucky. Because I am good at my favourite thing to do. I look at the other books. A Series of Unfortunate Events. That looks good. The Wind and the Willows and then… yes! – another Roald Dahl Book. Matilda. I turn around and squeeze Dod’s legs again.

  ‘Thank you.’
r />   He doesn’t say anything. Just smiles. He has been smiling so many times when he comes to see me these days. I haven’t seen angry Dod in a long time.

  ‘Ah for fuck sake.’

  I stand still when I hear him say that. I wonder what I did wrong. Then I turn around slowly.

  ‘Not you. Not you, Betsy. Just this… fuckin…’

  He likes to say the word fuck or fucking a lot but I don’t really know what they mean. They’re never in any of my books. I guess it just means Dod is angry. I turn around. He is looking into my basin. Into where I wash and pee. And poo.

  ‘You’re filling this a lot lately.’

  He lifts it up. It looks heavy. Heavier than the other times he has had to lift it up before. Then he walks up the steps.

  When I first came to this room I had to pee and poo on the floor. Then Dod brought me a box to go toilet in. Then he brought the basin. I think that was two years ago now. Yeah – when I was about five, I think. I’ve been living here for about three years. A little bit more. Sometimes I wish I lived in a place like the one Charlie Bucket from one of my favourite books lives in. It says in the book that he is poor and his family don’t have many things. But I think he has everything anybody would ever need. He has his Mummy and Daddy. And he has his granddads and grandmothers. I only had grandmothers in the outside world. I think both my granddads were dead. They must be in heaven now with my Mummy and Daddy. I hope they are having fun. Sometimes I wish I could go to heaven to be with them. But I have to wait until I die. I don’t know how long that will be.

  ‘Betsy.’

  I look up. Up the steps.

  ‘Betsy.’

  Dod is calling me from the top of the steps. He has never done this before. I can’t really see him because the light behind him is too bright. He is like a shadow. Then he takes one step down and I notice his hand. It is waving me to come up the steps. I take one step forward. Then I stop. I’m afraid. Dod gets really angry when I go near the steps. I don’t want him to be angry. Even if he is calling me. I don’t know what to do. I turn around. I grab Bozy.