by Jane Ryan
His secretary stood, observed my rocking and said nothing. She walked over to the closed door, giving three sharp raps. Tat-tat-tat.
‘Detective Garda Harney for you, Graham.’
Not a man for small talk, he took his seat and told me to stay standing. It suited, my body was receiving too many electrical pulses. His window was open and my mind fixated on the frustrated drivers grinding gears up and down in the looping traffic.
‘Bridget?’
I heard but didn’t respond.
‘Detective Garda Harney?’
‘Yes, Chief Super. Sorry, I lost my way there a bit.’
‘You have something to say to me?’
My head swung around to check the door. It was locked. I crossed over to the brown metal window frame and brought it down with a screech.
DCS Muldoon was visibly losing patience with my odd behaviour.
I walked back to face him.
‘I have reason to believe Sergeant Joe Clarke was Seán Flannery’s informer.’
Muldoon’s stillness was stark. A compression on one side of his mouth the single clue to his inner thoughts. A rhythm rose off him in waves, matched in some way by a tone inside me. A diving bell filled with a bubble of air waiting for the hammer knock.
‘What do you have?’ he said.
‘Flannery told me. Just before he was shot in the chest. Said the only informer he ever had was Joe.’
Muldoon’s face was a mask, but there was an echo behind his eyes, so I plumbed its depths.
‘Flannery was always in front. We never surprised him, back as far as 2018 when we picked up Lorraine Quigley and baby Marie, he knew we were coming. Had the Gardens cleared and was standing awaiting our pleasure.’ I searched Muldoon’s face. ‘The drugs seizure in Kilkenny was a joke, he knew we were coming and ditched the stuff in a service station. The shipment was tracked by MAOC, which means Flannery had an informer at senior level with access.’
Muldoon’s silence was wrapped in restrained fury.
I ploughed on. ‘Lorraine Quigley, at one of our last meetings, told me Seán had an informer.’
Muldoon stood up from behind his desk, walked to his window, the fingers of his right hand splayed and clenched.
‘You can’t trust someone who’s bargaining for her child’s life,’ he said.
‘I agree, but her information isn’t taken in isolation.’ I took a punt. ‘You have doubts about Joe, too.’
He turned to face me. An eternity of moments rolled through his office as neither of us spoke.
Muldoon’s eyes strayed off to some inner place. ‘Yes.’
I was biting the inside of my cheek, the blood on my breath a tell-tale.
‘I believe he has money troubles,’ I said.
Again the pulse from Muldoon.
‘His wife is in Spain most of the year and his daughters are in college. He sold the family home a few years back and not by choice.’
DCS Muldoon rubbed a hand through his hair and the bristles bounced back. ‘There’ll be no way to keep Joe off the NBCI radar.’
The National Bureau of Criminal Investigation’s brief covered anything from anti-racketeering to murder to postal theft and wedged in a subsection of a subsection, was ‘review of all major crimes’. They were internal affairs and called their reporting structure fluid, which meant they could tell any ranking officer outside their own department to jog on. They weren’t a popular bunch and no one outside their department knew how their accountability worked. The Commissioner had taken a real interest in what they did – it stood to reason with the amount of money the criminal gangs threw about– and was in the process of upgrading them to Anti-Corruption. This didn’t bode well for Joe.
‘Flannery was a monster,’ I said. A flip book of Seán Flannery’s broken body and pale fingers attempting to stem his own blood played for me.
‘He had no human feeling as an adult, but children don’t start out that way,’ said DCS Muldoon. His eyes moved to the picture on his desk of two boys, his mirror-image sons. ‘If Joe profited from Flannery’s empire he’ll answer for it.’
His voice was hard as oak and as knotted. His thumb flicked against his bent index finger, ticking off options.
‘You’ll take O’Connor.’
A loaded gun to a stick fight. My skin stretched and tightened in response to the danger. ‘Please, DCS Muldoon, O’Connor isn’t the man for this.’
‘He is the man for this. Don’t think for a second that you got away with planting evidence. You were so desperate to convict Seán Flannery of Emer Davidson’s murder you framed him, then Joe convinced Chris Watkiss to destroy that evidence for you. When Joe came back to Dublin, I asked him if he’d any skeletons that could haunt me. I know what you owe Joe and what you’d do to protect him.’
There was steel in DCS Muldoon, but I hadn’t known how well he’d use it.
‘Sir.’
Muldoon eyed me. ‘I’ll brief O’Connor.’
He turned his back to me in dismissal and I slunk out.
Chapter 55
D16 E991
Joe’s Eircode. It wasn’t what I had expected, a block of bleak rendered apartments with chunky rough redbrick balconies.
I swung around a small car park, with nowhere near enough car spaces. I drove, of course, and Detective Superintendent Niall O’Connor sat in the back lest there was any confusion in our demarcation.
‘Put it anywhere, Harney. We won’t be here long.’
DS O’Connor wasn’t wasting any pleasantries on me. Wearing a boxy overcoat cloaking his rank, he should have looked ridiculous, trussed up in the back of an unmarked Avensis with his perma-tan and comb-over – but he looked vigorous. A dog who had tasted blood and knew more was coming. It made me queasy. DS O’Connor knew how to shape a person’s fear – his high conviction rates spoke of how successful he was at breaking a person. DCS Muldoon knew this, yet here we were.
Joe buzzed us in. The foyer had a transient air, painted in bright colours with an empty bike rack and the smell of new carpet, complete with scuff marks on the steps. It was more hostel than home, full of people at the start of their lives, not wanting much privacy, enjoying long hours of purpose and fun, bursting with smugness. Joe was invisible here.
Students came down the stairs as we made our way up to the fifth floor and Apartment 14. Detective Superintendent O’Connor had said little or nothing to me on our drive over.
‘Get up the stairs, Harney.’
There was no ‘Detective Garda’ from him.
‘Yes, sir.’ I resisted the suicidal urge to call him ‘Ma’am’.
‘Don’t use your upper-crust voice with me, Harney. And it’s Detective Superintendent to you and don’t bother to shorten it to Super – we’re not on good terms. And you’ll stand outside.’
‘With respect, Detective Superintendent O’Connor, it would be advisable to have another garda present, to corroborate statements and assure witness safety.’
To my relief I sounded relaxed, even strong. Self-doubt, my abrasive friend, lurked around me but was undetectable by DS O’Connor. Any of that flammable anger I lit off two stones in my twenties was gone. Joe had stymied our operations, but it didn’t help ignite any fire. I was bringing an executioner to a friend’s home, not repaying the exit he once marked for me. My thoughts must have played out on my face and DS O’Connor granted me a rare smile, or a rattlesnake bite.
‘You’re worried about the witness? You’ve an idea about what went on when up the North, do you? Of course your old man was perched up in the Special Criminal Court, hiding behind layers of protection and worried about the human rights of terrorists. The rest of us didn’t have that luxury.’
Bolstered by the silence, he frogmarched me on.
‘Mind you, things have changed.’ He had the temerity to laugh. ‘Your oul’ fellah was so high and mighty on his wooden bench with his stiff neck, but he turned out to be bent. We’ll see how he gets on with the lads in NBCI. They’ll ha
ve the measure of him in no time. You know, if it’d been me, I’d have you suspended, but Muldoon is soft on a pretty face.’
If I didn’t give it to him over my father, I wasn’t going to be baited by crude chauvinism. I held my tongue – and had a moment of disassociated pride, or the ghost of a smile from Kay. I needed O’Connor to be in as good a mood as possible – one word and I could be denied access to his interview with Joe.
We reached Joe’s landing. He stood in the doorway of Apartment 14. He wore an open-neck shirt and slippers moved his weight from foot to foot as he stood in the doorway.
‘To what do I owe this pleasure?’ said Joe.
‘Get inside, Clarke,’ said O’Connor, abandoning all pretence of fairness before he was even through Joe’s door.
We went inside.
Joe was grey and smelled of mucus – the whole apartment was a shrine to eucalyptus and the flu. It invaded my nostrils and glanced off the back of my throat. O’Connor coughed, looking overpowered by the menthol.
There was a brief pause.
‘I am arresting you under the Criminal Justice –’ said O’Connor.
‘No! Sir!’ I said.
‘Corrupt Offences Act 2018 –’
‘Detective Super –’
‘Section 7 Subsection 2 –’
‘We need to discuss –’
‘You are not obliged to say anything unless you wish to do so, but whatever you say will be taken down in writing and may be given in evidence. Is that clear, Joe?’
Hit by a bomb, Joe was dazed.
‘Interrupt me again, Harney,’ said DS O’Connor.
For an instant I misunderstood, opening my mouth to ask a questions, but he leaned in and Newton’s-cradle-shunted me away.
He looked at Joe. ‘I don’t want to cuff you. Insult to both of us, so put on your shoes there’s a good man and we’ll go back to the station.’
Joe said nothing as I got his coat and he changed into a pair of slip-ons straight out of an eighties music video, with built-up heels and distressed leather. He squeezed my hand as O’Connor led him out of his house. His bowed shoulders beside an upright, exultant O’Connor was painful to witness.
PART 3
Wash yourself of yourself
-Rumi
Chapter 56
Amina stood in an airless Terminal 1 in Dublin Airport.
Something had gone wrong and potential passengers milled around somewhere in the middle ground between frustration and clear rage. Airport staff tried to look nonchalant, with limited success.
Amina’s headscarf was neat and pinned to the side of her face, stiff and formal. A meet-and-greet committee of one. Falling into step beside me, she rattled off our itinerary as we walked towards Departures.
‘I heard about Joe – are you OK, Bridge?’ said Amina.
‘No.’
I had a low buzz of anxiety from a bad night’s sleep.
‘Is he OK? Are you OK, Bridge? Can we talk about it or not?’
‘Sorry, Amina. I don’t have any information about Joe, I’m not in Muldoon’s confidence. Sorry.’
She gave my arm a light squeeze. ‘Why don’t we walk by Butlers and get a coffee? Our gate is 107, our flight to Birmingham is at 6.35. I have our boarding passes all printed out, both ways because it’s a one-day trip. I brought a salad box each as the food on the flight is either too cold or plastic-tasting. We can go straight through security – I rang ahead and told them we were coming, so we’ll be treated as airport staff. We land in Birmingham at 7.35 and Chris will meet us outside the Departures hall.’
She rattled off this brisk information and we took a side gate, bypassing security and screening. I showed my badge to the airport policeman and we nodded at one another, nothing more.
Amina’s fussy generosity was soothing and, as per her itinerary, we were making our way out from Arrivals in Birmingham International Airport to the Departure set-down car parking by 7.45.
Chris stood waiting beside his Alfa Romeo 156 like they were on a date.
‘Hullo, ladies! Let’s get you in and we can start the niceties,’ he said.
His whole body was smiling. He rubbed chapped hands together against the early December cold and opened the door for Amina when she couldn’t work out where the handle was.
We got onto the Ring Road to Holloway Circus quickly. The city centre wasn’t as tidy as I’d expected. Hotels had been finished and much of the hoarding was gone, but a confusing collection of diversions meant I didn’t know where we were. The city shone with Christmas decorations, reminding me of the presents I had stashed for Matthew’s children in a spare room.
‘Curry leaves?’ said Amina. We inhaled the spicy green smell living in Chris’s car.
‘Gamthi curry leaves, lemony. Wife uses them in everything, including me. Makes the best butter chicken this side of the River Rea – reckon it’s why I’ve a bit wood on me unfortunately.’
‘Not at all!’ said Amina. ‘A little weight looks good on a man –’ She stopped, two pink spots on her cheeks.
‘On a man my age!’ said Chris. He chuckled, a deep rumbling bass. ‘Reckon you’re right – wife seems to think so.’
There was comfort in Chris’s stolid presence. His accusations of me not doing enough on the Burgess Data Centre case and Amina doing too much unauthorised had lost much of its heat after my trip to Barcelona and subsequent events. Chris and I would have to have words, but I’d had about as much discord as I could take.
Chris palmed the steering wheel with his right hand and squeezed my arm with his left.
‘Sorry to hear about your dad, little ’un.’
‘He was questioned and has no case to answer. Nothing to back up their claims. If there was any doubt I’d have been suspended.’
My voice was tight with emotion.
‘Aye, you’ve had a time of it since we last met. I’m sorry you had to go through it on your own, Bridge.’
The kindness in his voice undid me and easy tears swam up. I couldn’t blame it on pregnancy, but my bladder had moved to my eyes.
Chris kept the chat flowing.
‘Ruddy Queens Parkway, digging the crap out the city again – honestly the council are experimenting on us. It’s Crystal Maze around here.’
‘The decorations are lovely though,’ said Amina. Her voice was wistful.
The decorations were festive, but Christmas with my mother in a nursing home tasted like burnt feathers.
Amina was already searching through her carry-on case, a sturdy affair propped up on the car seat beside her, laden with sheets of printouts, ancient yellow forms and the brilliant white of paper taken off a fresh ream.
‘I have all the documentation we discussed here, Chris,’ said Amina.
‘We’ll hold it, Amina, till we’re at Circus if you don’t mind. You’ve done an amazing job. Be handy to take me through it same as Bridge, from the top.’
‘Thank you,’ said Amina. She shone new-penny-style at Chris’s praise.
My phone gave a piqued bleep, irritated it was in my back pocket being sat on. The message on the lock screen threw my head back for a deep inhalation.
I’ve tested yours and Seán Flannery’s DNA. No match. No familial connection.
Chapter 57
‘You’ve perked up no end,’ said Chris.
I put the phone back in my pocket. ‘Some good news. More than good.’
‘Right, we’re here!’ said Chris.
The Circus was as I remembered, an edifice of grey concrete made less dusty for a recent shower of rain.
We ran inside, over the greasy-looking tarmac, and Chris signed everyone in. We followed him up the stairs.
‘I’ve a meeting room on fourth floor – it’s quiet enough and we’ll not be disturbed.’
We grabbed mugs of black, prison-grade tea with bobbing sugar cubes from a self-service drinks station inside the door.
‘You could trot a mouse across it, but it’s wet and warm,’ said Chris.
We sat down to work in a meeting room, the size of a walk-in wardrobe and redolent of armpits.
‘First off, I owe you both an apology,’ said Chris.
His face was brick-red.
‘Couple of weeks ago I threw you rightly under the bus.’
Steam from our polystyrene cups curled into the silent air.
‘I’m not proud of it. Maitland’s been sat on me about Burgess and the Data Centre. Our Deputy Chief Constable was on Maitland’s back. She were giving him heat about missing a narcotics ring supplying the Midlands and beyond. So Maitland were passing it all down to me. And not giving me the resources to investigate it. I believed it were constructive dismissal and reported him to our Deputy Chief, told her Maitland were using DS O’Connor to put pressure on you about the Emer Davidson case. Maitland has form for this kind of thing, so there’ll be wigs on the green for those boys.’
He smacked the desk in triumph, thinking he was giving me O’Connor on a plate.
I gave him a frayed smile, unable to go into Joe’s treachery and unwilling to relive his arrest.
‘Right, we’ll move on,’ said Chris, perplexed. ‘Amina, there’s no overhead so you’ll have to use your laptop.’
She was organised and handed each of us a pack in a blue folder. Much of this work was a result of the court orders Joe had fast-tracked for me. The irony wasn’t lost. I undid the elastic toggle with an awkward fumbling of fingers and it snapped.
‘No matter, Bridge,’ said Amina.
Her laptop was on, the first slide chock-a-block with black lines and boxes bisecting the harsh neon. A complex topology of banking transactions. We were going straight in.
‘The documents in your packs are to back up my claims about Seán Flannery’s drug business,’ Amina said. ‘There are gaps and I’ll need your help. Do you want the abridged version or line by line?’
‘Oh, abridged please,’ said Chris.
Amina’s downcast face was comical.
