The Death of an Irish Tinker

by Bartholomew Gill

  Yes, he’d missed the bitch. She was crawling toward a gate in the wall. He reached for the Beretta in his jacket pocket. If he missed her with the Rover again, he’d jump out and do her with that. It was only a .25 caliber, but the bullets were hollow-tipped, and he’d pump all seven shots into her brain. The car then he’d take to the warehouse, as planned. And he’d be done with the only person who could still link him to a murder.

  Jamming the stick into reverse, he tromped the gas pedal, and the Rover, skidding, leaped wildly back down the alley, rocking from side to side.

  Biddy thought she’d been blinded. Her face was covered with dirt and blood. But catching sight of the bright stainless steel body of the revolver, where it had fallen out of her bag in front of her, she threw herself forward and snatched it up. Turning, she sat up, arms extended, the heavy gun locked in both hands. If he would kill her, she’d not go alone.

  The Toddler did not know what happened. The rear window, which, like the others, was bulletproof glass, crazed suddenly into an opaque pattern of like crystals. He could not see a thing through it, and with the left external mirror now gone as well, he could not see her.

  Twisting the wheel to the left, so he could, he lost control of the careering van, which slammed into the farther wall and nearly spun around. Like that he was straddling the alley. Where at least he caught sight of her again, just sitting there with something in her hands.

  A bolt of flame spit from the thing and crazed the window of the passenger seat, sending a shower of glass slivers over the Toddler. And the next window on that side and the next, before he realized what it was and reacted. Christ, it must be a cannon, he thought. A second shot at any one of the frazzled windows would carry right through.

  Spinning the wheel, he turned the Rover and aimed it directly at her. Fuck it, he’d just run her down and chuck her corpse in back, then proceed as planned.

  But the gun was still up, and the Toddler threw himself across the credenza and onto the shattered glass on the passenger seat, just as the windscreen exploded and the Rover crashed into the wall on the other side of the alley.

  There was a pause of maybe four or five seconds—the Toddler would later think—as he tried to collect his wits, and he realized he could still hear the engine ticking over. Before the floor of the car—the only part of the Rover that wasn’t armored—exploded right under him, smashing the credenza and sending a bolt of searing pain through his left thigh. Bits of frayed headliner sifted down on him.

  Christ, he’d been shot. He’d even dropped the Beretta, which he now picked up again. She must be right under the car. He had either to kill her now or to get out of there. Or both. He pulled himself up, wondering if he could still walk. There was a chunk out of the fleshy part of his thigh the size of a tanner. It was bubbling blood.

  Enraged now that she had actually managed to injure him, he jerked up the handle and threw the door open. He’d blow the bitch away, then get the fuck out of there and get himself some help. How could he have been so careless! He might even bleed to death from a wound like that.

  But the door was wrenched out of his hand, and there she was standing above him all blood and dirt, some huge handgun pointed right at his head. She pulled the trigger. Nothing. And again. Only a click.

  As the Beretta in his left hand came up, she smashed the butt of the gun into his face, again and again. Then she spun and fled.

  The Toddler roared. He bawled and spit shards of his shattered front teeth across the dashboard. His nose was broken, he could tell; there was a bright orange ball of pain right in the center of his vision; and his front teeth were ruined where the butt of the gun—some huge revolver—had punched into his mouth. It was filled with blood.

  He spit again and tried to fight through the pain just as he had in Nam. He swung his good right leg out of the car and pulled himself to a stand beside the open door, which he would use as a firing brace.

  But he’d only sighted the bitch in when she twisted her key in the gate latch and let herself into the back garden. And the three small-caliber slugs that he managed to squeeze off thwacked harmlessly in the wood of the closing door. Tasting his own blood, he fell back into the car.

  He had to get rid of the gun, get himself to hospital, and get himself some other help before all this got out of hand. He’d call in favors, every one he could, he decided, finding it nearly impossible to drive with his left foot alone.

  He’d put out a fucking dragnet for the fucking cunt—Beth Waters/Biddy Nevins. It wouldn’t matter if it was known he wanted her, as long as he popped her himself. Discreetly. No witnesses.

  The Rover jerked and bucked, as he pulled out into the Pembroke Road and headed toward the Royal Dublin Hospital.

  Back in the house Biddy locked the cubby door, then rushed through the kitchen to the cellar door, which she wrenched open.

  “What—back so soon?” Tag asked from the kitchen table until he realized what he was seeing. “Christ, Bid, what happened to you?”

  Cheri Cooke was sitting with him, beer in hand. “Didn’t I tell you you needed me?”

  Biddy pulled open the door and reached up for one of the boxes of cartridges. She’d been foolish to think only six shots would do. Now she might need an entire fifty. She’d leave the second there in case she had to return to the house, and then bullets were heavy. She could travel better light.

  Snapping open the cylinder, she shook out the spent shells and quickly reloaded. That done, she poured the rest of the box into a pocket of her dress, dropping the empty carton by her feet.

  The two at the table seemed dumbstruck until Cheri managed to ask, “And where do you think you’re going looking like that?”

  Said Tag, “Was that boomin’ we heard yeh? Were you shootin’ yehr six-gun out in the alley?” He shook his head in wonder. “Yeh should see yehr face. Yeh look like you just committed murder.”

  With any luck, she thought, tugging open the door and rushing out into the back garden. If he wasn’t there, she’d find him somehow. Which should have been her plan from the start, way back years ago after he’d murdered Mickalou.

  Opening the door cautiously, she stood where the wall would protect her, sticking only her head out into the alley. Once, quick.

  But all that was left of him was the side mirror of his Rover, bits of shattered plastic and glass, and streaks of blue enamel down the walls on both sides of the alley.

  “Are you all right, Miss Waters?” Her neighbor from across the alley asked, standing in her own back garden doorway.

  Biddy concealed the gun behind her back. “Yes,” she said.

  “What was that anyway? I heard a fierce bit o’ roaring and banging. It sounded like war.” The woman stepped out into the alley to take a closer look. She picked up the side mirror. “Could it have been a car crash? And, look, here’s a bag, a woman’s bag.”

  Biddy glanced over her shoulder at her own house, where Tag and Cheri were now standing in the kitchen window, looking out. She couldn’t go back there where the Toddler could find her; she had to be the one to dictate where and when and be ready for him. For the next time, which was inevitable.

  Stepping out into the alley, Biddy closed the gate and advanced upon the woman.

  “Oh, sweet Jesus, miss, you’ve been injured.”

  Biddy tried to smile. “I’m fine, really. Grand.” She took the bag from the woman.

  “Are you sure? Your face, now—it’s all blood and dirt. Whatever happened to you?”

  Opening the bag, Biddy tried to turn her body away, but the woman saw the gun. “Oh, my! Oh!” She turned and fled toward her open garden gate. “I don’t know what went on here. But I’m ringing up the guards this instant. They’ll sort it out, I’m sure.”

  Unsteady now, staggering a bit, Biddy made her way toward the end of the laneway, her skinned scalp, face, and shoulder now paining her bad. If nothing else, she’d learned two things: She could get lucky, and the Toddler was not invincible. He made mi
stakes.

  Maybe he was slipping. Maybe she could get him out of their lives the right way, the way that would matter to her most and pay the bastard back for Mickalou and all the others.

  CHAPTER 11

  Victim

  NEXT MORNING PETER McGarr bumped through the swinging door of the Murder Squad office and made straight for his cubicle.

  Twelve years had changed him little. Although short by the measure of younger generations at five feet ten and a half, McGarr still looked somewhat youthful. The hair that could be seen under a stylish trilby was brilliant orange and curly, and his eyes were clear and gray.

  All that was different, really, were his posture, which was a bit stooped now, and his gait, which had become more distinct. Called the Dublin trudge by his wife, McGarr’s way of perambulating was distinctive. With hands plunged in his trouser pockets and hat still on his head, he traversed the office leaning forward. His steps were quick, seemingly purposeful, but also a bit harried, as though “carrying the weight of an improbable universe” on his shoulders. Her quote.

  Which assessment was accurate at least this morning. McGarr’s “form” was in no way good. Not more than a half hour earlier he had read an editorial in one of the morning papers that had made him angry. It contended that whereas Ireland could boast of one of the lowest per capita murder rates in Europe—lower, in fact, than Japan and Singapore, which were considered two of the safest countries in the world—the country’s conviction rate was deplorable. Significantly below those two countries.

  Granted, it was nitpicking at its worst, but the editorial went on to call for an inquiry into “Garda investigation priorities, techniques, and relevant personnel.” Only in passing were government barristers mentioned, as though winning or losing in court depended solely on Garda evidence and not on the capabilities of prosecutors.

  Nor was any mention made of the fact that a significant portion of Ireland’s murders were political in nature and not pursued for political reasons. Or that those murders were generally not assigned to McGarr’s squad or were taken away from him the moment progress was made.

  Drug-related murders were another area that many politicians and even some of the police wished to play down. Probably a decade ago McGarr had heard a high-ranking guard say, “Why make an issue of them? Let the scuts kill each other off. And fair play to them.”

  Hands still in pockets, hat still on head, McGarr sat at his desk, beside which Detective Superintendent Hugh Ward was now sitting. He had replaced Liam O’Shaughnessy, who had long since retired.

  With arms spread, Ward was reading a newspaper. “Gobshites, shooting from the lip,” he said. “It’s easy. A few pints of courage and a word processor. He’s probably all the chat among his own kind. But safe, knowing we can’t respond.” Since it was Garda policy not to.

  And they—the others in the journalist’s profession, such as it was—would know that, McGarr told himself. But not the general public. Nor McGarr’s superiors, who hated criticism of any sort. Nor his wife or young daughter and their relatives, who would take it personally. McGarr was in a foul mood.

  A gracefully shaped hand now appeared in front of him, setting a large cup of steaming coffee on the blotter beside the sheaf of papers. Fully a detective inspector now, Ruth Bresnahan was no longer the least senior staffer, but she nevertheless performed the coffee duty whenever it required instant attention. Straightening up, she glanced at Ward, who looked away noncommittally. McGarr, however, had not moved, and she decided to chance it.

  Bending, she opened the lower left drawer of McGarr’s desk and removed a bottle of Hogan’s Own. It was a single-pot-stilled malt whiskey that had been aged in sherry casks to impart a ruby color and a sweet-smoky bouquet. Although no longer produced, cases had been acquired by regulars, like McGarr, when Hogan’s changed hands some years ago. He took a drop now and then, but only with cause.

  Pulling out the cork, Bresnahan lowered the neck toward McGarr’s cup and waited. When there was no objection from the seated, hatted, hands-in-trouser-pocketed one, she splashed in a dollop and waited again. With still no objection, she added some more. Finally she simply topped up the cup, then corked and replaced the bottle.

  Leaving the cubicle, she heard the newspaper rustle, as Ward lowered it to watch her go out the door. There she paused and turned to him, knowing that the straps of her “braced” slacks were riding provocatively along the sides of her full breasts. These last were encased in a ribbed cotton spandex bodysuit. Having brushed her auburn hair off her forehead, she had arranged the natural waves to flow over her shoulders. Her eyes were smoky gray.

  And his? Adoring, worshipful, conquered. Which was enough corroboration for the moment. She moved back toward her desk, fully believing she had heard a sigh, although they had parted intimate company only a few hours earlier. The man simply could not get enough of her, that much was plain.

  Holding the cup in both hands, McGarr breathed in the evaporating malt before taking a wee sip. The cup would last him until noon. And should. Details and alcohol did not mix, but a “Hogan’s coffee” could certainly improve an ugly mood.

  Taking a second touch that seeped down his throat like a soothing balm, he began reading through the stack of police activity reports that had come in overnight. It was a ritual that he had performed every working day for the last nearly thirty years. And perhaps because of the editorial, one item on the second page jumped out at him.

  It was the report of a gunshot wound. The name of the victim? Desmond Bacon. And there could be no doubt it was their Desmond Bacon who had virtually disappeared for years and was only rumored still to be involved in his former illegal activity.

  In the margin Bresnahan had written:

  Bulletproofed Land Rover left running outside the Royal City of Dublin Hospital on Baggot Street. Owned by Desmond Bacon of Hacketstown, Wicklow, but formerly of Coolock. Windows shot up & the interior. Tech Squad says three large-caliber gunshots entered from beneath the vehicle, wounding the victim, who, claiming shock, states he has no idea how or where it happened or who the perpetrator might be. Victim is in hospital and likely to be for some time. Please note the hour of his arrival at the Royal Dublin, then see pages 17 first, 11 second.

  The time that Bacon had been admitted to hospital was circled in red pencil: 5:37 P.M.

  McGarr set down the cup and followed Bresnahan’s advice since she daily perused all police reports countrywide for items relevant to open cases. And she possessed a good memory and better analytical skills.

  Page 17 said a woman had phoned in a complaint about what she first thought was a road accident in Raglan Lane but subsequently believed were also gunshots. After hearing the noises, she observed her neighbor—one Beth Waters of Raglan Road—with “a great shiny pistol.” Waters placed it in her purse and walked toward the Pembroke Road.

  McGarr glanced up from the activity sheet. Beth Waters: He’d heard that name before or read it. But where? He glanced back down.

  A police patrol had been dispatched to Raglan Lane and discovered evidence of an automobile having struck walls on both sides of the lane. A side mirror from the car was later found that appeared to have come from the left passenger side of Desmond Bacon’s Rover, as did paint chips taken from the wall. The time of the woman’s phone call was 5:25 P.M. It too was circled in red.

  McGarr turned to page 11. The item marked there said that acting on a tip, Chief Superintendent Paul Hannigan and his Drug Squad had raided number 12 Raglan Road, a residence owned by the same Beth Waters, and discovered a sizable cache of heroin, cocaine, and tablets of MDMA, the drug known on the street as Ecstasy.

  Hannigan took two inhabitants into custody: Tag Barry, twenty-nine, originally of Belfast, and Cheri Cooke, sixty-one, who gave a permanent address in Reigate, Surrey. There was no mention of their having been arraigned, so they would still be in custody, McGarr supposed. The house itself had been sequestered.

  Hannigan also issued an all-points a
lert for the owner, Beth Waters, who might also be a British subject. She was described as being in her early to mid-thirties, nearly six feet in height, of full build, with short brown hair and brown eyes.

  “This much made The Times,” Bresnahan had written in the margin. It was a paper that McGarr read mostly at night after supper.

  The next sentence was circled in red and caused McGarr to remove his hat: “She also goes under the name Biddy Nevins and is known to associate with members of the Traveling community. She is armed and dangerous. If apprehended, she is to be remanded to Dublin, as per order of Chief Superintendent Hannigan.”

  The time of the raid on the Raglan Road house was also ringed in red 5:30 P.M.

  “Now turn back to page 1 and read the 13th entry,” Bresnahan advised in the margin.

  It said that at 4:46 P.M. CS Hannigan issued an order that a four-door teal-colored 500 SL Mercedes-Benz sedan be followed, until a unit under his command could take over the surveillance. It was headed south on the Merrion Road. “The car is registered to Beth Waters,” Bresnahan noted, “who is a rather well-known British artist now resident in Dublin. Yesterday was her first Irish opening.”

  That was where McGarr had seen the name: in the shop a few doors down from his wife’s picture gallery in Dawson Street. McGarr reached for the phone.

  “Our Toddler? Our Biddy Nevins?” Ward asked without looking away from his newspaper. “Together again.”

  McGarr consulted the phone listing taped to the writing slide of the desk, then dialed Hannigan’s number. “Paul—Peter McGarr here.” After pleasantries were exchanged, he asked, “The Raglan Road raid? Who gave you the tip?”

  There was a pause before Hannigan said, “Er, why do you ask, Peter?”

  Which McGarr found interesting of itself, one chief superintendent to another. He waited, and when no other answer was forthcoming, he went on. “Did you see the other report? The one that says Desmond Bacon, the Toddler, was shot in the laneway in back of the Raglan house just before you arrived there. Later a householder reported seeing Beth Waters with a handgun?”