Dead Girls Dancing

by Graham Masterton

  The man in the black leather jacket waited until she had set down their glasses and then he said, ‘We could be in the shite like. It’s Dennehy’s moth, Maggie.’

  ‘What about her?’ asked Davy.

  ‘She came around last night and she was talking to my Sive. She’s fierce upset about Niall. She knows that he was in with us like, and she knows that you and him had a bit of shemozzle about this and that.’

  Davy stared at him hard. ‘So what?’ he demanded.

  ‘Well, she knows for a fact that it wasn’t her Bernie that killed him, because Niall told her right from the start that he was paying Bernie to give her a regular belt of the relic, although she never told Bernie that she knew. She didn’t mind at all because Bernie could never give her what she wanted in the flange department, and the grade was welcome.’

  ‘All right. So what are you saying?’

  ‘I’m saying that out of all the people who might have had a reason to shoot him, Maggie reckons the only feller who had the motive and the means to do it was you.’

  ‘Ah, that’s some raiméis she’s talking. Why would I want to do Niall any harm, of all people? He was building up the business again after Bobby went to hell and he was building it up fantastic. Granted, he and me saw things a bit different as far as politics was concerned, but I liked the man. He was sound.’

  ‘Listen, don’t blame me,’ said the man in the black leather jacket. ‘I’m only telling you what she told Sive, that’s all.’ He took a swallow of his beer, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and let out a crackling burp.

  Davy said, ‘Whatever she told your Sive there’s nothing she can do about it, is there? She doesn’t have any proof that it was me, because it wasn’t me.’

  ‘I believe you, but she’s ripping about it and she told Sive that she was going down to Anglesea Street to talk to the shades. Even if it wasn’t you, they’re going to come sniffing around asking you questions, aren’t they? Like, where were you when Niall got shot, things like that.’

  ‘I was in here, that’s where I was. Murtagh here and Billy can vouch for that, can’t you, boys?’

  Both Murtagh and Billy pulled faces that confirmed that they would. Neither of them was going to dare to say that when Niall had left the pub and driven away, Davy’s Mercedes had been right behind him and heading in the same direction.

  ‘There’s that CSI stuff they can do now,’ put in the dartboard man. ‘I seen them on the telly. Like they can prove ninety-nine per cent certain that it wasn’t you, by the NDA, and they can do tests on the bullet like, shooting it into a tank of water, to show that it didn’t come out of your gun.’

  ‘Well, that’ll be easy to prove because I don’t have a gun that it didn’t come out of. And it’s DNA, not NDA. NDA’s a fecking toyshop.’

  ‘Maggie’s still going to go and talk to the shades,’ said the man in the black leather jacket. ‘Sive said she’ll be doing it first thing tomorrow morning, when she goes into town to get the messages.’

  ‘Where does she live, this Maggie?’

  ‘Nash’s Boreen, up by Fair Green. I don’t know the number, but it’s the first house after you’ve passed the halting site.’

  Davy didn’t answer that. He sat silent for a while, obviously thinking. The other five men at the table exchanged questioning glances, but none of them spoke, either.

  At last, Davy picked up his glass of lemon MiWadi, drained it, and put it back on the table very quietly and precisely. Then he stood up and said, ‘Right, let’s go.’

  ‘Go where?’ asked Murtagh.

  ‘Where do you think? Nash’s Boreen. I think we have to have a discouraging word with this Maggie.’

  ‘What, you mean now?’ asked Billy.

  ‘Now’s as good a time as any.’

  The other four men looked at each other, and then they all lifted their pints of Murphy’s and swallowed them down as quickly as they could.

  Kyna watched them from behind the bar as they all stood up from the table and made their way to the door. She had been trying to listen in to their conversation, but the man in the black leather jacket had spoken very quickly and indistinctly with a strong Mayfield accent and she had only picked up the gist of what they were saying.

  Just before they reached the door it opened and Liam came in. His navy-blue nylon windcheater was slung over his shoulders because his right hand was bandaged and his arm was supported by a sling. He saw Kyna and gave her a thumbs-up sign with his left hand, but Davy said something to him and he had to turn around and go out again, with Davy and Murtagh and Billy and the other three men following.

  As the door closed behind them, Patrick came up behind Kyna and said, ‘Somebody’s in for it.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘When that bunch of scummers all go out together, they’re on their way to soften somebody’s cough, believe me.’

  ‘I heard them talking about some woman called Maggie.’

  Patrick stuck out his lower lip and shook his head. ‘Sure like, I know a couple of Maggies but I wouldn’t be able to tell you which one they meant. Whoever she is, I think we should be saying a lorica for her. She’s going to need it.’

  *

  Davy’s silver Mercedes drew up outside the first in a row of white-painted houses on Nash’s Boreen. It was followed a few seconds later by a dusty black Kia Sorento driven by the dartboard man.

  Nash’s Boreen was a narrow lane that ran westwards along the brow of the hill from Fair Green and eventually dwindled out into a cul-de-sac. To the north there were usually views of fields and farms and distant green hills, but this afternoon the clouds were dark grey and hanging low. Over towards Blarney rain was beginning to drift in, like a procession of very tall ghosts, so it was hard to see any further than Blackstone Bridge.

  Davy and Murtagh and Billy and Liam climbed out of the Mercedes and the three other men jumped down from the Kia. The man in the black leather jacket was smoking, but he flicked his cigarette into the hedge.

  In the front window of the house next door a curtain was tugged to one side and an elderly woman in curlers stared out at them. She looked like an inquisitive rhesus monkey. As soon as Davy stared back at her, however, she promptly vanished and the curtain was tugged back. In the Dennehy house, though, the front room was in darkness and there was no outward sign that anybody was at home.

  ‘Maybe your one’s not in,’ said Billy, with a sniff.

  ‘Well, we’ll have to see, won’t we?’ said Davy. ‘Give her a knock, will you?’

  ‘Who me?’

  ‘No, you gobdaw, your long-dead grannie.’

  Billy went up to the green-painted front door and said, ‘There’s a bell.’

  ‘Then ring the fecking bell, for the love of God.’

  Billy pressed the bell and they could faintly hear it chiming inside. They waited, but there was no answer.

  ‘She better not have gone to the pigsty already, I tell you,’ said Davy. ‘Give it another go.’

  Billy pressed the bell again and this time they heard a door slamming and a woman’s voice calling out, ‘All right, all right! I’m coming! Stall the ball, will you?’

  The door opened and there was Maggie Dennehy, looking flustered. She was a small woman, about forty-five years old, with short dark hair in a messy fringe and long dangling earrings. She was wearing no make-up but she had large brown eyes and high cheekbones and a squarish jaw, and as Billy had said, she was quite a fair knock for her age.

  She was wearing a loose ginger sweater and black leggings and fluffy white slippers.

  As soon as she saw Davy, she tried to slam the door shut, but Billy stuck his foot in it and pushed it back open.

  ‘What are you after?’ she demanded, although it was obvious that she was frightened.

  ‘Just come to have a bit of a chat, that’s all,’ said Davy.

  ‘I have nothing to say to you, Davy Dorgan.’

  ‘Maybe not, Maggie, but I have one or two thing
s that I need to say to you. Like, for instance, what a load of conna you’re thinking of telling to the shades.’

  ‘Who told you that?’

  ‘Never you mind who told me. Let’s go inside and talk it over, shall we?’

  Again Maggie wrestled to shut the door, but Billy wouldn’t let her even though she slammed it against his foot five or six times.

  Davy came right up to the door and said very calmly, and with a strong hint of an Ulster accent, ‘Come on, wee doll. Cool your jets. You know that if you don’t let us in we’ll only be after breaking down the door.’

  ‘Away to feck with you,’ said Maggie, gritting her teeth and trying to slam the door shut yet again.

  ‘Kevan,’ said Davy. The dartboard man came forward and while Billy leaned back to give him some space he pressed his shoulder against the door and his weight alone was enough to force it wide open.

  Maggie was pushed backwards into the hallway, but she immediately turned around and stumbled into the front living room, slamming the door behind her.

  Kevan didn’t need telling again. He stepped into the hallway, rested his back against the wall opposite the living-room door, and gave it a kick that burst the lock and swung it wide open.

  Davy walked into the living room, dry-washing his hands together and smiling. The rest of the men followed him, although Liam stayed close by the door with his back to the wall.

  Maggie was crouching in the corner behind the large brown corduroy couch, as if by curling herself up small enough she could make herself invisible.

  ‘What do you want?’ she said, although she didn’t look up at them and her voice was little more than a whisper, so that it didn’t sound like a question at all.

  ‘I want to know what you were thinking of telling the shades, wee doll. That’s what I want.’

  Maggie squeezed her eyes tight shut. ‘I wasn’t thinking of telling them nothing.’

  ‘Oh yes, you fecking were,’ said Davy. He turned to the dartboard man again and said, ‘Kevan,’ and nodded towards the large flat-screen TV standing on a table at the end of living room. The dartboard man went up to it, lifted it over his head and threw it against the wall, so that the screen broke diagonally in half with a sharp crack like a pistol shot. Maggie let out a little whimper.

  ‘There’s no use in you spoofing,’ said Davy. ‘You were going to rat on me to the shades even though you had no reason to. You really think I killed Niall? Jesus – you’ve a wee want if that’s what you believe! I know one thing, though. You do it for the money. You’re no better than any dockside brasser, are you?’

  Maggie kept her eyes tight shut, but she began to sob.

  ‘I’ll tell you what, wee doll,’ said Davy. ‘You can pay me back for what you were thinking of doing, the same way you paid Niall back for his money. Billy – Kevan – Alroy – Darragh—’

  Billy and the man in the black leather jacket and the man in the shiny grey suit all made their way around the couch. Billy and Alroy gripped Maggie by the arms and pulled her upright. She opened her eyes and screamed and kicked, but between them they heaved her around to the front of the couch and forced her to lie down on it.

  ‘Get off me!’ she screeched. ‘Let me go! Get your hands off me you bastards! Get off me!’

  Davy looked around and saw that the curtains were held open by wide pink cotton tie-backs. He yanked one of them free and handed it to Darragh. ‘Here, big man. Shut her bake for me, would you?’

  Kevan and Alroy were keeping Maggie flat on her back on the couch, while Murtagh and Billy were holding her ankles to stop her from kicking. Darragh pushed the tie-back into her mouth and then gripped her hair so that he could lift up her head and knot it at the back of her neck. Maggie spat and gnashed her teeth and made angry gargling noises, but Darragh had tied it so tight that she couldn’t loosen it.

  Maggie had already lost her slippers, but while Kevan pinned her legs down, Murtagh reached underneath the hem of her baggy ginger sweater and took hold of the waistband of her black stretch leggings. She made even more gargling sounds as he tugged them down, centimetre by centimetre, and then rolled them right off, baring her thin white legs and a dark brown triangle of pubic hair.

  Now Darragh pulled up her sweater, with Billy and Alroy helping him to wrestle her arms out of her sleeves. Darragh lifted up her head again by gripping her hair and then he dragged her sweater right off and slung it across the room.

  Davy came up to the couch, leaning over Maggie with a smile that was almost beatific. She was naked now except for a black nylon bra, and he raised one hand as if he were a priest giving her a blessing. She glared up at him with glittering hatred, chewing at the tie-back between her teeth. In response, he smiled at her even more broadly, and leaned even closer, almost close enough to kiss her, so that he could reach with both hands behind her back to slide open the fastening of her bra.

  After a few moments’ jiggling he managed to take her bra right off. He held it up triumphantly and showed it around, as if it were a grey mullet that he had tickled out of the River Lee, and then he dropped it on to the floor.

  ‘Well, you’re small, wee doll, but perfectly formed,’ he said, looking down at her breasts. ‘What do you think, Billy?’

  ‘I prefer my diddies a sight bigger than that, Davy, but beggars can’t be choosers like, can they?’

  ‘Go on, then, give her what we came for.’

  Billy gave Maggie’s right wrist to Darragh to hold. Then he went behind the couch, unbuckled his belt and dropped his jeans. He came back around the end of the couch wearing only his brown check shirt and mismatched socks, one calf-length and one short. His penis was only half-erect, and he was rubbing it furiously, but when Murtagh and Kevan forced Maggie’s legs even wider apart, so that the lips of her vulva opened up, he stiffened immediately, until his penis stuck up between his shirt-tails like a long thin prong with a purple fig on the end of it. He unbuttoned his shirt from the bottom upwards and climbed on to the couch, kneeling between Maggie’s skinny thighs.

  Davy was now standing on the other side of the room with his back turned. The rain had reached the boreen outside and it was freckling the window panes. He had expected Maggie to struggle even more violently when Billy climbed on top of her, but all he could hear was Billy huffing and puffing and the monotonous squelching of the couch springs.

  Liam was watching, but he stayed by the door.

  Maggie had closed her eyes again and she lay floppy and unresponsive. She knew what these men were going to do to her, and she knew that she wasn’t strong enough to resist them, so she had decided to let them get on with it and try and think of Niall and some of the happy hours they had enjoyed together. Niall had been a considerate lover, good in bed. He had been physically strong, and urgent, and he had hurt her occasionally, but she had enjoyed that, and he had always made sure that she was satisfied.

  Billy kept on plunging and plunging, but as he reached his vinegar strokes he took himself out of her and gave himself a last quick rub so that his semen splattered all over her pubic hair.

  ‘Dowcha, boy!’ said Alroy, which was what hurling supporters shouted when the ball was slammed into the back of the net.

  Billy climbed off and it was Alroy’s turn next. He took off his leather jacket and T-shirt and jeans, although like Billy he left his socks on. Big-bellied and hairy and tattooed, with a penis that was short and stumpy and crimson, he clambered on to the couch and managed to push himself between Maggie’s legs. Standing by the window, looking out, Davy guessed it was him because of his repetitive grunting and the much louder scrunching of the couch springs.

  Alroy climaxed after only two or three minutes, grunting and snorting and repeatedly breathing ‘feck, feck, feck’. He was so exhausted by his efforts that Billy had to give him a hand to lift himself off the couch.

  Next, Darragh took off his jacket and trousers and hung them over the back of one of the armchairs before he stepped out of his purple-spotted boxer shorts.
He took his time, penetrating Maggie with an odd in-and-out motion, with a little quiver of his tightly squeezed buttocks every time he pushed himself into her. Maggie remained completely motionless. She might just as well have been a dead body as a live woman.

  Kevan stripped himself completely naked and struck a bodybuilder’s pose with his biceps bulging before he climbed on top of Maggie. He had a bramble-bush of gingery pubic hair and his erect penis was enormous, so that he had to stretch apart Maggie’s vulva with his black-nailed fingers before he could force it in. When he started pumping at her, her hips were jounced up and down, even though she was trying to lie completely still.

  Murtagh was last, but he didn’t get on top of her. Instead, he stood beside the couch, unzipped his trousers, and took out his penis. He masturbated with quick, punchy, piston-like movements and when he was nearing his climax he moved even closer to the couch and shot sperm all over Maggie’s cheeks and looped it across the bridge of her nose.

  He tucked himself away and as he did so he grinned and said, ‘You see that in all them porn videos, don’t you, but my Breda would cut my bollocks off with a pair of pinking shears if I tried it on her.’

  ‘Right, are you all finished?’ asked Davy, turning around. ‘What about you, Liam?’

  Liam lifted his sling and shook his head. ‘Don’t want to bust my stitches, Davy.’

  Billy and Alroy and Kevan let go of their hold on Maggie’s arms and legs. She still didn’t move or open her eyes, but Murtagh said, ‘Don’t worry, she’s breathing all right. We haven’t fucked her to death.’

  Davy went over to the couch. He stood silent for a moment and then he said, ‘You listen to me, wee doll. I know you can hear me. Don’t you ever suggest to nobody ever again that it was me who shot Niall, especially the shades. You’ll get more of the same if you do, but this was just a warning like, do you know what I mean? Next time it’s going to be much, much worse. You’ll get things pushed up you front and back that’ll give you bad dreams for the rest of your life.’