by Declan Burke
I caught Herbie napping, facedown in a pillow. The pillow scarlet and sodden, hands tied behind his back with electrical cable. He groaned when I turned him over onto his side. It was a tiny sound, a grunt I wouldn’t have heard if I hadn’t been straining to hear it, but it told me all I needed to know. Herbie was alive.
The ginger hair was the giveaway. Everything else was pretty much unrecognisable. It looked like someone had been pulping jam with his head and pineapple jam at that. His nose was pushed to one side, lips split, the mouth an ugly red gash. His cheekbones were stove in, eyes puffed up to maybe three times their usual size. He had no teeth left that I could see, although it was possible they hadn’t been able to get to the grinders right at the back. It wasn’t for the want of trying if they hadn’t.
I dug out Gonzo’s mobile, dialled emergency.
“Herb,” I said, as I untied his hands. “Herb? You hear me?”
“Aauugh,” he whispered. It was a guttural, primitive sound, the blood clogging up his mouth not helping. He was blind and punch-drunk but I got the impression he recognised my voice, although that was probably just wishful thinking. Maybe it was just as well. If Herbie had recognised it, he’d have known it as the voice responsible for getting him into this mess.
“Help’s on the way, Herb. Hear that? I’ve rung for an ambulance.”
There was nothing more I could do for him, what Herbie needed was professional help and early retirement. I went across the hall and checked his computer room. The whole system was kicked asunder, hard-drives mangled, screens booted in. Even the furniture had been smashed. At a rough guess, there was maybe ten grand worth of damage done. I was disappointed. I’d expected more from professionals than petty spite.
I went back to Herbie’s room, opened a window and watched him while I waited for the ambulance to arrive. He was in poor shape. The pros hadn’t been too worried whether he suffocated or just choked on his own blood. He’d live, I was guessing, which was good, but Herbie was never going to be the same again. Maybe it was just as well that most of his friends lived in cyberspace.
When I heard the faint whine of the ambulance siren, the sound carrying on the clear air, I went downstairs. I found a dishcloth in the kitchen, wiped the poker clean and put it back on the hearth. Then I left.
I parked at the bottom of the avenue, started building a smoke. Thirty seconds later an ambulance came tearing around the corner, a squad car in close attendance. When they pulled up outside Herbie’s, I turned onto Fortfield and headed back towards town.
It was time the pigeon threw himself among the cats.
The foyer of Conway’s office was bright, airy. Dust motes hung in the sunlight that angled down through the slatted wooden blinds. There was so much potted greenery I expected a pygmy to jump out and shoot off a poisoned dart.
A row of low chairs occupied the far wall. A young couple sat on two of them, her blonde, him bland, the furrowed brows suggesting that they were newly married and about to dive headfirst into insolvency. A balding gent in his sixties occupied a third chair. He wore a plain grey suit and his shoes were trimmed with dry mud. His face was round, ruddy and slightly anxious, the way all farmers look when walls hem them in.
The secretary was in her forties. Prim, the precise make-up job screaming inferiority complex. Her desk was so big it looked like she needed to yodel to be heard on the other side. I didn’t want to be responsible for her face falling off, so I marched past. Her expectant expression creased in confusion as I headed for the door marked ‘Private’. The last thing I heard her say was, “I said, you can’t go in there,” but I’d heard that line from younger women than her so I just closed the door quietly behind me.
Conway’s office was an amphitheatre. The plush carpet rippled away towards the horizon, where Conway sat behind a mahogany desk that could have hosted the Ziegfield Follies. The lighting was subtle, art deco, the temperature cool. The colour scheme exuded mellow repose, pale blue walls with lime-green borders. There was more potted greenery in the corners, and the room was so quiet I guessed it was soundproofed. Given the way the property market was running, the ambience was perfect. When you’re an auctioneer trying to minimise the chances of your client suffering a coronary, every little helps. Especially when you still have to tack on your own five per cent.
The woman facing Conway, cut off in mid-flow, glanced over her shoulder. She was power dressed in matching skirt and jacket, gunmetal grey with a light pinstripe. It looked like it cost an arm and a leg and she’d have looked just as good after the amputations. It took her a moment to recognise me. I slipped her the usual grubby smile.
“Excuse me for interrupting, Mrs Conway. But your husband and I have some urgent business to attend to.”
She smiled, icy.
“You’re persistent, Mr Delaney, I’ll grant you that. And what might you be selling today?”
I sat down in the other chair, a leather-and-tubular-steel affair that probably cost as much as all the furniture in my office put together. Started rolling a smoke. I looked at Conway and we made sheep’s eyes at one another until the secretary burst through the door. Her face was livid, the skin stretched tight. If she’d been annoyed more often, maybe, she wouldn’t have needed the nips and tucks that left her face looking like a map of the Burren.
“I’m sorry, Mr Conway,” she said, shooting me a venomous glance. Her cheeks were flushed beneath the layers of foundation, or maybe she’d taken time out to apply blusher before the big entrance. “He just walked right by me.”
Conway held up a hand.
“That’s okay, Martina.” If I was a surprise, I was a pleasant one. He sounded composed. There was no trace of the bluster he’d treated me to last time out. “I believe I forgot to remind you that I had a prior appointment this morning.”
The secretary glared a couple of daggers and left.
“I don’t mind if she stays,” I told Conway, nodding at the Ice Queen. “But it’s money talk.”
“Helen is privy to all my financial affairs.”
I sparked the smoke.
“This is dirty money, Frank. It’s dirty because it’s buried and it’s buried because you can’t tell anyone about it. I know about it already, but then I wouldn’t recognise money if it didn’t come all grimy and worn.”
The Ice Queen stood up.
“I wouldn’t dream of eavesdropping, Mr Delaney.” It was an unnecessary kindness, if I ever came up with anything Helen Conway might want to hear I’d carve it in stone and shout it from the top of Mount Sinai.
“If you’re interested, you can always listen to the tapes when your husband does.”
She chuckled, too deep in her throat for the humour to reach her eyes, and then she left too. Conway was sitting forward, elbows on the desk, fingers steepled and touching his lips.
“Thought you’d like a report, Frank,” I breezed. “Everyone likes to get good news at Christmas.”
“You have good news?” Calm, collected.
“Yeah. Your wife is screwing the College football team, keeper included.”
He didn’t take the bait.
“You can tell so soon? I’d have thought your investigations would be a little more rigorous than that.”
“Trust me, Frank. She’s fucking with a few more people too, only now we’re talking metaphors. And that includes you.”
Again he ignored the dig. I was impressed. I thought a slur on his wife’s character would have been enough to get Big Frank out from behind the desk, seeing as how that’d be muscling in on Big Frank’s turf. Instead he reached for the chequebook on the desk.
“That is good news.” He picked up a pen. “What do I owe you?”
“That isn’t the good news, Frank. At least, it might be good news but it’s nothing you didn’t know already. The good news is that you’re getting a new partner.”
“Partner?”
“Not in the biblical sense. You’re a good-looking cove but you’re not my type. I want in.”
“In?”
“A cut, Frank. A percentage. A tidy little earner for doing sweet fuck all. And that includes not repaying the visit I had from the Dibble yesterday morning.”
He didn’t flinch. Not a twitch. He really was good. I thought about what Brady told me. If Conway inspired respect in Brady, then his office was the last place I should have been sitting. Then again, Brady hadn’t been shot at, or forced to put his family on the run. Not that he’d told me about anyway, Brady seemed shy that way. But I was guessing that any of those reasons would have put Brady where I was and it was unlikely Brady would have been my side of the desk.
“You want to get into the real-estate business?” His tone was polite, but edgy, like he was playing to a crowd.
“The surreal-state business. Drugs, by any other name.”
“I’m a bit old for doing drugs.” He laughed, but it came up short, ending on a high note. He cleared his throat, reached for his Marlboros.
“You’re never too old for a high, Frank. But I’m not talking about a few tokes. I’m talking about distribution, profit margins, the full nine yards. Word’s out, Frank, you’re the Candyman. I know it, the Dibble know it, and if they know it you can bet half of Christendom knows it.”
“That’s libel, Rigby.”
“Slander, actually, and only if it’s not true. Or is it the other way around?” I dropped him the shoulder. “What’s your favourite Bond movie, Frank?”
He bought the dummy.
“What?”
“Your favourite Bond movie, everyone has one. Mine is Thunderball. Connery’s the main man, the only Bond. Moore’s too camp and Brosnan’s too posh. Anyway, there’s a line in Thunderball where Bond reckons that once is coincidence, twice is happenstance, three times is enemy action. Know that line?”
He shook his head, licked his lips. I sat forward, grinned, waded in swinging.
“You came to me two days ago, Frank. Gave me some bullshit about how your wife was screwing around. Which didn’t scan, any time I said she was playing away you jumped like someone was into your strides with a cattle prod. Which meant you had some other reason for being there. I don’t know, maybe you knew the Branch boys were keeping tabs and you were looking for a patsy.” I shrugged. “All you had to do was ask, Frank. I don’t mind being anyone’s patsy, so long as they pay for the privilege.”
He didn’t say anything.
“I played along, Frank. Did a little digging on the lovely Mrs Conway, not really expecting to find anything, because generally I wouldn’t find water in a well, especially when the well is dry. So imagine my surprise when I discover that the lovely Mrs Conway is not only screwing someone but I manage to capture the Kodak moment.”
His lips were clamped shut but his jaws were moving.
“Choice stuff, Frank,” I needled. “I’ve heard about some of those positions but I never believed them possible. Still, they say the camera never lies.”
Conway deserved a lot of things but the truth wasn’t one of them. And if my instincts were right, my best bet was to push him all the way to the edge.
“Don’t sweat it, there’s usually something. A woman wouldn’t be human if she didn’t flirt a little, and your wife just happened to take it a step further.” I paused. “Okay, so she took it about a triple jump further, but let’s not split hairs. The point I’m making is, you didn’t think she was screwing around at all. So that got me wondering. Why does Big Frank want me thinking his wife is screwing around? Then, yesterday morning, two Branch boys turned up in my office, asking about you. That’s coincidence, Frank, in any man’s book.”
He rubbed at his nose with the back of his hand.
“Dry your eyes, I didn’t tell them anything. All my clients are assured of discretion, even the ones that are fucking me around. But it got me wondering, so I did a little more digging and fuck me if I didn’t turn up a sweet little potato, Big Frank Conway is running party favours through Belfast. A word to the wise, Frank, and I won’t charge you a penny for it. I didn’t have to dig very deep. So, let’s talk profit margins.”
His voice was scratched sandpaper.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“No? Then maybe I’m wasting my time talking to you.” I kissed the dice, let them roll. “Do me a favour, Frank. Ring Tony Sheridan for me, I don’t have his number handy. And if you don’t have it, I’m sure the lovely Martina will be only too happy to oblige.”
Snake eyes. He slumped back in the chair, deflated.
“What do you want?”
“Two things. For starters I want two grand a month for keeping my trap shut. That wouldn’t pay your dry cleaning bill, I know, but I’m not greedy.”
“What else?”
He was too quick, too compliant.
“Don’t get smart on me now, Frank. I’ll be surprised and I don’t like surprises. You think I’m stupid? That I’d walk in here and start shooting my mouth off? Without taking out insurance against ending up like Gonzo?”
He’d done composed, he’d done panicked, now he was doing confused. He was wasted as an auctioneer. He should have been in Hollywood.
“Gonzo?”
“Gonzo. My brother, that enemy action I was talking about, the third coincidence. It’s the other thing I want, to know why my brother was murdered last night.”
His mouth dropped open. Either he knew nothing about Gonzo or Stanislavski was officially old hat.
“Your brother was murdered?”
“Someone fed him dodgy E. His brains came out his nose in the end. When the picture’s developed, I’ll send you a copy. You can frame it.”
“Christ, Rigby.” He was hoarse by now. “I didn’t even know you had a brother.”
“He wasn’t brother enough to say, but that’s not the point. You mightn’t have known him as my brother. Some people knew him as Gonzo. Other people knew him as Eddie. You knew him, about four years ago, as Robbie. Robbie Callaghan.”
He swallowed hard.
“Ding-ding, that rings a bell. Good old Robbie, Robbie the fall guy. Did his time without a squeak, kept your nose clean. He gets out and all of a sudden he’s called Gonzo again. Or was he still calling himself Robbie? I only ask because I want to know what we should put on the headstone.”
“Robbie’s dead?”
“Someone slipped him a Mickey Finn. I’m betting it was you, even though the Dibble are thinking the same.”
He gave me his best goldfish impression.
“Jesus, Rigby. I knew nothing about –”
It looked convincing, but then Big Frank was only a movie away from a nervous breakdown in the Dorothy Chandler pavilion. I stood up.
“Maybe you did and maybe you didn’t and maybe you know someone who did. If you do, tell them this. Whoever had him killed had a reason for doing it. Tell them I said the reason wasn’t good enough. No matter what it was, it wasn’t good enough. Which is why we’re talking payback.”
He nodded, reached for the Marlboros.
“You smoke too much, Frank. Be carrying a brown envelope the next time you see me and make like I’m a TD.”
I strolled out through the foyer, slow, so my legs wouldn’t give way. The secretary was still furious. She really needed to get out more, or maybe invest in a battery-powered appliance.
“You’ve lipstick on your teeth,” I said, and heard my second new swear word of the week.
19
I strolled up the street, settled into the window table of a café diagonally across from Conway’s office. The place was clean, quiet, the tables covered with white-and-red checked plastic cloths. The smile the waitress flashed was also plastic but she didn’t look anywhere near as fresh as the tablecloths. The coffee wasn’t warm mud but it wanted to be.
The street was thronged but I’d have spotted Helen Conway with one eye tied behind my back. She emerged from the office with Frank in tow, disappeared around the corner. I left the waitress a tip – don’t get married ‘ti
l you’re thirty-five – and disappeared after them.
They crossed the street, turned another corner onto the old bridge, tripped up the steps of the Connaught Arms Hotel. I gave them a minute to get comfortable and then I tripped up the steps of the Connaught Arms Hotel too.
The foyer was warm and humid, sultry as Faulkner’s socks. The gold lamé decoration tacked up over the reception desk bore the legend ‘Happy Xmas’. Silver disco balls were suspended from the dusty light-shades, each one boasting a sprig of mistletoe. Off to the right, an avocado three-piece suite that had seen better days in a far better place menaced a ring-marked coffee table.
The windows stretched from floor to ceiling, affording a dirt-streaked view of the river as it frothed over the weir beneath the bridge. In the distance, maybe a quarter mile away, I could see the new bridge. If I squinted I could make out the bench where I’d been sitting just before taking my header into the river, so I didn’t squint. In front of the windows were long, shallow ashtrays filled with sand, cigarette butts and one or two plastic plants.
Off to the left, the doors of the hotel bar were wide open and the Christmas spirit was going down in doubles. I crossed the foyer to the reception desk, standing sideways on so I could watch the door of the bar. I tapped the bell on the desk, which was the receptionist’s cue to ignore me completely. The collar of her gleaming white blouse was stiffly starched but pretty much everything else sagged. Her chins had chins and her make-up foundation was threatening to collapse under the weight of her expectations.
I coughed, polite. Still she leafed through the sheaf of papers on the desk. I coughed again, a more phlegmy effort. She pushed back the rimless spectacles that had slipped to the end of her nose and stared, imperious.
“Yes? Can I help you?”
“I’d ask for the manager, only a Hilton like this couldn’t afford any other staff after meeting your demands.”
