Sad Song

by Vincent Banville

  “Big deal, little man,” Carey sneered. “See that he gets a few thumps to remember me by,” he said to Alfred. “But leave his kisser alone. Don’t want someone with a marked face leaving the building. Bad for business.”

  Blaine and his companion descended the stairs, then went down one more flight to the basement. There Alfred was joined by another two hard men, who held Blaine while Alfred whacked him in the ribs. By the time they pushed him back out onto the street, he felt as if he had gone rounds with Iron Mike Tyson.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Blaine went around to the front of the building. He thought about finding a brick and throwing it through one of the large front windows. He shook his head. “There’s more than one way to skin a cat,” he told himself.

  He opened the door of his car and eased himself in painfully. Felt as if one rib, if not half a dozen, were broken. He drove down the quays, then into Amiens Street and along the North Strand. A friend of his called Leo Quinn lived in one of the tall old houses to his left. He found a spot and parked. Getting out of the car was even harder than getting in. He walked along the pavement, crouched over like the thousand-year-old man. Leo had a basement flat. Blaine went down the steps and knocked. He waited, then gave the door an almighty kick.

  Putting his ear to the wood panel, he heard shuffling steps approaching. It was later in the evening now and he knew that Leo had probably started drinking. Leo was an alcoholic who had once trained to be a doctor. He never actually qualified but knew more about medicine than many a surgeon with letters after his name. He ran a practice from his flat, treating people who for one reason or another wouldn’t go to a regular doctor. He did a thriving business.

  The door squeaked open and Leo stood blinking in the evening sunlight. Someone had once said that Leo was so thin you could read a magazine through him. He had a narrow head with sparse sandy hair, faded blue eyes and a nose as red as a stop light. He was a sorry sight.

  “Good evening, Doctor Spock,” Blaine said. “I need to be taped up. Got a little rib trouble.”

  “Hah,” Leo said, breathing a blast of pure alcohol in Blaine’s face.

  “Puff the Magic Dragon. If I lit a match you’d turn into a flame thrower.”

  Leo sniffed, then turned and shuffled back down the hall. Blaine followed along behind him, breathing hard. They went into Leo’s surgery which, unlike its owner, was spick and span.

  “Get up on the table,” Leo muttered.

  “I can’t. I’m in extreme pain.”

  “What happened to you?”

  “I was kicked by an ass named Alfred.”

  “How do you know his name is Alfred?”

  “He told me.”

  Leo whistled through his teeth.

  “A talking ass,” he said. “Now I’ve heard everything.”

  He went to a glass-fronted cupboard and took out a roll of surgical tape. “Take off your jacket and shirt,” he instructed Blaine.

  “The vest as well?”

  “You’re wearing a vest in the summer?”

  “My mother told me never to leave my vest off until Mid-Summer’s Day.”

  “Wise woman.”

  Leo whistled again when he saw the purple bruising on Blaine’s rib cage.

  “Nasty,” he said, poking gently at Blaine’s skin with a nicotine-stained finger.

  “Easy, Leo, I think there’s something broken in there.”

  Leo nodded. He said, “All I can do is tape you up. You need to go and get yourself X-rayed. And don’t sneeze or yawn.”

  “Why?”

  “A splinter of rib could puncture your heart and do you in.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  “Jesus,” Blaine said when Leo had finished taping him up, “I can’t breathe.”

  “You’ll get used to it. Use your ears, nose and arse. At least it improves your figure. Think of yourself as wearing a corset.”

  “I feel as if I’m being squeezed to death by Hulk Hogan.”

  “Listen,” Leo said, “I’m using up valuable drinking time here. That’ll be twenty quid.”

  “Put it on my account.”

  Leo went off grumbling, leaving Blaine to creak around the surgery like the Tin Man from The Wizard of Oz. After a while he got the hang of it. He went out into the hall and dropped some coins into Leo’s pay phone. He dialled his house in Cabra. On the fourth ring, his wife Annie answered.

  “Hello?”

  “This is E.T., calling home.”

  “Blaine, is that you?”

  “It is indeed me. You’re still there?”

  “That’s obvious, isn’t it? What do you want?”

  “To speak to Sam Carey. I presume you haven’t run her off?”

  “On the contrary. We’re just into our third gin & tonic.”

  “You’re drinking my gin?”

  “And your tonic. And having a pleasant conversation about the men in our lives: you in mine, her father in hers.”

  “Don’t compare me to her father.”

  “What’s wrong with your voice? You sound like a chipmunk.”

  “I’m wearing a corset.”

  “I always knew there was something odd about you.”

  “A surgical corset. Sam’s father’s hard men gave me a kicking.”

  “Good for them. I wish I’d been there to watch.”

  “It hurts like hell.”

  “Poor baby.”

  “You’re laughing at me.”

  “I’ll put Sam onto you. She could do with a good laugh as well.”

  Blaine leaned against the wall, feeling sorry for himself. He was badly in need of some TLC – tender loving care.

  Sam did sound sympathetic when she came on the phone: “Annie told me that bastard had you beaten up.”

  “There were at least five of them,” Blaine said. “But I gave a good account of myself.”

  “Good for you.”

  “I need to know where your mother lives. I think it’s important I talk to her.”

  “Why?”

  “Just an idea I have. I want to hear what she thinks of her ex-husband.”

  “You better bring ear plugs. The last time I was in her company she told me he was Satan come up out of hell.”

  “So, where does she live?”

  “In Howth. Number Fifteen, Freemantle Hill. Just off the summit. You know where it is?”

  “I’ll find it.”

  “She’s a tough old bird.”

  “You think she might give me another kicking?”

  “Not a kicking. But she swings a mean umbrella.”

  “You’ll wait in the house until I call again?”

  “As long as the gin lasts.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  The sun was low in the west now, the sky a milky blue. Blaine drove slowly in the heavy evening traffic. Every time he took a breath, he felt as if a knife had been inserted under his ribs.

  He turned off at Sutton Cross and took the winding road to Howth summit. He parked, got out and leaned against the bonnet of the car. The bay was full of heat haze, the city hidden behind it. Down below him, a fishing boat idled. It looked like a toy boat at that distance.

  He lit a cigarette, but drawing the smoke into his lungs was like inhaling over broken glass. He groaned out loud, and a woman walking her dog stopped to gaze at him.

  “A broken heart,” he told her. “My wife’s left me.”

  “For another man?”

  “No, for another woman. It’s all the rage nowdays.”

  The woman hastily pulled on the dog’s leash and took off. When she had put a good distance between them, she stopped and looked back. Blaine gave her a wave. He took another couple of puffs of the cigarette, then threw it away. A jogger came high-stepping up the hill and Blaine asked him if he knew where Freemantle Hill was.

  “I do.”

  “Could you give me directions?”

  “I could.”

  Blaine waited while the man did some on-the-spot running
. He was a little guy, with curly hair and a Charlie Chaplin moustache.

  “It’s today I’d like to go there,” Blaine said. “Not next week.”

  “Oh, sure. Back down the road, first left, then first left again. That’s Freemantle Hill. Who are you calling on?”

  “Gay Byrne.”

  “He doesn’t live there. He lives over near the Baily Lighthouse.”

  “Not that Gay Byrne. This is another Gay Byrne. There must be thousands of them about.”

  “Oh, well, have a nice day. What’s left of it.” The jogger ran down the hill, his little legs pumping. Blaine envied him his freedom of movement. It felt as if his own ribs were on fire. He got back into his car and followed the directions he had been given. Freemantle Hill had some nice houses on either side of it. There was a smell of money about them.

  Number Fifteen was about halfway down. It was a bungalow. It had a red-tiled roof and white-painted walls. It also had a lot of ground around it. Bushes, flowers, even a few statues of fellows and girls with very few clothes on.

  Blaine parked his car in the gravelled driveway, then moved stiffly to the door and rang the bell. It chimed loudly, but no one came to answer it. He tried a couple of times more. Same result.

  Curious, he moved around the side of the building. There was a swimming pool, with the bottom painted blue. There was no water in it. A deck chair stood in a patch of sunlight. It contained an oldish woman who, on first glance, appeared to be dead. Her eyes were half open, her head fallen to one side. But when Blaine approached the chair, she suddenly straightened up. “Who the hell are you?” she asked him in a hoarse voice. “Not another one of my husband’s goons sent to do me in?”

  Chapter Sixteen

  “It’s him I’ve come to talk to you about,” Blaine said. “I presume you are Mrs Carey?”

  “Don’t mention that name around here. I use my maiden name, Murphy. If you’re no friend of my ex-husband’s, you can call me Mabel.”

  Blaine stood just out of the patch of sunlight and looked at her. Her daughter Sam had told him her mother had a drink problem. But she looked in good shape in spite of this. Her hair was nicely styled, her make-up well applied, her figure still trim. She was wearing shorts and a flowered silk blouse. On the garden table beside her an ice bucket contained a bottle of white wine. There was also a packet of Player’s Navy Cut cigarettes, an expensive lighter and Patricia Scanlan’s latest novel.

  “So, what do you want?” she now asked. “I’ll give you two minutes to speak your business. Then you’re out of here.”

  “My name is John Blaine. I’m a private detective and I’ve just come from your daughter Sam –”

  “You mean Assumpta?”

  “Yes, Assumpta. I don’t know if you are aware of this, but your ex-husband is trying to get her to marry a very unsuitable person.”

  “What do you mean, unsuitable?”

  “Well, for starters, she doesn’t love him.”

  “Love is for the birds.”

  “Maybe in your case, but not in hers.”

  “Yes, I was unfortunate. Two husbands and both of them shits.”

  “Was there not someone else?”

  The woman shifted in the chair, then shaded her eyes to see Blaine better.

  “You have been talking to my daughter,” she said. “It had to be Assumpta who told you about George Emerson.”

  “A foreman who worked for your ex-husband?”

  “Yes, the only good man I ever met in my life.”

  “He died in an accident?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Like the accident that happened to your first husband?”

  “Almost exactly the same.”

  “Fell into a cement mixer?”

  “Yes.”

  “Were they pushed?”

  Mabel Murphy looked hard at Blaine.

  “Nothing was ever proved,” she said.

  “But you think they were pushed?”

  “Not think, know.”

  “You’ve proof of that?”

  “Maybe. If I had why should I tell you?”

  “To help your daughter. To get her out of your ex-husband’s control, once and for all.”

  The woman stood up from the chair. She gazed in the direction of the house, then looked back at Blaine.

  “It’s almost dinner time,” she said. “Why don’t you come in and eat? We can talk more. I might even tell you a few things.”

  “Things that will help your daughter?”

  “We’ll see.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  They went in and sat down at a table in a very tastefully furnished dining room. A sulky-looking woman about Mabel’s age came in and served them soup.

  “That’s Breda, my companion and housekeeper,” Mabel explained when the other woman had gone back out. “No point trying to talk to her. She hates everyone, especially me.”

  “Then why do you keep her on?”

  “Good help is very hard to find.”

  Blaine took a sip of the soup, which was delicious.

  “I notice you’re moving rather carefully,” Mabel said. “Is there something wrong with you?”

  Blaine told her how Carey’s men had beaten him up. She made sympathetic noises, but didn’t seem surprised. They finished the soup, then moody Breda came in and took the plates away.

  “Look at her,” Mabel said. “She has a face on her that would turn milk sour.”

  “I think she heard you,” Blaine whispered.

  “Sure she did. Makes her hate me all the more. It’s good to know where you stand with people.”

  Blaine made a face, but before he could say anything further the sulky one came in with the rest of the food. Lamb chops, marrowfat peas, mashed potatoes.

  “Plain food, but good,” Mabel said. “Eat up.”

  Blaine did his best, but the pain in his ribs soon defeated him.

  “Do you mind if I smoke?” he asked. Mabel shook her head, so he lit up. He poured himself a glass of wine and its cool chill settled his stomach a little.

  “To get back to what we were talking about before,” he said. “You mentioned you had proof that your former husband, McMullen, and his foreman, George Emerson, were murdered.”

  “Did I say that?”

  “I believe so. Don’t play around, Mabel. Your daughter’s happiness is at stake.”

  “She doesn’t visit me very often.”

  “Doesn’t mean she doesn’t love you.”

  “I suppose not.”

  Mabel took up some potato on her fork and held it in front of her. She said, “Have you wondered how I can afford to live in a big house in a place like Howth? With all the trimmings?”

  “Your ex-husband’s money?”

  “Correct. But parting him from it is like getting blood out of a turnip.”

  “But you have a way?”

  Mabel put the mashed potato in her mouth and chewed slowly. “Pour me a glass of wine,” she said. Blaine did so, ignoring the twinge in his battered ribs as he handed it across the table.

  “The day that McMullen died,” Mabel said, “George Emerson was filming an advertising video. Shots of the construction site, of the half-finished building, that sort of thing. But when he took a look at it afterwards, what do you think he saw?”

  “Maybe a shot of someone who looked like Carey doing something he shouldn’t?”

  “Exactly. Pushing poor old Willie McMullen into that cement mixer. Plain as daylight.”

  “Carey himself?”

  “He didn’t have the minders then that he has now.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Blaine grinned happily, in spite of the pain in his rib cage.

  “And Emerson gave you the video?”

  “He knew he was in danger. How right he was.”

  “So, why didn’t you go to the police with it?”

  “And kill the goose that laid the golden egg? Both Willie and George were dead. I couldn’t bring them back.
If Carey was arrested, there was a good chance he would have got off. He’s an expert at bribing people. Better for him to be hit where it matters most, in his wallet. I’ve been bleeding him dry for years.”

  “So that’s why his business is in such a bad state.”

  “Probably.”

  “And are you willing to let me use this information to help your daughter?”

  “Why not? If it annoys Carey, then it makes me happy.”

  “Listen, I’ve got to go,” Blaine said, rising carefully to his feet. “If I hurry I should just catch Carey in his office.”

  “I’d like to see his face when you tell him you know about the video.”

  “You’ve got it hidden away in a safe place, I hope?”

  “Breda keeps it in her knickers. I’d like to see the man who can get in there.”

  Blaine laughed.

  “You’re joking.”

  “You think so?”

  He shook his head.

  “Mabel, it was very good to meet you. Maybe one of these days I’ll come back out and we’ll get plastered together.”

  “Any time, big boy. Just give me a bell so that I can put on my warpaint.”

  As Blaine was turning to go, Breda came in with the dessert. He went as fast as his injured ribs would allow, just in case she threw it over him.

  He made it to the Carey building in record time but the woman in the foyer was shutting up shop when he arrived.

  “Carey still aboard?” he asked her.

  “I’ve had orders not to let you in.”

  “Give him a buzz. Tell him I’ve been out to see his ex-wife and that I know about the video.”

  “I’ve forgotten your name.”

  “Blaine, as in chilblain.”

  The woman muttered into the intercom, then she nodded her head at the stairs. “He’ll see you,” she said.

  Blaine shuffled up the stairs and along the corridor to the door of Carey’s office. It was standing open. Alfred was leaning against the wall just inside. He looked bored.

  Carey was also on his feet, in front of his desk. And he looked worried.

  “Don’t say anything,” Blaine told him. “I’ll do the talking. And I’m not asking, I’m telling. You’ll cut your daughter free. Allow her to lead her own life. And you’ll give her a reasonable amout of money to keep her in the style she deserves. I’ll leave you to settle that up with her. If nothing has been done in a week’s time, I’ll go to the police with my information. And I know where the video is. You’re getting off lightly. Really you should be in prison.”