A Carra King

by John Brady

  Little clapped his hands and began rubbing them hard together.

  “Here,” he said. “Give you a laugh. Do you know who that was on the phone there? Trying to give me grief? Go on, guess.”

  “Your daughter’s new boyfriend,” said Malone.

  “No. He’s still in a coma. Try again.”

  “We don’t know, Damian,” said Minogue.

  “Public Works. That’s who.”

  “Who are they?” Malone asked.

  “Very funny,” said Little. “Don’t you like them? Streets of Shame?

  ”

  “‘Nobody’s home,’ Yeah, yeah, yeah.”

  “I bet you have all their CDs, you bollocks.”

  “Not gone on them,” said Malone. “I’d be more a GOD man these days.”

  Little gave a breathless laugh. It took Minogue a moment: Girls Over Dublin, the latest rage group. Little looked over at Minogue.

  “Well, Matt,” he said. “‘Do you believe in GOD?’ ”

  Minogue kept his eyes on the screen. He remembered the pictures on the ads for their smash hit CD. They were like those Chagall pictures, couples flying over a city. Nice. Only one of them, a Fiona, had claimed she was lesbian, he’d heard, and the bishops and archbishops had been smart enough to keep their mouths shut, let GOD’s publicity genius spin in the wind over the free controversy they wanted.

  “Girls Over Dublin,” Minogue said. “Or the Man Himself, Damian?”

  “Ah, what’s the use,” Little said. “You’re in the dark ages, the pair of you. Get with it. It was their big-shot manager on the phone, not the celebrities themselves. Should have heard him, I’m telling you. You know him, Daly? Baldy, tries to wear a ponytail. Jumped-up gobshite.”

  Minogue looked up from the screen.

  “So Public Works are held up here are they,” said Minogue. “Along with us ordinary mortals.”

  “How’d you get this number, says I to him,” Little went on. “This line is a vital link in our communications. ‘Senior officer at Garda HQ,’ says he. Like I’m supposed to fall down and adore or something. ‘We have a very tight schedule,’ says he. Rules don’t apply to him of course.”

  The drone was on the move again. It spun slowly. Minogue caught a glimpse of several cars.

  “So he starts to push,” said Little. “‘Couldn’t we just go around the side and slip away’ says he. ‘We have a private aircraft.’ Well Dublin Airport is closed down, says I. In its entirety. No exceptions. On my orders. Now get off my fucking phone or I’ll run you in for obstructing the Guards. You fucking weasel.”

  Minogue almost smiled. What would the celebrity manager have made of Little’s gentle tone, the delivery.

  “Is that what you said,” he said to Little.

  The lights reflected off wet tarmacadam were throwing glare at the camera now.

  “Nearly told him to set his hair on fire and put it out himself with a lump hammer,” said Little. “Christ, you’d think he’d be thanking us. If the car’s wired, goes up… Well, I mean, I know it’s not going to happen, but…”

  Minogue looked up.

  “So: not a word of a warning here, Damian?”

  Little shook his head.

  “Ask ’em how long more,” he said to O’Reilly.

  O’Reilly adjusted the earpiece and bent the stalk for the microphone while he waited. Little tugged at his ear and swore under his breath. The drone wasn’t moving. Minogue glanced over and traced the lines cut into Little’s forehead.

  Raw meat heroes, Kilmartin called Little and his former cohorts. Still the fitness maniac, Minogue supposed, Little coached Garda teams, and his contorted face had appeared on the front pages of newspapers a few years ago: “Garda Officer, 42, Places 4th in Dublin City Marathon.”

  Kilmartin disdained and envied the reputation the Emergency Response Units had built. He’d put out rumours that Little’s training regimen involved booting trainees in T-shirts out of helicopters up in the Glen of Imaal and making them survive their two-day stay in the open by eating snails and bits of weeds. Some of Kilmartin’s inventions had turned out to be true.

  Damian Little had had to do the sideways waltz into Communications after a disastrous ERU raid in a border village. Shot eight times, the suspect lived. He turned out to be a Special Branch officer. Trigger Little suffered no public rebuke, however. Minogue heard that he had become separated from his wife.

  The cell phone chirping was his own. He opened it and listened to Larry Griffin, a site specialist, describe the progress of the site van in the thickening traffic outside the airport. He held his hand over the mouthpiece.

  “Damian. Can I point the site van up here while we’re waiting?”

  The drone was moving again. This time it emerged from behind the armoured lorry. A screen filled with its jarring progress as it swung about and advanced by a line of cars. The radio came to life. Minogue asked again.

  Little picked up a headset.

  “Bring ’em up alongside, sure,” he said.

  Minogue’s stomach rumbled again. He dropped the phone in his jacket pocket.

  “Ah bollocks,” said Little. “Bollocks, bollocks, bollocks…”

  Minogue looked over at the still picture on the monitor. The voice on the radio sounded bashful. Problems with a key were enumerated. Little swore. The picture shook again. The drone was reversing. Little put down the headset.

  “Bollocks,” he said. “Here we are with a ton of the best detection and control stuff in the world. The sniffer reads fine. The controls are dead on. But we can’t put a frigging key in a frigging lock.”

  “Like you’re Einstein,” said Malone, “but you arrive home pissed.”

  A bag of crisps even, thought Minogue. He scribbled the cell phone number on a pad and waved it at Little.

  “Cut the shagging panel and be done with it,” Little muttered. “Jases. We’ll be here all night.”

  “Derek Mur . . .” said Minogue. “The airport security lad?”

  “Mitchell,” said Little. “APF, they’re called. Airport Police and Fire. Joeys, we call them. But they don’t much like that. Especially being as they’re going ahead with putting in a station proper here soon enough.”

  “Where’ll I find this Mitchell fella?”

  “Staff canteen at the near end of the terminal.”

  THREE

  It took Minogue and Malone twenty minutes to corral cups of tea, a bag each of cheese and onion crisps, and a quick account by Derek Mitchell of how he had turned up the missing car. Fogarty, the supervisor, had been too talkative for Minogue not to notice. Fogarty was worried about being caught on the hop. So he should. Mitchell might be new on the job but maybe he’d turn out to be the only fella patrolling with his eyes open too.

  Minogue sipped his tea, took in Mitchell’s modest qualifiers. Mitchell had heard nothing of car thefts or break-in gangs working the airport. Five times — and Minogue had put a small tick in his notebook each time, so he knew: “I’m only new here like.” Minogue stared at his notes and tried more combinations for APF: Airport Police and Fire; Always Planned Fiascos.

  Malone prodded Mitchell a few times about his APF colleagues. Mitchell kept to the modest route. He didn’t seem to notice he was repeating himself: (a) there were lots of cars there; (b) it was just lucky he had a knack for cars and numbers; (c) “I’m only new here like” number six; (d) they all check the lists on shift. Like hell, Minogue wanted to say. Áine’s Police Fella; Awful Patrol Folk . . .

  Fogarty had brought them a smudgy photocopy of the patrol and duty schedule. Missing persons and stolen vehicle lists were displayed prominently on the wall of the office by the schedules and the radio plug-ins. Too prominent, too neatly aligned.

  The plastic taste of the tea grew sharper. PVC tea. Malone asked Mitchell to go over the route again. Mitchell drew his finger east from the horseshoe area by the terminals toward the long-term car park. Could he remember the exact times for the checkpoints? Mitchell though
t that he could.

  Minogue stood. The aftertaste from his last gulp was pure plastic. He dropped the cup into the can.

  “Take your time there,” he said to Mitchell. “And don’t be worrying. There are no wrong answers, now.”

  Malone joined him by the door.

  “There have to be videos here, Tommy. Get a layout of where they have them. And see what they cover, like a good man. Then we’ll start rounding up the tapes.”

  Malone eyed Mitchell straining to get his times right.

  “Fogarty is fussing around a lot. He’d be the one for the — ”

  The first man in the door was wearing sunglasses. Minogue didn’t recognize him at first. More people piled in. Soft leather jackets, a woman with very short hair, a brace of cameras around her neck. Fogarty came next. He looked very pleased with himself. Perfume — men’s or women’s, Minogue couldn’t tell — began to take over the room. Someone was smoking Gauloises or Gitanes too.

  “Won’t be long, lads,” Fogarty said. “We’ll have you en route ASAP.”

  Minogue recognized the manager. Daly: bald on top, that ponytail, just like Damian Little had said. The band members looked shagged. Daly took off his sunglasses and rubbed at his eyes. Minogue began to smell whiskey off someone’s breath. Fogarty began rounding up chairs. The group shuffled and glanced around the canteen. Mr. 21 Byrne, the nickname off the bus he’d been born on. Crowley, the Crow. Mooney, that was the drummer’s name. A nephew of neighbours of Kathleen growing up in Harolds Cross, Minogue recalled. Kevin Mooney, Batman, the fans called him. Daly threw up an arm and looked at his watch.

  “Soon as we can,” Fogarty said. “First up. You can slip out there and go around the side of the terminals. Be off in a flash.”

  Batman Mooney sank into a chair and lit a cigarette. He nodded at Malone.

  “How’s it going there?”

  Malone chewed his gum hard, burst a bubble behind his teeth.

  “Not so bad,” he said. “Yourself?”

  Mooney shrugged and blew out smoke. He ran his fingers through his stubbly, streaked hair and looked at them. Minogue watched the photographer twist on a lens and focus on Mooney. He mugged for her.

  “Trapped in Dublin,” he groaned. “Sober . . .! Aarrghh! Help!” She moved around him. The camera shutter went off in bursts. A heavy-set man with an earring and a brush-cut came through the door. He nodded at Daly and shook his head once.

  “Fuck,” muttered Daly. “Fuck! When, then, for Christ’s sake?”

  Daly yanked a cell phone out of his pocket. Did they make them that small now, Minogue wondered. His own phone began to ring. Damian Little: the site van was here. The Bomb Squad finally had a key in. They were ready to open the Escort.

  “Jesus Christ,” said Daly. “Is every Garda phone engaged these days?”

  Minogue closed his phone.

  “Not any more.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The phone,” said Minogue. “Don’t be phoning us any more now, like a good man. We need the lines kept open.”

  Daly looked to Fogarty.

  “Guards,” Fogarty said. Daly took in Minogue’s expression.

  “Garda, ah . . .?”

  “Minogue. We’re waiting too.”

  Daly raised his hands and let them drop. The camera was clicking again. Minogue walked to the doorway. Malone paused by Batman Mooney.

  “Thanks,” he said. “The picture? She’ll keep it under her pillow, you know.”

  “Great. Catherine, yeah?”

  “That’s right.” Malone said. “Me ma.”

  Mooney gave him a blank stare.

  “Are you really a cop?”

  “Me?”

  “Yeah, you.” Mooney nodded at Minogue. “Him, he looks like a farmer. So he must be a cop, right? You, though, I’d be wondering.”

  “Yeah, I’m a Guard.”

  “And your ma’s into the scene? With the music like?”

  “Course she is. We all are, man. I’ve a niece runs her own fan club on yous.”

  Batman Mooney sighed. He drew hard on his cigarette.

  “Tell the niece I’ll be looking for her at the Point concert next month,” he said.

  “I’ll tell her,” Malone said. “Thanks very much. Oh, and by the way…”

  Mooney stopped in mid-stretch.

  “She asked me to remind you,” Malone went on. “She wants her blouse back.”

  The rain was coming in sheets across the lights now. The plastic cracked, hissed. Christy Griffin was cursing. Not real cursing, Minogue reflected. There was no real relish, no comfort to it.

  The rain had soaked in under Minogue’s arms. He reached up to help Griffin pull down the plastic again. They’d need a couple of lights in closer after they had sealed the back of the car. He balanced on one leg to look down at the side of Shaughnessy’s face again. An anorak, a mountaineering type of coat. It looked like it was made of that dear stuff, the Gore-Tex, was it called? A black T-shirt.

  Malone had been helping tie the plastic by the front bumper. Pasty-faced, the eyes darting around on him. Well, Shaughnessy’s face wasn’t as bad as Minogue had expected. Except for the colour, that is. Griffin was talking.

  “Where do you want the opening left?” he asked again. Minogue stood back.

  “Too blowy, Christy. Let it die down a bit, take the pressure off us here.”

  He held the plastic tighter and studied the hand. He couldn’t see any scratches or bloodstains even. The lividity in the face didn’t help. This man wasn’t dead the six days he was missing. He handed the flap to Griffin and hunkered down by the tail light of the Escort. A runnel dropped onto his neck.

  “Hold it over me, Larry, for the love of God, man!”

  Malone had moved in beside him.

  “Jases,” he whispered.

  “Head first,” Minogue murmured.

  He studied the drawn-up legs. A twenty-degree tilt, he guessed. The blood would have come out steady enough.

  “The blood drained from the head for the few hours before the air did its bit.”

  Malone wiped rainwater from the hair above his ears.

  “Drained into someplace under the boot,” he said. “Then leaked out?”

  “Three or four hours is as much as you’d get blood draining out, Tommy.”

  “Kept pouring — draining out, like — when the car was left here?”

  Minogue went down on his knees. He squinted at the stain.

  “See the dent in the panel there?” said Griffin. “You’ll find a hole there.”

  Minogue stood. His head pushed at the plastic.

  “Thanks, Christy.”

  Griffin rearranged the roof. Minogue waited for a lull in the gusts before stepping out. The rain hit his face like needles. Malone backed out after him. Griffin’s face sticking out of his hood reminded Minogue of a big, truculent toddler.

  “Have to keep it tight, Christy. No choice now. Give it a half an hour.”

  Griffin began to secure the tent around the Escort. Bloody awful, Minogue heard him mutter. Two more Scenes technicians showed up from the site van. Minogue reminded them about rain coming in under the car on the blood. He handed Malone the phone.

  “Keep tabs on Mitchell, Tommy, will you? And poke around with any other staff. Press him on the times again. It’ll count for a lot if we can fix the time. I’ll do me calls from the site van. We’ll see what we have to do if the rain keeps up.”

  “Sixteen million,” Damian Little repeated.

  The heater in the site van hadn’t made much difference. Minogue’s coat was saturated. His shoulders felt like they were encased in half-set cement.

  “That’s quid too,” Little added. “The last album.”

  Minogue checked his watch. Little rubbed the window and peered out.

  “No tax either,” said Little. “Not a bloody penny. They’re artists, you see.”

  He turned to Minogue again and cocked an ear.

  “That frigg
in’ tent of yours might be flying up out of there yet.”

  Griffin and his crew were still securing the scene. Minogue had watched him driving masonry nails into the tarmac to hold ropes over the tent.

  “I’ve a young fella mad about them,” Little said. “Wanted the price of a ticket there a few weeks ago. Guess how much?”

  Minogue shivered. He looked over the diagram he had sketched of the boot of the Escort. There’d be blood collected under the spare wheel.

  “Tenner,” he said.

  “A tenner?” Little scoffed. “Where have you been? Go on out of that.”

  “Twenty, then.”

  Little tapped the side of a video-camera case.

  “Twenty-two fifty! And that was a deal, I was told. A deal.”

  Minogue studied the copy of the passport photograph again. The nose, maybe that was the Irish part of Shaughnessy’s face.

  “Not a penny tax,” Little was saying. “The States, Japan. Oz. Everywhere. They spend half the year in the air.”

  “Art,” said Minogue. “We’ve plenty to spare. Why not spread it around?”

  Little laughed. It was clear to Minogue that Damian Little had had this conversation before and that he would have it, in varying forms, again.

  “Art? Ever notice when they sing, all of them now, not just them — they all sing in American accents?”

  “What age are you now, Damian?”

  Little waved a finger at him.

  “Don’t try that one on me. Nothing to do with it.”

  Minogue tested the sleeves of his coat with his elbows. Wet through, a strange musty smell. Had the rain died down a bit?

  “Sixteen million,” said Little. “That’s a hell of a lot of jack for stuff that doesn’t even rhyme half the time.”

  “‘Let the storms come, take them all, Shake the pillars, make them fall,’” said Minogue. “If it’s rhymes you want.”

  “Jesus, I can’t even hear words half the time.”

  “What about ‘Graveyard Baby’?”

  Little rubbed at the window.

  “Here’s someone over now.”