The good life imm-5

by John Brady

  “Jim. Thanks. Now go out and play on the train lines There’s a Cork train due.”

  “Ah, howiya there, Kathleen,” Kilmartin called out. “Take him home, will you. He’s losing the run of himself here.”

  Minogue spoke between clenched teeth.

  “Jim says hello.”

  “Do you see an end to it all soon, love?” she asked.

  “Not really. I’m trying to find anything we might have missed.”

  “Ah. Well, have you spoken to her?”

  Minogue looked down at the brown mess where his coffee had been. Definitely Africa. He wondered if his headache would get worse.

  “Who?”

  “Iseult. Your daughter.”

  “Sorry. No. I tried the flat, but there was no answer. Listen, did she drop a hint as she flew the coop?”

  “She just leaped up from the table and out the door with her. It’s the wedding. The cancellation, I mean.”

  “Yes.”

  “Maybe there’s some way to talk her out of it. Get her to see reason. Talk to poor Pat maybe?”

  Poor Pat? He studied the flash of the outside line on his phone, its constant glow as Murtagh picked it up.

  “I’ll try her again around tea-time,” he said.

  “Yes. And you could suggest to her-”

  Murtagh was waving and pointing at the receiver in his left hand. Kilmartin walked smartly to Hoey’s desk and grabbed the extension.

  “Have to go, Kathleen. Got a call. I’ll phone you back.”

  “It’s Hickey,” Murtagh whispered. He tapped at his head. “Sounds like he’s out of it.” Minogue’s heart began to beat faster.

  “Ready to try again then?” he whispered to Murtagh. He pushed down the button.

  “Liam? This is Matt Minogue. How are you?”

  He heard the dull bass of television voices nearby.

  “How do you fucking think I am?”

  Murtagh waved. He had the line open to Communications.

  “I’m glad you called, Liam. I was hoping you would.”

  “So’s you get another chance? I seen yous racing around the place two minutes after I dropped the phone, man! What kind of fucking treatment is that?”

  Slurred all right. Minogue bit his lip.

  “It’s police procedure, Liam. Straight out.”

  “Wait a minute there, you! Just hold on there a minute! This isn’t how it’s supposed to be. Why amn’t I getting more of the social worker crap? ‘Come on, Liam, I understand your problems.’ Huh? ‘Let’s talk about it, Liam.’ What if I just drop the bleeding phone right now?”

  Minogue waited for several seconds.

  “Then you’d be a damn liar, Liam. You’re no friend of Mary’s.”

  The Inspector looked around the squadroom. Murtagh was rubbing his ear. Kilmartin’s brow had lifted and the Inspector caught a glimpse of teeth as they scraped on his upper lip. Hickey wasn’t talking.

  “So prove me wrong, Liam.”

  “Don’t… you… fucking talk to me like that! What gives you the-I could just drop the phone-”

  “Listen to me, Liam. Your alibi is coming out pretty clean. Tell me who you fenced the stuff to, the camera and the jacket.”

  “Why? So’s I get the guy into trouble and have him and his mates after me too? All he’d tell you anyway is the opposite of what I’m telling you. ‘Never heard of the guy.’ Christ, that’s what I’d say if the cops landed in on top of me, man! Forget it.”

  “Well, give me something definite then. I mean, someone else could have robbed the stuff and told you about it. Tell me what else you took out of the car.”

  “What do you mean, what else?”

  “If you’re lying, you don’t know what I mean then, do you?”

  “A Walkman. I kept it.”

  “What kind of a Walkman?”

  “Sony. The batteries ran out.”

  “What tape was in it?”

  “What kind of a fucking question-”

  “What tape was in it, Liam?”

  “What’s the guy. He has a group. The guitar guy. Ahhh… Dire Straits. Brothers in Arms.”

  “What did you do with it?”

  “I still have it in the… Wait a minute. What are you trying to do here? You’ll pull me in on robbing the car and then throw me somewhere the Egans can nail me!”

  The drone of a conversation blended with the bass, excited and indecipherable tones of a television ad. Minogue looked down at his scribble. Brothers in Arms. Had he heard that one before?

  “Come on in, Liam. We can put you in a safe place.”

  “Where, for Christ’s sake? For how long? My only chance is out here! But you guys are out there, still trying to run me down as well!”

  “Meet me, Liam. Just me.”

  “You’re nuts! Even if I did, what good would it do? I don’t know anything about Mary. I come in, you want answers that I don’t have! I don’t know what she was into, man!”

  “You might know something we could use and still-”

  “To hell with you!”

  “Give me a middleman then. Someone you trust.”

  “Like who?”

  “Your friend, Tierney. Your ma says you and he are pals, right?”

  “Jammy? Hah! We used to be. But he hates my guts now. Jesus! When he found out about Mary, he treats me like AIDS man. Christ! He always… Forget it.”

  “He always what?”

  “Forget it, I said! I’m going to drop this fucking phone-”

  “Why not Tierney?”

  “Jammy’s a gobshite like anyone else. He heard the Egans were on the warpath. He’s so straight, he’s like a fucking…”

  “What?”

  “Ah, they were opposites. Mary liked the life. Jammy’s thick. He couldn’t figure that out. He doesn’t know how people work. That’s just the way with some people.”

  “You all grew up together-”

  “‘Course we fucking did! As if you didn’t know that already! That’s ages-way back, yeah. Everything’s mad when you’re thirteen. A few jars out in the back fields before they built the cardboard factory out there. Next thing you know is you’re doing it, like. The girls, you know? But Jammy couldn’t get near her. Ah, what am I talking about?”

  Minogue’s hand closed tighter on the pen. He began to stab it slowly and deliberately into the mess of tissues and coffee. He didn’t want to see the expression on Kilmartin’s face.

  “Don’t leave it hanging, Liam. You can help. You can.”

  “I’m no fucking mug! I got to look out for Number One, man!”

  Thoughts flew faster through Minogue’s mind.

  “We have to talk, Liam. There’s got to be a way. Pick a spot-”

  “I’m gone, man. I’m gone!”

  “Pick a time, Liam. Any time. I guarantee-”

  “Fuck you and your guarantee! Eddsy Egan had a guy’s throat slit in the ’Joy three years ago! And Eddsy’s still walking the streets!”

  Minogue squeezed the pen tight and closed his eyes. The line went dead.

  He flung the receiver on the desk. Murtagh leaped up out of his chair.

  “Pub phone,” he called out. “Barney’s, in Capel Street.”

  Minogue handed the note to Eilis.

  “Will you kindly get ahold of the fella with the GTI Hickey says he did?”

  Eilis looked up at the ceiling and drew on her cigarette.

  “Travers,” she murmured. “Blackrock.” Minogue winked.

  “There’s the name of the tape that Hickey says he got in the Walkman he robbed. First see if the actual name of the, er, the artist, is inventoried on the Stolen Vehicles report. If you please, Eilis.”

  She squinted at the sheet and turned it upside down.

  “I’ll be needing it translated, your honour. ‘Brothers…’?”

  “ Brothers in Arms.”

  Minogue returned to his desk and flopped into his chair. He rested his chin on his fist and stared at the phone. Kilmartin sat
on the edge of Minogue’s desk looking down at the floor. Minutes crawled by. The phone didn’t ring.

  “Damn,” said Minogue. “They’d be on to us by now if they’d nabbed him.”

  “Ah, hold your whist,” said Kilmartin. He seemed to be scrutinising the Inspector’s forehead. Perhaps it had just dawned on Kilmartin that Barney’s was on the edge of a warren of streets and alleys which led on and through the markets up to Smithfield.

  “A little unorthodox there on the phone, weren’t we, Watson?” he whispered. Minogue glared at him.

  “No, we weren’t.”

  “What was the rationale to driving into his face the way you did, then?”

  “He was drunk, Jim. I thought I could go direct while he was out of it. Maudlin and the rest of it. Prolong the call.”

  Kilmartin threw his empty cigarette package across the room. It missed the bin by two feet. He stood.

  “Maybe there’s a Guard off the Olympic team on foot patrol up there in the Markets.”

  “Maybe,” sighed Minogue. He rose from his chair. “I need some air. Out of the way or I’m going through you.”

  “Oh, the tough talk is out now, is it? Hold me back. Learn to relax, man.”

  The air was muggy and thick with the tang of exhaust and hops from the Guinness brewery. He strolled about the yard, his thoughts on Iseult. Drive by her studio, that’s where she’d hidden out. Entice her out for a walk and a pint? That’d get her talking. He was leaning against the boot of his Citroen when Kilmartin emerged. From the Chief Inspector’s wary hangdog gait, Minogue concluded failure.

  Kilmartin paused to light a cigarette.

  “Well, Jim?”

  Kilmartin shook his head. Minogue swore.

  “And the rest of it. He’s alive, he’s scared. We’ll find him.”

  “He’s also smart, James. He picks his phones very damn well.”

  “We’ll bag him yet, old son. Barman put it at about two minutes between him hightailing it and a Guard bursting in the door. Left a half pint of beer on the counter behind him too, the little shite. But it’s not over, old bean. There are a half-dozen cars in the area.”

  Kilmartin blew out smoke, cleared his throat in a long, modulated gurgle and spat across the yard.

  “Look at the time now, for the love of Jases,” he groaned. “No wonder you’re gone crooked. Are you lost without your new sidekick?”

  “Keep it up, Jim. You’ll probably get your wish.”

  There was an outbreak of hurt innocence on Kilmartin’s face.

  “Oh, is it my fault for trying to insist we hire dependable and dedicated staff?”

  “He can’t help it if he has a family, for God’s sake, or if his brother ran amok, can he?”

  “Oh, I forgot-everybody’s a victim these days. Quick, fetch me a consultant-a counsellor!”

  “In case you forgot, Jim, you’re not supposed to take family details into account from his personnel file. It’s strictly performance, commendations, record-”

  “I know that, Professor.”

  Kilmartin, in his truant, shifty schoolboy incarnation, let his tongue swell his cheek.

  “What’s the latest bulletin on this soap opera of a family of his anyhow.”

  “Terry the brother is all over the place. He has a drug problem. He’s gotten in with the Egans. They got to him right when he walked from the ’Joy. They’re going to destroy him. Tommy thinks they’re trying to take him down in the job too. Quits for arresting Lenehan.”

  “Well, there’s a thesis now. This is real Egan style, I daresay.”

  Minogue nodded.

  “That’s right. Nobody’s immune.”

  “You think they might be blackguarding our Molly somehow, using the brother?”

  “They might try but he won’t go.”

  Kilmartin’s eyes lingered on his colleague’s for a moment before he looked down at the Citroen.

  “Here, let’s climb aboard this rig and I’ll buy you your tea.”

  “Sorry, James. I’m going to drop by Iseult’s studio.”

  “Fine and well. I didn’t want to be seen in this frigging nancy-boy spaceship anyway.”

  Minogue held up his fist. Kilmartin shoved the cigarette into the corner of his mouth and made a feint. Minogue went into a crouch.

  “Plan for six months in traction there, you bullock! Tommy Malone gave me tips.”

  “Go to hell, you Clare lug! It’s yourself that’ll get the astronomy lessons here!”

  Christ! Couldn’t a fella read the bleeding paper any more? He tried again to ignore the barman. The gobshite behind the bar must have wiped the counter twenty times since he’d come in. Maybe he was drinking too fast or something. But it was a hot day, for Jases’s sakes! He was still jittery after the row on the phone, the running from Barney’s. He peered over the top of the paper again. What a kip. Things living in the carpet. The stink of the place was made even worse by the smells of the rotting fruit and vegetables and fish hanging in the air all around the Markets. They should knock the place down. He finished the pint. Which one was that, number three or four? Three. He looked at the clock. Three pints in a half an hour. He watched the two oul lads cocked up on stools by the bar. At least they weren’t bothering him any more, trying to put talk on him. Another fella had come in a few minutes ago, a big fella with an apron. The barman had a pint ready for him and he downed it in about ten seconds. Not a word out of him. At first he’d thought it was a cop and he was up out of the seat before the guy had stepped through the door properly. Yeah, maybe that’s what had done it.

  He studied the leftover froth on the sides of the glass. Maybe the barman was trying to fit him to some picture he’d seen but didn’t remember enough. Surely to God there weren’t pictures of him up, in the papers. Up on walls: “Wanted Leo Hickey. Murder.” Jesus! He folded his paper and looked down at the seat beside him for his cigarettes. He didn’t want to go, he realized. He didn’t want to be out there in the streets. He didn’t want to go back to the Park. He let himself lean back against the seat. He hadn’t been ten steps from the phone when he’d heard the the tyres of the squad car through the open door of the pub. Straight out the side door into the lane-way and through the Markets. What a pack of lying bastards, the Guards. They must have had the cars ready again, waiting for him. That could only mean they had him fitted for this, for Mary. Even that guy, the culchie who’d told him straight out: standard procedure, Liam.

  Why was the guy still looking at him, for Christ’s sake? He stood up. The bar seemed to move with him. Hey! He felt in his pocket for the knife. The bar seemed brighter now. The barman was rubbing the counter again, but slowly now. He saw his own face in the mirror. A sight. No wonder he’d been keeping an eye on him. The anger began to drain out of him. He let go of the knife and grasped the coins instead.

  “Here. Give us another pint there.”

  He watched the barman pouring it, pretending to watch the filling glass but watching him at the same time.

  “Any grub here, man? Sandwiches or stuff?”

  “Crisps-”

  “Okay. Three crisps. Smokey Bacon?”

  The barman looked up from the glass. The two old geezers had stopped talking. Christ, why was the kip so quiet? Didn’t they have a telly or anything?

  “-or peanuts,” the barman added.

  “Yeah, well, all I want is the crisps, see? Smokey Bacon.”

  The barman placed the pint on the counter. Why was he moving so slowly? He turned aside to get the bags of crisps.

  “Three bags of Smokey Bacon,” he said. He turned back, placed them next to the pint and rested his hands on the counter-top to either side of the glass. Now he was looking straight at him. What the hell was this guy’s problem? Like this was such a fancy place they didn’t want riffraff or something? Like, it was so fucking exclusive or something? He let his hand slide back into the pocket. His fingers closed on the knife again. He imagined his hand coming out of the pocket so fast, the blade open
ed already and coming down on the guy’s hand: right through it, pinning it to the counter. Right into the counter.

  His hand came out with the fiver crunched up inside. He dropped it on the counter. The barman spoke in the same flat voice.

  “Five pounds.”

  What had he ever done to this guy? Was it just the way he looked or something? Did he stink and he didn’t even know it? The bar seemed to be changing around him. Christ, he really should get a decent meal before he…

  “That’s a hot one, I’m telling you all right,” someone was saying. He turned. One of the oul lads. His forehead was shining.

  “Yeah,” he heard himself say. “Isn’t it.”

  “But there’s going to be rain like was never seen before, I read.”

  Something about the oul lad’s face reminded him of something, of someone he knew. Keeping the peace, he was. He must have been reading his mind. Could he know about the knife?

  “Rain…”

  “Oh, that’s a fact! If you’re to believe those chancers what give the forecast.”

  The glass was cool and wet in his hand. He saw the downpour beating down the leaves of the chestnut tree which he had hoped would be his home. Of course it had to piss rain, he thought. It was always that way. The minute you thought you were getting somewhere. It came to him as a pain then, like that heartburn he used to get when he was a kid. Everything wrong. Just impossible. He brought the crisps and the pint back to the table and flopped down in the seat. He’d go out later, he decided. He had money and he had a knife. He didn’t really give a damn any more.

  Her eyes filled with tears. Coming here, he said, but his lips didn’t move, coming here to surprise her was a very, very stupid idea. No sleep tonight if he were to tell Kathleen. If? When. He’d have to tell her. He stared at her. Paint had dried under her nails. Strands of hair had escaped her hair-band. Some part of him must have known already, he understood.

  “Is that all you can say?” she whispered. “Try to say something funny.”

  Things crashed about in his head. Grandfather; babysitting; bottles; nappies. He would always remember this time, this place. The big windows with peeling paint and putty which kept the studio like a fridge in winter-the landlord’s hint to Iseult and the co-op of just how annoyed he was that he had given them such a lease before the area had become so suddenly trendy several years ago.