Sad Bastard

by Hugo Hamilton

  Pat, he said. Pat Coyne.

  Coyne’s first reaction was to walk on. Ignore the bastard at all costs. But Coyne softened almost instantly when he saw the name of Nora Killmurphy on a gravestone. She had been dead all the time while Coyne was making his abusive phone calls. Jesus, Coyne should have known this. She never answered the phone.

  Coyne stopped. The sound of a decade of the rosary on the breeze behind him.

  Mr Killmurphy, he said.

  I saw you in the shopping centre a few times, Pat. How are you these days?

  Killjoy stepped forward and shook hands. Coyne found himself talking to his enemy: the man who had made his life hell and the man he had victimised for years in return; the man he would never forgive. Coyne looked at the grave-stone and felt instantly sorry for him. He was overwhelmed with remorse and saw everything from Killjoy’s perspective for the first time.

  She died of cancer four years ago, Killjoy said, with his head down.

  I’m sorry to hear that, Coyne said.

  They exchanged some words of encouragement and Coyne ended up reciprocating with his own grief.

  My mother, he said. Three years ago.

  Killjoy said something stoical about life having to go on. He was always one for the daft and ceremonious, looking for some kind of financial parable to spout at you across his desk. And he was still wearing those pink shirts. But you couldn’t be hard on a man in his grief, and Coyne’s heart went out to him. Jesus, he was close to bursting into tears. Any minute he would be begging Killjoy for forgiveness. Please forgive me for damaging your property. Forgive me for the patio stuff, and all the phone calls.

  I retired early to look after her, Killjoy said.

  Coyne felt helpless. Tried to remember some of the anger that had sent him up to sabotage Killjoy’s house that time. Killjoy had it coming! But it was all so far in the past now and he was unable to stop himself becoming Killjoy’s friend. Here in the graveyard. United in mourning.

  Coyne slowly opened up, baring his soul to Killjoy as though the cemetery had brought out some deep conciliatory unction. He explained how he’d been injured in a fire. How he was out of the Gardai now. And separated.

  You always seemed like a perfect couple to me, Killmurphy said. I never would have thought… I’m sorry, you know, about all that trouble in the bank. I wish I could have been more generous.

  Ah, no, Coyne said. You did your duty, Mr Killmurphy.

  No, Pat. It’s not good enough. I should have given you a break. It was wrong to call in the debt on a young couple like yourselves. I should have rescheduled. I should have written it off, in fact.

  The conversion in the graveyard.

  To hell with the bank, Killjoy kept saying. To hell with all their money. I should have been more generous.

  No, Coyne insisted. It’s me who should be apologising. I’m sorry about all the trouble I caused. You know, all that damage, like.

  Will you go away out of that, Killjoy said. You were a customer. You should have been treated better.

  There was no need for the damage, Coyne said. And the phone calls. That was wrong.

  What damage? Killjoy smiled. What are you talking about? Then he came around and slapped Coyne on the back. Told him not to mention it. His behaviour had been exemplary in the circumstances.

  The truth lay hidden. It was clear that Killjoy had not made the connection. Coyne had come right out and admitted everything and Killjoy still didn’t get it. He had no idea that Coyne was a terrorist. Perhaps some time in his sleep the whole thing would click and Killjoy’s suburban arithmetic would finally reveal the formula. Coyne didn’t have the heart to drag it all up again. I mean, that would have been worse than the original crime. Jesus that would kill him, to tell him now, at this late stage.

  They walked away towards the gates together.

  It was nice to meet you again, Killjoy said. Always like to keep in touch with my old customers. He even told Coyne to look him up in the telephone directory: perhaps they could go for coffee some day, now that they both had so much time on their hands.

  Mongi O Doherty was not idly standing by. He was not the type to sit on his arse, pro bono publico, waiting for Sergeant Corrigan to come and point the finger at him. He was on the move, pursuing his own ambitions, looking at ways of recouping his losses, still hoping to extract the capital repayment from Jimmy Coyne. A pound of flesh if he couldn’t actually get it in liquid currency.

  The problem was that Jimmy Coyne had disappeared off the face of the earth, leaving no trace, not even with his family or friends.

  Early afternoon, Mongi decided to call on Carmel Coyne to see if she could help. Stood on the threshold of the family home with his hoof in the door.

  I’m looking for Jimmy, he said brusquely. He was getting desperate now, and there was no point in trying to pretend he was a friend or a Garda. No foil better than the blunt truth. Stare the mother in the eye and tell her you want to whack her son. Nothing more profoundly disturbing than that.

  I don’t know where he is, Carmel said, fiddling with the lock. Honestly.

  The line was hard to sustain. It wasn’t even worth saying, even if it was true. A mother who didn’t know where her son was? And there was something even more dishonest about the way she tried to bang the door shut on Mongi O Doherty’s footwear. As if she didn’t notice the big pump-up runner stuck in her hallway.

  Do you expect me to believe that, Carmel?

  She was shocked to hear her own name. Then he stepped inside the house and produced a knife. Stood in the hallway and closed the door quietly, silent, solicitous, like a priest with bad news, looking her up and down and choosing his words carefully while his assistant went around the house searching the place for the money. Carmel could smell his smoky breath. The electrical hum of his nerves. He told her he was devoted to the physical force tradition – guns and blades, concrete blocks and glass shards, metal objects and syringes. He liked the sound of accidents and natural causes. He was particularly good on car crashes and was also the type to do most of his own creative dirty work. Held the knife up to her neck as though he was proffering it to her. Here, I’d like you to feel the edge on that. Sheffield steel – diamond sharpened.

  You have no right to come in here! she shouted, all righteous and proprietorial. As if the whole thing was a matter of assertiveness. But the conviction had already left: she detected a kind of misfired irony in her own voice.

  My husband is a Garda, she announced. He’s due back any minute.

  Oh, I see, Mongi said. He’s not living in that flat any more?

  Carmel had never felt so exposed. It was such a comprehensive defeat. Victim embarrassment. It was the lie, more than the attempted defence.

  Leave us alone, she cried. Once again the plural, inclusive concept of the traditional family.

  Look, don’t start bawling like a fucking baby, Mongi shouted. He slapped her across the face and Carmel was suddenly left holding her burning cheek, blinking through tears, unable to cry. Didn’t notice the trickle of blood flowing down her chin. She tried to swallow, but couldn’t do that either.

  The search of the house yielded nothing.

  I’m going to clean this thing on your tits if you don’t tell me where he is.

  I swear, I don’t know, Carmel whispered and then sank down. Collapsing in slow motion, trying to close over her light blue summer blouse.

  He fucking owes me money! Mongi shouted.

  He opened his mouth wide to pronounce the words. I’ll be back, he said. Like news for the deaf. Then he prepared to make his point with a graphic illustration. Took Carmel’s hand as though he was going to dance with her. Come dance with me, in Ireland!

  Maybe it was some kind of parting handshake. Or more like a quick manicure. He pointed her index finger out and tucked the tip of the blade under the painted nail. Just one
sharp little stab of dilated pain to drive his message home. Up through her arm and straight into the smarting tear ducts. By which time he had already stepped back and opened the door, pausing for a moment to look out before he disappeared. But as with all intruders, part of his persona still remained. Under the fingernails. As though he had only stepped out temporarily and would be back again any minute to continue. As though he was moving in. A new resident. Like a husband.

  Coyne came across the poet with the four docile dogs outside the shopping centre. His face was very familiar from the Anchor Bar, but Coyne had never really had much to say to him. This time, in the street at the entrance to the town-killing shopping mall, there was something that attracted his attention. The poet had pinned a rough charcoal drawing of a man with a shaven head up on the wall behind him. Underneath was written the word ‘Foe’, in bold black letters. By induction, through the medium of verse, the poet was teaching his docile dogs to bite. Trying to turn these timid animals into selective killers. If they ever encountered this shaven-headed monster, alive or dead, they were instructed to turn instantly vicious.

  Would you like a poem, sir?

  But Coyne didn’t see the point. I mean, everybody was spouting the stuff these days and nobody was listening. Poets vastly outnumbered readers. Coyne’s advice was to change his career immediately. Offer himself as a listener. He’d make a fortune.

  Coyne was more interested in the Identikit drawing. It was pinned up almost like a religious picture. Something to be venerated.

  Who’s that?

  My enemy, the poet responded. Then he hunted through his portfolio for his best invective poems. Greatest hits of hate! Here, he said, and began reading out cantos of abuse and denigration, so that the dogs started growling at the drawing again. May you choke on a chicken bone. May you be thrown out in the rain. May you contract distemper and ringworm and the mange. Forsaken even by your own fleas. All the empirical suffering that dogs understood so well.

  Coyne knelt down and examined the drawing. Finally interrupted the epic poem in order to extract some explanation for all this hatred. There was a time when every poet had a muse: some figure of great beauty that inspired him to place the chaos of the world behind him and seek perfection in words. Now they only had figures of great contempt. A poet could not work without a formidable enemy: some malicious bastard who had offended his honour and humiliated him. It made better source material. The poet as victim.

  Coyne examined the drawing and became attracted to the notion of an anonymous, clearly defined but nameless adversary.

  Can I buy it?

  It’ll cost you a fair whack, the poet said. Besides, what would I do? I’d be lost. I’d have to go back to writing love poems.

  I’m offering you money for it, Coyne insisted.

  Thou shalt not covet another man’s enemy, the poet warned. You’d be taking your life in your hands. I’d feel responsible.

  He was underestimating Coyne. There was no situation he was unable to handle. No enemy that he hadn’t unceremoniously dispatched to the dustbin of history.

  Except for himself. As enemies went, Coyne would never find anyone more formidable than himself. The battle with himself is the only one he would never win. The Identikit face seemed like a walkover. A skirmish. He haggled until the poet took the drawing down and handed it over, along with the strict advice that this man was armed and dangerous. Do not approach! The dogs snapped at the paper in Coyne’s hand.

  Slowly, Jimmy Coyne started changing his mind. The totality of his love affair with Irene Boland was under threat. He wanted to re-enter society and abandon the refuge of love in which he had become imprisoned like a captive.

  I don’t care if they kill me, he was now saying.

  Don’t go out there, Irene warned, trying to preserve the sanctuary of their relationship at all costs. Once Jimmy set foot outside, he would be murdered. It was like the archaic legend in which Jimmy would fall off his white horse and grow instantly old.

  I’m going to renounce my wealth, he said.

  In the long hours that he sat in the flat looking out to sea, he realised that he had been trapped into happiness. This was Jimmy’s big re-think. What he now wanted was to be able to see both sides of the coin at once. Love and freedom at the same time. The great opposites.

  He asked Irene to get the money. In the boiler room, he told her. Just reach into the back of the boiler and you’ll find a bag. It’s full of money, Irene, so be careful. I’d get it myself only I can’t go in there any more.

  What money is this? she asked.

  Don’t let anybody see you with it, Jimmy said, ignoring her enquiry.

  Coyne was in the supermarket at the town-killing shopping centre when he was approached from behind by Irene Boland. He was standing close to the cornflakes. Jumped back in shock and smiled awkwardly.

  It’s about your son Jimmy, she said.

  Where is he?

  He remained non-judgmental. This woman standing in front of him like a store detective was almost Carmel’s age. Jesus, she could be Jimmy’s mother for Christsake. But Coyne could also see the attraction. The warmth in her eyes. The husky voice.

  You’ve got to protect him, she said.

  Why? What’s wrong?

  They’re after him. They’re going to kill him.

  Coyne pulled out the Identikit picture, right there in the supermarket with the sound of Frank Sinatra going his own way in the background and the voice of a woman breaking in telling them the price of chicken legs.

  Is that him? Coyne asked.

  I don’t know, Irene said. I never saw any of them.

  There were two women talking in one of the aisles not far away. One of them had a baby on her arm. She was listening to the other woman and rocking the supermarket trolley with her free hand. Back and forth, back and forth, making the groceries go to sleep. The hand that rocks the supermarket trolley.

  I had to give him shelter, Irene Boland said. They attacked him and broke his ankle.

  They’ll hear from me, Coyne vowed. They better not lay a finger on him again or I’ll kill them. He picked up a packet of Bran Flakes, realised he didn’t normally buy that kind of thing and put it back.

  They’re after the money, Irene said.

  What money?

  Irene handed Coyne a bag full of dollars. Coyne opened it briefly and saw bundled notes inside.

  They’re the same people who killed the man at the harbour. Jimmy said that to me. He saw them.

  Coyne looked all around him. At the meat counter there were some men in white coats and white hats that you could see the shape of their heads through. And matching red faces. On the wall was a gathering of these men smiling and standing around a table full of raw meat. Smiling at this slaughtered animal with their red spotty faces and white hats and canine eye teeth. Beside them another poster of a bull like a map dissected into territories. Cantons of rib roast and rump steak.

  Where is Jimmy now? Coyne demanded. I need to speak to him.

  No, she said.

  There was something troubled about her: a kind of shakiness in the eyes. Then she turned and Coyne watched her walking away. She was small and plump and wore an ankle bracelet. He stood there with the bag of money, looking at the ankle bracelet under the tights. The red-faced butchers with their meat cleavers suspended in mid-air were joking and laughing among themselves.

  Coyne went looking for Jimmy. Found out from the Haven nursing home where Irene Boland lived and stood ringing the bell early that evening. Irene was not there at the time but Jimmy was looking out at his father below on the steps. He moved back from the window, but then sneaked forward again to watch Coyne ringing on bells next door and speaking to an old man for a moment. Once again he came back and rang on the right doorbell but got no answer.

  Jimmy, frozen, held on to his fugitive status and allow
ed his father to knock and ring until he gave up and walked away, a vulnerable figure pacing away along the seafront in the closed cyberspace of his own thoughts.

  That’s my dad, he said to himself, and saw his own father for the first time with the brutal clarity of a curt description on a shampoo bottle – dry, damaged. A man with a limited vision. An absolutist. A sad bastard, carving a polite but determined path through a crowd of pedestrians who had come out for the evening with their children and their dogs and their buggies. His father was at odds with the languid mood of the evening, walking among the ordinary people of the city, locked in mortal combat with his phantasmal adversaries.

  Jimmy felt sorry for him. It was unforgivable to ignore his own father like this. He changed his mind and decided to run after him. Wanted to re-enter his force-field of trust, perhaps walk out to the lighthouse together and talk about things the way they used to when Jimmy was still a child, convinced his father knew everything. Maybe hear some of the stories that were going on in Coyne’s head and pretend that everything was all right again in the little republic of Coynes.

  Mongi O Doherty had been awaiting this opportunity. It was inevitable that luck would fall his way at last, after so much scratching. It was like three identical numbers on a lottery card. He was there to intercept this emotional reunion between father and son. He and his assistant caught Jimmy crossing through the boat yard this time, asked him to sit in the back of the car and drove the short distance to the Lolita with a tape over his mouth to keep him quiet. Took him on board for a conference-style meeting, once the sun had gone down and the light was beginning to fade.

  Jimmy was brought down below into the main cabin. There was an altercation with the skipper, Martin Davis, who refused to allow his boat to be used as an interrogation centre. This is not Castlereagh. I can’t have any inhuman and degrading treatment on my boat. He said he was finished with all of this stuff. He was going back to fishing.

  I’m going clean, he said, but Mongi laughed out loud with his protruding teeth. What was clean about fishing? Besides, Martin Davis was in this business up to his neck. It was too late to get out now. So he agreed to take the Lolita for a spin around the bay. Started the engines and set off into the evening with the smell of diesel fumes all around.