Father's Music

by Dermot Bolger

  ‘Not only can you not trust the police to protect you,’ Luke continued as people strained to listen, ‘sometimes they even set you up. Take a photographer new to the job. He sees a police car outside a funeral home so he asks if it’s safe to go in. Walk right up, the police say, we’ve been trying to pin something on these people for years. The problem is they’re clean so nothing sticks. But please, intrude on their grief. See if you can provoke them into breaking your arm or leg while we sit on our arses watching you do our donkey work.’

  ‘That’s horsehit,’ the detective said in fury. ‘Shut the fuck up, Duggan, or we’ll have you down the station too.’

  ‘So why exactly did you tell me it was safe to come in?’ the photographer asked, suspicious now and silencing the detective.

  Luke bent down to pick up the shattered camera. He handed it to the photographer, then reached into his own pocket to produce a compact Kodak.

  ‘Your camera is broken,’ Luke said. ‘You must have dropped it when you stumbled in the crowd. Have mine as a present. It’s not as good, but stand inside the church door and it will get you whatever shots you need. Keep back, though, because it’s good manners and, I mean, no matter how you might meet your death we’d respect your widow’s privacy at your funeral too.’

  The fact that Luke’s tone was confiding and friendly made the unspoken threat all the more chilling. The detective pushed Luke aside and gripped the photographer’s arm, but the young photographer shook it off.

  ‘Now I know how Christ felt,’ he said. ‘Strung up between two robbers.’

  He ignored the small camera in Luke’s hand and turned to walk off.

  ‘You’re a scumbag, Duggan,’ the detective said.

  ‘You said that before, Mr Brennan,’ Luke replied mildly. ‘Obviously self-abuse hasn’t just stunted your growth but also your vocabulary.’

  I hadn’t wanted to go back to Christy’s house in Howth, but Al said we didn’t have to stay long. It was in a tiny estate of fifteen luxury houses crammed together with flat roofs curving into a cul-de-sac. Massive pillars formed an arch at the entrance which looked like it was stolen from a film set. The trees in most of the front gardens had been rigged with Christmas lights, but only one house had these lights actually turned on. The estate seemed deserted, although from an unlit bedroom window I saw two small children stare down at the cars arriving. Christy’s daughter angrily got out of the first car and was about to storm across to the house with its Christmas lights on, when Luke put an arm on her shoulder and asked Shane to have a word with them instead. The squad car had followed the cortège and I saw Brennan, the detective, watching as Shane walked across to the offending house.

  Christy’s house was crammed with knick-knacks and cut glass ornaments. Even the curtains were like something you’d see in a mock Victorian theatre. Carl tried to keep a straight face as he muttered that it was like ‘a high-class knacker’s caravan’. Al said the decor was modelled on an Irish politician’s house which had been featured in a magazine. He claimed that Christy’s wife, Margaret, had kept the magazine centrespread pinned up on her wardrobe door, hounding Christy until he produced an exact replica for her.

  Children moved about with plates of sandwiches and Carl and the others went off to raid the food available, promising to bring me back a plate. Al left me alone for a moment, pressed into serving drinks. He had returned to pour me what looked like a treble gin when Christy’s black-haired daughter angrily grabbed the bottle from his hand.

  ‘Jesus,’ she said, ‘are you saying my father was mean? People always got a decent measure in this house.’ She poured three times the amount into my glass, staring at my face and inquiring, ‘Who do we have here?’

  ‘Leave her alone, Christine,’ Al butted in. ‘I met her down the Pod, she’s visiting Dublin. She’s with me and my mates.’

  Christine turned to glare at Al, shooing him away to serve other people. She looked back, scrutinising my face. Her features were harder than I remembered them in the Irish Centre. Even her mourning clothes were stylishly cut and she reeked of white musk. It was a perfume I associated with teenage girls in high heels and mini-skirts freezing at bus stops. It had the strong musty smell of Gran’s bedroom when I used to sneak in as a child to dress up in her scarves and hats. Now the tables were turned from that night in London and I tried not to show my fear.

  ‘I’m a friend of Al’s,’ I said, holding her gaze.

  ‘Since when?’

  ‘Since recently.’

  ‘I was trying to place your face,’ she said. ‘But then I forgot, all you English bints look the same. I hate to think of any Duggan falling for an English braser, but don’t get too cocky, love, because they always fall back on their own sort, no matter what sort of tricks you do for them in bed.’

  She walked off to fill another glass. I saw Al across the room looking concerned, but before he could reach me Luke’s father had sat down. He patted my arm and looked at Christine.

  ‘I hope that wee girl didn’t upset you,’ he said, ‘it would be better if she went off and cried, but she has it all bottled inside. She was her Daddy’s best girl always. Her boy-friend should be here to comfort her but she never brings him home. Either he’s one of the stuck-up types around here who can’t stomach us or he’s one of us who can’t stomach the neighbours here.’

  ‘I’m sorry about your son,’ I said.

  ‘I know you are, love.’ He patted my hand gently again. ‘He was a good lad, Christy, good to everyone. Big fists and a soft heart. People took advantage of him. The dogs in the street wouldn’t starve if Christy was around.’

  The room was filling up with in-laws, their voices carrying an almost desperate gaiety, although here and there people sat slumped in silence.

  ‘It’s a lovely house, isn’t it?’ he said. ‘He did well, Christy, and he’d never let you take a bus home. Taxis to your doorstep. All the same, I don’t know what they’ll do now. It’s mortgaged to the hilt. He could have bought a lovely house, somewhere near his own kind. You could be here till you were a hundred and people still wouldn’t give you the time of day. I mean, the neighbours never appreciated Christy. Do you know, there wasn’t one burglary on this estate since the day Christy moved in?’

  A seven-year-old girl came from the kitchen, with a plate of vol-au-vents. She stood, bewildered by all the people in her living room, until some woman took the plate from her. A man squeezed a ten pound note into her hand, but she stared at him blankly, letting the money fall as she walked off. Luke’s father watched her.

  ‘You see wee Jacinta there,’ he said. ‘Do you know they refused to have prayers for her Daddy in school, like when any other parent died? Only that the other little girls insisted. There’s more decency in the kids than in the teachers and all because of the rubbish written in the papers.’

  Jacinta ran across to Luke in the other doorway who picked her up. He said nothing but she nestled her head against his chest. Luke’s wife joined him and Christine walked over to stroke her young sister’s hair. She stared at me until Luke’s wife noticed and began to stare too. I wanted to find Carl but Luke’s father seemed unable to stop talking. I knew I was going to get his life story, because this torrent of words seemed his only anaesthetic against grief.

  He kept touching my hand to emphasise some point as he went through every job he ever had, since starting off at fourteen by sweeping the floor in a barber shop down the markets. Pierrepoint, the last hangman, used to be shaved there, fresh off the boat from England on the morning of an execution. They opened two hours early especially for him. Luke’s father showed me how the barber’s hand trembled as he worked with the open blade and would finish up by slicking back the hangman’s hair with makeshift brilliantine which they concocted from whitewash and other scavenged ingredients in a bathtub hidden in the back room of the shop.

  Beyond nodding I found I didn’t need to say anything. It was like he was telling these stories to himself, hoping that this
time he would understand how he came to be here, decades later, with a son who owned a posh house and was riddled to death. I only really listened when his memories collided with stories Luke had told me. I was more concerned about what Christine knew, or suspected, and how much she might tell Luke’s wife. Christine had gone upstairs to look after her mother, but Luke’s wife seemed to watch me now every time she entered the room.

  ‘Tell me about Luke,’ I asked and his father stopped, surprised.

  ‘I didn’t know you knew Luke,’ he said.

  ‘I don’t. It’s just that he handled himself well at the funeral.’

  ‘He did.’ Mr Duggan nodded, but it didn’t quite seem wholehearted. ‘Luke always handled himself well, not like poor Christy. Luke’s done well, you couldn’t but be proud of him. But he never comes home. I don’t like that. I worked anywhere I could find work, but I never lost touch. Luke would put his hand in his pocket for anything you asked him for, but, you see, with Christy you didn’t need to ask.’ He rose slowly. ‘Finish your drink, love. It’s the Missus I’m worried for. Christy was always her baby, even though he was her first born.’

  He walked towards the kitchen as Luke’s wife crossed the room. I knew instinctively she was going to sit beside me and there was nothing I could do. She said nothing but just sighed as if relieved to have the weight off her feet. I don’t know how many measures of alcohol Christine had poured me, but I drained them all as I sat in silence beside her. I put the empty glass down and tried to rise, but found that my legs were unsteady. Her arm gripped my elbow. Her grasp was strong. Her nails dug in and hurt.

  ‘Easy does it,’ she said casually as I steadied myself, ‘even for a young slip like yourself it’s sometimes a long way up.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said, ‘it’s very warm in here.’

  ‘Get a little air and you’ll feel better,’ she replied. ‘Try the back garden. I always say a change is as good as a rest.’

  I was steady now but she still didn’t let go.

  ‘Your hair is nice,’ she said. ‘It shows your face off well. It’s pretty. Make the most of it while it lasts. My own husband was at me for years to dye my hair blonde.’

  ‘Which one is your husband?’ I tried to keep my voice composed. ‘I don’t think I know him.’

  Luke’s wife let go my arm, but I could see the imprint of her nails on my skin. She smiled.

  ‘There’s few that do, love,’ she said confidently. ‘Very few ever do.’

  I walked away, wanting to run, and opened the sliding doors on to the patio to take great gulps of night air. I slid the door closed, glad to be alone. It seemed an eternity since I had left my hotel to walk into town. There was a child’s swing on the lawn and an artificial pond with a miniature fountain worked by a noisy electric pump. Green bulbs created an effect under the water. Trees had been planted against the back wall where a wooden playhouse was built in the shape of a tiny Swiss chalet. Beyond the wall I could see harbour lights in the distance. I was tempted to slip out the side gate and find a taxi, but my disappearance might only create more stir.

  Since his arrival Luke hadn’t glanced in my direction. The whole day had been an elaborate game of manipulation. I felt vulnerable now and light-headed from drink. I was angry with him, yet I also hoped he would follow me into the garden. I knew it was risky to be seen together, but perhaps I was getting hooked on the danger of this game.

  I walked down to the playhouse and had already stooped to enter it when I heard the faint creak of a board and somebody breathing a few inches away. I felt trapped in the darkness of the miniature house. I guessed it was Christine lying in wait after Luke’s wife had suggested I come out here. I was too scared to scream or run.

  ‘Trace?’

  I recognised Al’s whisper and started breathing again. He put a hand out, inadvertently brushing against my breast and then taking my shoulder as he guided me to the seat beside him.

  ‘Are you okay?’ he asked. ‘I told Carl and the lads to keep on eye on you inside.’

  Something made me put my hand up to his face. His cheeks were wet. He sat, letting me wipe them with my fingers.

  ‘I couldn’t take any more of it,’ he said. ‘People in there are almost giddy, like they’re in shock. You can see that the kids only half believe it. They think at any moment the door is going to open and Christy will walk in again.’

  ‘Did you like him?’ I asked.

  ‘I loved him,’ Al replied. ‘I helped him assemble this playhouse. It cost a fortune. Aunt Margaret saw it in some magazine and had to have it.’

  ‘Aunt Margaret is fond of magazines.’

  ‘Tell me about it,’ he said bitterly. ‘I mean, who in the name of Jaysus wants to live on top of this bleeding cliff? They’re a different fucking breed. Needless to say Aunt Margaret put him up to buying it. That woman was always thick as shite on a blanket. She spent half her life getting pissed in the Berkeley Court Hotel with some stuck-up lush whose granddaddy built chain-stores in England. Creaming her knickers to share a sunbed with a woman who only got mentioned on the gossip pages for drunk driving, and then spending a fortune keeping her pissed in case she discovered that Margaret had once been a scrubber working in the Tayto Crisp factory. All poor oul Christy ever got from Margaret was a string of debts and a few stolen packets of Cheese and Onion.’

  ‘You’re all as bad as each other with this poor old Christy business,’ I blurted out, with the drink freeing my inhibitions so that I didn’t care who I insulted. ‘The money for everything here was robbed. I know he was your uncle, but he was still a yob. All the Irish papers say so.’

  Al was silent. I couldn’t see his face. I had no friends here. It was foolish to antagonise him as well.

  ‘You wouldn’t understand, Trace,’ he said after a while.

  ‘You mean everything in the papers is lies?’

  ‘No. But things got blown up. Christy didn’t mind, he loved the stuff in the papers. He only ever bought the tabloids to see if he was in them. Otherwise he stuck to comics. I remember, when I was twelve, getting really embarrassed over him still talking about Batman and Robin. He loved this Ice Man shit, it made him feel clever. He was always tough and people had reason to fear him but he was never clever. I mean what class of criminal genius marries Aunt Margaret?’

  ‘What paid for all this, then?’ I asked.

  ‘I don’t really know.’ Al looked up at the house where Luke could be seen in the window, pulling the curtains. ‘He did the odd stroke and a bit of smuggling here and there, but I often think the big guys paid him to take the rap for jobs and keep the heat off them. There was a time he was public enemy number one. Half of Dublin was able to go on a robbing spree, fecking anything that wasn’t nailed down because the entire police force were sitting like monkeys up in the trees here, hoping to provoke Christy into doing something rash.’

  ‘Houses like this don’t come cheap,’ I argued.

  ‘All Christy ever paid was the deposit,’ Al said. ‘Everything else is on tick. Some months he had to borrow the mortgage payment off my Da. This last year he’s been totally broke. Everyone says he robbed that security van the Bypass Bombardiers were staking out, but I have my suspicions. Last week he was still broke, and not even Christy would be crazy enough to take those lads on unless some bastard set him up. If I ever find out …’

  There was a noise on the wall above us and Al stopped. The anger in his voice had frightened me. Al looked towards the house where Luke had emerged. He stood, as if looking for someone, then stubbed his cigarette out and began to walk towards the playhouse. I didn’t want Luke to find us like this. It looked too suspicious. Al put a hand to my mouth as footsteps thudded on the roof of the playhouse. A man jumped down on to the grass in front of us. My heart was so loud it scared me. Even from the back I recognised him as the thug who had kicked the photographer. Luke let him approach. Al withdrew his hand slowly, warning me to stay still.

  ‘I sort of figured you might surfa
ce here,’ Luke said.

  ‘We have to talk,’ the thug replied. ‘The Pig Brennan is out the front. Christy’s eldest is running wild, screaming at some neighbour who won’t turn his Christmas lights off as a mark of respect. She’ll be out with a knife slashing tyres shortly.’

  ‘Christine is a bit wired,’ Luke said. ‘She’s taking her Daddy’s death hard.’

  ‘Aren’t we all the poorer with Christy gone?’ he sneered.

  Luke lit another cigarette. ‘Not all of us, McGann,’ he said. ‘Some people may do very nicely from it.’

  ‘Like who?’ the thug challenged warily.

  ‘Let’s take the residents here.’ Luke indicated the rooftops of neighbouring houses beyond the tall hedges. ‘I’d say property prices could go up by ten or fifteen per cent when Christy’s family are forced to sell. Unless, of course, some of his friends feel obliged to help out.’

  ‘Come off it,’ the man said.

  ‘He looked after you when he had money,’ Luke said. ‘He would have looked after your family too. Christy was like that.’

  ‘Save the sob stories,’ the thug said. ‘There’s money due to us.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘That was between Christy and us. You just give me a time and place and I’ll tell you how much to bring if you don’t want trouble.’

  ‘There’s nothing left, McGann,’ Luke said.

  ‘Where did it all go then?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Luke said. ‘You tell me how much is missing and where you claim to have got it from. What Christy earned hardly paid for sun-tanning his wife’s arse. I know nothing about any other money and neither does anyone else here.’

  ‘Christy was laundering money from a job that he talked us into doing. We’d never have touched it if we’d known. That’s all I’ll say.’

  ‘Find the money launderer so,’ Luke told him.

  ‘I intend to.’

  The drapes were pulled back and the sliding door opened. Luke’s wife stood in the square of light and called his name. Luke and the man stepped into the shadows at the side of the playhouse, out of sight from her and from us. She called again, then slid the door closed. Only a thin piece of wood separated my head from their voices. I felt Al’s hand move across my leg. I thought he was going to try something and in my anger I didn’t care about the noise. I let my jacket slip from my shoulders on to the ground and gathered up the zip fastener in my right hand, ready to stab it into his face. Al’s fingers skimmed the top of my ski-pants, searching for something, then they found my hand. I realised he was scared and just wanted to hold it. For all his talk of revenge Al was out of his depth here too.