Headstone

by Ken Bruen

  “The Brethen started as a wonderful idea. To reform the church from within. A return to the teaching of Our Lord, Jesus, and the hope of restoring the people’s trust in their church.”

  I nearly laughed.

  The sheer fucking naivete of this. Every day, the papers screamed about how the bishops continued to hide and minimize the abuse. To such an extent that the Guards were considering prosecuting them. And still, the hierarchy, entrenched in arrogance, refused to co-operate. I wanted to roar,

  “Good luck with that.”

  Went with,

  “Didn’t work, huh?”

  She sidestepped my sarcasm, said,

  “In the beginning, it did so well. Later it emerged that Father Gabriel had another agenda. A return to the fundamentalism that would bring the people to their knees. Father Loyola believed that if he removed their funding, they’d be powerless.”

  I said,

  “Gabriel sounds like an ecclesiastical hit squad.”

  She nearly smiled, said,

  “That is bordering on sarcasm, Mr. Taylor, but Father Gabriel is not a man to be crossed. They even have a motto, Brethren Eternitas.”

  The initials on his sharp briefcase.

  They were sounding like the militant wing of Dominus Deo.

  Cut to the chase time. I asked,

  “Do you know where I can find him?”

  If she told me, my case would be wrapped right there. I could wipe the smug look off Gabriel’s face, pocket my fee, and look forward to Laura’s imminent arrival. Sister Maeve was on the verge of answering when her whole body shuddered. I recognized the effect. It’s called in Ireland

  “When someone walks on your grave.”

  She stared at me and, oh sweet Jesus, fear and terror in her eyes.

  She said, as if she was channeling something,

  “You have recently been in a dark place.”

  Recently!

  Like the last twenty years of my banjaxed life. But she was right.

  I’d met the devil, up close and way too personal.

  I said,

  “It’s true. I got to glimpse into the very mouth of hell.”

  Tad dramatic but close to the truth.

  She shook her head, nigh screamed,

  “No… no Mr. Taylor, you have it wrong, Hell looked into you.”

  For fuck’s sake.

  I tried again,

  “Will you tell me where Father Loyola is?”

  She was in some kind of trance. When she did speak, it was in a flat dull monotone,

  “The rains are coming; it will rain for nigh forty days and nights.”

  Welcome to Galway.

  Then she stood, physically shook herself, and fled from the room.

  I sat for a moment, the box of chocolates like a severe reprimand, muttered,

  “Great, scaring the bejaysus out of a nun.”

  I got to me feet, trying to make sense of her words. Whatever else, she sure as shooting was right about the weather. Outside, I looked at the skies, dull gray and with the darkness tinge that speaks of worse to come. A wino was perched on the small wall, close to the Salmon Weir Bridge. I thought,

  “Precarious the pose.”

  He stared at me with bloodshot hopeless eyes, asked,

  “Got anything?”

  I gave him the chocolates. He snarled, muttered,

  “Fucking chocolate.” and tossed the box in the river. Asked,

  “Got anything else?”

  I gave him twenty euros and said,

  “Some advice.”

  He grasped the money in a dirty fist, looked up, asked,

  “And what’s the freaking advice?”

  I was already moving on, said,

  “Steal a raincoat.”

  A win doesn’t feel as good as a loss feels bad.

  – Andre Agassi, from his memoir, Open

  And true indeed, it rained for nigh on forty days.

  Downright biblical.

  But despite flood devastation, the tabloids continued feeding on Tiger Woods. A fallout being that a nine iron was becoming the weapon of choice. The Guards had issued a strike notice, creating a fascinating conundrum: if it was illegal for them to strike, who was going to arrest them?

  The army?

  The nurses were again threatening industrial action. Sean O’Casey, our finest playwright, had written nearly fifty years ago,

  “The world is in a state of chassis.”

  I. e… fucked.

  I had a priest to find. He’d been parish priest at the small church in Bohermore where I made my First Communion. It was my last resort. I stopped in at Richardson’s Pub, holding point at the right wing of Eyre Square. It was that rarity, a family pub.

  Got a stool at the counter, ordered a pint.

  The U.K. had recently introduced the Pour Your Own. The deal being, you were given a meter that clocked every time you poured your own. At evening’s end, you paid your bill.

  Sweet fuck, was nothing sacred?

  The whole buzz of a pub was watching a competent barman take his sweet time nourishing your pint and creaming off the head. If I wanted to pour my own, I’d stay home. The pint came, splendid in all its black music. John, the barman, said,

  “Haven’t seen you for a bit, Jack.”

  This was a subtle lash, meaning,

  “You’ve been taking your business elsewhere, yah bollix.”

  I was saved from a lame defense by a customer who said,

  “Liam Clancy is dead.”

  The end of an era indeed. Bob Dylan had called them the finest ballad singers ever.

  What the fuck was he smoking back then?

  Still, I raised my glass, said,

  “Codladh samh leat”

  … Safe sleep.

  I asked John,

  “You ever see Father Loyola?”

  His church was less than a brief rosary away. John gave a warm smile, said,

  “Oh yeah, he’d stop in for a small Paddy once a week.”

  In the current climate, that could be hugely misconstrued. John meant Paddy’s, regarded by many as the true Irish whiskey. Above John’s head was a large flat-screen TV. The top story was whether a children’s toy, “Go-Go Hamster,” was safe. Literally as a footnote, the irritating bottom line script announced that the hundredth British soldier had been killed in Afghanistan. I pulled myself back to John, ran a scam, asked,

  “He sure relied on that housekeeper of his.”

  Did he have one? The fuck I knew. But some things thankfully don’t change. John said,

  “Ah, Maura, the poor creature, the salt of the earth, she loves her port but she’s been devastated since he left.”

  Gotcha.

  You don’t tip Irish barman. I do.

  And did.

  John nodded, said,

  “Much appreciated Jack.”

  I headed for St. Patrick’s church, stopping at a new off -license to buy a bottle of port. My mobile shrilled.

  Stewart.

  He said Father Malachy was still in a coma. I ran the encounter, meeting with Ronan Wall’s sister, by him, he said,

  “The swan killer. You caught him, yeah?”

  Added,

  “You were a local hero for a while.”

  I said,

  “It didn’t last.”

  He countered with,

  “Jack, with you, what does?”

  I bit down on my temper, said,

  “I think the headstone, Ronan Wall, and his sister are somehow all connected.”

  “Why?”

  “The fuck do I know why; call it a former hero’s hunch.”

  I knew he was laughing. He said,

  “Lemme guess, you want me to track down the sister and maybe even the bold Ronan himself?”

  I counted to ten, said,

  “What do you think I pay you for?”

  Feigning indignation, he said,

  “You’ve never paid me a single euro.”

  N
ow, I nearly smiled, said,

  “Money is not the only currency. Zen that.”

  And clicked off.

  The priest’s house was a neat bungalow to the side of the new church.

  The bungalow had been freshly painted and looked welcoming.

  Maybe spent the stolen cash on that.

  I knocked on the door. It opened to a tiny robust woman, late sixties with her gray hair scraped back to a severe bun. How do women do that and more importantly….why?

  I literally rushed her.

  “Maura, just great to see you.”

  Offering the port in the same frenzied tone. She was taken aback but I was already inside and I knew she wasn’t sure how the hell that happened. I upped the bullshite.

  “You look great alanna.”

  Paused to let the flattery sink in, then rushed,

  “I’m so sorry it’s been a while but I promised Loyola I’d call the minute I got back.”

  Still perplexed, she led me into the sitting room. A large portrait of the Sacred Heart was perched above a roaring turf fire. Is there a finer sight? I saw some framed photos of a benign smiling priest, thought,

  “I’ll be having me one of those.” I said,

  “God, I’m perished.”

  Meaning….frozen.

  She took the hint and went to make hot ports. I followed her into the kitchen. It was spotless and I startled her all over again.

  Good.

  I wanted her to be on the precipice continuously.

  I said,

  “In you go and sit by the fire, I’ll make the hot port.”

  She left reluctantly, her look saying,

  “Should I call the Guards now….or call… after… the port?”

  The port won.

  The kettle was boiled and I added lethal amounts of port to her mug, then pulled out the Jameson in me other pocket and added a serious dollop to hers and just the Jay for me own self.

  Found the sugar, ladled in three spoons to hers.

  Brought out the two mugs, she was sitting on the edge of the armchair, ready to flee.

  I handed her the mug, said,

  “Loyola loved a wee drop of port.”

  Toasted,

  “Slainte.”

  And she took a homicidal swallow of the drink. Her eyes danced in her head. I apologized with,

  “I’m so sorry, I probably shouldn’t have overdone the sugar.”

  She gasped,

  “Oh no, ’tis lovely.”

  She took another large dose and I could see it physically relax her. I said,

  “Ah, Loyola, those were the days, and when I entered the Guards and he the Seminary, we still stayed in touch.”

  She managed,

  “You’re a Guard?”

  She was relaxing, I said,

  “Retired now but I do miss it.”

  The latter being the only truth I told.

  I asked,

  “So where is the bold man himself?”

  Her eyes kept flicking to the small framed photo that was near hidden behind the host of other frames. I rattled on about the great times we’d had fishing and other nonsense. Finishing her drink, she asked,

  “Another?”

  “Lovely,”

  I said.

  Soon as she headed for the kitchen, a barely noticeable stagger in her walk, I was up and grabbed the frame, put it in my pocket.

  On returning back, she said,

  “I left out the sugar, is that all right?”

  I nodded, asked,

  “So where do I find my old friend?”

  She looked to her left, i.e., lying.

  I’d watched Season One of Lie to Me.

  She said, and slowly, that careful dance among your words you know are trying to be slurred,

  “He’s away on parish business.”

  I acted irritated, pulled my phone from my pocket, looked at the screen, said,

  “Please excuse me Maura, I’ll have to take this.”

  That she hadn’t heard the ringtone was overridden by the booze.

  I said to the silent phone,

  “What? Now?”

  I nearly believed there was someone at the other end, acted like

  I’d rung off, said,

  “Emergency at home, I’ll have to run I’m afraid.”

  I was up and leaving, the drink had her rooted to the chair, she tried to rise, failed,

  I said,

  “I’ll be back next week and we can have a proper chat.”

  And I was outta there.

  We must get into step, a lockstep toward the prison of death.

  There is no escape.

  The weather will not change.

  – Henry Miller, Tropic of Cancer

  Ridge knew her marriage was over. As a gay woman, she’d married Anthony because of who he was.

  He had serious clout. Played golf with the people who ran the city. Anthony simply wanted a mother for his teenage daughter and a lady of the manor for functions. Sex just wasn’t in the picture. Ridge looked good, knew how to behave, and he believed, like breaking in a horse, he could train her into some semblance of aristocracy.

  Before the marriage, Ridge had lived in a small house at the bottom of Devon Park. On a quiet day, you could almost hear the ocean. It was an oasis of gentility between Salthill and the city. She loved that house and just couldn’t bear to sell it. She rented it to an ex-lover named Jenny. More and more, she was drawn back to her old life, to intimacy and some remnants of integrity.

  Two years ago, as a favor to Jack, she’d gone on a routine call. Some girls were bullying a Down syndrome child and she intended to give a quiet caution to the girls in this family. Neither she nor Jack realized their father was an up-and-coming thug. He’d beaten Ridge senseless, put her in the hospital.

  The mastectomy she’d undergone a year before worsened her condition. She’d heard that Jack went after the thug in his own inimitable fashion and, for once, she was glad. Her recovery was slow and painful. She resolved never to be defenceless again. The hypocrisy of her life had begun in earnest then. Jack’s treatment of the thug was never legal, she knew that. She never openly acknowledged it. She was still a Guard and Jack persisted with his philosophy of the law being for courtrooms and justice being for alleyways.

  Her marriage had paid dividends, she was almost… almost ashamed to get the rank of sergeant. Torn asunder by that incident and the coldness of her marriage, she had three times a week begun to drive to Devon Park and park outside her old house. Same time those three days. Jack had always warned: never set up a routine; makes you a target. When her shift finished, it was as though her car headed for Devon Park. With a deep longing, she imagined Jenny, curled up on the sofa, dressed in her old track suit, eating chicken curry and watching reruns of The L Word. Her visits became so regular she began to notice the neighbors. Two men, in their late sixties, bang on nine, they’d walk their dogs, head for the Bal, have one pint and stroll back. There was something very comforting in the regularity of their habit.

  When the floods came, Ridge, like all the Public Sectors, was stretched to the limit. One Tuesday, after a day of ferocious depression, dealing with people who’d lost everything, she just could not face Anthony, who’d ask, without the slightest interest,

  “How was work dear?”

  And before she could spill all the pain and distress, he’d add,

  “A dry sherry perhaps, my sweet?”

  She’d want to scream,

  “Wake the fuck up, people’s homes are being washed away.”

  But he never actually asked about her work. Once, bone weary from the day, she’d tried,

  “Don’t you ever wonder about what I do?”

  Anything to break the impression of living in a Jane Austen novel.

  He’d raised one eyebrow in that infuriating manner, his tone one of mild reproach, said,

  “My dear, I’m sure you do it awfully well.”

  Then took out his po
cket watch, a fucking pocket watch! uttered,

  “Gosh, is that the time? I must to my chamber, we’re riding with the Athenry Hunt at seven.”

  The country was submerged in water but these barbarians insisted on hunting down and allowing a pack of hounds to tear asunder a terrorized fox. She’d jumped up, not quite startling him but definitely getting his attention. His eyes met hers. Usually he’d gaze at a spot just above her right shoulder. She stomped to the drinks cabinet and near shouted,

  “Jesus Christ, you’ve every spirit on the planet except Jameson.”

  He said,

  “There’s a rather fine claret I fetched from the cellar.”

  She glared at him, wanting to bury him in the fucking cellar.

  Grabbing a bottle of Glenfiddich, she poured it into a large, beautiful, handcrafted crystal tumbler.

  An heirloom from sweet old Mumsie!

  Turned to him, drained the glass, tried not to shudder when it hit her raw stomach, asked,

  “Guess what I got in the post this morning?”

  Paused.

  “Darling?”

  With that tolerant smile as outrider, he answered,

  “Not the foggiest dear.”

  Her head was awash in reptiles of resentment, rage, confusion.

  She bored into his eyes, said,

  “A headstone.”

  He was slightly bemused, tried,

  “A silly prank, no doubt.”

  Oh, Christ, she thought. She really needed to talk to Jack. Anthony was waiting expectantly, geared for some mildly verbal chess. Her anger drained away. She finished the whiskey, turned on her heel, and went to her room. When Anthony’s daughter had been around, it had been easier. You could put a Band-Aid on a seeping wound. But the girl was at finishing school in yeah… Switzerland.

  Ridge had barely finished any school.

  To aid her recovery from the savage beating, to vent and to try to restore her shattered confidence, she’d enrolled in a grueling kickboxing class. She was next to hopeless for a few weeks and the other students sneered at her. Drove her on. Then one day, it began to click. She took down the best student, and the Master, who claimed to be from Tibet, but was actually from Shantalla, actually bowed to her.

  Not only did it get her in shape, it emptied the simmering anger. On days when her muscles ached and her spirit cried,

  “Stop!” she’d mutter,

  “By all that’s holy, no man is ever… ever going to put his fucking hands on me again.”

  After the encounter with Anthony, after a fierce day of families in deep distress over the flooding, she was exhausted. When she left work, her spirits were as low as the final decade of the rosary. She longed for intimacy and her car just took its own self to Devon Park. She thought she’d just sit for an hour, let misery wash over her. Seeing the two regulars walking their dogs began the balm. She thought of Jack and, God knows, he was no angel, as maddening as Anthony, but he did listen to her, attentively. Despite their long decade of bruised, compromising, caring skirmishes, he remained an enigma. As likely to give twenty euros to a homeless person as bring his hurley to a bully. The time a guy had been verbally abusing his young boy in broad daylight, and Jack, oh sweet Jesus, Jack, he’d put the guy through a plate glass window.