The Abstainer

by Ian McGuire

  “Someone talked,” he says. “How else would O’Connor have known to be there at just the right time? If we knew who it was that blabbed, we could set Doyle straight. Sort it out that way.”

  Riley is still leaning over, with his hands on his knees, examining the fire. He turns his head to one side, then nods and straightens up.

  “That would fix it,” he agrees.

  “Who would have heard about their plan besides Doyle and Neary and the two of us? Did you ever speak about it at the alehouse? Did you overhear anything?”

  “There’s allus some loose talk as the night goes on,” he says. “You know how that is, Peter. You couldn’t stop it if you tried. But they’re all good fellows at the alehouse. You know they are. I’d swear by every one of them.”

  Rice scratches his neck and nods.

  “Tell me some more,” he says.

  Riley doesn’t answer straightaway. He winces and looks briefly pained, as if he is being asked to reveal a secret that he’d rather keep hidden.

  “That lad Sullivan from the tannery,” he says. “That night he took the oath, I may have said something to him about Doyle’s plan, just a little something to make him feel a part of it all like. But it can’t have been him.”

  “Why not?”

  “He’s only a lad. And he only just got here. Why would he be off telling tales?”

  “Was anyone else listening, or was it just you and him?”

  “Just the two of us. There’s allus some loose talk, it’s only natural.”

  Rice frowns and looks away.

  “You shouldn’t be talking to a private like that, Jack,” he says. “You know the fucken rules.”

  “Aye, but he’s a good lad, Sullivan. And he has no fondness for the coppers either. You should have seen him flatten that one before.”

  “What else do we know about him? Remind me.”

  Riley shakes his head.

  “He had that trouble over in New York. Some fellows were after him. That’s why he’s here now. He has a brother in Brooklyn still, and other family in Dublin somewhere. The Coombe, isn’t it?”

  “The Coombe,” Rice says. “That’s right. He has a cousin, George Sullivan, married a girl from my father’s village in Clare. He told me that.”

  “Well, there you are, then.”

  “Who else do we know from around there?”

  Riley thinks.

  “Tom MacRae comes from Cork Street,” he says. “That’s not so far away.”

  “You should talk to Tom MacRae, then. Find out if he knows anything about the Sullivans.”

  “There’ll be nothing to tell. He’s an honest lad, Michael. If I’d had any doubts at all, I’d have sent him on his way. Whoever talked to O’Connor, I can promise you, it wasn’t him.”

  The boy comes upstairs with a pot of tea, two cups, and a jug of milk on a wooden tray. Riley takes the tray from him and puts it on the table.

  “You know,” Rice says, “today at the lockup, after Maybury and O’Connor tried their nonsense on me, the next one called from the cells was Michael Sullivan. Directly after me. Why would they care so much about little Michael Sullivan, I wonder?”

  Riley shrugs.

  “That’s just coincidence. Nothing more,” he says. “Here you are.”

  He holds out the cup and Rice stands up to take it. He blows, takes two sips, then puts it down on the empty mantelpiece. He rubs his hands together and holds them out to the fire.

  “You go talk to Tom MacRae anyhow,” he says. “Find out what he knows. It can’t do us any harm.”

  CHAPTER 18

  O’Connor watches Alfred Patterson amble off down platform two, waits a minute more to be sure he is truly gone, then turns and goes back inside the Albion. The barman—oiled black hair, rolled-up shirtsleeves, a starched apron—gives him a sideways glance, and O’Connor licks his lips and points across to the brandy bottles. Every law, however needful, must have its limits, he thinks, and a drink will do me no harm right now after the fearsome night I’ve passed. Something to mend the shredded nerves, that’s all. It would be a cruel kind of man who would begrudge me that.

  His hand shakes as he lifts the glass. He can still smell the rank air of the mortuary, still see, if he closes his eyes, Malone’s pale, scarecrow body, sagged and lifeless on the wooden rack. It is the solitude of death that frightens him most. Not the pain but the loneliness. To see all the familiar details slip away, the places, the people, to know they are gone forever, that is the true horror, he thinks, not the pitchfork or the fires of hell. Blasphemy, of course, to think like that, to imagine you can understand the mysteries, but that is how it strikes him always. The cruelty of it, even if it makes no sense to think that way, that is how he feels.

  He has one more brandy, then pays and leaves. The news of Malone’s death will be general by now, he is sure. The evening newspapers will all carry their reports, there will be conversations in corridors and drawing rooms and bars, urgent letters will soon be written to the editor, and forceful speeches made in parliament. And how long will it all last: a week? a month? a year? Then there will be something else, another outrage more awful, yet somehow just the same. We are all marching on the same treadmill, he thinks, strapped to a great slow-turning wheel. We think we are moving forward, but we are only going around and around again.

  He stops at the Feathers, then at the Brunswick, then at the Shakespeare on Fountain Street. By the time he arrives back at the Town Hall, it is the late afternoon. Darkness is falling quickly, and the full moon is showing like a bruised fruit in the mold-black sky. His mood is changed from before. The tiredness and gloom are gone, and he feels a new kind of energy swelling inside him, febrile and vaguely belligerent. He remembers all the slights and insults he has suffered since his arrival in Manchester and tells himself he is a man maligned, a victim of ignorance and English prejudice. If the world was arranged as it should be, he thinks, according to reason and good sense, then I would be recognized and rewarded for who I am. Instead, I am mocked and belittled.

  He finds the detective office alive with rumors. There are reports of Doyle being seen as far away as Burnley and Southport, and a man fitting his description has just been arrested in Crewe. Some believe he must still be hiding out in Manchester, others that he has escaped abroad already, disguised as a priest or manservant, or hidden inside a beer barrel. When he asks Fazackerley’s opinion, Fazackerley tells him they have had men kicking down doors in Ancoats since midnight and it is clear as day that no one has a fucking clue where Doyle is, not even the Fenians themselves.

  “Where have you been hiding yourself anyway?” he says. “We’ve been looking out for you.”

  O’Connor shakes his head, as if the question is pointless.

  “I’ve been occupied,” he says.

  Fazackerley looks at him more closely, then leans in and sniffs.

  “Ah, Christ, no,” he says, stepping back again. “Not that, Jimmy. Not now.”

  “Just a brandy or two for the nerves,” O’Connor says. “That’s all it is. Would you begrudge me that?”

  “I don’t begrudge you a thing,” Fazackerley says. “Christ knows I’d likely be the same after the night you’ve had. But you can’t be here in that state. You know the regulations. Go home now. Go to bed and come back in the morning. If we find Doyle, then I’ll send a man to George Street to fetch you back. But I’m betting we won’t find him, not tonight at least.”

  O’Connor doesn’t answer. He has a blank, distracted look and when he speaks it is as if he is speaking to himself.

  “After he shot Malone, I swear I thought he’d shoot me too,” he says. “When he pointed that gun right at my forehead, I thought it was the end. God love me, I thought I was dead. I’ve been frightened before, but that wasn’t fear I felt, it was something else altogether. I don’t know the r
ight word for it. Perhaps there isn’t one.”

  “It’s a bad business all around,” Fazackerley says. “I know that. I feel it myself. We all do. But it won’t do to soften now, when there’s still work to be done.”

  O’Connor straightens himself and blinks. He doesn’t want to go home yet. The thought of lying alone in bed with his racing thoughts appalls him.

  “Where’s Rice?” he says. “Did you follow him like we said?”

  “He’s with Jack Riley above the butcher’s on Tib Street. We’ve got Barton in one of the shops opposite keeping an eye open in case Doyle ever shows himself. Though I don’t believe he ever will.”

  “I could go over there now. Keep Barton company awhile. What do you think?”

  “He doesn’t need any company, Jimmy. You should go on home, like I told you. We can talk about it all tomorrow.”

  O’Connor shakes his head and looks away. Through the window he sees Franklin the lamplighter with his bent back and his ladder and pole working his way up King Street. I’m tired of being pushed aside, he thinks, passed over as if I’m nothing. He glares at Fazackerley, as if Fazackerley has become the distillation and the cause of all his miseries.

  “Frank Malone might still be alive now, if you’d sent me Michael Sullivan’s message when you first got it. Christ almighty, the lad risks his life, and when he gives you what you asked for, you let it sit there as if it’s nothing.”

  He’s talking louder now, shouting almost, and waving his hands around. Sanders, who is sitting close by, writing a report, puts his pen down and looks up. Fazackerley looks back at him and shakes his head.

  “Jimmy’s upset, that’s all,” he says. “It doesn’t matter.”

  “He should show some more respect,” Sanders says.

  Fazackerley pats O’Connor on the shoulder and smiles.

  “Come on now, Jimmy,” he says.

  O’Connor shrugs it off. I’ve stayed quiet too long, he thinks, I’ve let other men drown me out. He feels more words, scathing and necessary, gathering on his tongue.

  “Sanders?” he says, turning. “What the hell do you know?”

  “I know Frank Malone’s lying dead with a Fenian bullet inside him, and you’re standing here without nary a scratch on you. I know you Irish bastards like to stick together.”

  O’Connor shakes his head and breathes out slowly. His lips and tongue are dark with spittle, and he is sweating although the room is not even warm. He tucks his chin into his chest and looks up, like a schoolmaster addressing a dunce.

  “By Christ, I’ve met some dull and dim-witted fuckers in my time,” he says, “I truly have. But you must take the crown.”

  Sanders’ eyes open wide in outrage. He jumps up from behind the desk and grabs O’Connor by the throat with both hands. They struggle awkwardly for a moment, grunting and gasping, their boot heels scraping and banging against the bare floorboards, before the others step across to break it up. They push Sanders down into a chair and hold him there, and Fazackerley tugs O’Connor out into the empty corridor.

  “That Sanders is a great prick,” he says, “but you’ve become a fucking mischief maker. You go home now, like I told you to, and don’t show your face back here until you’re in a fit state.”

  O’Connor is unrepentant. He is happy to have things in the open now, happy to shake off the falsehoods and evasions at last.

  “Doyle’s still close by, you know,” he says. “I’m sure of it. He won’t give up.”

  “You leave Doyle to us.”

  “I’ve seen him in the flesh. Heard him talk, remember. He was standing just as close to me as you are now.”

  “And you think you understand him because of it? Is that right?”

  “He’s a man, that’s all, not so very different from you or me.”

  “Christsake,” Fazackerley says. “You best not let the others hear you talk like that.”

  “I don’t much care what they think. I’m finished here. You know I am.”

  Fazackerley lets go of his arm and looks at him.

  “You take it all too hard, Jimmy,” he says. “You always have done. A man can’t live that way.”

  “You’re saying I bring it on myself?”

  “That’s not what I’m saying.”

  O’Connor turns aside. Rain is beating against the windowpane, and there is a low hiss, like a half-heard whisper, from the gas mantle on the wall above their heads.

  “By the time you know anything, it’ll already be too late,” he says. “Doyle will be away and gone. I promise you.”

  “We’ll see about that.”

  They go outside together, and Fazackerley puts him into a hackney and tells the driver to drive to George Street. After half a mile, O’Connor leans out and calls for him to stop. He pays what he owes and sends the cab away. The evening is cold and the steady rain lends a dull polish to the muddy cobbles and to the smoke-blackened walls. He stops in the Unicorn, then makes his way toward Tib Street. The drink has cleared his mind, given him new strength and power. I’ll follow my own lead from now on, he tells himself, I’ve had enough of other men’s advisements. I’ll take the saddle off my back and the bit from my mouth and do, for once, as I see fit. When he gets to the corner of Whittle Street he looks about for Barton. He finds him eventually, seated in the window of the chemist’s shop across the road from O’Shaughnessy’s. His face is half-concealed behind the bottles of hair oil and dusty cartons of Epsom salts and toilet soap.

  “Changing of the guard,” O’Connor tells him lightly. “You can go on home now.”

  Barton doesn’t question it. He is young, newly married, and eager, O’Connor imagines, to get back for his supper.

  “Anything new to report?”

  Barton shakes his head.

  “Riley left a few hours ago, but Peter Rice is still up there.”

  “On his own, then?”

  “Far as I can tell.”

  “I’ll take the gun too,” O’Connor says, guessing there must be one.

  Barton gives it to him and O’Connor checks it is loaded properly before dropping it into his jacket pocket.

  “They don’t need you at King Street until the morning,” O’Connor tells him. “Fazackerley knows all about it.”

  “So they haven’t found him yet?” Barton says.

  “Not yet but it won’t be long. It’s all in hand.”

  After Barton leaves, he takes off his jacket and settles himself down into the chair. He keeps careful watch for nearly an hour but sees nothing. There is a light glowing in the window above the butcher’s shop, but no other sign of life or movement from inside. The chemist, short, middle-aged, with straggly gray hair and a dubious, world-weary look, is standing behind the counter pressing pills and sorting them into bottles. O’Connor turns and asks him if he has ever seen a man shot, and the chemist frowns and says he hasn’t ever seen such a thing and he doesn’t hope to either.

  “Doyle may surrender without a fight,” O’Connor says. “That’s possible too.”

  “Or else he won’t appear at all. That other one, Barton, told me he’s most probably miles away by now. Said this here is just a sideshow and the real business is going on elsewhere.”

  O’Connor shakes his head.

  “He’ll come by here. I know he will.”

  “Made you a promise, did he?”

  “It’s a feeling I have.”

  The chemist snorts.

  “Feelings is for girls,” he says.

  “He’ll be here,” O’Connor repeats. “And when he comes, you’ll be my witness to what happens next.”

  “I should charge you rent for that there chair,” the chemist says, pointing to it. “Sixpence an hour. What do you say?”

  “I say you can talk to the chief constable about it,” O’Connor answers.
“Mr. Palin. You’ll find him to be a most pleasant and genial kind of fellow. Generous with his money too.”

  “Will I now?”

  O’Connor laughs. The chemist shakes his head and goes back to pressing pills. After a minute, the door chimes and a young woman comes in, a factory hand in a grubby blue gown with a scarf over her head seeking something for her pounding headaches. The chemist asks her some questions, then mixes up a bottle and charges her a shilling. When she is gone, O’Connor gets up from the chair and puts his jacket and hat back on. He is feeling restless and the heat and smell of the place are making him queasy.

  “I’m going outside for a spell,” he says. “Walk about, get some air.”

  CHAPTER 19

  When Riley returns, unobserved by James O’Connor, to the room above O’Shaughnessy’s, it is just past nine o’clock. Peter Rice is snoozing openmouthed by the fireplace amid a scattered wreckage of dinner plates, newspapers, and teacups. Riley shakes him awake and explains what he has learned on his travels. Rice listens, then sits up straighter in his chair and asks him to repeat it over again, but more gradually.

  “And you’re sure of all this?” he says when Riley has finished.

  Riley nods.

  “About as sure as I can be.”

  “If it’s true, then we’ve both been made to look like fools,” Rice says.

  Riley nods again and grimaces.

  “I can’t hardly believe it myself,” he says. “I truly can’t.”

  “And where has he got to now?”

  “We don’t know that, but there are some boys out looking. When they find him, they’ll bring him direct to the tannery. That’s what I told them to do.”

  Peter Rice shifts about, scowls, and reaches for his pipe.

  “Of all the fucken nonsense,” he says. “Of all the fucken, fucken nonsense.”

  “I know, Peter. It’s a great surprise to me, I can tell you.”

  “You should never have believed him in the first place. Lad walks in from nowhere, why would you give him any credence at all? Why would you offer him the time of fucken day?”