Angels in the Moonlight_A prequel to The Dublin Trilogy

by Caimh McDonnell

  “Yes,” said Ferguson, “well, I imagine we’ll both have to spend quite a lot of time explaining that to an inquiry at some point. Charging in against former Army Rangers. Christ.”

  “Yes, sir. O’Shea caught one in the chest. One of the robbers took one in the leg, then they made good their escape.”

  Ferguson looked up at the ceiling. “So, can we nail these bastards? Can your officers identify them?”

  “Well, yes and no. The raiders were wearing masks the whole time, so neither DS Cunningham nor DS Spain could make a positive ID, but, as I said, one of the raiders was shot in the leg. We just picked up Carter, Doyle and Moran from their houses. They returned a couple of hours ago, and no doubt they’ll have a rock-solid, multiple-witness alibi for where they’ve been. That leaves O’Donnell, who’s still out there somewhere, hopefully badly wounded and with nowhere to run. That’s how we’ll get them, sir.”

  “Yes,” said Ferguson, “assuming Carter didn’t put two in the back of his own man’s head already.”

  O’Rourke said nothing. The possibility of that having happened had already occurred to him.

  A silence descended on the room for a moment. Ferguson threw his legs off the desk and dragged his considerable bulk to his feet. He belched and then raised his glass. “Devane, Wallace, McCall, McGrath, Hodgson, Murphy, Laidlaw, Murphy again, Smith, Gallagher, O’Shea.”

  O’Rourke looked up at Ferguson in confusion.

  The commissioner lowered his glass. “When you get this job, as you probably will one day, Fintan, those are the names that will haunt your every waking moment. They’ll be there, to slip in and rain on the best of days. It’s what this job does to you. Some of them will have died as part of a road accident while on duty, others dealing with some raving loon off his meds with a carving knife, or side-swiped by some idiot drunk who thought he could make a break for it rather than blow in a bloody bag. It doesn’t matter, every one will be your fault, and I guarantee you, the names will be burned into your very soul.”

  O’Rourke stood and raised his glass. Ferguson repeated the list. “Devane, Wallace, McCall, McGrath, Hodgson, Murphy, Laidlaw, Murphy again, Smith, Gallagher, O’Shea.” They both drank.

  Ferguson placed his glass down, picked up his cigar and drew a lighter from his pocket.

  “Tomorrow, you and I shall both go and see the widow, assuming she will allow it. Kids?”

  O’Rourke nodded. “Two, sir – third on the way.”

  Ferguson went very quiet, staring at the goldfish bowl in the corner, which was minus a goldfish. Then he sparked his lighter and puffed the cigar into life. “Most of the time,” he said around the cigar, “there’s no one who you can assuage those voices with. No one to blame. Or if there is, it’s some pathetic fool, and that offers no satisfaction. That is not the case this time.”

  Ferguson drew a long drag on his cigar and blew the smoke out slowly. “This time, I have someone to blame and a pound of flesh to extract. I got off the phone with the minister thirty minutes ago. I offered the snivelling little shit a choice – either we get carte blanche or else he has my resignation, and the assurance that I will go out ugly. He rang his daddy, the whining little weasel, and after some spiel in which he pretended he had some say in it, he gave us the green light.”

  Ferguson moved around his desk. “We go hard, Fintan, harder than Carter can possibly expect. Everyone they know, everyone they’ve ever met, we drag ’em in. That estate wants to provide alibis for their wayward sons, fine – but it comes at a cost. If any of them has so much as a parking ticket, they get the full service.” Ferguson began jabbing his finger at the air, warming to his subject. “We squeeze and we squeeze until people are queuing up to rat these bastards out to save their own skins. The Irish public, ungrateful and gormless as they may often appear, will not stand for a member of An Garda Síochána being gunned down in the line of duty by some pathetic excuse of a man. We cry havoc, and let slip the dogs of war.”

  As if on cue, the battered smoke alarm on the floor issued a plaintive, beeping warble.

  Ferguson stepped forward, and in one decisive stomp, obliterated it.

  “In other words,” he said, “Tommy Carter is going down.”

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Tara Flynn nervously polished a glass that didn’t need it. She’d only been working in O’Hagan’s for a week, but she liked the job and she wanted to keep it. Before this, she’d spent a miserable week as a waitress before getting fired, and a worse week as a barmaid in Deegan’s – avoiding the wandering hands and paint-stripping halitosis of the owner, Phil – before she quit. This job she liked, and she wanted to break her previous record for employment longevity and make it to day number eight. The currently developing situation, however, might prevent that. They should have closed up and gone home an hour ago, but their “guest” was refusing to leave. Normally, he would have been slung out as soon as he’d tried to start a fight, but allowances had been made. Instead, they’d corralled him into the snug in the back bar and tried to get some coffee into him. Tara chewed her lip nervously. She shouldn’t be in charge of coping with this, but Graham, the manager, had phoned in sick and she was the only member of bar staff on. That left just her and the two bouncers: Brian and his uncle Anthony. Brian had been all in favour of chucking their unwanted guest out, but his uncle had preached caution and given Tara the number to ring.

  There was a bang on the door. Anthony got up, slid the bolts back and opened it. With a nod, the distinctive figure of Bunny McGarry strode in. She may have only worked there a week, but some men made an impression.

  “Where is he?”

  Tara pointed towards the snug, “Back there.”

  Bunny nodded.

  “Yeah,” said Brian, “and you’d want to tell him to mind his bleedin’ manners or he’s getting a slap.”

  Bunny was eye to eye with him before Brian could finish raising his pint to his lips. “Excuse me?”

  Anthony rushed over, putting a placating hand on McGarry’s arm. “Don’t mind him, Bunny, he’s only a stupid young fella.” He glared at Brian. “He doesn’t have the sense he was born with. I apologise.”

  Bunny looked at Anthony again, then nodded. He turned about on his heels and headed off in the direction of the snug. Once he’d departed, Anthony caught Brian with a vicious clout around the ear.

  “What da f—?”

  Anthony grabbed a handful of his nephew. “What did I tell you? They lost a man last night. Have a bit of common sense, would ye?”

  Tara picked up another glass and gave it a cleaning it didn’t need. This was turning into a long day.

  “Well, look at the sorry state of ye.”

  Gringo looked up from staring balefully into the bottom of his empty pint glass. A pint of water and a cup of cold coffee sat untouched on the table beside him.

  “Bunny!” he roared enthusiastically. “My amigo. Pull up a stool. Drinks for everybody!” He started pounding on the table.

  “Think you’ve had enough there, fella. You look like something a wino threw up and felt all the better for being rid of.”

  “Well, I feel fantastic. Thanks for asking. Got a couple of free days’ holiday – compassionate leave. That’s what you get for having a perfectly good T-shirt ruined by Dara O’Shea’s blood.” He raised his glass. “Cheap at twice the price.”

  “You’re drunk, and you’re being an arsehole.”

  “Well now, look who’s talking.”

  “Yeah, me, your best friend. And if you keep on like this, your only friend.”

  “Ha, with friends like you, who needs enemas.” Gringo’s voice was slurred and his eyes were glassy, his gaze wandering around the edges of the room.

  “You’re a hoot. Last I heard, you were in giving your official statement, then you disappeared. First I could find of you, you’re here trying to start a fight with some student from Trinity College.”

  “Ah, that prick, ye should’ve seen him Bunny, just the
face alone . . . Him and his face.”

  “Yeah, he sounds like a monster alright.”

  Gringo picked up his pint glass. “Can we get some bastard service here? Here, love, why don’t you wiggle your fine arse over . . .”

  Bunny slapped him across the face. Not hard, but enough to stop Gringo in his tracks.

  “I’m not having that.”

  “Oh yes, I forgot, the mighty moral Bunny McGarry. Defender of ladies’s virtue everywhere. Fuck you.”

  “Back at ye.”

  Gringo looked down at his empty glass a long moment, a slight tremor in his hand. “Go on, ask me.”

  “What?”

  “You know what.”

  “Not here and not now,” said Bunny.

  “Why? Have ye somewhere else to be – or someone else to be in? Don’t let me keep you.”

  Bunny sighed. “You need to listen to me now, Gringo. You don’t have time for this.”

  “For what? I’ve got all the time in the world.” He spread his arms out expansively and grinned a drunken grin.

  Bunny thumped his fist on the table. “This! You don’t have time for this shite. We’ve been here before. Hell, I could almost set my watch by it. These are the dark days, where you go down to this place and nobody can reach you. All I can do is follow you down and make sure you don’t hurt yourself or someone else. And I’m fine with that, it’s what friends are for, but I’m telling you, you don’t have time for this bullshit now.”

  Gringo gave a drunken sneer. “Oh please, impart more of your wisdom, oh wise one. Think you’re so clever.” His voice became a sing-song. “I know something you don’t know.”

  “Fantastic. Come on, we’re going.”

  Gringo rubbed the pint glass over his forehead. “We’re not going anywhere until you ask me the question.”

  “Like I said, not here and not now.”

  Gringo slammed the pint glass down on the table. “Yes here, and yes now. Let’s really clear the air. It’s going to be quite the evening. For me and you and your little black whore—”

  Bunny reached across and grabbed Gringo by the shirt collar, pulling him roughly across the table and sending its contents crashing to the floor in a wet crescendo of breaking glass and crockery. “I know what you’re doing. You don’t mean any of this shite. You just want somebody to give you the kicking you think you deserve. Well, any more bollocks like that and I’ll grant your wish. Now come on, we’re going.”

  Bunny stood, grabbing Gringo under the arm. He turned and headed for the fire door down by the toilets. Tara peeked out of the serving hatch, a worried expression on her face. Bunny stopped momentarily. “Very sorry about this.” He pulled a couple of notes from his pocket and slapped them onto the counter. “For the damages.”

  “Put it on my tab,” said Gringo.

  “He’s not normally this much of a gobshite.”

  “I am, I just keep it hidden.”

  Bunny propelled Gringo down the hall, kicked open the fire door and hurled him out into the drizzling rain. Gringo staggered a few feet and then flopped against the skip, propping himself up on its grubby side. Bunny followed, slamming the fire door behind him.

  “Look, Bunny, we’re in an alley. This is where you do all your best work.”

  “You’re not in the least bit amusing.”

  Gringo turned. “Maybe I’m not trying to be. Go on, ask me.”

  “I don’t want to know.”

  “Ha. Like hell. I bet you already do. I saw that look in your eyes last night. Your big thick gorilla routine doesn’t work on me, remember? I know you. You’re smarter than you let on, and we both know you never let anything go. So go on, ask me.”

  “No.”

  “Go on. You have questions, I know you do. Whose idea was it? Cunningham’s, that’s whose. Well, at least she was the one who approached me . . .”

  “Shut up, Gringo.”

  “Her and O’Shea. They knew – knew I was in trouble. I’ve . . . I can’t pay my debts. I can’t even pay the interest on my debts. I’ve a soon-to-be ex-wife and a mother who just won’t die. And they have connections, you see. Cunningham knows things. Or at least, she knows a man who does.”

  “Why didn’t you—”

  Gringo kicked his foot back into the dumpster. “Oh for. . . why didn’t I come to you? This! Because of this! This disappointed brother routine. I’m fucking sick of it.”

  “I’ll tell you your problem, ye fecking idiot, you don’t want help. You just want to see how badly you can fuck up.”

  Gringo staggered forward, close enough that Bunny could smell the stale-booze stench on his breath. “Well, I think I’ve finally found out. Our simple little ambush was going to get us sixteen million quid in uncut diamonds, clean and clear, while simultaneously taking down that shower of pricks – but it got us nothing but O’Shea dead and me and Cunningham looking at long stretches in prison.”

  “What did you expect? Why didn’t you come to me and talk about this?”

  “They wanted to, but I said . . . I said you’d never go for it. You’re too moral.” He almost spat the last word.

  “And you’re too stupid. I think you wanted to be caught. D’ye know how easy it was for me to find out? Magpie Mary lives over the canal, saw the whole fecking thing. Two minutes.”

  Gringo grabbed tufts of his hair in his hands, a moment of clarity amidst the drunken rage. “Oh Jesus.”

  “Relax. She only talked to me and I told her to keep schtum. Most of the rest of them will probably just dismiss her as some mad old loon. She’s not exactly grade A witness material. She’s not your problem – the forensics are your problem. I presume you’ve figured that out?”

  Gringo said nothing, just looked at the hazy raindrops dancing on the surface of the puddle in the centre of the alley.

  “Cunningham tried her best, I’ll grant you that. When you were sitting there, getting covered in her partner’s blood, she ran out to the car, didn’t she? You couldn’t ambush Carter’s boys with your service weapons, obviously, so you had other guns, right?”

  Gringo nodded.

  “So, she ran back, dumped the dodgy ones and the balaclavas in her boot and grabbed your legal ones. Then you pop off a few rounds, because you can’t be in a gunfight where you didn’t shoot back. That’ll muddy the water, but they’re going to find more bullets than they’ve got explanations for. Did you honestly think that’d convince anyone for very long?”

  “She said . . . We didn’t expect . . .”

  “O’Shea to get shot? No kidding. Carter’s crew struck you as go-quietly types, did they?”

  Gringo lowered his voice. “We had them cold. We knew where they were going to be, so we waited, but . . .”

  “But what?”

  “I had O’Donnell in my sights, clean shot, but I . . . I couldn’t take the shot. And he fired, hit O’Shea. It’s my fault.”

  Bunny lowered his voice. “No, no it isn’t. O’Shea knew what he was getting himself into, and the lad who pulled the trigger is the one responsible. You’re not a cold-blooded killer.”

  “Not like you, hey Bunny?”

  Bunny looked hard at Gringo, his face twitching with barely suppressed rage. “Keep going the way you’re going, Gringo, see what happens.”

  Gringo spat on the ground and leaned back drunkenly “Oh, I’m just getting warmed up. I’m going to get that bastard Carter, you see if I don’t.”

  Bunny threw his hands up in the air. “Christ, Gringo, would you get a grip. Tomorrow morning, every copper in Dublin is after Carter and his boys. I just heard – they gave them nothing under interrogation and the searches produced zero, so they’ll be let go. Ferguson personally gave the go ahead to squeeze the life out of them and anyone stupid enough to be in their general vicinity. If their story of how Gardaí tried to ambush them comes out, it’ll be enough to get questions asked – and you two aren’t going to have enough answers.”

  “Christ.”

  “So you need
to stop feeling sorry for yourself, and start thinking. I’ll try to help you but—”

  “I don’t need your help.”

  “Yeah, you’re doing a super job on your own. Look at you, stinking drunk and drowning in self-pity. Part of you wanted this – you know that, right? You want to punish yourself because Daddy left you and Mummy didn’t love you.”

  From anyone else, Bunny would have seen the punch coming. As it was, he only managed to turn his face at the last second, so the impact busted his lip as opposed to breaking his jaw. Gringo was spun around with the momentum of his own swing; Bunny kicked the legs from under him and Gringo landed messily in the large puddle.

  “You finished? Or does baby want to continue with his stupid fecking tantrum?”

  Gringo looked up at him, something in his expression that Bunny had never seen before. “Think you’re so smart, don’t you Bunny? You’re as big a fuck-up as I am.”

  “I’m not the one with his arse in a puddle.”

  “No, you’re the one fucking the murderer.”

  The words hung in the air, silent save for the patter of the rain, steadily increasing in ferocity.

  Bunny looked down at Gringo, a confused buzzing in his ears. “What?”

  “When she didn’t want to press charges on Ryan, I got suspicious.”

  Bunny could feel an icy cold in his stomach. “What did you do?”

  “Do?” he said, defiance in his voice now. “I looked out for you, that’s what I did. I got that guy we know at the US Embassy, from the thing, to do some checks. Remember a couple of weeks ago when you were standing at the bar chatting to Simone and I took a picture? Well, that was me being a devious prick. I asked him to run it against their facial recognition. It came back with a partial match, but it was her. Simone Watson is actually Simone Delamere – she didn’t even change her first name, for Christ’s sake. Murdered a man last year in New York.”

  “And you just . . .” Bunny took a step towards Gringo, towering over him. His hands clenched into fists.

  “I covered it up. Told the guy it was a fool’s errand, we’d already definitively identified the woman in the picture as someone entirely different. Told him to get his computer checked.”