A stone of the heart imm-1

by John Brady

  Cummins and Kehoe knew the Avenue. Each separately wondered if the driver of the Merc did. There was a good chance that there were some kids knocking about at the bottom of the Avenue.

  Kehoe was travelling at eighty and the Merc was still pulling away. The Vauxhall bottomed out on a dip in the road surface. Kehoe had put the odds at about even: the Mercedes had the power and the handling, but it had to open a path in the traffic too. Dispatch, a girl with a Cork accent, told them there was a unit turning up Merrion Avenue to meet them. She cut off and the other car radioed that it was passing Sion Hill School. The driver of the Merc didn't use the brakes at all now. He swung it across the road or even passed on the inside. The distance between the cars was widening. Then Kehoe spotted the flicker of blue light atop the other police car in the distance. At the same time, the brake lights on the Merc glowed. In an instant, the Mercedes had turned off to the right. The driver had almost lost it. The yellow car had skidded to face almost completely up the Avenue. The tires left greying smoke in the wake of the car. Time yet, Kehoe thought.

  The Vauxhall roared into the street behind the Mercedes. Cummins shouted that there was a cul-de-sac up on the left. Kehoe looked in the mirror to see the other police car come swaying into the street at speed. Ahead of the Merc, a County Council dustbin lorry was backing out onto the road. The Mercedes swung wildly to the left and careened into the cul-de-sac. Kehoe laughed aloud. Cummins groaned inwardly because it looked like another episode of leaping over walls and through bushes. They might be lucky. Maybe the Merc would crash and give them the chance to put the heavy hand on these fellas. The other police car was closing in behind them. Four against three. Shag it, Cummins thought, and he hoped to God that there was some fit lad in the car behind to do the leaping and jumping. Lucky there was no one on the street. The Merc sped up.

  "How far ahead?" Kehoe shouted.

  "Around the bend there's a crescent and that's it," Cummins replied.

  The Vauxhall rocked and squealed over the concrete roadway. As it swayed around the bend, Kehoe saw a housewife look up from the plants near her front door, her hand full of weeds and a trowel in the other hand. Then a yellow shape appeared across the roadway ahead of them. Two men were jumping out the doors on the far side of the car. The driver was shouldering his door on this side. Kehoe stood on the brakes and with screaming tires, the Vauxhall dredged into the road.

  Cummins was thinking: watch out, the lads are coming up fast behind. Kehoe was looking at the heads which appeared over the roof of the Mercedes. They're not running, Kehoe thought. They're not running; isn't that a queer turn of events?

  The Vauxhall was slowing, skidding sideways. Cummins felt and heard a pat somewhere in the body of the car. Pebbles? More. Then something like one of those sticker things against the window, those joke bulletholes. One of the men ran out from behind the Mercedes. He was carrying some kind of torch, flashing it at them. The windscreen whitened and a chunk of it fell out onto the bonnet. The Vauxhall was almost stopped now, grinding down on the suspension on Kehoe's side. Kehoe grunted and sighed. Something went through the car, then another and another, in and out the windows.

  Isn't that odd? Cummins thought. It's me who should be leaning up against Kehoe the way the bloody car is going, not the other way around. Anyone would think he was trying to give me a feel. His hands are all over the place. Something hit Cummins in the side of the face. A warm snowball, like a sod you'd clip from the field when you missed with your kick at the ball. Sore thing, that…

  The siren had stopped. Someone was breaking glass. Before the car had stopped-at the very instant that Cummins looked at his partner-their car was hit by the patrol car which had come into the cul-de-sac behind them. Cummins' belt bit into his neck and his head shot out in reaction to the shock. The door was coming in at him. Everything became suddenly glarybright and the world turned sideways, then over. Cummins' car rolled but once before it hit the Mercedes. It came to rest on its side. Without turning his head, Cummins could see Kehoe half hung in his belt above him. His head and shoulders had slipped out and lay partly on Cummins. Bright red splashes covered the roof of the car and Cummins could feel the absurd drip soaking further into his navy blue uniform. Cummins felt uncomfortably hot as the darkness which welled in through the windows from the sideways world outside gathered him.

  Minogue stood in the doorway of the building which housed Allen's office. He stroked his upper lip between thumb and finger. A group of passing students looked at Minogue and awoke him. Loftus he discounted. He was engaged in the administration of his fiefdom and his loyalties to the university and an old army buddy of his. Chivalry my royal Irish arse. Allen? Minogue gave it a chance.

  He walked up the staircase slowly. On the way he stepped around a woman on her knees, washing the steps. That could be that Brosnahan woman doing that, Minogue thought. Maybe her knees'd give out soon or she'd have arthritis for her pains. He knocked, expecting and hoping that Allen wouldn't be there. Bugger: Allen's face appeared in the doorway.

  "Sergeant," he said.

  "Good day to yourself, Doctor. I hope you can spare me some of your time."

  "Just a few loose ends, Sergeant?" Allen asked.

  "I beg your pardon," Minogue said.

  A smile crossed Allen's face briefly. Minogue thought he saw irritation replace it. Maybe something else.

  "Nothing really. It's just that I expected you to say something like that. Like the films or the television. Yes, I can spare you about ten minutes. Will that be enough?"

  Minogue marvelled at the mixture of sentiments which Allen's remark could conceal. There were touches of sarcasm undoubtedly, and even a little arrogance too. There were also traces of relief and apprehension. In a strange sense he seemed relieved to see Minogue, almost resigned in some way, but he was guarded.

  Minogue stepped into the room. The place was cluttered with books. Some order informed it all though, Minogue's glance affirmed. Allen sat next to his desk. Minogue noticed Allen's eyes. They seemed bigger than normal, whiter. Perhaps they were more opened. He looked as though he had just run up the stairs or he had been walking for some time.

  Behind Allen, a view of the greenery and trees of New Square was framed in the tall window.

  "Oh, I think I get it all right. I really should polish up my lines. You're quite right about the loose ends, I don't mind telling you. I'll be calling them straws soon enough. Where there's life…"

  Allen, his arms folded, was displaying a patience which was not easy for him, Minogue realised. He was privately pleased that Allen should be uncomfortable.

  "To follow up on every little thing," Minogue continued. "I need to convince my superiors and myself that this is not some lunatic random thing."

  Allen frowned.

  "Yes. I suppose that I've hidden my light under a bushel, Doctor. Do you know that I hadn't even admitted to myself out loud in the middle of the day that this simply couldn't be a random thing? Well, there you have the gist of it. We can't escape it. I feel badly that I don't have some class of solid stuff for my superiors to digest, you know. It's like I can trace out elements, but I can't put things together in a way that appears rational. I'm waiting for a part of my brain to catch up with me," Minogue allowed himself a grin before continuing.

  "Yes. What do you call it, free association. Like we allow ourselves to believe certain things without even stopping to think. We don't know the half of it, do we? A hint here, a suggestion there. It's my experience that people are easily led, if you know what I mean."

  Allen eased himself in his chair a little.

  "I think I follow you. Your technique for thinking out loud is a very good exercise. What I'm asking myself though is why you do it here."

  "Ah, there's a good one indeed, Doctor. I confess I was drawn to your office by the need of your insight. I mean that I think I'm up the garden path at the moment. For instance, the drug thing you mentioned to me. I'm stymied by it. Agnes McGuire knew nothing of
his interests in that line. He wasn't the kind of lad to hold back, was he? I mean, that was almost a failing in him, the way he had so much to say, to offer. He was naive, like."

  "Well, he'd hardly advertise it to someone he wanted to impress, Sergeant," Allen observed.

  "So you put some store in the whole thing then?" Minogue asked quickly.

  "Actually I'm almost sorry I mentioned it at all. You seem to be saying that it is a red herring."

  "Were you aware that an anonymous note had come to the college security officer, Captain Loftus, suggesting that Jarlath Walsh might be involved in drugs?"

  "Matter of fact I was. I'll grant it may have coloured my interpretation of the questions he was asking me. Like I said, I'm almost regretting having told you about this in the first place…"

  Allen sat back in the chair and folded his arms again. Then, like a cloud passing over his face, Minogue watched the idea come to Allen. Allen leaned forward slowly.

  "I have the distinct feeling that you're not asking what you really want to ask me, Sergeant, but you're trying to provoke me in a way."

  Full marks, Minogue thought. Go to the top of the class. Did it really look that obvious?

  Minogue said nothing. He watched what looked like indignation loosen Allen's manner. Finally he said:

  "Doctor, I'm sorry if I left you with that impression. I wonder if I might ask you to sleep on the matter. Any small details or memories that come to you. A remark in class, a fellow student, anything."

  "You think I'm concealing something, don't you?" Allen said.

  "Not at all. I haven't been able to firm up anything on this effort about the drugs, you see, and it's distracting me. I must be a very suggestible person."

  Not fooled for a minute, Minogue thought. Allen's gaze suggested a knowingness but an amused ambivalence too. Maybe he was working hard at not being rude, Minogue considered. Hard to blame him, with a detective who is flying by the seat of his drawers.

  Minogue returned to the room he had been lent in Front Square. He determined to make an early day of it. At least it had stopped raining. Walking to the carpark, he found himself searching the faces of passing students for any signs of a son or a daughter. Were they all the same, students?

  Climbing into the car, he assigned the day a four out of ten. Little remained of the rain except a saturated city and oily roads. Could it be that they might get a bit of sun?

  Minogue wanted to sneeze but the sensation passed. A police car with sirens and lights going full blast went by him as he rounded into College Green. Damn and blast it, he thought. It would be better if he at least phoned Kilmartin's office and checked in. Go by the book. Minogue stopped at two phone-boxes in succession. Both had been vandalized. Reluctantly, he drove up Dame Street toward the Castle. Another police car passed him at the lights at George's Street, screaming away. Maybe it was a bank robbery, another one.

  Outside Kilmartin's office there was no work being done. Several uniformed Gardai sat on the edges of tables, smoking. Minogue could hear the monitored voices of men out in the streets, patrolling. The voices and clicks drifted down from the dispatch room. Nobody in Kilmartin's office. Minogue strolled toward the dispatch room, nodding at several Gardai as he passed them.

  "Inspector Kilmartin, lads?"

  "He's above in dispatch, sir," a Garda replied.

  Kilmartin was sitting in a chair next to one of the girls. She was studiously concentrating on her earphones, nervous at his presence. He was smoking a cigarette. He stood up when he noticed Minogue and he walked over to the doorway.

  "Did you hear about it?"

  "What now?" Minogue asked.

  "They shot our lads out in Blackrock. It's still going on. They got the driver, but the two fellas with the shooters are on the loose still."

  Minogue felt an approaching swell. He waited. Kilmartin was mooching about for someplace to kill the butt of his cigarette. His arm was wavering. Minogue felt light, cold. The day was transformed. Somehow the room looked lurid. It pressed in on him.

  "The IRA or the INLA or whatever crowd, I'll wager. One of our lads was killed outright. The other one's alive," Kilmartin murmured, still wandering around the room. Minogue was taken up with watching the girl's nervousness as Kilmartin paced.

  "Only a pack of animals would react to a uniform like that. They have automatic rifles. The place is upside down so it is. They have a cordon up. The army and the whole shebang is there."

  "Where?" Minogue heard himself asking.

  Kilmartin stopped walking.

  "Out near the bottom of Merrion Avenue, near enough to Blackrock."

  As hard as he tried, Minogue couldn't get the taste out of his mouth. The fear was like cheese on his breath. It sticks in your throat, it actually chokes you, he thought. Smell it on your breath.

  CHAPTER NINE

  The tanned man replaced the phone and walked over to the window. His room at the Shelbourne overlooked St. Stephen's Green. He watched couples and children and old people enter the Green. They haven't a clue, he thought, about what goes on less than a hundred miles from here.

  Parked cars glutted the streets around the hotel. No one feared that one might contain a bomb. No searches, no midnight raids by troops. The shops were full, the pubs were open. A soft city in a soft country. It even made visitors soft. People became so flaccid that they feared slight changes to their self-satisfied equilibrium. A decision had to be made within the hour. The danger was in over-reacting, of pouncing too soon.

  The Green was swollen with trees and shrubs, all dense with the day's rain. The tanned man was thinking of Minogue. The photo showed a tall man in a cheap suit walking in the Front Square of Trinity College. Totally out of place. A redneck. There was something cautious and reluctant about the face. Soft, maybe. He didn't put his hands in his pockets walking. Certainly not stupid. Was it possible that this Minogue had a hidden sense of an adversary out there, that this boy's death was linked to another world of events? It didn't matter now, be pragmatic. Kill Minogue or not?

  Why kill? To be sure. Take such a risk, just get this one crucial delivery across the border to prove he was right. The place would be crawling with cops if that happened. That moron playwright would leak eventually. Get him too. No, needed him for this.

  The tanned man decided that Minogue would live. He would stick with the story about drugs and build one more block onto it. It had to be something fairly dramatic, a bit of Mafia or something to it. Like being done in with a stone. The papers would say, 'Assault the work of drug related-criminal element' or 'Suspected drug link in assault of Garda.' It would have to do, even though the tanned man didn't like it. As he waited for the playwright to answer the phone, he wondered if Minogue knew that his probing was forcing somebody's hand.

  "Are you getting the car ready for that trip?" he asked.

  "Yep. He'll bolt on the goods tomorrow," the playwright replied airily.

  "Another thing. Minogue, remember? Like we discussed. Get a car, that way. Leave something behind."

  "Yep."

  "You know how important this is. We're buying time until we can deal with the other thing that's come up. I'll be dealing with that other asshole before his knees give out completely."

  The playwright laughed. He hadn't heard the Yank using bad language until now. It didn't fit with the suit. Could it be that Mr Whiz Kid might be human after all?

  "Yes. I'll do the other thing myself. Kilmacud, is it?"

  "Yes. No Roy Rogers stuff now. Think of it as a part. Imagine yourself as a gangster."

  The tanned man hung up. He suppressed the little ice of anxiety which was rising in his stomach.

  He returned to gazing out the window. The waiting was the worst of it. He acknowledged the burrowing truth that ultimately, no one was completely reliable. No one should be trusted in extremity. As the stakes rose with the latest dangers, he had felt his own control slipping, his sense of agency diminish. Like a bank of clouds, chance and circumstance wer
e drifting in to conceal the elements. He had no choice but to wait and see what came in from the fog. He thought about Minogue again. Would his nerve go after a bit of pushing or would he dig in his heels?

  He was drawn out of his speculations by the rising wawa and the car horns which came in over the trees in the Green. Two police cars, an unmarked van and an army Land Rover sped by the hotel. Reflexively, he pushed his elbow into his side to feel the belt at his shoulder better and to feel the butt of the gun meet the inside of his jacket. Not for me, he thought. Only in the movies. He felt slightly claustrophobic with the noise filling the air.

  He took his gabardine and went to the hotel foyer. He stepped out into the street. On the footpath outside the Shelbourne, a newspaper seller squatted on an orange box. The radio beside her chattered on and then broke into a monotonous disco beat. He walked over to the woman. The doorman from the hotel was watching the Mercedes and the Jags strewn along the double yellow line. The doorman rubbed his hands. The woman looked up at him.

  "Looks like a nice how-do-ye-do, now. Shoot first and ask questions later, I say. Thugs down from the North is what they are. Disturbing the peace."

  "Right enough. Thugs isn't the word for them. And them driving around in a Mercedes like they owned the bloody country. Unarmed pleecemen, I ask you. Where's the fairness in that. Shoot the buggers I say," said the doorman.

  "I have a nephew out in Monkstown. I wonder if he's caught in the cross-fire," the newspaper woman said.

  The doorman tried to ease the full weight of his sarcasm.

  "Jases sure Monkstown is miles away. Cross-fire is it? What fillum was that in. Your cousin is under the bed if he's not inside in the shaggin' bed itself."

  The tanned man stood quite still. He felt the ripple pass right to the top of his head. He turned to the doorman.

  "What's going on with all these police cars?"

  "Ah sir. There's some class of gunfight going on in Blackrock. There's a Garda after being killed and there's two of them on the loose-"