The Ghost Factory

by Jenny McCartney

  I did indeed look Dunne up, and the more I read about him, the more I thought that as a teenager Gerard had a very near miss. It seemed that for Dunne the decision to cross the line between a maiming and a murder could depend on something quite trivial, like how he felt about the quality of his lunch. There were pictures along with the news stories and, later, some longer feature pieces.

  Dunne was a burly man with reddish, receding hair, a human pit bull who zealously sniffed out treachery against Irish republicanism wherever he imagined it was lurking, with the exception of his own interior. Those with experience of him told reporters that beneath his superficial conviviality lay a terrible coldness. Some people felt the chill too late to get away.

  Dunne’s sniffing went on all the time, setting nerves on edge, but the sniffing and the edginess became so constant that sometimes people almost forgot it was there, like the rain pattering on the roof. Then a thin trace of something would come floating on the air towards him. A rumour, a nervy laugh, an operation gone awry. Something that didn’t quite sit right, something that snagged on the consciousness.

  Something that snagged. It passed across the pit bull’s flared nostrils. Sniff, sniff, and Dunne was on the scent. He conducted his enquiries with energetic capability, exuding the heavy musk of intimidation. He followed betrayals, but what he was really after was the exhilarating stench of fear. That came next.

  It trickled out over the next few months, like a line of blood from under a locked door, the story of Dunne and his friends. They had abducted men, and women too. Some captives were fathers or mothers, some were kids hardly out of their teens, some were in the IRA and some weren’t; they were taken up alleyways or driven away in the dark, down hopeless, nameless little rural lanes, on and on until finally the car stopped and they were shoved out faltering and afraid. Their tormentors would play wee tricks and jokes, kidding people they were about to be freed when in fact they were seconds from death.

  There were much the same ingredients in every story, doled out in different measures. There was extreme pain, dispensed with ingenuity, or the intimate threat of it. Sometimes those held were in trouble because they had spoken out of turn, or lost the plot momentarily and punched a more senior IRA man. Maybe, with youthful folly, they had ignored the organisation and tried a small-time crime spree of their own. But most often the charge against the prisoner – the one that could turn bowels to liquid – was that he or she had been touting, passing on information that helped the British Army or the police.

  Tout was a bad word. It stank of shame and brutal retribution. It sprawled obscenely across gable walls, inviting trouble, turning nods and smiles to cold glares of suspicion. Tout could stick to you like wet tar.

  The enforcers kept to due process, all right: their own version of it. They would often compel the captive to make a tape recording admitting alleged crime, a stuttering confession which was retained as evidence that IRA justice had been done.

  The process could take hours or days. The prisoner would cling to the dwindling hope that there was still a way out, a narrow tunnel through violence or shame or some as yet unspecified bargain which would permit them to crawl on their belly back to life. It had happened before to others, maybe it would happen again.

  I keep pondering the moment when they finally realised that there was to be no way back, when they understood that this petered-out country road or that particular room, with its stained mug of tea and the nondescript blanket on the bed, was the last one they would see. The fine drizzle that flecked the windowpane would be the last rain: there would be no more of anything. The thought of them trapped there in that condition of knowing haunts me, their loneliness drifting across the decades like smoke on the wind.

  And when I think of that I also sometimes think of McGee leaving the newsagent’s cellar that grey morning, walking stiffly back out into the short portion of his life that was left.

  Dunne wasn’t alone in executing his duties. He just added some extra spin to the game. Even before his era, back in the 1970s, the IRA had killed local people who offended them and left the bodies by the road as a warning to others. At times they took to burying the bodies at night in the bogland. Then the captives just disappeared, gulped down by the soggy earth.

  Their relatives never knew where they had vanished to, or even why. The disappeared existed only in hushed talk and creased photographs showing them with awkward smiles, in haircuts and clothes from the decade they had died in, sideburns and perms, flares or drainpipe jeans. Time dumped them there and ran on without them.

  One was the widowed mother of ten children. After she was seized from the family home in West Belfast one night, her youngest children huddled close together for weeks like frightened puppies, with their fifteen-year-old sister struggling to play the role of mammy. The authorities were eventually alerted to what was going on, whereupon they promptly separated the children from each other and dispatched them to various institutions.

  For many years Dunne was one of the prized British sources at the heart of the IRA, tipping them off as to who was planning what, when and how. He saved lives with his information and took others with his gun. As his story came out, I became fascinated with this man. Inside him, pulverised by his contradictions, what kind of dust was left, what smear of essence?

  Dunne was different from other informers, not least in the enigma of his motivations. He was never touched or harmed by anyone. There was a good reason: for the longest time he gave everyone above him exactly what they needed. For the IRA he was the cheerful enforcer of internal discipline, the whistling butcher who was endlessly willing to roll up his sleeves and plunge into stomach-churning tasks that others avoided. For the British he held the key to the IRA cupboard of secrets. Either master could potentially have destroyed him, so he dutifully served them both.

  So Dunne wasn’t a psychopathic zealot after all. He was a psychopathic pragmatist, the poster boy for everything the Troubles became once the last of the fantasies dribbled out of them. He took care of business. He sucked up the cash. He played the ball, in all its intricate moves. He stayed on his feet until the final whistle blew. Dunne’s hidden away somewhere now, hardly anyone knows exactly where. The main thing is, he’s still alive.

  26

  Phyllis flew over to London with Titch’s mum a couple of months ago, on a trip to see us and go to a musical in the West End. She had wanted to catch The Phantom of the Opera, which sounded a bit corny to me, but she was excited about it and had been reading up all about it on her iPad and egging Titch’s mum on too. She kept saying, ‘And I believe the bit where the Phantom appears is amazing.’

  The pair of them were sleeping in twin beds in the spare room, which made me glad we had one, and when I passed by at night I could hear their muffled voices through the door, giggling at some joke like a couple of girls.

  I wanted to say that the Phantom had been haunting the West End for so long now he was probably falling apart at the seams, but I kept quiet. It cracked me up to hear Phyllis going on like she was some kind of theatre buff – ‘the Phantom is amazing’ – with Elsie watching her wide-eyed, her mouth ajar, as though this great-aunt was the font of all theatrical knowledge.

  She’s in her seventies now, a bit tottery at the joints, but when I asked her if she would be okay leaving the newsagent’s she answered me all airy like a superannuated Holly Golightly: ‘Oh don’t worry, Marty has it all under control.’

  Aye, Marty.

  Shortly after McGee was killed, all those years ago, Phyllis was back on the phone. In the course of the conversation she said that ‘a wee lad called Marty has been calling round to the shop, asking for any odd jobs on Saturdays. He says he knows you.’

  When she mentioned his name and his recent proximity, I had felt the prickle of wariness. What’s that shivery line from the old play? Something wicked this way comes. That might seem a strange thing for an adult to say about a young boy, but there it was. My instinct was to tell him to s
tay away. I didn’t know what that slippery wee fella would trail in the door behind him.

  ‘Tell him no for now, Phyllis,’ I said. ‘I’ll have a chat with him when I’m over.’

  That night I lay motionless in bed and thought about him: his permanent air of twitchiness, the restlessness in his bones. From the first time I met him, I could sense he was out searching for a wing to creep under. We both knew it, but my wing had so few feathers on it at the time. And then he wandered into the path of McGee, a bird of prey.

  It must have scared him, McGee’s murder. From what I had overheard out in the yard that night, he was already getting frightened before it. He understood right from wrong; not enough yet perhaps, but a bit at least. I thought about his pale face the night he had tried to warn me to get out. He had taken a risk for me, that night.

  If I left him alone there I knew it was only a matter of time before someone else found him, someone built along the same lines as McGee.

  The next time I went back to Belfast I didn’t see him around at all for a couple of days. Then I spotted him one evening hanging out alone on his wall as the daylight died, hunched in his bomber jacket. I sneaked up behind him.

  ‘Hello stranger,’ I said.

  He jumped and turned around to look at me, surprised for a second before he remembered to seem blasé.

  ‘I thought you were in England.’

  I vaulted over the wall. He wasn’t smoking, but there were two squashed cigarette butts on the ground directly beneath his dangling trainers.

  ‘Well, not at the moment,’ I said, ‘or I wouldn’t be here talking to you.’

  ‘Aye,’ he said.

  ‘How’s tricks?’ I said.

  ‘Okay, I suppose. Jeanette’s gone off to college.’

  ‘D’you miss her?’

  ‘Now and then. When she’s not here I’ve got her room, though.’

  ‘Come on and I’ll buy you a plate of chips and a cup of tea in the café.’

  He liked the sound of that: although his shrug affected indifference, he was down off the wall in a jiffy.

  The café combined a general air of decline with a brisk trade: its paintwork was peeling, but its deep-fat fryer was rarely out of action. Once we were sitting opposite each other over the scarred Formica table top, I got down to business.

  ‘I heard you got a bit too close to the action not long ago,’ I said.

  He looked at me warily with his light, narrowed eyes, trying to work out what I knew and how.

  ‘McGee,’ I said, and took a slurp of my tea, watching him.

  There was a silence, as he fussed about with the salt and vinegar on his chips, buying time.

  ‘Who told you that?’ he said.

  ‘A wee bird.’

  He paused for a second, then dropped his voice.

  ‘Was it you that shot him?’

  ‘Now why would I do that?’ I said.

  ‘You know why,’ he said.

  He sat back in his chair, staring.

  ‘I suppose I did have a reason,’ I said with a minimal smile. ‘But you know I’m not really that kind of person.’

  I wasn’t worried that anyone in charge would actually think it was me. From what the news reports said, his death had Loyalist feud written all over it in indelible ink. Their interminable power struggle was still grinding on. Only the week before, wee Tommy’s dad had been gunned down outside a pub.

  But I stared calmly back at him until he got uncomfortable and shifted his gaze. You’ll notice I didn’t deny his suggestion flat out. I told him the truth, but with enough space there for him to imagine that I really might have had something to do with McGee’s death.

  I didn’t do that for me, but for him. It’s what he needed. It was a feature of his personality that he could only respect someone older if he was a tiny bit frightened of them.

  ‘Phyllis told me you wanted to help out in the shop,’ I said.

  ‘Aye,’ he said.

  He kept his eyes lowered, but his body was tensed and alert, his head cocked to one side like a listening bird. He had only just turned twelve: he said his birthday had happened while I’d been away, and his ma had given him money to take a couple of friends to see a horror film with a 15 certificate.

  I didn’t understand how the ushers could have let him in, with him looking so small, but he wore a cynically streetwise air around town. Strangers give up early on shielding kids like Marty. They figure the likes of him have seen it all already.

  ‘I need to make one thing very clear,’ I said. ‘Everything that happens in that shop has to be above board. No nicking stuff, no so-called “donations” to anyone who might be collecting, no tip-offs about when the cash register is left unlocked to any special friends.’

  His eyes widened in indignation: ‘D’you think I would do that?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘You might. But if you ever do, I will find out. And if anyone approaches you, tell me. As it is, the shop makes one big donation from Phyllis every year, and in public too. To yon wee disabled club.’

  He nodded. I snaffled one of his chips. It was best to be honest.

  ‘One more thing,’ I said. ‘Your first Saturday’s money, take it down to Mrs Hackett and give it to her in exchange for all the Walnut Whips you nicked. After that it’s all yours.’

  ‘I’m not going to do that,’ he said, insulted.

  ‘Fine. I was going to give you a chance. But go back to sitting on your wall. Go back to being a top lad. Maybe one of the hoods will bring you into one of their wee schemes so you can scrape together just enough for a fancy skateboard. Then one day when you stop being useful to them you’ll see what happens.’

  That stopped him in his tracks. The barbs were too sharp and specific. They stung and they were disorienting him. He couldn’t figure how I knew about the skateboard.

  He glared at me and stood up in a fury. Then he got up and walked out the door. I didn’t follow: I pulled his plate over towards me and sat quietly polishing off the rest of his chips and enjoying my tea.

  Two minutes later he walked back in and sat down.

  ‘Okay,’ he said, sulkily.

  I pushed the plate back towards him and smiled.

  That’s how it started. Now he’s a grown man, with a girlfriend and a baby on the way and a stake in our newsagent’s. He never got that tall but he keeps in shape: he’s a wiry, quick wee nut and he knows everything and everyone and how to dodge trouble. He gave up the fags when he turned fifteen, and got into kick-boxing and Thai cookery and later a part-time business degree. Phyllis loves him, and even says so occasionally, like the sap she’s always been. I suppose I do too, although it would freak him out if I ever admitted it, so I just get him a present on his birthday and see him right with his Christmas bonus and leave it at that.

  He didn’t ask me about McGee again. I respected that. It takes intelligence to know when it’s better to keep a box locked. I’ve never had a reason yet not to trust him, but after all these years I still keep half an eye on him. Okay, a quarter of an eye. The thing is that in some ways he’s very like me.

  Mrs Hackett got her Walnut Whip money – which according to Marty she accepted with good grace, even insisting he took half back – but she’s been dead five years now. McGee’s shop closed down when the old man retired. It’s turned into a chemist’s, and Phyllis goes there for her prescriptions. Belfast has changed, too. Everywhere you turn there are fellas with rampant facial hair sucking on giant sippy cups of warm, coffee-flavoured milk. The place is hiving with restaurants, with new eateries competing for awards every week. It’s as if after all those long years of constant arguing people now can’t get enough of stuffing their faces.

  We came late to the recreational possibilities of food, although those of drink had been heavily explored. I can remember back when the city, wrapped in the drab shawl of the Troubles, had only one Italian restaurant, Luigi’s, run by a middle-aged owner who was a perfect caricature of an excitable Neapolit
an. It was as though – in the absence of any other prominent Italians in Belfast – he was determined to give us our money’s worth in terms of gross stereotyping.

  His customers were a willing audience. Deep in our parochial wrangling, we were thirsty for a taste of the exotic. In our city many people were permanently incensed over history, politics, borders, insults, threats, killings, and the simple fact of one another’s existence, but we’d never seen anyone get so worked up about food before. It was an enthralling novelty.

  Luigi once chased a customer round the restaurant with a knife in a dispute over the quality of his monkfish. The fella on the other end of the knife had rashly suggested that the monkfish was past its best, and Luigi was determined to bully him into attesting otherwise. That was a high point, but there was some form of incident in there most nights. People used to pack out Luigi’s, settling in amid the red-checked tablecloths just to shovel down spaghetti and watch the owner work himself up into that evening’s rage, his gelled ringlets springing in indignation away from his contorting face. Even when Luigi was in a good mood, his jollity was as unnerving as his tantrums: it was potentially on the turn.

  As time went on the food – which had often been tasty, at least – began to veer consistently towards the inedible, to the point of blatant provocation. It was as though Luigi, who used to swing so dramatically between moods, was jammed on anger. Maybe he’d caught it from us.

  His delicate balance of theatre and culinary unpredictability began to tip against him. Other restaurants opened and gradually drew customers away. Even his tempers lost their cachet. The taxman circled. Luigi’s famous yellow Lamborghini vanished from outside the restaurant. I can’t remember now how it all ended. There were so many stories in Belfast at the time, each one more pressing than the last.

  I can see it now among people my age from home, the struggle in their different ways to make sense of everything that happened. They’ll never manage it, because sense had so little to do with it. From the very start, the Troubles created their own logic, the crazed logic of opposition, like when you’re in the thick of a blazing row and you hear yourself smashing a glass and screaming in a high-pitched tone that isn’t normally yours. In the midst of so many voices urging you to weigh in, it was a fight just to stay half decent.