Blood Will Be Born

by Donnelly, Gary

  ‘None of my business boss, but there are lots of other places in town where you can get a jar; friendly pubs, welcoming to strangers. Small town; and this is a small part of it. Strangers stand out. Not always in a good way,’ said Gerard.

  ‘Thanks Gerard. I’ll keep that in mind, mate,’ he said, closing the door. He would too, though perhaps he was not so much of a stranger after all. Sheen had been to enough flat nosed boozers from Stratford to the Isle of Dogs to know how to cope with a frosty welcome. You just needed to be able to speak the local lingo.

  As he approached the entrance, Sheen could hear music from within, country, or western, Sheen had no idea what the difference was. The singer crooned that it was five o’clock somewhere. He reached and pulled open one of the double doors by its cold brass handle. The music got instantly louder, under it the sound of ribaldry and clanking glasses and the crack of pool balls breaking; definitely already five o’ clock in Muldoon’s. The music did not stop abruptly, nor did punters pause, and stare at him reproachfully, but Sheen was clocked as he entered.

  The barman, short sleeve white shirt, black pencil tie glanced over as he pulled a pint behind the long wooden bar that occupied the right side of the room as Sheen entered. There were two punters, their backs to Sheen. He set half poured pints of stout on the bar, before them. Two men in their early twenties stared at him. They were at a three quarter sized snooker table which was directly opposite Sheen. It was on a raised plinth, six inches off the main floor which extended most of the length of the far wall. A stage, or at least it was at some point.

  Sheen strolled across the floor, could smell the ammonia pong of stale urine from the toilet to his right. The wall to Sheen’s left was lined with stable box booths of dark, varnished wood. The little snugs were paned in small squares of stained glass which cast faint squares of colour on the floor. A big television over the bar showed the run up to the Celtic and Rangers match, on mute.

  Sheen glanced at the young men at the snooker table who were still staring at him. Both wore dark jeans and polo tops with a brand logo on the breast. One wore white, the other wore black. As Sheen got a bit closer, he could see that they were identical twins, buzz cuts. Both were big men, over 6 feet and with workout bodies that told of hours in the gym; wide shoulders, trunk biceps, lean waists. Sheen looked away, stayed alert for sudden movements, none came.

  A second later he heard the sharp crack of a break. They were back at their game, Sheen discarded.

  Sheen took a stool at the bar. The rake thin men to his right, broken blood vessels on their cheeks, their attention fixed on an open racing supplement from a newspaper, were the men who had been waiting outside the pub earlier this morning.

  Sheen’s shoulders dropped, then he noticed a single punter who was sitting in the far corner of the bar, to his left. A brown tweed cap was visible above the parapet of his open copy of The Irish News, a fresh pint waited. The barman nodded once to Sheen and he ordered a pint of stout. As he counted Sheen’s coins into the till, Sheen nodded to his tattooed forearms, slabs of muscle that sported a black panther and a tiger, full of colour.

  ‘Spent a bit of time in the forces, I see,’ said Sheen. ‘Army, navy?’ he added. The barman closed the tap and set Sheen’s pint down between them. His eyes were green, flecked with chips of orange, broken brake lights.

  ‘Army,’ he said quietly, and Sheen picked up the sharp dip on the first letter. This guy was a Dubliner.

  ‘Irish Army,’ he qualified. Orish.

  ‘Any place interesting?’ said Sheen. The stout had settled from cloudy yellow to black, the white head forming a perfect line between day and night.

  ‘I was in the Balkans mate, eighteen years old. It was an education I can tell you,’ he said.

  ‘You from Dublin, right? Many of your city men in Belfast or are you an exception?’ asked Sheen. The barman stopped walking and turned again to Sheen.

  ‘And you are from London. And you ask a lot of questions,’ he said.

  Sheen smiled, dropped his gaze, trying to keep it friendly. The barman had left a shamrock motif in the head of his beer.

  ‘Yes, I am and I suppose I do. But maybe that’s the Irish in me. You see my family was from these parts, Sailortown, not just Belfast. Name’s Sheen. I want to trace a few of them, get in touch with old relatives if possible. You reckon you might be able to point me in the right direction?’

  ‘Same again fellas?’ said the barman in response. The question was directed over his head. On either side he could see long legs in blue jeans; the twins. He raised his pint, took a sip, and glanced behind him. Sheen had not heard or even sensed their approach. The barman stepped along the bar to the larger taps and started pouring two pints of beer simultaneously, one in each hand.

  ‘You say you’re trying to find someone, mate?’ Sheen turned to face the voice.

  Chapter 17.

  When Aoife reached the Bat Bet, Cecil Moore’s pub in Tiger’s Bay, it was rammed with Rangers’ supporters, some already in full song. A massive projection screen took up an entire wall of the bar. The pre-match report was on, volume turned way up, and the punters were shouting in one another’s faces, a barrage of sound.

  She scanned the place, trying to zone out the distraction of the noise, looking for Moore but not seeing him. Nelson was behind the bar, serving drinks and taking payment, working hard, his bald skull shining in the light of the overhead. He did not look at her. In the far right corner, adjacent to two doors with male and female signs was another marked private. It was slightly ajar, if she could get in she could get upstairs; and Cecil would be there. Nelson started pouring two pints of lager and turned his back to reach the optics. This was her moment.

  She skirted round a group of men, each holding two pints of beer, shouting and laughing animatedly, followed the smell of urine and bleach but instead of entering the toilets she turned right and pushed the Private door, felt it give. A vice grip on her right upper arm, tight enough to hold her back, but not hurting, at least not yet.

  She stared at the big hand which now enclosed her arm; darkly tanned, a gold chaps bracelet draped across a thick wrist, grey hair abundant, like a fingerless glove. The hand led to an arm, same rash of grey hair, a short sleeved tangerine coloured shirt, open at the neck, where more grey hair sprouted, laced with gold.

  ‘Where are you off till, young lady?’

  Pale grey eyes, bushy grey brows, an old scar, white and indented, ran from his chin round his right cheek, tapering away into wrinkles near his ear. His accent was thick Glaswegian. He was one of a group of three who were sitting round a small card table, clothed in shadow, concealed in a little snug. They were in their fifties, dressed like the one who still clasped her wrist in his fist; short sleeve shirts, jeans, soft leather shoes, no football tops for these guys. All eyes rested on her, dead and emotionless. She looked back to the big paw that still clasped her right arm, then shrugged hard, and pulled away. He dropped his hand, feigning alarm.

  ‘Wooo wee lass, don’t be getting bargy with me, I’m just asking your business. Can you nay read?’ he said, jerking his thumb at the door marked Private.

  ‘I’m here to see Cecil Moore. He’s expecting me,’ she said. She was about to pull her warrant card but instead she waited for his reply. If he lifted his hand again, she’d pull her protection pistol.

  ‘Oh, aye, is that so? Yeah, well Cecil is a pal of ours, he’s kindly putting us up over the 12th - I’m Kyle, and that’s my business here,’ he said, big smile, white capped teeth.

  ‘So who are you? And what is your business here? Cecil made no mention he was expecting anyone. That makes me a wee bit concerned, and that’ll make me unpredictable,’ he said, no longer smiling. Aoife saw a mobile phone on the table. She nodded to it.

  ‘Call Cecil and tell him Aoife McCusker is here and I want a word,’ she said. Kyle’s face darkened and his eyes narrowed.

  ‘Aoife you say? I doubt Cecil has any business with anyone called Aoi
fe. Sounds like you might be in the wrong part of Belfast, Aoife McCusker. You run on home now. Before something should happen,’ he said, not moving for his phone.

  ‘Detective Constable Aoife McCusker,’ she said, this time withdrawing her warrant card and holding it in his face. Call him, or don’t; that door is open and I’m going up.’ She pushed hard on the private door and it gave easily, revealing a carpeted staircase beyond. Kyle had the phone to his ear, speaking.

  She stood on the first step of the staircase and closed the door; from pub to home in one step. The stairs were carpeted in magnolia wool, thin stubble. A varnished mahogany rail extended at a steep angle. The walls were painted light clay, the ceiling white, the overall impression was one of sparse domestic neutrality, at odds with the busy, public space of the bar she had come from. Aoife walked up the staircase, the sounds from the pub below becoming more muted and muffled as she ascended. The small square of carpet that marked the top of the stairs was illuminated from above by an old fashioned skylight window, iron and glass.

  ‘Hello, Mr. Moore? This is DC McCusker, PSNI,’ she called.

  A small passage extended in both directions, ten feet to the left and about fifteen to her right. The passage had the same décor as the staircase, but was floored in thinly cut hardwood planks. Overhead spots softly illuminating the way in both directions. On the left the passage ended with a closed door, half paned in glass. Light was seeping through, made cloudy by a mask of opaque plastic which covered the pane. The door at the end of the passage to her right was open. The hardwood floor extended seamlessly into this room, a sash window visible, again shielded. Cecil Moore’s voice answered from within.

  ‘DC McCusker. Sure our stars must be aligned,’ he called and laughed, sounding genuinely amused. Not a good sound. A shiver sneaked down the back of her neck. Perhaps this was not such a brilliant idea after all. Shen turned and looked back down the stairs. There was still time to make an excuse, to get away from here. Moore appeared in the doorway from the left, roller neck woollen jumper, cream slacks and expensive looking leather brogues.

  ‘Come into my office, I’m trying to catch up with myself,’ he said, then turned and walked out of sight. Aoife hesitated, then followed.

  Moore was sitting behind the desk, doing something on his computer. At the opposite end of the room a large, flat screen TV was mounted on the wall, a leather sofa and bean bags positioned around it. The room was finished in the same neutral colours as the staircase and landing. No paramilitary regalia or flags, no photographs of old comrades standing shoulder to shoulder in a prison cell or exercise yard. Instead, on the wall next to the window, was an oil painting of a woman’s torso, breasts stretched and full, a rainbow of colour for her skin. Moore looked up from his desk where he was sitting on a comfortable looking swivel chair and nodded at the painting.

  ‘Art lover?’ he said.

  ‘If its good,’ she replied, looking at the flecks of colour, the thick dabs of wet looking oil. It was good, tasteful and subtlety executed. She was about to offer her sympathies for the loss of his mother, but instinct told her it was the wrong move. Instead, she said:

  ‘This is a nice place you have here,’ she said.

  ‘Nicer than you expected?’ he said, flashed her smile. Moore stretched back in his chair. ‘Well, you have to enjoy your home comforts while you can, and there’s sense in keeping the public and private apart. Something learned a long time ago, DC McCusker,’ he said. ‘Now what can I do for you? I have already spoken to Irwin Kirkcaldy. Went over all the nasty details,’ he said.

  ‘I appreciate this is a hard time, a difficult time, but I need to ask you a few questions,’ she said. The phrase sounded as false as a badly delivered line in a school play.

  ‘Please, call me Cecil,’ he said. She nodded, returned his smile with a thin reply.

  ‘Cecil, I’d like to ask you about your whereabouts last night. And also, I wanted to know whether you believe there are any enemies, anyone who would want to get to you though your mother.’ The muffled commentary from the big screen downstairs vibrated through the floor. After a second or two he looked away from her and tapped the desk three times with the knuckles of his left hand.

  ‘Those are difficult questions, tough for me to have to answer, DC McCusker,’ he said.

  ‘You know, when I spoke to Irwin he said that whoever did this removed her tongue. I tried to find out whether they thought she was alive when it happened, but he would not be drawn on that detail,’ he said. Aoife did not react. It was possible that Moore got information from Irwin, but then again, it could have come from anywhere, the lion’s share of the details were already on the front page of the papers. He was toying with her.

  ‘I was at Mother’s place until about three thirty PM. She cooked me up a fry for my Friday lunch, like she always does. I was here, in the Bad Bet from then on. Nelson can corroborate, as can my pals from Glasgow,’ he said.

  ‘The only people I know who would want to do this terrible thing is a so called Dissident who wants to pull this great country back into its violent past. I would say this was the work of some degenerate Fenian,’ he said. He held her gaze, his smile gone, let the sectarian jibe hit home. She didn’t react, but didn’t break his stare.

  Moore opened his desk drawer, took out a black remote control and pointed it in her direction. She glanced over her shoulder and the flat screen TV on the opposite wall came to life, the pre-match build up, same channel as the big screen in the bar. The muffled commentary was keeping time with the images on the screen, the players lining up, ready to go on the pitch. A cheer erupted from the bar below as the camera panned along the Rangers team.

  Irwin was right, he had it covered. The conversation was going nowhere. She moved to the door.

  ‘Great thing, this Smart TV, you can get all sorts. Look you can even play a video off your phone,’ said Moore.

  ‘Goodbye Cecil, I am sure we will be in touch again. If you have any questions, or any information you think will be of use to the enquiry, please get in-’ She stopped, frozen, looking at the flat screen. It had changed. The football was gone, instead she was seeing the inside of what looked like a hotel room. It was familiar, she had seen it before, a man was sitting on an arm chair, hunched over a coffee table. She could see the top of his head, a bald spot, bright and clean. Another rustle of recognition, and of dread.

  This was wrong, not possible.

  That was Charlie Donaldson.

  On the screen Charlie sat up straight, showing his face to the camera that was positioned above him. On the table were the makings of cocaine, chopped and prepared into two lines. Charlie bent down and moved his face from left to right across the surface of the coffee table and lifted his head with a jerk. One of the lines of coke was gone.

  He repeated the process, mopping the residual powder off the surface of the table with his middle finger and applying it to his gums.

  She knew what was coming next because she had been there. It was the hotel room in Derry where they had stayed for a night last year. One of only two trips away, before she’d realised that Charlie was substance dependent as well as a drinker. On cue, she walked out of the bathroom, a towel wrapped round her. The pair of them went down together in a tangle. Her towel was off, and she landed unceremoniously on her back, laughing as Charlie slowly approached her on all fours like a dog. Charlie was on her, she pulled at his belt as he unbuttoned his shirt off and threw it across the room.

  The picture paused, a frozen smile on her face.

  Chapter 18.

  Sheen looked up from his stool at the bar in Muldoon’s.

  ‘Do you mean the Sheens from Dockview Parade?’ said white top.

  It was his childhood street. A spark of excitement, fizzing and intense, ignited in Sheen’s chest. He had been right to come to Muldoon’s, already he was close. A few words in the right ear, he would have a name. The barman set down two pints of fizzing lager with a single knock, one at each of Sheen�
��s elbows.

  ‘Dockview Parade, sounds right,’ said Sheen. To his right, from further down the bar, a light rustle of movement, like a blackbird in a hedge. It was the other punter, with the newspaper, taking a look.

  ‘The Sheens from Dockview have long gone, mate. They left after that car bomb. The one that killed the kids. Their son was killed. The peelers had to shovel the bits into black bin bags. Some woman found a hand in her sheets that was hanging out to dry, two streets away,’ said white top.

  ‘You’re fulla shite,’ his twin said, and then punched white top, hard and fast, connecting with the ball of meat that bulged on his left shoulder under the stretched hold of his polo top. The hit made a dull, cold sound, like slapping a leg of lamb. White top rocked and as he did so, his beer slurped over the edge of his glass and spattered on to the floor. He turned on his brother.

  ‘Fellas!’ It was the barman. Sheen could hear the gravel in his voice. So did the twins who stepped away from each other. Sheen shifted round, found his pint, lifted it and sucked in a good draw. It was bitter, creamy and moreish; the best he’d ever had. Every Irish pub in Islington had served him a pale imitation. Fake, like him, maybe.

  ‘Aye, our Uncle Mick used to know them,’ resumed black top.

  ‘This Uncle Mick of yours, is he around, I mean could I have a word with him?’ asked Sheen.

  ‘Uncle Mick can’t leave the house no more,’ said white top.

  ‘It’s his breathing, it’s no good,’ said black.

  ‘But we might be able to bring you round and visit him. Just for a wee while mind, he’s not a well man,’ said white top.

  ‘Suits me, I don’t have a lot of time. I am on a business conference, the other side of town, near Balmoral. I need to get back within the hour,’ said Sheen, about to get off his stool.

  ‘You houl your horses, Mr. Businessman Sheen,’ said black top, raised his palm. Sheen stayed on the stool.

  ‘We need to talk about a donation, something to help our Uncle Mick, he doesn’t have two sticks to rub together, and as I said, this might take a lot out of him, you know?’