The Bloomsday Dead (4 page)

“Ms. Callaghan apologizes for her heavy-handed behavior of this morning. She says that she urgently needs your help and she would like to speak to you again,” he said, producing a cell phone from his bike bag and placing it on the table.

“What’s the deal here? Is it going to blow up as soon as you walk off?” I inquired.

“Uh, no, it’s just a phone. She wants to talk to you,” he said.

“Bridget wants to talk to me? Ok, fine, I got some time. But I’ll call her on my phone. You ever hear of ricin nerve-toxin poison? One touch of it and you’re toast. For all I know you’re wearing some sort of protective lubrication on your hands, that phone is coated in poison, and I’m about to be topped like they did with that Bulgarian.”

The kid looked at me to see if I was taking the piss out of him, which, if truth be told, I half was.

“Why don’t you just give me her number, if you’re legit I’ll call her on the phone,” I said.

He gave me the number without any fuss at all. A Belfast listing. I dialed it.

“Hello, Europa Hotel,” a voice answered.

“Yeah, I need Bridget Callaghan, she says she’s staying there.”

“One moment, please.”

“Hello?” Bridget said.

“Nice try, sister,” I said. “I didn’t bite last time, I won’t bite this time, took care of your delightful emissaries,” I said.

“Yes, Michael, I heard about your exploits. In fact, I saw the results of your shenanigans on BBC World. For God’s sake, they weren’t there to kill you. Don’t you believe me? I need your help.”

“Aye, they weren’t there to kill me, that’s why they pulled out their guns and told me to make my peace with the Lord.”

I looked at the lawyer and put my hand over the receiver.

“Are you getting an earful of all of this? Make yourself scarce for a minute.”

“I’ll sit over there until you need me,” he said, moving to an adjacent table.

“They weren’t supposed to hurt you, Michael,” Bridget insisted.

I laughed out loud.

“Oh, Bridget, the times we had, you make me smile, and I suppose the men in Los Angeles last year wanted to take me to a surprise party in Malibu.”

“No, they were there to kill you. They were there to kill you and cut your fucking head off and bring it to me. But the two men today were there to make sure you flew to Ireland. My daughter has gone missing and I need your help. For God’s sake, I’m a mother and my only child has vanished. I need your help, Michael,” she said, her voice trembling.

I looked at the phone. I found her very affecting. She was good. She nearly had me convinced. All she had to do was squirt a few and I’d be on my way to the Emerald Isle and certain death.

“Honey, look, it’s been great talking to you and it was very clever of you to find me twice in one day. But this time I’m out of your life forever. I’m going to India, wearing a turban, opening a pawnshop in Bombay, so adios, Bridget, my love. And I’ll give you this wee warning, honey: my patience has its limits. This game can go two ways. Try this one more time and if I find you’re still after me, I’m coming for you, understand? Be a lot harder for you to conceal your movements than it will be for me to conceal mine. I’ve had twelve years of practice.”

“Are you threatening me?”

“Aye. I am.”

“Michael, first off, you are no position to fucking threaten me. Second off, I’m not trying to con you or scam you. Everything I said was completely true,” she said.

“Don’t go, Michael, don’t go, listen to me, just listen. Everything I said was true. My daughter, Siobhan, has gone missing in Belfast. We were over here on a trip, we come here every summer. We were in Belfast. On Saturday she went for a walk, she didn’t come back to the hotel. She said she was going to get a milk shake but no one at the milk shake place saw her. Michael, she has completely disappeared. The police are looking for her, you can call up their tip line if you don’t believe me. 01232-PSNI-TIP. Please, Michael, I want you on board. I am losing my mind, I’ve got every single person I know helping me here. The police, everyone. Please, I’m willing to let bygones be bygones. Wipe the slate clean, if you would just come and help. I know you’re good at being you and you’re better than anyone I know. I’m not trying to flatter you, Michael, but you’re the best I’ve ever met. This is your town, you can find her, I know you can. Please come. Please.”

And now she did start to cry. She cried and cried.

I could feel the tide shifting under my feet. I blinked. And I fought against it, but it didn’t help and now I did believe her.

Shit.

What an eejit I was.

“Don’t cry, Bridget, please don’t cry,” I said.

The sobbing continued for another minute.

“Ok, enough, I’ll come,” I said.

Bridget blew her nose. Sniffled.

“I love her. She’s my whole universe, Michael.”

“I understand. I’m sure she’s fine. Kids run away sometimes. Especially at that age. It’s a mother-daughter thing more than likely. Don’t worry about her. We’ll get her.”

“Thank you, Michael. That man who contacted you will give you fifteen thousand dollars for expenses and a ticket to Dublin. The plane goes in an hour, you better hurry if you’re going to catch it,” Bridget said.

“I’ll be calling that tip line, I need to confirm this. What did you say her legal name was?” I asked.

“Siobhan Callaghan. Eleven, nearly twelve years old. The spit of her ma.”

“Heartbreaker, in other words.”

“She’s my whole life, Michael, I want you to help me.”

“Ok, if it’s kosher, I’ll be on the plane. Bridget, I got to warn you, I don’t respond well to heavy stuff; if you have goons waiting to meet me in Ireland, I’ll kill them and you’ll never hear from me again. And if it’s a trick, I’ll make sure you go down. I’m getting mighty tired of this.”

“Thank you, Michael. It’s not a trick. I hate you. I hate your guts. But I need you. I’m pulling out all the stops.”

“Ok.”

She hung up. I motioned the kid to come over.

“Ok, dickwad, you got some money for me,” I said.

“Mr. Forsythe, I have been instructed to give you this envelope containing fifteen thousand dollars and a confirmation for your Aer Lingus ticket to Dublin on the five-fifteen flight this evening.”

“Take out the money and put a few bills in your mouth.”

“Why my mouth?”

“Didn’t I tell you about the nerve toxin? If they’ve poisoned the money, I want it to kill you first.”

The kid hesitated, as if considering the possibility that someone had indeed spiked the dough. He put the first two bills in his mouth with no ill effect.

“Ok, now, the thirteenth bill and the last five.”

He did those as well, again without keeling over or spitting blood.

“Can I get a receipt for the money?” he asked.

“A receipt? Oh, I see. Of course. You’re worried I’ll take the money and just fuck away off with it. Well, I’ll let you in on a little secret, that’s precisely what I’m going to do,” I said.

“Ms. Callaghan believes you will not do that. However, Mr. Moran has instructed me—”

“He’s instructed you, has he?”

“Yes, he has. I am to ask politely but I am not to coerce you in any way,” he said.

“You think you could coerce me if you really needed to?”

“Um, well, it isn’t really my department,” he said.

“No, I didn’t think so.”

He nodded, stood.

“Good luck, Mr. Forsythe,” he said.

I watched him walk out of the airport and hail a cab. I counted the money. Fifteen large, sure enough. And I could have it for free. But there was that other thing she said. She would “wipe the slate clean” if I helped her.

Wipe the slate clean.

Now that was an attractive proposition. My body ached from the exhaustion of it all. Dodging her and her minions. Twelve years I’d been on the run from the New York Irish mob. Since Christmas Eve 1992. Now Bridget claimed she was willing to forgive it all. Forgive me killing Darkey, forgive me selling Darkey’s boys down the river. Why?

There were really only two possibilities.

One, that this was all a trap, an elaborate hoax to get me to come to Ireland.

Two, she really did have a daughter who had gone missing and like any concerned parent she was at the end of her tether. If I were a betting man, I’d have gone for one.

But you never knew. I sipped the dregs of my beer.

“How do you think the Red Sox rotation will match up against the opposition this year,” a voice said.

I looked up.

A tall, blond storm trooper of a man, in a wide blue business suit. A clone behind him with dark hair.

“Can’t you cocksuckers get anything right?” I said. “Yankees’ rotation and I’m supposed to mention the— Oh, forget it, take a seat, there’s been a slight change of plans. . . .”

“That’ll hold the bastards up for an hour or so,” Dan said while he drove in from an “important conference,” which in fact was almost certainly a golf course in Westchester.

He arrived about thirty minutes later in navy slacks, white shirt, and red Kangol beret. I hadn’t seen him in person for a long time. He was a nice guy, going places with the bureau. An administrator, not a field man. He wouldn’t be in witness protection forever. Although twelve years could seem like it. Tall, bald, but good-looking and very affable. I liked him. He sat down at my table and ordered a lime juice for himself and another beer for me. The agents got up and slipped into the background.

Dan had known me since ’93, when the FBI had offered me that first deal to rat out Darkey’s organization. He’d helped me in ’97 when the bureau and MI6 had had me infiltrate an IRA splinter group in Massachusetts and he’d cleaned up that ugly situation last year when Bridget had sent her men to Los Angeles. We’d been through a lot together and we shook hands with genuine affection.

“Michael, first thing I have to say is I’m sorry I didn’t meet you off the plane, I thought we’d have a couple of days and I was right in the middle of, well, to be honest, I was right in the middle of a foursome at the country club.”

“Aye. That’s ok. Makes me happy to see that you’re golfing in the middle of a workday. That’s what our taxpayers’ money goes on.”

“Since when did you ever pay taxes?” he asked.

“Sales tax.”

“Ok, so what’s this I hear about you wanting to fly to Dublin?”

“I talked to Bridget. Her daughter’s gone missing and she wants my help to find her. She’s willing to wipe the slate clean.”

Dan smiled.

“It’s a trap, don’t you see that?” he said without inflection.

“Does she have a daughter?” I asked.

“She does.”

“Is it Darkey’s kid?”

“It is,” he said flatly.

“How come I never knew about this?”

Dan looked embarrassed.

“Why would you need to know? Bridget never took the stand, even as a witness, so it never came out in court. Furthermore, it was information we did not wish to share with you because we didn’t think it was important,” Dan said. It was an answer filled with weasel words.

“You didn’t want me to know she was pregnant when I killed her fiancé and rolled up her fiancé’s gang; you thought it might throw me a bit, didn’t you?”