“You're a hard man, Tommy. A real desperado, these days, I tell you.”
“Ah don't start that crap.”
“Just give Hughes a start.”
“What do I have?”
“One of your touts.”
“I don't believe you actually said that. I don't.”
“Just someone who's not in this big war thing you're in the middle of.”
“I can't believe you'd ask me for the loan of a source. Jesus.”
“Anybody. This Klos man is showing up with cocaine in his system.”
“Who doesn't, these days? Any club now, you see people snorting.”
“Be that as it may. Give the mother something to hope for, and she taking him home.”
“You are frigging piling it on, so you are.”
“You know I'll be above board with whoever you give me.”
“What do I tell him? What's in it for him?”
Minogue thought about it for a moment.
“âAssisting the Guards.'”
“Don't be an iijit.”
“Is he coming to trial, sentencing maybe? Paste it into a plea for him?”
“Uh-uh. Anyone worth anything isn't going to be in any position.”
“What, then?”
“M-O-N-E-Y. That works nicely.”
“You pay them?”
“Damned right we do. It gets results.”
“Really. Okay then. What's the going rate?”
M
INOGUE ATE AT HIS DESK
. He was glad of the Pepsi to push the taste of the so-called brioche with its cargo of dry ham and chalky cheese, and its too-sharp crust that gouged his gums. There was nothing left worth reading in the newspaper. Still he searched. Someone had spray-painted the wall of the Muslim school in Clonskeagh. A road rage thing that led to fines of over a thousand Euro. An Aran islander who spoke no English had just died at the age of 105. The forecast said changeable, but to be on the lookout for showers coming in from the West. He almost missed the ping from his mobile. Don't screw up, Malone had texted. The name he offered was for someone Murph. He was to wait until Malone had gotten in touch with this Murph character. No address of course. In caps then the following: NOPRESSUREONHIM.
The low-hanging slabs of clouds that had formed the sky over the funeral this morning had now given way to masses of torn and running clouds. They lost their shapes quickly, but they occasionally revealed patches of blue. Minogue composed a rare text reply of six letters and one space: TA ASAP.
EilÃs was trying to get a printer to work.
“What's up?”
“It looks like the damned thing is broken. Do you know anything aboutâ¦?”
“I'd do more harm than good, EilÃs.”
“Well, horseman, pass by, so.”
He heard her cursing quietly in his wake. He wondered if every Irish speaker knew so many curse words.
On his way back from the bathroom, there were two messages in his box, proof of the mysterious dispensation of fate that timed phone calls for when he entered a bathroom.
EilÃs was shoving the paper tray hard into the bottom of the printer. She spoke without looking up.
“Peter Igoe,” she said. “Wants to talk to you.”
Odd, Minogue thought, and unwelcome. His head of section loathed meetings, preferring to network at a distance.
“A matter of some urgency,” she murmured.
“Concerning?”
EilÃs grunted as she pushed the tray home yet again.
“Didn't say.”
Igoe asked Minogue to wait a moment so he could step out of the meeting to take the call. Minogue heard a door closing.
“Thanks, Matt. You got to that meeting there, the Polish matter.”
“I did.”
“Fair play to you. A good send-off for Mrs. Tynan this morning?”
“It's how she wanted it, I believe.”
“Sad. Now listen, before I pass on the news to you, remind me what you're at. Current casework, I mean.”
“The papers from the raid on the building sites in Cork and Waterford.”
“Right, right. How goes it there?”
“I sent off scans of them to The Hague yesterday. I'm going through the lists of contractors now for more.”
“Good, good. Listen to me, now, and brace yourself, I suppose.”
“Is it going to involve brown trousers, Peter?”
“Ah, no. Okay. I just got off the phone from the Deputy Comm. You were with a Garda Hughes? Kevin Hughes, case lead on the murder?”
“This very day â is he all right?”
“As a matter of fact he's not. But he will be. He has appendicitis. Apparently he had to go to hospital.”
“I'm sorry to hear that. Nice fella, a workhorse entirely, by God.”
Her arms folded, EilÃs was standing by the printer now. There was a faraway look in her eyes and her bottom lip was working its way slowly over her upper teeth. No one in the section had yet dared ask her if she was still off the cigarettes.
“Howandever. Now. I've been requested to free you up, so you can stand in for Hughes.”
“Requested, Peter.”
“You know the score, now.”
“I have the impression there are a lot of people expecting CSI here, all wrapped up in forth-five minutes before bedtime?”
“Hard to argue with you there,” Igoe agreed. “A lot of publicity, over in Poland and here. Yes.”
Minogue knew Igoe long enough to recognize what his tone meant.
“But the point is,” Igoe said, “this case has moved right up the ramp. So you have the whip hand, as they say. Ask for anything, and it's yours. You have only to ask.”
Minogue kicked back the slurs forming in his thoughts.
“Up the ramp,” he heard himself say.
“That's right, Matt. Right to number one.”
This time when he phoned, Malone was somewhere quieter.
“Didn't we just talk about this?” Malone said. “Alzheimer's now?”
“Ancient history now, Tommy. The whole thing just got a kick, a big kick from on high. Here's the short version: I'm on the job, the Polish man's murder.”
“April Fool's.”
“I'm not joking. The case lead detective is in hospital.”
“Well whatever you said to him, or did to him⦔
“Acute appendicitis. So it's me now.”
Several moments passed.
“Well best of luck to you,” said Malone. “Let me know how it goes.”
“Full steam ahead, is how it's going. I was given the keys to the kingdom.”
“Everybody says that. Then they sober up.”
“Seriously, Tommy. I hit a bump in the road, I pick up a phone: it's fixed.”
Malone had nothing to say.
“So let me get to this Murph, Tommy. If you please.”
“I told you,” said Malone. “I haven't been able to get ahold of him.”
“Sooner the better, and phone right away? It'd be much appreciated.”
“Are you pushing rank my way?”
“Would that help if I did?”
“Like a hole in the head. I told you I have enough to do. Look, there's not much I can do until I get hold of this guy.”
“How about I send you an email with lots of smileys? Would that do you?”
“You can shove your smileys. And since when do you use email?”
“Where are you?”
“I am in a car.”
“Where?”
“In the back seat.”
“So you're operational.”
“I'm trying to be. But everyone's hiding under their beds.”
“Your clients.”
“Yeah, my âclients.' Forget the global warming stuff. I'm already dealing with an endangered species here.”
“You're environment is under pressure, it seems.”
“Yeah. We call it the Mulhall effect. Lead poisoning.”
It wasn't like Tommy Malone to be flip about murders, even when criminals were doing one another in. Minogue wondered if it was a signal that Malone was ready to give up.
“Let me guess where you are: Capel Street area?”
“Not bad. Near enough.”
Over the top of his cubicle, Minogue now saw that rain was landing in streaks on the window beyond EilÃs. The sky was bright behind.
“That coffee place up by Smithfield Market,” he said to Malone.
“Beanz,” said Malone. “What about it?”
“Ten minutes.”
“That's kind of pushy.”
“I'm buying.”
“Do I have to salute when I show up?”
There were few umbrellas showing here on Capel Street. Minogue drove past a half-dozen secondary-school students who stood clumped around the entrance to a kabob restaurant. In the stop-and-go traffic he had landed in since turning off Parnell Street, Minogue's thoughts had slipped the leash again. He eyed two slight Indian-looking men walking past, flinching from the rain. He wondered what their home streets and towns looked like. Full of people, no doubt, but sunny and hot and colourful.
Some honking started far ahead. A woman crossed through the stopped traffic, her head and shoulders hidden by her umbrella. What did Juraksaitis mean? Minogue imagined her at work listening, noting, drinking tea, walking through rooms. His unease grew. The van ahead of him lurched forward. He got the Peugeot into second gear.
He spotted the parked Octavia with a man behind the wheel just after the junction of Little Mary Street. He slowed, looking for any space at all to pull in. There was someone in the passenger seat, just the tip of his nose showing from the reclining seat. He pulled in behind a delivery lorry not far ahead, and slid his sign down on the dashboard. The Garda radio antenna on the Octavia was the new black one that looked like a claw. A silhouette moved beside the driver as Minogue approached.
Malone stepped out awkwardly. He held the door open and said something to the driver, a balding man in a Nike jacket with a mobile in his lap. The driver shrugged and gave Minogue a nod. Malone, unshaven and looking generally creased, pale, and irritated, closed the door. From the slight shrug he gave as he stepped forward Minogue knew that he was wearing a ballistic vest.
“Thanks,” he said to Malone.
“I haven't given you anything yet.”
“Am I interrupting anything?”
He held open the door of the restaurant for Malone. The smell of ground coffee that met him livened Minogue considerably.
Malone's eyes wandered the restaurant. Minogue ordered an au lait, and Malone's usual black. The man who took the order sounded Spanish. He would bring them over. They were to relax, he said.
A teenager with very black hair, and her boyfriend, were the only others here. They looked far beyond even glum. The girl stared at the street while the boy played with a twisted-up sugar packet. A difficult age.
Minogue settled himself ceremoniously at a table.
“You've got that look about you,” said Malone. “On the mooch.”
“You're a victim of your own success. Legendary.”
“Success,” said Malone and scratched at his stubble. “You think, huh.”
Minogue waited a moment.
“Your film career,” he said. “Any day now?”
Malone wrinkled his nose.
“What's his name again?”
“Fanning,” said Malone. “But he's a complete iijit.”
“Not working out for you?”
Malone flicked his head.
“Just what we need,” he said. “Some wannabe like him glamorizing the whole thing.”
“Has he given up phoning you then?”
“I wish,” said Malone, his voice rising. “He keeps on trying to get a foot in.”
“What exactly did he want, again?”
Malone sighed.
“What didn't he want, you should be asking. I don't know anymore. First, it's can we talk. I give him the brush-off, but nice enough, right? You know me.”
Minogue almost smiled.
“Maybe he's deaf, I thought,” Malone continued. “When he gets a âno' for the chat thing, bejases if he doesn't ask for something more instead! Sit-down interviews, he wanted next, big long Q and A sessions. Listen, says I, write what you like, but stay away from me. Not in so many words, now.”
“Any of the words start with an F?”
Malone ignored the jibe.
“He got bolshie on me then, like, âI want to give the Guards the opportunity to tell things from their side,' says he. Like, make me an offer or I'll make the Guards look like iijits in this.”