He shook himself out of his wonderings and left the bathroom. In the hall he heard Crossan’s characteristic rapid-fire tones barked out behind the living-room door. He stopped by the closed door and swept his fingers over the top of his fly for the third time, again to make certain that he had zipped it and would not make a complete iijit of himself in front of Sheila Howard. He look about the hallway again. The staircase spindles were clear-lacquered over a cherry-coloured varnish and the mahogany handrail curved as the staircase ascended. The hall door was a generous width, heavy between slim windows to both sides…
Minogue stopped his hand turning the knob and looked more intently toward one of the windows flanking the door. Gone, whatever it had been. A cat or a dog out by the cars? He let go of the door-handle and stepped across to the window. He stared at the pebbled drive where his Fiat was parked, stubby and down-at-heel next to the Audi. Light from above the hall door outside did little more than confirm the shapes of the cars and outline the low hedges nearby. But someone was out there.
His fingertips began to tingle and he held his breath. His mind could not fasten on anything beyond his own quickening heartbeat now. He stepped back from the window but kept his eyes on the narrow strip of glass. Half-formed images tore through his mind: the muzzle of a gun firing, the sense that the world in smithereens had been thrown at impossible speeds into the air, the bomb’s shock waves pounding his eardrums, the windscreen coming in at him like a lace tablecloth. His mouth turned chalky with the memory of his own near-fatal greeting from death. Sourness burned low in his throat and he heard his breath come out in a tight sigh.
He grasped the door handle, turned it sharply and stepped through the doorway. Crossan said all right to Howard who said the day after tomorrow and I was already in touch with Father O’Loughlin and he knew the Bourkes years ago… Eyes turned toward the Inspector and stayed on him. The broad window to his left, that graceful opening to the night outside which had pleased him before, now issued a silent shriek of alarm. Ice gathered in his chest.
“What is it?” someone said, a man’s voice.
Minogue looked: Howard. The window remained in his side vision.
“What’s wrong?” Crossan asked.
Minogue’s thoughts returned. Damn: he had walked by the phone in the hall. Go back?
“I’m not certain now,” he began. He tried to clear his throat. “I’m not sure now, but I think I saw someone outside.”
Howard’s eyes snapped into an intense stare.
“Does there be anyone around here at night?” Minogue asked.
“No,” said Howard.
The Inspector reached over to the strings and began pulling the curtains closed. Howard catapulted up from the sofa and grasped Sheila Howard’s arm. Crossan stood to a crouch.
“We’d do well to stay low,” Minogue whispered, and he sank to his knees. He put his hands out on the floor. He remembered playing horsey with Daithi and Iseult twenty years previously.
“Aren’t we being kind of stu-” Crossan began.
“No!” snapped Minogue. The Howards were now on all fours and Crossan was kneeling.
“The phone-” Minogue started to say when the curtains danced. An instant later, even before he heard the chat-chat-chat of automatic fire, pieces of glass batted and tore at the curtains before cascading onto the floor. More tears appeared in the curtain and it danced quicker, as though being whacked by invisible hands. Minogue felt his cheek against the wood floor. A part of his mind not swept away in panic wondered about ricochets. He opened his eyes and saw the spots being punched across the ceiling. Fragments of cornice and plaster flew in the air and dust swirled under the ceiling light. Then it was dark. Minogue heard a lampshade being flung against the wall. Small, sharp things rained down on him. Wood splintered and he heard the window frame chirrup before it disintegrated. Minogue clenched his eyelids tight then against the maelstrom of dust and minute flying shards and he began to wriggle toward the doorway. Through his knees and elbows he felt the dull percussive thump of bullets as they hit the walls and were stopped by the stone bulk within the plaster.
Several seconds passed before he realised that the shooting had stopped. The remains of the ceiling light kept swinging wildly in the lull. The torn curtains settled slowly against the window-sill. Odd fragments of glass and plaster fell at intervals, making Minogue’s heart leap each time. He steeled himself for the shooting to resume, for footsteps coming up the steps or running through the kitchen. He rubbed knuckles in his eye sockets and opened his eyes cautiously. Light from the hall sliced into the clouds of dust. He looked up at the wire of the ceiling light still swinging, the frayed curtains. Suddenly his body tensed: he heard running steps on the gravel outside.
They were going away from the house. As the sound of the footsteps receded, he began to hear gasps nearby. The fire glowed in the grate still, its yellow glow widened but dulled by the slowly falling dust. The room was now eerily calm.
“Are ye there?” Minogue whispered. An engine coughed down on the road and he listened intently, hoping that he could at least tell if it was a six- or a four-cylinder or something.
“I think so,” Howard answered.
“Yes,” said Sheila Howard.
The engine didn’t catch on the first turn of the key. When it did, the driver let out the clutch immediately and the tires bit in, leaving a rasping hiss as they scrambled for traction on the wet road.
“Is there anyone hurt?” Minogue hissed. No one answered.
“Alo!” Howard called out.
“Oh, don’t worry about me,” Crossan replied before coughing. He elbowed up from the floor. “This isn’t my house at all,” he spluttered and coughed again.
“We’ll get out of here right away,” Minogue said. “They may have left something behind them that could do damage.”
Like figures in a dream, the Howards, with Crossan following, scurried like monkeys to the door.
“Stay well down still,” Minogue warned. He reached up from his crouch and switched off the hall light, then hurried the shambling, hopping figures toward the kitchen and the rear of the house.
CHAPTER TEN
Russell showed up an hour after the first Gardai from Ennis, and a half-hour after two carloads of Guards from the Emergency Response Units. A half-dozen squad cars, an ambulance and several vans now clogged the road by the gates. Minogue watched the Superintendent slide out of his seat and listen while a Sergeant briefed him. Minogue was sitting in the passenger seat of a squad car, the Howards in the back. Crossan, the last to be interviewed, was in a nearby squad car. Minogue had noticed that the ERU Guards didn’t mix much with the uniformed Guards. The former had at least covered their guns after inspecting the house. Minogue looked down at the Elastoplast on the back of his hand. The air in the car was too hot now and he turned down the blower.
He spoke over his shoulder to the Howards.
“Are ye warm enough in the back?”
Sheila Howard was leaning into her husband and he had his arm around her shoulders. Dan Howard touched his forehead where a small, fine piece of glass had been expertly removed by an ambulance attendant.
“We are,” said Howard in a whisper.
The interior light of the Toyota accentuated Howard’s pallor. His curls were greyed lighter in parts by dust from the pulverised plaster. Minogue turned around. His elbows rubbed at the cloth of his jacket and reminded him that he had rubbed raw spots there from his movement across the floor during the fusillade. Sheila Howard’s eyes were small and fixed on the headrest in front of her.