“Jack’s my gopher, you know, the one who jumps when I whistle.”
Building a whole amount of sneer into that. She liked it, pushed,
“Get him to jump now.”
Maybe I’d just shoot her.
A long moment. We were frozen in a tableau of dislike. Reardon broke the spell, said,
“Jack has to run along now. Isn’t that right, Jack? There’s a good boy, hop it.”
The sneer was so inbuilt, you could almost miss it-almost. I stood, slipping the nine into the pocket of item 1834, my all-weather Garda coat, asked,
“Any idea of where your wife might be?”
The reality genius heard wrong, laughed, said,
“Is he looking for a wife, Daniel?”
Daniel. Jesus, who knew?
I’d of course read about Danny Reardon, American poet/actor/author who now lectured at Trinity, but, I figured, no kin. Daniel smiled.
“Jack, you’re a PI and asking me?”
The bright spark was about to ask something and he lashed her, fast, with,
“Shut. . the. . fuck. . up.”
She did.
I looked right into his eyes, let him see I was not fucking around, said,
“Best for all if maybe I find her before, you know, the cops?”
We both knew that was a crock. He asked,
“Where would Oscar flee to?”
I was on my way out, a slight tremor niggling at my nerve ends. I heard, in whine song,
“Who’s Oscar?”
Galway was on the world stage for all the wrong worst reasons.
An Indian woman died of blood poisoning after being denied a pregnancy termination. Though she was in severe pain, the hospital refused to act, as the staff said,
. . there was still a fetal heartbeat and this was a Catholic country.
Previously, she’d been told she was having a spontaneous abortion and the fetus had no chance. Details of the woman’s horrendous agony and agonizing death led to immediate street protests, and crowds from both sides of the abortion divide shouted at each other outside the hospital.
The government ducked and dived, muttering platitudes, adding fuel to the notion it was the most hated government we’d ever had. The new austerity measures, seemingly new ones daily, had the people already at breaking point.
I was in Garavan’s, a pint before me, and a man in a splendid suit, groomed hair, tan, knocked back a large gin and tonic, pronounced,
“See, say what the fuck you like, the church still rules this country. The clergy might be less profile but they are still covert. Abortion is their ticket back.”
His use of the obscenity seemed especially offensive. A photo of the deceased woman was on all the front pages. She had one of those lovely faces that testify to a gentle soul. The suit turned to me, assessed me, found me wanting, asked-demanded-
“What do you think, fellah?”
I moved from my stool, looked at him, said,
“You shout the odds in a pub but what are you going to do?”
This seemed to baffle him. He echoed,
“Do? What can I possibly do?”
I hadn’t the energy to start, said,
“Gotcha.”
He grabbed my arm, hissed,
“What’s that mean, eh? We’re a nation of talkers, we shout and rant, it’s our heritage.”
“But what happened to the country of fighters?”
I asked.
“Not the point,”
He said.
. . and more’s the Irish-ed pity.
33
“Naturally,” he said, “I don’t defend evil deeds, but if you can’t understand the nature of crime. . the motives of a criminal. . well, you won’t get very far as a detective. There is a sort of twisted logic which is often easier to discover than the logic which governs our everyday actions. As we all know, chaos is the neighbour of God; but everything’s usually neat and tidy in hell.”
Finally did a detective thing-found the apartment Kelly lived in when she wasn’t staying at Reardon’s place. Knew she had to have a separate, if not peace, then territory.
How?
I asked the ESB.
Light bills have caught more villains than the Guards.
The apartment was in Devon Park, formerly a rich enclave for hidden and hiding consultants who’d be hiding even more after the needless death of the young Indian woman. The whole of the bottom floor was in Kelly’s name. I had a clipboard and a puzzled expression, basically the only tools essential for burglary. Those and a bent key. I got in without triggering alarms and, it struck me, this was my second break-in in a week, maybe a whole new line of work.
The living room was spotless, I mean, vacuumed to within an inch of its fiber. Leather easy chairs and a large lived-in sofa.
One massive bookcase.
Wilde.
As in, hundreds of Oscar volumes. A top shelf devoted to true crime and psychology.
Ann Rule.
People of the Lie.
Books on Bundy and all the boyos. But, most telling, a three-volume Study on Women Psychopaths and Sociopaths.
One volume seemed to be especially well thumbed so I took that. And must have triggered something in the shelf as suddenly all the lights came on, the radio, the huge-screen TV. Put the shite crossways in me. I literally jumped. Moved quickly around, turned off everything save the TV.
I found the drinks cabinet, and phew-oh, a veritable wet dream for an alky. I settled for a fine old single malt. The TV was tuned to Setanta, our version of ESPN.
Showing Sweden versus England and Ibrahimović’s spectacular scissor goal. It was in a loop play and I watched, mesmerized, as
1. He focused on the ball, bent his knees to prepare.
2. The non-kicking left foot leaves the ground first.
3. The left foot’s rapid upward swing gets him airborne.
4. In midair!. . He brings the kicking boot into play.
5. The right foot strikes the ball in a looping goal-aimed trajectory.
6. The sheer power rush of the strike somersaults his body as he then lands on his feet to punch the air.
He knew that baby was going to goal.
“Jesus,”
I muttered,
“What a thing of beauty.”
I checked the bedroom: neat, tidy, and brand-new clothes, still in their wrappers. Ten pairs of expensive shoes, lined up, and I knew the prices, as the tags were still intact. A Michael Mortell coat on the door peg, also unworn. I stepped back, thought,
“A life waiting to be lived, truly on hold, but for what?”
Bathroom. Usually a treasure of medication, you can at least hope for a slew of Valium. Nope, just a bottle of Joop!
Jesus-with the tag, real men wear pink. Surely an Oscar link. If you ignored the bookcase, there was nothing to say anyone lived here. This was vacancy writ large to largest. I’d learned absolutely fuck all. I took one final sweep through, not even sure what I hoped to find. In the kitchen, on top of the fridge, was a TV Guide and I flicked the pages.
One series heavily underlined.
The Booth at the End.
Of the myriad of things I longed to share with Stewart, to discuss, fight over, this series was prime. Had begun as a twenty-minute Internet sensation, now a five-part series, directed by Adam Arkin, it was The Twilight Zone meets The Zen of the Diner.
It was punk, street metaphysics, and I no longer could watch it as, every line, I wanted to shout,
“Stewart, get a load of this.”
Fuck to fucked loss.
Why she’d marked that didn’t provide a whole lot more light. The bitch was a stone-cold psycho, unraveling faster than a propeller cycle backward kick. I sat on a hard cane chair, put my head in my hands, and wondered when the grief would ebb. I mused on the five stages of grief they extol and said,