‘Ah, would you fuck off, Larry. Really. You’re losing the run of yourself here.’ Norton’s head is ready to burst.
‘I’m not,’ Bolger says. ‘I’m not.’ He turns and slaps the palm of his hand down on the desk. ‘Something weird went on back then, Paddy, and there’s something weird going on now, too. Because that young fella the other day in Buswell’s Hotel? I know who he was. He was the kid who survived the crash. He was Mark Griffin. He had to be. I thought he was just some journalist looking for a story, but a couple of hours ago -’ he motions back at his desk again, at the phone, ‘I get a call, and do you know what? The Guards have identified that second guy who’s in intensive care out in St Felim’s, from last night, from that thing in Cherryvale. It’s going to be on the news at nine o’clock.’ He pauses to let that sink in. ‘And do you know who it is? They said he’s in a bad way and mightn’t make it, but it’s him, Paddy. Mark Griffin.’ He holds up his hands. ‘Explain that to me.’
Norton stares at Bolger for a long time.
‘What are the Guards saying?’ he says eventually.
Bolger stares back. He hesitates, but then says, ‘That it was his warehouse. That he’s a local businessman. They’re saying it might just be that he was unlucky. In the wrong place at the wrong time.’
‘What, like a random victim?’
Bolger nods. ‘That sort of thing.’
‘But no reference to… who he is,to…’
‘No.’
‘OK,’ Norton says, considering this, looking at the floor. ‘And of course why would there be? It was a long time ago? If he dies, who’s going to make the connection, right?’
‘Ah, now hold on, Paddy, hold on… for the love of Christ, what are you saying to me here?’
Norton continues staring at the floor. ‘But even if someone did make the connection,’ he says, almost to himself now, ‘even if some industrious hack dug it up, so what? It’d just be a curious fact, with a nice tabloid ring to it.’ He pauses. ‘But it wouldn’t mean anything, it wouldn’t have any further resonance… unless…’
Norton hears a gentle tap on the door behind him, a creaking sound, and then an obsequious male voice, ‘Er… Minister, excuse me, but -’
‘GET OUT!’
Norton then hears the creaking sound in reverse.
Visibly trembling, Bolger takes a couple of steps backwards and leans on his desk. ‘Unless what?’
‘Calm down, Larry.’
‘Unless what?’
Norton sighs. ‘Unless you keep asking questions about Frank.’
Silence fills the room, spreading out like a toxic vapour, finding every corner.
‘But Paddy,’ Bolger eventually manages to say, leaning forward, pleading, ‘he was my brother.’
Norton winces and raises a hand to his head. Without saying anything, he then walks across the room. He goes in behind Bolger’s desk and starts pulling at the various drawers, opening one after the other and rummaging through them.
Bolger turns, still at the front of the desk, and says, ‘Paddy, what are you doing?’
‘I need something for this headache,’ Norton says, ‘I need…’
He pulls a packet of Nurofen from one of the drawers and holds it up. On a shelf behind him there is a tray with glasses on it and half a dozen bottles of Ballygowan. He opens one of the bottles. He fiddles with the packet of Nurofen and knocks four of the tablets back in one go, followed by a long slug of water. He puts the bottle down and rolls his neck a couple of times. When he is ready, he walks back into the middle of the room, turns and faces Bolger.
‘Right,’ he says, closing his eyes for a moment and then opening them again. ‘You have a simple choice here. You can either pursue this and keep asking questions – what happened that night, was he drunk, was he pushed, blah, blah. You can go down that road, resurrect shit from two and a half decades ago and feed it to the media on a platter.’ He pauses. ‘Or you can go out that door over there and embrace your destiny. You can take power and run this country for five, maybe even ten years. You can change things, make a difference, fix the Health Service, build infrastructure. You can have access to Downing Street, to Brussels, you can sit on the UN Security Council, you can eat dinner at the fucking White House, whatever. But believe me, Larry…’ – he holds up a finger and shakes it – ‘… you can’t do both.’
Bolger stares back at him, deflated. The silence is excruciating and goes on for nearly a minute.
Norton is the one who breaks it.
‘I’m going to leave now,’ he says in a quiet, measured voice.
He turns and heads for the door. ‘By the way,’ he adds, over his shoulder, ‘I’m having lunch tomorrow with James Vaughan. He’s flying in from London. I’m sure you’ll be busy, but maybe you could fit us in?’
He stops at the door and looks around.
Bolger hasn’t moved.
‘Jesus, Larry,’ Norton says. ‘Look at the bloody state of you. Straighten your tie up at least, would you? Christ.’
Shaking his head, he turns back to the door, opens it and leaves.
‘Still with us, yeah?’
Gina hops up from her desk. Only half awake, she was lost, eyes closed, in a Technicolor re-enactment of what had happened the previous night.
At his workstation, Steve is leaning back in his chair, arms outstretched. ‘Got it,’ he says.
This is the jolt that Gina needs. It wakes her up.
‘Excellent,’ she says. ‘You’re a genius.’ She pauses. ‘So what is it?’
‘I’ve no idea. Two PDF files, one long, the other one not so long, and five emails. I’ve copied them and sent them over to you.’ He nods in the direction of her desk.
‘Thanks. I really appreciate this.’
He shrugs. ‘Who do I bill for the time?’
‘Oh God, Steve, look, I know things are -’
‘Gina,’ he says, holding a hand up. ‘Don’t. I was only messing.’ He turns and grabs a jacket from the back of his chair. ‘Buy me a drink sometime.’
‘OK. Thanks.’
After he leaves, Gina makes herself some coffee, turns out most of the lights and sits at her desk again. She is just about to open one of the PDF files when her mobile rings. She picks it up.
New number.
‘Hello?’
Silence.
‘Hello?’
More silence, then, ‘Gina?’
‘Yes.’
A click and it goes dead. She looks at the phone, stares at it for a few moments, as though expecting it to talk up, to explain itself. With an unpleasant churning in her stomach, she then goes to Options and presses Reply. It rings. No one answers. There’s no voicemail. It rings out.
Gina swallows.
She runs a hand through her hair, and sighs.
After a few moments, she turns back to the computer.
So she is alive.
Norton stands in the phone box with his hand on the receiver. He hasn’t been inside one of these things in ten or fifteen years, not since the days when most of the damn things were permanently out of order.
He slides his hand off the receiver and backs out through the glass door.
Anyway, she’s alive. And answering her phone.
He looks around. He’s on the Long Mile Road. When he got back to his car on Baggot Street, the Nurofen were only just kicking in, so he decided he’d drive around for a while and give them a chance to work. Besides, he had no desire to go home. And in any case after about half an hour Paula phoned – on Bolger’s instructions. The choreography had been set in motion. Three senior ministers were in with the Taoiseach at the moment, and assuming he didn’t put up a fight, which no one expected him to do, his office would shortly be releasing a statement announcing his resignation – after which a statement from party HQ would be released. It should all be wrapped up within the hour, Paula said. So was he coming back in? There’d be celebrations. Champagne.