The Rage (28 page)

The birthday boy had already received his presents and cut his cake and it was time to drain some of the hyper energy out of the party guests. Rose Cheney’s husband threw a switch and the guests cheered as a bouncy castle shimmied into its upright position. When it was fully inflated Rose yelled, ‘Three, two – one!’ and stepped back as a dozen screaming kids rushed forward. For a moment she watched them jumping, bouncing, tumbling, then she joined Bob Tidey, who was nursing a can of Heineken on the raised deck at the end of the back garden.

‘I’m not sure that’s such a good idea, Bob – the investigation is over, at least our part in it. The brass aren’t overfond of foot soldiers who play detective.’

‘You’re buying the Kennedy theory?’

‘He had a shotgun – he had the nerve to turn it on himself, so he more than likely would have had the nerve to use it on Sweetman. Put it this way – it’s an explanation. You or I might want to put firmer ground under it, but we have our place in the scheme of things.’

‘What pisses me off is that Connie Wintour knew – probably before we were told – he knew the investigation was being closed down.’

‘Cosy cartels, golden circles – whatever you call them, they’re as much a part of this country as the mountains and the bogs. They watch out for each other.’

Tidey finished his Heineken. ‘Let it be?’

‘There’s no percentage in fighting a battle you can’t win.’

At the bouncy castle, a kid was crying. Cheney went to help a parent soothe the hurt.

Home – it’s like when you’re a kid and you build a hidey-hole from where you can look out onto a world in which you don’t feel entirely safe. Maybe the hidey-hole period lasted just one summer, maybe only a couple of weeks, but that idea of sanctuary never left Garda Sergeant David Dowd. Even with all the confidence and knowledge he retained from his ERU training, the part of the day he most enjoyed was when work and social obligations were done with, when he closed off the outside and relaxed into his hidey-hole.

He’d changed into T-shirt and shorts, he’d read two Mr Men books to his daughter – chosen at random from her enormous stack. Now, time to go downstairs and chill with his wife. There was a time when that would have meant a couple of beers or whiskeys, but not now. In the years since joining the ERU he hadn’t touched a drop. He would stay that way until he moved on to some unit where he would never be called out at short notice to deal with potentially fatal circumstances.

He raised both arms to pull the bedroom curtains closed and pieces of glass hit him in the face. He went down, screaming his wife’s name, telling her to drop to the floor – two more shots shattered window glass and he was belly down, moving fast across the floor, out the bedroom door, up onto his feet, running towards his daughter’s bedroom. The sound of two, three more shots, glass breaking.

Fuck, fuck, fuck. Not here. Not here
.

The city centre pub was crowded and noisy. It had never bothered Bob Tidey when he drank here back in the days when he was stationed nearby at Store Street. Back then, the crush and the noise was part of the fun, now he found the raised voices and the slight hysteria oppressive. He’d dropped in on his way back from Rose Cheney’s home, but after a single whiskey he left. He’d texted Holly and got another
Out and about
reply, so he took a taxi home to Glasnevin.

After a while, sitting in his flat, he found himself having an imaginary conversation about the Sweetman case – the reasons for believing that a business partner did it and then committed suicide, and the holes in that theory. He wondered if having imaginary conversations was a sign of mental deterioration. He switched on the television and clicked his way through a jungle of old sitcoms, showbiz gossip and obscure sports, along with documentaries offering all he needed to know about Nazis, ancient Romans or air crashes. He didn’t notice himself nodding off and when he jolted awake he was still sitting in the armchair, his head tilted at an awkward angle. On the television, a man was explaining something about Stonehenge. Tidey’s watch said it was just after two o’clock. He made it to the bedroom and slipped back into sleep.

In the dim light from inside the open boot, Vincent Naylor could see that the reporter’s tied hands were trembling, his lips quivering as though he’d just surfaced from an arctic sea. For a moment, Vincent thought the creep had gone into shock.

‘Please.’

‘Shut up.’

Vincent leaned down and pulled the reporter out, dumped him in a heap on the ground. They were out beyond Tallaght, in a wooded area in the foothills of the Dublin mountains. Below, the lights of the western suburbs glowed. It was almost three in the morning, the air was chilly, the whole world quiet.

Vincent took a knife from his pocket, unfolded the blade and cut the bindings on the reporter’s hands and legs.

‘You gave me everything I needed, right? No reason to worry, then – right?’

The thing at the cop’s house had been sweet. Vincent was prepared for a false start, maybe a darkened house, maybe a long wait until the bastard arrived home. Instead, an SUV in the driveway, lights on upstairs and down. Stoking himself up to ring the doorbell and put the muzzle of the gun in the bastard’s face, Vincent looked up and there the bastard was at the bedroom window and it took Vincent just a second to get the Bernardelli out of his shoulder bag.
Blam blam blam
– the cop went down like someone took his legs away. And again,
Blam blam blam
, for good measure. The only maybe in Vincent’s mind was what if that wasn’t him? But who else would be in a bedroom of the guy’s house at that time of evening? Had to be.

Vincent took the reporter by the back of his jacket and dragged him – the guy’s legs scrambling awkwardly on the uneven ground – until they were in front of the car, in the beam from the headlights.

‘Please—’

‘A bone to pick.’

‘Please—’

‘My brother Noel—’ Vincent leaned down so his lips were a couple of inches from the reporter’s ear – ‘all his life, he never got his name in the papers.’ Vincent straightened up. The little creep cowered, carefully avoiding eye contact. ‘First time he got his name in the papers was when he was shot dead by the cops. Shot dead trying to surrender.’

‘Please—’

‘Never got his name in the papers, his whole life. Then, his name was all over the papers and some of it was fair enough, it just said what happened. Even if it didn’t say he’d been surrendering.’

The reporter tilted his chin up towards Vincent. ‘I said that, about surrendering – I put that in – there was an old man, he told me – thousands of people read that, they—’

Vincent punched the reporter in the face. Anthony said, ‘Ah,’ then he said it again, almost a sigh, over and over. There was blood on his mouth, where his lip split when it was crushed against his teeth. Vincent leaned down again. ‘A notorious thug, you called him. A drug dealer, you called him. Thousands of people read that too. Why’d you have to tell lies? Why?’

‘It’s – I talked to the police, they said there were things he was never charged with, and—’

‘And those bastards never lie?’

‘Please—’

‘You expect to get away with that?’

‘Please—’

Vincent reared back and his hand with the Bernardelli came swinging, the gun smashing into the side of the reporter’s head. Which was a mistake. Vincent shook him, slapped his face, tried to bring him round – no use. The smack in the head probably gave him a concussion. Pity, that. When Vincent put the gun to the reporter’s forehead and squeezed the trigger the bastard never saw it coming.

Rising up from a deep sleep, Bob Tidey was already reaching for his bleating mobile before he was fully awake.

‘Yeah?’

‘Detective Sergeant Tidey?’

‘Yeah?’

‘There’s a car waiting, out front. Instructions from Detective Chief Superintendent Hogg.’

It took several moments of silence to make sense of this. At first, Tidey thought he might have slept in and missed an appointment.

‘A car? What for?’

‘Detective Chief Superintendent wants to see you, directly.’

‘What about? I’m on leave.’

‘Those are my instructions.’

Tidey muttered, ‘Bollocks.’ He looked at his watch – quarter past ten. ‘Give me a minute.’ He ended the call.

He was ready in twenty.

Vincent Naylor sat down to a late breakfast at the Four Seasons Hotel. Usually, a coffee and a slice of toast was enough, but today he felt like treating himself. He glanced inside the large envelope he’d collected at the car park at the Ilac. All in order.

These were people it was a pleasure to deal with. They could supply anything, and take your dirty money and launder it for a sizeable commission. The envelope held a driving licence, a real passport with a fake name, a debit card to match, linked to an account with three grand. There were details of the options for his trip via Belfast to Glasgow, and it was up to him to make his own way to London. He had a choice of when to leave – one phone call, twenty-four hours’ notice, and they’d slot the final pieces into place. These people knew how to charge, but they did a first-rate job.

The scales inside Vincent’s head were more balanced, and that made him feel like he was paying Noel the respect he deserved. He could leave the country right now and he’d feel he’d done the right thing – but he hadn’t cleared the entire list. He’d done the Protectica guy, Lorraine and Albert, the reporter and the cop. Almost finished.

The waiter came to take his order. Vincent said he’d have the full Irish, with extra sausages.

Detective Chief Superintendent Malachy Hogg was sitting behind his large oak desk. He didn’t rise to greet Bob Tidey. ‘Right to the point, Detective Sergeant. After consultation with Assistant Commissioner O’Keefe, I am to inform you that you’re suspended from duty, on full pay, as and from this moment, pending a disciplinary inquiry.’

The words were delivered flatly, as though Hogg was reading aloud from a set of instructions. ‘You will be informed within forty-eight hours of the particulars of the conduct that led to this suspension. I suggest you notify the Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors, with a view to acquiring representation.’

Tidey waited. Hogg remained silent.

‘That’s it? I’ve done something unspecified, to someone unknown – and—’

‘You know damn well – you received specific instructions regarding a major murder case, and you ignored them and ploughed your own furrow.’

‘It never occurred to me you and Connie were close.’

‘Don’t be stupid. This isn’t about Connie Wintour, it’s about you. Decisions were made, but you decided you’re above all that chain-of-command shit. Well, we don’t have lone crusaders in this force.’ Hogg’s voice was now more brisk. ‘Wintour complained about being harassed, as he was entitled to do. And when it trickled down to Assistant Commissioner O’Keefe – when he learned that you’d ignored orders – he had no option.’

‘Trickled down to an AC. How high up the political ladder do Connie’s protectors go?’

‘Off the record, Bob, leaving rank aside – you’re way out of line. Senior officers reached a conclusion based on the evidence. You’re entitled to your opinion, but we can’t have freelance investigators second-guessing official findings.’

‘Off the record, leaving rank aside – do you believe the Sweetman murder was just a falling-out between two businessmen?’

‘I do.’

‘You don’t think it’s a convenient story – a little drama to distract the skulls?’

‘I believe the evidence supports our conclusion.’

‘You’re ready to stand over that, Chief Superintendent?’

Hogg had drained his face of empathy. When you’re giving someone a kicking, there’s no point wearing fluffy slippers. ‘Remember, you got a reprimand from a judge, in open court, over the quality of your evidence in a criminal trial. If you’ve any notion of making a song and dance about this, that reprimand can be picked up and run as a perjury allegation.’ He waited a moment, and when Tidey didn’t respond he said, ‘Now, fuck off, Bob.’

Twice Bob Tidey called Colin O’Keefe’s number, and twice there was no answer. He adjusted his mobile so his number wouldn’t appear on the receiving phone. He called again and the Assistant Commissioner answered.

‘Colin, you know this murder–suicide shit is dodgy. Hogg is so set on closing the case that he’s threatening me with trumped-up perjury charges if I follow an open lead.’

‘This is inappropriate.’

‘Colin, this stinks.’

‘We were colleagues, we were friends. We’ll be colleagues again, and I hope we’ll be friends again – but right now you’re one of the many problems I have to deal with. I wish it was different – but that’s the way it is. Now, I’m ringing off.’

The phone went dead.

Almost noon.

The car that had brought Bob Tidey to Garda headquarters in the Phoenix Park was nowhere to be seen. He walked a while and picked up a taxi on the North Circular Road. He was sitting in the back, oblivious to his surroundings, when the driver turned and said, ‘We’re going where?’

Tidey didn’t want to go home, to be alone. He didn’t want to go anywhere, to be with anyone else. ‘O’Connell Bridge.’