Ken Bruen - Cross

I was clenching my fists, trying not to go over to the desk.

He continued, 'So we began a more active style of Neighbourhood Watch, and, let me say, those particular teenagers won't be stealing dogs – or indeed anything else – for some time. Do I need to spell it out for you?'

He nigh glowed with his self-righteousness.

I said, 'Vigilantes, that's what you are.'

He stood up. My session was over.

'Ah, Taylor, we are what this city needs, citizens of affirmative action.'

Short of walloping the bejaysus out of him, there was no way of bursting his smugness. I said, 'The Klan have a similar line of rhetoric. You wear sheets yet?'

He looked at me with complete contempt.

'Goodbye, Taylor, and let me add, you're not welcome in this neighbourhood, we're trying for decency and respectability here.'

Fucker was threatening me. I asked, 'Or what, you'll take affirmative action?'

He opened the front door, said, 'Treat it as a friendly word of caution.'

'I'll walk wherever I damn well like, and you decide to take affirmative action, bring more than a sheet with you, pal.'

I headed down towards the canal, bile in my mouth and deep regret that I hadn't taken at least one pop at him. My mind was a maelstrom. King's factory had been razed for nothing, and Eoin Heaton drowned in the canal. Why?

A woman carrying a charity box, selling flags for the homeless, approached.

'Would you like to help the poor?'

I fumbled for a note, shoved a twenty in the box, said, 'Wrong terminology.'

She stared at me. 'Excuse me?'

'The poor. I'm reliably informed they're now the disadvantaged.'

She moved away quickly, keeping the twenty.

I went back to Eoin Heaton's haunts, trying to figure out what the hell happened to him. A round of dingy pubs, dire bookies' offices and hit if not pay dirt, at least a lead in the Social Security Office – a guy there told me Heaton had lived with his mother, and if anyone knew him, she did.

She lived in Bohermore, in one of the few remaining original houses that hadn't been converted to a townhouse. The original one-up, one-down model, in a terrace. It had a tiny garden that was well tended and the front had been freshly painted.

I knocked at the door and it was opened by a tiny woman, bent in half by age and poverty. Her clothes were spotless, clean as anything to emerge from the Magdalen Laundry. The memory of that place gave me a shudder.

'Mrs Heaton, I am so sorry to bother you, I was a friend of Eoin's.'

She lifted her head with obvious effort, looked at me, said, 'Come in, amac (son).'

Jeez, I hadn't heard that term in twenty years. She led the way into a small sitting room, again clean as redemption. The wall had three framed pictures: the Pope, the Sacred Heart, and Eoin in his Guard uniform. He looked impossibly young, fresh-faced and with an eagerness that tore at my heart.

Mrs Heaton asked, 'Can I get you a drop of tea, loveen?'

Jesus.

Loveen .

Time was, this term of endearment was as common as muggings. You never heard it any more. It conveyed effortless warmth and an intimacy that was reassuring without being intrusive. For one insane moment, I thought I was going to weep. I said I'd love a cup of tea. The old ritual, also dying out. Nowadays you went to a house, you got offered designer coffee and no warmth, maybe a stock option to put on the tray with the flash caffeine. You'd never refuse tea from such a lady, it would be like spitting in her face. And no matter how old or fragile she was, you never – ever – offered to help.

On the mantelpiece – which was covered with Irish lace, all hand embroidered – were trophies for hurling and Gaelic football, and a small bottle of Lourdes holy water. I took out one of Stewart's pills and swallowed it. I was more shaken than I wanted to admit.

Five minutes later, she returned with a tray. A pot of tea, her best china and a slab of fruitcake.

She raised her head, asked, 'Would you like a drop of the creature?'

Whiskey.

Only if I could never leave and finish the whole bottle.

'No, the tea will be grand.'

Slipping into the old way of talking as if I'd never left.

She said, 'We'll let the tea draw.'

She lowered herself with deliberate movement into an armchair, and used a spoon to stir the pot. Around her neck was a Miraculous Medal, held by blue string.

She said, 'Isn't it fierce cold?'

It wasn't.

I said, 'It's bitter.'

Tea and the weather, does it get more Irish?

I said, 'I'm so sorry about Eoin.'

Fuck, I tried to come up with some convincing lie about him, but she was his mother, she was going to believe any crumb I could dredge up.

I tried, 'He was a good man.'

Brilliant, just fucking inspired.

She began to sob. Not loudly – worse, those silent ones that rack the frame. A tear ran down her cheek, hit the china cup, made a soft plink, and I knew, knew with every fabric of my being, it would join the phantom orchestra of nightmarish melodies that tormented my sleep.

She dabbed at her eyes with a tissue, said, 'I'm sorry, Mr Taylor, it's…'

I rushed in with, 'Please, Mrs Heaton, call me Jack.'

She wouldn't, but it bought me some time. I asked, 'Is there anything I can do? Get you?'

She shook her head. 'Eoin was… very troubled, and the drink, that is a fierce curse, he couldn't get free of it.'

I was trying to think of a way to get out when she said, 'I didn't think he'd bring Blackie.'

Like a complete moron, I echoed, 'Blackie?'

As if she was talking to herself, she continued, 'Of course, he loved that dog, and I should have known he'd never leave without him.'

I felt my mind whirl, dance and reel as I attempted to put this into perspective.

'Blackie was his dog?'

The shrewd detective, not missing a beat, right on top of the data.

She gave a small smile, it lit up her whole lovely face, took thirty years straight off her.

'He lived for that animal, and when he… he… went into the river, I wasn't surprised he took Blackie.'

She fumbled in her apron, took out a neatly folded sheet of paper, offered it to me.

'He left this for me.'

With a sinking heart, I took it, unfolded it, read:

My Dear Mamie

I'm so sorry, I can't go on and please pray for me, I'm bringing Blackie for company, there's a few hundred euro in my sock drawer. I love you Mam.

XXXXXXX Eoin

I handed her back the note, unable to say a single word.

She said, 'He used his belt to tie Blackie to him. It was his Guards one, he was fierce proud of that. When they took his uniform, he held on to the belt. Do you think they'll take it back?'

'No… No, they won't.'

I got up to leave, promised I'd call in from time to time, check on her.

She said, 'You never ate your cake. Wait a minute.' And she went to the alcove, wrapped it in paper, said, 'That will be nice after your dinner. A growing man like yourself, you need something sweet for energy.'

She reached up and gave me a hug.

After I got out, I walked down the street in a daze, the slice of cake in my hand like the worst kind of recrimination.

The pub beckoned stronger than in a long time, but the odd thing, I felt it would be a real slap in the face to Mrs Heaton to use her grief to fuel my own desperation. I was guilty of so many things, but adding her to the list, that I couldn't quite stretch to.

I swallowed another of Stewart's pills.

Gail was about to leave the club when the man spoke to her.

He said, 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer?'

She'd heard every line in the book, but this caught her. The guy was older than most of the other clubbers, but she could see he was in shape, a tight lean body. But the eyes, the eyes were the lure. Hard, cold, like she knew she had her own self. He was wearing jeans, and a white open-neck shirt that showed off his build.