Ken Bruen - Headstone

Maybe they don’t.

She said,

“You don’t know me.”

Statement.

I asked,

“Any reason why I should?”

Allowing a hint of force in there. If she was here to bust my balls, she’d chosen the right fucking day and the right fucking time to try it.

Her accent was the new cultivated Irish that spoke of:

money,

education,

confidence,

and fuck you.

As alien to me as a Brit.

She said,

“You put my brother in the mental hospital.”

As lines go, it’s a showstopper.

I asked.

“What?”

She took my spoon, asked,

“May I?”

Cut a corner of my Danish, said,

“I like sweet things.”

She’d thrown me. The only person I knew for sure I’d put in the home for the bewildered was my own self. Then,

Jesus Christ.

Years ago, a young man had been beheading swans. I’d nailed him and, yeah, he came from a good family, meaning cash and clout. No jail time, sent to a hospital. She asked,

“Coming back dude? The booze hasn’t destroyed all the brain cells?”

I’d met most brands of psychos during my career as a half-arsed investigator. They all shared the same total lack of empathy. Not so much they lacked a human element, more like they were a whole other species. A highly lethal one. But that kid, he’d used a samurai sword to decapitate the swans. What I most recalled was the absolute glee in his eyes. He didn’t so much enjoy his deeds as revel in them. I’d used a stun gun to knock him back into the water. The swans had gone for his eyes. He lost one. Every fiber of my being had been to let him drown. But I’d dragged him out. I’d hoped never to see the creep again.

Years later, he’d turned up,

“ Cured ,”

he told me.

The medicine hadn’t been invented to rewire his kind. They simply changed their act. The deadly impulse even more honed and ferocious than ever. He’d then vanished from my radar. I always knew he was out there and I was unfinished business. I said,

“I remember him; he told me he was a student.”

She gave me a look of pure defiance, said,

“He got his degree.”

I couldn’t resist, said,

“Long as it wasn’t as a vet.”

She pushed the Danish back, said,

“It’s stale.”

I said,

“So……..?”

“He’s missing.”

I wanted to say,

“He was born missing,” but went with

“And I should care………….why?”

“I want you to find him.”

I laughed, said,

“I’m the very last person he’d want on his case. You never gave me your name.”

Her whole body language was screaming that she had ammunition. She said,

“Bethany.”

I signaled to the waitress for the bill, said,

“Your family as I recall has lots of resources, and at last count, there are nine professional investigators in the city. They’d be glad to take your money. Me, I couldn’t give a rat’s arse what happens to your whacko brother.”

I paid the bill, stood up, and was turning to leave when she near whispered,

“I have something you want, Taylor.”

I shook my head, had already reached the door when she hissed,

“I know what happened to the priest,”

pause,

“and the retard.”

Stopped me. But she was up and brushing past me, moving fast.

I went after her.

Great.

Pursuing a young girl on the busiest street in Galway. My mobile shrilled, I said,

“Fuck.”

Pulled it from my jacket. Bethany had reached McDonagh’s Fish ’n’ Chip shop, the bottom of Quay Street. Christ, that girl could move. She turned, stared back at me, then ever so elegantly, gave me the finger. She disappeared among the horde of tourists being off-loaded from a coach.

I answered the mobile, heard,

“Jack, it’s Stewart.”

“Yeah?”

“Where are you?”

“Iraq.”

“What?”

“The bottom of Quay Street, the fuck does it matter where I am?”

He wasn’t fazed, he’d heard it too often, asked,

“I’m at the Meyrick, can you come? We need to talk.”

I said OK and rang off. The Meyrick used to be the Great Southern Hotel. It was never great but it was one more fading landmark on the city’s landscape. I’ve always had a sneaking fondness for it, mainly as they allow me in. It had moved further up the ladder in its new incarnation. And me, I just got older.

I headed up Shop Street, marveling at the new outlets, a new one every day. The street was ablaze with buskers, mimes, panhandlers, and the dying remnants of a drinking school. I stopped outside the GBC Café. The name had come to me. Bethany’s brother broke the surface of my bedraggled mind.

Ronan Wall.

The last time I’d met him, he’d been charm personified. You’d think he’d have a hard-on for me. But no, despite his eye loss, his incarceration in the mental hospital, you’d swear I was his best friend. Did he, as you’d expect, lacerate me, berate me for destroying his life?

Nope.

He thanked me!

I shit thee not.

Said, and I quote,

“Thanks to you, Jack Taylor, I’ve turned my life around. I have great plans for my future.”

My arse.

He was the real McCoy, a full-blown psycho, the out and full-focused ultimate predator, and he’d learnt to hide in plain sight. He could mimic human behavior to a degree of charm that probably fooled most people. A good-looking kid, blond hair falling into his remaining eye. The new artificial one was, no doubt, the best money could buy, but disconcerting in its stillness.

His good eye couldn’t quite disguise what lay beneath, and worse, he knew I knew.

But he’d rattled on, flush with affability and studied warmth. I hadn’t seen him since but I knew, one day, he’d show, and so here he was again in my life. Whatever the gig, it wouldn’t be good. How could it, with a stone killer just biding his time?

The Meyrick Hotel lies at the bottom of Eyre Square and the new renovations should have made it imposing. All that solid granite, the iron railings, but to me it was still the hotel of my youth. I pushed through the freshly polished glass door, saw Stewart in the lounge. A white porcelain teapot, matching cups before him. Decaffeinated or herbal tea no doubt. He stood up on seeing me. Dressed in an Armani suit, one of those suits that whispered to you,

“You ain’t never going to be able to afford this.”

He was the personification of the new Irish: sleek, smug, self-contained. I felt like his bedraggled grandfather. We sat, he offered me some of the shite stuff he was drinking, and I gave him the look.

Asked,

“What’s up?”

He reached in the pocket of the immaculate suit, produced a small package, said,

“This came in the post.”

I said,

“A headstone.”

His surprise was evident so I said,

“I got one too.”

He glanced at the package, said,

“It’s unnerving.”

I gave a short laugh, said,

“That’s the point.”

He waited, apparently believing I had an answer.

I didn’t. Finally, he tried,

“Would it be some kind of Halloween prank?”

I said,

“Trick or threat?”

I told him about Ronan Wall’s sister and her parting shot about Father Malachy. Stewart was edgy. He liked patterns, things that made sense, events he could Zen-control. His mobile shrilled and he checked the screen, said,

“I have to take this Jack.”

Like I gave a fuck?

While he talked, I played with ordering a large Jay, decided the distaste on Stewart’s face wasn’t worth the hassle. He finished the call, said,

“Sorry about that, a new venture.”

He’d been a dope dealer, got busted, did a long jail stretch, and since then I knew he was involved in all sorts of business gigs. He never shared details but was always awash in cash. For once,