Matt McGuire - Dark Dawn

‘Next time, Jack. There’s always next time.’

It was bullshit and Ward knew it. He was too old. His face didn’t fit. He didn’t speak the lingo. He would retire next year anyway, leave the force to Wilson and the rest of the bean-counters.

There was still O’Neill though. O’Neill was a peeler. A real peeler. On the drive over to Laganview, Ward had come up with an idea. What if he left O’Neill behind him. Make him the stone in Wilson’s shoe. Always there. Niggling away. Ward had smiled at the thought. He knew it wasn’t just about Wilson though. It wasn’t just some personal vendetta. It was bigger than that. The North needed peelers like O’Neill. Now more than ever. It needed guys to get out there, to get involved, to get their hands dirty. Hiding in meetings, ducking behind spreadsheets. . what did that ever get done?

***

Standing beside Ward, O’Neill studied the area round the body. The SOCOs were on their way with a tent. Protect the integrity of the scene. He remembered his Locard from Police College: the first rule of forensic science, every contact leaves a trace. O’Neill looked at the rain. Most of the forensics would have washed into the river and be halfway to Scotland by now. Maybe the rules didn’t apply in Belfast.

O’Neill still hadn’t gone near the body. When the SOCOs arrived they’d begin from the perimeter and work their way in, in everdecreasing circles. They’d go slowly, patiently, following the golden rule which says there may be only one crime scene, but there are many ways to fuck it up.

The body was an IC1 male. Late teens, pale and skinny, with hollow cheeks and a shaved head. The most important question was, who was he? Ninety per cent of homicides were committed by someone who knew the victim. A neighbour, a friend, a relative. That was right. In a detective’s litany of cynical thoughts, the nearest and dearest were never excluded from the list. Random attacks? Stranger danger? Ward was right. People watched too much TV. Start with his mates, call them killers, see who blinks. Find out who the victim was, you were halfway to finding out who killed him.

The kid’s grey tracksuit was wet through. A 3-foot pool of red spread out from his head, mixing with a puddle of rainwater. They would wait for the pathologist, but it looked like a fatal head wound that finally turned the lights out.

O’Neill ran his eyes the length of the body. The legs were wrong. Twisted out of shape, like an Action Man tossed away by a child. Was he a jumper? O’Neill looked at the roof of the apartment block, 30 feet away. Not unless he was Jesse Owens.

No. This thing had ‘punishment beating’ written all over it. Sure, they’d been a bit over-enthusiastic with the bats, but it was a punishment beating nonetheless.

O’Neill rolled his eyes. Punishment beatings were a Grade-A nightmare. They were a paramilitary thing, a hangover from the Troubles, when Catholics and Protestants policed their own areas and handed out vigilante justice to drug dealers and joy-riders. A bullet through the knees. A couple of rounds with a baseball bat. One thing was sure, you didn’t forget in a hurry. O’Neill thought about the ASBOs the PSNI gave out for the same thing. A curfew? In bed by ten? No wonder the kids laughed in their faces.

With a punishment beating the victim never pressed charges. There were never any witnesses. Victim dragged from a crowded bar? Folk were always in the toilet. Peelers joked that Belfast pubs had some of the largest toilets in the world. Entire bars had been known to all go for a piss at exactly the same time. What were the odds of that?

No one pressed charges and after a while, a punishment beating went away. A few forms, a few questions, that was it. A murder inquiry though, a murder inquiry had legs. It always went the distance.

If all men were created equal, all victims certainly weren’t. You’d hear people:

‘He deserved what he got.’

‘Fucking wee hood.’

‘He had it coming to him.’

O’Neill peered into the black river as it flowed under Queen’s Bridge and out into Belfast Lough. Anything tossed in — a bat, say — would be long gone. He knew the stats. PSNI solved three out of four murders. Northern Ireland hospitals had treated over 300 punishment beatings last year. The cops hadn’t made an arrest for a single one.

O’Neill felt Ward standing beside him.

Up front on this one?

He looked at the rain, pulling out another cigarette. There was no doubt about it: someone up there didn’t like him. At least it was one thing he could be sure of.

Marty and Petesy were hoods.

Hoods because they wore tracksuits. Because they stood on street corners and stared down traffic. Because they hung outside off licences, drinking Buckfast and White Lightning. Because they were fifteen and hadn’t been to school for two years. They liked it that way. So did the school. Hoods because security guards followed them round shops. Because every second word was ‘fuck’ or ‘cunt’. Because they loved getting off their faces. Because they liked happy hardcore. Because they stole cars. Because they were joy-riders. Because they were drug dealers. Because they had shaved heads, black eyes and baseball caps. Because they didn’t give a fuck, because what the fuck are you looking at, because I’ll knock your fucking ballicks in. They were hoods.

It was half ten on Monday morning. The boys had been busy. They hunkered behind a large bin in an entry off High Street. The alley smelled of piss and rotting food. Marty and Petesy sucked in air, trying to get their breath back.

‘You’re a mad bastard,’ Petesy said. Marty raised his eyebrows, taking the compliment and smiling.

‘The guard was a fat cunt. He couldn’t catch a fucking cold. Mind you, he fairly got a hold of you. Fuck me, Petesy. My ma’s quicker than you are.’

‘Fuck away off,’ Petesy said. ‘You were running before we were even in the door.’

Marty had always been quick. When he was selected for the Belfast U-12s the coach said he was greased lightning, one of the quickest things he’d even seen on a football pitch.

‘No flies on you, Martin Toner.’

Marty was kicked off the team three weeks later. Fighting. He’d skinned the full-back, some brick shithouse from Ballymacarrett, who’d brought him down. Marty got up and whacked him. It was only training, but so fuck, what were you going to do. There were no flies on Marty.

That morning the security guard had grabbed Petesy, and Marty had had to go back for him. Now he pulled off his old jersey and put on the white Kappa top, courtesy of the morning’s outing. Marty adopted a mock melodic voice, like he was announcing the football results.

‘Martin Toner one — JJB Sports nil.’

JJBs was one of the only shops in Belfast that didn’t have foreigners working as security guards. Lithuanians. Poles. You didn’t fuck with them.

‘Hard to make a living these days,’ Marty had said after his first and last encounter with the latest addition to the Northern Irish workforce.

Before they showed up, it was a piece of piss. The security men were all locals. Guys that didn’t give a shit. They stood round all day, chatting up sixteen-year-old shop assistants. They’d chase you round the corner and give up. The Polish guys, the Lithuanians, they were different. Chase you for miles. Like it was personal. Like it was their shop or something.

‘It’s fucked up,’ Marty said, after his one experience with a Lithuanian security guard. He’d run full pelt the whole way down Donegal Place, past the Belfast Telegraph, all the way down York Street.

‘I was near in Carrickfergus before he stopped. I mean, what the fuck does he care?’