Ken Bruen - Green Hell

It was,

“Ya cunt.”

Jack smiled, whispered,

“Wild side me arse.”

The classic murder victim, if you like,

in today’s terminology:

A single, middle-aged man, socially

marginalized with a serious alcohol dependency.

(Leif G.W. Persson, He Who Kills the Dragon. Your standard piss-head, basically, was how Detective Backstrom described the victim.)

Owen Daglish was a guard of the old school.

Rough,

Blunt,

Non-PC,

and one hell of a hurler.

My kind of cop. Unlike me, he hadn’t walloped anyone in authority.

Yet.

But it was there, simmering. His superiors knew it, so he was never going to climb the ranks. He didn’t arse-kiss, either, so he was doomed to uniform. He and I had some history and most of it was pretty decent. A big man, he was built on spuds, bacon, Guinness, and aggression. Why we got along.

I met him on Shop Street, his day off, and he said,

“Jack, we need to grab a pint.”

“Sure, how you fixed this evening?”

He glanced furtively around. Fragile as his job prospects were, it definitely wouldn’t help to be seen with me. He grabbed my arm, insisted,

“Now.”

Anyone else, he’d have lost the hand from the elbow. I asked,

“I’m presuming something discreet?”

He nodded.

Close to the docks is one of those rare to rarest places. A pub without bouncers and probably without a license. Under-the-radar business is its specialty. That plus serious drinking. No

Wine spritzers,

Bud Lite,

Karaoke.

We got the pints in, grabbed a shaky table in a shaky corner. No word until damage was done to the black. Owen, the creamy top of the Guinness giving him a white mustache, sighed, said,

“’Tis a bad business.”

No one, not even Jimmy Kimmel, can delay a story like the Irish. The preparation is all. Bad business could mean a multitude:

The government,

The economy,

Priests,

X Factor,

The weather.

I waited.

He said,

“A young girl found murdered a few days back, part-time student I think.”

My radar beeped.

“She was. . gutted. What’s the word?. . eviscerated.”

He looked as if he was going to throw up, rallied, shouted at the bar guy,

“Couple of Jamesons, make them large.”

He wiped his brow, said,

“I tell you, Jack, like yer ownself, I’ve seen some ugly shit. You learn to shut off, like the nine-yard stare. You’re watching but you’re not seeing. Jesus!”

I’m an Irish guy, we don’t do the tactile. Keep your friggin hands to yourself. Whoa, yeah, and your emotions, too. Keep those suckers, as they said in Seinfeld ,

“in the vault.”

But I reached over, gently touched his shoulder.

“The last bit, Jack, fuck, the final touch. .”

It didn’t register. He downed the Jay, let that baby weave its wicked magic, shuddered, then,

“A six-inch nail was hammered between her eyes.”

I thought,

. . Nailed!

I spotted an East European guy across the bar. We had business in the past,

Heavy,

Risky

Business.

I indicated a meet with my right hand and he nodded. I said to Owen,

“I need a minute.”

In mid-narrative, he was jolted back to where we actually were, protested,

“But there is something else, Jack.”

There was always something else and never-ever-good.

“One second,”

I said.

In the small smoker’s shed at the back, he was waiting, sucking fiercely on one of the cheap Russian cigarettes currently flooding the city. He shook my hand, said,

“Jack, my friend, you need some merchandise?”

Over the years, that had mainly been muscle and dope.

I made the universal sign of my thumb, trigger hammer coming down. He booted the cigarette, took out his mobile, spat some foreign command in a harsh tone, grimaced, clicked off, asked,

“A Ruger, is OK?”

“Sure.”

“One box of shells?”

“Perfect.”

No money exchanged. That would be later, on delivery.

Got back to Owen. He was literally wringing his hands, went,

“Jesus, times like this, I wish I still smoked. You gave up, didn’t you, Jack?”

For an alarming moment I thought he meant it literally, like on life, but focused, shrugged, said,

“Nope, still smoking.”

He cracked a smile at that, said-quoted a line from Charley Varrick ,

“Last of the Independents.”

Even Walter Matthau was dead, and recently the great Elmore Leonard. Deferring the final piece of Owen’s story, I told him how Leonard’s son called around to visit, saw his wife up on the roof clearing the eaves, asked his dad why she was up there. Elmore said,

“Because she can’t write books.”

Enough with the stalling, I pushed,

“You had something else, Owen?”

Owen said,

“The American kid you were friendly with?”

Jesus, how long was he going to stretch it? I grilled,

“Yeah?”

“They’ve arrested him for the girl’s murder. As the Brits say, ‘they’ve got him bang to rights.’”

I really believed I had lost the capacity to be shocked. The life I’d lived, I could no longer really tell the difference between a shock and a surprise. Like Owen’s Brits. . I was flabbergasted, asked,

“How, I mean. .?”

He caught my confusion, cut past it, said bluntly,

“Bloodied underwear was found under his mattress. Sick little fuck.”

I finished my Jameson, hoping to blast the bile in my mouth, the acid in my gut, said,

“He didn’t do it.”

For a moment it seemed as if Owen would punch me on the shoulder, swerved, settled for,

“Come on, Jack, you liked the kid but, let’s face it, you obviously had no idea who he was or what he was capable of.”

I stared straight at Owen’s eyes. Whatever he saw there, he flinched. I said,

“You know history, buddy. I’ve looked into the faces of

Rapists,

Psychos,

Stone killers,

Priests

and

Bankers.

Trust me, I know when someone is feral.”

Owen’s eyes got that shadow tint. He wanted another drink, his blood sang for it, he just didn’t want it with me. It’s always a revelation, a short, intense chat can bury a friendship cold. He knew too we’d come to a standoff but tried to wrap, said,

“I know that, Jack, but there’s something else out there now, something new.”

I shrugged,

“Evil is never new, simply a different shade.”

He put out his hand, we shook, almost meaning it. I headed back to town, went into a hardware store. Bought a pack of six-inch nails. The guy in the store had remarked,

“Some mild weather, huh?”

Indeed.

December 1 and no rain, no real cold weather. We weren’t complaining. He asked,

“You know Mike Diviny?”

I didn’t. Said,

“Sure.”

“He caught forty mackerel in the docks this morning.”

He pronounced them in that distinctive, flat-vowel Galway tone,

Mac — ker — el.

One of the reasons I still had a gra for the town. Farther down Shop Street a group of carol singers were seriously massacring “Jingle Bells.” A woman with a collection box shoved it in my face, and not politely. I asked,

“Who are you collecting for?”

Figuring I’d gladly help the Philippines Typhoon Fund. She said,

“Girls’ basketball team.”

I had to take a breath, rein in my disbelief, then,

“You got to be kidding me.”

She was up for it, challenged,

“And what do you suggest they do with their leisure time?”

“Would fishing be out of the question?”