Ken Bruen - Green Hell

“Slainte amach.”

His voice was neutral, not toneless but more used to silence. He nodded at the books page, said,

“Guy there, last week, he tore my book to shreds.”

I took a hefty swipe of my own Jay, asked,

“That bother you?”

He gave a short laugh, said,

“They try to wipe you off the floor of a cell containing thirty desperate inmates, what do you think?”

What did I think?

The booze or the craziness of the past year made me pushy or thoughtless. I asked,

“How does a person. . you know, handle that, I mean, after, when you’re out?”

He studied the top shelf, scanning the variety of lethal spirits, then,

“You get a shitty bed-sit in Brixton, then you get an old-fashioned revolver, with the spin chamber. Every Wednesday, seven in the evening, you sit and spin that sucker.”

Christ!

Reckless now, I asked,

“Why Wednesday?”

He put twenty euros on the counter, turned up his coat collar, said,

“Never liked midweek much.”

He nodded to Paddy, indicating a drink for me. I put out my hand, said,

“I’m Jack Taylor.”

He gave me a long hard look, not threatening, just resolute, said,

“Oh, I know who you are.”

And he was gone.

Professor de Burgo had his feet up on his desk, the lion in the lair. Books scattered everywhere, potpourri overriding the smell of pot. De Burgo was on his third Americano, anticipating the young female undergraduate due in. .

He extracted his gold pocket watch from his tartan waistcoat, a theatrical, well-rehearsed gesture. Even alone, he repeated the rituals necessary to re-inform the whole

“old-fashioned, John Cheever-type

professor of English literature.”

She was due in twenty minutes. In twenty days she’d be history. He suppressed a giggle at his own wit, popped half a Valium, get the mellow gig cooking. Began to sift through his in-box. A small padded envelope called. He sliced it open with a heavy silver Moroccan letter opener and the color drained from his sunlamped face.

A six-inch nail-

The letters-ed.

Nailed!

Badly shaken, de Burgo pulled another envelope from the pile. A bright pink envelope and. . hold a mo-

Perfumed!

Fuck, yes, actually scented! He chuckled (this is a parched sound as he’d been told it made him lovable ).

Figuring it to be from one of the many moonfaced cunts who adored his lectures, he opened it with a flourish and

out

tumbled

tiny white and black paper figures wearing? Mortarboards. A note on lilac paper read,

This is Sancta Muerta,

the Death Curse. . on you.

The figures amount to the number

of days until you burn in hell.

Xxxxxxxxx

Kalinda

P.S. Kalinda is PI/vengeance chick from

the series The Good Wife .

Feverishly, he counted the fragile figures.

Six!

He crumpled them in a rage-fueled dread. Reached into his desk, took out a bottle of Grey Goose, lashed into it.

A knock on the door, then a pretty girl’s head peered around the door, asked,

“Am I on time, professor?”

He flung a copy of the collected Blake at her, shouted,

“Get the fuck!”

Cambridge’s Hampers, a Galway Christmas tradition. Not cheap, but oh, so fabulous. Chockablock with every goody you could yearn for. One was delivered to my apartment on Christmas eve.

A note:

Knock yourself out Jack.

Your very own dark

Emerald

Xxxxxxx

What I remember of Christmas Day is the wild storms, not only in my head but in the weather. A falling tree killed a twenty-three-year-old who’d just passed her driving test. It came right through the windscreen.

The racing ace Schumacher was preparing his ski gear for a week of exhilaration.

I watched the original BBC series of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. Alec Guinness was, as always, riveting. I spaced the day between

Snacks of cold turkey

Xanax, 2.5 mg

Single hot whiskeys

no cloves.

The mobile rang once.

Ridge.

A flood of relief that she was prepared to wish me,

“Nollaig Sona Duit” (Happy December).

She wasn’t.

Lashed,

“Taylor, you want to explain to me who that mad bitch was?”

My bile in check, I said gently,

“Need a bit more to go on. I know quite a few bitches, but mad? That’s relative.”

Heard her angry rasp in a deep breath, then,

“Don’t play the cute hoor, the supposed lawyer who showed up at our last meet.”

I had a choice. It being the season of goodwill, would I goodwill it?

No.

Went for annoyance.

“Gotta plead the Fifth.”

A beat, then,

“Don’t suppose she knows anything about the disappearance of the underwear, vital to the Boru Kennedy case?”

My heart soared.

“Good fuck, really? So you’ve no case now.”

“Fuck you, Taylor.”

Slammed the phone down.

In the early hours of Christmas morning, Boru had used a sheet to hang himself.

The case was truly CLOSED.

Late Christmas night, my mind was crawling with snakes. Desperate to distract, I had a mini Ben Wheatley fest.

Down Terrace

Kill List

Sightseers -with the line after the main character beats a guy to death and says,

“Not a human, a Daily Mail reader.”

Doesn’t come any darker or more blackly humorous. My life in disjointed glances really. Saint Stephen’s morning, my hangover was what you’d expect.

Rough.

The doorbell rang.

A group of disheveled singers, I kid thee fucking not.

Either the Wren (and do they still continue this tradition?) or the remnants of a soused hen party. I gave them a few notes on condition they stopped singing!

Two kick-ass coffees,

Solpadine,

Xanax,

And, God help me, one sick cigarette. My mind began to twist.

I phoned Ridge.

She answered with a terse,

“Taylor?”

“You know Boru Kennedy was innocent on Christmas eve?”

Sigh.

“Yes.”

“Did you tell him or did his lawyer?”

“Not my job, Taylor.”

“You cunt.”

Stunned gasp,

“What did you call me?”

“He spent Christmas eve not knowing he was clear. Terrorized, terrified. . what was he anticipating, Christmas dinner? That some big bastard would take off him. This was a kid who’d spent every Christmas safe, warm, and with a family!”

She spat her words,

“Don’t. . you. . dare put this on me, Taylor.”

“You got your wish, sergeant. You’ve become a real Guard.”

“How dare you.”

“Have a nice New Year, see the sheets you helped strangle that poor, lost kid in a dark cell.”

I slammed down the phone.

Days blundered through the post-Christmas gloom. Sales, despite the recession, had people sleeping outside Brown Thomas for thirty-six hours to secure

Gucci handbags!

The homeless just slept outside anywhere and for longer. Covered in piss, despair, and degradation.

Recession my arse, as a woman got lead story on RTE six o’clock news for buying a Stella McCartney dress for only fifteen hundred euros!

The New Year galloped toward us. Em hadn’t returned nor phoned. Maybe she’d fucked off permanently.

Did I care?

Not a whole bunch.

I was too broken, heartsick over the needless waste of Boru’s suicide. Was I to blame? I was certainly in the mix. A horrible irony wasn’t lost on me that the coveted number one song was by a prison guard.

Hang your guilt on that.

Ken Dodd on the first

sign of aging-

“ When you wake up and find you’ve a bald-headed son.”

January 3, 2013.