Adrian McKinty - The Cold Cold Ground

In a normal society that’s where you’d look for your leads.

But this was not a normal society.

No leads. Brick walls. And then there was Shane. Shane boy was as bent as a five-bob note. Billy and Shane jungled up together? Or was Shane a heroic loner in a murderously intolerant world? If Shane and Tommy Little were having an affair, Shane might have killed him to cover it up. Anything could have happened: lovers’ quarrel, fear of exposure, you name it. Sure he talked the talk about incurring the wrath of God from the IRA but in the heat of a fight you don’t think of such things.

The problem with Shane was his alibi. After Tommy Little left he said that he played snooker with Billy and the other lads until midnight. They would cover for him as a matter of course.

I thought about the angles. Shane didn’t seem like the type who embraced opera and Greek culture, but you never knew, did ya? It would be nice to have a nosey around his place …

On Tuesday night Laura and I went to see Chariots of Fire . It was about running. The two British guys won. I had a feeling they might. No one, however, blew up the cinema and there were no bomb scares.

Laura asked me about Heather. I told her part of the truth. A reserve constable who was a little drunk and freaked out after a riot in Belfast had briefly come on to me. She was, I added, married.

“You’ve every right to see whoever you want, we’re not really going out,” she said.

“I’m not going to see anybody else,” I told her.

I walked her to her apartment door but she wouldn’t let me in for a coffee. I didn’t mind. She kissed me on the cheek and said something about the weekend.

I said something in reply.

I was distracted.

I was thinking about that other kiss.

Trying to get it the fuck out of my mind.

On the way home from the station I met Sammy, my Marxist barber, walking his bulldog. He told me that I looked depressed. I said that I was. He said that it wasn’t surprising because the collapse of capitalism was imminent. He said that this was a reason for celebration, not anxiety, and that I should start listening to Radio Albania on the shortwave.

I went home, made myself a vodka gimlet and found Radio Free Albania. Sammy was right — it did cheer me up. The Americans were denounced, the Russians were denounced, Mao was praised, Comrade Enver Hoxha’s achievements at chess, athletics, in research physics, agricultural innovation were all saluted …

Wednesday morning: I checked under the car for bombs, drove to the cop shop and sat staring at McCrabban’s ugly mug from 9 until 10.

“Crabbie, you want to go up to Belfast with me?”

“What for?”

“Let’s go see Scavanni.”

“Why?”

“I’d like to get your take on him, Crabbie. I didn’t like him and I think he’s hiding something.”

Crabbie yawned. “Aye, why not? I’ve just been pretending to work.”

We signed out a Land Rover and drove up the Shore Road. We passed the Loughshore Park in Newtownabbey. There was no point telling either McCrabban or Matty about Shane. Not yet. Not until I knew something.

The rain was heavy, the traffic light.

We drove past a fresh bombsite that was, with ruthless efficiency, being bulldozed into a car park. Soon Belfast would be the only city in the world with more parking spaces than cars.

We left Queen’s Street RUC and walked through the search gates into the centre of town.

“Oi, chief, I’m starving, I had no breakfast this morning, can we get something to eat?” Crabbie said.

“No breakfast?” I said, staring at the ghost of his black eye. “Are you sure everything’s sweetness and light at chez McCrabban?”

“The, uh … she’s been a bit … Pregnant, you know.”

This, I felt, was a major breakthrough in my attempt to get him to open up.

“My treat. Breakfast. Question is where?”

Because of the sky-high insurance rates there were no major chains in Belfast: no McDonald’s, no Burger King, no Kentucky Fried Chicken, nothing.

“Anywhere.”

We found a greasy spoon off Anne Street and I got the cornflakes. Crabbie got the Ulster fry and I waited while he scarfed: pancakes, potato bread, soda bread, sausages, bacon, egg, black pudding, white pudding — all of it fried in lard. A heart-attack special.

We walked over to the Cornmarket and found Bradbury House.

The painters were in doing the lobby in Mental Hospital Beige.

“Scavanni’s in a new Sinn Fein press office up on the second floor,” I was explaining when I noticed on the directory that the offices of Councillor George Seawright were on the ground floor.

That was interesting. It was like finding Rommel and Montgomery sharing the same tent.

I pointed it out to Crabbie.

“I’ve heard rumours about him,” McCrabban said.

“About who? Seawright?”

“They say he’s tight with the paramilitaries.”

“Let’s go pay him a visit.”

“What for?” Crabbie asked.

“He hates homos, doesn’t he? Let’s see what he was doing on the night Tommy got himself topped.”

“You’re reaching, mate,” Crabbie said.

“Exactly the sort of thing you do when you have no leads.”

I was wearing my black polo neck and leather jacket and Crabbie was in his orange shirt and tie so Seawright’s secretary had to be convinced that we were peelers by our warrant cards. She showed us into his office which, like Scavanni’s, also overlooked Cornmarket Street where they had hanged the United Irishmen, the last time Protestants and Catholics had ever come together to fight the blah, blah, blah …

Unlike Scavanni’s digs, however, Seawright’s office was adorned by several Union Flags and boxes and boxes of a little DUP pamphlet entitled Proof The Bible Is True . Seawright was a big guy with a mop of greasy hair and thick 1970s glasses. He was wearing a grey checked suit that was a size too small. The Napoleon haircut and the suit gave him a comedic air and in truth he wasn’t that funny.

“What can I do for you gentlemen?” he asked after his secretary showed us in.

I told him that we were from Carrick RUC and were investigating the murders of Tommy Little and Andrew Young.

“The two fruits? That guy should get a medal, so he should,” he said with a hideous grin.

“Where were you on the night of Tuesday the twelfth?”

“I was in bed with my wife, so I was.”

“She’ll vouch for that?”

“She better.”

“Did you know either Tommy Little or Andrew Young?”

Seawright leaned back in his chair. “Your investigation must be in a sorry way if you’ve come to question me just because I’ve said a few things about the queers. I mean, excuse me, officer Duffy, but isn’t being queer still illegal in Northern Ireland?”

“Being homosexual isn’t, homosexual acts are, but there is an interesting case up before the European Court of Human Rights that-”

“Fucking Europe. The fucking whore of Babylon will bring about the apocalypse. Sixteen years, Sergeant Duffy, 1997. Not 2000, no. The fenians got the calendar wrong. 1997, that’s the Millennium. That’s when our Lord Jesus Christ will return and cleanse this world of the idolaters and fenians and queers and all the mockers of the holy Bible.”

“Any particular day I should keep clear?” I asked him.

“August twenty-ninth,” he said immediately. I was a little thrown by that and I glanced at Crabbie and he asked Seawright if any of his followers had been bragging about the murders. Seawright denied that they had.

Seawright’s secretary spoke through the intercom: “Councillor, I’m afraid you have another appointment.”

Crabbie gave me a “Why are we wasting our time here?” look.