Adrian McKinty - The Cold Cold Ground

We were leaving when I saw that a low-key bidding war was going on between Freddie Scavanni and Sammy.

They were both after a pressing of Richard Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos by Karl Bohm and the Vienna State Orchestra that had been recorded live for Strauss’s eightieth birthday on 11 June 1944 in the presence of many top Nazis. It was a very rare record indeed but the bidding was only going up in twenty-pence increments and now stood at two pounds sixty.

I was disgusted and sad for Paul. I went outside with Laura.

“Do you want to go back to my place for a cup of tea?” she asked.

It was a good idea. I could leave the records at her house and come back for them when I had the car.

We went to her flat and she put the kettle on. I hadn’t been there since we’d made love. Nothing had changed. Except spiritually. Emotionally.

I sat in the easy chair and looked at the harbour.

“Thank you so much for this album,” she said.

“You’re welcome.”

“I’ve never heard her before.”

“You’re going to love it.”

“Why don’t you put it on?”

I went to the turntable, cleaned the record with my antistatic cloth and put on the B-side, which begins with the Randy Newman song “Just One Smile”.

“You probably shouldn’t play this too much, it’s very valuable,” I told her as Dusty’s breathy vocals competed with the heavy strings on what was really a subpar song.

“How do you take your tea again?” she asked.

I didn’t answer. It suddenly hit me. Richard Strauss. Ariadne auf Naxos . After they kill the Minotaur in the labyrinth, Ariadne is abandoned by Theseus on the island of Naxos; bewailing her fate, she mourns her lost love and longs for death. Three nymphs, Naiad, Dryad and Echo then announce the arrival of a stranger on the island. Ariadne thinks it’s death’s ambassador but it is in fact the god Bacchus. He falls in love with Ariadne and promises to set her in the heavens as a constellation.

I remembered the killer and his talk of labyrinths. And here we had Freddie Scavanni bidding on Richard Strauss. Was this a coincidence? He wasn’t a stupid man but, my God, there were getting to be a lot of coincidences in this case.

I stood up. “I’ve got to go to the auction. I won’t be long,” I yelled. I jogged across the harbour car park to the town hall.

The auction was over now and I found Freddie Scavanni getting help with his purchases. Loading milk crates full of records into the back of a Ford Transit van. Even on a Saturday he was wearing a suit and tie. A rather nice cashmere blue suit. A rather nice silk tie.

“Hello, Freddie,” I said.

He squinted his eyes as if trying to recall who I was.

“Sergeant Duffy, Carrick CID,” I said.

“Oh yes, of course. I meet so many people, as you can imagine.”

“Did you get the Richard Strauss?” I asked.

“No, I was outbid,” he said cheerfully. “But I got plenty of other stuff.”

“Interesting record that. Ariadne conquers the labyrinth with Theseus but then Theseus shows his gratitude by abandoning her on an island where he leaves her to die.”

Scavanni shrugged. “Well … yes. If that’s your thing, sure, great. But with that record it’s more the rarity of the recording, isn’t it?”

“Why are you in Carrick, Freddie? Do you live around here?”

“You know where I live, Sergeant Duffy. Near Straid.”

“Oh, that’s right.”

I stared at him. His smile began to falter a little.

“Is there something I can help you with, Sergeant?”

“I didn’t see you at Tommy Little’s funeral.”

He shook his head. “No. Too busy.”

“I suppose it would have been seen as a distraction. A dilution of the message in this time of great sacrifice, is that it?”

“Perhaps. I don’t really go into the politics. I just do as I’m told.”

“You didn’t go to Lucy Moore’s funeral either.”

He shook his head. “No. I read about that. We did send along a representative from Sinn Fein.”

He looked impatiently at the sky. “Well I suppose I should-” he began.

“Maybe we can help one another,” I said.

“How so?”

“As one professional to another, Freddie, you wouldn’t mind telling me how the FRU investigation in Tommy’s death went? Any suspects? Any leads? We’re both after the same thing, aren’t we? The killer.”

“The FRU?”

“The FRU. The Force Research Unit, the IRA’s internal security outfit.”

He sighed. “How many times do I have to tell you? I know nothing about the IRA. Nothing at all.”

So that’s the way he wanted to play it. “Labyrinths, Freddie? La Boheme ? Who knows about that stuff? Nobody. It’s classic misdirection, isn’t it? Somebody wanted us to get caught up in the minutiae, to get distracted. So we’ve all run off like a crazy fox hound on a scent trail.”

“I’m afraid I’m not following you at all,” he said cheerfully.

“I think you are, Freddie,” I said grimly.

“I think you’re barmy!” he laughed.

“Do you own an Imperial 55?”

“A what?”

“Can you account for your movements on Thursday night?”

“I can actually, I was at work in Belfast sending out press releases.”

“You didn’t get a moment to pop down to Larne by any chance, did you?”

“Larne? Why would I go to Larne?”

“To lead the trail away from you. To close the book forever on Tommy Little. He was a queer mixed up in some filthy queer business. Let’s forget him and move on.”

Freddie shook his head. “I’ve had enough of this. I’m-”

I took a step a closer to him. “It’s a good move, but he’s layered the cake too thick, our murderer. He was too clever by half. He’s too smart for his own good. Like you, Freddie.”

Freddie shook his head. “Excuse me, Sergeant, I have to go,” he said and brushed past me.

“Don’t think this is over, mate. You know something and by God I’ll find out what it is!”

A crowd of bidders, assistants and ringmen were looking at us now.

Freddie gave his shaggy head an embarrassed little shake. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, Detective, but you’re not going to intimidate me. We’ve put up with eight hundred years of intimidation by the English and we’re not to stand for it any more. That, I promise.”

“What are you going to do? Shoot me?” I said.

“If you don’t stop bullying me, you’ll certainly be hearing from my lawyer,” he said, closed the van door and drove off with his purchases.

“Bloody peelers,” somebody muttered but when I looked to see who it was everyone hid their faces.

The crowd dispersed and I stood there watching Freddie’s car drive along the Marine Highway. I walked back to Laura’s. My tea was still warm. She asked me what I’d been doing but I was too embarrassed to tell her. If Crabbie had heard me spout all that he wouldn’t have been able to look me in the eye. That wasn’t police work. That was frustration. That was a man clutching at straws.

Dusty Springfield was singing an early version of that weird Legrand-Bergman song “Windmills of Your Mind”:

The circle it is closing, like a compass on the page,

A curve that’s always ending, a silvered metal cage,

No ending or beginning, like an ever turning wheel,

No escape or exit from the way that you must feel …

I sipped the tea and nodded in agreement.

Days. As Philip Larkin says: days, they come, they wake us, where can we live but days? Friday. Saturday. Sunday. Monday.

This particular day was a Tuesday. The mood was black. A policeman in Lurgan had been killed by a mercury tilt bomb under his Mini Cooper. That’s what happens when you skip the routine .