Ken Bruen: Dublin Noir

“PJ’s dead, isn’t he?”

“I hope that’s not the case for the defense, because he killed himself. Nothing to do with you. Dumb fucking luck.”

“Myaark,” said PJ, falling forward from the sofa. His arm came free with a sound like an oyster being sucked out of a shell.

Christy and Little Mike screamed like school girls and ran straight out the door.

“Arm, fuckaaark!” moaned PJ behind them. A bit less dead than previously believed.

In the corridor Christy was blessed with an idea. Rather than go through the usual discussion rigmarole with Little Mike, he decided to act on his own initiative. After all, Batman occasionally decided to go on missions without Robin. Or he used to, until that bastard Joker came along. Now he had no choice in the matter. Christy pulled out his phone, composing a text on the run. He sent it to every runner in the building who had made drops for him over the past months.

Bllx n BMW sez Man UTD r shite, read the message.

In seconds doors were whipped open and enraged Manchester United fans spilled onto the balconies. They howled like hyenas, pouring down the stairwells. Twenty fearless, immortal little fuckers headed straight for Warren’s car door.

Christy waved his phone. “I got it too. Some fucker in a BMW hates Man United. Out the front. Big fatheaded cunt.”

Little Mike copped on for once, but felt he was being left out. “He said that Andioni fucks pigs. And, eh, sucks shit through straws.”

One urchin stopped. He was wearing an Andioni jersey. “I heard about the shit thing. It’s homeopathic, for the squirts. It’s not his own shit.”

Little Mike faltered, then came back with: “Yer man in the BMW says it is his own shit.”

“Cunt!” spat the urchin, disappearing down the stairwell in a red-and-white flash.

Christy and Little Mike held back, allowing the sea of miniature hooligans to flow around them. Several hands dipped into their pockets, but came out empty. It was like a couple of sharks being nibbled by cleaner fish. If the sharks were scared shitless.

It took a couple of minutes to make it down to the surface, and by then Warren’s Beamer was being pelted with everything light enough to throw. A couple of boys had kicked over a few wheelie bins and were firing rotten vegetables.

Warren was not taking it well. He opened the window a crack.

“Fuck off home, ye blackguards!” he roared through the gap, his comb-over separating from his skull. “Don’t you know who I am?”

The boy in the Andioni jersey hopped up on his bonnet. “Yeah, Mister. You’re the cunt who sucks shit through straws. Your own shit.”

The boy apparently could not produce a shit on command, but he could certainly have a slash. He undid his fly and pissed in lazy arcs across Warren’s windscreen. The wipers sloshing most of it back onto his own trainers did not seem to put him off.

Little Mike and Christy were circling around the back, giggling.

“Warren will do his nut. He’s not used to this kind of abuse.”

“Serves him right. Him and his fucking tests.”

Warren, as predicted, did his nut. He struggled from the passenger seat, waving a large pistol.

“Now who sucks shit? You fucking cockroach.”

A few warning shots, thought the drugs-and-porn video baron, just to send these monkeys back to their tree. The reports echoed off the apartment block walls, scattering boys like frightened birds. Except unlike frightened birds, they only scattered as far as the nearest cover, then peeked over for a look at the gun.

Warren, with his flapping hair and Louis Copeland suit, mistook this curiosity for newfound respect.

“That’s more like it!” he shouted, waving the pistol. “Now you’re getting the idea. Nobody fucks with me on my own doorstep.”

One boy yawned. Several more hooted. These were old lines. Rendered impotent by dozens of straight-to-video films.

Christy and Little Mike were thrilled with all this lack of respect. They would have been joining in themselves if they hadn’t been sneaking up behind the car.

“He’s going to see us,” hissed Mike. “We need a distraction. Will I get me lad out again?”

Christy pointed across at the flats. “No. I think we’re all right for a distraction.”

PJ was stumbling out the door like a zombie, swinging his knife before him like a blind man’s cane. His bad arm looked like it had been dipped in crimson paint.

“Mistaaaark,” he groaned.

Warren was shocked. “Fuckin’ hell, PJ. You didn’t go and shove your entire arm up someone’s arse, did you?”

Christy and Little Mike didn’t hear the reply to this unusual question, because they were in the BMW and reversing across the car park. Warren-fair play to him-reacted quickly enough, putting several rounds into the windscreen.

Mike stuck his head out the side window. “Bullet-proof glass, asshole. Yer always going on about it.” He then withdrew his head sharpish as another bullet whistled past his ear.

Before they pulled onto the road, Christy saw Warren hurl his empty gun in their direction. Not wise. The urchins were on him in under a second, stripping him like piranas on flesh. PJ didn’t fare much better. He got a swift kick in the bollocks and his wallet lifted.

“Ah, Jaysus,” said Christy regretfully. “We forgot PJ’s wallet.”

Mike had the night safe bag open on his lap. It was filled with wedges of banded notes.

“We’re made, Mike,” hooted Christy when he saw the cash. “There must be thirty grand in here. Maybe forty. We can live like kings on this in Waterford. Those señoritas love fellas from the big city. We’ll be like Bono and the Edge, brother.”

They pulled away from the flats, flashing everyone they thought they might know. In minutes, they were on the motorway heading south.

Christy was already lost in the dream. “Come tomorrow and we’ll be topless by the pool. Sipping cocktails in the sunny southeast, a girl on either side and one in the middle.”

Little Mike’s phone rang.

“Hello. Mike here.” He winked at Christy. Another thirteen-inch call. “Yep, it’s true. I have it right here before me. Could use a little TLC, as it happens… Uhuh… Really? Well, I’m sure we could work something out.”

Mike covered the mouthpiece with a hand.

“Any chance we could make a stopover in Castledermot?”

ART: skill; human skill or workmanship.

Then you got a whole page of crap on:

Art

Form

Paper

Nouveau

– ful

Like I’ve got the interest.

Jesus.

I was in the bookshop, killing time, saw the manager give me the look. That’s why I picked up a book, a goddamn dictionary, weighing like a ton, opened it to the bit on art. Glanced up, the manager is having a word with the security schmuck.

Yeah, guys, I’m going to steal the heaviest tome in the shop.

Check my watch, Timex piece of shit, but it’s getting late. Tell you one thing, after the job, first item, a gold Rolex. The imitations are everywhere but the real deal… ah, slide that sucker on your wrist, dude, you are home.

Cost a bundle, right?

The whole point, right?

On my way out, I touch the manager’s arm, the wanker jumps. I go, “Whoa… bit nervous there, pal? Could you help me?”

He has bad teeth, yellow with flecks of green, a little like the Irish flag. He stammered: “How, I mean… am… what? ”

“ Dictionary for Dummies, you got that?”

His body language is assessing me and wanting to roar, “ Nigger !”

Man, I know it, you grow up black in a town like Dublin, you know.