Claire Kilroy - The Devil I Know

‘Mr St Lawrence, these lands you describe as your proposed new urban quarter for Dublin: would this be the farm in Oldcastle?’

That would be correct. ‘The most expensive scrubland in Ireland,’ as the Irish Times dubbed it when news of the deal was officially released a couple of months later. A profile of Hickey was published in the business section, with a picture of his shaggy head in a football jersey, describing him as a small-time builder with little formal education who had started out with garage conversions and renting prefabs to schools and graduated to developing the prominent coastal Claremont site and acquiring an international property portfolio within the space of ten years. Currently on to his second marriage to a marketing executive also from Howth, father to nine — nine! — children with his first wife. Then the article made reference to a powerful publicity-shy business partner, considered to be the mastermind of the operation but about whom little was known other than that he was connected at the highest level to the world of international investment banking.

I dropped the paper and stood at the window with a racing heart and mind. Mastermind of the operation. Powerful publicity-shy business partner. So Hickey had a puppet master too. Background figures were yanking his strings just as surely as they were yanking mine. He hadn’t the wit to pull it off, and, frankly, neither did I. We had bought properties in countries we couldn’t locate on a map.

I checked my phone. M. Deauville hadn’t called. He would already have seen the morning’s papers. His information service would have drawn the extract to his attention. This silence was a bad omen. I phoned Hickey.

‘I was about to ring you,’ he shouted at me over the racket — he was on site. On the old site, that is. The original one. The one we should have stuck with.

I eyed the man in the tower crane as if eyeing Hickey. I hated that he had a peephole into my privacy. I resented his vantage point. ‘I just saw the Irish Times .’

The background noise fell away and I heard the drum of footsteps across a raised floor. He had retreated into the Portakabin. ‘Yeah.’

‘Who is this “powerful silent partner” that they’re talking about, Dessie? Your “shady business associate”?’

‘You, ya fucken eejit. You’re me shady associate. Listen, get your arse down here now.’

‘I can’t. I have a board meeting. The legal team is arriving as I speak.’ A black Mercedes S class was crunching across the gravel, reflecting warped silhouettes in its polished flanks.

‘Well, come down the minute it’s over. We could be bollixed.’

*

The barrister and his assistant shook my hand in front of the Castle Holdings plaque at the top of the terrace steps. I led them inside to the steward’s room.

Once we were seated, the assistant, a young man who was devilling for the barrister in the Law Library, took a laptop from his briefcase and powered it up. The barrister produced a mobile phone. He dialled a number and set the device on speakerphone before placing it in the centre of the table. The three of us listened to the foreign ringtone.

Click. ‘Yes?’ M. Deauville. My heart sat up in recognition, a dog responding to his master’s voice. How strange to hear him in an official context. How strange to hear M. Deauville answering a phone, in fact. I was the one who answered to him. Those were the terms of engagement.

The barrister listed the names of the three persons present and the young devil took notes. Tocka tocka on his laptop. The barrister read out the minutes from the previous board meeting: a list of properties acquired and the amounts paid for them, the extent of the loan notes issued to date — millions. M. Deauville proposed the adoption of the minutes and I seconded him. ‘Any Other Business?’ the barrister enquired, turning to me.

‘None,’ I dutifully responded as the statutory Irish resident of Castle Holdings Ltd. A spider was suspended from a gossamer thread directly in front of my face. It was a small specimen, brown with yellow flecks, and its legs were bunched so tightly that it formed a sphere. It plunged further down its thread until it hovered just above the tooled leather surface of the desk. I don’t know why I mention the spider. Other than to remark that I wished it wasn’t there, but it was there, and I lived with it, along with a number of other monstrosities that made their home in mine. The devil hit print and his portable printer fired out the minutes. It was most efficient. His master checked them for errata before placing them in front of me. He proffered a lacquered pen with which to sign. The spider scuttled back up its thread. I uncapped the pen and couldn’t help but pause to admire its craftsmanship.

‘You know, you should never share a good fountain pen,’ I said by way of making conversation now that the dirty work was done. ‘The nib has adapted to your hand.’

‘Don’t worry about the pen, Mr St Lawrence,’ the barrister advised me, indicating where my signature should be inserted. ‘This pen has adapted to many hands over the centuries.’

I scratched my name on the dotted line and returned the endorsed minutes and the pen. The barrister witnessed my signature with his, then handed the document to the devil, who stowed it in his briefcase. M. Deauville rang off at that point. I gave the barrister the unopened stack of post that had arrived addressed to Castle Holdings Ltd. Harps from the Irish taxman and block capitals from the North Americans: ‘IMPORTANT TAX RETURN DOCUMENT INSIDE.’ M. Deauville’s counsel accepted the correspondence and thanked me for my time. I saw the two of them back out to their car.

Didn’t I find this arrangement odd? No, Fergus, not in the least. It is what my family has done for centuries, I suppose. Managed our estate. That’s what passes for work amongst the landed gentry: authorising others to undertake it on our behalf.

‘By the way,’ I said to the barrister as he was lowering himself into the back seat, ‘could I get M. Deauville’s number from you?’ I took out my mobile phone. ‘I appear to have, ahm, deleted it from my contacts folder.’

The barrister glared up at me in outrage. I had deviated from the script. ‘I’m afraid that won’t be possible,’ he muttered tightly before pulling the door of the Mercedes shut as hard as he could manage.

*

‘Have you gone up thirteen floors on that hotel?’ I asked Hickey when I found him in the Portakabin. I needn’t have bothered pitching it as a question. Hickey had gone up thirteen floors on the hotel. Any fool with an eye in his head could see that.

‘Don’t mind that now. We’re in trouble here.’

‘For the love of God, you can’t just go up two extra storeys.’

Hickey pointed at the paint-spattered plastic chair in front of his desk and raised his voice. ‘For fuck’s sake, Tristram, this is serious. Shut the fuck up and sit down.’ I shut the fuck up and sat down.

He turned his back on me and flicked a switch. ‘Useless piece of shit.’

I jumped to my feet. He had found out about Edel. How? Because someone knew about our affair. I didn’t see her diddies!

‘Cheapo fucken crap. Jesus Christ, who designs this shite?’

The kettle. He was referring to the yellowing plastic jug kettle, trying to manhandle it onto its base. The thing eventually connected with the power supply and the orange switch lit up. He looked over his shoulder.

‘What are you standing there for?’

‘I… Can I help?’

‘You? Help? With a faulty appliance? Stop the lights.’