‘More than he used to?’
‘Maybe.’
‘I heard he’s been scared about something,’ Lennon said. ‘I heard he talks when he’s drunk. You ever overhear anything?’
Mooney leaned over the bar. ‘Like I said, I’m hard of hearing. Now, do you want that second pint or what?’
Lennon drained his glass and suppressed a burp. No, I’ve had enough. But thanks.’
Mooney nodded and walked away.
Thirty minutes later, Lennon sat parked on Eglantine Avenue staring at Marie’s boarded-up windows. Occasionally, small groups of kids in school uniforms walked past, probably heading for the takeaways on the Lisburn Road. Ellen must have started her second year of primary by now.
Marie only allowed him that one photograph. He hadn’t met her since then, and that had been four years ago. It was no more than he deserved. She had sacrificed so much for him, and he had betrayed her.
He hadn’t meant to. If anyone had asked him if he was capable of such a thing a week before it happened, he would have said no, absolutely not. He had learned since then never to underestimate a man’s weakness.
They’d been living in the flat for a year when it all fell apart. Marie’s nesting instinct had gone into overdrive, and every weekend was spent touring shopping centres looking for the perfect cushion cover, or the ideal mirror to go above the fireplace.
They’d been standing in a furniture store off the Boucher Road for an hour, Marie agonising over a pair of bedside lockers while a sales assistant looked on, when Lennon noticed the shape of her in the light. His mind wandered to the times when she’d clambered on him, the soft ‘oh’ of her mouth at the point of orgasm, the feel of her weight on him. It had been a while. She was saying something and he snapped himself back to the here and now.
‘You haven’t heard a thing I just said.’ Her eyes were cold stone.
‘I’m sorry, what?’
‘Look, if you can’t be bothered listening to me then why did you come?’
The sales assistant looked at his feet.
Lennon smiled, his voice soft. ‘I’m sorry, I was just daydreaming. What were you saying?’
‘This is important to me.’
‘I—’
‘This is our home. This is our future together.’
Lennon stopped smiling. ‘I know. I’m sorry.’
The sales assistant remembered an important matter that needed his attention elsewhere.
‘You’re not sorry,’ she said. ‘You don’t care.’
‘Of course I do.’
‘No you don’t, or you’d fucking listen. Why am I bothering to run myself ragged over this when you don’t give a shit?’
‘Marie, please.’
‘Fuck you.’
He stayed ten steps behind her all the way to the car.
The irony was that Wendy Carlisle had been the one who’d introduced Lennon to Marie eighteen months before. She was the media officer at Lennon’s station, and a hard-luck girl if ever he’d met one. They became friends, though looking back he couldn’t think why.
She stumbled from one bad relationship to another, five of them while he knew her, always ending up hurt and bitter. Lennon had tried his luck, but she said she knew his type, she wouldn’t get chewed up and spat out by a user like him. She always smiled when she said it, but anger hid beneath the teasing.
When Wendy passed a request for an interview on to Lennon, he had no idea it would change the course of his life. He saw something in Marie, recognised the separation from her roots as a reflection of his own situation. He hadn’t meant to fall in love any more than Marie had. Given her family – she was a McKenna, niece of Michael McKenna, for Christ’s sake – he should have gone nowhere near her. Their relationship destroyed what was left of the ties to her kin, and Lennon’s colleagues made a point of pulling him up on it every chance they got. He’d been in line for a move to Special Branch, but at the last moment he was switched to CID. They never said why, but he knew. He was a Catholic cop at a time when such a thing was still a rarity, and now he was mixed up with Michael McKenna’s niece. He didn’t know which was worse: the threats from Republicans, with the Mass cards and bullets that arrived in the post, or the hard stares and silence he met in his workplace.
As soon as they moved in together, Marie started talking about children. Always at night, when they lay together in the dark. Just thinking out loud, she’d say. Just talking. Nothing serious.
Serious or not, it terrified him. It wasn’t the idea of sleepless nights or being tied down that frightened him so much. Rather it was the certainty that he would, sooner or later, let the child down. He tried to tell Marie this, to explain it was his own weakness that scared him, but the words never came out right. Every conversation ended with her cold back to him as he silently cursed his clumsy tongue.
After a while, they didn’t talk about it any more. The stony grey of her eyes cooled, her lips thinned, her laughter dried until it rasped like sandpaper on wood. They should have ended it then, but neither of them had the courage.
Lennon’s head jerked up to bounce against the Audi’s headrest. Had he been asleep? His head had that sodden feeling, like clay behind his eyes. He looked at his watch. Coming five. When had he last checked the time? An hour, maybe.
‘Jesus,’ he said.
Lennon fired the Audi’s ignition and listened to the diesel clatter and rumble. He blinked the sleep away.
A man approached on the pavement. Mid-thirties, Lennon guessed. A hard face, lined more by life than age. His right eyelid was red and swollen. His left arm hung stiff and long at his side. He nodded at Lennon as he passed.
Lennon watched the man’s back in his side mirror. The man disappeared between the parked cars. Lennon opened the Audi’s door and climbed out. He looked up and down Eglantine Avenue.
No sign of him.
Lennon settled back into the Audi, his mouth dry. He wanted another pint of Stella, and maybe some company.
27
The Traveller kept walking along the side street, his head down. He chanced one look back over his shoulder. No one followed. His Merc was parked on the next street north, the one tethered to Eglantine Avenue by this side street. He didn’t know its name. Belfast was starting to grate on him, with its red-brick houses and cars parked on top of one another. And the people, all smug and smiling now they’d gathered the wit to quit killing each other and start making money instead.
He reached the Merc and got in. He dialled the number.
‘For fuck’s sake, what now?’ Orla asked.
‘Jesus, love, don’t bite my face off.’
‘Don’t “love” me, you gyppo bastard. I’ll come up there and cut your balls off. Now what do you want?’
The Traveller sensed it was not an idle threat. Was she on the rag? ‘All right,’ he said. ‘That cop. What did you find out about him?’
‘Why?’
‘’Cause he’s sitting outside that McKenna blade’s flat again. What’s he doing hanging about there? Who is he?’
‘That cop’s the least of your worries, believe me,’ she said. ‘He’s Jack Lennon, a detective inspector. A smart cop. He should be higher up the ranks, but he’s been in some bother. He had a sexual harassment charge hanging over him a few years back, some tramp from the office tried to make a claim against him. The charge didn’t stick, but the reputation did. He’s in debt up to his eyeballs. He’s too friendly with some Loyalists. We’re told he might be taking payment in kind from the brothels, and another cop accused him of trying to pass on a bribe. His superiors are wary of him, think he’s bent. Don’t worry about him.’
‘Well, I am worried about him,’ the Traveller said. ‘He’s going to get in the way. I should do something about it.’