‘Just get out,’ Bronagh said. She slipped her arm around her mother’s shoulders. ‘Look what you’re doing to her. Get your stuff and get out.’
That evening, Lennon left the home he’d grown up in. With a tattered suitcase and a sports bag carrying his few possessions, he drove back to Belfast. He heard through an old friend that Phelim Quinn once again called on his mother a few weeks later. This time, Quinn told her if her son ever returned to Middletown, he’d be shot. For the second time in a year she told the councillor to get out of her house.
Lennon bent down and kissed his mother’s forehead. She reached up and stroked his cheek. A crease appeared on her brow.
‘Where’d all those lines come from?’ she asked. ‘You look more like your father every time I see you.’
Lennon doubted she remembered the last time she’d seen him. ‘So you keep telling me.’
‘He’ll be back soon,’ she said.
‘Who? Our da?’
‘Aye, who do you think? The Pope? He’ll be back soon, and he’ll take us all to America with him.’
Lennon could barely recall his father’s face. Almost thirty years had passed since he’d seen it. No one had heard tell of him since, but it would do no good to remind Lennon’s mother of that. Let her cling to her delusions if they brought her a glimmer of happiness.
‘He’ll take us all to some fancy place in New York. Me, you, Liam and the girls. All of us together.’
‘That’s right, Ma,’ Lennon said. He kissed her again and left her there.
The exit to the car park opened as he approached it. Bronagh stepped through and froze when she saw him. She stood there for a few seconds, still as a cold morning, before putting her head down and walking past him.
‘Bronagh?’ he called.
She stopped, her back to him, her gaze fixed on the floor. Her hands formed fists, opening and closing. She wore a smart jacket and skirt. She’d probably come straight from the hotel she managed in the centre of Newry.
‘How’s she been?’ he asked. ‘Are they looking after her?’
‘I didn’t know you’d be here,’ she said.
‘Sorry, I forgot to text you.’
‘Don’t do it again,’ she said. She walked away without looking at him.
29
The Traveller was sick of waiting. Two and a half hours now, coming three, and no sign of Toner. The little runt of a lawyer had left his wife and kids and moved into a grotty flat off the Springfield Road. The Bull said he was drinking himself to death. The Traveller would be doing Toner a favour, really. Put him out of his misery.
He shifted in the driver’s seat. The wound in his arm wouldn’t let him settle, and his eye itched and stung. He’d put a dollop of antibiotic ointment in it twenty minutes ago. For conjunctivitis, the chemist had told him. The stuff found its way down to the back of his throat and turned his stomach. He’d opened the window an inch to let the night air at it, but it did little good. Everything was a blur in that eye. The Traveller knew he wasn’t at his best. It wouldn’t matter with a speck of fly shit like Toner, but anyone harder, he’d have to hold back.
A fresh flutter of stings and itches made the Traveller’s eyelid twitch, and a warm drop of something ran down his cheek. ‘Fuck,’ he said.
He pulled a wad of tissues from the door pocket and mopped his face and eye. The soft paper stuck to something on his eyelid and tore. He blinked, shreds of tissue flapping against his cheek. ‘Fuck,’ he said. ‘Shite bastard fucking whore.’
The Traveller screwed his eyes shut and put his head back. He picked at bits of tissue, feeling them tug at the stickiness on his eyelid. He felt in the door pocket for the bottle of water. He found it with his fingertips, unscrewed the cap. Blinded, he poured some into his palm and splashed it across his eyes. He wiped them with the heel of his hand, then his sleeve. His vision came and went as he blinked. He reached for the interior light switch and flicked it on. His reflection in the rear-view mirror blurred and focused. Jesus, that eye looked bad enough. The lid was red and swollen, the eyeball was streaked red. Maybe he needed more of that ointment. He looked around him to see where he’d dropped it.
He saw Patsy Toner standing on the footpath across the road, outside his building, staring back.
‘Fuck,’ the Traveller said. He reached between his legs, under the seat, where he’d stowed the Desert Eagle, found only rubbish and damp carpet.
Toner stood frozen for just a second before he turned and ran for his front door. The Traveller explored the darkness beneath him, grazed his knuckles on the metal rails that supported the seat. As his hand flailed in the narrow space, he spared Toner a glance. The lawyer’s panicked whines didn’t mask the sound of his key scraping at his lock.
The Traveller twisted his torso as he shoved his hand further back. His injured shoulder screamed at the effort, but he was rewarded by the feel of cold pistol in his fingers. He pulled the Eagle free, leapt out of the car, on his feet, chambered a round, aimed.
Toner’s door slammed shut.
‘Fuck,’ the Traveller said. He ran for the door, kicked once, twice. It wouldn’t budge. Toner lived on the top floor. The Traveller hit the buzzer for the first floor flat. He hit it again. He stayed close to the door in case the flat’s occupant looked down from the window above. He heard footsteps on the stairs inside.
A woman of young middle-age opened it, her face sharpened with anger. ‘What do—’
The Traveller crushed her nose with the butt of the gun. She fell back and her head bounced on the polished floorboards. She sighed, coughed blood, and stilled. Her chest rose and fell. The Traveller thought about finishing her, but there was no time. He stepped over her and made for the stairs. He took them two at a time until he reached the top floor.
Toner’s door would give with one kick, the Traveller was sure of it. He paused, breathed deep, wiped his sleeve across his eyes. The right blurred, and he blinked until it cleared. He formed a good combat grip on the Eagle, one hand supporting the other, and booted the door below the handle. It slammed back against the wall. A ragged couch faced him in the dimness. Dishes, bottles and the detritus of takeaways littered a coffee table. The Traveller edged into the room. A breeze licked at the dampness on his face.
‘Fucking cock-pulling arsehole,’ he said.
A door in the corner of the kitchenette stood ajar. It opened onto a metal staircase that descended into the yard two floors down. A fucking fire escape.
The Traveller’s eye flickered and blurred and burned. Something warm trickled down his cheek. His left shoulder ached.
‘Bastard cunt of a motherfucking whore’s son,’ he said.
30
Fegan sat in the darkness of a cheap motel room near Newark Airport, breathing hard. Had the phone really rung? He reached for it and thumbed a button.
No calls. He returned it to the bedside locker and lay back down on top of the blankets. The pillow was damp with sweat. He had dreamed of fire, of a little girl swallowed by black smoke as her screams turned to the sound of a phone ringing. Her name was Ellen McKenna and she would be almost six by now. Only months ago, Fegan had carried her past the bodies of men he had killed. She had closed her eyes and pressed her wet face against his neck, just like he told her to. Her skin had been hot against his.
The last time he’d seen her, she waved at him from the back of her mother’s car at Dundalk Port. It seemed a lifetime ago. He had told Marie McKenna to call the cheap mobile phone he carried with him if she was ever in danger. That phone had not left his side since. He rubbed his left shoulder with the heel of his right hand. The scar itched, like baby spiders burrowing beneath the shiny pink skin.