We drove to the station in silence. I let my mind go into the zero zone, focusing on nothing. I’d been this route many times.
I was brought into Superintendant Clancy’s office. In full regalia, he was behind his massive desk. A scowl in place. Sitting to his left was Ridge, no smile of welcome. The two Guards stood behind me. Clancy adopted a fake warmth.
“Ah Jack, good of you to come.”
I said,
“I’d a choice?”
Clancy flipped through some papers, then,
“Professor de Burgo was found murdered on Friday evening. Can you account for your whereabouts between eight and eleven that evening?”
My mind tried to grasp the implications but, before I could answer, Ridge leaped to her feet, shouted,
“He has a bloody alibi. . it’s me. I was with him.”
And she stormed out of the office. A silence followed, then Clancy paced.
“Lovers’ tiff?”
I asked,
“How was he killed?”
A beat before,
“A nail through his forehead.”
Then waved his hand, dismissing me. I said,
“You can cross another suspect off your list.”
His head moved, slight interest.
“And who might that be?”
“Boru Kennedy.”
He shook his head,
“Not known to me, I’m afraid.”
I turned to go, said,
“Of course not. Why would you remember a young man who hanged himself in prison on Christmas eve? He had been cleared of putting a nail through his girlfriend’s head.”
Em vanished. As if she’d never been. No e-mails, texts, nothing. I missed her. But the pup filled the void. I bought him a small Galway United scarf and he seemed delighted with its fit.
I took him, or rather he took me, for daily walks and I became reacquainted with my city. Feeding the swans was, of course, on our agenda. Oddly, after a few visits, the swans tolerated him. He could move along the shore and the slipway without them hissing. I kept a wary eye. Best not to fuck with these beautiful creatures.
He didn’t.
The evenings were getting a stretch to them and I’d see Ziggy, outlined against the bay, his scarf blowing gently, the swans dotted around him. He’d stand on the pier watching them glide. I could see his sharp mind thinking,
“Shit, I could do that.”
One evening, on our way back, standing on a wall by the Claddagh was the thug whose teeth I had removed. He was staring, dead-eyed, not at me but at the pup. Then he turned to me, made the cutthroat motion slowly across his neck with his right hand
. . and smiled.
The teeth had been replaced. I shouted,
“Now all you need to get is a set of balls.”
But he was gone.
As spring slowly began to creep up, we got back to the flat and in the middle of the kitchen was. .
A tiny green emerald.
Manchester United continued their losing streak as they made a record-breaking bid to buy Chelsea’s Spanish, Le Meta. I said to Ziggy,
“The Six Nations Cup will begin soon.”
He seemed more rapt in Paul O’Grady’s series on the Battersea Dogs Home. The pup disliked cigarette smoke so I took the odd cig outside. Too much drink and he sensed my loss of control, responded by whimpering. I cut way back. He was whipping me into shape.
Tuesday morning, St. Anthony’s Day, I was sitting on a bench in Claddagh. Ziggy was down on the shore, his sense of smell in overdrive from all the different stimuli. A well-dressed woman approached and sat on the bench. Her handbag? I saw an article in the Galway Advertiser quoting some lunatic price for these suckers. Plus a six-month waiting period to purchase! Jesus, you could order a Harley in less time. She obviously had not been among those who had to wait.
She smiled, said,
“That your little dog on the shore?”
I nodded.
She said,
“He keeps checking you’re still here.”
I gave a noncommittal smile.
Then she put out her hand, said,
“I’m Alison Reid. I already know you’re Jack Taylor.”
I took her hand, noting the thin gold Rolex, said,
“Nice to meet you.”
And waited.
She cleared her throat, said,
“My husband died a long time ago and all I really have is one brother.”
I wanted to say,
“Fascinating, but should I give a fuck why?”
Went with,
“My condolences.”
No maneuver room there. But she tried,
“My brother was killed recently and the Guards appear to have abandoned the case. A Superintendent Clancy suggested you might help. Said you were a form of a forlorn St. Jude. For hopeless cases?”
Clancy fucking with me. I whistled for Ziggy, stood, said,
“I’m very sorry but I’m temporarily out of the business.”
I was putting the lead on Ziggy, she handed me a card, said,
“If you might reconsider, I would reward your time generously.”
I shoved the card into my jeans, said,
“Nice talking to you.”
We’d gotten about five yards when she called,
“That’s my business card, it’s my maiden name.
I didn’t snap. .
Whatever!
That evening as Ziggy and I shared a pot of Irish stew with a hint of Jameson, the card slipped out of my pocket. Picked it up, read:
Alison de Burgo.
The sound, the feel of some words linger in my mouth. There is almost a joy in uttering the Danish TV series,
Forbrydelsen,
a current favorite. The translation now seems bitterly apt on that wet, stormy Saturday. I had the lead ready for Ziggy but the sound of the storm discouraged him. Maybe he had flashbacks to the evening I found him. So I said,
“It’s OK, buddy. You snuggle up on the couch, I’ll get the shopping and be back in jig time.” Earlier, when I’d been playing with him, the joy in his little body so overwhelmed him that he lay back, gave a yawn/sigh to release it. I tickled his ears, then headed out.
The wind was fierce, with a cold rain lashing across the streets. I’d gotten the shopping and stopped for brief shelter near Garavan’s. A ne’er-do-well named Jackson coerced me into a fast pint.
I did delay a bit. The chat was lively and the pub was warm, whispering:
“Stay a little longer.”
Guilt-ridden, I pushed out of there, way past my intended plan. Struggled against the wind, got my keys out, juggling the groceries. My front door was wide open. A hard kick had taken it completely off the hinges. My heart lurched.
The pup literally had been torn apart. His tiny head was left on the arm of the couch. A sheet of paper underneath, awash in blood, but clearly scrawled on it was:
“Doggone.”
Em had said to me one time,
“Yo, Dude (sic), if I’m not, like, around, and you need me, e-mail me at
Greenhell@gmail.com.
Sick and near broken, I did e-mail her and outlined the events of the last few days and ended with
“Sometimes there’s just no justice. The bad guys do live, if not happily ever after, then certainly conspicuously.”
She didn’t reply.
At least not by e-mail.
You might say her reply was more biblical, and definitely more colorful.
At the tennis championships in Melbourne, one of the players had a tattoo in Celtic print. From Beckett, it read:
I can’t go on, I won’t go on. . I’ll go on.
A month later, almost to the day, the head of a young man was found, wrapped in a blanket, outside Galway City’s dog shelter.
Newspapers variously described the blanket as dark blue and dull green, but one tabloid, in a fanciful piece, described it as “emerald green.”
Identifying the young man was proving difficult as his teeth had been removed.
Returning to the flat on a fine Sunday evening, I found a small Labrador pup in a box at my door. I cried,
“I can’t. . Jesus, I just can’t!”
Can I?