"About the best. They did our last repaint job and I couldn't praise them enough."
There was the sound of a horn outside.
"It's the linen, Mr. Brennan. I'll take the sack down to them now," Buzzo called out.
Yesterday's dirty tablecloths and napkins went off at speed down the lane and Buzzo returned carrying a large box of folded replacements. This had just been placed in what was called Brenda's cupboard when the meat arrived.
By now the chef trainee had arrived, so he took over and Buzzo, with his folded bank note in his pocket, was heading off for the second job of the day. It reminded Derry so much of his own early years, finding any job that was going and nailing it down. He wished he could tell Buzzo how well it had turned out for him, but kids hated these preaching speeches, so he would say nothing.
The trainee, who was called Jimmy and was a bit slow for Patrick's liking, was being hastened through his coffee. His job now was to cut up the meat and have it ready for Chef to cook when the time came. At the same time he was to make a stock with the bones, chicken carcasses and vegetables that were in the cool room all tied up in plastic bags.
And then Blouse Brennan appeared to check the list of what they needed. "I'll have to buy courgettes. My own are ludicrous," he apologised.
"That's all right, Blouse, a lot of places buy all their vegetables," Patrick assured him.
Then the fish box came, from the fishmonger, and then boxes of wine from the supplier and the cheeses.
The assistant chef, Katie, said that there were three new cheeses today. She laid them out expertly on a marble-topped trolley in the cool room. "That's three more to teach the waiters how to explain and pronounce. I'll have to ring up the cheese man and check myself first. We don't want to look like eejits."
Derry smiled at her. If she were to say that to the camera, it would be very endearing. Ella had been right. Following a day in the restaurant was a good way to let the story unfold.
Ella! She was going to be fine. She had promised to ring if she wasn't. Ella wanted to be alone. She needed to think. She did not need endless helpful voices of friends telling her she was all right and that it was all right and everything was going to be all right. None of these things was true.
Don Richardson was coming after her. Or was he?
Could she take Sasha seriously? She needed to talk to somebody. It wasn't fair to wear Derry down with it all again. Perhaps Don would go to her parents" house.
She called her mother. And discovered that he had just left.
"How was he, Mother?"
The question seemed to upset Barbara Brady. "He was ... well, he was all right."
"No, Mother, I mean it."
"Well, what do you want to know? He wasn't pale or anxious .. ."
"I mean, was he sane or did he look as if he were going to come after me with a cleaver?"
"He thinks he's coming after you with an offer you can't refuse. He thinks you're going back to him."
"Then you've answered my question, Mother. He's far from sane and we must bring in the cavalry."
She phoned the Fraud Squad. They had heard. He would be in custody by evening.
Dee wasn't able to come to the phone, her message said. Ella saw Nick and Sandy watching her covertly through the glass door .. . she couldn't wait like this in a trap until he arrived. She had to get out. But she knew they wouldn't let her.
Leaving her jacket over the back of her chair and her handbag on the desk so that they would think she was coming back, she took her telephone and her wallet with her. She slipped out to the bathroom and to the side door into the lane. They would be annoyed, but she had to be alone. She hailed a cab and asked to be taken to Stephen's Green. From the back of the cab she dialled directory enquiries and got Michael Martin's number. She got through straight away.
"Yes?" he said crisply.
"Tell him to stop looking. I'm on my way to Stephen's Green. I'll be beside the duck pond. I'll see him there."
"Yeah, you and half the Guards in Ireland."
If they're there it's not because I'll have brought them," she said and hung up.
"You okay?" the driver asked, looking at her in the mirror.
"I don't know," Ella said. "Why do you ask?" "You're shivering. You've no coat. You look worried." "All of these things are true," Ella agreed. "So?"
"So I have to do something I don't want to do and I'm a little bit afraid," she said.
"Take someone with you," the driver suggested.
"I can't."
"You've got a phone. Then tell someone where you're going."
"But I don't want anyone coming in and interrupting it."
"You're in a mess then, aren't you," the driver said agreeably.
"I am indeed," she said. Derry King walked back to the building where the major painting job was taking place. He saw the professional sign for the painters. His father could have been part of this firm, lived in this city. Derry could have grown up here. But then, if he had, he might well have been like that boy Buzzo, cleaning out dustbins, making tea on sites before school. Like his own childhood in New York.
He saw two men walking towards a van with the name Kennedy on it. They stood discussing a sheaf of papers, some attached to clipboards. He watched them for a long time with a lump in his throat. They were square men like himself, same bristly hair, a little taller than he was, but they had the same lines coming out like stars around the eyes. You would not need a college degree in genetics to know that these were his relations.
He should be their friend. They were, after all, the sons of brothers. But there was so much to regret. To try to forget. He would walk way.
At that moment they looked over. He couldn't run.
"Scan? Michael?" he said.
"Well, Derry, you came to see us at last," said one of them.
"You knew me?" He didn't know whether to be pleased or outraged.
"Of course we did."
"Kim, I suppose?" he said.
"Well, she did show us a photo of you when she was here, but that was a while ago, and anyway, aren't you the spit of us?"
"That's right."
Derry still seemed uneasy.
The bigger man said, "Now it's easy for us to know you. There's
only one of you. You don't have an idea which of us is which. I'm Scan and this is Michael, the brains of it all, and can we buy you breakfast?"
"I've been eating breakfast for hours," he said with a half-smile.
"It's the one meal you can't overeat on, they say." Scan was eager. Touchingly eager to treat the cousin who had ignored them for decades.
He looked from one to the other. "You don't seem surprised to see me," he said.
"Kimberly sent us a message saying you might be here and to look out for you," said Michael.
"And one of the painters said there was a Yank who was the dead image of us, asking about us in the cafe," added Sean.
And they laughed like old family friends as they went to Derry's third breakfast of the day. Possibly ducks were not as content as they looked. Maybe they were up to their little feathered armpits with worry, but they looked fairly sound, Ella thought. As if they had it sorted.
She looked around. There was no sign of him yet.
She sat down on a bench and found a paper bag with the remains of someone's breakfast croissant. Normally she would have been appalled at the Dublin litter problem. Now she could give it to these quacking ducks as she pleased. Maybe it was what they called an Act of Random Kindness to leave the bag there.
She saw people moving around, some of them hurrying, others idling. None of them was Don. And yet she knew he would come. He had moved so quickly from Spain. He must be desperate to find her. Perhaps he had known she was lying when she spoke to him last night about having given the laptop in already. He must have flown out of Spain immediately, gone by London possibly. What passport had he used?