It grew and grew as he watched Quirke more. He’d smash him if it was the last thing he did, and he seemed to dog the barracks these days, the other policemen as much as Reegan, with surprise early morning inspections and oral examinations of their knowledge of police duties. It seemed as if he thought he’d hound them into efficiency.
“I can’t remember anything I read these days. It just slips through the auld mind, the memory is goin’, sir. I had it all off once, sir!” Reegan listened to Mullins near breaking down under examination one early morning.
“But, my good man, haulage vehicles are something that you should come up against every week,” Quirke retorted impatiently. “It shouldn’t be even necessary to have a memory, if you had only your eyes open I can’t see how you could escape knowing,” he said in cold disgust, staring at Mullins’s great and sagging corpus. Then, “when have you had your last summons in court?” he asked quietly.
“It’s a good while,” Mullins tried to bluster. “About a year ago, sir. Nothing ever much happens in this district.”
“No, everybody just breaks the law quietly, without any fuss, in broad daylight,” Quirke said with heavy sarcasm and then, “Perhaps, you, Sergeant, could illuminate that section of the Road Act for Mr Mullins,” he turned to Reegan.
“The Road Traffic Act,” Reegan corrected.
“The Road Traffic Act,” Quirke said, both of them staring at each other without any veils on their mutual loathing and hatred, and Reegan, who had almost perfect knowledge of duties and regulations, answered in a tone that was calculated to be as blameless on the surface and as insulting as possible in undertone. The examination eventually ended with a scarifying lecture by Quirke, the policemen trooped hotly away to leave Quirke and Reegan alone.
“I’ve been informed that you’ve supplied the Convent Laundry and half the town with fuel, Sergeant,” Quirke went straight to the attack as soon as they were alone.
“And what if I did?” Reegan stiffened.
“We’ll pass that point for the moment. May I ask you this one question, Sergeant? Do you intend to stay long more in the police? Why, Sergeant, are you a policeman anyhow?”
“Is it the regulation answer you want?” Reegan insulted, though well in the grip of the habit of years of discipline that had kept his feelings towards his superiors from erupting into violence.
“Any answer!” Quirke shouted, far the more infuriated.
“To keep from starvin’ I suppose,” Reegan ground.
“And you don’t believe you have a responsibility in the matter? You don’t believe you should do a fair job of work for a fair remuneration,” Quirke beat with his fist on the patrol book on the table.
“I don’t believe anything nor care,” Reegan said.
“Well, I’ll see that you’ll act something at least, I’ll see that much, Sergeant.”
“You can see what you like!” was Reegan’s answer.
Quirke had taken his gloves from the table: he rose and went half-way to the door. He grew quieter to say, “I thought there for a time that you were coming to your senses, and left you alone, but that was no use. Then you had your trouble and I wanted to give you every consideration but that’s plainly no use either. Things have passed out of bounds. This station might as well not exist, except as an example in everything that no police station should be. And those men can be led, you’re the root—” he was saying when he saw Reegan’s eyes look hard as steel, the breath hissing: “You leave my trouble out of this, she’s the dead!”
Quirke apologized quickly as he moved towards the door, “Though what I’ve said stands! I intend to make a serious report. There’ll have to be changes.”
“There’ll have to be changes,” Reegan almost bared his teeth to shout as the door closed, and it was to all intents the end of Reegan the policeman. He did no more patrols, rose always late for roll call in the mornings, answered no official letters, and made a complete travesty of the signing in-and-outs, but waiting, not sending in his resignation. The others grew afraid; they had a secret meeting together in the dayroom; and while deciding against reporting him they resolved to attend to their own subordinate duties with blameless care. And they knew that the situation couldn’t continue long as it was, soon there would have to be some crash. It was Brennan who was the most indignant of the three, he’d have reported Reegan to make sure of his own safety. “We have a duty to protect ourselves,” he said. “The man’s gone out of his mind, he doesn’t care what happens, and he’ll get us the sack as well as himself. We must look out.”
“No. I’ll not inform on any man,” Mullins said.
“No,” Casey said too. “We’ll just have to see that we do our own jobs properly and then we can’t be blamed. No such a thing as reporting though, that’d not be playin’ the game, some of us here are a long time under his baton and he reported no man.”
“We’ll watch our own ends, that’s all, but no skunkin’,” Mullins said last, and Brennan felt chastised and shamed and angry.
So the next early morning inspection found Mullins and Casey and Brennan lined up the other side of the table before Quirke and their faces and boots and uniform shining clean, but Reegan was still in bed. There was sense of real occasion, and tension; something would have to happen today. It was the children who brought Reegan first news of Quirke’s presence.
“Daddy, the Super’s car is outside,” they had already caught the fear of authority in their voices.
“So he’s come,” Reegan said, and they were shocked by his casualness; another time the news would have stirred him into some kind of action.
“He’s in the dayroom, Daddy!”
“That’s all right, don’t worry,” he said, but there was a shake in the voice; and then Casey pounded upstairs to tap at the bedroom door.
“The Super’s down below, Sergeant,” he said, the pallid skin as white as ever death would make it. “He wants to know if you’re reportin’ sick or comin’ down.”
“Tell him I’m comin’ down,” Reegan said.
“I’ll tell him you’re comin’ down,” Casey wanted it to be confirmed.
“Do.”
“Right, Sergeant,” Casey shuffled uneasily away as Reegan pulled back the bedclothes and swung his feet out on the floor.
He dressed hurriedly and came downstairs and into the kitchen in his socks, there he laced on his boots, and very quietly got notepaper and envelopes and pen and ink and wrote his resignation. He took much time and when he had the envelope closed, he called Willie and told him to run to post it, now.
“It’s finished and done at last,” he said to the uncompre-hending children, and then went down to the dayroom in a royal state of disorder, unshaven, the hair tousled, the whistle-chain hanging loose, and the tunic wide open on the dirty flannel shirt that was open without collar on the throat.
Both Quirke and the three policemen were in a state of nervous tension when he opened the door; there had been a ridiculous parody of an inspection after Casey’s return; their whole minds on Reegan’s feet padding downstairs; and what in the name of Christ could he be doing in the kitchen. Quirke was writing when he entered, the three policemen standing in a stupid line the other side of the table, so many red and black inkstains on the bare deal, the official pens and books of foolscap and stampers and pads; seams of dirt in the cracks between the scrubbed boards. Quirke did not look up, he continued writing, as if no one had entered; but Reegan went and leaned against the corner of the table, deliberately jogging it so that Quirke had to take notice before he intended. He surveyed Reegan’s appearance and demanded an explanation in as unemotional a tone as he could master. He got none.